gid in the
posture described above--his mouth awry, his eyes gleaming. So
this is what has happened! In a few weeks after the death of the
hapless Cara he is active and triumphant; he hurls his lariat on
the golden calf and captures new millions. A demi-god! A Titan!
The king of markets! He sweeps forward in seven-league boots over
roads, at the crossing-points of which are Americans with
milliards, they are millionnaires no longer, but masters of
milliards. He is the man who, as Baron Emil said, knows how to
will.

Still, how small he seemed and devoid of desire at the hour when
he stood near the corpse of his daughter, joined with the silent
smoke of the censer, which rose like light mist in the air. How
petty he appeared at that juncture, crushed, as it were, by some
giant hand--not a demi-god in any sense, or a Titan, but rather
an insect, pushing into some narrow cranny to hide from a bird of
prey. Kranitski had seen Darvid then, for, on hearing of the
misfortune, no power on earth or in hell could have stopped him
from running, from flying to the house where it had happened.

That misfortune had pierced his heart. And straightaway he felt,
also, those inward and other pains which for some time had
attacked him without pity and more frequently; but, in spite of
his pains, he ran on without a thought that he had been forbidden
that house, or a thought of what might meet him within it. He
entered, and by well-known ways went directly to the chambers of
the lady. Happen what might, he must see, in such a terrible
moment, that woman, that saint, that mild and noble being. She
was surrounded by many; there was a throng of people about her,
but he did not see who they were, nor did he think what they
might say of him. Before his eyes was a mist which veiled all
things in front of him, save the face of that woman so dreadfully
changed and grown old recently; that woman who no longer had the
bright aureole of pale, golden hair above her forehead, but on
that forehead and across the whole width of it was the dark
furrow of a deep wrinkle. Without seeing, or greeting a person,
he walked up to her directly, and, dropping on his knees, pressed
to his lips the hem of her mourning garment. He did this without
the trace of a plan, without forethought; he did it through an
impulse which threw him at the feet of the woman. That action
came from his heart, and from his heart only. For never was
anyone like her, he thought. Many