him very little in itself,
however; the less so since, when he reached his room again, he found in
his hand an envelope containing a princely sum of pocket-money--which
was to last him through the spring. Wearily and drearily, however, the
boy, with the aid of his serf, packed the few garments he had brought
with him, and then went off to hang about the closed door of his aunt's
suite of rooms, in which, also packing, was Nathalie: that strange, new
Nathalie, born for him fifteen hours before.

He had reached a great depth of unhappiness when suddenly, about
noon-time, the gate to fairy-land opened and he was admitted by
Celestine, who had been sent, indeed, to seek him. In a few, whirling
moments, he found himself eating an early _dejeuner a la fourchette_
with his aunt and cousin, after which he drove with them to the
Petersburg station, and there, upon the noisy, crowded platform, reached
his empyrean.

Madame Dravikine and her maid were in the carriage reserved for them,
arranging their bags and rugs. But Nathalie had remained--ah, was it not
of her own choice?--outside, for three minutes longer. Their few words
were as simple and as awkward as inexperience could make them; but they
were afterwards gone over, a hundred times, at least, by Ivan, who, at
each repetition, became more impressed by the brilliance, the wit, the
_savoir-faire_, the repose of Mademoiselle Nathalie's brief and
stumbling formalities. Then--then Madame Dravikine was calling her
daughter. A whistle blew. The second bell rang loudly. Officials jangled
hastily down the platform; and Ivan, his heart throbbing in his throat,
suddenly caught his cousin's slender figure in his arms, held her for
one endless instant, found her lips with his own, and found himself,
five minutes later, gazing blindly down an empty track, while the
footman at his side stared at him in stupid wonderment. So, coloring
with shame, joyously angry, broken by the long prospect of ensuing grief
and longing--not for one being loved and lost, but for two--he entered
the carriage which was to carry him across Moscow, from heaven to hell:
from the Petersburg station to the stone buildings of the _Corps des
Cadets_, where, in the ensuing weeks, Ivan Gregoriev, already an adept
in enduring the various forms of school-boy misery, was about to begin
upon a lesson before which more than one grown man would have visibly
shrunk; and under which Ivan himself, before it was finished, had b