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what was before him, he stared at the back of the sofa and waited, waited expecting that fearful fall and shock and dissolution. “Resistance is impossible,” he said to himself. “But if one could at least comprehend what it’s for? Even that’s impossible. It could be explained if one were to say that I hadn’t lived as I ought. But that can’t be alleged,” he said to himself, thinking of all the regularity, correctness, and propriety of his life. “That really can’t be admitted,” he said to himself, his lips smiling ironically as though someone could see his smile and be deceived by it. “No explanation! Agony, death.⁠ ⁠… What for?”