at down at my feet, laid her head on
my knees, and, looking at me with shining, loving eyes, asked:

"'Kolya, do you love me? Very, very much?'

"And she laughed with happiness. . . . This struck me as sentimental,
affected, and not clever; and meanwhile I was already inclined to
look for 'depth of thought' before everything.

"'Kisotchka, you had better go home,' I said, or else your people
will be sure to miss you and will be looking for you all over the
town; and it would be awkward for you to go to your mother in the
morning.'

"Kisotchka agreed. At parting we arranged to meet at midday next
morning in the park, and the day after to set off together to
Pyatigorsk. I went into the street to see her home, and I remember
that I caressed her with genuine tenderness on the way. There was
a minute when I felt unbearably sorry for her, for trusting me so
implicitly, and I made up my mind that I would really take her to
Pyatigorsk, but remembering that I had only six hundred roubles in
my portmanteau, and that it would be far more difficult to break
it off with her in the autumn than now, I made haste to suppress
my compassion.

"We reached the house where Kisotchka's mother lived. I pulled at
the bell. When footsteps were heard at the other side of the door
Kisotchka suddenly looked grave, glanced upwards to the sky, made
the sign of the Cross over me several times and, clutching my hand,
pressed it to her lips.

"'Till to-morrow,' she said, and disappeared into the house.

"I crossed to the opposite pavement and from there looked at the
house. At first the windows were in darkness, then in one of the
windows there was the glimmer of the faint bluish flame of a newly
lighted candle; the flame grew, gave more light, and I saw shadows
moving about the rooms together with it.

"'They did not expect her,' I thought.

"Returning to my hotel room I undressed, drank off a glass of red
wine, ate some fresh caviare which I had bought that day in the
bazaar, went to bed in a leisurely way, and slept the sound,
untroubled sleep of a tourist.

"In the morning I woke up with a headache and in a bad humour.
Something worried me.

"'What's the matter?' I asked myself, trying to explain my uneasiness.
'What's upsetting me?'

"And I put down my uneasiness to the dread that Kisotchka might
turn up any minute and prevent my going away, and that I should
have to tell lies and act a part before her. I hurriedly dressed,
packe