When Polly hears her father whistling for the first time since her mother's death five years earlier, she fears he is interested in Lydia Wilds, a widow she doesn't trust. A year and a half later, Polly discovers her father has taken Mrs. Wilds to the Dye cottage for a week, along with his parents and some other family members. Polly feels betrayed and angry that her father has kept his relationship with Mrs. Wilds a secret. The guiding motivation of Polly's life has been her promise given at her mother's deathbed to help her father raise the children. She assumed if she remained single, her father would never remarry. How could she bear it if he brought another woman into her mother's house? Especially a woman she doesn't trust.