Evening was closing in, and the lamp had been lit. Moonlike, it cast through the ivy-covered trellis a light so dim that the dusk still veiled the outlines of Olga’s face and figure--it still shrouded them, as it were, in crepe; while the soft, strong voice, vibrating with nervous tension, came ringing through the darkness with a note of mystery. At Schtoltz’s prompting she sang several arias and romances, of which some expressed suffering, with a vague forecast of joy, while others expressed joy, coupled with a lurking germ of sorrow. As Oblomov listened he could scarcely restrain his tears or the cry of ecstasy that was almost bursting from his soul. In fact, he would have undertaken the tour abroad if thereby he could have remained where he was at that moment, and _then_ gone. “Have I pleased you to-night?” she inquired of Schtoltz. “Ask, rather, Oblomov,” he replied. “Confess now, Ilya: how long is it since you felt as you are feeling at this moment?” “Yet he might have felt like that this morning if ‘a cracked barrel-organ’ had happened to pass his window,” put in Olga--but so kindly as to rob the words of their sarcasm. “He never keeps his windows open,” remarked Schtoltz. “Consequently, he could not possibly hear what is going on outside.” That night Oblomov was powerless to sleep. He paced the room in a mood of thoughtful despondency, and at dawn left the house to roam the city, with his head and his heart full of God only knows what feelings and reflections! Three days later he called again at the aunt’s. “I want you,” said Olga, “to feel thoroughly at home here.” “Then pray do not look at me as you are doing now, and as you have always done.” Instantly her glance lost its usual expression or curiosity, and became wholly softened to kindness. “Why do you mind my looking at you so much?” she asked. “I do not know. Somehow your gaze seems to draw from me everything that I would rather people did not learn--you least of all.” “Why so? You are a friend of Schtoltz’s, and he is a friend of mine, and therefore----” “And therefore there is no reason why you should know as much about me as he does,” concluded Oblomov. “No, there _is_ no reason. But at least there is a _possibility_ that I may do so.” “Yes---- thanks to his talkativeness! Indeed a poor service!” “Have you, then, any secrets to conceal--or even crimes?” With a little laugh she edged away from him. “Perhaps,” he said with a sigh. “Yes, to put on odd socks _is_ a grave crime,” she remarked with demure timidity. Oblomov seized his hat. “I will _not_ stand this!” he cried. “Yet you want me to feel at home here! As for Schtoltz, I detest him! _He_ told you about the socks, I suppose?” “Nay, nay,” she said. “Pardon me this once, and I will try to look at you in quite a different way. As a matter of fact, ’tis _you_ who are looking at _me_ in rather an odd fashion.”