se. Madame Gregoriev, lying motionless in the
half-light of her room during the morning hours, preceding the impending
ordeal, was filled with a sense of unreality, of wonder at the stir that
was suddenly being created about her. For years she had been accustomed
to a life of systematic neglect. For months she had borne her bodily
torment silently and without hope of aid. Now, in one day, as it seemed,
she had become the centre of a new world. There were two professional
nurses to anticipate her every want, while old Masha, hitherto her one
attendant, cowered snuffling in a dark corner of the room. At her
bedside her husband, his black eyes dulled with trouble, sat side by
side with Vassily, the brother, whose manner had never before so
softened in addressing her. And his voice grew husky as he persisted in
the assurances of perfect recovery that he could not himself believe.
Lastly, and best of all, Caroline was coming: was, indeed, already on
her rapid way. All things had been done for her comfort; yet none of
them weighed for a moment in the balance with her one, great, unvoiced
desire: the desire to see and talk to her boy before she yielded herself
to that mysterious unconsciousness from which she had not the smallest
hope of emerging. But she was now wholly under Michael's sway. She
realized that he was acting for Ivan's peace of mind: that in so acting
he had himself some hope of her recovery. And, remembering his new
consideration for her, she could not bring herself to dispute him. When,
at the hour named, the surgeons and their assistants entered her room,
she received the kisses of husband and brother upon an unwrinkled brow;
and, as she lifted her head towards the sweet-smelling sponge, there was
a faint smile upon her lips, a gleam of relief in her tired eyes.

Vassily Blashkov and his black brother-in-law waited together at
Sophia's bedside till her unconsciousness was complete; and then both
stood, reverently, while the limp body was carried from the room. For
the first time in their lives these two utterly selfish men looked into
each other's eyes with but one comprehensive thought, which was all for
another. Each man was suddenly white with unwonted feeling; for there
was something in the pose of that helpless form which brought home, with
a poignant stab, a sudden realization of her neglected life.

Still acting upon common impulse the two presently descended, side by
side, to Michael's official room,