reality alone: for you it’s everything; your existence would have no meaning for you without it. You want nothing but that, and you get it; but since you’ve taken to reading novels you are ashamed of it: you rush from pillar to post, you recklessly change your men, and to justify this turmoil you have begun talking of the evils of marriage. So long as you can’t and won’t renounce what underlies it all, your chief foe, your devil—so long as you serve that slavishly, what use is there in discussing the matter seriously? Everything you may say to me will be falsity and affectation. I shall not believe you.”

I went to find out from the hall porter whether the sledge was at the door, and when I came back I found it had become a quarrel. As sailors say, a squall had blown up.

“I see you want to shock me by your cynicism today,” said Zinaida Fyodorovna, walking about the drawing- room in great emotion. “It revolts me to listen to you. I am pure before God and man, and have nothing to repent of. I left my husband and came to you, and am proud of it. I swear, on my honour, I am proud of it!”

“Well, that’s all right, then!”

“If you are a decent, honest man, you, too, ought to be proud of what I did. It raises you and me above thousands of people who would like to do as we have done, but do not venture through cowardice or petty prudence. But you are not a decent man. You are afraid of freedom, and you mock the promptings of genuine feeling, from fear that some ignoramus may suspect you of being sincere. You are afraid to show me to your friends; there’s no greater infliction for you than to go about with me in the street.… Isn’t that true? Why haven’t you introduced me to your father or your cousin all this time? Why is it? No, I am sick of it at last,” cried Zinaida Fyodorovna, stamping. “I demand what is mine by right. You must present me to your father.”

“If you want to know him, go and present yourself. He receives visitors every morning from ten till half- past.”

“How base you are!” said Zinaida Fyodorovna, wringing her hands in despair. “Even if you are not sincere, and are not saying what you think, I might hate you for your cruelty. Oh, how base you are!”

“We keep going round and round and never reach the real point. The real point is that you made a mistake, and you won’t acknowledge it aloud. You imagined that I was a hero, and that I had some extraordinary ideas and ideals, and it has turned out that I am a most ordinary official, a cardplayer, and have no partiality for ideas of any sort. I am a worthy representative of the rotten world from which you have run away because you were revolted with its triviality and emptiness. Recognise it and be just: don’t be indignant with me, but with yourself, as it is your mistake, and not mine.”

“Yes, I admit I was mistaken.”

“Well, that’s all right, then. We’ve reached that point at last, thank God. Now hear something more, if you please: I can’t rise to your level—I am too depraved; you can’t descend to my level, either, for you are too exalted. So there is only one thing left to do.…”

“What?” Zinaida Fyodorovna asked quickly, holding her breath and turning suddenly as white as a sheet of paper.

“To call logic to our aid.…”

“Georgy, why are you torturing me?” Zinaida Fyodorovna said suddenly in Russian in a breaking voice. “What is it for? Think of my misery.…”