The Confessions of a Little Man during Great Days by Leonid Andreyev

18th January.

It was Petrov, a volunteer and friend of Pavel's, who informed me about his death. To spare his mother and Sashenka a sudden shock, Pavel must have arranged with his friend to write to my office address in case of need, so that I should be the one to break the terrible news to his nearest and dearest. I shall never forget the awful moment when I tore open the envelope marked "On active service," and addressed in an unfamiliar hand, a fact which in itself foreboded evil, and read the few lines it contained. The men in our office were very sympathetic, but what did their sympathy matter to me? I went home at once, wondering, in agony, how I was to break the news to mother and Sashenka. When I reached Sashenka's hospital I turned away again, not daring to go in, and for a couple of hours I paced the streets; I even wandered aimlessly into the Philipov Café. I can't remember whether it had been snowing hard that day, but everything seemed deadly white. People and tramcars seemed weird and strange; the sound of a car bell vibrated painfully through the brain; it seemed as though human beings were drowned in silence, and only the car bells rang and rang like mad. I could not cry at the time; my tears were dried by the thought of Sashenka and mother.