In a quiet Swedish town, Karin Vergerus is a housewife, married to the hospital physician Andreas Vergerus and raising two children. During a visit to the clinic where her mother, Aino Taube, is ill, she learns that her mother has died. David Kovac, an American archaeologist, witnesses her grief and is drawn into the moment with a quiet, unsettling intensity. The couple invite him to dinner at their house, and he recounts his work at a medieval church, where a 500-year-old wooden statue of the Virgin Mary has been uncovered. He also reveals that he fell in love with Karin the day he first saw her at the clinic, a statement that hangs over their gathering with a strange, almost clinical honesty.
Karin visits David in his apartment and agrees to have sex with him. It is her first affair, and she is uncertain whether she is in love with him, yet the connection feels significant enough to disturb the rhythm of her ordinary life. As the affair unfolds, David’s moods oscillate—he can be distant, overbearing, and at times angry—creating a push-pull dynamic that keeps Karin off balance. When she arrives after drinking and has not quit smoking as they had agreed, he slaps her, a stark gesture that underscores the power imbalance at the center of their relationship. He then shares his family history, telling her that many of his relatives were murdered in Nazi concentration camps during World War II, a revelation that adds a grave, almost mythic weight to his otherwise cool, controlled demeanor.
The tension intensifies when Andreas visits David and reveals that he has been receiving anonymous poison-pen letters accusing Karin of an affair. David dismisses the visit as absurd, recalling that he once cared for Andreas after a suicide attempt, and the conversation leaves both men unsettled but unchanged in their ruffled certainties. In the church, David shows Karin the restored Mary statue, explaining that it is being consumed from inside by a previously unknown insect—a detail that blends the spiritual with the unnerving, blurring the line between reverence and dread. David then leaves for London, and Karin tells Andreas that she feels compelled to go and discover why he has departed, even if it means risking their marriage. Andreas sternly warns that if she leaves, she cannot return to their life together, but she departs anyway, driven by a need for clarity she cannot ignore.
In London, Karin goes to David’s address and encounters a woman with congenital health problems who identifies herself as Sara and claims to be David’s sister. Sara guesses that Karin might be pregnant, though Karin refuses to say who the father is, and Sara makes a chilling assertion: that David will never leave her. The encounter leaves Karin shaken and uncertain about the path she will take, yet she goes on, feeling that she may not return.
Back in Sweden, David reaches out and asks to meet again. He confesses that life without Karin is intolerable and that their bond has changed him; he has even accepted a position at a Danish university and asks Karin to join him, along with her children. Karin, however, insists on her duty to stay, a response that strikes at the core of her sense of self and responsibility. He accuses her of lying and cowardice as they confront the chasm between what they want and what they owe to others. The story closes on a note of separation, with both characters altered by their experiences and the choices they have made, leaving the door open to ambiguity about what might come next.
