"Now, my girl, tell me all the details; sit beside me, so. Well?"

"I met Stepan Trofimovich..."

"Wait, stop. I warn you that if you lie or hold anything back, I'll dig you up out of the ground. Well?"

"Stepan Trofimovich and I ... as soon as I came to Khatovo, ma'am..." Sofya Matveevna was almost suffocating...

"Wait, stop, be quiet; what's all this stammering? First of all, whatsort of bird are you?"

The woman told her haphazardly, though in the briefest terms, about herself, beginning with Sebastopol. Varvara Petrovna listened silently, sitting straight-backed on her chair, looking sternly and steadily straight into the narrator's eyes.

"Why are you so cowed? Why do you look at the ground? I like people who look straight and argue with me. Go on."

She finished telling about their meeting, about the books, about how Stepan Trofimovich treated the peasant woman to vodka...

"Right, right, don't leave out the smallest detail," Varvara Petrovna encouraged her. Finally, she told of how they had set off and how Stepan Trofimovich had kept talking, "already completely sick, ma'am," and even spent several hours here telling her his whole life from the very first beginning.

"Tell me about the life."

Sofya Matveevna suddenly faltered and was completely nonplussed.

"I couldn't say anything about that, ma'am," she spoke all but in tears, "and, besides, I hardly understood anything."

"Lies—it's impossible that you understood nothing at all."

"He was telling for a long time about some black-haired noble lady, ma'am," Sofya Matveevna blushed terribly, incidentally noticing Varvara Petrovna's fair hair and her total lack of resemblance to the "brunette."

"Black-haired? What, precisely? Speak!"

"How this noble lady was very much in love with him, ma'am, all her life, a whole twenty years; but she didn't dare open her heart and was ashamed before him, because she was very portly, ma'am..."

"Fool!" Varvara Petrovna snapped out, pensively but resolutely.

Sofya Matveevna was now completely in tears.

"I can't tell anything right about it, because I myself was in great fear for him and couldn't understand him, since he's such an intelligent man..."

"It's not for a crow like you to judge his intelligence. Did he offer you his hand?"

The narrator trembled.

"Didhe fall in love with you? Speak! He offered you his hand?" Varvara Petrovna yelled.

"That's nearly how it was, ma'am," she sobbed. "Only I took it all for nothing, on account of his illness," she added firmly, raising her eyes.

"What is your name, name and patronymic?"

"Sofya Matveevna, ma'am."

"Let it be known to you, then, Sofya Matveevna, that he is the paltriest, the emptiest little man... Lord, Lord! Do you take me for some vile creature?"

The woman goggled her eyes.

"A vile creature, a tyrant? Who ruined his life?"

"How could that be, ma'am, seeing you yourself are weeping?"

Varvara Petrovna did indeed have tears in her eyes.

"Well, sit down, sit down, don't be frightened. Look me in the eyes again, straight; why are you blushing? Dasha, come here, look at her: what do you think, is her heart pure?..."

And to Sofya Matveevna's surprise, and perhaps still greater fright, she suddenly patted her on the cheek.

"Only it's a pity you're a fool. Too great a fool for your years. Very well, my dear, I shall concern myself with you. I see that this is all nonsense. Stay nearby for the time being, lodgings will be rented, and I'll provide board and everything... till I ask for you."

The frightened Sofya Matveevna tried to peep that she must hurry.

"You don't have to hurry anywhere. I'm buying all your books, and you can stay here. Quiet, no excuses. After all, if I hadn't come, you wouldn't have left him, would you?"

"I wouldn't have left him for anything, ma'am," Sofya Matveevna said softly and firmly, wiping her eyes.

It was late at night when Dr. Salzfisch was brought. He was a rather venerable old man, and quite an experienced practitioner, who had recently lost his official position in our town as the result of some ambitious quarrel with his superiors. Varvara Petrovna had instantly begun "patronizing" him with all her might. He examined the patient attentively, asked questions, and cautiously announced to Varvara Petrovna that the "sufferer's" condition was quite doubtful, owing to the occurrence of a complication in the illness, and that one must expect "even all the worst." Varvara Petrovna, who in twenty years had grown unaccustomed even to thinking that anything serious and decisive could proceed from Stepan Trofimovich personally, was deeply shaken, and even turned pale:

"Is there really no hope?"

"How could it be that there is by no means not any hope at all, but..."

She did not go to bed that night and could barely wait until morning. As soon as the sick man opened his eyes and regained consciousness (he had been conscious all the while, though he was growing weaker by the hour), she accosted him with the most resolute air:

"Stepan Trofimovich, one must foresee everything. I have sent for a priest. You have to fulfill your duty..."

Knowing his convictions, she greatly feared a refusal. He looked at her in surprise.

"Nonsense, nonsense!" she cried out, thinking he was already refusing. "This is no time for mischief. Enough foolery."

"But... am I really so ill?"

He pensively agreed. And, generally, I was greatly surprised to learn afterwards from Varvara Petrovna that he was not in the least afraid of death. Perhaps he simply did not believe it and continued to regard his illness as a trifle.

He confessed and took communion quite willingly. Everyone, including Sofya Matveevna, and even the servants, came to congratulate him on receiving the Holy Sacrament. Everyone to a man wept restrainedly, looking at his pinched and worn-out face and his pale, quivering lips.

"Oui, mes amis, and I am only surprised that you are... fussing so. Tomorrow I'll probably get up and we'll ... set off ... Toute cette cérémonie^[ccxx]... which, to be sure, I give all its due... has been..."

"I beg you, father, to be sure to stay with the sick man," Varvara Petrovna quickly stopped the priest, who was already taking off his vestments. "As soon as tea has been served, I beg you to start talking immediately about things divine, to bolster his faith."

The priest started to speak; everyone was sitting or standing near the sick man's bed.

"In our sinful times," the priest began smoothly, a cup of tea in his hands, "faith in the Most High is the only refuge for mankind in all the trials and tribulations of life, as well as in the hope of eternal bliss promised to the righteous..."

Stepan Trofimovich grew all animated, as it were; a subtle smile flitted across his lips.

"Mon pire, je vous remercie, et vous êtes bien bon, mais ... "^[ccxxi]

"No, no, no mais, no mais at all!" Varvara Petrovna exclaimed, leaping from her chair. "Father," she turned to the priest, "this, this is the sort of man, the sort of man ... he'll have to be reconfessed again in an hour. That's the sort of man he is!"

Stepan Trofimovich smiled restrainedly.

"My friends," he said, "God is necessary for me if only because he is the one being who can be loved eternally..."