Our Story
Steve Keller, an arrogant, irascible professor of phonetics, boasts to a new acquaintance that he can teach any woman to speak so "properly" that he could pass her off as a duchess. The person whom he is shown thus teaching is one Sonia Rajguru, a young woman with a horrendous Cockney accent who is selling flowers on the street. After overhearing this, Sonia finds her way to the professor's house and offers to pay for speech lessons, so that she can work in a flower shop. The acquaintance is intrigued and wagers that Steve cannot back up his claim; Steve takes Sonia on free of charge as a challenge to his skills.
Sonia goes through many forms of speech training, such as speaking with marbles in her mouth and trying to recite the sentence "In Hertford, Hereford, Hampshire, hurricanes hardly ever happen" without dropping the h, and to say "The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain" rather than "The rine in spine sties minely in the pline". At first, she makes no progress due to Steve's harsh approach to teaching, but just as they are exhausted and about to give up, Steve softens his attitude and gives an eloquent speech about the beauty and history behind the English language. Sonia tries one more time and finally "gets it"; she instantly begins to speak with an impeccable upper class accent.
Steve takes her on her first public appearance to Ascot Racecourse, where she makes a good impression with her stilted, but genteel manners, only to shock everyone by a sudden and vulgar lapse into Cockney; "C'mon Dover, move your bloomin' arse!". Steve, who dislikes the pretentiousness of the upper class, partly conceals a grin behind his hand, as if to say "I wish I had said that!"
The bet is won when Sonia successfully poses as a mysterious lady of patently noble rank at an embassy ball, despite the unexpected presence of a Hungarian phonetics expert trained by Steve. Steve's callous treatment of Sonia afterwards, especially his indifference to her future prospects, leads her to walk out on him, leaving him mystified by her ingratitude. When she is gone however, he comes to the horrified realization that he has "grown accustomed to her face." Putting aside his resentment about the intrusion on his life and toward women in general, Steve finds Sonia the next day and attempts to talk her into coming back to him. During a testy exchange, Steve's ego gets the better of him, and his former student rejects him.
Steve makes his way home, stubbornly predicting that Sonia will be ruined without him and come crawling back. However, his bravado collapses and he is reduced to playing old phonograph recordings of her voice lessons. To Steve's great delight, Sonia chooses that moment to return to him.