In this adaptation of Albert Camus' short story, D'Arrast, a French engineer, arrives in the remote town of Iguape to renovate an abandoned hospital. During the city's most important festival, the Bom Jesus procession, he meets a man who promised to carry a stone over his head after being miraculously saved from a shipwreck. Curious about the man's life, d'Arrast decides to help him fulfill this promise.