book, about ten
pages in length, no more, and offered it to Aratoff. The latter grasped
it eagerly, recognised the irregular, bold handwriting,--the handwriting
of that anonymous letter,--opened it at random, and began at the
following lines:

"Moscow--Tuesday ... June. I sang and recited at a literary
morning. To-day is a significant day for me. _It must decide my
fate_." (These words were doubly underlined.) "Once more I have
seen...." Here followed several lines which had been carefully
blotted out.--And then: "No! no! no!... I must return to my former
idea, if only...."

Aratoff dropped the hand in which he held the book, and his head sank
quietly on his breast.

"Read!" cried Anna.--"Why don't you read? Read from the beginning....
You can read the whole of it in five minutes, though this diary extends
over two whole years. In Kazan she wrote nothing...."

Aratoff slowly rose from his chair, and fairly crashed down on his knees
before Anna!

She was simply petrified with amazement and terror.

"Give ... give me this diary," said Aratoff in a fainting voice.--"Give
it to me ... and the photograph ... you must certainly have another--but
I will return the diary to you.... But I must, I must...."

In his entreaty, in the distorted features of his face there was
something so despairing that it even resembled wrath, suffering.... And
in reality he was suffering. It seemed as though he had not been able to
foresee that such a calamity would descend upon him, and was excitedly
begging to be spared, to be saved....

"Give it to me," he repeated.

"But ... you ... you were not in love with my sister?" said Anna at
last.

Aratoff continued to kneel.

"I saw her twice in all ... believe me!... and if I had not been
impelled by causes which I myself cannot clearly either understand or
explain ... if some power that is stronger than I were not upon me.... I
would not have asked you.... I would not have come hither.... I must ...
I ought ... why, you said yourself that I was bound to restore her
image!"

"And you were not in love with my sister?" asked Anna for the second
time.

Aratoff did not reply at once, and turned away slightly, as though with
pain.

"Well, yes! I was! I was!--And I am in love with her now...." he
exclaimed with the same desperation as before.

Footsteps became audible in the adjoining room.

"Rise ... rise ..." said Anna hastily. "My mother is coming."