In 1805 England, eligible bachelors are scarce on Quality Street. Twenty-year-old Phoebe Throssel (Hepburn) becomes very hopeful when one of the few, Dr. Valentine Brown (Tone), tells her he has something important to say to her that day. Both she and her older sister Susan believe he will propose. However, he informs her that he has enlisted in the army to fight in the Napoleonic Wars. Phoebe hides her devastation so well that Dr. Brown never suspects she is deeply in love with him. She gives up hope of ever marrying. By contrast, the Throssels' servant Patty, though she is a decade older and aware she is no beauty, is confident that she will get a man.