"You're a queer sort of fellow! But it's all right ... you take it the right way.... There is something straightforward in what you say. Come then ... do your work well But not for my sake; do it for the sick people.... It's like a field of battle here; we have to save the sick from the jaws of disease; do you understand? Well then, help us with all your strength to conquer. Now then, be off and get some sleep!" Orloff was soon lying in his bunk, feeling a pleasant sensation of pride at being on such a confidential footing with a person like the doctor. He was' only sorry that Matrona had not overheard the conversation. But he would tell her about it to-morrow. She would scarcely believe it, the fat little lump that she was.... Busy with such pleasant thoughts Grigori fell asleep. CHAPTER VI "Come and drink your tea, Grischka." With these words Matrona awoke her husband the next morning. He lifted his head and looked at her. She was smiling pleasantly at him; her hair was brushed, and looked glossy and neat, whilst her white dress gave her a smart, clean appearance. It pleased him to see her thus, but immediately afterwards the thought glanced through his brain that the other men in the Infirmary might also find pleasure in looking at her. "What's the matter?... Tea's ready?.. I'll have my tea here!... Where do you want me to go and get it?" he asked, with a frown. "Come, we'll drink our tea together," she proposed, looking at him with her grey smiling eyes. Grigori turned away, and replied in a curt voice that he would come directly. As she left the room he stretched himself once more in his bunk and began to brood. "Yes ... she calls me to tea ... and is as pleasant as possible! She has grown thinner too in these last few days...." He felt pity for her, and would have liked to have prepared an agreeable surprise for her, perhaps to have bought some cakes or something of that sort to eat with their tea. But whilst he was washing he put these thoughts away.... "Why should he spoil his wife?... She could get on very well without it!" They drank their tea in a small bright room, the two windows of which looked out on to the open fields. The gilded rays of the morning sun lay on the floor. Dew still sparkled on the grass under the window. Along the distant horizon could be just seen through a light opal morning mist the trees that bordered the high-road. The sky was cloudless, and a fresh smell of grass and of damp earth was waited in at the open windows.