sgust, and realised that he was in hysterics.

"How hideous, how shameful!" he thought, feeling the warmth of tears
on his face. ". . . Oh, oh, what a disgrace! It has never happened
to me. . . ."

They took him under his arms, and supporting his head from behind,
led him away; a glass gleamed before his eyes and knocked against
his teeth, and the water was spilt on his breast; he was in a little
room, with two beds in the middle, side by side, covered by two
snow-white quilts. He dropped on one of the beds and sobbed.

"It's nothing, it's nothing," Samoylenko kept saying; "it does
happen . . . it does happen. . . ."

Chill with horror, trembling all over and dreading something awful,
Nadyezhda Fyodorovna stood by the bedside and kept asking:

"What is it? What is it? For God's sake, tell me."

"Can Kirilin have written him something?" she thought.

"It's nothing," said Laevsky, laughing and crying; "go away, darling."

His face expressed neither hatred nor repulsion: so he knew nothing;
Nadyezhda Fyodorovna was somewhat reassured, and she went into the
drawing-room.

"Don't agitate yourself, my dear!" said Marya Konstantinovna, sitting
down beside her and taking her hand. "It will pass. Men are just
as weak as we poor sinners. You are both going through a crisis. . . .
One can so well understand it! Well, my dear, I am waiting for
an answer. Let us have a little talk."

"No, we are not going to talk," said Nadyezhda Fyodorovna, listening
to Laevsky's sobs. "I feel depressed. . . . You must allow me to
go home."

"What do you mean, what do you mean, my dear?" cried Marya
Konstantinovna in alarm. "Do you think I could let you go without
supper? We will have something to eat, and then you may go with my
blessing."

"I feel miserable . . ." whispered Nadyezhda Fyodorovna, and she
caught at the arm of the chair with both hands to avoid falling.

"He's got a touch of hysterics," said Von Koren gaily, coming into
the drawing-room, but seeing Nadyezhda Fyodorovna, he was taken
aback and retreated.

When the attack was over, Laevsky sat on the strange bed and thought.

"Disgraceful! I've been howling like some wretched girl! I must
have been absurd and disgusting. I will go away by the back stairs
. . . . But that would seem as though I took my hysterics too seriously.
I ought to take it as a joke. . . ."

He looked in the looking-glass, sat there for some time, and went
back into the drawing-room.

"Here