time, too,
before I make use of our estimate. I fear our night-shelter will
fall into the hands of our pious humbugs and philanthropic ladies,
who always ruin any undertaking."

Yulia Sergeyevna got up and held out her hand to Laptev.

"Excuse me," she said, "it's time for me to go. Please give my love
to your sister."

"Ru-ru-ru-ru," hummed the doctor. "Ru-ru-ru-ru."

Yulia Sergeyevna went out, and after staying a little longer, Laptev
said good-bye to the doctor and went home. When a man is dissatisfied
and feels unhappy, how trivial seem to him the shapes of the
lime-trees, the shadows, the clouds, all the beauties of nature,
so complacent, so indifferent! By now the moon was high up in the
sky, and the clouds were scudding quickly below. "But how naive and
provincial the moon is, how threadbare and paltry the clouds!"
thought Laptev. He felt ashamed of the way he had talked just now
about medicine, and the night-refuge. He felt with horror that next
day he would not have will enough to resist trying to see her and
talk to her again, and would again be convinced that he was nothing
to her. And the day after--it would be the same. With what object?
And how and when would it all end?

At home he went in to see his sister. Nina Fyodorovna still looked
strong and gave the impression of being a well-built, vigorous
woman, but her striking pallor made her look like a corpse, especially
when, as now, she was lying on her back with her eyes closed; her
eldest daughter Sasha, a girl of ten years old, was sitting beside
her reading aloud from her reading-book.

"Alyosha has come," the invalid said softly to herself.

There had long been established between Sasha and her uncle a tacit
compact, to take turns in sitting with the patient. On this occasion
Sasha closed her reading-book, and without uttering a word, went
softly out of the room. Laptev took an historical novel from the
chest of drawers, and looking for the right page, sat down and began
reading it aloud.

Nina Fyodorovna was born in Moscow of a merchant family. She and
her two brothers had spent their childhood and early youth, living
at home in Pyatnitsky Street. Their childhood was long and wearisome;
her father treated her sternly, and had even on two or three occasions
flogged her, and her mother had had a long illness and died. The
servants were coarse, dirty, and hypocritical; the house was
frequented by priests and monks, also hypocritical; they at