The old lady who was sitting at the window with Maria Dmitrievna was her father’s sister, the aunt with whom she had formerly spent so many lonely years at Pokrovskoe.  Her name was Marfa Timofeevna Pestof.  She was looked upon as an original, being a woman of an independent character, who bluntly told the truth to every one, and who, although her means were very small, behaved in society just as she would have done had she been rolling in wealth.  She never could abide the late Kalitine, and as soon as her niece married him she retired to her own modest little property, where she spent ten whole years in a peasant’s smoky hut.  Maria Dmitrievna was rather afraid of her.  Small in stature, with black hair, a sharp nose, and eyes which even in old age were still keen, Marfa Timofeevna walked briskly, held herself bolt upright, and spoke quickly but distinctly, and with a loud, high-pitched voice.  She always wore a white cap, and a white kofta[A] always formed part of her dress.

[Footnote A:  A sort of jacket.]

“What is the matter?” she suddenly asked.  “What are you sighing about?”

“Nothing,” replied Maria Dmitrievna.  “What lovely clouds!”

“You are sorry for them, I suppose?”

Maria Dmitrievna made no reply.

“Why doesn’t Gedeonovsky come?” continued Marfa Timofeevna, rapidly plying her knitting needles. (She was making a long worsted scarf.) “He would have sighed with you.  Perhaps he would have uttered some platitude or other.”

“How unkindly you always speak of him!  Sergius Petrovich is—­a most respectable man.”

“Respectable!” echoed the old lady reproachfully.

“And then,” continued Maria Dmitrievna, “how devoted he was to my dear husband!  Why, he can never think of him without emotion.”

“He might well be that, considering that your husband pulled him out of the mud by the ears,” growled Marfa Timofeevna, the needles moving quicker than ever under her fingers.  “He looks so humble,” she began anew after a time.  “His head is quite grey, and yet he never opens his mouth but to lie or to slander.  And, forsooth, he is a councillor of state!  Ah, well, to be sure, he is a priest’s son."[A]

[Footnote A:  Popovich, or son of a pope; a not over respectful designation in Russia.]

“Who is there who is faultless, aunt?  It is true that he has this weakness.  Sergius Petrovich has not had a good education, I admit—­he cannot speak French—­but I beg leave to say that I think him exceedingly agreeable.”

“Oh, yes, he fawns on you like a dog.  As to his not speaking French, that’s no great fault.  I am not very strong in the French ‘dialect’ myself.  It would be better if he spoke no language at all; he wouldn’t tell lies then.  But of course, here he is, in the very nick of time,” continued Marfa Timofeevna, looking down the street.  “Here comes your agreeable man, striding along.  How spindle-shanked he is, to be sure—­just like a stork!”