Bingo and Sturzi became friends in prison and have big plans. After their release, they both want to turn their backs on a life of crime and emigrate to Brazil. When Sturzi is released from prison six months after Bingo, he discovers that his friend is still broke and even has criminal plans again. Sturzi, who has grown older and wiser in prison, is deeply disappointed, but wants to generously pay for the plane tickets out of his small fortune. His guardian disagrees: Sturzi is to go to a men's shelter and pay off his debts first. When he witnesses how amateurishly Bingo and his buddy Schorschi are planning a bank robbery, the old professional in Sturzi awakens.

Ingeborg starts her new job at the hospital. Her boss is the venerable Professor Burger, a famous heart surgeon who devotes himself entirely to his work. His son, womanizer Manfred, is an assistant doctor on the same ward. After an affair between Ingeborg and Manfred, the father sends his son away and dismisses Ingeborg, unaware that she is expecting Manfred's child. She gives birth in secret. Only when Manfred has a car accident and the father saves his son's life in a costly operation is there a reconciliation at his bedside.

The socialist dream collapses.

After the end of Word War II, a lone and elusive skier from the German Mountain Troops continues to kill British Occupation Forces personnel, prompting a joint British-German manhunt operation to capture him.

A new student, Manuela, enters a strict girls' boarding school after her mother’s death, where she finds comfort in a kind teacher, stirring complex emotions within her.

Inspector Welling, the warden Miss Pierce and the convicted murderess Sarat Carn are on their way back to Norwich from London. They are returning from a court hearing at which Carn's appeal against the death sentence imposed on her was rejected...