The Caucasus (Bunin)
Short summary
Moscow, presumably 1930s. A man secretly met with his married lover in rented rooms near the Arbat. She visited him briefly, always anxious that her husband might discover their affair.
The lovers planned to escape to the Caucasus coast, where they would spend several weeks together in a remote location. Despite their fears that the plan was too good to be true, they managed to board the same train separately, with the husband seeing his wife off to her supposed health retreat.
The couple found a secluded place on the coast, surrounded by exotic trees and vegetation. They spent idyllic days swimming, sunbathing, and enjoying the natural beauty of the landscape. At night, they listened to distant music from the village and watched fireflies in the darkness.
He searched for her in Gelendzhik, in Gagry, in Sochi. The day after his arrival in Sochi, he bathed in the sea in the morning, then shaved, put on clean linen, a snow-white tunic... and shot himself in the temples with two revolvers.
The woman had sent postcards to her husband from different resorts to mislead him. Their passionate escape ended tragically when the husband, unable to find his wife and face the reality of her betrayal, took his own life.
Detailed summary
Section titles are editorial.
Secret meetings in Moscow
The narrator stayed in inconspicuous rooms near the Arbat in Moscow, living a reclusive life while awaiting meetings with his lover. She visited him only three times, always hurriedly claiming she could stay just for a minute. During these brief encounters, she appeared pale with excitement and would quickly embrace him after removing her veil.
She feared her husband suspected their affair, possibly having read her letters or found the key to her desk. She recalled his direct threat that he would stop at nothing to defend his honor as a husband and officer. Despite these dangers, the lovers devised an audacious plan to escape to the Caucasus coast by the same train and live in a remote location for several weeks.
Our plan was audacious: to leave for the coast of the Caucasus by one and the same train and to live there in some completely wild place for three or four weeks... We did not believe in the realization of our plan until the last minute.
Anxious departure by train
The weather in Moscow was cold and wet, with streets glistening black from rain. On the evening of their departure, the narrator drove to the station feeling anxious and cold. He hurried through the station with his hat pulled low and face buried in his coat collar, trying to remain inconspicuous.
It was cold and wet in Moscow... And it was a dark, repulsive evening as I drove to the station, and everything inside me was freezing from anxiety and the cold. I ran through the station... with my face buried in the collar of my coat.
In his pre-booked first-class compartment, the narrator immediately lowered the window blind and locked the door after the porter left with his tip. They had arranged that he would arrive early and she would come later with her husband to avoid any suspicious encounters on the platform.
Reunion on the train and fear of pursuit
Peering anxiously through the window, the narrator finally spotted her husband's tall figure in an officer's peaked cap and greatcoat, holding her arm as they strode toward the second-class carriage. He recoiled from the window, imagining the husband helping her settle in, kissing her goodbye, and making the sign of the cross over her.
As the train departed, the narrator slipped a ten-rouble note to the conductor who brought her to his compartment. When she entered, she didn't kiss him but sat down wearily, removing her hat. She confessed she couldn't eat dinner and had struggled to maintain her composure through the ordeal.
Addressing the narrator intimately for the first time, she asked for water and expressed her conviction that her husband would come after her. She had given him two addresses, Gelendzhik and Gagry, where he might look for her in a few days. Despite this danger, she declared she preferred death to the torment of her current life.
"I'm convinced he'll come after me. I gave him two addresses, Gelendzhik and Gagry... But who cares, better death than this torment..."
Journey through changing landscapes
The next morning, the narrator ventured into the corridor of the train. Outside the dusty windows, the landscape had transformed into a scorched steppe with dusty roads and occasional carts drawn by bullocks. They passed trackmen's huts with bright sunflowers and hollyhocks in their gardens.
As they continued southward, the scenery changed to boundless plains with burial mounds, beneath a harsh sun and dusty sky. Eventually, the first spectral outlines of mountains appeared on the horizon, signaling their approach to the Caucasus region.
Covering their tracks
From both Gelendzhik and Gagry, she sent her husband postcards, writing that she had not yet decided where she would stay. This strategy was meant to confuse him and buy them time. After sending these misleading messages, the couple continued their journey southward along the coast.
Idyllic life in the Caucasus
The lovers discovered a primeval place lush with plane trees, flowering shrubs, mahogany, magnolias, and pomegranate trees, interspersed with fan palms and dark cypresses. Their days fell into a pleasant routine. The narrator would wake early and walk through the hills and woodland thickets while she slept.
We found a primeval place, overgrown with forests of plane trees, flowering shrubs, mahogany, magnolias and pomegranate trees, among which there rose fan palms and the cypresses showed black...
On his morning walks, he passed through the village marketplace, which bustled with traders and mountaineers of different races. Among them moved Circassian girls in long black clothes and red slippers, their heads wrapped in black fabric, occasionally flashing quick glances from within their somber coverings.
Later, the couple would spend time on the deserted seashore, bathing and sunbathing until lunch. Their afternoons were spent in the sultry twilight of their hut, with strips of light filtering through the shutters. When the heat subsided and they opened the windows, the sea visible between the cypresses appeared tranquil and violet-colored.
At sunset, magnificent clouds would gather beyond the sea, their glow so beautiful that sometimes she would lie down, cover her face with a gauze scarf, and cry at the thought that in a few weeks they would have to return to Moscow. The nights were warm and dark, with fireflies twinkling like topaz lights and tree frogs making sounds like little glass bells.
The nights were warm and impenetrable, in the black darkness fireflies floated, twinkled, shone with a topaz light... And all night, from there, from the inn, could be heard the muffled banging of a drum and the throaty, doleful, hopelessly happy wailing...
Near their dwelling, a shallow river ran through a coastal ravine to the sea. On nights when the late moon appeared from behind the mountains, its waters rippled magically. Sometimes terrifying storms would approach from the mountains, with lightning illuminating the woods and thunder cracking overhead. During these storms, wild animals would stir - eaglets mewing, snow leopards roaring, and jackals yelping near their window.
Tragic outcome: the husbands fate
Meanwhile, the husband searched for his wife in Gelendzhik, Gagry, and finally Sochi. The day after arriving in Sochi, he followed a precise morning routine. He bathed in the sea, shaved, and dressed in clean linen and a snow-white tunic. He then had lunch at his hotel's restaurant terrace, drinking champagne and finishing with coffee and chartreuse before leisurely smoking a cigar.
After completing this deliberate ritual, he returned to his room, lay down on the couch, and shot himself in the temples with two revolvers. The story ends with this stark revelation of the husband's suicide, dated November 12, 1937.