tion, reflected Stepan Arkadyevitch, who was fond of physiology)--utterly involuntarily
assumed its habitual, good-humored, and therefore idiotic smile.
This idiotic smile he could not forgive himself. Catching sight of that smile,
Dolly shuddered as though at physical pain, broke out with her characteristic
heat into a flood of cruel words, and rushed out of the room. Since then she
had refused to see her husband.
"It's that idiotic smile that's to blame for it all," thought Stepan
Arkadyevitch.
"But what's to be done? What's to be done?" he said to himself in
despair, and found no answer.
Chapter 2
Stepan Arkadyevitch was a truthful man in his relations with himself. He was
incapable of deceiving himself and persuading himself that he repented of his
conduct. He could not at this date repent of the fact that he, a handsome, susceptible
man of thirty-four, was not in love with his wife, the mother of five living
and two dead children, and only a year
