The narrator awakens on Saturday, realizing his boss’s irritation about requesting two days off because it creates a four‑day vacation that includes Sunday. Though he feels guilty about his mother’s burial the day before, he decides to go swimming. He catches a streetcar to the public beach at the harbor, dives into the channel, and encounters Marie Cardona, a former office typist with whom he once had a mutual attraction. They play in the water, she laughs, they rest on a float, and he rests his head on her stomach while feeling her heartbeat. When the sun becomes too hot they dive out, swim together, and on the dock she comments, “I’m darker than you.” He invites her to the movies; she agrees, mentioning a Fernandel film. Dressed in a black tie, Marie asks if he is in mourning; he tells her his mother died yesterday, which startles her. The film proves only partly funny; she presses her leg against his, he fondles her breasts, and kisses her poorly. She later comes to his place, spends the night, and leaves in the morning to visit her aunt. He notes it is Sunday, a day he dislikes, and spends the rest of the morning smoking, eating eggs, and rearranging his small apartment after his mother’s death. He reads a newspaper, cuts out an advertisement for Kruschen Salts, and observes his balcony view of the main street: families strolling, a distinguished little man with a frail wife, local boys in greased hair and red ties, and a near‑empty street as matinees begin. He watches a tobacconist set a chair outside, sees a deserted café being swept, and smokes while eating chocolate. The sky darkens then clears, and later streetcars return packed with soccer fans shouting celebratory chants, some waving at him. Evening brings a reddish glow, bustling pedestrians, movie‑goers spilling out, and local girls arm‑in‑arm. Street lamps flicker on, stars appear dim, and the neighborhood gradually empties until a solitary cat crosses the street. Feeling hungry, he buys bread and spaghetti, cooks standing up, and, noticing his reflection beside an alcohol lamp, concludes that another Sunday has passed, his mother is buried, and despite returning to work “nothing has really changed.”