apparently overjoyed (poor chap!), leaped up, gave a sigh, and began thanking me for the treat I had given them.… But I made him no reply; I looked towards Vera Nikolaevna … I wanted to hear what she would say. She got up, walked irresolutely towards the door, stood a moment in the doorway, and softly went out into the garden. I rushed after her. She was already some paces off; her dress was just visible, a white patch in the thick shadow. ‘Well?’ I called--‘didn’t you like it?’ She stopped. ‘Can you leave me that book?’ I heard her voice saying. ‘I will present it you, Vera Nikolaevna, if you care to have it.’ ‘Thank you!’ she answered, and disappeared. Priemkov and the German came up to me. ‘How wonderfully warm it is!’ observed Priemkov; ‘it’s positively stifling. But where has my wife gone?’ ‘Home, I think,’ I answered. ‘I suppose it will soon be time for supper,’ he rejoined. ‘You read splendidly,’ he added, after a short pause. ‘Vera Nikolaevna liked _Faust_, I think,’ said I. ‘No doubt of it!’ cried Priemkov. ‘Oh, of course!’ chimed in Schimmel. We went into the house. ‘Where’s your mistress?’ Priemkov inquired of a maid who happened to meet us. ‘She has gone to her bedroom.’ Priemkov went off to her bedroom. I went out on to the terrace with Schimmel. The old man raised his eyes towards the sky. ‘How many stars!’ he said slowly, taking a pinch of snuff; ‘and all are worlds,’ he added, and he took another pinch. I did not feel it necessary to answer him, and simply gazed upwards in silence. A secret uncertainty weighed upon my heart.… The stars, I fancied, looked down seriously at us. Five minutes later Priemkov appeared and called us into the dining-room. Vera Nikolaevna came in soon after. We sat down. ‘Look at Verotchka,’ Priemkov said to me. I glanced at her. ‘Well? don’t you notice anything?’ I certainly did notice a change in her face, but I answered, I don’t know why-- ‘No, nothing.’ ‘Her eyes are red,’ Priemkov went on. I was silent. ‘Only fancy! I went upstairs to her and found her crying. It’s a long while since such a thing has happened to her. I can tell you the last time she cried; it was when our Sasha died. You see what you have done with your _Faust_!’ he added, with a smile. ‘So you see now, Vera Nikolaevna,’ I began, ‘that I was right when----’ ‘I did not expect this,’ she interrupted me; ‘but God knows whether you are right. Perhaps that was the very reason my mother forbade my reading such books,--she knew----’ Vera Nikolaevna stopped. ‘What did she know?’ I asked. ‘Tell me.’ ‘What for? I’m ashamed of myself, as it is; what did I cry for? But we’ll talk about it another time. There was a great deal I did not quite understand.’ ‘Why didn’t you stop me?’ ‘I understood all the words, and the meaning of them, but----’