elegant, but this was my wife with whom I had once lived, and with
whom I should have been living to this day if it had not been for her
unfortunate character; she was the one human being on the terrestrial
globe whom I loved. At this moment, just before going away, when I knew
that I should no longer see her even through the window, she seemed to
me fascinating even as she was, cold and forbidding, answering me with
a proud and contemptuous mockery. I was proud of her, and confessed to
myself that to go away from her was terrible and impossible.

"Pavel Andreitch," she said after a brief silence, "for two years we
have not interfered with each other but have lived quietly. Why do you
suddenly feel it necessary to go back to the past? Yesterday you came to
insult and humiliate me," she went on, raising her voice, and her face
flushed and her eyes flamed with hatred; "but restrain yourself; do not
do it, Pavel Andreitch! Tomorrow I will send in a petition and they will
give me a passport, and I will go away; I will go! I will go! I'll go
into a convent, into a widows' home, into an almshouse...."

"Into a lunatic asylum!" I cried, not able to restrain myself.

"Well, even into a lunatic asylum! That would be better, that would be
better," she cried, with flashing eyes. "When I was in Pestrovo today I
envied the sick and starving peasant women because they are not living
with a man like you. They are free and honest, while, thanks to you,
I am a parasite, I am perishing in idleness, I eat your bread, I spend
your money, and I repay you with my liberty and a fidelity which is of
no use to any one. Because you won't give me a passport, I must respect
your good name, though it doesn't exist."

I had to keep silent. Clenching my teeth, I walked quickly into the
drawing-room, but turned back at once and said:

"I beg you earnestly that there should be no more assemblies, plots,
and meetings of conspirators in my house! I only admit to my house those
with whom I am acquainted, and let all your crew find another place
to do it if they want to take up philanthropy. I can't allow people at
midnight in my house to be shouting hurrah at successfully exploiting an
hysterical woman like you!"

My wife, pale and wringing her hands, took a rapid stride across the
room, uttering a prolonged moan as though she had toothache. With a wave
of my hand, I went into the drawing-room. I was choking with rage, and
at the same time I was trem