'So much the better, so much the better,' he thought, as he hurried
home. 'I have learnt nothing new, but so much the better. What
possessed me to go hanging on to the edge of another man's happiness?
I regret nothing; I have done what my conscience told me; but now it
is over. Let them be! My father was right when he used to say to me:
"You and I, my dear boy, are not Sybarites, we are not aristocrats,
we're not the spoilt darlings of fortune and nature, we are not even
martyrs--we are workmen and nothing more. Put on your leather apron,
workman, and take your place at your workman's bench, in your dark
workshop, and let the sun shine on other men! Even our dull life has
its own pride, its own happiness!"'

The next morning Insarov got a brief note by the post. 'Expect me,'
Elena wrote to him, 'and give orders for no one to see you. A. P. will
not come.'





XXVIII


Insarov read Elena's note, and at once began to set his room to rights;
asked his landlady to take away the medicine-glasses, took off his
dressing-gown and put on his coat. His head was swimming and his heart
throbbing from weakness and delight. His knees were shaking; he
dropped on to the sofa, and began to look at his watch. 'It's now a
quarter to twelve,' he said to himself. 'She can never come before
twelve: I will think of something else for a quarter of an hour, or I