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to signify to her and himself the firmness of his conviction; but this
warm defense, though it could not shake him, reopened his wound. He
began to speak with greater heat.
“It is extremely difficult to be mistaken when a wife herself informs
her husband of the fact—informs him that eight years of her life, and a
son, all that’s a mistake, and that she wants to begin life again,” he said
angrily, with a snort.
“Anna and sin—I cannot connect them, I cannot believe it!”
“Darya Alexandrovna,” he said, now looking straight into Dolly’s
kindly, troubled face, and feeling that his tongue was being loosened in
spite of himself, “I would give a great deal for doubt to be still possible.
When I doubted, I was miserable, but it was better than now. When
I doubted, I had hope; but now there is no hope, and still I doubt of
everything. I am in such
doubt of everything that I even hate my son, and sometimes do not
believe he is my son. I am very unhappy.”
He had no need to say that. Darya Alexandrovna had seen that as
soon as he glanced into her face; and she felt sorry for him, and her
faith in the innocence of her friend began to totter.
“Oh, this is awful, awful! But can it be true that you are resolved
on a divorce?”
“I am resolved on extreme measures. There is nothing else for me
to do.”
“Nothing else to do, nothing else to do...” she replied, with tears in
her eyes. “Oh no, don’t say nothing else to do!” she said.
“What is horrible in a trouble of this kind is that one cannot, as in
any other—in loss, in death—bear one’s trouble in peace, but that one
must act,” said he, as though guessing her thought. “One must get out
of the humiliating position in which one is placed; one can’t live a trois.”
“I understand, I quite understand that,” said Dolly, and her head
sank. She was silent for a little, thinking of herself, of her own grief in
her family, and all at once, with an impulsive movement, she raised her
head and clasped her hands with an imploring gesture. “But wait a
little! You are a Christian. Think of her! What will become of her, if
you cast her off?”
“I have thought, Darya Alexandrovna, I have thought a great deal,”
said Alexey Alexandrovitch. His face turned red in patches, and his
dim eyes looked straight before him. Darya Alexandrovna at that
moment pitied him with all her heart. “That was what I did indeed
when she herself made known to me my humiliation; I left everything
as of old. I gave her a chance to reform, I tried to save her. And with
what result? She would not regard the slightest request—that she
should observe decorum,” he said, getting heated. “One may save
anyone who does not want to be ruined; but if the whole nature is so
corrupt, so depraved, that ruin itself seems to be her salvation, what’s to
be done?”
“Anything, only not divorce!” answered Darya Alexandrovna
“But what is anything?”
“No, it is awful! She will be no one’s wife, she will be lost!”
“What can I do?” said Alexey Alexandrovitch, raising his shoul-
ders and his eyebrows. The recollection of his wife’s last act had so
incensed him that he had become frigid, as at the beginning of the
conversation. “I am very grateful for your sympathy, but I must be
going,” he said, getting up.
“No, wait a minute. You must not ruin her. Wait a little; I will tell
you about myself. I was married, and my husband deceived me; in
anger and jealousy, I would have thrown up everything, I would my-
self.... But I came to myself again; and who did it? Anna saved me.