It was
easy and pleasant to breathe in them; but one's voice involuntarily
dropped a note in the wish not to speak aloud and intrude upon the
peaceful thoughtfulness of the people who sent down a concentrated look
from the walls.

"The flowers need watering," said the mother, feeling the earth in the
flowerpots in the windows.

"Yes, yes," said the master guiltily. "I love them very much, but I
have no time to take care of them."

The mother noticed that Nikolay walked about in his own comfortable
quarters just as carefully and as noiselessly as if he were a stranger,
and as if all that surrounded him were remote from him. He would pick
up and examine some small article, such as a bust, bring it close to
his face, and scrutinize it minutely, adjusting his glasses with the
thin finger of his right hand, and screwing up his eyes. He had the
appearance of just having entered the rooms for the first time, and
everything seemed as unfamiliar and strange to him as to the mother.
Consequently, the mother at once felt herself at home. She followed
Nikolay, observing where each thing stood, and inquiring about his ways
and habits of life. He answered with the guilty air of a man who knows
he is all the time doing things as they ought not to be done, but
cannot help himself.

After she had watered the flowers and arranged the sheets of music
scattered in disorder over the piano, she looked at the samovar, and
remarked, "It needs polishing."

Nikolay ran his finger over the dull metal, then stuck the finger close
to his nose. He looked at the mother so seriously that she could not
restrain a good-natured smile.

When she lay down to sleep and thought of the day just past, she raised
her head from the pillow in astonishment and looked around. For the
first time in her life she was in the house of a stranger, and she did
not experience the least constraint. Her mind dwelt solicitously on
Nikolay. She had a distinct desire to do the best she could for him,
and to introduce more warmth into his lonely life. She was stirred and
affected by his embarrassed awkwardness and droll ignorance, and smiled
to herself with a sigh. Then her thoughts leaped to her son and to
Andrey. She recalled the high-pitched, sparkling voice of Fedya, and
gradually the whole day of the first of May unrolled itself before her,
clothed in new sounds, reflecting new thoughts. The trials of the day
were peculiar as the day itself. They did not