n on cooperative lines. He's all right! he'll stick to anything
he undertakes. Got some grit in him! His strength lies in the fact that
he doesn't attempt to cure all the social ills with one blow. What a
rum set we are to be sure, we Russians! We sit down quietly and wait for
something or someone to come along and cure us all at once; heal all our
wounds, pull out all our diseases, like a bad tooth. But who or what
is to work this magic spell, Darwinism, the land, the Archbishop
Perepentiev, a foreign war, we don't know and don't care, but we must
have our tooth pulled out for us! It's nothing but mere idleness,
sluggishness, want of thinking. Solomin, on the other hand, is
different; he doesn't go in for pulling teeth--he knows what he's
about!"

Mashurina gave an impatient wave of the hand, as though she wished to
dismiss the subject.

"And that girl," she began, "I forget her name... the one who ran away
with Nejdanov--what became of her?"

"Mariana? She's Solomin's wife now. They married over a year ago. It was
merely for the sake of formality at first, but now they say she really
is his wife."

Mashurina gave another impatient gesture. There was a time when she was
jealous of Mariana, but now she was indignant with her for having been
false to Nejdanov's memory.

"I suppose they have a baby by now," she said in an offhanded tone.

"I really don't know. But where are you off to?" Paklin asked, seeing
that she had taken up her hat. "Do stay a little longer; my sister will
bring us some tea directly."

It was not so much that he wanted Mashurina to stay, as that he
could not let an opportunity slip by of giving utterance to what had
accumulated and was boiling over in his breast. Since his return to St.
Petersburg he had seen very little of people, especially of the younger
generation. The Nejdanov affair had scared him; he grew more cautious,
avoided society, and the young generation on their side looked upon him
with suspicion. Once someone had even called him a traitor to his face.

As he was not fond of associating with the elder generation, it
sometimes fell to his lot to be silent for weeks. To his sister he
could not speak out freely, not because he considered her too stupid
to understand him--oh, no! he had the highest opinion of her
intelligence--but as soon as he began letting off some of his pet
fireworks she would look at him with those sad reproachful eyes of hers,
making him feel quite ashamed