Madame Roc, supposedly concerned about their poor health and with the agreement of Mrs Brown, says they must live apart for a year without any communication before getting married.

Returning to France, Claude moves in artistic circles and has affairs with a number of women while Muriel in Wales keeps a diary and becomes increasingly despondent.

Muriel sends her diary, which includes details of her experience of a childhood lesbian event and her consequent prolonged struggle against an urge for masturbation, to Claude, who publishes it against her wishes.

Anne has become engaged to a Frenchman called Nicholas but falls ill and also returns to Wales, dying among her family with Diurka at her side.

In an epilogue set in the 1920s, the narrator explains that Claude, who is now a successful author, but unmarried, and whose mother has died, still dreams of the artistic gifts of Anne and the children he and Muriel might have had.

[6] Disappointed with its reception in France, Truffaut decided to restore over 20 minutes of footage to the film, a project he completed just before he died in 1984.