Deborah Kerr(hereafter referred as Ms. K), a beautiful and elegant singer,
met Gary Grant(hereafter referred as Mr. G), a painter and dandy boy at a
sea voyage, and they fell in love with each other despite that Ms. K hadalready been engaged with an socially-recognized successful man, while Mr.G also had a fiancee who was a rich heiress. The boat romance halted when they finally arrived in New York where standing in the dock were another two lovers greeting their sweethearts. So they made an appointment that they would meet at the top level of the Empire State Building, then the
tallest skyscraper in the world, exactly six months later. Needless to say, prior to that they had to manage somehow to have their engagement
bonding lifted.

Six months elapsed, both of them made the rendezvous they had long been
pining for. Mr. G was waiting anxiously at the top of the building for Ms. K to come, while the latter was rushing to cross a bustling street(23rd Street, I guess) and was accidentally hit by a car. She was badly injured and handicapped ever since. Mr. G, utterly unaware of what’d happened below, kept on asking the elevator boy, "What time is it?" and roaming in the observatory until midnight. Bereft, he accepted the boy’s offer "Going down?", and left.

The dramatic but tragic event changed both of their lives. Downhearted, Mr. G lost his glamour in social activities which used to boost his success in selling his paintings. He even had to do billboard ad to scratch a living. In the meantime, Ms. K, being unable to stand up any more, discontinued her singing career and devoted herself to charity, though not financially. She taught music in some orphanages, and children’s laughter helped her out of depression in return. On the Christmas Eve, before Mr. G decided to leave New York for other city to seek a better opportunity, something in his mind was telling him that he should bid an adieu to his "old friend", Ms. K. Then he looked her name up in a telephone directory with listed addresses. Luckily he found the name.

With a blanket covering her disabled legs, Ms. K was leaning snugly
against a couch, preparing herself reading a book to spend the silent
night before she found Mr. G, still debonair and gallant, standing in front of her. Subsequent scenes were gradually reaching the climax: several witty remarks and deadpan humors were interwoven until at last Mr.G thought of someone who told him that the other day a crippled woman, who could not afford a piece of painting, solicited the gallery to give her one of his works—-"the girl with a white shawl praying in a cathedral".  The light dawned on Mr. G, and he found the painting was in her apartment, then found the tearful Ms. K, that crippled woman and the model of the
painting, was looking languishingly at him. What a sentimental denouement
with such a bouquet worth of savoring!

I’ve watched the movie too many times to forget its storyline, nor to anadmirable supporting character—the ex-fiance of Ms. K’s. The gentleman
loved Ms. K so dearly that even when she mumbled Mr. G’s name, not his, in the bed of a hospital emergency room after she was hit, yet he stood beside her, firmly holding her hands. One day when he was going to stand
up and pick up her wheelchair after a Broadway show or a concert was over,
they came across Mr. G who was just passing by. Mr. G and Ms. K were simply exchanging a "hello", a word full of mixed emotions. With an
impulse, that gentleman even wanted to tell Mr. G the truth, but Ms. K
stopped him. He would have known better that whatever he had done to her, he was unable to win her heart, still he continued to do it without any
regret. Stupid? I’d rather call it an "unselfish and unrequited love", one of the ultimate human affections.