Shiryaev walked on
and on. Far, far ahead he saw the inn, a dark patch against the grey
background of cloud. Beyond the inn, on the very horizon, he could see a
little hillock; this was the railway-station. That hillock reminded him
of the connection existing between the place where he was now standing
and Moscow, where street-lamps were burning and carriages were rattling
in the streets, where lectures were being given. And he almost wept
with depression and impatience. The solemn landscape, with its order and
beauty, the deathlike stillness all around, revolted him and moved him
to despair and hatred!

"Look out!" He heard behind him a loud voice.

An old lady of his acquaintance, a landowner of the neighbourhood, drove
past him in a light, elegant landau. He bowed to her, and smiled all
over his face. And at once he caught himself in that smile, which was so
out of keeping with his gloomy mood. Where did it come from if his whole
heart was full of vexation and misery? And he thought nature itself had
given man this capacity for lying, that even in difficult moments of
spiritual strain he might be able to hide the secrets of his nest as the
fox and the wild duck do. Every family has its joys and its horrors, but
however great they may be, it's hard for an outsider's eye to see them;
they are a secret. The father of the old lady who had just driven by,
for instance, had for some offence lain for half his lifetime under the
ban of the wrath of Tsar Nicolas I.; her husband had been a gambler; of
her four sons, not one had turned out well. One could imagine how many
terrible scenes there must have been in her life, how many tears must
have been shed. And yet the old lady seemed happy and satisfied, and
she had answered his smile by smiling too. The student thought of his
comrades, who did not like talking about their families; he thought of
his mother, who almost always lied when she had to speak of her husband
and children....

Pyotr walked about the roads far from home till dusk, abandoning
himself to dreary thoughts. When it began to drizzle with rain he turned
homewards. As he walked back he made up his mind at all costs to talk
to his father, to explain to him, once and for all, that it was dreadful
and oppressive to live with him.

He found perfect stillness in the house. His sister Varvara was lying
behind a screen with a headache, moaning faintly. His mother, with a
look of amazement and guilt upon her face,