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Yevmen only glanced askance at Yura, and suddenly Yura seemed to have noticed for the first time his broad, black, wavy beard and thought respectfully that Yevmen was a very worthy man. He said: "Good morning, Yevmen." Then all moved very rapidly.
The ladies were ordinary, but the students had holes cut at the left side of their white coats for their swords. But they did not bring their swords along, no doubt because of their pride they were all very proud. And the ladies rushed over to Yura and began to kiss him. Then the most beautiful of the ladies, whose name was Ninochka, took Yura to the swing and swung him until she threw him down.
That wrong Yura Mikhailovich had visited them several times; he even came once on horseback; but most of the time he came just before little Yura had to go to bed. And little Yura went to bed, while the unreal Yura Mikhailovich remained with mamma, and that caused him to feel alarmed and sad; he was afraid that mamma might be deceived.
But when Yura's eyes had grown heavy and he was falling asleep with all his sorrow and his tears, mamma suddenly went down on her knees before the little bed and kissed Yura firmly many, many times. But her kisses were wet hot and wet. "Why are your kisses wet? Are you crying?" muttered Yura. "Yes, I am crying." "You must not cry." "Very well, I won't," answered mother submissively.
Mitenka had a heavy leather sword, which was as cold as a snake, which could not be taken out but Mitenka lied; the sword was only fastened at the handle with a silver cord, but it could be taken out very nicely; and Yura felt vexed because the stupid Mitenka instead of carrying his sword, as he always did, placed it in a corner in the hallway as a cane.
Suddenly father heaved a loud sigh and stirred. Yura walked away quietly. And then all was the same as ever. No one would have learned of this; but the image of the enormous, mysterious and charming man who was his father and who was crying remained in Yura's memory as something dreadful and extremely serious.
And, if there were things of which he did not feel like speaking, it was absolutely necessary to say nothing of this, as though it were something sacred and terrible, and in that silence he must love father all the more. But he must love so that father should not notice it, and he must give the impression that it is very jolly to live on earth. And Yura succeeded in accomplishing all this.
Guests were expected in the evening; military music was to play, and in the garden and upon the terrace parti-coloured lanterns were to burn, and Yura need not go to bed at 9 o'clock but could stay up as late as he liked. Yura got up when all were still sleeping. He dressed himself and jumped out quickly with the expectation of miracles.
At times father could not understand him and would simply send him away to play or to sleep Yura never felt offended and went away with a feeling of great satisfaction. He did not feel the need of being understood; he even feared it.
They played so loudly that there was nothing but the orchestra on the whole earth everything else had vanished. The brass ends of some of the trumpets even spread apart and opened wide from the great roaring; Yura thought that it would be interesting to make a military helmet out of such a trumpet. Suddenly Yura grew sad.
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