Page:The Novels of Ivan Turgenev (volume VII).djvu/257

Rh of her with gratitude not long before my death. She will understand.

'But I must tear myself away. I looked out of window just now; among the rapidly moving clouds there was one lovely star. However rapidly they moved, they had not been able to hide it. That star made me think of you, Marianna. At this instant you are sleeping in the next room, and suspecting nothing. I went to your door, listened, and I fancied I caught your pure, calm breathing. Good-bye, good-bye, my dear! good-bye, my children, my friends!—Your A.

'Fie! fie! How came I, in a last letter before death, to say nothing of our great cause? I suppose because one can't tell lies on the point of death. Marianna, forgive me this postscript. The falsehood's in me, not in what you have faith in!

'Oh! something more: you will think, perhaps, Marianna, "He was afraid of the prison where they would certainly have put him, and he thought of this expedient to escape it." No; imprisonment's nothing of any consequence; but to be in prison for a cause you don't believe in—that's really senseless. And I am putting an end to myself, not from dread of being in prison. Good-bye, Marianna! Good-bye, my pure, spotless girl!'