"I repeat to you, I could not do otherwise. If you had not betrayed yourself"—
"I was shut up in my room," she replied naïvely. "I did not know that the landlady had another key."
This innocent excuse at the moment put me in a rage; and now I cannot think of it without deep emotion. Poor child, what an upright and frank soul!
"So all is at an end," I replied once more; "at an end—; and we must part."
I looked at her furtively. The color mounted to her face; shame and terror—I felt it only too keenly—seized her. On my side, I walked to and fro, speaking as if in delirium.
"There was in my heart," I continued, "a feeling just springing up, which, if you had left it to time, would have developed! You have yourself broken the bond that united us; you have failed to put confidence in me."
While I spoke, Annouchka leaned forward more and more.—Suddenly she fell upon her knees, hid her face in her hands, and began to sob. I ran to her, I attempted to raise her, but she resisted obstinately.
Woman's tears thoroughly upset me. I cried out to her:—
"Anna Nicolaëvna! Annouchka,—pray, for heaven's sake,—calm yourself,—I beseech you."
And I took her hand in mine.