Most good stories start with a fundamental list of ingredients: the initial situation, conflict, complication, climax, suspense, denouement, and conclusion. Great writers sometimes shake up the recipe and add some spice.
Initial Situation
I'm King of The World
Newland Archer and May Welland are about to announce their engagement. Woo-hoo, wedding bells! These crazy kids are seemingly perfect for each other. They're both the crème de la crème of New York society: young, wealthy, good-looking, and wearing the exactly right fashions. Everyone approves of this union and you just know that the wedding décor is going to be fabulous.
Conflict/Complication
Lovin' His (Soon-To-Be) Cousin
But then, enter Ellen Olenska, May's cousin. She's left her husband (gasp!) but the husband was a cheating dirtbag. She may have done something sexy with her husband's secretary. New York is seriously scandalized. Should they welcome her into high society? May's family says yes, so Newland is roped into defending her cause with his legal-eagle lawyer skills.
Even though he's not thrilled about having to come to Madame Olenska's aid, Newland realizes that he has started to fall in love with her. D'uh oh. He's a smitten kitten. He starts making excuses to spend time with her and he starts buying her roses.
This infatuation doesn't stop him from telling Ellen not to get a divorce though, because of What Society Would Think. It also doesn't stop him from asking May to have her parents agree to step up their wedding date. Because everyone knows the cure for love is to marry someone else, stat.
Climax
Kissing Cousins (On The Shoe)
This love-fever comes to a pitch. After sleepless nights, staring off into the distance and probably carving Ellen + Newland = LUV on a couple of park benches, Newland confesses his l-o-v-e for her.
Ellen is like "Hey, guy, you told me not to get a divorce… but gosh I think you're hot, too." They have a repressed amorous moment and he kisses her slipper (weirdo), but a knock on the door brings a telegram. Hey, it's a telegram from May, whose parents have agreed to an earlier wedding date. Be careful what you wish for/ be careful what you explicitly ask your fiancée to do.
Falling Action
(Un)Happily Married
Wedding bells ring for Newland and May. Jeepers. That must have been a really fun time for Newland. After the wedding, Newland doesn't have contact with Madame Olenska for a year. During that time, he settles into married life and becomes more and more dissatisfied with its routines.
Then he sees Ellen Olenska again and the whole madly-in-love things comes right back like a bad penny. He yearns for her. He kisses more inanimate objects, thinking that they belong to Ellen. He follows her to Boston and they have strained conversations about how much they adore each other and can't be together.
Time passes, and Ellen moves down to Washington. Love is still boiling away on the back burner of Newland's heart. He wants a night alone with her (dang, what happened to Victorian repression?) and Ellen agrees to give him one night of passionate sexytimes before she returns to her husband in Europe.
Resolution/ Denouement
(Un)Happily Ever After
Ahh, but the night of passion doesn't happen. Newland doesn't know what happened until after Ellen Olenska has gone back to Europe (though not to her husband, thank goodness). What happened is this: sneaky May tells Ellen that she's pregnant and Ellen decides that sleeping with a daddy-to-be is going too far.
Newland considers leaving May to travel and find Ellen again, but then May tells Newland that she's got a bun in the oven and Newland thinks "Oh well, I'm a proud papa now: Dreams. Over."
Fast-forward twenty-five years and Newland goes with his son to Paris. May is deader than a doornail. Newland's son says "Hey, let's go see Ellen Olenska," but Newland decides at the last minute to sit on a bench and stare at her window instead of, you know, seeing the face of the woman he loved so deeply.