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In an attempt to escape from the war, and cross over into France from Belgium, a family is caught up and confronted with war violence they might never have encountered had they stayed at home.

The story begins with Waldo Havermans and his father and mother cycling ahead of the German invasion of

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Belgium to cross the border into France. However, the border is closed and the refugees are bombed by a German war plane. Waldo's parents are both killed in the attack. Waldo is taken to a hospital, where a Belgian soldier picks him up to take him to a refugee camp near the coast. At a resting point, Waldo meets Vera, a school friend. They decide to stay together, and find their way home. Traveling through the countryside, the danger of Germans and the war surrounds them. Encounters with a local farmer and Vera's uncle are much less warm and friendly than expected. Fear and danger are around every corner. Uncle Andreas turns out to be a collaborator with the Nazis. Eventually, they are picked up by four Germans, and taken to a small forest where Vera is raped and murdered.

The story is narrated by the ten-year-old Waldo, who does not really understand death. Various allusions to sexuality, girls' giggling in the back of an army vehicle, Uncle Andreas exploits with a prostitute seen through a key hole, and the rape of Vera, left to die, are over an above young Waldo's comprehension. The war machine and the infernal German soldiers are seen as all powerful and inescapable, chasing Waldo all over the country, and catching up with death and destruction. The omnipotence and omnipresence of evil leads Waldo to the sinful conclusion that God is responsible for the evil he has seen and the death of his parents and Vera.

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