“Open!  Let me in just for a moment!  I implore you!” He hardly knew what he was saying.

* * * * * * *

When she left him, trembling and silent, giving no answer to his words, he again went out into the porch and stood trying to understand the meaning of what had happened.

It was getting lighter.  From the river below the creaking and tinkling and sobbing of the breaking ice came still louder and a gurgling sound could now also be heard.  The mist had begun to sink, and from above it the waning moon dimly lighted up something black and weird.

“What was the meaning of it all?  Was it a great joy or a great misfortune that had befallen him?” he asked himself.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Afterwards.

The next day the gay, handsome, and brilliant Schonbock joined Nekhludoff at his aunts’ house, and quite won their hearts by his refined and amiable manner, his high spirits, his generosity, and his affection for Dmitri.

But though the old ladies admired his generosity it rather perplexed them, for it seemed exaggerated.  He gave a rouble to some blind beggars who came to the gate, gave 15 roubles in tips to the servants, and when Sophia Ivanovna’s pet dog hurt his paw and it bled, he tore his hemstitched cambric handkerchief into strips (Sophia Ivanovna knew that such handkerchiefs cost at least 15 roubles a dozen) and bandaged the dog’s foot.  The old ladies had never met people of this kind, and did not know that Schonbock owed 200,000 roubles which he was never going to pay, and that therefore 25 roubles more or less did not matter a bit to him.  Schonbock stayed only one day, and he and Nekhludoff both, left at night.  They could not stay away from their regiment any longer, for their leave was fully up.

At the stage which Nekhludoff’s selfish mania had now reached he could think of nothing but himself.  He was wondering whether his conduct, if found out, would be blamed much or at all, but he did not consider what Katusha was now going through, and what was going to happen to her.

He saw that Schonbock guessed his relations to her and this flattered his vanity.

“Ah, I see how it is you have taken such a sudden fancy to your aunts that you have been living nearly a week with them,” Schonbock remarked when he had seen Katusha.  “Well, I don’t wonder—­should have done the same.  She’s charming.”  Nekhludoff was also thinking that though it was a pity to go away before having fully gratified the cravings of his love for her, yet the absolute necessity of parting had its advantages because it put a sudden stop to relations it would have been very difficult for him to continue.  Then he thought that he ought to give her some money, not for her, not because she might need it, but because it was the thing to do.

So he gave her what seemed to him a liberal amount, considering his and her station.  On the day of his departure, after dinner, he went out and waited for her at the side entrance.  She flushed up when she saw him and wished to pass by, directing his attention to the open door of the maids’ room by a look, but he stopped her.