On 10 May 1916, during World War I, John Gielgud portrays a British Captain and novelist who returns home on leave only to discover an obituary printed in the newspaper. A shadowy figure identifying himself as “R” lays out a covert mission: identify and eliminate a German agent who is on his way to Arabia to foment trouble in the Middle East. To carry out the task, the operative is given a new identity—Richard Ashenden—a staged death, and the support of a formidable killer known as the General (the Hairless Mexican, though he is neither bald, Mexican, nor a general).
Ashenden is whisked to a neutral Switzerland, where the assignment grows increasingly intricate. In the Hotel Excelsior, the mission takes a personal turn when Madeleine Carroll as Elsa Carrington is presented as Ashenden’s new wife. The suite soon reveals a complication: Elsa’s interest is not only strategic but also flirtatious, as she entertains another hotel guest, Robert Young as Robert Marvin, who pursues her with a bold charm even as she hints at the thrill of the arrangement. Ashenden is uneasy about the arrangement, and Elsa admits she pressed for the assignment for the sake of excitement.
The undercover operation advances when the pair attempt to contact a supposed double agent—the church organist—only to find him dead. A crucial clue remains: a button clutched in the organist’s hand. Later, at the casino, the missing button reappears on a gambling table, and Percy Marmont is drawn into the plot when the veteran mountaineer Caypor picks it up, mistaking it for his own. The conspirators persuade Caypor to join a staged bet: who can climb higher on a nearby mountain. As the moment of truth approaches, Ashenden hesitates to commit cold-blooded murder, while the General shows no such scruples and pushes Caypor off a cliff.
A coded telegram soon reveals a wrenching twist: Caypor was not the intended target after all. The General finds the news amusing, but Elsa is devastated by the revelation and resolves to quit, confessing that she fell in love with Ashenden at first sight. In the hotel lobby, Elsa unexpectedly encounters Marvin, and, with no clear destination in mind, she agrees to accompany him. Meanwhile, the other two spies secure a crucial message by bribing a worker at a chocolate factory—the so-called secret post office of the German spy network—which turns out to be addressed to Marvin.
The pursuit intensifies as Ashenden and the General board the same train as Marvin and Elsa. The train crosses into enemy territory, Turkey, and a wave of soldiers boards, yet the quartet manages to keep Marvin separated from Elsa for a moment. Elsa raises a pistol to prevent further carnage, but before any decisive action can be taken, the train is attacked and derailed by aircraft sent by R. Marvin is pinned in the wreckage and, in a final act, shoots the General fatally before dying himself. With the mission exposed and the casualties mounting, the two Ashendens withdraw from the spy game, returning to a quieter life away from the dangerous world they helped uncover.
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