Page 350 sur 2288

Then...." Kitty hesitated; she wanted to say further that ever

since this change had taken place in her, Stepan Arkadyevitch had

become insufferably repulsive to her, and that she could not see

him without the grossest and most hideous conceptions rising

before her imagination.

"Oh, well, everything presents itself to me, in the coarsest,

most loathsome light," she went on. "That's my illness. Perhaps

it will pass off."

"But you mustn't think about it."

"I can't help it. I'm never happy except with the children at

your house."

"What a pity you can't be with me!"

"Oh, yes, I'm coming. I've had scarlatina, and I'll persuade

mamma to let me."

Kitty insisted on having her way, and went to stay at her

sister's and nursed the children all through the scarlatina, for

scarlatina it turned out to be. The two sisters brought all the

six children successfully through it, but Kitty was no better in

health, and in Lent the Shtcherbatskys went abroad.

Chapter 4