After four years, Claudia and David Naughton have settled into their life as farmers in Connecticut, although David still regularly commutes to the city in his work as an architect. The one issue of contention between the two of them is their individual parenting of their three-year-old son Bobby and how it relates to other aspects of their lives. They both love Bobby, but David believes that Claudia coddles him too much, worrying about every ache, pain, and cough, while Claudia believes that David focuses too much attention on other things at Bobby's expense. David has been hired by young widow Elizabeth Van Doren to work on what David would consider his own dream project of a farm complex, and his excitement with the project could transfer to Elizabeth herself. Claudia seems to have caught the attention of married Phil Dexter, whose marriage to Edith has suffered the strain of losing a child, after which Edith has become increasingly hysterical in trying to find meaning in her own life without her child.
—Huggo