The exposition of the story is a description of the grave of the main character. The following is a summary of her story. Olya Meshcherskaya is a prosperous, capable and playful schoolgirl, indifferent to the instructions of a classy lady. At the age of fifteen, she was a recognized beauty, had the most admirers, she danced best at balls and ran on skates. It was rumored that one of the gymnasium students in love with her attempted suicide due to her windiness.

In the last winter of her life, Olga Meshcherskaya "completely went crazy with fun." Her behavior makes the boss make another remark, reproaching her, among other things, for dressing and acting not as a girl, but as a woman. At this place, Meshcherskaya interrupted her with a calm message that she was a woman and her friend and neighbor of her father, brother of the boss Alexei Mikhailovich Malyutin, was guilty of this.

A month after this conversation, an ugly Cossack officer shot Meshcherskaya on the station platform in the midst of a large crowd of people. He announced to the bailiff that Meshcherskaya was close to him and vowed to be his wife. On this day, seeing him off to the train station, she said that she had never loved him, and offered to read the page from her diary, which described how Malyutin seduced her.

It follows from the diary that this happened when Malyutin came to visit the Meshchersky and found Olga alone at home. Her attempts to occupy the guest, their walk in the garden are described; Malyutin’s comparison of them with Faust and Margarita. After tea, she pretended to be unwell, and lay down on the couch, and Malyutin moved to her, first kissed her hand, then kissed her on the lips. Then Meshcherskaya wrote that after what happened then, she felt such disgust for Malyutin that she could not survive it.

The action ends at the cemetery, where every Sunday at the grave of Olya Meshcherskaya her classy lady comes, living in an illusory world, replacing her with reality. The subject of her previous fantasies was her brother, a poor and unremarkable ensign, whose future seemed brilliant to her. After the death of his brother, Olga Meshcherskaya takes his place in her mind. She goes to her grave every holiday, watches her oak cross for hours, recalls a pale face in a coffin among flowers and once overheard words that Olga spoke to her beloved friend. She read in one book what beauty a woman should have — black eyes, black eyelashes, longer than a normal arm, but the main thing is light breathing, and she (Olya) has it: “... you listen to me I sigh - is there any truth? ”