“No, no, my dears! it’s not for _you_ to outwit me,” she thought, as she drove along. “Zina agrees; so half the work is done. Oh, Zina, Zina! so your imagination is susceptible to pretty little visions, is it? and I _did_ treat her to a pretty little picture. She was really touched at last; and how lovely the child looked to-day! If I had her beauty I should turn half Europe topsy-turvy. But wait a bit, it’s all right. Shakespeare will fly away to another world when you’re a princess, my dear, and know a few people. What does she know? Mordasoff and the tutor! And what a princess she will make. I _love_ to see her pride and pluck. She looks at you like any queen. And not to know her own good! However, she soon will. Wait a bit; let this old fool die, and then the boy, and I’ll marry her to a reigning prince yet! The only thing I’m afraid of is—haven’t I trusted her too much? Didn’t I allow my feelings to run away with me too far? I am anxious about her. I am anxious, anxious!” Thus Maria Alexandrovna reflected as she drove along. She was a busy woman, was Maria Alexandrovna. Zina, left alone, continued her solitary walk up and down the room with folded hands and thoughtful brow. She had a good deal to think of! Over and over again she repeated, “It’s time—it’s time—oh, it’s time!” What did this ejaculation mean? Once or twice tears glistened on her long silken eyelashes, and she did not attempt to wipe them away. Her mother worried herself in vain, as far as Zina was concerned; for her daughter had quite made up her mind:—she was ready, come what might! “Wait a bit!” said the widow to herself, as she picked her way out of her hiding-place, after having observed and listened to the interview between Zina and her mother. “And I was thinking of a wedding dress for myself; I positively thought the prince would really come my way! So much for _my_ wedding dress—what a fool I was! Oho! Maria Alexandrovna—I’m a baggage, am I—and a beggar;—and I took a bribe of two hundred roubles from you, did I? And I didn’t spend it on expenses connected with your precious daughter’s letter, did I? and break open a desk for your sake with my own hands! Yes, madam; I’ll teach you what sort of a baggage Nastasia Petrovna is; both of you shall know her a little better yet! Wait a bit!” CHAPTER VII. Maria Alexandrovna’s genius had conceived a great and daring project. To marry her daughter to a rich man, a prince, and a cripple; to marry her secretly, to take advantage of the senile feebleness of her guest, to marry her daughter to this old man _burglariously_, as her enemies would call it,—was not only a daring, it was a downright audacious, project. Of course, in case of success, it would be a profitable undertaking enough; but in the event of _non_-success, what an ignominious position for the authors of such a failure.