Book 3, Chapter 10
Nekhludoff, after parting with the Englishman, went straight to his hotel, and walked about his room for a long time. The affair with Katiousha was at an end. There was something ugly in the very memory of it. But it was not that which grieved him. Some other affair of his was yet unsettled—an affair which tortured him and required his attention. In his imagination rose the gloomy scenes of the hundreds and thousands of human beings pent up in the pestiferous air. The laughter of the prisoners resounded in his ears. He saw again among the dead bodies the beautiful, angry, waxen face of the dead Kryltzoff; and the question whether he was mad, or all those who commit those evils and think themselves wise were mad, bore in upon his mind with renewed power, and he found no answer to it. The principal difficulty consisted in finding an answer to the principal question, which was: What should be done with those who became brutalized in the struggle for life? (From : Gutenberg.org.)

Book 3, Chapter 9
Passing through the hall and the ill-smelling corridors, the superintendent passed into the first building of the prison in which those condemned to hard labor were confined. Entering the first room in that building they found the prisoners stretched on their berths, which occupied the middle of the room. Hearing the visitors enter they all jumped down, and, clinking their chains, placed themselves beside their berths, while their half-shaven heads were distinctly set off against the gloom of the prison. Only two of the prisoners remained at their places. One of them was a young man whose face was evidently heated with fever; the other was an old man, who never left off groaning. The Englishman asked whether the young man had been sick for a long time. The superintendent replied that he had been taken sick that very same morning, that the old man had had convulsions for a long time, and that they kept him in prison because there was no place for him in the... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

Book 3, Chapter 8
After the disappointment at the prison, Nekhludoff drove down to the Governor's Bureau to find out whether they had received there any news concerning the pardon of Maslova. There was no news there, so he drove back to his hotel, and wrote at once to the lawyer and to Selenin concerning it. Having finished the letters, he glanced at his watch; it was already time to go to the general. On the way he thought again of how he might hand over the pardon to Katiousha; of the place she would be sent to, and how he would live with her. At dinner in the general's house all were not only very friendly to Nekhludoff, but, as it seemed, very favorably inclined to him, as he was a new, interesting personality. The general, who came in to dinner with a white cross on his breast, greeted Nekhludoff like an old friend. On the general's inquiry as to what he had done since he saw him in the morning, Nekhludoff answered that he had been at the post-office, that... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

Book 3, Chapter 7
"What do you think of him?" said Maria Pablovna. "In love, and earnestly in love! I never thought that Vladimir Simonson could fall in love in such a very stupid, childish fashion. It is remarkable, and to tell the truth, sad," she concluded, sighing. "But Katia? How do you think she will take it?" asked Nekhludoff. "She?" Maria Pablovna stopped, evidently desiring to give a precise answer. "She? You see, notwithstanding her past, she is naturally of a most moral character. And her feelings are so refined. She loves you—very much so—and is happy to be able to do you the negative good of not binding you to herself. Marriage with you would be a dreadful fall to her, worse than all her past. For this reason she would never consent to it. At the same time, your presence perplexes her." "Ought I then to disappear?" asked Nekhludoff. Maria Pablovna smiled in her pleasant, childish way. "Yes, partly." "How ca... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

Book 3, Chapter 6
An officer entered the cell and announced that the time for departing had arrived. He counted every prisoner, pointing at every one with his finger. When he reached Nekhludoff he said, familiarly: "It is too late to remain now, Prince; it is time to go." Nekhludoff, knowing what that meant, approached him and thrust three rubles into his hand. "Nothing can be done with you—stay here a while longer." Simonson, who was all the while silently sitting on his bunk, his hands clasped behind his head, firmly arose, and carefully making his way through those sitting around the bunk, went over to Nekhludoff. "Can you hear me now?" asked Simonson. "Certainly," said Nekhludoff, also rising to follow him. Maslova saw Nekhludoff rising, and their eyes meeting, she turned red in the face and doubtfully, as it seemed, shook her head. "My business with you is the following," began Simonson, when they reached the corr... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

With a faint heart and with horror at the thought that he might find Maslova in an inebriate condition and persistently antagonistic, and at the mystery which she was to him, Nekhludoff rang the bell and inquired of the inspector about Maslova. She was in the hospital. A young physician, impregnated with carbolic acid, came out into the corridor and sternly asked Nekhludoff what he wanted. The physician indulged the prisoners' shortcomings and often relaxed the rules in their favor, for which he often ran afoul of the prison officials and even the head physician. Fearing that Nekhludoff might ask something not permitted by the rules, and, moreover, desiring to show that he made no exceptions in favor of anybody, he feigned anger. "There are... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

The cell in which Maslova was confined was an oblong room, twenty feet by fifteen. The kalsomining of the walls was peeled off, and the dry boards of the cots occupied two-thirds of the space. In the middle of the room, opposite the door, was a dark iron, with a wax candle stuck on it, and a dusty bouquet of immortelles hanging under it. To the left, behind the door, on a darkened spot of the floor, stood an ill-smelling vat. The women had been locked up for the night. There were fifteen inmates of this cell, twelve women and three children. It was not dark yet, and only two women lay in their cots; one a foolish little woman—she was constantly crying—who had been arrested because she had no written evidence of her identity, had... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

The short-haired, lean, yellow-faced Vera Efremovna, with her large, kindly eyes, entered timidly through the rear door. "Well, I thank you for coming here," she said, pressing Nekhludoff's hand. "You remember me? Let us sit down." "I did not expect to find you here." "Oh, I am doing excellently—so well, indeed, that I desire nothing better," said Vera Efremovna, looking frightened, as usual, with her kindly, round eyes at Nekhludoff, and turning her very thin, sinewy neck, which projected from under the crumpled, dirty collar of her waist. Nekhludoff asked her how she came to be in prison. She related her case to him with great animation. Her discourse was interspersed with foreign scientific terms about propaganda, disorganization, ... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

Nekhludoff managed to see Maslova only twice between Nijhni and Perm—once in Nijhni while the prisoners were being placed on a net-covered lighter, and again in the office of the Perm prison. On both occasions he found her secretive and unkind. When he asked her about her prison conditions, or whether she wanted anything, she became confused and answered evasively and, as it seemed to him, with that hostile feeling of reproach which she had manifested before. And this gloomy temper, due only to the persecutions to which she was being subjected by the men, tormented him. But at their very first meeting in Tomsk she became again as she was before her departure. She no longer frowned or became confused when she saw him, but, on the contr... (From : Gutenberg.org.)

Immediately upon his arrival in Moskow, Nekhludoff made his way to the prison hospital, intending to make known to Maslova the Senate's decision and to tell her to prepare for the journey to Siberia. Of the petition which he brought for Maslova's signature, he had little hope. And, strange to say, he no longer wished to succeed. He had accustomed himself to the thought of going to Siberia, and living among the exiles and convicts, and it was difficult for him to imagine how he should order his life and that of Maslova if she were freed. The door-keeper at the hospital, recognizing Nekhludoff, immediately informed him that Maslova was no longer there. "Where is she, then?" "Why, again in the prison." "Why was she transferred?" asked Nekhludo... (From : Gutenberg.org.)