The dramatic story of a paper manufacturing dynasty tells of one who, drawn back to the water like magic, returns time and again. Before our eyes, this man brings to life the portraits of his ancestral gallery. He recalls the summer scenes of his childhood and imagines how it might have been: back when, in the last century, his great-great-grandfather discovered on his estate between the Orpe and Diemel rivers how water could be transformed into paper and paper into money; back when the son of the baroque founder managed to navigate the factory through the first war with his sober understanding of numbers; back when the storied history of the firstborn factory owners threatened to end with the next war and a director turned towards the muses. Back when a woman brought temporary salvation.