If you do not even now answer me, I will not trouble
you further. It only remains for me to regret
my indiscretion in having allowed myself to be agitated
for nothing, in having held out a hand to a friend,
and having come for one minute out of my lonely corner.
I must remain in it for ever, must lock myself up—that
is my apportioned lot, the lot of all old maids.
I ought to accustom myself to this idea. It’s
useless to come out into the light of day, needless
to wish for fresh air, when the lungs cannot bear
it. By the way, we are now hemmed in all round
by deadly drifts of snow. For the future I will
be wiser.... People don’t die of dreariness;
but of misery, perhaps, one might perish. If
I am wrong, prove it to me. But I fancy I am not
wrong. In any case, good-bye. I wish you
all happiness.
FROM ALEXEY PETROVITCH TO MARYA ALEXANDROVNA
I am writing to you, my dear Marya Alexandrovna, and
I am writing only because I do not want to die without
saying good-bye to you, without recalling myself to
your memory. I am given up by the doctors ...
and I feel myself that my life is ebbing away.
On my table stands a rose: before it withers,
I shall be no more. This comparison is not, however,
altogether an apt one. A rose is far more interesting
than I.
I am, as you see, abroad. It is now six months
since I have been in Dresden. I received your
last letters—I am ashamed to confess—more
than a year ago. I lost some of them and never
answered them.... I will tell you directly why.
But it seems you were always dear to me; to no one
but you have I any wish to say good-bye, and perhaps
I have no one else to take leave of.
Soon after my last letter to you (I was on the very
point of going down to your neighbourhood, and had
made various plans in advance) an incident occurred
which had, one may truly say, a great influence on
my fate, so great an influence that here I am dying,
thanks to that incident. I went to the theatre
to see a ballet. I never cared for ballets; and
for every sort of actress, singer, and dancer I had
always had a secret feeling of repulsion....
But it is clear there’s no changing one’s
fate, and no one knows himself, and one cannot foresee
the future. In reality, in life it’s only
the unexpected that happens, and we do nothing in
a whole lifetime but accommodate ourselves to facts....
But I seem to be rambling off into philosophising again.
An old habit! In brief, I fell in love with a
dancing-girl.
