The tiny family, who live under the kitchen floorboards of an old manor (Chawton House in Hampshire was used for on location filming), are eventually discovered by the other humans who occupy the home and are forced to flee into the English countryside. After finding an old boot to live in, the family befriends a fellow Borrower - a young man who goes by the name "Dreadful Spiller". Spiller helps them find a more permanent home by reuniting them with relations who had formerly run away from the same manor after one of them was seen and eventually relocated in the caretaker's cabin on the manor's grounds.