m not to go. Petrushka laughed and said he would
be back quickly. Tatiana cried, and implored him on her knees not to go.
Then Petrushka grew irritable and almost rough, and told her not to vex
him with foolishness. Reluctantly and sadly she gave in at last.

Petrushka went to the river, and Tatiana watched him go with a heavy
heart. She felt quite certain some disaster was about to happen.

At seven o'clock Petrushka had not yet returned, and he did not return
that night. The next morning the carpenter and two others went to
the river to look for him. They found his body in the shallow water,
entangled in the ropes of the raft he had made. He had been drowned, no
doubt, in setting the raft straight.

During all that Sunday night, Tatiana had said no word, nor had she
moved from her doorstep: it was only when they brought back the dripping
body to the village that she stirred, and when she saw it she laughed
a dreadful laugh, and the spirit went from her eyes, leaving a fixed
stare.

THE OLD WOMAN

The old woman was spinning at her wheel near a fire of myrtle boughs
which burnt fragrantly in the open yard. Through the stone columns the
sea was visible, smooth, dark, and blue; the low sun bathed the brown
hills of the coast in a golden mist. It was December. The shepherds were
driving home their flocks, the work of the day was done, and a noise of
light laughter and rippling talk came from the Slaves' quarter.

In the middle of the stone-flagged yard two little boys were playing at
quoits. Their eyes and hair were as dark as their brown skin, which had
been tanned by the sun. In one of the corners of the yard a fair-haired,
blue-eyed girl was nursing a kitten and singing it to sleep. The old
woman was singing too, or rather humming a tune to herself as she turned
her wheel. She was very old: her hair was white and silvery, and her
face was furrowed by a hundred wrinkles. Her eyes were blue as the sky,
and perhaps they had once been full of fire and laughter, but all that
had been quenched and washed out long ago, and Time, with his noiseless
chisel, had sharpened her delicate features and hollowed out her cheeks,
which were as white as ivory. But her hands as they twisted the wood
were the hands of a young woman, and seemed as though they had been
fashioned by a rare craftsman, so perfect were they in shape and
proportion, as firm as carved marble, as delicate as flowers.

The sun sank behind the hills of th