d peaceably
in love and complete harmony.

But behold! one winter day after drinking hot tea in the office,
Vassily Andreitch went out into the yard without his cap on to see
about sending off some timber, caught cold and was taken ill. He
had the best doctors, but he grew worse and died after four months'
illness. And Olenka was a widow once more.

"I've nobody, now you've left me, my darling," she sobbed, after
her husband's funeral. "How can I live without you, in wretchedness
and misery! Pity me, good people, all alone in the world!"

She went about dressed in black with long "weepers," and gave up
wearing hat and gloves for good. She hardly ever went out, except
to church, or to her husband's grave, and led the life of a nun.
It was not till six months later that she took off the weepers and
opened the shutters of the windows. She was sometimes seen in the
mornings, going with her cook to market for provisions, but what
went on in her house and how she lived now could only be surmised.
People guessed, from seeing her drinking tea in her garden with the
veterinary surgeon, who read the newspaper aloud to her, and from
the fact that, meeting a lady she knew at the post-office, she said
to her:

"There is no proper veterinary inspection in our town, and that's
the cause of all sorts of epidemics. One is always hearing of
people's getting infection from the milk supply, or catching diseases
from horses and cows. The health of domestic animals ought to be
as well cared for as the health of human beings."

She repeated the veterinary surgeon's words, and was of the same
opinion as he about everything. It was evident that she could not
live a year without some attachment, and had found new happiness
in the lodge. In any one else this would have been censured, but
no one could think ill of Olenka; everything she did was so natural.
Neither she nor the veterinary surgeon said anything to other people
of the change in their relations, and tried, indeed, to conceal it,
but without success, for Olenka could not keep a secret. When he
had visitors, men serving in his regiment, and she poured out tea
or served the supper, she would begin talking of the cattle plague,
of the foot and mouth disease, and of the municipal slaughterhouses.
He was dreadfully embarrassed, and when the guests had gone, he
would seize her by the hand and hiss angrily:

"I've asked you before not to talk about what you don't understand.
When we v