all, though the diary extends over two years. In Kazan she used to write down nothing at all. . . .'
Aratov got up slowly from his chair and flung himself on his knees before Anna.
She was simply petrified with wonder and dismay.
'Give me . . . give me that diary,' Aratov began with failing voice, and he stretched out both hands to Anna. 'Give it me . . . and the photograph . . . you are sure to have some other one, and the diary I will return. . . . But I want it, oh, I want it! . . .'
In his imploring words, in his contorted features there was something so despairing that it looked positively like rage, like agony . . . And he was in agony, truly. He could not himself have foreseen that such pain could be felt by him, and in a frenzy he implored forgiveness, deliverance . . .
'Give it me,' he repeated.
'But . . . you . . . you were in love with my sister?' Anna said at last.
Aratov was still on his knees.
'I only saw her twice . . . believe me ! . . . and if I had not been impelled by causes, which I can neither explain nor fully understand myself, . . . if there had not been some power over me, stronger than myself . . . I should
72
