Love? In a Cottage is the story of two middle-aged people from very different backgrounds who meet as the result of an advertisement placed in the lonely hearts section of a national newspaper. Marlene Sugden is a secretary working in London whose life has changed very much for the worse in a few months. Firstly her father, who she has loved and cared for over many years, dies then her best friend marries and immediately emigrates to Australia and, as a final straw, Marlene's boss retires and her new boss is a snappy and difficult man. Marlene dearly wants a husband and a home to care for and in her desperation, she places an advertisement in the Evening Standard. "Lonely unmarried woman, good cook and homemaker seeks kind-hearted, single middle-aged man with view to matrimony if suited". Deep in the Herefordshire countryside, Donald Evans sits reading a two-day-old newspaper as he eats his meal of baked beans straight from the tin. His eye is caught by Marlene's advertisement. He is single, mid-40s and kind-hearted if it does not cost him anything. Donald hunts out a piece of notepaper, sharpens his pencil and replies to Marlene's advertisement.