The Godfearing vicar Niels Quist lives with his beloved daughter Mette in the small Jutland town of Vejlby The newly elected county bailiff and local magistrate Erik Sørensen is the lucky fellow who wins Mettes heart but their happiness is shortlived One day the vicars farmhand mysteriously disappears and all signs suggest that the vicar is the killer But is Erik Sørensen willing and able to sentence his own true loves father to death