“This very winter again, it at one time seemed to me, Irene Pavlovna, that I had found in you a true friend; but I am afraid you are too much occupied with your own salvation to sacrifice any time or thought to friendship. And yet if anything in the world can save you, it is not a convent and not Catholicism, but simply an active interest in your fellow-creatures. When experience and observation have taught us love and charity, we are saved, and life is no longer terrible. Fate may be as cruel as she pleases; but if we have warmth and love in our hearts, we shall never be alone, never in despair, and shall never think of self-destruction, if only out of pity for all our suffering brothers, whom, as long as we live, we have always the chance of helping. “If only you could rid yourself of the idea that you are too old for marriage! For what precisely is it that you think yourself too old? For kisses? It is extraordinary that women never seem to see anything beyond the mere physical side of marriage! Look at it from a higher, purer, more Christian standpoint! Believe me, what men need most is sympathy, friendship, understanding, and the generous, noble love that can forgive us our faults and our shortcomings. I have contemplated your state of mind from every standpoint, and sometimes I wonder whether the sickness of my own soul is not even more dangerous and incurable than yours. I only cannot myself see it so plainly, or rather I do not attach to it the importance it deserves.…” Irene became engaged to Gzhatski, and he persuaded her to leave Rome as quickly as possible, and go to the Riviera, whither his doctors were sending him, in fear of Roman springtime malaria. To tell the truth, Gzhatski was far less afraid of malaria than of Père Etienne, the strength of whose influence over Irene he greatly exaggerated. Natures like Irene’s never remain long under the same influence. They are swayed by sudden enthusiasms and equally sudden disappointments. Blown to right and to left by every passing breeze, they fling themselves into one friendship and then another, searching for happiness everywhere, and finding it nowhere. The hour of Catholicism in the person of Père Etienne had struck and passed, and there had dawned the new dream of salvation through love. Irene agreed to go with Gzhatski to Monte Carlo. The day and hour of departure were already fixed; but she still had not the courage to inform Père Etienne of her new plans. She tried several times to write to him, but always ended by tearing her lengthy explanations in despair. At last, on the very morning of the great day, an hour before her departure, she sent him a note, informing him of her unexpected decision to leave immediately for the Riviera, and promising to write at greater length from there.