In a post-war town a loving, but psychotic, father goes to extreme lengths to prevent his daughter being transported to the concentration camps.
The children in a provincial European town pulling itself out of the ruins of a catastrophic war are being killed and dumped into the river. The police are at a loss as to who the murderer is. When a minor civil servant from the town archives volunteers to help the lead detective his offer of help is initially rejected. It is only when the archivist forms a dangerous friendship with a mysterious little girl that the police start to take him seriously. Then his world becomes a hellish nightmare.