in answer."

This made Nadezhda smile, and then whisper with a confiding glance at
my face:

"You see, I have made a full confession to her. I went and said to her:
'Mamenka, I have had a misfortune.' And her only reply as she stroked
my hair was, 'Ah, little fool!' Thus you see that she pities me. And
what makes her care the less that I should stray in that direction is
that she yearns for me to bear her a child, a grandchild, as an heir to
her property."

Next, Gubin was heard saying within the room:

"Whensoever an offence is done against the law I..."

At once a stream of impressive words from the other drowned his
utterance:

"An offence is not always an offence of moment, since sometimes a
person outgrows the law, and finds it too restrictive. No one person
ought to be rated against another. For whom alone ought we to fear?
Only the God in whose sight all of us have erred!"

And though in the elderly lady's voice there was weariness and
distaste, the words were spoken slowly and incisively. Upon this Gubin
tried to murmur something or another, but again his utterance failed to
edge its way into his interlocutor's measured periods:

"No great achievement is it," she said, "to condemn a fellow creature.
For always it is easy to sit in judgment upon our fellows. And even if
a fellow creature be allowed to pursue an evil course unchecked, his
offence may yet prove productive of good. Remember how in every case
the Saints reached God. Yet how truly sanctified, by the time that they
did so reach Him, were they? Let this ever be borne in mind, for we are
over-apt to condemn and punish!"

"In former days, Natalia Vassilievna, you took away from me my
substance, you took my all. Also, let me recount to you how we fell
into disagreement."

"No; there is no need for that."

"Thereafter, I ceased to be able to bear the contemplation of myself; I
ceased to consider myself as of any value."

"Let the past remain the past. That which must be is not to be avoided."

"Through you, I say, I lost my peace of mind."

Nadezhda nudged me, and whispered with gay malice:

"That is probably true, for they say that once he was one of her
lovers."

Then she recollected herself and, clapping her hands to her face, cried
through her fingers:

"Oh good Lord! What have I said? No, no, you must not believe these
tales. They are only slanders, for she is the best of women."

"When evil has been done," continued the quiet