It’s 1942 in Ger­many and after his father is arrest­ed by the Nazis, 12-year-old Zig­gy Wirth and his moth­er sur­vive by hid­ing in the neighbor’s attic. For Jews, nowhere is safe. Ziggy’s moth­er arranges shel­ter for him through the secret aid soci­ety, which sends him by rail with forty oth­er orphans to a chateau in France. There, Zig­gy meets Elka, a Jew­ish girl his age, who lives with the shame of hav­ing left her moth­er and lit­tle sis­ter behind in Ger­many, in order to save her­self from immi­nent dan­ger. The chateau staff and school­teacher give the Jew­ish refugee chil­dren a sem­blance of nor­mal­i­ty and com­fort. But when a man whom Zig­gy met on the train, Georges, shows up at school as a new gym teacher, Zig­gy is ter­ri­fied he will ​“out” them as Jews. Is he a spy for Hitler? When an Olympic-style game is planned for the spring, Zig­gy is wary. But Elka is thrilled to reignite her old pas­sion for run­ning and begins train­ing in secret. With secret police hunt­ing Jew­ish peo­ple all over Ger­many and the Nazis mov­ing south in France, Zig­gy, Elka, and the oth­er Jew­ish chil­dren are fear­ful of any betray­al. When their beloved school­teacher is abrupt­ly fired, no one knows who to trust. While Elka trains for a com­pe­ti­tion that is start­ing to feel like a set­up, Ziggy’s clan­des­tine sleuthing unveils the real rea­son behind Georges’ inten­tion. Togeth­er, the friends find that hope can be a very dan­ger­ous thing indeed — and also their only chance at survival.