She said this so distinctly that I can’t to this day conceive how it was Priemkov, who came into the room at that instant, heard nothing. Slowly, terribly slowly, passed that day. Vera sometimes looked about her with an expression as though she were asking herself if she were not dreaming. And at the same time there was a look of determination in her face; while I … I could not recover myself. Vera loves me! These words were continually going round and round in my head; but I did not understand them--I neither understood myself nor her. I could not believe in such unhoped-for, such overwhelming happiness; with an effort I recalled the past, and I too looked and talked as in a dream.… After evening tea, when I had already begun to think how I could steal out of the house unobserved, she suddenly announced of her own accord that she wanted a walk, and asked me to accompany her. I got up, took my hat, and followed her. I did not dare begin to speak, I could scarcely breathe, I awaited her first word, I awaited explanations; but she did not speak. In silence we reached the summer-house, in silence we went into it, and then--I don’t know to this day, I can’t understand how it happened--we suddenly found ourselves in each other’s arms. Some unseen force flung me to her and her to me. In the fading daylight, her face, with the curls tossed back, lighted up for an instant with a smile of self-surrender and tenderness, and our lips met in a kiss.… That kiss was the first and last. Vera suddenly broke from my arms and with an expression of horror in her wide open eyes staggered back---- ‘Look round,’ she said in a shaking voice; ‘do you see nothing?’ I turned round quickly. ‘Nothing. Why, do you see something?’ ‘Not now, but I did.’ She drew deep, gasping breaths. ‘Whom? what?’ ‘My mother,’ she said slowly, and she began trembling all over. I shivered too, as though with cold. I suddenly felt ashamed, as though I were guilty. And indeed, wasn’t I guilty at that instant? ‘Nonsense!’ I began; ‘what do you mean? Tell me rather----’ ‘No, for God’s sake, no!’ she interposed, clutching her head. ‘This is madness--I’m going out of my mind.… One can’t play with this--it’s death.… Good-bye.…’ I held out my hands to her. ‘Stay, for God’s sake, for an instant,’ I cried in an involuntary outburst. I didn’t know what I was saying and could scarcely stand upright. ‘For God’s sake … it is too cruel!’ She glanced at me. ‘To-morrow, to-morrow evening,’ she said, ‘not to-day, I beseech you--go away to-day … to-morrow evening come to the garden gate, near the lake. I will be there, I will come.… I swear to you I will come,’ she added with passion, and her eyes shone; ‘whoever may hinder me, I swear! I will tell you everything, only let me go to-day.’