When all hope is gone are dreams enough...? After losing both her parents sixteen-year-old Merrion Roberts is left to bring up her baby sister. Unable to cope alone she teams up with Rhonda Rees a trained milliner who also has a young baby. They share rooms in notorious Tiger Bay in Cardiff struggling to make ends meet. In time though they are able to open up a little shop & it seems as if life is looking up for both young women. But fate soon intervenes & they are reduced to living in even greater squalor barely able to eke out enough money to support themselves let alone their two children. Meanwhile Merrions brother & her childhood sweetheart have both gone to sea & she has almost given up hope of ever seeing them alive again...