If you had not promised it once, she would have reconciled herself to her position, she would have gone on living in the country.

But you promised it, and she wrote to you, and moved to Moscow.

And here she's been for six months in Moscow, where every chance meeting cuts her to the heart, every day expecting an answer.

Why, it's like keeping a condemned criminal for six months with the rope round his neck, promising him perhaps death, perhaps mercy.