Lydia

At a reception honoring her work with blind and orphaned children, Lydia is approached by her old acquaintances from the past. Dr. Michael Fitzpatrick, who has loved her for forty years, invites her to tea and hints at other familiar faces who will join. The moment stirs memories and hints at unresolved feelings that will thread through her recollection.

Back in the present, Lydia catalogs the men who once loved her—Michael, Bob, Frank, and Richard. Each memory carries warmth, longing, and regret, shaping her current outlook on love and duty. The reminiscence sets the stage for the stories she will recount.

In Boston in 1897, a young Lydia readies for a ballroom night while her hypochondriac grandmother frets over propriety. Michael, the butler's son who has just finished medical school, arrives to escort her to the dance. The tense household provides the backdrop for Lydia's first brush with romance.

Lydia admits she is in love with Bob Willard, the football player she met earlier. Bob calls on Lydia at her home, and Michael coaches him on how to speak and act to please Lydia's guardian. His charm clashes with the constraints of Lydia's world, foreshadowing trouble ahead.

Lydia and Bob plan to elope, but the magistrate who would perform the ceremony is unavailable. The couple heads to the hotel room Bob reserved for their honeymoon, seeking privacy away from Lydia's guardian. There, Bob becomes drunk and tries to assault Lydia; she flees and is aided by Michael.

In the present, aging Bob confesses that he has felt guilty about that night for forty years. Lydia forgives him and continues her story, choosing to focus her life on her charitable work rather than on romance.

Lydia sees Michael off to a troop ship bound for Cuba during the Spanish‑American War. Among the soldiers, she realizes a familiar figure—Captain Richard Mason—one of the men who raced her earlier.

Lydia uses her resources to found a school for blind children. There she meets Frank Audrey, a pianist-composer who comes to work there and soon falls in love with her. He even composes a piano concerto as a tribute to her. Lydia, however, turns him down, choosing friendship and her mission instead.

At another ball, Richard Mason sweeps Lydia off her feet. The couple steals away to Lydia's seaside home and spend weeks there, reveling in a romance that seems unbreakable. Richard eventually leaves for the mainland on business, promising to return.

Months later, the mainland calls and a caretaker arrives with a letter revealing that Richard must settle matters with another woman who has a 'claim' on him. Lydia reads the news with a heavy heart, sensing that their future may be complicated.

Back in Boston, Lydia receives a letter from Richard asking to meet at a church on New Year's Eve. The promised reunion never materializes, leaving her with a sense of unfinished business and lingering sorrow.

Lydia reveals that she gave up Michael's marriage proposal because her grandmother dies just before the ceremony. She dedicates the rest of her life to running the school. As she finishes her story, the final guest arrives—an aged Richard Mason who does not remember her.