Justin Bayard, a Northern Territory policeman, is given the job of taking an Aboriginal prisoner Emu Foot, to Alice Springs to be tried for a tribal killing. Bayard is wounded during a revenge attack by tribesmen, and Emu Foot helps him take refuge at a remote cattle station. But there Bayard gets involved in a domestic crisis involving Julie Kirkbride, the neurotic, bored wife of the station owner, Tad, and is tempted by the head stockman's daughter Chris Palady. On an impulse, Julie sets Emu Foot free, but when she is later discovered murdered, the evidence points to the Aboriginal man being guilty. Emu Foot is killed by tribesmen seeking revenge for his earlier killing, and Julie's real murderer is discovered by Bayard on the station Dust in the Sun offers a perspective on Aboriginal-white relations, the attitude to women in the outback, and the sort of mythology of the outback the creative team tried to sell to the city.