e, let's embrace." Lean and thin he clasped her neck in his
powerful arms, looked into her eyes, and smiled. "It seems to me I've
fallen in love with you. I keep embracing you all the time."

She was silent, kissing his forehead and cheeks, and her hands
quivered. For fear he might notice it, she unclasped them.

"Go. Very well. Be careful to-morrow. This is what you should
do--send the boy in the morning--Liudmila has a boy for the
purpose--let him go to the house porter and ask him whether I'm home or
not. I'll forewarn the porter; he's a good fellow, and I'm a friend of
his. Well, good-by, comrades. I wish you all good."

On the street Sasha said quietly to the mother:

"He'll go as simply as this to his death, if necessary. And apparently
he'll hurry up a little in just the same way; when death stares him in
the face he'll adjust his eyeglasses, and will say 'admirable,' and
will die."

"I love him," whispered the mother.

"I'm filled with astonishment; but love him--no. I respect him highly.
He's sort of dry, although good and even, if you please, sometimes
soft; but not sufficiently human--it seems to me we're being followed.
Come, let's part. Don't enter Liudmila's place if you think a spy is
after you."

"I know," said the mother. Sasha, however, persistently added: "Don't
enter. In that case, come to me. Good-by for the present."

She quickly turned around and walked back. The mother called "Good-by"
after her.

Within a few minutes she sat all frozen through at the stove in
Liudmila's little room. Her hostess, Liudmila, in a black dress girded
up with a strap, slowly paced up and down the room, filling it with a
rustle and the sound of her commanding voice. A fire was crackling in
the stove and drawing in the air from the room. The woman's voice
sounded evenly.

"People are a great deal more stupid than bad. They can see only
what's near to them, what it's possible to grasp immediately; but
everything that's near is cheap; what's distant is dear. Why, in
reality, it would be more convenient and pleasanter for all if life
were different, were lighter, and the people were more sensible. But to
attain the distant you must disturb yourself for the immediate
present----"

Nilovna tried to guess where this woman did her printing. The room had
three windows facing the street; there was a sofa and a bookcase, a
table, chairs, a bed at the wall, in the corner near it a wash basin,
in