Sadness had now overcome them both, and both recalled the words that Mirel had only just uttered:

—Can you imagine, Montchik? I still have absolutely no idea what’ll become of me.

She didn’t even know where she’d go when she left the house after the divorce. Quite possibly for the first week she wouldn’t even have the wherewithal to see her through a day. But now she wasn’t at all afraid. The world seemed so extensive to her now. The day before, after the divorcebroker had left, she’d given a shriek of joy only because she’d reminded herself that she could wash in an enormous amount of cold water.

—She’d find somewhere to go when she left the Zaydenovskis’ house …

Her home in the shtetl … That home meant nothing to her now, and was merely a source of frustration. She had no attachment to her mother, and her father … it would be easier if she and her father lived apart from each other. They certainly couldn’t help each other, in any case.

She was thinking a great deal about herself; she’d always been used to thinking a great deal about herself.

Not long ago she’d re-read one of Turgenev’s books: a Russian girl could no longer cope with life around her, so she retreated to a convent and came to nothing.* But she, Mirel—she was no longer a girl, while the concept of a convent was totally alien to her and seemed so silly. From childhood on she’d never been taught how to be religious. Since she could no longer cope with the state of affairs in which she found herself, she’d have to seek farther afield:

—She couldn’t say whether or not she’d find anything, but go she would.

Having reached the start of the chain bridge, they stopped. Because of the Zaydenovskis, Montchik could go no farther into the suburb. A sad little fire burned in Mirel’s dreamy eyes; deep, deep within the dream it burned, gazing out dreamily to some distant place diagonally across the broad, flowing river. Above the blue shadows under her eyes, her long black lashes seemed even longer and blacker than usual, investing with particular grace her alluring, perfectly straight mouth, which she now kept sternly shut. Suddenly that little fire flashed like lightning in her eyes:

—I have an acquaintance, a Hebrew poet, Montchik. For the most part he smiled a great deal, this acquaintance of hers, and generally held his peace, but once he’d said of her:

—Nothing would ever come of Mirel, he’d said. She was nothing more than a transitional point in human development, and nothing would come of her.

A smile of self-mockery kindled in her eyes, and she turned to glance at Montchik with it:

—I myself—this acquaintance of mine has said—am nothing, and will never get anywhere. The centrally overriding consideration, he says, are those who will come after me.

She wanted to part from him and cross the bridge alone, but Montchik, who was lost in thought, started as though awakening from sleep:

—Out of the question! He might be unable to call on the Zaydenovskis, but he could certainly accompany her to the other side of the bridge.

Afterward he was so confused that he couldn’t remember when he’d recrossed the bridge and boarded a streetcar. When he paid the conductor his fare, a wallet stuffed with papers fell from his pocket. An old general sitting opposite him noticed his state of distraction, picked up the wallet and returned it to him, but he stared straight at the general with unseeing eyes and didn’t even thank him. Such idiotic thoughts crept into his mind:

—No, this was certainly something that couldn’t be, this possibility now so seemingly feasible, that he, Montchik, might ostensibly be able to marry Mirel. It was so absurd. And he had no idea how such a hopeless prospect could ever have occurred to him. Firstly, he could never imagine such happiness for himself … Mirel was something of an intellectual, after all … And secondly … What? Who? When? Did Mirel need him? Mirel needed something else … Wait … Perhaps that acquaintance of hers was right in saying that she was “a transitional point” … “a transitional point.” But wait … Recently he, Montchik, had made so much money, and she, Mirel … . She’d soon be needy … How could it be otherwise?

—After all, it would simply be a pleasure if Mirel would consent to take as much as she needed from him … First of all, she needed to go abroad on her own … to Italy, for example. Winter was coming on … She’d definitely have to rest after the summer she’d just lived through. But wait: how could one tell her this? How could one possibly propose this to her?

By the time he’d shaken o. all this confusion, the streetcar had carried him to another side of the city and farther than he needed to go. He finally got off and started walking back home. But soon he was overcome by confusion once more. Some elegantly dressed young man, a merchant, delighted to have met him here in the street, dismissed those of his companions in whose company he was on his way to pass the evening and began discussing business with him:

One contract here, another contract there.

Montchik stood opposite him, biting his thumb and looking down at the pavement in a daze. The elegant young man was under the impression that Montchik couldn’t hear him over the incessant rattle of passing streetcars and droshkies, so he led him to the top end of a quiet street nearby and there began repeating everything from the beginning again.