Mr. Ferber is an old man living in Pendragon Castle along with his two grandchildren Bobby and Paddy who find a small dragon to heat their castle. The dragon helps them to find hidden treasure in the castle.

When ship's fireman Peter McCabe walks out on his long-suffering wife, he leaves her impoverished, with two young daughters and a boy born soon after his departure. After an absence of fourteen years McCabe returns, sacked and humiliated, trailing trouble in his wake.

A group of children are evacuated during world war two into the care of an alcoholic woman.

Following her father's death, a teenage heiress moves in with her guardian uncle who is broke and schemes to murder his niece for her vast inheritance.