In Paris shortly before WWII, a girl named Aisha goes to Le Théâtre du Grand-Guignol to see grotesque plays starring a woman named Maxa. In the plays, Maxa dies with spurts of fake blood and other cosmetic effects. Aisha lies and tells her mother she's going to church. (The theatre was once a church). Aisha is mixed race. Her mother tells her her father is dead. Her neighbor doesn't believe it. At this time in France, it's uncommon to see a person of mixed race and there's a lot of anti-Blackness. Aisha's mother dies and she has nowhere to live. She convinces Maxa to let her move into the theatre and work there. Maxa doesn't ask her name but rather renames her Bess. Sabine, Maxa's other helper, seems jealous and unhappy about Aisha's arrival. She tells Aisha that Maxa looks at her (Aisha) hungrily. After one performance, Maxa asks Aisha to wash her instead of Sabine. Aisha goes to Maxa's flat for the first time. She helps her bathe and eat and sleeps at her feet, with her dog. One day, Maxa takes her to see a fortune-teller. Evidently, this fortune-teller had told Maxa to one day return with a woman of mixed race. The fortune-teller tells Maxa “You are a conduit for violence, but not a host. It passes through you," and that she will die a violent death. She tells Aisha, “On a distant shore, your lover will find you,” then asks her, "What are you?" Maxa has a boyfriend, Marcel, and the two have submissive/dominant sex together frequently. Marcel doesn't like Aisha, calling her Maxa's "little Arab" and Maxa's "whore." The three go to see a play together. While getting ready, Maxa is cutting Aisha's hair and tells her why she calls her Bess. She uses scarves to bind Aisha's arms to the chair and tells her Bess is a character in "The Highway Man," who, bound to a bedpost, kills herself because she knows the people who restrained her are going to kill her lover. After the play, Marcel takes them to a nightclub. Aisha sees a Black girl and a white girl dancing sensually together. They go home and sleep and Aisha wakes up to the sound of Marcel's palm slapping Maxa's vagina, which she then feels she can't escape. Aisha and Maxa go on a walk and Maxa tries to convince Aisha to write her a play to perform. On a bridge, Maxa bends Aisha over the river and fingers her. Then they kiss. She tells her, “Write the filthiest, foulest, most tremendous play, and we will put it on.” Marcel nearly assaults Aisha and Maxa stops him. Aisha asks Maxa why she stays with him, to which Maxa responds that the world is terrifying for women. The two have sex and Maxa asks Aisha to run away to Greece with her. Then, she exits the room to be with Marcel, who bangs on the door. The rest of the company worries about how profane the play Aisha has written is, but they go through with it. Maxa and Aisha scatter money on the seats before the audience arrives then watch the audience brawl over it. In the play, it is the end of the world and Maxa is "the last queen that reigns over men." The audience is asked what to do with the final queen and Aisha, planning an orgy scene, calls out: "Worship her!" however, someone in the audience cries louder: "Strike her down!" The audience chimes in and urges Jean, another of the actors, to beat Maxa again and again onstage. A woman in the audience cries "Stop!" and her dress is torn off and she is consumed by the audience, disappearing. That night, Aisha hears Marcel and Maxa inside Maxa's flat, Marcel whipping her with a belt, and Maxa screams to Aisha for help. Aisha breaks in and, throws Marcel against a wall, and forces him out. Later, he assaults a woman on the sidewalk and is arrested. Maxa feels as if she has turned both Marcel and Aisha into monsters. She disappears the next morning. Aisha eventually finds the home she fled to. Maxa asks Aisha to strike her and Aisha refuses. Aisha says, "You ... need to tell me that I will not be limping after you for our entire lives. That my humiliation is not your only pleasure. I don’t want your performance or your persona. I just need to know that you need me, or some part of me.” Maxa responds, "Need you for what? I'm not an invert," and Aisha slaps her. Aisha leaves, reminding Maxa her name isn't Bess. Years later, Aisha immigrates to the US. One day, she see's Maxa's face on a magazine, for an article: “I Am the Maddest Woman in the World." She reads about Maxa's life. The only reference to her is a reference to the "degenerate women" Maxa "had power over." Aisha's new lover pulls her away and calls her by her real name.