“Forgive me! I don’t know myself what I have been saying.”

“But I do; and you spoke the truth.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“That we must go to Petersburg,” he said; “there is nothing for us to do here just now.”

“As you please,” I said.

He took me in his arms and kissed me.

“You must forgive me,” he said; “for I am to blame.”

That evening I played to him for a long time, while he walked about the room. He had a habit of muttering to himself; and when I asked him what he was muttering, he always thought for a moment and then told me exactly what it was. It was generally verse, and sometimes mere nonsense, but I could always judge of his mood by it. When I asked him now, he stood still, thought an instant, and then repeated two lines from Lérmontov: