A marriage without great financial resources and bad luck wins a little lamb in a raffle. Once they have decided to have it for dinner on Christmas Eve, the couple warn that their children have grown too fond of the animal, now christened as Bolita.

Madrid, Carnival Sunday. A night watchman finds the body of a woman, a rich and greedy moneylender who has apparently been murdered. The prime suspect is a watchmaker who owed her a lot of money.

After suffering a family tragedy, Carmen leaves Spain and emigrates to Paris, where she will make new friends among some of the most peculiar characters who inhabit the bohemian neighborhoods of the city. (Partially lost film.)