XXII

“Terrible,” said Nekhlúdoff, as he went out into the waiting-room with the advocate, who was arranging the papers in his portfolio. “In a matter which is perfectly clear they attach all the importance to the form and reject the appeal. Terrible!”

“The case was spoiled in the Criminal Court,” said the advocate.

“And Selenín, too, was in favour of the rejection. Terrible! terrible!” Nekhlúdoff repeated. “What is to be done now?”

“We will appeal to His Majesty, and you can hand in the petition yourself while you are here. I will write it for you.”

At this moment little Wolff, with his stars and uniform, came out into the waiting-room and approached Nekhlúdoff. “It could not be helped, dear Prince. The reasons for an appeal were not sufficient,” he said, shrugging his narrow shoulders and closing his eyes, and then he went his way.

After Wolff, Selenín came out too, having heard from the Senators that his old friend Nekhlúdoff was there.

“Well, I never expected to see you here,” he said, coming up to Nekhlúdoff, and smiling only with his lips while his eyes remained sad. “I did not know you were in Petersburg.”

“And I did not know you were Public Prosecutor-in-Chief.”

“How is it you are in the Senate?” asked Selenín. “I had heard, by the way, that you were in Petersburg. But what are you doing here?”

“Here? I am here because I hoped to find justice and save a woman innocently condemned.”

“What woman?”

“The one whose case has just been decided.”

“Oh! Máslova’s case,” said Selenín, suddenly remembering it. “The appeal had no grounds whatever.”

“It is not the appeal; it’s the woman who is innocent, and is being punished.”

Selenín sighed. “That may well be, but⁠—”

“Not may be, but is.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I was on the jury. I know how we made the mistake.”

Selenín became thoughtful. “You should have made a statement at the time,” he said.

“I did make the statement.”

“It should have been put down in an official report. If this had been added to the petition for the appeal⁠—”

“Yes, but still, as it is, the verdict is evidently absurd.”

“The Senate has no right to say so. If the Senate took upon itself to repeal the decision of the law courts according to its own views as to the justice of the decisions in themselves, the verdict of the jury would lose all its meaning, not to mention that the Senate would have no basis to go upon, and would run the risk of infringing justice rather than upholding it,” said Selenín, calling to mind the case that had just been heard.

“All I know is that this woman is quite innocent, and that the last hope of saving her from an unmerited punishment is gone. The grossest injustice has been confirmed by the highest court.”

“It has not been confirmed. The Senate did not and cannot enter into the merits of the case in itself,” said Selenín. Always busy and rarely going out into society, he had evidently heard nothing of Nekhlúdoff’s romance. Nekhlúdoff noticed it, and made up his mind that it was best to say nothing about his special relations with Máslova.

“You are probably staying with your aunt,” Selenín remarked, apparently wishing to change the subject. “She told me you were here yesterday, and she invited me to meet you in the evening, when some foreign preacher was to lecture,” and Selenín again smiled only with his lips.

“Yes, I was there, but left in disgust,” said Nekhlúdoff angrily, vexed that Selenín had changed the subject.

“Why with disgust? After all, it is a manifestation of religious feeling, though one-sided and sectarian,” said Selenín.

“Why, it’s only some kind of whimsical folly.”

“Oh, dear, no. The curious thing is that we know the teaching of our church so little that we see some new kind of revelation in what are, after all, our own fundamental dogmas,” said Selenín, as if hurrying to let his old friend know his new views.

Nekhlúdoff looked at Selenín scrutinisingly and with surprise, and Selenín dropped his eyes, in which appeared an expression not only of sadness but also of ill-will.

“Do you, then, believe in the dogmas of the church?” Nekhlúdoff asked.

“Of course I do,” replied Selenín, gazing straight into Nekhlúdoff’s eyes with a lifeless look.

Nekhlúdoff sighed. “It is strange,” he said.

“However, we shall have a talk some other time,” said Selenín. “I am coming,” he added, in answer to the usher, who had respectfully approached him. “Yes, we must meet again,” he went on with a sigh. “But will it be possible for me to find you? You will always find me in at seven o’clock. My address is Nadéjdinskaya,” and he gave the number. “Ah, time does not stand still,” and he turned to go, smiling only with his lips.

“I will come if I can,” said Nekhlúdoff, feeling that a man once near and dear to him had, by this brief conversation, suddenly become strange, distant, and incomprehensible, if not hostile to him.