Seventeen-year-old Brydie White (Hayley Mills) is emotionally stunted due to an accidental shooting death with which she was involved when she was an adolescent, the incident which she doesn't remember. Mrs. White (Annette Crosby), a widow, recluse, and alcoholic, still treats her daughter like a child, although she pays her daughter little attention. However, Brydie is physically becoming a young woman. Always fascinated by death, Brydie's new pastime is to bury any dead animal in the local church graveyard. She has convinced all of the young children of her small English rural town to do the same, the animal plots complete with grave markers. These animal burials are the last straw for many of the townsfolk, who see Brydie as a menace and bad influence who should be locked away. The vicar, Reverend Philip Moss (Geoffrey Bayldon), although as perturbed by the animal graves as anyone, does understand Brydie's position more than anyone in the town and wants to do what is best for her. When it looks like Brydie is in some real danger, Roibin Krisenki (Ian McShane), one in a band of Gypsies recently settled in the area, takes it upon himself to be her savior.