Pavel Pavlovitch turned back and seized his bracelet-case, stuffing it into his pocket, and went out.
Velchaninoff stood in the hall, waiting to shut the front door after him.
Their looks met for the last time. Pavel Pavlovitch stopped, and the two men gazed into each others eyes for five seconds or so, as though in indecision. At length Velchaninoff faintly waved him away with his hand.
“Go!” he said, only half aloud, as he closed the door and turned the key.
CHAPTER XVI.
A feeling of immense happiness took possession of Velchaninoff; something was finished, and done with, and settled. Some huge anxiety was at an end, so it seemed to him. This anxiety had lasted five weeks.
He raised his hand and looked at the blood-stained rag bound about it.
“Oh, yes!” he thought, “it is, indeed, all over now.”