"Let God be her judge! Why did she humiliate me? She's waiting for an aristocrat and it doesn't occur to her that there are all sorts of aristocrats--she might be miserable with one of them; but a simple, good man might make her happy. And now I'll go to church and put a candle for her health and pray: May God give her a drunken husband, who will beat her, who will squander her money and leave her penniless in the world. Then she will remember me, but it will be too late. She will dry her tears with her hand and say, 'What a fool I was to reject Pavel Vassilyevitch. There's no one to direct me now. He was a good man!'" Touched by his own words, a few tears came into Volodin's eyes and he wiped them from his sheepish, bulging eyes with his hands. "You'd better break some of her windows one night," advised Peredonov. "Well, God be with her," said Volodin sadly. "I might be caught. No, and what a miserable little boy that is! O Lord, what have I done to him that he should think of harming me? Haven't I tried hard for him, and look what mischief he's done me! What do you think of such an infant; what will become of him? Tell me." "Yes," said Peredonov savagely, "you couldn't even manage the little boy. Oh, you lover!" "Well, what of that?" said Volodin. "Of course I'm a lover. I'll find another. She needn't think that I'll grieve for her." "Oh, you lover," Peredonov continued to taunt him. "And he put a new tie on! How can a chap like you expect to be a gentleman? Lover!" "Well, I'm the lover and you're the match-maker, Ardasha," argued Volodin. "You yourself aroused hopes in me and couldn't fulfil them. Oh, you matchmaker!" And they began zealously to taunt one another and to argue as if they were discussing some important business matter. * * * * * Nadezhda escorted her visitors to the door and returned to the drawing-room. Misha was lying on the sofa laughing. His sister pulled him off the sofa by his shoulders and said: "But you have forgotten that you oughtn't to listen behind doors." She lifted her hands and made as if to cross her little fingers at an angle, a sign for him to go into the corner, but suddenly burst out laughing, and the little fingers did not come together. Misha threw himself towards her. They embraced and laughed for a long time. "All the same," she said, "you ought to go in the corner for listening." "You ought to let me off," said Misha. "I saved you from that bridegroom, so you ought to be grateful." "Who saved whom? You heard how they were talking of giving you a birching. Now go into the corner." "Well, I'd better kneel here," said Misha.