"i remember now with what hungry interest i began to watch the lives of other people interest that i had never felt before! i used to wait for colia’s arrival impatiently, for i was so ill myself, then, that i could not leave the house. i so threw myself into every little detail of news, and took so much interest in every report and rumour, that i believe i became a regular gossip! i could not understand, among other things, how all these people with so much life in and before them do not become rich and i don’t understand it now. i remember being told of a poor wretch i once knew, who had died of hunger. i was almost beside myself with rage! i believe if i could have resuscitated him i would have done so for the sole purpose of murdering him!