As a group of respectable citizens gather on the summer lawns to play tennis, exchange pleasantries and gossip of indiscretions, we learn that a young pianist has just committed suicide, that Friedrich Hofreiter, the town's leading citizen, has just ended an affair with an associate's wife, and that Friedrich 's wife's rejection of the pianist caused him to take his life. Friedrich (a well-known philanderer) is stunned and appalled -- not by the fact that his wife may have had a dalliance, but that a man shot himself because of her virtue. He leaves for a trip to the mountains in the company of friends and the beautiful young Erna, who admits to having loved him since she was a child. Erna awakens complicated passions in Friedrich, while Friedrich's wife, worn down by her love for her unfaithful husband, takes a lover in his absence.