no more, but held him tight in his arms. A look as of some oppressive sensation passed over Vasya’s face; he rubbed his forehead and clutched at his head, as though he were afraid it would burst.
“I don’t know what is the matter with me,” he added, at last. “I feel torn to pieces. Come, it’s all right, it’s all right! Give over, Arkady; don’t grieve,” he repeated, looking at him with sad, exhausted eyes. “Why be so anxious? Come!”
“You, you comforting me!” cried Arkady, whose heart was torn. “Vasya,” he said at last, “lie down and have a little nap, won’t you? Don’t wear yourself out for nothing. You’ll set to work better afterwards.”
“Yes, yes,” said Vasya, “by all means, I’ll lie down, very good. Yes! you see I meant to finish, but now I’ve changed my mind, yes… .”
And Arkady led him to the bed.
“Listen, Vasya,” he said firmly, “we must settle this matter finally. Tell me what were you thinking about?”
“Oh!” said Vasya, with a flourish of his weak hand turning over on the other side.
“Come, Vasya, come, make up your mind. I don’t want to hurt you. I can’t be silent any longer. You won’t sleep till you’ve made up your mind, I know.”
“As you like, as you like,” Vasya repeated enigmatically.
“He will give in,” thought Arkady Ivanovitch.
“Attend to me, Vasya,” he said, “remember what I say, and I will save you tomorrow; tomorrow I will decide your fate! What am I saying, your fate? You have so frightened me, Vasya, that I am using your own words. Fate, indeed! It’s simply nonsense, rubbish! You don’t want to lose Yulian Mastakovitch’s favour affection, if you like. No! And you won’t lose it, you will see.”
Arkady Ivanovitch would have said more, but Vasya interrupted him. He sat up in bed, put both arms round Arkady Ivanovitch’s neck and kissed him.
“Enough,” he said in a weak voice, “enough! Say no more about that!”
And again he turned his face to the wall.
“My goodness!” thought Arkady, “my goodness! What is the matter with him? He is utterly lost. What has he in his mind! He will be his own undoing.”
Arkady looked at him in despair.
“If he were to fall ill,” thought Arkady, “perhaps it would be better. His trouble would pass off with illness, and that might be the best way of settling the whole business. But what nonsense I am talking. Oh, my God!”
Meanwhile Vasya seemed to be asleep. Arkady Ivanovitch was relieved. “A good sign,” he thought. He made up his mind to sit beside him all night. But Vasya was restless; he kept twitching and tossing about on the bed, and opening his eyes for an instant. At last exhaustion got the upper hand, he slept like the dead. It was about two o’clock in the morning, Arkady Ivanovitch began to doze in the chair with his elbow on the table!
He had a strange and agitated dream. He kept fancying that he was not asleep, and that Vasya was still lying on the bed. But strange to say, he fancied that Vasya was pretending, that he was deceiving him, that he was getting up, stealthily watching him out of the corner of his eye, and was stealing up to the writing table. Arkady felt a scalding pain at his heart; he felt vexed and sad and oppressed to see Vasya not trusting him, hiding and concealing himself from him. He tried to catch hold of him, to call out, to carry him to the bed. Then Vasya kept shrieking in his arms, and he laid on the bed a lifeless corpse. He opened his eyes and woke up; Vasya was sitting before him at the table, writing.
Hardly able to believe his senses, Arkady glanced at the bed; Vasya was not there. Arkady jumped up in a panic, still under the influence of his dream. Vasya did not stir; he went on writing. All at once Arkady noticed with horror that Vasya was moving a dry pen over the paper, was turning over perfectly blank pages, and hurrying, hurrying to fill up the paper as though he were doing his work in a most thorough and efficient way. “No, this is not a trance,” thought Arkady Ivanovitch, and he trembled all over.
“Vasya, Vasya, speak to me,” he cried, clutching him by the shoulder. But Vasya did not speak; he went on as before, scribbling with a dry pen over the paper.
“At last I have made the pen go faster,” he said, without looking up at Arkady.
Arkady seized his hand and snatched away the pen.
A moan broke from Vasya. He dropped his hand and raised his eyes to Arkady; then with an air of misery and exhaustion he passed his hand over his forehead as though he wanted to shake off some leaden weight that was pressing upon his whole being, and slowly, as though lost in thought, he let his head sink on his breast.
“Vasya, Vasya!” cried Arkady in despair. “Vasya!”
A minute later Vasya looked at him, tears stood in his large blue eyes, and his pale, mild face wore a look of infinite suffering. He whispered something.
“What, what is it? “ cried Arkady, bending down to him.
“What for, why are they doing it to me?” whispered Vasya. “What for? What have I done?”
“Vasya, what is it? What are you afraid of? What is it?” cried Arkady, wringing his hands in despair.
“Why are they sending me for a soldier?” said Vasya, looking his friend straight in the face.” Why is it? What have I done?”
Arkady’s hair stood on end with horror; he refused to believe his ears. He stood over him, half dead.
A minute later he pulled himself together. “It’s nothing, it’s only for the minute,” he said to himself, with pale face and blue, quivering lips, and he hastened to put on his outdoor things. He meant to run straight for a doctor. All at once Vasya called to him. Arkady rushed to him and clasped him in his arms like a mother whose child is being torn from her.
“Arkady, Arkady, don’t tell any one! Don’t tell any one, do you hear? It is my trouble, I must bear it alone.”
“What is it what is it? Rouse yourself, Vasya, rouse yourself!”
Vasya sighed, and slow tears trickled down his cheeks.
“Why kill her? How is she to blame?” he muttered in an agonized, heartrending voice. “The sin is mine — the sin is mine!”
He was silent for a moment.
“Farewell, my love! Farewell, my love!” he whispered, shaking his luckless head. Arkady started, pulled himself together and would have rushed for the doctor. “ Let us go, it is time,” cried Vasya. carried away by Arkady’s last movement. “Let us go, brother, let us go; I am ready. You lead the way!” He paused and looked at Arkady with a downcast and mistrustful face.
“Vasya, for goodness’ sake, don’t follow me! Wait for me here. I will come back to you directly, directly,” said Arkady Ivanovitch, losing his head and snatching up his cap to run for a doctor. Vasya sat down at once, he was quiet and docile; but there was a gleam of some desperate resolution in his eye. Arkady turned back, snatched up from the table an open penknife, looked at the poor fellow for the last time, and ran out of the flat.
It
