"Yes, I know that you would. But--well. You can't help me because I
don't know what's the matter with me."

"That's very unlike you," I said.

"Yes, I know it is--and perhaps that's why I am frightened. It's so
vague; and you know I long ago determined that if I couldn't define a
trouble and have it there in front of me, so that I could strangle
it--why I wouldn't bother about it. But those things are so easy to
say."

She got up and began to walk up and down the room. That again was
utterly unlike her, and altogether I seemed to be seeing, this
afternoon, some quite new Vera Michailovna, some one more intimate, more
personal, more appealing. I realised suddenly that she had never before,
at any period of our friendship, asked for my help--not even for my
sympathy. She was so strong and reliant and independent, cared so little
for the opinion of others, and shut down so closely upon herself her
private life, that I could not have imagined her asking help from any
one. And of the two of us, she was the man, the strong determined soul,
the brave and self-reliant character. It seemed to me ludicrous that
she should ask for my help. Nevertheless I was greatly touched.

"I would do anything for you," I said.

She turned to me, a splendid figure, her head, with its crown of black
hair, lifted, her hands on her hips, her eyes gravely regarding me.

"There are three things," she said, "perhaps all of them nothing.... And