It is the story of seven days in the life of the 70-year-old Peter who learns that he has lung sarcoma and that there is a faint hope that in a week the diagnosis may be ruled out by a medical luminary from Moscow. Peter spends the seven days summing up the results of his life which he considers worthless, in which he could not start a family, earn money, save his reputation. But time and again the events in which he becomes involved and which are filled with smiles, sadness, human destinies, let the viewer realize that the protagonist’s life is far from worthless.

In the Far Eastern village of Chernovka, surrounded by taiga and swamps, an emergency occurs: a sawmill burns down, and in the morning bodies are found there, burned beyond recognition. A young investigator, Evgenia Rakitina, arrives from the district center. The local authorities and the villagers themselves are trying in every possible way to hush up the case, writing everything off as an accident, but Evgenia's professional instinct tells her that something is wrong here. And the deeper the heroine delves into this matter, the more she realizes that the people here are not only related to each other. Comparing the testimony of witnesses, she concludes that she will have to look for the solution to the mystery in the past.…