Nekhludoff translated the Englishman’s and the inspector’s words without paying any attention to their meaning, and felt an awkwardness he had not in the least expected at the thought of the impending interview.  When, in the midst of a sentence he was translating for the Englishman, he heard the sound of approaching footsteps, and the office door opened, and, as had happened many times before, a jailer came in, followed by Katusha, and he saw her with a kerchief tied round her head, and in a prison jacket a heavy sensation came over him.  “I wish to live, I want a family, children, I want a human life.”  These thoughts flashed through his mind as she entered the room with rapid steps and blinking her eyes.

He rose and made a few steps to meet her, and her face appeared hard and unpleasant to him.  It was again as it had been at the time when she reproached him.  She flushed and turned pale, her fingers nervously twisting a corner of her jacket.  She looked up at him, then cast down her eyes.

“You know that a mitigation has come?”

“Yes, the jailer told me.”

“So that as soon as the original document arrives you may come away and settle where you like.  We shall consider—­”

She interrupted him hurriedly.  “What have I to consider?  Where Valdemar Simonson goes, there I shall follow.”  In spite of the excitement she was in she raised her eyes to Nekhludoff’s and pronounced these words quickly and distinctly, as if she had prepared what she had to say.

“Indeed!”

“Well, Dmitri Ivanovitch, you see he wishes me to live with him—­” and she stopped, quite frightened, and corrected herself.  “He wishes me to be near him.  What more can I desire?  I must look upon it as happiness.  What else is there for me—­”

“One of two things,” thought he.  “Either she loves Simonson and does not in the least require the sacrifice I imagined I was bringing her, or she still loves me and refuses me for my own sake, and is burning her ships by uniting her fate with Simonson.”  And Nekhludoff felt ashamed and knew that he was blushing.

“And you yourself, do you love him?” he asked.

“Loving or not loving, what does it matter?  I have given up all that.  And then Valdemar Simonson is quite an exceptional man.”

“Yes, of course,” Nekhludoff began.  “He is a splendid man, and I think—­”

But she again interrupted him, as if afraid that he might say too much or that she should not say all.  “No, Dmitri Ivanovitch, you must forgive me if I am not doing what you wish,” and she looked at him with those unfathomable, squinting eyes of hers.  “Yes, it evidently must be so.  You must live, too.”

She said just what he had been telling himself a few moments before, but he no longer thought so now and felt very differently.  He was not only ashamed, but felt sorry to lose all he was losing with her.  “I did not expect this,” he said.