Despite the fact that his brother is missing in action in the Pacific theater, Theo McCallum, a gunner on a B-24 Liberator returns to his unit in Europe to continue the war because he feels that the other men in his unit feel like family to him--and he cannot believe that his brother is actually dead.

At the Hotel Balzaar, Marta's mother rises before the sun, puts on her uniform, and instructs Marta to roam as she will but quietly, invisibly like a little mouse. While her mother cleans rooms, Marta slips down the back staircase to the grand lobby to chat with the bellman, study the painting of an angel's wing over the fireplace, and watch a cat chase a mouse around the face of the grandfather clock, all the while dreaming of the return of her soldier...