be too little and ten lines would be enough. Ten lines would
be enough to ask you to be a nurse. Since I left Skvoreshniki I've been
living at the sixth station on the line, at the stationmaster's. I got
to know him in the time of debauchery five years ago in Petersburg. No
one knows I am living there. Write to him. I enclose the address.

"Nikolay Stavrogin."

Darya Pavlovna went at once and showed the letter to Varvara Petrovna.
She read it and asked Dasha to go out of the room so that she might read
it again alone; but she called her back very quickly.

"Are you going?" she asked almost timidly.

"I am going," answered Dasha.

"Get ready! We'll go together."

Dasha looked at her inquiringly.

"What is there left for me to do here? What difficulty will it make?
I'll be naturalised in Uri, too, and live in the valley.... Don't be
uneasy, I won't be in the way."

They began packing quickly to be in time to catch the midday train.
But in less than half an hour's time Alexey Yegorytch arrived from
Skvoreshniki. He announced that Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch had suddenly
arrived that morning by the early train, and was now at Skvoreshniki but
"in such a state that his honour did not answer any questions, walked
through all the rooms and shut himself up in his own wing...."

"Though I received no orders I thought it best to come and inform you,"
Alexey Yegorytch concluded with a very significant expression.

Varvara Petrovna looked at him searchingly and did not question him. The
carriage was got ready instantly. Varvara Petrovna set off with Dasha.
They say that she kept crossing herself on the journey.

In Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch's wing of the house all the doors were open
and he was nowhere to be seen.

"Wouldn't he be upstairs?" Fomushka ventured.

It was remarkable that several servants followed Varvara Petrovna while
the others all stood waiting in the drawing-room. They would never have
dared to commit such a breach of etiquette before. Varvara Petrovna saw
it and said nothing.

They went upstairs. There there were three rooms; but they found no one
there.

"Wouldn't his honour have gone up there?" some one suggested, pointing
to the door of the loft. And in-fact, the door of the loft which was
always closed had been opened and was standing ajar. The loft was right
under the roof and was reached by a long, very steep and narrow wooden
ladder. There was a sort of little room up there too.

"I am not goi