Pagina 375 van 1294

Then he softly unlatched the door, went out, slipped downstairs

and glanced in at the open kitchen door. Nastasya was standing

with her back to him, blowing up the landlady's samovar. She

heard nothing. Who would have dreamed of his going out, indeed? A

minute later he was in the street.

It was nearly eight o'clock, the sun was setting. It was as

stifling as before, but he eagerly drank in the stinking, dusty

town air. His head felt rather dizzy; a sort of savage energy

gleamed suddenly in his feverish eyes and his wasted, pale and

yellow face. He did not know and did not think where he was

going, he had one thought only: "that all this must be ended

to-day, once for all, immediately; that he would not return home

without it, because he _would not go on living like that_." How,

with what to make an end? He had not an idea about it, he did not

even want to think of it. He drove away thought; thought tortured

him. All he knew, all he felt was that everything must be changed

"one way or another," he repeated with desperate and immovable

self-confidence and determination.