Tolstoy thereupon wrote to Fet:
I could not resist opening another letter from Mr. Tourgénef in reply to mine. I wish you well of your relations with that man, but I despise him. I have written to him, and therewith have terminated all relations, except that I hold myself ready to give him any satisfaction he may desire. Notwithstanding all my apparent tranquillity, I was disturbed in spirit and felt I must demand a more explicit apology from Mr. Tourgénef; I did this in my letter from Novosélok. Here is his answer, which I accept as satisfactory, merely informing him that my reason for excusing him is not our opposite natures, but one he may himself surmise.
In consequence of the delay which occurred, I sent besides this, another letter, harsh enough and containing a challenge, to which I have not received any reply; but should I receive one I shall return it unopened. So there is an end of that sad story, which, if it goes beyond your house, should do so with this addendum.
Tourgénef's reply to the challenge came to hand later, and ran as follows:
Your servant says you desire a reply to your letter; but I do not see what I can add to what I have already written; unless it be that I admit your right to demand satisfaction, weapons in hand. You have preferred to accept my spoken and repeated apology. That was as you pleased. I will say without phrases, that I would willingly stand your fire in order to efface my truly insane words. That I should have uttered them is so unlike the habits of my whole life, that I can only attribute my action to irritability evoked by the extreme and constant antagonism of our views. This is not an apology—I mean to say, not a justification—but an explanation. And therefore, at parting from you for ever—for such occurrences are indelible and irrevocable—I consider it my duty to repeat once again that in this affair you were in the right and I in the wrong. I add that what is here in question is not the courage I wish, or do not wish, to show, but an acknowledgment of your right to call me out to fight, in the accepted manner of course (with seconds), as well as your right to pardon me. You have chosen as you pleased, and I have only to submit to your decision. I renew my assurance of my entire respect,
Iv. Tourgénef.
The quarrel was not, however, destined to die out so quickly. Even good-natured Fet got into trouble by trying to reconcile the irascible novelists. Here is one of the notes he received from Tolstoy:
I request you not to write to me again, as I shall return your letters, as well as Tourgénef's, unopened.
Fet remarks: 'So all my attempts to put the matter right ended in a formal rupture of my relations with Tolstoy, and I cannot now even remember how friendly intercourse between us was renewed.'
Before four months had passed, Tolstoy repented him of his quarrel. Like Prince Nehlúdof in Resurrection, he used from time to time to repent of all his sins and all his quarrels, and undertook a sort of spring- or autumn-cleaning of his soul. It was at such a moment that, on 25th September, he wrote to Tourgénef expressing regret that their relations to one another were hostile, and he added: 'If I have insulted you, forgive me; I find it unendurably hard to think I have an enemy.' Not knowing Tourgénef's address in France, he sent this letter to a bookseller in Petersburg (with whom he knew Tourgénef corresponded) to be forwarded. The letter took more than three months to reach its destination, nor was this the only thing that went wrong, as is shown by the following portion of a letter, dated 8th November, from Tourgénef to Fet: