"Oh, that's always the case," said the lawyer, "and that's always

for you to decide."

He let his eyes rest on Alexey Alexandrovitch's feet, feeling

that he might offend his client by the sight of his irrepressible

amusement. He looked at a moth that flew before his nose, and

moved his hands, but did not catch it from regard for Alexey

Alexandrovitch's position.

"Though in their general features our laws on this subject are

known to me," pursued Alexey Alexandrovitch, "I should be glad

to have an idea of the forms in which such things are done in

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practice."

"You would be glad," the lawyer, without lifting his eyes,

responded, adopting, with a certain satisfaction, the tone of his

client's remarks, "for me to lay before you all the methods by

which you could secure what you desire?"

And on receiving an assuring nod from Alexey Alexandrovitch, he

went on, stealing a glance now and then at Alexey

Alexandrovitch's face, which was growing red in patches.

"Divorce by our laws," he said, with a slight shade of

disapprobation of our laws, "is possible, as you are aware, in

the following cases.... Wait a little!" he called to a clerk

who put his head in at the door, but he got up all the same, said

a few words to him, and sat down again. "...In the following

cases: physical defect in the married parties, desertion without

communication for five years," he said, crooking a short finger

covered with hair, "adultery" (this word he pronounced with

obvious satisfaction), "subdivided as follows" (he continued to

crook his fat fingers, though the three cases and their

subdivisions could obviously not be classified together):

"physical defect of the husband or of the wife, adultery of the

husband or of the wife." As by now all his fingers were used up,

he uncrooked all his fingers and went on: "This is the

theoretical view; but I imagine you have done me the honor to

apply to me in order to learn its application in practice. And

therefore, guided by precedents, I must inform you that in

practice cases of divorce may all be reduced to the following--

there's no physical defect, I may assume, nor desertion?..."

Alexey Alexandrovitch bowed his head in assent.

"--May be reduced to the following: adultery of one of the

married parties, and the detection in the fact of the guilty

party by mutual agreement, and failing such agreement, accidental

detection. It must be admitted that the latter case is rarely

met with in practice," said the lawyer, and stealing a glance at

Alexey Alexandrovitch he paused, as a man selling pistols, after

enlarging on the advantages of each weapon, might await his

customer's choice. But Alexey Alexandrovitch said nothing, and

therefore the lawyer went on: "The most usual and simple, the

sensible course, I consider, is adultery by mutual consent. I

should not permit myself to express it so, speaking with a man of

no education," he said, "but I imagine that to you this is

comprehensible."




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