Moral
endurance. Yes, that was the necessity of the situation. An immense
longing to make his way out of these grounds and to the other end of the
town, of throwing himself on his bed and going to sleep for hours, swept
everything clean out of his mind for a moment. "Is it possible that I am
but a weak creature after all?" he asked himself, in sudden alarm. "Eh!
What's that?"
He gave a start as if awakened from a dream. He even swayed a little
before recovering himself.
"Ah! You stole away from us quietly to walk about here," he said.
The lady companion stood before him, but how she came there he had not
the slightest idea. Her folded arms were closely cherishing the cat.
"I have been unconscious as I walked, it's a positive fact," said
Razumov to himself in wonder. He raised his hat with marked civility.
The sallow woman blushed duskily. She had her invariably scared
expression, as if somebody had just disclosed to her some terrible news.
But she held her ground, Razumov noticed, without timidity. "She is
incredibly shabby," he thought. In the sunlight her black costume looked
greenish, with here and there threadbare patches where the stuff seemed
decomposed by age into a velvety, black, furry state. Her very hair and
eyebrows looked shabby. Razumov wondered whether she were sixty years
old.
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