played the most pitiable role.  Everybody knew her, and nobody paid her any attention.  At balls she danced only when a partner was wanted, and ladies would only take hold of her arm when it was necessary to lead her out of the room to attend to their dresses.  She was very self-conscious, and felt her position keenly, and she looked about her with impatience for a deliverer to come to her rescue; but the young men, calculating in their giddiness, honored her with but very little attention, although Lizaveta Ivanovna was a hundred times prettier than the bare-faced, cold-hearted marriageable girls around whom they hovered.  Many a time did she quietly slink away from the glittering, but wearisome, drawing-room, to go and cry in her own poor little room, in which stood a screen, a chest of drawers, a looking-glass, and a painted bedstead, and where a tallow candle burnt feebly in a copper candle-stick.

One morning—­this was about two days after the evening party described at the beginning of this story, and a week previous to the scene at which we have just assisted—­Lizaveta Ivanovna was seated near the window at her embroidery frame, when, happening to look out into the street, she caught sight of a young Engineer officer, standing motionless with his eyes fixed upon her window.  She lowered her head, and went on again with her work.  About five minutes afterwards she looked out again—­the young officer was still standing in the same place.  Not being in the habit of coquetting with passing officers, she did not continue to gaze out into the street, but went on sewing for a couple of hours, without raising her head.  Dinner was announced.  She rose up and began to put her embroidery away, but glancing casually out of the window, she perceived the officer again.  This seemed to her very strange.  After dinner she went to the window with a certain feeling of uneasiness, but the officer was no longer there—­and she thought no more about him.

A couple of days afterwards, just as she was stepping into the carriage with the Countess, she saw him again.  He was standing close behind the door, with his face half-concealed by his fur collar, but his dark eyes sparkled beneath his cap.  Lizaveta felt alarmed, though she knew not why, and she trembled as she seated herself in the carriage.

On returning home, she hastened to the window—­the officer was standing in his accustomed place, with his eyes fixed upon her.  She drew back, a prey to curiosity, and agitated by a feeling which was quite new to her.

From that time forward not a day passed without the young officer making his appearance under the window at the customary hour, and between him and her there was established a sort of mute acquaintance.  Sitting in her place at work, she used to feel his approach, and, raising her head, she would look at him longer and longer each day.  The young man seemed to be very grateful to her; she saw with the sharp eye of youth, how a sudden flush covered his pale cheeks each time that their glances met.  After about a week she commenced to smile at him....