The small Norman village of Allouville is proud of its thousand-year-old oak tree. But one day, a project of enlargement threatens the tree. The deputy Charles Crétois was keen on this project, which allowed him to continue the speculation he had been indulging in on certain lands. He is supported by the mayor of Allouville to whom he promised the Legion of Honor. But the whole village protests: they want to save the oak tree.

Three generations, the Chic, the Bumpkin and the New confront in a bourgeois family in Paris.

A servant girl, given in marriage when she turns out to be pregnant, can't bring herself to live away from her master.

A serial-killer frightens Paris by phoning young ladies at night, telling them insults about their lives. Minos, as he calls himself, wants to prevent the world from free women and he targets at first these ones. Commissaire Letellier is given the investigation and he has hard work with the maniac.