Pagina 42 de 1294

She was not herself when she spoke, but driven to distraction by

her illness and the crying of the hungry children; and it was

said more to wound her than anything else.... For that's Katerina

Ivanovna's character, and when children cry, even from hunger,

she falls to beating them at once. At six o'clock I saw Sonia get

up, put on her kerchief and her cape, and go out of the room and

about nine o'clock she came back. She walked straight up to

Katerina Ivanovna and she laid thirty roubles on the table before

her in silence. She did not utter a word, she did not even look

at her, she simply picked up our big green drap de dames shawl

(we have a shawl, made of drap de dames), put it over her head

and face and lay down on the bed with her face to the wall; only

her little shoulders and her body kept shuddering.... And I went

on lying there, just as before....