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thinking deeply and intensely. Levin involuntarily thought with him
of what it was that was happening to him now, but in spite of all his
mental efforts to go along with him he saw by the expression of that
calm, stern face that for the dying man all was growing clearer and
clearer that was still as dark as ever for Levin.
“Yes, yes, so,” the dying man articulated slowly at intervals. “Wait
a little.” He was silent. “Right!” he pronounced all at once reassuringly,
as though all were solved for him. “O Lord!” he murmured, and sighed
deeply.
Marya Nikolaevna felt his feet. “They’re getting cold,” she whis-
pered.
For a long while, a very long while it seemed to Levin, the sick man
lay motionless. But he was still alive, and from time to time he sighed.
Levin by now was exhausted from mental strain. He felt that, with no
mental effort, could he understand what it was that was right. He
could not even think of the problem of death itself, but with no will of
his own thoughts kept coming to him of what he had to do next; closing
the dead man’s eyes, dressing him, ordering the coffin. And, strange to
say, he felt utterly cold, and was not conscious of sorrow nor of loss, less
still of pity for his brother. If he had any feeling for his brother at that
moment, it was envy for the knowledge the dying man had now that he
could not have.
A long time more he sat over him so, continually expecting the end.
But the end did not come. The door opened and Kitty appeared.
Levin got up to stop her. But at the moment he was getting up, he
caught the sound of the dying man stirring.
“Don’t go away,” said Nikolay and held out his hand. Levin gave
him his, and angrily waved to his wife to go away.
With the dying man’s hand in his hand, he sat for half an hour, an
hour, another hour. He did not think of death at all now. He wondered
what Kitty was doing; who lived in the next room; whether the doctor
lived in a house of his own. He longed for food and for sleep. He
cautiously drew away his hand and felt the feet. The feet were cold,
but the sick man was still breathing. Levin tried again to move away
on tiptoe, but the sick man stirred again and said: “Don’t go.”
* * * * * * * *
The dawn came; the sick man’s condition was unchanged. Levin
stealthily withdrew his hand, and without looking at the dying man,
went off to his own room and went to sleep. When he woke up, instead
of news of his brother’s death which he expected, he learned that the
sick man had returned to his earlier condition. He had begun sitting up
again, coughing, had begun eating again, talking again, and again had
ceased to talk of death, again had begun to express hope of his recov-
ery, and had become more irritable and more gloomy than ever. No one,
neither his brother nor Kitty, could soothe him. He was angry with
everyone, and said nasty things to everyone, reproached everyone for
his sufferings, and insisted that they should get him a celebrated doc-
tor from Moscow. To all inquiries made him as to how he felt, he made
the same answer with an expression of vindictive reproachfulness, “I’m
suffering horribly, intolerably!”
The sick man was suffering more and more, especially from bed-
sores, which it was impossible now to remedy, and grew more and more
angry with everyone about him, blaming them for everything, and
especially for not having brought him a doctor from Moscow. Kitty
tried in every possible way to relieve him, to soothe him; but it was all
in vain, and Levin saw that she herself was exhausted both physically
and morally, though she would not admit it. The sense of death, which
had been evoked in all by his taking leave of life on the night when he