'I have reached the age when a woman begins to perceive that she is growing into the person whom she least plans to resemble: her mother.'Nadine has always wanted her daughter Maud to be married and off her hands.When the two women are staying at Nadine's sister's house near Meaux, they become part of a sophisticated, wordly group into which neither Maud nor Edward Harrison, a young visitor from England, seem to fit.Maud is swept off her feet by David Tyler, a stylish, irresponsible young man who robs her of her innocence and disappears.Edward, forced into adulthood by his inheritance of a bookshop, and thus a career, takes Maud into his care.But for both of them the shadow of Tyler is always there, illuminating their feelings of inadequacy, disappointment and loss.