A little hurried sound as of a broken sob fell on my ear, and I felt on my hair the tender touch of a hand that trembled like a leaf. I raised my head, and looked in her face. The expression of fear was gone from her features. Her glance swept past me into the room. Her lips were a little apart, her forehead white as marble, and the hair pushed off as if the wind had blown it back. I forgot everything; I drew her toward me; willingly her hand obeyed, and her whole body followed; the shawl slipped from her shoulders, and her head bowed silently to my breast and laid itself against my burning lips.
Already my arm was about her, when suddenly, like a gleam of lightning, the thought of Gagin flashed through my brain. "What are we doing?" I cried, and moved roughly away. "Your brother knows all--he knows that we are here together."
"Yes," I went on, while I rose and went over to the other side of the room. "Your brother knows everything. I had to tell him everything."
"You had to?" she stammered unintelligibly. She could not come to herself, and only half comprehended me.
"Yes, yes," I repeated with a certain bitterness, "and you are to blame for it--you alone. Why did you betray your secret? Who compelled you to tell your brother? He himself was with me to-day, and told me of your conversation with him."
I avoided looking at Assja, and went up and down the room with great strides. "Now everything is lost--everything, everything."
Assja was about to get up from her chair.
"Oh, sit still," I cried; "sit still, I beg you. You have to do with a man of honor--yes, with a man of honor. But in Heaven's name what disturbed you so? Have you seen any change in me? But it was impossible for me to conceal it from your brother when he made me a visit to-day."
"What am I saying?" I thought to myself, and the idea that I should be a base hypocrite, that Gagin knew of this meeting, that everything had been talked over, twisted and spoiled, maddened me.
"I did not call my brother," Assja said, in a frightened, harsh voice. "He came of his own will."
"Only see what you have done," I went on. "Now you want to go away."
"Yes, I must go," she said in a whisper, "and I only asked you to come here that I might take leave of you."