ovna.

"Very good. Make a match for me with Pimenov."

"Really?"

"Yes, do!" Anna Akimovna said resolutely, and she struck her fist
on the table. "On my honour, I will marry him."

"Really?"

Anna Akimovna suddenly felt ashamed that her cheeks were burning
and that every one was looking at her; she flung the cards together
on the table and ran out of the room. As she ran up the stairs and,
reaching the upper story, sat down to the piano in the drawing-room,
a murmur of sound reached her from below like the roar of the sea;
most likely they were talking of her and of Pimenov, and perhaps
Stinging Beetle was taking advantage of her absence to insult
Varvarushka and was putting no check on her language.

The lamp in the big room was the only light burning in the upper
story, and it sent a glimmer through the door into the dark
drawing-room. It was between nine and ten, not later. Anna Akimovna
played a waltz, then another, then a third; she went on playing
without stopping. She looked into the dark corner beyond the piano,
smiled, and inwardly called to it, and the idea occurred to her
that she might drive off to the town to see some one, Lysevitch for
instance, and tell him what was passing in her heart. She wanted
to talk without ceasing, to laugh, to play the fool, but the dark
corner was sullenly silent, and all round in all the rooms of the
upper story it was still and desolate.

She was fond of sentimental songs, but she had a harsh, untrained
voice, and so she only played the accompaniment and sang hardly
audibly, just above her breath. She sang in a whisper one song after
another, for the most part about love, separation, and frustrated
hopes, and she imagined how she would hold out her hands to him and
say with entreaty, with tears, "Pimenov, take this burden from me!"
And then, just as though her sins had been forgiven, there would
be joy and comfort in her soul, and perhaps a free, happy life would
begin. In an anguish of anticipation she leant over the keys, with
a passionate longing for the change in her life to come at once
without delay, and was terrified at the thought that her old life
would go on for some time longer. Then she played again and sang
hardly above her breath, and all was stillness about her. There was
no noise coming from downstairs now, they must have gone to bed.
It had struck ten some time before. A long, solitary, wearisome
night was approaching.

Anna Akimovna walked through