iliar objects and wondered
that the tables, the windows, the chairs, the light, and the sea
stirred in him a keen, childish delight such as he had not known
for long, long years. Nadyezhda Fyodorovna, pale and haggard, could
not understand his gentle voice and strange movements; she made
haste to tell him everything that had happened to her. . . . It
seemed to her that very likely he scarcely heard and did not
understand her, and that if he did know everything he would curse
her and kill her, but he listened to her, stroked her face and hair,
looked into her eyes and said:

"I have nobody but you. . . ."

Then they sat a long while in the garden, huddled close together,
saying nothing, or dreaming aloud of their happy life in the future,
in brief, broken sentences, while it seemed to him that he had never
spoken at such length or so eloquently.

XXI

More than three months had passed.

The day came that Von Koren had fixed on for his departure. A cold,
heavy rain had been falling from early morning, a north-east wind
was blowing, and the waves were high on the sea. It was said that
the steamer would hardly be able to come into the harbour in such
weather. By the time-table it should have arrived at ten o'clock
in the morning, but Von Koren, who had gone on to the sea-front at
midday and again after dinner, could see nothing through the
field-glass but grey waves and rain covering the horizon.

Towards the end of the day the rain ceased and the wind began to
drop perceptibly. Von Koren had already made up his mind that he
would not be able to get off that day, and had settled down to play
chess with Samoylenko; but after dark the orderly announced that
there were lights on the sea and that a rocket had been seen.

Von Koren made haste. He put his satchel over his shoulder, and
kissed Samoylenko and the deacon. Though there was not the slightest
necessity, he went through the rooms again, said good-bye to the
orderly and the cook, and went out into the street, feeling that
he had left something behind, either at the doctor's or his lodging.
In the street he walked beside Samoylenko, behind them came the
deacon with a box, and last of all the orderly with two portmanteaus.
Only Samoylenko and the orderly could distinguish the dim lights
on the sea. The others gazed into the darkness and saw nothing. The
steamer had stopped a long way from the coast.

"Make haste, make haste," Von Koren hurried them. "I am afraid