t.

For a couple of minutes I stood and heard her running. I had no desire
to go home, there was nothing there to go for. I stood for a while lost
in thought, and then quietly dragged myself back, to have one more look
at the house in which she lived, the dear, simple, old house, which
seemed to look at me with the windows of the mezzanine for eyes, and to
understand everything. I walked past the terrace, sat down on a bench by
the lawn-tennis court, in the darkness under an old elm-tree, and looked
at the house. In the windows of the mezzanine, where Missyuss had her
room, shone a bright light, and then a faint green glow. The lamp had
been covered with a shade. Shadows began to move.... I was filled with
tenderness and a calm satisfaction, to think that I could let myself be
carried away and fall in love, and at the same time I felt uneasy at the
thought that only a few yards away in one of the rooms of the house lay
Lyda who did not love me, and perhaps hated me. I sat and waited to see
if Genya would come out. I listened attentively and it seemed to me they
were sitting in the mezzanine.

An hour passed. The green light went out, and the shadows were no longer
visible. The moon hung high above the house and lit the sleeping garden
and the avenues: I could distinctly see the dahlias and roses in the
flower-bed in front of the house, and all seemed to be of one colour. It
was very cold. I left the garden, picked up my overcoat in the road, and
walked slowly home.

Next day after dinner when I went to the Volchaninovs', the glass door
was wide open. I sat down on the terrace expecting Genya to come from
behind the flower-bed or from one of the avenues, or to hear her voice
come from out of the rooms; then I went into the drawing-room and the
dining-room. There was not a soul to be seen. From the dining-room I
went down a long passage into the hall, and then back again. There were
several doors in the passage and behind one of them I could hear Lyda's
voice:

"To the crow somewhere ... God ..."--she spoke slowly and distinctly,
and was probably dictating--" ... God sent a piece of cheese.... To the
crow ... somewhere.... Who is there?" she called out suddenly as she
heard my footsteps.

"It is I."

"Oh! excuse me. I can't come out just now. I am teaching Masha."

"Is Ekaterina Pavlovna in the garden?"

"No. She and my sister left to-day for my Aunt's in Penga, and in the
winter they are probably going abroad."