the table so that everything on it trembled,
including a forty-pound weight, which happened to be lying near the ink
pot.

When Markelov and Nejdanov began discussing ways and means of executing
their plans, Solomin listened with respectful curiosity, but did not
pronounce a single word. Their talk lasted until four o'clock in the
morning, when they had touched upon almost everything under the sun.
Markelov again spoke mysteriously of Kisliakov's untiring journeys and
his letters, which were becoming more interesting than ever. He promised
to show them to Nejdanov, saying that he would probably have to take
them away with him, as they were rather lengthy and written in an
illegible handwriting. He assured him that there was a great deal of
learning in them and even poetry, not of the frivolous kind, but poetry
with a socialistic tendency!

From Kisliakov, Markelov went on to the military, to adjutants, Germans,
even got so far as his articles on the shortcomings of the artillery,
whilst Nejdanov spoke about the antagonism between Heine and Borne,
Proudhon, and realism in art. Solomin alone sat listening and
reflecting, the smile never leaving his lips. Without having uttered a
single word, he seemed to understand better than the others where the
essential difficulty lay.

The hour struck four. Nejdanov and Markelov could scarcely stand on
their legs from exhaustion, while Solomin was as fresh as could be. They
parted for the night, having agreed to go to town the next day to see
the merchant Golushkin, an Old Believer, who was said to be very zealous
and promised proselytes.

Solomin doubted whether it was worth while going, but agreed to go in
the end.

XVII

MARKELOV'S guests were still asleep when a messenger with a letter
came to him from his sister, Madame Sipiagina. In this letter Valentina
Mihailovna spoke about various little domestic details, asked him to
return a book he had borrowed, and added, by the way, in a postscript,
the very "amusing" piece of news that his old flame Mariana was in love
with the tutor Nejdanov and he with her. This was not merely gossip, but
she, Valentina Mihailovna, had seen with her own eyes and heard with her
own ears. Markelov's face grew blacker than night, but he did not utter
a word. He ordered the book to be returned, and when he caught sight of
Nejdanov coming downstairs, greeted him just as usual and did not even
forget to give him the promised packet of Kislia