Midle-aged school teacher Nora Trinnel comes to a Washington D. C. hotel in the summer of 1940 to see Dewey Robinson, presidential candidate. While she waits, her thoughts flash back to the time when she first started teaching at the Auburn, where Robinson was in her eight-grade class, and the star pitcher on the school baseball team. The young boy falls in love with his teacher, mainly because she knows all about boats. Nora and Dan Hopkins, the school's baseball coach are in love but a scandal develops when they spend their summer vacation at the same place, and Dan is dismissed from his job at the school. Nora and Dan secretly marry two weeks before he sails for France, in 1916, with Canadian troops in World War I and is killed, and passes out of her life. Now, she is in Washington to see her former student, who has also passed out of her life. Her presence inspires him to stick to his ideals despite outside pressure.