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He knew she sat at her window without a lamp throughout the evenings, waiting for Olya; and that for this reason her niece, on leaving him, went round by the back- way, in order to obviate suspicion. Nothing was ever said of the aunt in a personal way; the name was uttered only indirectly, as though applying to a substance and not to a human being.
You are a deceitful man! I see through you and understand every step you take!" "Olya, I wish you would please warn me when you are out of humour. Then I will sleep in the study." Saying this, Pyotr Dmitritch picked up his pillow and walked out of the bedroom. Olga Mihalovna had not foreseen this.
But all the same she did a willow-reed blown in the wind. Agrenev arranged to meet her the next day in the factory office, so that he might hear whether the aunt had created a scene or not, although he did not admit that reason, even to himself. In the ravine when Olya after yielding all wept and clung to his knees, Agrenev's heart had been pierced with pangs of remorse.
"Very, very glad to make your acquaintance," said the doctor in a loud tenor voice, shaking hands with me warmly, with a naive smile. "Very glad!" He sat down at the table, took a glass of tea, and said in a loud voice: "Do you happen to have a drop of rum or brandy? Have pity on me, Olya, and look in the cupboard; I am frozen," he said, addressing the maid.
She felt as though the bed were heaving under her and her feet were entangled in the bed-clothes. Pyotr Dmitritch, in his dressing-gown, with a candle in his hand, came into the bedroom. "Olya, hush!" he said. She raised herself, and kneeling up in bed, screwing up her eyes at the light, articulated through her sobs: "Understand . . . understand! . . . ."
The next morning, when Olya came into the office for business as usual, she exclaimed joyfully: "My aunt has not found out anything. She opened the door for me without lighting the lamp, and as she groped through the passage I ran quickly past her. Then I changed my clothes and appeared at supper as though nothing had happened!" A willow-reed blown by the wind!
Pyotr Dmitritch tried to make some answer, but his lips quivered and his mouth worked like a toothless old man's, like Uncle Nikolay Nikolaitch's. "Olya," he said, wringing his hands; big tears suddenly dropping from his eyes. Why didn't we take care of our child? Oh, it's no good talking!" With a despairing gesture he went out of the bedroom.
Olya could not think of the pain or the joy or the suffering she was only thinking how she could pass her aunt unnoticed; Agrenev felt cold and sickened at the thought of a possible scandal. They discovered there was a light at the aunt's window, and Olya began to tremble like a reed, whispering hoarsely almost crying: "I won't go in! I won't go in!"
Alexander Alexandrovitch Agrenev made out the returns for his department; these were duly printed not to be read, but so that beneath them might appear the signature: "A. A. Agrenev, Engineer." Olya only kept a report-book and the name-rolls, placing in her reports so many marks opposite the pupil's names. Mammy rose in the morning just as usual during those interminable months.
In the office were many telephone calls and the rattling of counting- boards. Agrenev and Olya sat together and arranged when to meet again. She did not want to go to the Ravine because of the shepherd boys' rude remarks. Alexander Alexandrovitch did not tell her all was known at home. As she said goodby she clung to him like a reed in the wind and whispered: "I have been awake all night.
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