[1] It is about a young girl, Marianne Shaw, who sets out on a journey to Denmark in search of her father, after her mother dies in England.

Marianne is the illegitimate daughter of a once wealthy English woman and a Danish father, who left her mother not knowing that she was pregnant, and promising to return to England one day.

The journey is long and hard, and finally she arrives at Skagen, now penniless and destitute, and foreign, unable to speak Danish, only to find that her father, Lars Christensen, has been dead for years which is why he did not return for her mother.

Marianne is stranded in Skagen with nowhere to go, and so is forced to stay with a poor fisherman's family as a servant.

She contemplates telling her Uncle about her existence, however, she decides against it on finding that he has a reputation for being a very strict man.