The Idiot

Towards the end of November, during a thaw, at nine o'clock one morning, a trainon the Warsaw and Petersburg railway was approaching the latter city at full speed.The morning was so damp and misty that it was only with great difficulty that theday succeeded in breaking; and it was impossible to distinguish anything more thana few yards away from the carriage windows.Some of the passengers by this particular train were returning from abroad; butthe third-class carriages were the best filled, chiefly with insignificant persons ofvarious occupations and degrees, picked up at the different stations nearer town.All of them seemed weary, and most of them had sleepy eyes and a shiveringexpression, while their complexions generally appeared to have taken on the colourof the fog outside.When day dawned, two passengers in one of the third-class carriages foundthemselves opposite each other. Both were young fellows, both were rather poorlydressed, both had remarkable faces, and both were evidently anxious to start aconversation. If they had but known why, at this particular moment, they were bothremarkable persons, they would undoubtedly have wondered at the strange chancewhich had set them down opposite to one another in a third-class carriage of theWarsaw Railway Company.