Arms and the Man takes places during the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian war.  Raina Petkoff is a young Bulgarian woman engaged to a famous soldier.  One night, a Swiss voluntary soldier to the Serbian army, Bluntschli, bursts into her bedroom and begs her to hide him, so that he is not killed. Raina complies, though she thinks the man a coward, especially when he tells her that he does not carry pistol cartridges, but chocolates.  As the Petkoff family, their servants, and the soldier himself scramble to keep their secrets and preserve their ideals, they are forced to question their romantic notions about war, love, social class, and themselves.  The play ends with Raina renouncing her idyllic love for her fiancé and proclaiming her love for Bluntschli.