at his desk, busy with his will, I expect.” (One of the prince’s favorite occupations of late had been the preparation of some papers he meant to leave at his death and which he called his “will.”)
“And Alpátych is being sent to Smolénsk?” asked Princess Márya.
“Oh, yes, he has been waiting to start for some time.”
III
When Mikháil Ivánovich returned to the study with the letter, the old prince, with spectacles on and a shade over his eyes, was sitting at his open bureau with screened candles, holding a paper in his outstretched hand, and in a somewhat dramatic attitude was reading his manuscript—his “Remarks” as he termed it—which was to be transmitted to the Emperor after his death.
When Mikháil Ivánovich went in there were tears in the prince’s eyes evoked by the memory of the time when the