Sanine

There was a pause. Lida looked hard at him, her face red as fire.

Sarudine turned pale, as if suddenly covered by a grey veil.

"Well, why are you silent? Why don't you speak? Speak! Say something to

comfort me!" she shrieked, her voice becoming hysterical in tone. The

very sound of it alarmed her.

"I ..." began Sarudine, and his under-lip quivered.

"Yes, you, and nobody else but you, worse luck!" she screamed, almost

stifled with tears of rage and of despair.

From him as from her the mask of comeliness and good manners had

fallen. The wild untrammelled beast became increasingly evident in

each.

Ideas like scurrying mice rushed through Sarudine's mind. His first

thought was to give Lida money, and persuade her to get rid of the

child. He must break with her at once, and for ever. That would end the

whole business. Yet though he considered this to be the best way, he

said nothing.

"I really never thought that ..." he stammered.

"You never thought!" exclaimed Lida wildly. "Why didn't you? What right

had you not to think?"

"But, Lida, I never told you that I ..." he faltered, feeling afraid of

what he was going to say, yet conscious that he would yet do so, all

the same.

Lida, however, had understood, without waiting for him to speak. Her

beautiful face grew dark, distorted by horror and despair. Her hands

fell limply to her side as she sat down on the bed.

"What shall I do?" she said, as if thinking aloud. "Drown myself?"

"No, no! Don't talk like that!"

Lida looked hard at him.

"Do you know, Victor Sergejevitsch, I feel pretty sure that such a

thing would not displease you," she said.

In her eyes and in her pretty quivering mouth there was something so

sad, so pitiful, that Sarudine involuntarily turned away.

Lida rose. The thought, consoling at first, that she would find in him

her saviour with whom she would always live, now inspired her with

horror and loathing. She longed to shake her fist at him, to fling her

scorn in his face, to revenge herself on him for having humiliated her

thus. But she felt that at the very first words she would burst into

tears. A last spark of pride, all that remained of the handsome,

dashing Lida, deterred her. In a tone of such intense scorn that it

surprised herself as much as Sarudine, she hissed out, "You brute!"

Then she rushed out of the room, tearing the lace trimming of her

sleeve which caught on the bolt of the door.