.. but do you know, Jennechka, I'm drawn to the
thieving trade the most, after all ... Daring, dangerous, hard, and
somehow intoxicating ... It's drawing me! ... Don't you mind that I'm
so respectable and modest, and can appear an educated young lady. I'm
entirely, entirely different."

Her eyes suddenly blazed up, vividly and gaily.

"There's a devil dwells in me!"

"It's all very well for you," pensively and with weariness pronounced
Jennie. "You at least desire something, but my soul is some sort of
carrion ... I'm twenty-five years old, now; but my soul is like that of
an old woman, shrivelled up, smelling of the earth ... And if I had
only lived sensibly! ... Ugh! ... There was only some sort of slush."

"Drop it, Jennka; you're talking foolishly. You're smart, you're
original; you have that special power before which men crawl and creep
so willingly. You go away from here, too. Not with me, of course--I'm
always single--but go away all by your own self."

Jennka shook her head and quietly, without tears, hid her face in her
palms.

"No," she responded dully, after a long silence, "no, this won't work
out with me: fate has chewed me all up! ... I'm not a human being any
more, but some sort of dirty cud ... Eh!" she suddenly made a gesture
of despair. 'Let's better drink some cognac, Jennechka,'" she addressed
herself, "'and let's suck the lemon a little! ...' Brr ... what nasty
stuff! ... And where does Annushka always get such abominable stuff? If
you smear a dog's wool with it, it will fall off ... And always, the
low-down thing, she'll take an extra half. Once I somehow ask
her--'What are you hoarding money for?' 'Well, I,' she says, 'am saving
it up for a wedding. What sort,' she says, 'of joy will it be for my
husband, that I'll offer him up my innocence alone! I must earn a few
hundreds in addition.' She's happy! ... I have here, Tamara, a little
money in the little box under the mirror; you pass it on to her,
please..."

"And what are you about, you fool; do you want to die, or what?"
sharply, with reproach, said Tamara.

"No, I'm saying it just so, if anything happens ... Take it, now, take
the money! Maybe they'll take me off to the hospital ... And how do you
know what's going to take place there? I left myself some small change,
if anything happens ... And supposing that I wanted to do something to
myself in downright earnest, Tamarochka--is it possible that you'd
interfere with me?"

Tamara