The garden, growing more and more open, till it became definitely
a meadow, sloped down to the river, which was overgrown with green
weeds and osiers. Near the milldam was the millpond, deep and full
of fish; a little mill with a thatched roof was working away with
a wrathful sound, and frogs croaked furiously. Circles passed from
time to time over the smooth, mirror-like water, and the water-lilies
trembled, stirred by the lively fish. On the further side of the
river was the little village Dubetchnya. The still, blue millpond
was alluring with its promise of coolness and peace. And now all
this--the millpond and the mill and the snug-looking banks--
belonged to the engineer!

And so my new work began. I received and forwarded telegrams, wrote
various reports, and made fair copies of the notes of requirements,
the complaints, and the reports sent to the office by the illiterate
foremen and workmen. But for the greater part of the day I did
nothing but walk about the room waiting for telegrams, or made a
boy sit in the lodge while I went for a walk in the garden, until
the boy ran to tell me that there was a tapping at the operating
machine. I had dinner at Madame Tcheprakov's. Meat we had very
rarely: our dishes were all made of milk, and Wednesdays and Fridays
were fast days, and on those days we had pink plates which were
called Lenten plates. Madame Tcheprakov was continually blinking
--it was her invariable habit, and I always felt ill at ease in
her presence.

As there was not enough work in the lodge for one, Tcheprakov did
nothing, but simply dozed, or went with his gun to shoot ducks on
the millpond. In the evenings he drank too much in the village or
the station, and before going to bed stared in the looking-glass
and said: "Hullo, Ivan Tcheprakov."

When he was drunk he was very pale, and kept rubbing his hands and
laughing with a sound like a neigh: "hee-hee-hee!" By way of bravado
he used to strip and run about the country naked. He used to eat
flies and say they were rather sour.

IV

One day, after dinner, he ran breathless into the lodge and said:
"Go along, your sister has come."

I went out, and there I found a hired brake from the town standing
before the entrance of the great house. My sister had come in it
with Anyuta Blagovo and a gentleman in a military tunic. Going up
closer I recognized the latter: it was the brother of Anyuta Blagovo,
the army doctor.

"We have come to you for a