A young aristocrat,the Marquis De Champcey,is completely broke.So he's got to work,which is decay for those who have blue blood in their veins.Undaunted ,he becomes a steward for Nouveaux riches..In the Laroque family,Maxime is ceaselessly humiliated ,even by Marguerite the daughter of the house ,he falls in love with.But he's got to carry on,for,as he writes in his diary,"I want to get the young one's dowry".Max speaks of his sister but a wicked person in the mansion reads it and mistakes him for a fortune -hunter.