“‘Nikolay Anastasyitch!’ she said, crying and laughing and looking at me with wet shining eyes, ’I shall never forget your sympathy . . . .  How good you are!  All of you are so splendid—­all of you!  Honest, great-hearted, kind, clever. . . .  Ah, how good that is!’

“She saw in me a highly educated man, advanced in every sense of the word, and on her tear-stained laughing face, together with the emotion and enthusiasm aroused by my personality, there was clearly written regret that she so rarely saw such people, and that God had not vouchsafed her the bliss of being the wife of one of them.  She muttered, ‘Ah, how splendid it is!’ The childish gladness on her face, the tears, the gentle smile, the soft hair, which had escaped from under the kerchief, and the kerchief itself thrown carelessly over her head, in the light of the street lamp reminded me of the old Kisotchka whom one had wanted to stroke like a kitten.

“I could not restrain myself, and began stroking her hair, her shoulders, and her hands.

“‘Kisotchka, what do you want?’ I muttered.  ’I’ll go to the ends of the earth with you if you like!  I will take you out of this hole and give you happiness.  I love you. . . .  Let us go, my sweet?  Yes?  Will you?’

“Kisotchka’s face was flooded with bewilderment.  She stepped back from the street lamp and, completely overwhelmed, gazed at me with wide-open eyes.  I gripped her by the arm, began showering kisses on her face, her neck, her shoulders, and went on making vows and promises.  In love affairs vows and promises are almost a physiological necessity.  There’s no getting on without them.  Sometimes you know you are lying and that promises are not necessary, but still you vow and protest.  Kisotchka, utterly overwhelmed, kept staggering back and gazing at me with round eyes.

“‘Please don’t!  Please don’t!’ she muttered, holding me off with her hands.

“I clasped her tightly in my arms.  All at once she broke into hysterical tears.  And her face had the same senseless blank expression that I had seen in the summer-house when I lighted the matches.  Without asking her consent, preventing her from speaking, I dragged her forcibly towards my hotel.  She seemed almost swooning and did not walk, but I took her under the arms and almost carried her. . . .  I remember, as we were going up the stairs, some man with a red band in his cap looked wonderingly at me and bowed to Kisotchka. . . .”

Ananvev flushed crimson and paused.  He walked up and down near the table in silence, scratched the back of his head with an air of vexation, and several times shrugged his shoulders and twitched his shoulder-blades, while a shiver ran down his huge back.  The memory was painful and made him ashamed, and he was struggling with himself.