I turned to my Unknown. She was gazing after the receding pair, and suddenly, tearing her arm from mine, she rushed toward the door. I was about to dash after her; but turning round, she gave me such a look that I made her a profound bow, and remained where I was. I understood that to pursue her would be both rude and stupid. "Tell me, please, my dear fellow,"--I said, half an hour later, to one of my friends--the living directory of Petersburg:--"who is that tall, handsome gentleman with a moustache?" "That?... that is some foreigner or other, a rather enigmatic individual, who very rarely makes his appearance on our horizon. Why do you ask?" "Oh, because!".... I returned home. Since that time I have never met my Unknown anywhere. Had I known the name of the man whom she loved, I might, probably, have found out, eventually, who she was, but I myself did not desire that. I have said above that that woman appeared to me like a dream-vision--and like a dream-vision she went past and vanished forever. FOOTNOTES: [20] Pass through these hills and come cheerily to me: care thou not for too great a company. Come thou, and think secretly of me, that I may be thy comrade all the way. [21] In central and southern Russia where timber is scarce, fences, and even the walls of barns and store-houses, are made of interlaced boughs.--TRANSLATOR. [22] The Nobles' Club.--TRANSLATOR. [23] "I am a picture of sorrow, Leaning against the wall." MUMÚ (1852) In one of the remote streets of Moscow, in a grey house with white pillars, an entresol, and a crooked balcony, dwelt in former days a well-born lady, a widow, surrounded by numerous domestics. Her sons were in the service in Petersburg, her daughters were married; she rarely went out into society, and was living out the last years of a miserly and tedious old age in solitude. Her day, cheerless and stormy, was long since over; but her evening also was blacker than night.