Sviazhsky went with him into the hall, yawning and wondering at

the strange humor his friend was in. It was past one o'clock.

Levin went back to his hotel, and was dismayed at the thought

that all alone now with his impatience he had ten hours still

left to get through. The servant, whose turn it was to be up all

night, lighted his candles, and would have gone away, but Levin

stopped him. This servant, Yegor, whom Levin had noticed before,

struck him as a very intelligent, excellent, and, above all,

good-hearted man.

"Well, Yegor, it's hard work not sleeping, isn't it?"

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"One's got to put up with it! It's part of our work, you see.

In a gentleman's house it's easier; but then here one makes

more."

It appeared that Yegor had a family, three boys and a daughter, a

sempstress, whom he wanted to marry to a cashier in a saddler's

shop.

Levin, on hearing this, informed Yegor that, in his opinion, in

marriage the great thing was love, and that with love one would

always be happy, for happiness rests only on oneself. Yegor

listened attentively, and obviously quite took in Levin's idea,

but by way of assent to it he enunciated, greatly to Levin's

surprise, the observation that when he had lived with good

masters he had always been satisfied with his masters, and now

was perfectly satisfied with his employer, though he was a

Frenchman.

"Wonderfully good-hearted fellow!" thought Levin.

"Well, but you yourself, Yegor, when you got married, did you

love your wife?"

"Ay! and why not?" responded Yegor.

And Levin saw that Yegor too was in an excited state and

intending to express all his most heartfelt emotions.

"My life, too, has been a wonderful one. From a child up..." he

was beginning with flashing eyes, apparently catching Levin's

enthusiasm, just as people catch yawning.

But at that moment a ring was heard. Yegor departed, and Levin

was left alone. He had eaten scarcely anything at dinner, had

refused tea and supper at Sviazhsky's, but he was incapable of

thinking of supper. He had not slept the previous night, but was

incapable of thinking of sleep either. His room was cold, but he

was oppressed by heat. He opened both the movable panes in his

window and sat down to the table opposite the open panes. Over

the snow-covered roofs could be seen a decorated cross with

chains, and above it the rising triangle of Charles's Wain with

the yellowish light of Capella. He gazed at the cross, then at

the stars, drank in the fresh freezing air that flowed evenly

into the room, and followed as though in a dream the images and

memories that rose in his imagination. At four o'clock he heard

steps in the passage and peeped out at the door. It was the

gambler Myaskin, whom he knew, coming from the club. He walked

gloomily, frowning and coughing. "Poor, unlucky fellow!" thought

Levin, and tears came into his eyes from love and pity for this

man. He would have talked with him, and tried to comfort him,

but remembering that he had nothing but his shirt on, he changed

his mind and sat down again at the open pane to bathe in the cold

air and gaze at the exquisite lines of the cross, silent, but

full of meaning for him, and the mounting lurid yellow star. At

seven o'clock there was a noise of people polishing the floors,

and bells ringing in some servants' department, and Levin felt

that he was beginning to get frozen. He closed the pane, washed,

dressed, and went out into the street.




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