The supposedly dead and buried Mabuse returns to his criminal activities, as his longtime foe Police Inspector Lohmann, a dauntless girl reporter, and an American - who may be an FBI agent, or maybe a Chicago mobster - investigate a series of gruesome murders connected to a maximum security prison and involving a minister who has written a book called "The Anatomy Of The Devil".
Having been happily married for ten years, Gerda Wagner, devoted mother and housewife, suddenly gets it into her head that she would like a career as a pop star. She had singing lessons in the past and her voice is still beautiful. A chance meeting with the idolized Italian singer Fabiani, revives her stage fever - much to the annoyance of her husband Gustl Wagner, head of the records section at a department store.
On his travels, Paul, a journeyman from northern Germany, runs into a childhood friend, Lisei, a puppeteer's daughter. They fall in love and get married. Together with Lisei's father, the young couple moves to Paul's hometown. Although Paul himself is accepted - even respected - by the stuck-up and snooty citizens, the young woman is rejected by the town dwellers, who are imbued with class arrogance. Paul stands up for his wife but the scorn and abuse heaped on her weigh heavily upon him.
On a barren and stormy island, fishing families eke out a meager existence on what they can catch during summer, and what washes ashore during winter. But little has been washing ashore of late, and their situation worsens. Elders recall how twenty years ago, when the lighthouse keeper’s beacon went dark, a cargo ship broke apart on the cliffs. It proved a bountiful accident for the fishermen. Today people on the island view the conscientious lighthouse keepers with evil hungry eyes...