A French woman returns to her childhood home in Cameroon - formerly a colonial outpost - where she's flooded by memories, particularly of Protée, her servant.

A young French woman returns to the vast silence of West Africa to contemplate her childhood days in a colonial outpost in Cameroon. Her strongest memories are of the family's houseboy, Protee - a man of great nobility, intelligence and beauty - and the intricate nature of relationships in a racist society.—Dawn M. Barclift

The young woman named France is walking along a road towards Douala, Cameroon. She is picked up by an African American man who has moved to Africa and is driving to Limbe with his son. As they drive, France's mind wanders and we see her as a young girl in Mindif, French Cameroon in 1957, where her father was a colonial administrator. In a remote outpost of the provincial government, seven-year-old France lives with her father Marc, her mother Aimée and a few Cameroonians, including Protée, the house servant who embodies so much dignity and intelligence that he has earned a certain status in a society that grants him nothing. There is no task he is given that he does not carry out with dignity and vitality. Yet he is neither conceited nor modest - he is efficient. And beautiful ... Frances's mother Aimée and Protée are strongly attracted to each other, and when the husband is away, they are almost painfully aware of each other. Into this domestic scene, in which longings remain unspoken and everyday rituals take center stage, a group of white French people, stranded after a technical defect in their plane, interferes. The conversations and events under the family roof now become increasingly rough and ugly.