Halifax, Nova Scotia, 1938. Orphaned at age nine by a zeppelin crash, DeFoe Russet grew up in a hotel under the care of his magnetic uncle Edward. Now thirty, DeFoe works with Edward as a guard in Halifax's three-room Glace Museum. By day, he and his uncle break the silence of the museum with heated conversations that show them to be "opposites at life." By night, DeFoe spends his time trying to keep the affection of Imogen Linny, the young caretaker of the small Jewish cemetery.

Their relationship is a most provocative example of unrequited love. When the Dutch painting Jewess on a Street in Amsterdam arrives at the museum, Imogen becomes obsessed and abandons her life in favor of the ennobled one she imagines for its subject - even though being a Jew in Amsterdam is becoming more and more perilous as the clouds of World War II begin to gather.

As the true story of the Jewess emerges, Imogen leaves DeFoe and enters the orbit of Edward and his own fascination with the horrific news being broadcast from Europe. Drawing together the mysteries of identity and self-determination and the ominous aura of the late 1930s, The Museum Guard is an examination of the desire to step out of the everyday and into action - and of that desire's often tragic consequences.