Chapter IYour sudden confession last night surprised me and disturbed me a little. Believe me, I didn’t expect it. I was under the impression that everything between us was clear, settled, and if I occasionally leant on your shoulder (even though this gesture regularly infuriated Andrei), I did it with friendly ease, almost without noticing, like so many other familiar gestures.
Why did you have to end up like the others? Let me scold you. You deserve it, and besides, it will do me good. In any case, you mustn’t read in my silence and my hurried escape from the ball the indignation of a hysterical woman. I am already old, even though you refuse to believe it, and I have heard words like the ones you uttered last night, in other circumstances, and expressed in different ways, so many times
