Page:The Kiss and Other Stories by Anton Tchekhoff, 1908.pdf/163

 It is this. The day before yesterday I took diphtheria at the hospital, and now. . . I feel bad. Send at once for Korosteleff.”

Olga Ivanovna called her husband and men-friends by their surnames; she disliked his name Osip, which reminded her of Gogol's Osip, and the pun “Osip okrip, a Arkhip osip.” But this time she cried —

“Osip, that is impossible!”

“Send! I am ill,” said Duimoff from behind the door; and she heard hira walking to the sofa and lying down. “Send!” came his hoarse voice.

“What can it be,” thought Olga Ivanovna, chilled with fear. “Why this is dangerous!”

Without any aim she took a candle, and went into her room, and there, wondering what she should do, she saw herself unexpectedly in the glass. With her pale, terrified face, her high-sleeved jacket with the yellow gathers on the breast, her skirt with its strange stripes, she seemed to herself frightful and repulsive. And suddenly she felt sorry for Duimoff, sorry for his infinite love, his young life, the forsaken bed on which he had not slept so long. And remembering his kindly, suppliant smile, she cried bitterly, and wrote Korosteleff an imploring letter. It was two o'clock in the morning.