'Read it!' cried Anna. 'Why don't you read it? Read it through from the
beginning.... It would take only five minutes to read it all, though the
diary extends over two years. In Kazan she used to write down nothing at
all....'

Aratov got up slowly from his chair and flung himself on his knees before
Anna.

She was simply petrified with wonder and dismay.

'Give me ... give me that diary,' Aratov began with failing voice, and he
stretched out both hands to Anna. 'Give it me ... and the photograph ...
you are sure to have some other one, and the diary I will return.... But I
want it, oh, I want it!...'

In his imploring words, in his contorted features there was something so
despairing that it looked positively like rage, like agony.... And he was
in agony, truly. He could not himself have foreseen that such pain could be
felt by him, and in a frenzy he implored forgiveness, deliverance ...

'Give it me,' he repeated.

'But ... you ... you were in love with my sister?' Anna said at last.

Aratov was still on his knees.

'I only saw her twice ... believe me!... and if I had not been impelled
by causes, which I can neither explain nor fully understand myself,... if
there had not been some power over me, stronger than myself.... I should