dread.

She was so confused that she did not even think of looking for her
pocket; she simply held her packet tight, and let her hand hang
down, hiding it in the folds of her wide dressing-gown. There
seemed to be so many people in the room which a moment before was
empty, that she felt cowed. Her heart beat pitilessly, and the
blood throbbed so violently in her temples that she could not
understand what was said to her. They were asking her if they
might place the body in the coffin, which had already been placed
beside it. Her silence was taken as consent. The skilful
undertakers easily lifted the already rigid body.

Olga Vseslavovna stood at the head of the dead general. Among the
crowd of undertakers and servants, she suddenly saw coming toward
her, with outstretched hand, and with tears of compassion in her
eyes, the Princess Ryadski, the same aristocratic kinswoman who had
already taken little Olga to stay with her.

"I must shake hands with her! And that horrible packet is in my
hand! Where shall I put it? How can I hide it?" Before her eyes
gleamed the brilliantly lighted, ashen forehead of the dead man,
helplessly bent backward and sideways, as the whole body was
suspended in the hands of the undertakers, over its last abode.

A saving thought!

The general's wife bent gently over the dead body. She gently
supported the head of the corpse, gently laid it on the satin
cushion, straightened the frills which surrounded the hard pillow,