Leni Neumann is rebuilding her life as a Jewish survivor in post-war Vienna, having lost her mother in a Nazi prison. As a singer going from café to café, she meets all kinds of people: good people, who want to leave the horrors of war behind; neurotics, who hope to restore days of perverse glory. Drawn by the splendid, strange new world in which she finds herself, Leni is easy prey for the forces that surround her.

Then she meets Gerhard, who offers her money, power, luxury and refinement, and Leni accepts his proposal. But Gerhard is a troubled man, and Leni finds herself forced to seek the truth about her marriage - a truth that may threaten her very life.