verything was hanging
over him, there was nothing he expected so much as that she would
answer mockingly as before that his suspicions were absurd and
utterly groundless. So terrible to him was what he knew that now
he was ready to believe anything. But the expression of her
face, scared and gloomy, did not now promise even deception.

"Possibly I was mistaken," said he. "If so, I beg your pardon."

"No, you were not mistaken," she said deliberately, looking
desperately into his cold face. "You were not mistaken. I was,
and I could not help being in despair. I hear you, but I am
thinking of him. I love him, I am his mistress; I can't bear
you; I'm afraid of you, and I hate you.... You can do what you
like to me."

And dropping back into the corner of the carriage, she broke into
sobs, hiding her face in her hands. Alexey Alexandrovitch did
not stir, and kept looking straight before him. But his whole
face suddenly bore the solemn rigidity of the dead, and his
expression did not change during the whole time of the drive
home. On reaching the house he turned his head to her, still
with the same expression.

"Very well! But I expect a strict observance of the external
forms of propriety till such time"--his voice shook--"as I may
take measures to secure my honor and communicate them to you."

He got out first and helped her to get out. Before the servants
he pressed her hand, took his seat in the carriage, and drove
back to Petersburg. Immediately afterwards a footman came from
Princess Betsy and brought Anna a note.

"I sent to Alexey to find out how he is, and he writes me he is
quite well and unhurt, but in despair."

"So _he_ will be here," she thought. "What a good thing I told
him all!"

She glanced at her watch. She had still three hours to wait, and
the memories of their last meeting set her blood in flame.

"My God, how light it is! It's dreadful, but I do love to see
his face, and I do love this fantastic light.... My husband!
Oh! yes.... Well, thank God! everything's over with him."

Chapter 30

In the little German watering-place to which the Shtcherbatskys
had betaken themselves, as in all places indeed where people are
gathered together, the usual process, as it were, of the
crystallization of society went on, assigning to each member of
that society a definite and unalterable place. Just as the
particle of water in frost, definitely and unalterably, takes the
specia