affairs, but there were no acts to speak of. Some one was persistently demanding of him: "Tell me, what have you done?" and he was searching his mind, desperately, sorrowfully—he was passing over the years he had lived as over the keyboard of a piano, and each year struck the same empty, wooden sound—"bya," without meaning, without significance.
"Ivanov, I am convinced that you copied the problem from Sirotkin." No, no, that is not the proper thing.
"Listen, madam, listen to me," he muttered, lowering his head, gesticulating calmly and properly. "How absurd it is to think that I am a spy. I—a spy? What nonsense! Please, let me convince you. Now, you see——"
Emptiness. Where had everything disappeared? He knew that he had done something, but what? All his kin and his acquaintances regarded him as a sensible, kind and just man—and they must have reasons for their opinion. Yes, he had bought goods for a dress for grandmother, and his wife even said to him: "You are too kind, Mitrofan!" But, then, spies may also love their grandmothers, and they may also buy goods for their grandmothers—perhaps even the same black goods with little dots. What else? But, no, no. That is all nonsense!
Unconsciously Mitrofan came back from the boulevard to the house where the student girl disappeared, but he did not notice it. He felt that
