But he did not come to himself as on the previous night, in spite of all
they could do. He fell the same night into a high fever, complicated by
failure of the heart.

A few days later he passed away.

A strange circumstance attended his second fainting-fit. When they lifted
him up and laid him on his bed, in his clenched right hand they found a
small tress of a woman's dark hair. Where did this lock of hair come from?
Anna Semyonovna had such a lock of hair left by Clara; but what could
induce her to give Aratov a relic so precious to her? Could she have put it
somewhere in the diary, and not have noticed it when she lent the book?

In the delirium that preceded his death, Aratov spoke of himself as Romeo
... after the poison; spoke of marriage, completed and perfect; of his
knowing now what rapture meant. Most terrible of all for Platosha was the
minute when Aratov, coming a little to himself, and seeing her beside his
bed, said to her, 'Aunt, what are you crying for?--because I must die? But
don't you know that love is stronger than death?... Death! death! where is
thy sting? You should not weep, but rejoice, even as I rejoice....'

And once more on the face of the dying man shone out the rapturous smile,
which gave the poor old woman such cruel pain.




PHANTOMS