Lisbon, 1904: A young man named Tomás discovers an old journal. It hints at the location of an extraordinary artefact that - if it exists - would redefine history. He sets out in an old automobile in search of this treasure. Some thirty-five years later, a Portuguese pathologist finds himself at the centre of a murder mystery. Fifty years on, a Canadian senator takes refuge in northern Portugal, grieving the loss of his wife; he comes to his ancestral village with an unusual companion - a chimpanzee...