A housewife, forever short of money, Madame McBing looks after her son McDull, a daydreaming piglet. Hoping to anticipate problems that might arise from the uncertain political situation, she starts taking out insurance policies, buying American dollars, gold, toilet paper, and even her own plot in the municipal cemetery. She also decides, for her son’s sake, to write down the strange story of her husband, the Prince of Bun. His mother’s account of his father sets McDull off in quest of his noble origins.