In 1974, 24 year-old Francis Wetherbee, a bank teller who is the subject of small-town envy and gossip, disappears from her hometown of Smithville, Texas two weeks after her fiance's bank is robbed. Her car is dredged from the bottom of a local river but it yields no clues. After a vigorous but futile search for the missing woman, the authorities give up, and Francis recedes into legend--until the case is revisited nearly 40 years later when key figures in her life come forward with theories and clues surrounding her disappearance. The film then morphs from documentary style to narrative as the odyssey of Francis' life unfolds for the audience and the truth is revealed.