"Oh, I am not thinking about myself. I am so sorry for him. Poor,
poor, senseless creature. How much I have suffered at his hands. He
was always so suspicious, so hard to get on with. And whims and
fantasies without end. You know, doctor, I have sometimes even thought
he was not in full possession of his faculties."

"Hm!" murmured the doctor, coughing in confusion.

"Take this strange change of his will, for instance," the general's
wife continued, not waiting for a clearer expression of sympathy.
"Take his manner toward me. And for what reason?"

"Yes, it is very sad," murmured the doctor.

"Tell me, doctor, does he expect his son and daughter?"

"Only his daughter, Anna Iurievna. She promised to come, with her
oldest children. A telegram came yesterday. We have been expecting her
all day."

"What is the cause of this sudden tenderness? They have not seen each
other for ten years. Does he expect her husband, too? His son-in-law,
the pedagogue?" contemptuously asked the general's wife.

"No! How could he come? He could not leave his service. And his son,
too, Peter Iurevitch, he cannot come at once. He is on duty, in
Transcaspia. It is a long way."

"Yes, it is a long way!" assented the general's wife, evidently busy
with other thoughts. "But tell me, Edouard Vicentevitch, this new