“Well, have you seen Menshoff?” she suddenly asked, to hide her emotion. “It’s true they are innocent, isn’t it?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“Such a splendid old woman,” she said.
There was another pause.
“Well, and as to the hospital?” she suddenly said, and looking at him with her squinting eyes. “If you like, I will go, and I shall not drink any spirits, either.”
Nekhludoff looked into her eyes. They were smiling.
“Yes, yes, she is quite a different being,” Nekhludoff thought. After all his former doubts, he now felt something he had never before experienced—the certainty that love is invincible.
When Maslova returned to her noisome cell after this interview, she took off her cloak and sat down in her place on the shelf bedstead with her hands folded on her lap. In the cell were only the consumptive woman, the Vladimir woman with her baby, Menshoff’s old mother, and the watchman’s wife. The deacon’s daughter had the day before been declared mentally diseased and removed to the hospital. The rest of the women were away, washing clothes. The old woman was asleep, the cell door stood open, and the watchman’s children were in the corridor outside. The Vladimir woman, with her baby in her arms, and the watchman’s wife, with the stocking she was knitting with deft fingers, came up to Maslova. “Well, have you had a chat?” they asked. Maslova sat silent on the high bedstead, swinging her legs, which did not reach to the floor.
“What’s the good of snivelling?” said the watchman’s wife. “The chief thing’s not to go down into the dumps. Eh, Katusha? Now, then!” and she went on, quickly moving her fingers.
Maslova did not answer.