Five nuns finish their morning prayers inside a farmhouse, then go to eat breakfast in silence. Their convent was bombed two weeks prior in the ongoing war, and they lost fifteen of their fellow sisters and now must move to the city to help with the war effort. Their leader, an older woman named Mother Gervaise, has been putting off the move since the attack, and now she remembers the bees they used to keep behind the convent. The sisters all agree to go back to the ruins for the first time and check on them, although some of them are hesitant to face the horrible scene. When they get to the convent, the beehives are miraculously intact, and the women set to work waking the bees up and preparing the hives for winter. They work for two hours, forgetting for the first time the bombs and death in the background. After the hives are done, Mother Gervaise announces that they will leave for the city the next day, and joyously the nuns run across the field towards their future.