.. Look, my dear Jennie, who manages life
now if not women! Yesterday's chambermaid, laundress, chorus girl
goes through estates worth millions, the way a country-woman of
Tver cracks sunflower seeds. A woman scarcely able to sign her
name, at times affects the destiny of an entire kingdom through a
man. Hereditary princes marry the street-walkers, the kept
mistresses of yesterday... Jennechka, there is the scope for your
unbridled vengeance; while I will admire you from a distance...
For you--you are made of this stuff--you are a bird of prey, a
spoliator... Perhaps not with such a broad sweep--but you will
cast them down under your feet."
"No," faintly smiled Jennka. "I thought of this before ... But
something of the utmost importance has burned out within me. There
are no forces within me, there is no will within me, no desires
... I am somehow all empty inside, rotted ... Well, now, you know,
there's a mushroom like that--white, round,--you squeeze it, and
snuff pours out of it. And the same way with me. This life has
eaten out everything within me save malice.
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