Count Hubert de Latour Latour is the lover of the Duchess de Maulévrier. The day he is surprised by the Duke in the company of his wife and... in a rather compromising situation, Hubert resorts to a subterfuge, claiming that he has come to see the Duchess to seek support to be elected at the Institut de France, whose chairman is precisely her husband. The latter takes him at his word and Hubert becomes... a member of the French Academy! Which just shows that everything leads to everything.

Archibald Burel, a banker, has had enough of his wife cheating on him, and with his best friend Hubert into the bargain! One day he has (at least that is what he thinks!) a bright idea : he asks Sonia, his cousin living in Poland but staying in Paris at the moment, to seduce Hubert. In these conditions, how could Lucienne not fall into his arms again? Unfortunately for Archibald, things do not go (at all!) according to plan : he himself falls for Sonia while Hubert manages to reconquer Lucienne! Dispirited, Sonia decides to return to Warsaw.

In 1914, in the first months of World War I, Louise Jarraud loses her husband, killed on the front. Shortly after, she gives birth to a baby, who soon dies. Devastated by this double misfortune, Louise decides to dedicate her life to caring for the children of others. She becomes a nurse with several employers, giving her affection to little boys or girls. A widower and another man propose to her but she refuses twice determined as she is to live only for the children in her charge.