half-turned away from his aunt, who was still sitting on the floor.

Platosha tried to remonstrate again, but Aratoff shouted at her in an
utterly unexpected and unusual manner:

"I am not a baby," he yelled, turning pale all over, while his lips
quivered and his eyes flashed viciously.--"I am six-and-twenty years of
age. I know what I am about,--I am free to do as I please!--I will not
permit any one.... Give me money for the journey; prepare a trunk with
linen and clothing ... and do not bother me! I shall return at the end
of a week, Platosha," he added, in a softer tone.

Platosha rose to her feet, grunting, and, making no further opposition,
wended her way to her chamber. Yasha had frightened her.--"I have not a
head on my shoulders," she remarked to the cook, who was helping her to
pack Yasha's things,--"not a head--but a bee-hive ... and what bees are
buzzing there I do not know! He is going away to Kazan, my mother, to
Ka-za-an!"

The cook, who had noticed their yard-porter talking for a long time to
the policeman about something, wanted to report this circumstance to her
mistress, but she did not dare, and merely thought to herself: "To
Kazan? If only it isn't some place further away!"--And Platonida
Ivanovna was so distracted that she did not even utter her customary
prayer.--In such a catastrophe as this even the Lord God could be of no
assistance!

That same day Aratoff set off for Kazan.

XII

No sooner had he arrived in that town and engaged a room at the hotel,
than he dashed off in search of the widow Milovidoff's house. During the
whole course of his journey he had been in a sort of stupor, which,
nevertheless, did not in the least prevent his taking all proper
measures,--transferring himself at Nizhni Novgorod from the railway to
the steamer, eating at the stations, and so forth. As before, he was
convinced that everything would be cleared up _there_, and accordingly
he banished from his thoughts all memories and speculations, contenting
himself with one thing,--the mental preparation of the speech in which
he was to set forth to Clara Militch's family the real reason of his
trip.--And now, at last, he had attained to the goal of his yearning,
and ordered the servant to announce him. He was admitted--with surprise
and alarm--but he was admitted.

The widow Milovidoff's house proved to be in fact just as Kupfer had
described it; and the widow herself really did resemble one of
Ostrovsk