that struck me most of all
in my new position was the complete lack of justice, what is defined
by the peasants in the words: "They have forgotten God." Rarely did
a day pass without swindling. We were swindled by the merchants who
sold us oil, by the contractors and the workmen and the people who
employed us. I need not say that there could never be a question
of our rights, and we always had to ask for the money we earned as
though it were a charity, and to stand waiting for it at the back
door, cap in hand.

I was papering a room at the club next to the reading-room; in the
evening, when I was just getting ready to go, the daughter of
Dolzhikov, the engineer, walked into the room with a bundle of books
under her arm.

I bowed to her.

"Oh, how do you do!" she said, recognizing me at once, and holding
out her hand. "I'm very glad to see you."

She smiled and looked with curiosity and wonder at my smock, my
pail of paste, the paper stretched on the floor; I was embarrassed,
and she, too, felt awkward.

"You must excuse my looking at you like this," she said. "I have
been told so much about you. Especially by Dr. Blagovo; he is simply
in love with you. And I have made the acquaintance of your sister
too; a sweet, dear girl, but I can never persuade her that there
is nothing awful about your adopting the simple life. On the contrary,
you have become the most interesting man in the town."

She looked again at the pail of paste and the wallpaper, and went
on:

"I asked Dr. Blagovo to make me better acquainted with you, but
apparently he forgot, or had not time. Anyway, we are acquainted
all the same, and if you would come and see me quite simply I should
be extremely indebted to you. I so long to have a talk. I am a
simple person," she added, holding out her hand to me, "and I hope
that you will feel no constraint with me. My father is not here,
he is in Petersburg."

She went off into the reading-room, rustling her skirts, while I
went home, and for a long time could not get to sleep.

That cheerless autumn some kind soul, evidently wishing to alleviate
my existence, sent me from time to time tea and lemons, or biscuits,
or roast game. Karpovna told me that they were always brought by a
soldier, and from whom they came she did not know; and the soldier
used to enquire whether I was well, and whether I dined every day,
and whether I had warm clothing. When the frosts began I was presented
in the same way in m