Part 1 - The Present - Chapters 1 and 2 Summary

Chapter 1 - Newly arrived from England, Henrietta is driven through Paris in the back of a taxi. As narration describes her initial disappointment in the city's early-morning lack of life, dialogue between Henrietta and her companion, the agitated Miss Fisher, reveals that Henrietta, on her way to the South of France, is stopping off at the Fisher's home between trains at the request of Henrietta's grandmother. As the gray morning becomes slightly brighter, Miss Fisher tells Henrietta there is another guest in the house, a boy about Henrietta's age named Leopold. She tells Henrietta that as the result of an unrevealed set of "strange and sad" circumstances, he is there to meet his mother for the first time in his life. She urges Henrietta to play with him naturally and avoid...