In Lyon where many are unemployed Marie is a prostitute who loves her work: she's thoughtful and exuberant toward clients old and young slim or flabby. One night a homeless man sleeps in the foyer of her apartment house; she gives him a hot meal then a place on the floor to sleep by her radiator then she offers herself. She falls in love giving him new life clothes a place to live. When he grouses that he must bar hop while she uses the flat for her work she finds them a larger flat. He grows restless seducing a manicurist and pressing her to prostitution. He's arrested for procuring so Marie must decide what to do; he too must face the consequences of his choices.