Polunin returned alone over a tractless road-way; the gale blew in his face; the snow blinded him. He stabled his horses; then found Alena waiting up for him in the kitchen, her expression was composed but sad. Polunin took her in his arms and kissed her. "Do not be anxious or afraid; I love only you, no one else. I know why you are unhappy." Alena looked up at him in loving gratitude, and shyly smiled. "You do not understand that it is possible to love one only. Other men are not able to do that," Polunin told her tenderly. The hurricane raged over the house, but within reigned peace. Polunin went into his study and sat down at his desk; Natasha began to cry; he rose, took a candle, and brought her to Alena, who nursed her. The infant looked so small, fragile, and red that Polunin's heart overflowed with tenderness towards her. One solitary, flickering candle illumined the room. There was a call on the telephone at daybreak. Polunin was already up. The day slowly broke in shades of blue; there was a murky, bluish light inside the rooms and outside the windows, the panes of which were coated with snow. The storm had subsided. "Have I aroused you? Were you still in bed?" called Kseniya. "No, I was already up." "On the watch?" "Yes." "I have only just arrived home. The storm whirled madly round us in the fields, and the roads were invisible, frozen under snow ... I drove on thinking, and thinking--of the snow, you, myself, Arkhipov, Paris ... oh, Paris...! You are not angry with me for ringing you up, are you, my ascetic?... I was thinking of our conversation." "What were you thinking?" "This.... We were speaking together, you see.... Forgive me, but you could not speak like that to Alena. She would not understand ... how could she?" "One need not speak a word, yet understand everything. There is something that unites--without the aid of speech--not only Alena and me, but the world and me. That is a law of God." "So it is," murmured Kseniya. "Forgive me ... poor old Alena." "I love her, and she has given me a daughter...." "Yes, that is true. And we ... we love, but are childless... We rise in the morning feeling dull and depressed from our revels of overnight, while you were wisely sleeping." Kseniya Ippolytovna's voice rose higher. "'We are the heisha-girls of lantern-light,' you remember Annensky? At night we sit in restaurants, drinking wine and listening to garish music. We love--but are childless.... And you? You live a sober, righteous and sensible life, seeking the truth.... Isn't that so?' Truth!" Her cry was malignant and full of derision. "That is unjust, Kseniya," answered Polunin in a low voice, hanging his head. "No, wait," continued the mocking voice at the other end of the line; "here is something more from Annensky: 'We are the heisha-girls of lantern-light!'... 'And what seemed to them music brought them torment'; and again: 'But Cypris has nothing more sacred than the words _I love_, unuttered by us' ..."