"Here, not far away."

"How ... have you found him? Is he alive?"

"To be sure. I have been talking to him." (A load was lifted from
my heart.) "His honour was sitting in his great-coat under a birch
tree ... and he was all right. I put it to him, 'Won't you come home,
Ilya Stepanitch; Alexandr Vassilitch is very much worried about you.'
And he said to me, 'What does he want to worry for! I want to be in the
fresh air. My head aches. Go home,' he said, 'and I will come later.'"

"And you left him?" I cried, clasping my hands.

"What else could I do? He told me to go ... how could I stay?"

All my fears came back to me at once.

"Take me to him this minute--do you hear? This minute! O Semyon,
Semyon, I did not expect this of you! You say he is not far off?"

"He is quite close, here, where the copse begins--he is sitting there.
It is not more than five yards from the river bank. I found him as I
came alongside the river."

"Well, take me to him, take me to him."

Semyon set off ahead of me. "This way, sir.... We have only to get
down to the river and it is close there."