Tomassov's special
confidant.

"He very soon got shy of talking before the others. I suppose the usual
camp-fire comments jarred his fine feelings. But I was left to him
and truly I had to submit. You can't very well expect a youngster in
Tomassov's state to hold his tongue altogether; and I--I suppose you
will hardly believe me--I am by nature a rather silent sort of person.

"Very likely my silence appeared to him sympathetic. All the month of
September our regiment, quartered in villages, had come in for an easy
time. It was then that I heard most of that--you can't call it a story.
The story I have in my mind is not in that. Outpourings, let us call
them.

"I would sit quite content to hold my peace, a whole hour perhaps, while
Tomassov talked with exaltation. And when he was done I would still hold
my peace. And then there would be produced a solemn effect of silence
which, I imagine, pleased Tomassov in a way.

"She was of course not a woman in her first youth. A widow, maybe. At
any rate I never heard Tomassov mention her husband. She had a salon,
something very distinguished; a social centre in which she queened it
with great splendour.

"Somehow, I fancy her court was composed mostly of men. But Tomassov, I
must say, kept such details out of his discourses wonderfully well. Upon
my word I don't know whether her hair was dark or fair, her eyes brown
or blue; what was her stature, her features, or her complexion. His love
soared above mere physical impressions. He never described her to me in
set terms; but he was ready to swear that in her presence everybody's
thoughts and feelings were bound to circle round her. She was that sort
of woman. Most wonderful conversations on all sorts of subjects went
on in her salon: but through them all there flowed unheard like a
mysterious strain of music the assertion, the power, the tyranny of
sheer beauty. So apparently the woman was beautiful. She detached all
these talking people from their life interests, and even from their
vanities. She was a secret delight and a secret trouble. All the men
when they looked at her fell to brooding as if struck by the thought
that their lives had been wasted. She was the very joy and shudder of
felicity and she brought only sadness and torment to the hearts of men.

"In short, she must have been an extraordinary woman, or else Tomassov
was an extraordinary young fellow to feel in that way and to talk like
this about her. I told yo