An older woman teaches Shakespeare in a girls' school, but events conspire to get her down-graded to an entry-level position. Just as that misfortune occurs, her only remaining family member -- a brother in an institution -- dies. Bereft on these personal and professional levels, she is especially grateful for the friendship of a couple she has met and has generously invited to share her apartment. The couple move out when they marry, and the woman goes to their wedding, continuing her acts of generosity to her newfound friends. Some time goes by before she realizes that the couple had been friends as long as they needed her apartment, and now that they no longer need it, they are not that interested in keeping up a relationship with her. When she does not hear from them any longer, she is at a loss as to how to recuperate some sort of balance in her life.