in her soul; a strange insensibility, the
insensibility of the man condemned to death, had come upon her. At dinner
Varvara Pavlovna talked little: she seemed to have become timid once
more, and spread over her face an expression of modest melancholy.
Gedeonovsky alone enlivened the conversation with his tales, although he
kept casting cowardly glances at Marfa Timofeevna, and a cough and
tickling in the throat seized upon him every time that he undertook to
lie in her presence,--but she did not hinder him, she did not interrupt
him. After dinner it appeared that Varvara Pavlovna was extremely fond
of preference; this pleased Marya Dmitrievna to such a degree, that she
even became greatly affected, and thought to herself:--"But what a fool
Feodor Ivanitch must be: he was not able to appreciate such a woman!"

She sat down to play cards with her and Gedeonovsky, while Marfa
Timofeevna led Liza off to her own rooms up-stairs, saying that she
looked ill, that her head must be aching.

"Yes, she has a frightful headache,"--said Marya Dmitrievna, turning to
Varvara Pavlovna, and rolling up her eyes.--"I myself have such
sick-headaches...." Liza entered her aunt's room and dropped on a chair,
exhausted. Marfa Timofeevna gazed at her for a long time, in silence,
knelt down softly in front of her--and began, in the same speechless
manner, to kiss her hands, in turn. Liza leaned forward, blushed, and
fell to weeping, but did not raise Marfa Timofeevna, did not withdraw
her hands: she felt that she had not the right to withdraw them, had not
the right to prevent the old woman showing her contrition, her sympathy,
asking her pardon for what had taken place on the day before; and Marfa
Timofeevna could not have done with kissing those poor, pale, helpless
hands--and silent tears streamed from her eyes and from Liza's eyes; and
the cat Matros purred in the wide arm-chair beside the ball of yarn and
the stocking, the elongated flame of the shrine-lamp quivered gently and
flickered in front of the holy picture,--in the adjoining room, behind
the door, stood Nastasya Karpovna, and also stealthily wiped her eyes,
with a checked handkerchief rolled up into a ball.

XL

And, in the meantime, down-stairs in the drawing-room preference was in
progress; Marya Dmitrievna won, and was in high spirits. A footman
entered, and announced the arrival of Panshin.

Marya Dmitrievna dropped her cards, an