Following the death of his beloved but unfaithful wife, a sculptor creates a mysterious fountain upon her grave in her honour – one whose water only flows in his presence. As the years pass, his son becomes determined to discover its secret.

Two years after receiving news of his father’s death in WWII a young boy continues to wait for trains from the front. The boy lives with his crippled uncle rather than with his mother, who has remarried and has another child. Then one day the father returns.