Susan Manning Middlecott is dean of a New England school called Benton College and it is her whole life, apart from living with dad Mark and raising an adopted daughter, Louisa.

A British astronomy professor she has never met, Alec Stevenson, mentions to a lecture-tour publicist named Teddy Evans that he has a locket belonging to Susan that he wants to deliver to her. For publicity's sake, Teddy invents a story that Alec and Susan are involved in a romance.

Susan is miffed and boards a train to Boston to confront him. She is unaware that Alec has been to her campus and is now on the same train. A photographer snaps their picture getting off the train. Susan, livid, hits Alec with her purse, and Teddy makes sure their spat makes the newspapers.

Susan believes that Alec is a publicity seeker, rejecting his attempts to explain. Susan's dad takes a shine to Alec and wants to encourage her to find time for a love life. To get away, Susan takes her daughter to the family's cabin, but Mark also invites Alec there.

The locket was given to Alec by a concentration camp prisoner named Benoit during the war. Alec tells her how he merely was attempting to bring it to her at the soldier's request. He and Susan attend a college dance, but another misunderstanding prompts her to leave with a student, who promptly gets Susan in trouble by drag racing with another car.

Teddy plants a story that Alec is the real father of Susan's little girl. Susan's job is now in jeopardy from the continuing bad publicity. Alec tries to cover for her, claiming he and Susan are actually married, but a college colleague does likewise, complicating Susan's situation further. She must decide what's important to her in the end, her professional life or her personal one.

• Rosalind Russell as Susan Manning Middlecott
• Ray Milland as Prof. Alexander "Alec" Stevenson
• Edmund Gwenn as Mark "JM" Middlecott
• Janis Carter as Teddy Evans
• Mary Jane Saunders as Louisa Middlecott
• Lucille Ball as herself

• A Woman of Distinction at IMDb