of the gab when the
talk's about his--between ourselves let it be said--tedious Bulgaria.
What! do you say I am unjust? One remark more: you'll never come to
Christian names with him, and none ever has been on such terms with him.
I, of course, as an artist, am hateful to him; and I am proud of it. Dry
as dust, dry as dust, but he can crush all of us to powder. He's devoted
to his country--not like our empty patriots who fawn on the people; pour
into us, they say, thou living water! But, of course, his problem is
easier, more intelligible: he has only to drive the Turks out, a mighty
task. But all these qualities, thank God, don't please women. There's no
fascination, no charm about them, as there is about you and me.'

'Why do you bring me in?' muttered Bersenyev. 'And you are wrong in
all the rest; you are not in the least hateful to him, and with his own
countrymen he is on Christian name terms--that I know.'

'That's a different matter! For them he's a hero; but, to make a
confession, I have a very different idea of a hero; a hero ought not to
be able to talk; a hero should roar like a bull, but when he butts with
his horns, the walls shake. He ought not to know himself why he butts at
things, but just to butt at them. But, perhaps, in our days heroes of a
different stamp are needed.'

'Why are you so taken up with Insarov?' asked Bersenyev. 'Can you have
run here only to describe his character to me?'

'I came here,' began Shubin, 'because I was very miserable at home.'

'Oh, that's it! Don't you want to have a cry again?'

'You may laugh! I came here because I'm at my wits' end, because I am
devoured by despair, anger, jealousy.'

'Jealousy? of whom?'

'Of you and him and every one. I'm tortured by the thought that if I had
understood her sooner, if I had set to work cleverly--But what's the use
of talking! It must end by my always laughing, playing the fool, turning
things into ridicule as she says, and then setting to and strangling
myself.'

'Stuff, you won't strangle yourself,' observed Bersenyev.

'On such a night, of course not; but only let me live on till the
autumn. On such a night people do die too, but only of happiness. Ah,
happiness! Every shadow that stretches across the road from every tree
seems whispering now: "I know where there is happiness... shall I tell
you?" I would ask you to come for a walk, only now you're under the
influence of prose. Go to sleep, and may your dreams be visit