ary," she went on, "I'm only too grateful to you for
speaking; but for you I might not have known of it. My eyes are opened
for the first time for twenty years. Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch, you
said just now that you had been expressly informed; surely Stepan
Trofimovitch hasn't written to you in the same style?"

"I did get a very harmless and... and... very generous letter from
him...."

"You hesitate, you pick out your words. That's enough! Stepan
Trofimovitch, I request a great favour from you." She suddenly turned to
him with flashing eyes. "Kindly leave us at once, and never set foot in
my house again."

I must beg the reader to remember her recent "exaltation," which had not
yet passed. It's true that Stepan Trofimovitch was terribly to blame!
But what was a complete surprise to me then was the wonderful dignity of
his bearing under his son's "accusation," which he had never thought of
interrupting, and before Varvara Petrovna's "denunciation." How did he
come by such spirit? I only found out one thing, that he had certainly
been deeply wounded at his first meeting with Petrusha, by the way he
had embraced him. It was a deep and genuine grief; at least in his eyes
and to his heart. He had another grief at the same time, that is the
poignant consciousness of having acted contemptibly. He admitted this
to me afterwards with perfect openness. And you know real genuine sorrow
will sometimes make even a phenomenally frivolous, unstable man solid
and stoical; for a short time at any rate; what's more, even fools are
by genuine sorrow turned into wise men, also only for a short time of
course; it is characteristic of sorrow. And if so, what might not
happen with a man like Stepan Trofimovitch? It worked a complete
transformation--though also only for a time, of course.

He bowed with dignity to Varvara Petrovna without uttering a word (there
was nothing else left for him to do, indeed). He was on the point of
going out without a word, but could not refrain from approaching Darya
Pavlovna. She seemed to foresee that he would do so, for she began
speaking of her own accord herself, in utter dismay, as though in haste
to anticipate him.

"Please, Stepan Trofimovitch, for God's sake, don't say anything," she
began, speaking with haste and excitement, with a look of pain in her
face, hurriedly stretching out her hands to him. "Be sure that I still
respect you as much... and think just as highly of you, and... think
well of