get free of her; and again there would be tears, boredom, a
disgusting existence, remorse, and so there would be no new life.
Deception and nothing more. A whole mountain of lies rose before
Laevsky's imagination. To leap over it at one bound and not to do
his lying piecemeal, he would have to bring himself to stern,
uncompromising action; for instance, to getting up without saying
a word, putting on his hat, and at once setting off without money
and without explanation. But Laevsky felt that was impossible for
him.

"Friday, Friday . . ." he thought. "Friday. . . ."

They wrote little notes, folded them in two, and put them in Nikodim
Alexandritch's old top-hat. When there were a sufficient heap of
notes, Kostya, who acted the part of postman, walked round the table
and delivered them. The deacon, Katya, and Kostya, who received
amusing notes and tried to write as funnily as they could, were
highly delighted.

"We must have a little talk," Nadyezhda Fyodorovna read in a little
note; she glanced at Marya Konstantinovna, who gave her an almond-oily
smile and nodded.

"Talk of what?" thought Nadyezhda Fyodorovna. "If one can't tell
the whole, it's no use talking."

Before going out for the evening she had tied Laevsky's cravat for
him, and that simple action filled her soul with tenderness and
sorrow. The anxiety in his face, his absent-minded looks, his pallor,
and the incomprehensible change that had taken place in him of late,
and the fact that she had a terrible revolting secret from him, and
the fact that her hands trembled when she tied his cravat--all
this seemed to tell her that they had not long left to be together.
She looked at him as though he were an ikon, with terror and
penitence, and thought: "Forgive, forgive."

Opposite her was sitting Atchmianov, and he never took his black,
love-sick eyes off her. She was stirred by passion; she was ashamed
of herself, and afraid that even her misery and sorrow would not
prevent her from yielding to impure desire to-morrow, if not to-day
--and that, like a drunkard, she would not have the strength to
stop herself.

She made up her mind to go away that she might not continue this
life, shameful for herself, and humiliating for Laevsky. She would
beseech him with tears to let her go; and if he opposed her, she
would go away secretly. She would not tell him what had happened;
let him keep a pure memory of her.

"I love you, I love you, I love you," she read.