here a prostitute was warming me with her body, a miserable, bruised, hunted creature, worthless, without any place in life, whom I had never thought of helping until she helped me, and whom I would hardly have been able to help even if the thought had occurred to me. Oh! I was ready to believe that all this was happening to me in a dream, in an absurd, oppressive dream.

But, alas! I couldn’t make myself believe that, for cold drops of rain were falling on me, a woman’s breast was pressed to mine, I felt her warm breath on my face, a breath smelling slightly of vodka, and yet so vivifying.…The wind howled and groaned, the rain beat against the boat, the waves splashed, and both of us, pressed tightly together, nevertheless shivered with cold. All this was utterly real, yet I am sure that no one ever dreamed such an oppressive and ugly dream as that reality.

Natasha kept on talking, with a tenderness and sympathy of which only women are capable. Under the influence of her simple and friendly words a little fire was gently kindled within me, and it melted something in my heart.

Then tears poured from my eyes, washing my heart of much that was evil, much that was foolish, much uneasiness and filth that had accumulated long before that night. Natasha kept soothing me:

“There, there, darling, that’s enough! Don’t howl! That’s enough! With God’s help you’ll be all right…you’ll find another place.…”

And she kept on kissing me. She gave me countless, hot kisses.…

Those were the first kisses from a woman that life had offered me, and they were the best kisses, for all those that came after were terribly costly and gave me almost nothing.

“Come, stop howling, you queer fellow! Tomorrow I’ll help you, if you have nowhere to go,” I heard her gentle, persuasive whisper as though in a dream.

…Until dawn we lay in each other’s arms.

And when day broke, we crawled out from under the boat and went to town.…There we said good-by to each other in a friendly fashion and never met again, although for half a year I searched all the low dives for that sweet Natasha with whom I had spent the autumn night I have just described.

If she is already dead—and well for her if it is so—may she rest in peace! And if she is living—peace be to her soul! And may she never awaken to the consciousness of her fall…for that would be unnecessary suffering, a pain that would not further life.…

1894.