eet in warm
waves. The effect was soft and noiseless. She appeared to be taller
in this dress; her eyes seemed darker, and her movements less nervous.

"Now, Sofya," said Nikolay after dinner, "here's another job for you.
You know we undertook to publish a newspaper for the village. But our
connection with the people there was broken, thanks to the latest
arrests. No one but Pelagueya Nilovna can show us the man who will
undertake the distribution of the newspapers. You go with her. Do it
as soon as possible."

"Very well," said Sofya. "We'll go, Pelagueya Nilovna."

"Yes, we'll go."

"Is it far?"

"About fifty miles."

"Splendid! And now I'm going to play a little. Do you mind listening
to music, Pelagueya Nilovna?"

"Don't bother about me. Act as if I weren't here," said the mother,
seating herself in the corner of the sofa. She saw that the brother
and the sister went on with their affairs without giving heed to her;
yet, at the same time, she seemed involuntarily to mix in their
conversation, imperceptibly drawn into it by them.

"Listen to this, Nikolay. It's by Grieg. I brought it to-day. Shut
the window."

She opened the piano, and struck the keys lightly with her left hand.
The strings sang out a thick, juicy melody. Another note, breathing a
deep, full breath, joined itself to the first, and together they formed
a vast fullness of sound that trembled beneath its own weight.
Strange, limpid notes rang out from under the fingers of her right
hand, and darted off in an alarming flight, swaying and rocking and
beating against one another like a swarm of frightened birds. And in
the dark background the low notes sang in measured, harmonious cadence
like the waves of the sea exhausted by the storm. Some one cried out,
a loud, agitated, woeful cry of rebellion, questioned and appealed in
impotent anguish, and, losing hope, grew silent; and then again sang
his rueful plaints, now resonant and clear, now subdued and dejected.
In response to this song came the thick waves of dark sound, broad and
resonant, indifferent and hopeless. They drowned by their depth and
force the swarm of ringing wails; questions, appeals, groans blended in
the alarming song. At times the music seemed to take a desperate
upward flight, sobbing and lamenting, and again precipitated itself,
crept low, swung hither and thither on the dense, vibratory current of
bass notes, foundered, and disappeared in them; and once m