observations. ‘If only he doesn’t
mean to stay till evening!’ was what she was
thinking incessantly, and she tried to make him realise
that he was not wanted. Kister, for his part,
took her awkwardness and her uneasiness for obvious
signs of love, and the more afraid he was for her
the more impossible he found it to speak of Lutchkov;
while Masha obstinately refrained from uttering his
name. It was a painful experience for poor Fyodor
Fedoritch. He began at last to understand his
own feelings. Never had Masha seemed to him more
charming. She had, to all appearances, not slept
the whole night. A faint flush stood in patches
on her pale face; her figure was faintly drooping;
an unconscious, weary smile never left her lips; now
and then a shiver ran over her white shoulders; a
soft light glowed suddenly in her eyes, and quickly
faded away. Nenila Makarievna came in and sat
with them, and possibly with intention mentioned Avdey
Ivanovitch. But in her mother’s presence
Masha was armed jusqu’aux dents, as the
French say, and she did not betray herself at all.
So passed the whole morning.
‘You will dine with us?’ Nenila Makarievna
asked Kister.
Masha turned away.
‘No,’ Kister said hurriedly, and he glanced
towards Masha. ’Excuse me... duties of
the service...’
Nenila Makarievna duly expressed her regret.
Mr. Perekatov, following her lead, also expressed
something or other. ’I don’t want
to be in the way,’ Kister wanted to say to Masha,
as he passed her, but he bowed down and whispered
instead: ’Be happy... farewell... take care
of yourself...’ and was gone.
Masha heaved a sigh from the bottom of her heart,
and then felt panic-stricken at his departure.
What was it fretting her? Love or curiosity?
God knows; but, we repeat, curiosity alone was enough
to ruin Eve.
Long Meadow was the name of a wide, level stretch
of ground on the right of the little stream Sniezhinka,
nearly a mile from the Perekatovs’ property.
The left bank, completely covered by thick young oak
bushes, rose steeply up over the stream, which was
almost overgrown with willow bushes, except for some
small ‘breeding-places,’ the haunts of
wild ducks. Half a mile from the stream, on the
right side of Long Meadow, began the sloping, undulating
uplands, studded here and there with old birch-trees,
nut bushes, and guelder-roses.
The sun was setting. The mill rumbled and clattered
in the distance, sounding louder or softer according
to the wind. The seignorial drove of horses was
lazily wandering about the meadows; a shepherd walked,
humming a tune, after a flock of greedy and timorous
sheep; the sheepdogs, from boredom, were running after
the crows. Lutchkov walked up and down in the
copse, with his arms folded. His horse, tied up
near by, more than once whinnied in response to the
sonorous neighing of the mares and fillies in the
meadow. Avdey was ill-tempered and shy, as usual.
Not yet convinced of Masha’s love, he felt wrathful
with her and annoyed with himself... but his excitement
smothered his annoyance. He stopped at last before
a large nut bush, and began with his riding-whip switching
off the leaves at the ends of the twigs....
