Everything was silent in the room; a butterfly that had flown in was fluttering its wings and struggling between the curtain and the window.
The first to speak was Litvinov.
'That, Irina Pavlovna,' he began, 'that is the misfortune, which . . . has befallen me, which I ought to have foreseen and avoided, if I had not now just as in the Moscow days been carried off my feet at once. It seems fate is pleased to force me again and again through you to suffer tortures, which one would have thought should not be repeated again. . . . It was not without cause I struggled. . . . I tried to struggle; but of course there 's no escaping one's fate. And I tell you all this to put an end at once to this . . . this tragic farce,' he added with a fresh outburst of shame and bitterness.
Litvinov was silent again; the butterfly was struggling and fluttering as before. Irina did not take her hands from her face.
'And you are not mistaken?' her whisper sounded from under those white, bloodless-looking hands.
'I am not mistaken,' answered Litvinov in a colourless voice. 'I love you, as I have never loved any one but you. I am not going to reproach you; that would be too foolish; I 'm
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