“I know why, perfectly well.  And so do you, too, my good friend.[A] As you are no fool, you will understand why I ask you this, if you will only think over it a little.  But now, good-bye, my dear.  Thank you for coming to see me; but remember what I have said, Fedia; and now give me a kiss.  Ah, my dear, your burden is heavy to bear, I know that.  But no one finds his a light one.  There was a time when I used to envy the flies.  There are creatures, I thought, who live happily in the world.  But one night I heard a fly singing out under a spider’s claws.  So, thought I, even they have their troubles.  What can be done, Fedia?  But mind you never forget what you have said to me.  And now leave me—­leave me.”

[Footnote A:  Literally, “my foster father,” or “my benefactor.”]

Lavretsky left by the back door, and had almost reached the street, when a footman ran after him and said, “Maria Dmitrievna told me to ask you to come to her.”

“Tell her I cannot come just now,” began Lavretsky.

“She told me to ask you particularly,” continued the footman.  “She told me to say that she was alone.”

“Then her visitors have gone away?” asked Lavretsky.

“Yes,” replied the footman, with something like a grin on his face.

Lavretsky shrugged his shoulders, and followed him into the house.

XLI.

Maria Dmitrievna was alone in her boudoir.  She was sitting in a large easy-chair, sniffing Eau-de-Cologne, with a little table by her side, on which was a glass containing orange-flower water.  She was evidently excited, and seemed nervous about something.

Lavretsky came into the room.

“You wanted to see me,” he said, bowing coldly.

“Yes,” answered Maria Dmitrievna, and then she drank a little water.  “I heard that you had gone straight up-stairs to my aunt, so I told the servants to ask you to come and see me.  I want to have a talk with you.  Please sit down.”

Maria Dmitrievna took breath.  “You know that your wife has come,” she continued.

“I am aware of that fact,” said Lavretsky.

“Well—­yes—­that is—­I meant to say that she has been here, and I have received her.  That is what I wanted to have the explanation about with you, Fedor Ivanovich, I have deserved, I may say, general respect, thank God! and I wouldn’t, for all the world, do any thing unbecoming.  But, although I saw beforehand that it would be disagreeable to you, Fedor Ivanich, yet I couldn’t make up my mind to refuse her.  She is a relation of mine—­through you.  Only put yourself into my position.  What right had I to shut my door in her face?  Surely you must agree with me.”

“You are exciting yourself quite unnecessarily, Maria Dmitrievna,” replied Lavretsky.  “You have done what is perfectly right.  I am not in the least angry.  I never intended to deprive my wife of the power of seeing her acquaintances.  I did not come to see you to-day simply because I did not wish to meet her.  That was all.”