- When Félicité is eighteen she goes to the fair with her employers and dances with a cute guy. On the way home he throws her to the ground (too bad she didn't have a can of pepper spray) and she runs away.
- She sees the guy, Théodore, again and he asks her to forgive him. They start seeing each other.
- Théodore is afraid that he will be drafted into the army.
- One night, at their meeting spot, Félicité finds a friend of Théodore's instead of her beau; he says that dear Teddy has married an old, rich woman to save himself from the draft.
- Félicité is heartbroken and quits her job.
- She finds a new one as a cook for Madame Aubain, a widow. She is crazy about Madame Aubain's kids, Paul and Virginie, and turns out to be a top-notch housekeeper.
- All of Félicité's education comes from a geography book that Paul shows her.
- One day the family goes to their farm at Geffosses on the seashore. As they walk through a meadow one evening a bull comes running toward them, Félicité distracts it so that Madame Aubain and the children can get to safety. She escapes through a fence just before the bull gores her.
- After the traumatic encounter with the bull, Virginie becomes ill with a "nervous ailment" and the doctor recommends she go bathe in the sea.
- The whole family heads to the beach at Trouville, and the air does Virginie good.
- One day at the port a woman comes up to Félicité. It turns out to be her long-lost sister, Nastasie Barette, with her three children. They start hanging around, and Félicité gives them things they need.
- Madame Aubain is sure they are taking advantage of her maid, and doesn't like it that Félicité's poor nephew is becoming friends with her son.
- Everyone moves back to Pont-l'Évêque when the weather gets bad.
- Paul is sent to a school in another town, and Félicité begins taking Virginie to catechism class.