Nekhludoff wished to forget all this, not to see it, but he could no longer help seeing it.  Though he could not see the source of the light which revealed it to him any more than he could see the source of the light which lay over Petersburg; and though the light appeared to him dull, dismal, and unnatural, yet he could not help seeing what it revealed, and he felt both joyful and anxious.

CHAPTER XXIX.

FOR HER SAKE AND FOR GOD’S.

On his return to Moscow Nekhludoff went at once to the prison hospital to bring Maslova the sad news that the Senate had confirmed the decision of the Court, and that she must prepare to go to Siberia.  He had little hope of the success of his petition to the Emperor, which the advocate had written for him, and which he now brought with him for Maslova to sign.  And, strange to say, he did not at present even wish to succeed; he had got used to the thought of going to Siberia and living among the exiled and the convicts, and he could not easily picture to himself how his life and Maslova’s would shape if she were acquitted.  He remembered the thought of the American writer, Thoreau, who at the time when slavery existed in America said that “under a government that imprisons any unjustly the true place for a just man is also a prison.”  Nekhludoff, especially after his visit to Petersburg and all he discovered there, thought in the same way.

“Yes, the only place befitting an honest man in Russia at the present time is a prison,” he thought, and even felt that this applied to him personally, when he drove up to the prison and entered its walls.

The doorkeeper recognised Nekhludoff, and told him at once that Maslova was no longer there.

“Where is she, then?”

“In the cell again.”

“Why has she been removed?” Nekhludoff asked.

“Oh, your excellency, what are such people?” said the doorkeeper, contemptuously.  “She’s been carrying on with the medical assistant, so the head doctor ordered her back.”

Nekhludoff had had no idea how near Maslova and the state of her mind were to him.  He was stunned by the news.

He felt as one feels at the news of a great and unforeseen misfortune, and his pain was very severe.  His first feeling was one of shame.  He, with his joyful idea of the change that he imagined was going on in her soul, now seemed ridiculous in his own eyes.  He thought that all her pretence of not wishing to accept his sacrifice, all the reproaches and tears, were only the devices of a depraved woman, who wished to use him to the best advantage.  He seemed to remember having seen signs of obduracy at his last interview with her.  All this flashed through his mind as he instinctively put on his hat and left the hospital.

“What am I to do now?  Am I still bound to her?  Has this action of hers not set me free?” And as he put these questions to himself he knew at once that if he considered himself free, and threw her up, he would be punishing himself, and not her, which was what he wished to do, and he was seized with fear.