“To-morrow.--Come, come, come, please,” he replied quickly, vexed, noticing that she quivered, and bowed her head in silence. “Please, Akulina, don’t cry. You know I can’t bear it” (and he twitched his flat nose). “If you don’t stop, I’ll leave you right away. What nonsense--to whimper!” “Well, I shan’t, I shan’t,” said Akulina hastily, swallowing the tears with an effort. “So you’re going away to-morrow?” she added, after a brief silence. “When will it please God to have me meet you again, Victor Alexandrovich?” “We’ll meet, we’ll meet again. If it isn’t next year, it’ll be later. My master, it seems, wants to enter the service in St. Petersburg,” he went on, pronouncing the words carelessly and somewhat indistinctly. “And it may be that we’ll go abroad.” “You will forget me, Victor Alexandrovich,” said Akulina sadly. “No--why should I? I’ll not forget you, only you had rather be sensible; don’t make a fool of yourself; obey your father.--And I’ll not forget you.--Oh, no; oh, no.” And he stretched himself calmly and yawned again. “Do not forget me, Victor Alexandrovich,” she resumed in a beseeching voice. “I have loved you so much, it seems--all, it seems, for you.--You tell me to obey father, Victor Alexandrovich.--How am I to obey my father--?” “How’s that?” He pronounced these words as if from the stomach, lying on his back and holding his hands under his head. “Why, Victor Alexandrovich--you know it yourself--” She fell silent. Victor fingered his steel watch-chain. “Akulina, you are not a foolish girl,” he said at last, “therefore don’t talk nonsense. It’s for your own good, do you understand me? Of course, you are not foolish, you’re not altogether a peasant, so to say, and your mother wasn’t always a peasant either. Still, you are without education--therefore you must obey when you are told to.” “But it’s terrible, Victor Alexandrovich.” “Oh, what nonsense, my dear--what is she afraid of! What is that you have there,” he added, moving closer to her, “flowers?” “Flowers,” replied Akulina sadly. “I have picked some field tansies,” she went on, with some animation. “They’re good for the calves. And here I have some marigolds--for scrofula. Here, look, what a pretty flower! I haven’t seen such a pretty flower in all my life. Here are forget-me-nots, and--and these I have picked for you,” she added, taking from under the tansies a small bunch of cornflowers, tied around with a thin blade of grass; “do you want them?”