“What is your trouble? For God’s sake, tell me. You said that you had something to confide in me, which means that I must be necessary to you; there is nothing I would not do for you. You have only to command me. Forgive me my too hasty speech.”
“You, too, my poor Ivan Ivanovich! I can find neither prayers nor tears, nor is there any guidance or help for me anywhere.”
“What words of despair are these, Vera Vassilievna?”
“Do you know whom you love?”
He threw his cloak on the bench, and wiped the sweat from his brow. Her words told him that his hopes were ruined, that her love was given elsewhere. He drew a deep breath, and sat motionless, awaiting her further explanations.
“My poor friend,” she said, taking his hand. The simple words filled him with new sorrow; he knew that he was in fact to be pitied.
“Thank you,” he whispered. “Forgive me ... I did not know, Vera Vassilievna ... I am a fool.... Please forget my declaration. But I should like to help you, since you say yourself you rely on me for a service. I thank you for holding me worthy of that. You stand so high above me; I always feel that you stand so high, Vera Vassilievna.”
“My poor Ivan Ivanovich, I have fallen from those heights, and no human power can reinstate me,” she said, as she led him to the edge of the precipice.
“Do you know this place?” she asked.
“Yes, a suicide is buried there.”