Peter Gruber, a young tenor from Vienna, gives piano lessons to Daisy, the daughter of a dentist. They fall in love and when Gruber has to perform in Antwerp, Daisy follows him there. She pretends to be an American musician and manages to get a job with Gruber's orchestra. Daisy's worried father...
After serving in the Royal Navy, Manus, Toon and Dries return to Amsterdam working-class quarter 'the Jordaan'. Back home, they find out things have changed while they were gone; Manus's girl Jans has been unfaithful to him, Toon's father now rejects him on account of his dissolute life and barmaid...
Dirk van der Kooy returns to the Dutch East Indies for a five year stint as the administrator of a sugar factory. His second wife Betje, however, unexpectedly decides to join him. Once there, she finds out that Dirk has a daughter from an earlier marriage, leading to misunderstandings galore...
When his colleague presents him with (forged) evidence of his wife Sylvette's unfaithfulness, factory owner Jean Sourdier kills him in a fit of rage. After fifteen years in prison he is determined to take revenge on his wife by killing Ninette, a daughter from her second marriage.
