“Give them this! Give them all you have with you,—only let us go away! For mercy’s sake, let us go home as quickly as possible! I cannot, I cannot bear to hear it!”
VI.
On the following day Peter was lying in his room prostrated with a nervous fever. He lay tossing on his bed, with a look of agony on his face, as if he heard some sound from which he was struggling to escape. The old local doctor attributed this illness to a cold, but Maxim well knew its real cause. It was a severe attack, and at the time of the crisis the sick man lay motionless for several days; but youth came off victorious in the end.
One pleasant autumn morning a bright sunbeam crept in at the window and rested near the invalid’s head. Anna Michàilovna turning to Evelyn said, “Please draw the shade. I dread that light.”
Rising in obedience to her request, the girl was arrested by the unexpected sound of the blind man’s voice:—
“Never mind, please. Let it be as it is.”
Both women leaned over him with rapture:
“Do you know me?” asked the mother.