"Why do you look at me like that?" asked Sanine, smiling.

This quiet smile and searching glance formed his usual expression, but,
strange to say, they did not please Lida. To her, they seemed self-
complacent, revealing nought of spiritual suffering and strife. She
looked away and was silent. Then, mechanically, she kept turning over
the pages of a book.

When the meal was at an end, Sanine's mother patted his head
affectionately, and said: "Now, tell us all about your life, and what you did there."

"What I did?" said Sanine, laughing. "Well, I ate, and drank, and
slept; and sometimes I worked; and sometimes I did nothing!"

It seemed at first as if he were unwilling to speak of himself, but
when his mother questioned him about this or that, he appeared pleased
to narrate his experiences. Yet, for some reason or other, one felt
that he was wholly indifferent as to the impression produced by his
tales. His manner, kindly and courteous though it was in no way
suggested that intimacy which only exists among members of a family.
Such kindliness and courtesy seemed to come naturally from him as the
light from a lamp which shines with equal radiance on all objects.

They went out to the garden terrace and sat down on the steps. Lida sat
on a lower one, listening in silence to her brother. At her heart she
felt an icy chill. Her subtle feminine instinct told her that her
brother was not what she had imagined him to be. In his presence she
felt shy and embarrassed, as if he were a stranger. It was now evening;
faint shadows encircled them. Sanine lit a cigarette and the delicate
odour of tobacco mingled with the fragrance of the garden. He told them
how life had tossed him hither and thither; how he had often been
hungry and a vagrant; how he had taken part in political struggles, and
how, when weary, he had renounced these.