hiding away, clouds upon clouds flew by ... they were for ever changing and stayed still the same in their monotonous, hurrying, wearisome sport! Sometimes the wind changed, the line bent to right or left, and suddenly the whole mass vanished, and at once reappeared at the opposite window; then again the huge tail was flung out, and again it veiled Litvinov’s view of the vast plain of the Rhine. He gazed and gazed, and a strange reverie came over him.... He was alone in the compartment; there was no one to disturb him. ‘Smoke, smoke,’ he repeated several times; and suddenly it all seemed as smoke to him, everything, his own life, Russian life--everything human, especially everything Russian. All smoke and steam, he thought; all seems for ever changing, on all sides new forms, phantoms flying after phantoms, while in reality it is all the same and the same again; everything hurrying, flying towards something, and everything vanishing without a trace, attaining to nothing; another wind blows, and all is dashing in the opposite direction, and there again the same untiring, restless--and useless gambols! He remembered much that had taken place with clamour and flourish before his eyes in the last few years ... ‘Smoke,’ he whispered, ‘smoke’; he remembered the hot disputes, the wrangling, the clamour at Gubaryov’s, and in other sets of men, of high and low degree, advanced and reactionist, old and young ... ‘Smoke,’ he repeated, ‘smoke and steam’; he remembered, too, the fashionable picnic, and he remembered various opinions and speeches of other political personages--even all Potugin’s sermonising ... ‘Smoke, smoke, nothing but smoke.’ And what of his own struggles and passions and agonies and dreams? He could only reply with a gesture of despair. And meanwhile the train dashed on and on; by now Rastadt, Carlsruhe, and Bruchsal had long been left far behind; the mountains on the right side of the line swerved aside, retreated into the distance, then moved up again, but not so high, and more thinly covered with trees.... The train made a sharp turn ... and there was Heidelberg. The carriage rolled in under the cover of the station; there was the shouting of newspaper-boys, selling papers of all sorts, even Russian; passengers began bustling in their seats, getting out on to the platform, but Litvinov did not leave his corner, and still sat on with downcast head. Suddenly some one called him by name; he raised his eyes; Bindasov’s ugly phiz was thrust in at the window; and behind him--or was he dreaming, no, it was really so--all the familiar Baden faces; there was Madame Suhantchikov, there was Voroshilov, and Bambaev too; they all rushed up to him, while Bindasov bellowed: ‘But where’s Pishtchalkin? We were expecting him; but it’s all the same, hop out, and we’ll be off to Gubaryov’s.’ ‘Yes, my boy, yes, Gubaryov’s expecting us,’ Bambaev confirmed, making way for him, ‘hop out.’