Ida, a good-natured, happy girl, is looking forward to her tenth birthday when she gets on her brand new bike and sets off to buy sweets. She should be back within half an hour but she never returns. Her mother, frantic with worry, calls the shop, friends and family but no one has seen her daughter. As the relatives reach breaking point and the media circus begins, Inspector Sejer is calm and reassuring, but inside he is worried: missing children are normally found within forty-eight hours. Ida seems to have vanished without a trace.