After a bombing raid destroys the family store and her husband, Reiko rebuilds and runs the shop out of love stopped short by destruction.
19yo girl loses husband in war. Bombing destroys his family's shop and the widow stays to rebuild it as the rest of the family flee and runs it for 18 years out of love for her dead husband and his mother. The film starts after 18 years when a new supermarket threatens to put them out of business. The sisters conspire to turn the shop into a supermarket and get rid of their brother's widow. Meanwhile, the surviving younger brother loafs around, losing jobs, getting drunk, laid and gambling. In the crisis, he confesses to his shocked sister-in-law, 11 years older, that he has always loved her and can't deal with it. She cars for him, but in a motherly/ big sister way. She rejects him and decides to return home to her family, threatening suicide if he stops her. This suits the sisters, but he follows her onto the long train ride. On the way, she softens and they disembark for a country inn, where they can talk. He resumes his approaches, but at the last minute, she can't face intimacy. He storms out, gets drunk and falls from a cliff. The film ends with him being carried off on a stretcher, injured or dead.
