"Where are you going, Vjera?" he asked, stopping again and looking into her face.
"Wherever you like," she said, trying to speak cheerfully. She saw that something terrible was happening, and it was only by a desperate effort that she controlled the violent hysterical emotion that rose like a great lump in her throat.
"Ah, that is it, Vjera," he answered. "That is it. Where shall I go, child?" Then he laughed nervously. "The fact is," he continued, "that I am in a very absurd position. I do not at all know what to do."
Perhaps he had tried to give himself courage by the attempt to laugh, but, in that case, he had failed for the present. In spite of his words his despair was evident. His usually erect carriage was gone. His head sank wearily forward, his shoulders rounded themselves as though under a burden, his feet dragged a little as he tried to walk on again, and he leaned heavily on the young girl's arm.
"What is it?" she asked. "Tell me—perhaps I can help you—I mean—I beg your pardon," she added, humbly, "perhaps it would help you to speak of it. That sometimes makes things seem clearer just when they have been most confused."
"Perhaps so, Vjera, perhaps so. You are a very good girl, and you came just in time. I love you, Vjera—do not forget that I love you." His voice was by turns sharp and suddenly low and monotonous, like that of a man talking in sleep. Altogether his manner was so strange that poor Vjera feared the very worst. The extremity of her anxiety kept her from losing her self-possession. For the first time in her life she felt that she was the stronger of the two, and that if he was to be saved it must be by her efforts rather than by anything he was now able to do for himself. She loved him, mad or sane, with an admiration and a devotion which took no account of his intellectual state except to grieve over it for his own sake. The belief that in this crisis she might be of use to him, strongly conquered the rising hysterical passion, and drove the tears so far from her eyes that she wondered vaguely why she had been so near to shedding them a few moments sooner. She pressed his arm with her hand.
"And I, too, I love you, with all my heart and soul," she said. "And if you will tell me what has happened, I will do what I can—if it were my life that were needed. I know I can help you, for God will help me."
He raised his head a little and again stood still, gazing into her eyes with an odd sort of childish wonder.
"What makes you so strong, Vjera? You used to be a weak little thing."