Un honnête commerçant

The merchant Hubert Verkamen suspected of viciously murdering an entire family, is being brutally interrogated at the police station in Brussels by two police inspectors. The police are convinced that he is an infamous drug trafficker who has often slipped through their fingers. Verkamen strenously denies any involvement but decides to play along and thus gives rise to a complicated game during which he pretends to play the part of the criminal the others want him to be. Through a series of flashbacks Verkamen slowly reconstructs the career of a timid, unhappy tax collector who, thanks to a series of fortuitous breaks, first becomes the assistant of a genteel dealer, then the leader of an international drug cartel. The interrogation leads up to an unexpected climax.