Yes; but where was I to go? The fog enveloped
me on all sides. For five or six steps all round
it was a little transparent—but further
away it stood up like a wall, thick and white like
cotton wool. I turned to the right along the
village street; our house was the last but one in
the village and beyond it came waste land overgrown
here and there with bushes; beyond the waste land,
a quarter of a mile from the village, there was a
birch copse through which flowed the same little stream
that lower down encircled our village. The moon
stood, a pale blur in the sky—but its light
was not, as on the evening before, strong enough to
penetrate the smoky density of the fog and hung, a
broad opaque canopy, overhead. I made my way out
on to the open ground and listened.... Not a
sound from any direction, except the calling of the
marsh birds.
“Tyeglev!” I cried. “Ilya Stepanitch!!
Tyeglev!!”
My voice died away near me without an answer; it seemed
as though the fog would not let it go further.
“Tyeglev!” I repeated.
No one answered.
I went forward at random. Twice I struck against
a fence, once I nearly fell into a ditch, and almost
stumbled against a peasant’s horse lying on
the ground. “Tyeglev! Tyeglev!”
I cried.
All at once, almost behind me, I heard a low voice,
“Well, here I am. What do you want of me?”
I turned round quickly.
Before me stood Tyeglev with his hands hanging at
his sides and with no cap on his head. His face
was pale; but his eyes looked animated and bigger
than usual. His breathing came in deep, prolonged
gasps through his parted lips.
“Thank God!” I cried in an outburst of
joy, and I gripped him by both hands. “Thank
God! I was beginning to despair of finding you.
Aren’t you ashamed of frightening me like this?
Upon my word, Ilya Stepanitch!”
“What do you want of me?” repeated Tyeglev.
“I want ... I want you, in the first place,
to come back home with me. And secondly, I want,
I insist, I insist as a friend, that you explain to
me at once the meaning of your actions—and
of this letter to the colonel. Can something
unexpected have happened to you in Petersburg?”
“I found in Petersburg exactly what I expected,”
answered Tyeglev, without moving from the spot.
“That is ... you mean to say ... your friend
... this Masha....”
“She has taken her life,” Tyeglev answered
hurriedly and as it were angrily. “She
was buried the day before yesterday. She did not
even leave a note for me. She poisoned herself.”
Tyeglev hurriedly uttered these terrible words and
still stood motionless as a stone.
I clasped my hands. “Is it possible?
How dreadful! Your presentiment has come true....
That is awful!”
I stopped in confusion. Slowly and with a sort
of triumph Tyeglev folded his arms.
