lievitch in
another. Of course Semyonov took Durward's bed. There was nowhere else
for him to go. I don't know what he thought about it. Of course he
said nothing. He talked a little about ordinary things and I answered
stupidly as I always do with him. I hated the solemn way he undressed.
He was a long time cleaning his teeth, making noises in his mouth as
though he were laughing at me. Then he sat on his bed, naked except
for his shirt, combing his moustache and beard very carefully with a
pocket-comb. He was so thick and solid and scornful, not looking at me
exactly, just staring in front of him. There was no sound except his
comb scraping through his beard. The room was so small and he seemed
absolutely to fill it, so that I felt really _flattened_ against the
wall. It was as though he were showing me deliberately how much finer
a man he was than I, how much stronger his body, that he could do
_anything_ with me if he liked. He asked me, very politely, whether
I'd mind blowing out the candle and I did it at once. He watched me as
I walked across the floor and I felt ashamed of my thinness and my
ugliness and _I know that he knew that I was ashamed_. After the light
was blown out I heard him settle into his bed with a great heavy plop.
I couldn't sleep for a long time, and at every movement that he made I
felt as though he were laughing at me. And yet with all this I had
also the strangest impulse to get up, there in the dark, to walk
across the room, to put my hand on his shoulder and to ask him about
her. What would he do? He'd refuse to speak, I suppose. I should only
get insulted--and yet.... He must be thinking of her--all the time
just as I am. He must _want_ to talk of her and I know her better than
any one else did. And perhaps if I once broke down his pride ... and
yet every time that his body moved and the bed creaked I felt that I
hated him, that I never wanted to speak to him again, that.... Oh! but
I'm ashamed of myself. He is right to despise me....

_Saturday, July 31st._ It is just midnight. I am on duty to-night.
Everything is quiet and there are not likely I think to be any more
wounded until the morning. I am sitting in the room where they brought
Marie. It's strange to think of that, and when you're sitting with a
candle in a dark room you can imagine anything. It's odd in this
affair how little things affect one. There's a book here, a "Report on
New Mexico." I looked at it idly the other day and