Greeks Poppy and Basil Pantzopoulos plan to have dinner at the house of her friend Sissy. Intellectual Sissy Kamara writes unpublished poetry, encourages artists and lives with her husband Sotos Louloudis of mysterious means. The couples have little in common except that Poppy and Sissy escaped from Smyrna in the war, becoming refugees with their bonds of shared memory. A Cheery Soul This is the story of change for people overtaken by the goodness of elderly Miss Docker. Ted Custance and his wife take her in as a boarder. From charitable beginnings, life with the outspoken Miss Docker becomes even more strained until Mrs Custance arranges for her to move to a home, freeing them to become closer than before in the joint knowledge she would be unbearable to the inmates. Leaving a trail of well-intentioned exposures and unwelcome remarks, Miss Docker goes on to assail the local minister in the final scene. Being Kind to Titina Dionysios tells this story in the first person while living with his large well-educated family from Alexandria when the "inferior" Stavrides family moves in across the street in Schutz. Everyone tells Dionysios to be kind to the daughter, awkward unlovely Titina who becomes the butt of the children's tortures and scorn. Within a few years, the two children meet again as teenagers in reversed roles – Titina, rich, beautiful, charming and based in Paris, is instead generous to Dionysios. After she returns to Paris he finds out her profession. Miss Slattery and her Demon Lover It is Australia 1961 and Miss Slattery, a door to door market researcher for Better Sales Pty Ltd, calls on Tibor Szabor, a Hungarian, whose home is paved with black and white real marble tiles, has a harbour "View", and a mirror ceiling over the mink covered bed. She needs him more than he needs her until the bohemian party where she shows her talent with a whip that drives him crazy. But Miss Dimity Slattery is no stranger to change. The Letters "Letters" is a descent into madness. Mrs Ursula Polkinghorn writes to a close family friend on second best paper, engraved with "Wishfort, Sarsaparila, N.S.W." Even while she tries to maintain the status quo ante, her main concern is her fragile son Charles who is having a birthday. At first a promising boy, Charles was called back to the family firm where he soon had a