第168章

There were still two hours before the passenger train by which Nekhludoff was going would start. He had thought of using this interval to see his sister again; but after the impressions of the morning he felt much excited and so done up that, sitting down on a sofa in the first-class refreshment-room, he suddenly grew so drowsy that he turned over on to his side, and, laying his face on his hand, fell asleep at once. A waiter in a dress coat with a napkin in his hand woke him.

"Sir, sir, are you not Prince Nekhludoff? There's a lady looking for you."

Nekhludoff started up and recollected where he was and all that had happened in the morning.

He saw in his imagination the procession of prisoners, the dead bodies, the railway carriages with barred windows, and the women locked up in them, one of whom was groaning in travail with no one to help her, and another who was pathetically smiling at him through the bars.

The reality before his eyes was very different, i.e., a table with vases, candlesticks and crockery, and agile waiters moving round the table, and in the background a cupboard and a counter laden with fruit and bottles, behind it a barman, and in front the backs of passengers who had come up for refreshments. When Nekhludoff had risen and sat gradually collecting his thoughts, he noticed that everybody in the room was inquisitively looking at something that was passing by the open doors.

He also looked, and saw a group of people carrying a chair on which sat a lady whose head was wrapped in a kind of airy fabric.

Nekhludoff thought he knew the footman who was supporting the chair in front. And also the man behind, and a doorkeeper with gold cord on his cap, seemed familiar. A lady's maid with a fringe and an apron, who was carrying a parcel, a parasol, and something round in a leather case, was walking behind the chair.

Then came Prince Korchagin, with his thick lips, apoplectic neck, and a travelling cap on his head; behind him Missy, her cousin Misha, and an acquaintance of Nekhludoff's--the long-necked diplomat Osten, with his protruding Adam's apple and his unvarying merry mood and expression. He was saying something very emphatically, though jokingly, to the smiling Missy. The Korchagins were moving from their estate near the city to the estate of the Princess's sister on the Nijni railway. The procession--the men carrying the chair, the maid, and the doctor--vanished into the ladies' waiting-room, evoking a feeling of curiosity and respect in the onlookers. But the old Prince remained and sat down at the table, called a waiter, and ordered food and drink. Missy and Osten also remained in the refreshment-room and were about to sit down, when they saw an acquaintance in the doorway, and went up to her. It was Nathalie Rogozhinsky. Nathalie came into the refreshment-room accompanied by Agraphena Petrovna, and both looked round the room. Nathalie noticed at one and the same moment both her brother and Missy.

She first went up to Missy, only nodding to her brother; but, having kissed her, at once turned to him.

"At last I have found you," she said. Nekhludoff rose to greet Missy, Misha, and Osten, and to say a few words to them. Missy told him about their house in the country having been burnt down, which necessitated their moving to her aunt's. Osten began relating a funny story about a fire. Nekhludoff paid no attention, and turned to his sister.

"How glad I am that you have come."

"I have been here a long time," she said. "Agraphena Petrovna is with me." And she pointed to Agraphena Petrovna, who, in a waterproof and with a bonnet on her head, stood some way off, and bowed to him with kindly dignity and some confusion, not wishing to intrude.

"We looked for you everywhere."

"And I had fallen asleep here. How glad I am that you have come," repeated Nekhludoff. "I had begun to write to you."

"Really?" she said, looking frightened. "What about?"

Missy and the gentleman, noticing that an intimate conversation was about to commence between the brother and sister, went away.

Nekhludoff and his sister sat down by the window on a velvet-covered sofa, on which lay a plaid, a box, and a few other things.

"Yesterday, after I left you, I felt inclined to return and express my regret, but I did not know how he would take it," said Nekhludoff. "I spoke hastily to your husband, and this tormented me."

"I knew," said his sister, "that you did not mean to. Oh, you know!" and the tears came to her eyes, and she touched his hand.

The sentence was not clear, but he understood it perfectly, and was touched by what it expressed. Her words meant that, besides the love for her husband which held her in its sway, she prized and considered important the love she had for him, her brother, and that every misunderstanding between them caused her deep suffering.

"Thank you, thank you. Oh! what I have seen to-day!" he said, suddenly recalling the second of the dead convicts. "Two prisoners have been done to death."

"Done to death? How?"

"Yes, done to death. They led them in this heat, and two died of sunstroke."

"Impossible! What, to-day? just now?"

"Yes, just now. I have seen their bodies."

"But why done to death? Who killed them?" asked Nathalie.

"They who forced them to go killed them," said Nekhludoff, with irritation, feeling that she looked at this, too, with her husband's eyes.