The Cave by Yevgeny Zamyatin. Short summary

5 seconds

In order to spare his wife’s misery in starving Petrograd, the good-natured intellectual violates sacred postulates.

1 minute

Hungry and cold post-revolutionary Petrograd. A young couple tries to survive in a frosty apartment. Martin Martinch and Masha live in the smallest room, just enough heat to keep them warm from the firewood stove.

The last logs are burning in the voracious stove. Martin sees that the last life powers of his beloved wife are dying out together with the dying out fire. The man takes a desperate step.

Breaking his moral principles and his own moral convictions, Martin Martynich steals firewood from his neighbor Obertyshev. Earlier, the neighbor has refused his request to borrow a few logs — he himself does not have enough fuel for a large family.

Obertsyshev exposes the thief and sues him. The ruling is to return the wood to the victim. But they have already been burned. Martin is ready to bear responsibility, but without him Masha is doomed to an agonizing death. A vial of poison is a scary but only possible solution to the problem.