Given up for dead three years ago in a plane crash in the Amazon rainforest, a young woman arrives in Paris to find her eminent ethnologist husband. She learns of his death in obscure circumstances, having remarried in the meantime. She sets out to unravel the mystery surrounding her husband's death.

A green mare makes the fortune of her owner, the horse dealer Haudouin. Shortly after his death, war broke out in 1870. One day, his neighbor Zèphe Maloret denounces Honoré, Haudouin's son, a maverick, to the Prussians. Following this denunciation, their non-commissioned officer enters the Haudouin home and rapes the mother while Honoré is hidden under the bed. The resentment already existing between the Haudouin and Maloret families turns to hatred... A letter recalling the events is lost, which doesn't help matters.

In this drama, a jilted bride and her little sister flee their hometown to search for better lives. They go to stay in their aunt's boarding house. There they meet a notorious philanderer and his mistress. The younger sister soon tries to lure him away from his love. Unfortunately, he falls for the older sister. As they make love, the poor little sister is left all alone.

Two girls, a virtuous one and a hussy, fight for a young man in the vineyards of the south of France.