"These, mind you, were the words of a man in whom the heart was absolutely single, absolutely dispassionate."
Until then Kalinin had told his story swiftly, with animation; but thereafter he seemed, as it were, to become extinguished. After a pause of a few seconds he continued—continued in slower, to all appearances more unwilling, accents—
"At the time I believed what Lukianov said, but subsequently I came to see that things were not altogether as he had represented—that woman is merely a delusion, and poetry merely fiddle-faddle; and that a man cannot escape his fate, and that, though good in war, boldness is, in peace affairs, but naked effrontery. In this, brother, lies the chief, the fundamental law of life. For the world contains certain people of high station, and certain people of low; and so long as these two categories retain their respective positions, all goes well; but as soon as ever a man seeks to pass from the upper category to the inferior category, or from the inferior to the upper, the fat falls into the fire, and that man finds himself stuck midway, stuck neither here nor there, and bound to abide there for the remainder of his life, for the remainder of his life.... Always keep to your own position, to the position assigned you by fate..... Will the rain NEVER cease, think you?"
By this time, as a matter of fact, the raindrops were falling less heavily and densely than hitherto, and the wet clouds were beginning to reveal bright patches in the moisture-soaked firmament, as evidence that the sun was still in existence.
"Continue," I said.
Kalinin laughed.
"Then you find the story an interesting one," he remarked.
Presently he resumed:
"As I have said, I trusted Lukianov implicitly, and begged of him to write the verses. And write them he did—he wrote them the very next day. True, at this distance of time I have forgotten the words in their entirety, but at least I remember that there occurred in them a phrase to the effect that 'for days and weeks have your eyes been consuming my heart in the fire of love, so pity me, I pray.' I then proceeded to copy out the poem, and tremblingly to leave it on her table.
"The next morning, when I was tidying her boudoir, she made an unexpected entry, and, clad in a loose, red dressing-gown, and holding a cigarette between her lips, said to me with a kindly smile as she produced my precious paper of verses: