He prays for her, and beseeches God to have mercy on her sins. And it is better so. But now what will he think?”

“I had not thought of that,” said Alexey Alexandrovitch, evidently agreeing.

Countess Lidia Ivanovna hid her face in her hands and was silent. she was praying.

“If you ask my advice,” she said, having finished her prayer and uncovered her face, “I do not advise you to do this. Do you suppose I don’t see how you are suffering, how this has torn open your wounds? But supposing that, as always, you don’t think of yourself, what can it lead to? — to fresh suffering for you, to torture for the child. If there were a trace of humanity left in her, she ought not to wish for it herself.