in love with her."

"But supposing I am not in love with her?"

"Then why run after her, disturb her, agitate her imagination!... Oh, I
know you well! Listen--if you wish me to believe you, come to Kislovodsk
in a week's time; we shall be moving thither the day after to-morrow.
Princess Mary will remain here longer. Engage lodgings next door to us.
We shall be living in the large house near the spring, on the mezzanine
floor. Princess Ligovski will be below us, and next door there is a
house belonging to the same landlord, which has not yet been taken...
Will you come?"...

I gave my promise, and this very same day I have sent to engage the
lodgings.

Grushnitski came to me at six o'clock and announced that his uniform
would be ready to-morrow, just in time for him to go to the ball in it.

"At last I shall dance with her the whole evening through... And then I
shall talk to my heart's content," he added.

"When is the ball?"

"Why, to-morrow! Do you not know, then? A great festival--and the local
authorities have undertaken to organize it"...

"Let us go to the boulevard"...

"Not on any account, in this nasty cloak"...

"What! Have you ceased to love it?"...

I went out alone, and, meeting Princess Mary I asked her to keep the
mazurka for me. She seemed surprised and delighted.

"I thought that you would only dance from necessity as on the last
occasion," she said, with a very charming smile...

She does not seem to notice Grushnitski's absence at all.

"You will be agreeably surprised to-morrow," I said to her.

"At what?"

"That is a secret... You will find it out yourself, at the ball."

I finished up the evening at Princess Ligovski's; there were no other
guests present except Vera and a certain very amusing, little old
gentleman. I was in good spirits, and improvised various extraordinary
stories. Princess Mary sat opposite me and listened to my nonsense with
such deep, strained, and even tender attention that I grew ashamed of
myself. What had become of her vivacity, her coquetry, her caprices, her
haughty mien, her contemptuous smile, her absentminded glance?...

Vera noticed everything, and her sickly countenance was a picture of
profound grief. She was sitting in the shadow by the window, buried in a
wide arm-chair... I pitied her.

Then I related the whole dramatic story of our acquaintanceship, our
love--concealing it all, of course, under fictitious names.

So vividly did I portra