Aboard the Brussels Express, an American returning to England from spending time with friends in Cologne meets an Englishman. Together, they view the flares rising from the steel furnaces in the Ruhr Valley. The Englishman has an outburst about the steel’s manufacturing pointing to another destructive war, and soon they begin debating who won the first World War. When the American wittily asks him who he thinks won the war, given the Englishman believes the Americans didn’t, he replies that he did. Noticing the Englishman’s serious tone for such an outlandish response, the American decides to hear him out. The conductor tells the Englishman the train will be arriving in Brussels in an hour and a quarter, and deeming this enough time, the Englishman introduces himself as Roger Bradman and begins his story.

Before World War I had begun, Bradman had been a spy for the British forces. After a fiasco involving getting caught by the Germans, Bradman was called back to England at the start of the war to command the Firedrake, a scouting destroyer. As the war continued, the Germans were close to taking Paris and winning the conflict. They were slowly crushing the Belgian forces in their way. On October 28, the Belgian army was at their breaking point and formed a last resort plan. They gathered a small group of men and snuck them along the shore of the North Sea. Fortunately, the German sentry had been asleep when the men found him, and after capturing him, they quickly built a fire to signal to passing British naval ships for assistance. After a while, Bradman caught sight of the fire and ordered the Firedrake’s companion ship to slow down. He and a dozen men approached the shore and were greeted by the group of relieved Belgian soldiers. Unfortunately, the Firedrake was not equipped for the support the Belgian forces needed, so Bradman suggested to the Belgians a new plan.

Aboard the Firedrake, the crew had discovered they had mistakenly been given a shipment of Scottish uniforms in lieu of Scotch whiskey. Bradman suggested the Belgians be given their uniforms to imitate a Scottish force, which would signal to the Germans the impending arrival of the British and scare them off. The operation hurriedly went underway, with uniforms being distributed and men changing clothes. Bradman then retreated to the Firedrake, leaving the Belgians with a slim increase in hope of beating the Germans. Miraculously, with the combined force of the uniforms, Belgian machine gunners, and dikes of the Yser River, the Belgians won the battle and stopped the Germans from taking Paris. Despite this victory, Bradman was quickly charged with treason for distributing English supplies to troops that could have been German. The Belgian officers oddly did not testify for him, so he was stripped of his military status.

In the present, Bradman tells the American no one believes his story except for one man. Bradman had been traveling frequently due to the reputation he garnered for his treason and decided to return to Belgium. The only other guest at his hotel in Nieuwpoort was a German man named Bechtel. At night, Bradman ventured back to the shore where he met the Belgians, only to find Bechtel already there. Bradman told him his story, and Bechtel revealed that he was the sentry the Belgian officers had found asleep. For years, he had been plagued with the fear that he had been the one to lose the first World War. Together, they were the two loneliest people in the world. They then wrote to each other once a year until Bradman received a letter from Bechtel, who was admitted to a hospital. Bechtel asked him to bury his ashes on the beach in Nieuwpoort, which is why Bradman is riding the train now.