Part Three: Chapter 31

by Leo Tolstoy

　　Running halfway down the staircase, Levin caught a sound heknew, a familiar cough in the hall. But he heard it indistinctlythrough the sound of his own footsteps, and hoped he wasmistaken. Then he caught sight of a long, bony, familiar figure,and now it seemed there was no possibility of mistake; and yet hestill went on hoping that this tall man taking off his fur cloakand coughing was not his brother Nikolay.

　　Levin loved his brother, but being with him was always a torture.Just now, when Levin, under the influence of the thoughts thathad come to him, and Agafea Mihalovna's hint, was in a troubledand uncertain humor, the meeting with his brother that he had toface seemed particularly difficult. Instead of a lively, healthyvisitor, some outsider who would, he hoped, cheer him up in hisuncertain humor, he had to see his brother, who knew him throughand through, who would call forth all the thoughts nearest hisheart, would force him to show himself fully. And that he wasnot disposed to do.

　　Angry with himself for so base a feeling, Levin ran into thehall; as soon as he had seen his brother close, this feeling ofselfish disappointment vanished instantly and was replaced bypity. Terrible as his brother Nikolay had been before in hisemaciation and sickliness, now he looked still more emaciated,still more wasted. He was a skeleton covered with skin.

　　He stood in the hall, jerking his long thin neck, and pulling thescarf off it, and smiled a strange and pitiful smile. When hesaw that smile, submissive and humble, Levin felt somethingclutching at his throat.

　　"You see, I've come to you," said Nikolay in a thick voice, neverfor one second taking his eyes off his brother's face. "I'vebeen meaning to a long while, but I've been unwell all the time.Now I'm ever so much better," he said, rubbing his beard with hisbig thin hands.

　　"Yes, yes!" answered Levin. And he felt still more frightenedwhen, kissing him, he felt with his lips the dryness of hisbrother's skin and saw close to him his big eyes, full of astrange light.

　　A few weeks before, Konstantin Levin had written to his brotherthat through the sale of the small part of the property, that hadremained undivided, there was a sum of about two thousand roublesto come to him as his share.

　　Nikolay said that he had come now to take this money and, whatwas more important, to stay a while in the old nest, to get intouch with the earth, so as to renew his strength like the heroesof old for the work that lay before him. In spite of hisexaggerated stoop, and the emaciation that was so striking fromhis height, his movements were as rapid and abrupt as ever.Levin led him into his study.

　　His brother dressed with particular care--a thing he never usedto do--combed his scanty, lank hair, and, smiling, wentupstairs.

　　He was in the most affectionate and good-humored mood, just asLevin often remembered him in childhood. He even referred toSergey Ivanovitch without rancor. When he saw Agafea Mihalovna,he made jokes with her and asked after the old servants. Thenews of the death of Parfen Denisitch made a painful impressionon him. A look of fear crossed his face, but he regained hisserenity immediately.

　　"Of course he was quite old," he said, and changed the subject."Well, I'll spend a month or two with you, and then I'm off toMoscow. Do you know, Myakov has promised me a place there, andI'm going into the service. Now I'm going to arrange my lifequite differently," he went on. "You know I got rid of thatwoman."

　　"Marya Nikolaevna? Why, what for?"

　　"Oh, she was a horrid woman! She caused me all sorts ofworries." But he did not say what the annoyances were. He couldnot say that he had cast off Marya Nikolaevna because the tea wasweak, and, above all, because she would look after him, as thoughhe were an invalid.

　　"Besides, I want to turn over a new leaf completely now. I'vedone silly things, of course, like everyone else, but money'sthe last consideration; I don't regret it. So long as there'shealth, and my health, thank God, is quite restored."

　　Levin listened and racked his brains, but could think of nothingto say. Nikolay probably felt the same; he began questioning hisbrother about his affairs; and Levin was glad to talk abouthimself, because then he could speak without hypocrisy. He toldhis brother of his plans and his doings.

　　His brother listened, but evidently he was not interested by it.

　　These two men were so akin, so near each other, that theslightest gesture, the tone of voice, told both more than couldbe said in words.

　　Both of them now had only one thought--the illness of Nikolayand the nearness of his death--which stifled all else. Butneither of them dared to speak of it, and so whatever they said--not uttering the one thought that filled their minds--was allfalsehood. Never had Levin been so glad when the evening wasover and it was time to go to bed. Never with any outsideperson, never on any official visit had he been so unnatural andfalse as he was that evening. And the consciousness of thisunnaturalness, and the remorse he felt at it, made him evenmore unnatural. He wanted to weep over his dying, dearly lovedbrother, and he had to listen and keep on talking of how he meantto live.

　　As the house was damp, and only one bedroom had been kept heated,Levin put his brother to sleep in his own bedroom behind ascreen.

　　His brother got into bed, and whether he slept or did not sleep,tossed about like a sick man, coughed, and when he could not gethis throat clear, mumbled something. Sometimes when hisbreathing was painful, he said, "Oh, my God!" Sometimes when hewas choking he muttered angrily, "Ah, the devil!" Levin couldnot sleep for a long while, hearing him. His thoughts were ofthe most various, but the end of all his thoughts was the same--death. Death, the inevitable end of all, for the first timepresented itself to him with irresistible force. And death,which was here in this loved brother, groaning half asleep andfrom habit calling without distinction on God and the devil, wasnot so remote as it had hitherto seemed to him. It was inhimself too, he felt that. If not today, tomorrow, if nottomorrow, in thirty years, wasn't it all the same! And what wasthis inevitable death--he did not know, had never thought aboutit, and what was more, had not the power, had not the courage tothink about it.

　　"I work, I want to do something, but I had forgotten it mustall end; I had forgotten--death."

　　He sat on his bed in the darkness, crouched up, hugging hisknees, and holding his breath from the strain of thought, hepondered. But the more intensely he thought, the clearer itbecame to him that it was indubitably so, that in reality,looking upon life, he had forgotten one little fact--that deathwill come, and all ends; that nothing was even worth beginning,and that there was no helping it anyway. Yes, it was awful, butit was so.

　　"But I am alive still. Now what's to be done? what's to bedone?" he said in despair. He lighted a candle, got upcautiously and went to the looking-glass, and began looking athis face and hair. Yes, there were gray hairs about his temples.He opened his mouth. His back teeth were beginning to decay. Hebared his muscular arms. Yes, there was strength in them. ButNikolay, who lay there breathing with what was left of lungs, hadhad a strong, healthy body too. And suddenly he recalled howthey used to go to bed together as children, and how they onlywaited till Fyodor Bogdanitch was out of the room to flingpillows at each other and laugh, laugh irrepressibly, so thateven their awe of Fyodor Bogdanitch could not check theeffervescing, overbrimming sense of life and happiness. "And nowthat bent, hollow chest...and I, not knowing what will become ofme, or wherefore..."

　　"K...ha! K...ha! Damnation! Why do you keep fidgeting, whydon't you go to sleep?" his brother's voice called to him.

　　"Oh, I don't know, I'm not sleepy."

　　"I have had a good sleep, I'm not in a sweat now. Just see, feelmy shirt; it's all wet, isn't it?"

　　Levin felt, withdrew behind the screen, and put out the candle,but for a long while he could not sleep. The question how tolive had hardly begun to grow a little clearer to him, when anew, insoluble question presented itself--death.

　　"Why, he's dying--yes, he'll die in the spring, and how helphim? What can I say to him? What do I know about it? I'd evenforgotten that it was at all."