ble everything went somehow wrong. Natalya, pale all over, could
scarcely sit in her place and did not raise her eyes. Volintsev sat as
usual next her, and from time to time began to talk in a constrained way
to her. It happened that Pigasov was dining at Darya Mihailovna's that
day. He talked more than any one at table. Among other things he began
to maintain that men, like dogs, can be divided into the short-tailed
and the long-tailed. People are short-tailed, he said, either from birth
or through their own fault. The short-tailed are in a sorry plight;
nothing succeeds with them--they have no confidence in themselves.
But the man who has a long furry tail is happy. He may be weaker and
inferior to the short-tailed; but he believes in himself; he displays
his tail and every one admires it. And this is a fit subject for wonder;
the tail, of course, is a perfectly useless part of the body, you admit;
of what use can a tail be? but all judge of their abilities by their
tail. 'I myself,' he concluded with a sigh, 'belong to the number of the
short-tailed, and what is most annoying, I cropped my tail myself.'

'By which you mean to say,' commented Rudin carelessly, 'what La
Rochefoucauld said long before you: Believe in yourself and others will
believe in you. Why the tail was brought in, I fail to understand.'

'Let every one,' Volintsev began sharply and with flashing eyes, 'let
every one express himself according to his fancy. Talk of despotism! ...
I consider there is none worse than the despotism of so-called clever
men; confound them!'

Everyone was astonished at this outbreak from Volintsev; it was received
in silence. Rudin tried to look at him, but he could not control his
eyes, and turned away smiling without opening his lips.

'Aha! so you too have lost your tail!' thought Pigasov; and Natalya's
heart sank in terror. Darya Mihailovna gave Volintsev a long puzzled
stare and at last was the first to speak; she began to describe an
extraordinary dog belonging to a minister So-and-So.

Volintsev went away soon after dinner. As he bade Natalya good-bye he
could not resist saying to her:

'Why are you confused, as though you had done wrong? You cannot have
done wrong to any one!'

Natalya did not understand at all, and could only gaze after him. Before
tea Rudin went up to her, and bending over the table as though he were
examining the papers, whispered:

'It is all like a dream, isn't it? I absolutely must se