Ernesto Agular, an Argentinian journalist of around forty, is an obituary writer for a Barcelona newspaper. His boss asks him to write an article on the disappearance of the Italian physicist Ettore Majorana. To do this, he has to go to Naples, where the dead physicist disappeared during a ferry journey from Palermo to Naples. That is when Ernesto runs into his old friend Ross, who has just arrived in Barcelona, sailing on the Victoria, and who offers to take him to Naples. After a brief stopover on the isle of San Pietro, Ernesto wakes up to discover that his friend Ross has disappeared. With no idea of how to get to port, he decides to swim ashore, where he becomes the main suspect in Ross's disappearance. When he looks into the matter, he discovers that it is thought that Majorana may have faked his suicide.