"Patience, patience." "He must be a smart fellow who murdered him," remarked Ilya. The indifference with which his words were received roused in him a desire to speak of the murder. "Smart?" said the inspector slowly. "No! I am the smart fellow! There!" and he played a five, slapping the card down on the table. Ilya could not follow suit, and lost the round. The husband and wife laughed at him, and he grew more restive. As he was dealing, he said defiantly: "To kill a man in broad daylight, in the main street of the town, that takes some courage." "Luck, not courage," Tatiana corrected. Ilya looked first at her, then at her husband, laughed softly and asked: "You call it luck to kill some one?" "Why, yes; to kill some one and not get caught." "You've given me ace of diamonds again," cried the inspector. "I could do with an ace," said Ilya seriously. "Kill a rich man, that's the best ace!" said Tatiana jokingly. "Hold on a bit with your killing, here's an ace of cards to go on with," cried Kirik, with a loud laugh and played two nines and an ace. Ilya glanced again at their pleasant, happy faces, and the desire to speak further of the murder left him. Living side by side with these people, separated only by a thin wall from their sheltered, peaceful life, Ilya was seized more and more frequently with fits of painful dissatisfaction. The feeling poured over him like a dense, cold flood, and he could not understand whence it came. At the same time thoughts of life's contradictions rose up in him, of God who knows everything, yet does not punish but waits patiently. Why does He wait? Out of sheer boredom he began to read again. His landlady had a couple of volumes of the "Niva," and the "Illustrated Review," and a few other odd volumes. Just as in his childhood, so now, he cared only for tales and romances, in which a strange unknown life was depicted, and not at all for representations of the real, the wrong and misery filling the life that surrounded him. Whenever he read tales of actual life, dealing with simple folk, he found them wearisome and full of false descriptions. Sometimes it is true they amused him, when it seemed as though these tales were written by clever people, anxious to paint this miserable, dull, grey life in fair colours and gloss over its wretchedness. He knew this life and daily learned to know it better. As he passed through the streets he never failed to see something that appealed to his critical faculties. In this way once he witnessed a scene on his way to visit his friend at the hospital which he related to Pavel: "This is what they call law and order. I saw some people like carpenters and plasterers going along the pavement. Up comes a policeman. 'Now then, you rascals!' he shouts, and turns them off into the road. That's to say, walk with the horses, else your dirty clothes may soil the fine gentry; build me a house, oh, yes, but I'll chuck you out of it, ah!"