He was then a poor student in his last year. When he went to the hospital on winter mornings, he stepped carefully so that not everyone should notice how cleverly the holes in his boots had been mended with cardboard. His overcoat was as tight as a strait-jacket, and so threadbare that the old-clothes man would not even give a florin for it when he tried to sell it in the summer. Poverty made him pessimistic, and produced that state of sadness which is more than mere unpleasant depression, but less than actual suffering. To be roused from it, one need only eat a chop or drink a glass of tea; but he frequently had no tea to drink, to say nothing of a dinner to eat. He used to run along the muddy Dłvga Street so as to enter the gate of the Saski Gardens by a quarter to nine. Here he would meet a young girl and walk past her, looking at her long, heavy, ashen-blonde pigtails. She would not look up, but knitted her brows, which reminded one of the narrow, straight wings of a bird. He used to meet her there daily in the same place. She always walked quickly to the suburb beyond, where she entered a tram going to Praga. She was not more than seventeen, but looked like a little old maid in her handkerchief thrown carelessly over her fur cap, in her clumsy, old-fashioned cloak, and shoes a size too large for her small feet. She always carried books, maps, and writing materials under her arm. On one occasion, finding himself in possession of a few pence, which were to have paid for his dinner, he was resolved to discover what her daily destination was. He therefore set out in pursuit, and entered the same car, but after he had sat down all his courage had failed him. The unknown measured him with such a look of absolute disdain that he jumped out of the tram immediately, having lost his bowl of broth and achieved nothing. Yet he felt no grudge towards her; on the contrary, this had only raised her in his estimation. He thought about her unconsciously and uninterruptedly; he strove through the course of whole hours to call to mind her hair, her eyes, her mouth, the colour of her lips. And yet he strained his memory in vain. For scarcely had she vanished from his sight than her features vanished from his memory. Instead there was left a vision like a white cloud without any distinct features; it seemed to hover over him. His thoughts pursued that cloud in longing and humble timidity, with a touch of unconscious regret, sadness, and sympathy, which dominated him altogether. He used to go every morning to compare the living girl with his vision, and the reality seemed to him the more beautiful of the two; her eyes, thoughtful, and clear like a spring, filled him with a certain sense of awe.