1943. French POWs escape through Hungary towards the Balkan. Jacques and Gérard are caught and taken to an internment camp at Lake Balaton. Jacques meets Klári here, who was abandoned by her military officer husband for her Jewish origin. Both want to have a short affair, but love unfolds between them.

In 1950, when a young communist director arrives to take charge of a stud farm, his efforts to draw on the experience of the old hands there meet with little success. Indeed, so outraged are they at the changeover to communism that they harass him at every turn, especially after he treats a local barmaid as if she were a whore of some kind. After administering a beating to him, the old hands are nonetheless incensed when he calls on the police. The director doesn't get enough help, however, because the stable hands stab him before running off for the border.