"Yes, yes," I repeated with a certain bitterness, "and you are to blame for it—you alone. Why did you betray your secret? Who compelled you to tell your brother? He himself was with me to-day, and told me of your conversation with him."
I avoided looking at Assja, and went up and down the room with great strides. "Now everything is lost—everything, everything."
Assja was about to get up from her chair.
"Oh, sit still," I cried; "sit still, I beg you. You have to do with a man of honor—yes, with a man of honor. But in Heaven's name what disturbed you so? Have you seen any change in me? But it was impossible for me to conceal it from your brother when he made me a visit to-day."
"What am I saying?" I thought to myself, and the idea that I should be a base hypocrite, that Gagin knew of this meeting, that everything had been talked over, twisted and spoiled, maddened me.
"I did not call my brother," Assja said, in a frightened, harsh voice. "He came of his own will."
"Only see what you have done," I went on. "Now you want to go away."
"Yes, I must go," she said in a whisper, "and I only asked you to come here that I might take leave of you."
"And do you think," I retorted, "that it is easy for me to part from you?"
"Why were you obliged to tell my brother?" repeated Assja with an expression of amazement.