A symbolic political allegory: 20-year-old Averill is traveling through a troubled countryside amid rumors of war to visit his father. He reaches a train station in a city which is paralyzed by a transportation strike and is forced to take lodgings at a hotel in a bizarre, unattractive town populated by seemingly malformed individuals. After a while, he begins to try to woo a much older woman, and symbolic images of entrapment, imprisonment and erotic enticement mark his adventures in this regard. When he receives a letter from his father, he learns a shocking truth.