Page 516 - the-brothers-karamazov

‘good-bye, perhaps I shan’t come again... we shall meet in
heaven. So I have been for fourteen years ‘in the hands of
the living God,’ that’s how one must think of those fourteen
years. To-morrow I will beseech those hands to let me go.’
I wanted to take him in my arms and kiss him, but I did
not dare — his face was contorted add sombre. He went
away.
‘Good God,’ I thought, ‘what has he gone to face!’ I fell on
my knees before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy
Mother of God, our swift defender and helper. I was half
an hour praying in tears, and it was late, about midnight.
Suddenly I saw the door open and he came in again. I was
surprised.
Where have you been?’ I asked him.
‘I think,’ he said, ‘I’ve forgotten something... my hand-
kerchief, I think.... Well, even if I’ve not forgotten anything,
let me stay a little.’
He sat down. I stood over him.
‘You sit down, too,’ said he.
I sat down. We sat still for two minutes; he looked intent-
ly at me and suddenly smiled. I remembered that — then he
got up, embraced me warmly and kissed me.
‘Remember,’ he said, ‘how I came to you a second time.
Do you hear, remember it!’
And he went out.
‘To-morrow,’ I thought.
And so it was. I did not know that evening that the next
day was his birthday. I had not been out for the last few days,
so I had no chance of hearing it from anyone. On that day

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