The plot is based on the dramatic fate of the Red Army commander Alexei Ivanovich Pavlov. Having been captured in January 1942 and being among the displaced persons, the hero did not immediately decide to return to the USSR. Having rolled around the foreign country for 17 years, Alexei nevertheless returned to his homeland. Alexei goes to his brother in the south of the country to Sevastopol. He accidentally meets the doctor Anna Andreyevna, who was saved from death in besieged Leningrad. She travels by car from Moscow and also to the south, with her daughter Tanya; she suggests he join them. Alexei tells about his life on the road.