The story recalling the spirit of Gilgamesh, the Sumerian king quarrelling with his approaching death, takes place in a cancer hospital in Budapest. Dávid, the young ethnography scientist resigned to his lot and is indifferent to his approaching death. His specialist reckons, however, that such a searching and stubborn mind with thorough knowledge of the nature of his own illness, will be able to fight death.
The top management of the co-operative in the rural community at Lake Balaton goes on coaches everywhere to irritate Mrs. Peczöli, the snobbish wife of the only individual farmer. Peczöli would readily join the co-operative, should it not oppose his apple improving experiments.
In the streets of Vichy, France, during World War II, the Germans apprehend nine men and a boy. Among them are a painter, a businessman, an electrician, a waiter, an army doctor, an actor, a prince, a gypsy, and a Jew. Confined without explanation, they can only speculate about their fate.
