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"'Do you remember, Natalya Stepanovna, I asked her, 'how I once brought you in the park a bouquet with a note in it? You read my note, and such a look of bewilderment came into your face. . . . "'No, I don't remember that, she said, laughing. 'But I remember how you wanted to challenge Florens to a duel over me. . . . "'Well, would you believe it, I don't remember that. . . .
As if there was a single living being in the town that would not know that all his pleasures were reduced to kissing a new girl on the forehead and petting her behind the ears! Nadejda Stepanovna told me how they all laughed watching Polenov through the keyhole.... "Thanks," I said, "I am through with the Oficerskaya Street." So he went alone, trying to look younger and straighter.
At last when the clock was striking two, all was hushed, the bedroom door opened, and Nadyezhda Stepanovna appeared. "Pavel, are you asleep?" she whispered. "No; why?" "Go into your study, darling, and lie on the sofa. I am going to put Olga Kirillovna here, in your bed. Do go, dear! I would put her to sleep in the study, but she is afraid to sleep alone. . . . Do get up!"
It's easy to see that if I deny the personality of some Natalya Stepanovna, it's absolutely nothing to me whether she is insulted or not. To-day one insults her dignity as a human being and pays her Blutgeld, and next day thinks no more of her. "So I sat in the summer-house and watched the young ladies.
After luncheon I crossed the street to see Mikhalovsky, whom I was sure to find in the Club. He was going out with Polenov. "Aha, dear boy!" Polenov said to me. There are no political parties or platforms at Nadejda Stepanovna. A little lawyer, and an old soldier are equally welcome. Nadejda Stepanovna just telephoned there are new ones." The old fool!
Half an hour later Natalya was sent for vodka and savouries; Zaikin, after drinking tea and eating a whole French loaf, went to his bedroom and lay down on the bed, while Nadyezhda Stepanovna and her visitors, with much noise and laughter, set to work to rehearse their parts.
She did not lose her head, however, and promptly sent for a sister of her mother's Princess Avdotya Stepanovna H , a spiteful and arrogant old lady, who, on installing herself in her niece's house, appropriated all the best rooms for her own use, scolded and grumbled from morning till night, and would not go a walk even in the garden unattended by her one serf, a surly footman in a threadbare pea-green livery with light blue trimming and a three-cornered hat.
"Natalya, set the samovar," cried Nadyezhda Stepanovna, with a loud rustle of her skirts. "I hear Pavel Matveyitch is come. Pavel, where are you? Good-evening, Pavel!" she said, running into the study breathlessly. "So you've come.
Verotchka, tell Aksinya to unlock the gate for us!" You are not asleep, you know. Little wife, we are really so done up and exhausted that we're not in the mood for jokes. We've trudged all the way from the station! Don't you hear? Ah, hang it all!" I see you are just as great a schoolgirl as ever, Vera, you are always up to mischief!" "Perhaps Vera Stepanovna is asleep," says Laev.
First of all it was necessary to get into a familiar tone and to change Kisotchka's lyrically earnest mood into a more frivolous one. "'Let us change the conversation, Natalya Stepanovna, I began. 'Let us talk of something amusing. First of all, allow me, for the sake of old times, to call you Kisotchka. "She allowed me.
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