covery, he got up and strode out of the silent,
dim room with its silent old woman in the chair, that mother! He never
looked back. It was frankly a flight. But on opening the door he saw
his retreat cut off: There was the sister. He had never forgotten the
sister, only he had not expected to see her then--or ever any more,
perhaps. Her presence in the ante-room was as unforeseen as the
apparition of her brother had been. Razumov gave a start as though he
had discovered himself cleverly trapped. He tried to smile, but could
not manage it, and lowered his eyes. "Must I repeat that silly story
now?" he asked himself, and felt a sinking sensation. Nothing solid
had passed his lips since the day before, but he was not in a state to
analyse the origins of his weakness. He meant to take up his hat and
depart with as few words as possible, but Miss Haldin's swift movement
to shut the door took him by surprise. He half turned after her, but
without raising his eyes, passively, just as a feather might stir in the
disturbed air. The next moment she was back in the place she had started
from, with another half-turn on his part, so that they came again into
the same relative positions.

"Yes, yes," she said hurriedly. "I am very grateful to you, Kirylo
Sidorovitch, for coming at once--like this.... Only, I wish I had....
Did mother tell you?"

"I wonder what she could have told me that I did not know before," he
said, obviously to himself, but perfectly audible. "Because I always did
know it," he added louder, as if in despair.

He hung his head. He had such a strong sense of Natalia Haldin's
presence that to look at her he felt would be a relief. It was she who
had been haunting him now. He had suffered that persecution ever since
she had suddenly appeared before him in the garden of the Villa Borel
with an extended hand and the name of her brother on her lips....
The ante-room had a row of hooks on the wall nearest to the outer door,
while against the wall opposite there stood a small dark table and one
chair. The paper, bearing a very faint design, was all but white. The
light of an electric bulb high up under the ceiling searched that clear
square box into its four bare corners, crudely, without shadows--a
strange stage for an obscure drama.

"What do you mean?" asked Miss Haldin. "What is it that you knew
always?"

He raised his face, pale, full of unexpressed suffering. But that
look in his eyes of dull, absent obstinac