Aratov opened his eyes, raised himself, leaned on his elbow.... The voice grew fainter, but kept up its plaintive, hurried talk, indistinct as before....
Unseen fingers ran light arpeggios up and down the keys of the piano ... then the voice began again. More prolonged sounds were audible ... as it were moans ... always the same over and over again. Then apart from the rest the words began to stand out ... 'Roses ... roses ... roses....'
'Roses,' repeated Aratov in a whisper. 'Ah, yes! it's the roses I saw on that woman's head in the dream.'... 'Roses,' he heard again.
'Is that you?' Aratov asked in the same whisper. The voice suddenly ceased.
Aratov waited ... and waited, and dropped his head on the pillow. 'Hallucinations of hearing,' he thought. 'But if ... if she really were here, close at hand?... If I were to see her, should I be frightened? or glad? But what should I be frightened of? or glad of? Why, of this, to be sure; it would be a proof that there is another world, that the soul is immortal. Though, indeed, even if I did see something, it too might be a hallucination of the sight....'
He lighted the candle, however, and in a rapid glance, not without a certain dread, scanned the whole room ... and saw nothing in it unusual. He got up, went to the stereoscope ... again the same grey doll, with its eyes averted. The feeling of dread gave way to one of annoyance. He was, as it were, cheated in his expectations ... the very expectation indeed struck him as absurd.
'Well, this is positively idiotic!' he muttered, as he got back into bed, and blew out the candle. Profound darkness reigned once more.
Aratov resolved to go to sleep this time.... But a fresh sensation started up in him. He fancied some one was standing in the middle of the room, not far from him, and scarcely perceptibly breathing. He turned round hastily and opened his eyes.... But what could be seen in impenetrable darkness? He began to feel for a match on his little bedside table ... and suddenly it seemed to him that a sort of soft, noiseless hurricane was passing over the whole room, over him, through him, and the word 'I!' sounded distinctly in his ears....
Some instants passed before he succeeded in getting the candle alight.