It was essential for him to be with someone to talk to, so as not to be left alone, to kill time.

Stepan Arkadyevitch would have been the companion most congenial to him, but he was going out, he said, to a _soiree_, in reality to the ballet.

Levin only had time to tell him he was happy, and that he loved him, and would never, never forget what he had done for him.

The eyes and the smile of Stepan Arkadyevitch showed Levin that he comprehended that feeling fittingly.