The time is shortly after WWI started in 1914. Three pregnant women about to give birth are admitted at a hospital. The women come from different circumstances and have disparate views about the impending births. Adèle was born into the middle class but after her family became poor she was forced to marry Tord, a tenant famer. She does not love him, nor does she care much for her child, whom she conceived out of spite. The baby is stillborn, and Adèle sheds nary a tear. Agda, the second woman became wild and sexually irresponsible after she was seduced as a young woman by a much older man. She entered the dual careers of modelling and robbery, and ended up sleeping with Bernhard, the scion of the family who owns the land Angela’s husband farms, which resulted in her pregancy. Bernhard offered to support his bastard provided Agda marry his friend Stellan and pretends the child is his, to which she agreed. The third woman, Angela, is introverted. As a youth, she had a short-lived lesbian affair in school. She then fell in love with an archaeologist who impregnated her. He refuses to acknowledge the child as his. This enrages Angela who joins a feminist movement and dedicates her life to removing the stigma of having babies out of wedlock.