After ending up in an orphanage, Olavi sets out to find his mother. While playing the violin on the street, his exceptional talent catches the attention of a music school professor, who takes him under his wing.
Iris Klewe is brought from her forest cottage by her bank-manager uncle Kaarlo Heinonen to attend school in Helsinki, where his wife and elder children resent the poor foster girl while only the youngest child and the cook show her kindness. Kaarlo’s financial troubles start to threaten Iris’s inheritance.