Episode One, originally transmitted on BBC2, 10/1/1999

Oswald Bates, a curator at the Fallon Photo Library and Collection, explains the events which have led up to his contemplating suicide. The stately home which houses the library is a valuable property, and the new American owners are eager to transform it into a business school. The company's representative, Christopher Anderson, has to explain to the chief archivist, Marilyn Truman, and her eccentric colleagues that this will entail disposing of the photo library. This comes as a shock, since Oswald has deliberately avoided informing Marilyn of the company's intentions, hoping that he can forestall the inevitable.

Marilyn, alarmed by Oswald's duplicity and the threat to her archive, confronts Anderson and discovers his intentions: that the most valuable photographs be sold and the rest either divided up or destroyed. She has four days to either find a home for the collection or lose it. Marilyn refuses to accept the situation and is infuriated by Anderson's disdain for the historical value of the archive and his patronising attitude towards her staff.

The staff discuss methods of stalling Anderson; Oswald suggests feigning madness to worry the company. He also proposes that the valuable photographs, worth £400,000, should be hidden amongst the rest of the collection. Marilyn is ambivalent, feeling that gaining Anderson's respect is a better strategy.

Given a tour, Anderson is impressed by the archive, particularly when Oswald finds a picture of the street in America where he grew up. But he becomes frustrated by the obvious fact that the valuable pictures have been hidden and insists that he will not leave without them.

To distract him, Marilyn tells a story from the archive. This is a series of photographs portraying a Jewish girl harboured by an Aryan family in Nazi Germany and following her through clandestine meetings with her parents, her internment in a concentration camp and her eventual survival. Fascinated, Anderson expresses sympathy for Marilyn's cause but insists that his hands are tied. He offers Marilyn the chance to save what she can for free in exchange for the valuable pictures. She reluctantly agrees as long as the staff all gain employment in the new school.

However, at the last minute she decides she is going to fight to keep the collection together. Impressed, Anderson gives her an extra week but insists that the seemingly unhinged Oswald is barred from the building. Reluctantly, Marilyn agrees, but Oswald has other ideas.