said, "wouldn't it be as well to send for some
specialist on internal diseases from Moscow? What do you think of
it?"

The doctor sighed, shrugged his shoulders, and made a vague gesture
with his hands.

It was evident that he was offended. He was a very huffy man, prone
to take offence, and always ready to suspect that people did not
believe in him, that he was not recognised or properly respected,
that his patients exploited him, and that his colleagues showed him
ill-will. He was always jeering at himself, saying that fools like
him were only made for the public to ride rough-shod over them.

Yulia Sergeyevna lighted the lamp. She was tired out with the
service, and that was evident from her pale, exhausted face, and
her weary step. She wanted to rest. She sat down on the sofa, put
her hands on her lap, and sank into thought. Laptev knew that he
was ugly, and now he felt as though he were conscious of his ugliness
all over his body. He was short, thin, with ruddy cheeks, and his
hair had grown so thin that his head felt cold. In his expression
there was none of that refined simplicity which makes even rough,
ugly faces attractive; in the society of women, he was awkward,
over-talkative, affected. And now he almost despised himself for
it. He must talk that Yulia Sergeyevna might not be bored in his
company. But what about? About his sister's illness again?

And he began to talk about medicine, saying what is usually said.
He approved of hygiene, and said that he had long ago wanted to
found a night-refuge in Moscow--in fact, he had already calculated
the cost of it. According to his plan the workmen who came in the
evening to the night-refuge were to receive a supper of hot cabbage
soup with bread, a warm, dry bed with a rug, and a place for drying
their clothes and their boots.

Yulia Sergeyevna was usually silent in his presence, and in a strange
way, perhaps by the instinct of a lover, he divined her thoughts
and intentions. And now, from the fact that after the evening service
she had not gone to her room to change her dress and drink tea, he
deduced that she was going to pay some visit elsewhere.

"But I'm in no hurry with the night-refuge," he went on, speaking
with vexation and irritability, and addressing the doctor, who
looked at him, as it were, blankly and in perplexity, evidently
unable to understand what induced him to raise the question of
medicine and hygiene. "And most likely it will be a long