rovided for
as she was with a respectable dowry and magnificent valuables ... Now
it was possible peacefully, without hurrying, with gusto, to dine and
sup on sweet things, for which Anna Markovna had always nourished a
great weakness; to drink after dinner good, home-made, strong
cherry-brandy; and of evenings to play a bit at "preference," for
kopeck stakes, with esteemed elderly ladies of her acquaintance, who,
even although they never as much as let it appear that they knew the
real trade of the little old woman, did in reality know it very well;
and not only did not condemn her business but even bore themselves with
respect toward those enormous percentages which she earned upon her
capital. And these charming friends, the joy and consolation of an
untroubled old age, were: one--the keeper of a loan office;
another--the proprietress of a lively hotel near the railroad; the
third--the owner of a jewelry shop, not large, but all the go and well
known among the big thieves, &c. And about them, in her turn, Anna
Markovna knew and could tell several shady and not especially
flattering anecdotes; but in their society it was not customary to talk
of the sources of the family well-being--only cleverness, daring,
success, and decent manners were esteemed.

But, even besides that, Anna Markovna, sufficiently limited in mind and
not especially developed, had some sort of an amazing inner intuition,
which during all her life permitted her instinctively but
irreproachably to avoid unpleasantnesses, and to find prudent paths in
time. And so now, after the sudden death of Roly-Poly, and the suicide
of Jennka which followed the next day, she, with her
unconsciously--penetrating soul foreguessed that fate--which had been
favouring her house of ill-fame, sending her good fortunes, turning
away all under-water shoals--was now getting ready to turn its back
upon her. And she was the first to retreat.

They say, that not long before a fire in a house, or before the wreck
of a ship, the wise, nervous rats in droves make their way into another
place. And Anna Markovna was directed by the same rat-like, animal,
prophetic intuition. And she was right: immediately right after the
death of Jennka some fearful curse seemed to hang over the house,
formerly Anna Markovna Shaibes', but now Emma Edwardovna Titzner's:
deaths, misfortunes, scandals just simply descended upon it
ceaselessly, becoming constantly more frequent, on the manner of bloo