ou if I'd
known? I was told it would be another ten days! Where are you going?...
Where are you going? You mustn't dare!"

"To fetch a midwife! I'll sell the revolver. We must get money before
anything else now."

"Don't dare to do anything, don't dare to fetch a midwife! Bring a
peasant woman, any old woman, I've eighty kopecks in my purse....
Peasant women have babies without midwives.... And if I die, so much the
better...."

"You shall have a midwife and an old woman too. But how am I to leave
you alone, Marie!"

But reflecting that it was better to leave her alone now in spite of
her desperate state than to leave her without help later, he paid
no attention to her groans, nor her angry exclamations, but rushed
downstairs, hurrying all he could.

III

First of all he went to Kirillov. It was by now about one o'clock in the
night. Kirillov was standing in the middle of the room.

"Kirillov, my wife is in childbirth."

"How do you mean?"

"Childbirth, bearing a child!"

"You... are not mistaken?"

"Oh, no, no, she is in agonies! I want a woman, any old woman, I must
have one at once.... Can you get one now? You used to have a lot of old
women...."

"Very sorry that I am no good at childbearing," Kirillov answered
thoughtfully; "that is, not at childbearing, but at doing anything for
childbearing... or... no, I don't know how to say it."

"You mean you can't assist at a confinement yourself? But that's not
what I've come for. An old woman, I want a woman, a nurse, a servant!"

"You shall have an old woman, but not directly, perhaps... If you like
I'll come instead...."

"Oh, impossible; I am running to Madame Virginsky, the midwife, now."

"A horrid woman!"

"Oh, yes, Kirillov, yes, but she is the best of them all. Yes, it'll all
be without reverence, without gladness, with contempt, with abuse, with
blasphemy in the presence of so great a mystery, the coming of a new
creature! Oh, she is cursing it already!"

"If you like I'll..."

"No, no, but while I'm running (oh, I'll make Madame Virginsky come),
will you go to the foot of my staircase and quietly listen? But don't
venture to go in, you'll frighten her; don't go in on any account, you
must only listen... in case anything dreadful happens. If anything very
bad happens, then run in."

"I understand. I've another rouble. Here it is. I meant to have a fowl
to-morrow, but now I don't want to, make haste, run with all your might.
There's a s