His eyes glittered “as though he were mad,” Sonia thought, in her turn.

“Go where?” she asked in alarm and she involuntarily stepped back.

“How do I know? I only know it’s the same road, I know that and nothing more. It’s the same goal!”

She looked at him and understood nothing. She knew only that he was terribly, infinitely unhappy.

“No one of them will understand, if you tell them, but I have understood. I need you, that is why I have come to you.”

“I don’t understand,” whispered Sonia.

“You’ll understand later. Haven’t you done the same? You, too, have transgressed... have had the strength to transgress. You have laid hands on yourself, you have destroyed a life... your own