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"
During these assemblies of the Zemstvo I always slept badly in my
strange quarters. That night I went to sleep directly, but, as sometimes
happens, a sort of sudden shock awoke me. I thought immediately of her,
of my physical love for her, of Troukhatchevsky, and that between them
everything had happened. And a feeling of rage compressed my heart, and
I tried to quiet myself.
"'How stupid!' said I to myself; 'there is no reason, none at all. And
why humiliate ourselves, herself and myself, and especially myself,
by supposing such horrors? This mercenary violinist, known as a bad
man,--shall I think of him in connection with a respectable woman, the
mother of a family, MY wife? How silly!' But on the other hand, I said
to myself: 'Why should it not happen?'
"
Why? Was it not the same simple and intelligible feeling in the name
of which I married, in the name of which I was living with her, the only
thing I wanted of her, and that which, consequently, others desired,
this musician among the rest? He was not married, was in good health
(I remember how his teeth ground the gristle of the cutlets, and how
eagerly he emptied the glass of wine with his red lips), was careful
of his person, well fed, and not only without principles, but evidently
with the principle that one should take advantage of the pleasure that
offers itself. There was a bond between them, music,--the most refined
form of sensual voluptuousness. What was there to restrain them?
Nothing. Everything, on the contrary, attracted them. And she, she had
been and had remained a mystery. I did not know her. I knew her only
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