This line was expressed thus: “You know,” she would say to acquaintances, “Ivan Ilyitch cannot, like all other simple-hearted folks, keep to the treatment prescribed him. One day he’ll take his drops and eat what he’s ordered, and go to bed in good time; the next day, if I don’t see to it, he’ll suddenly forget to take his medicine, eat sturgeon (which is forbidden by the doctors), yes, and sit up at ‘screw’ till past midnight.”

“Why, when did I do that?” Ivan Ilyitch asked in vexation one day at Pyotr Ivanovitch’s.

“Why, yesterday, with Shebek.”

“It makes no difference. I couldn’t sleep for pain.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter what you do it for, only you’ll never get well like that, and you make us wretched.”