ing delight
to the noise of the rats and the wind droning and knocking above
the ceiling. It seemed as though some old house spirit were coughing
in the attic.

The snow was deep; a great deal had fallen even at the end of March,
but it melted quickly, as though by magic, and the spring floods
passed in a tumultuous rush, so that by the beginning of April the
starlings were already noisy, and yellow butterflies were flying
in the garden. It was exquisite weather. Every day, towards evening,
I used to walk to the town to meet Masha, and what a delight it was
to walk with bare feet along the gradually drying, still soft road.
Half-way I used to sit down and look towards the town, not venturing
to go near it. The sight of it troubled me. I kept wondering how
the people I knew would behave to me when they heard of my love.
What would my father say? What troubled me particularly was the
thought that my life was more complicated, and that I had completely
lost all power to set it right, and that, like a balloon, it was
bearing me away, God knows whither. I no longer considered the
problem how to earn my daily bread, how to live, but thought about
--I really don't know what.

Masha used to come in a carriage; I used to get in with her, and
we drove to Dubetchnya, feeling light-hearted and free. Or, after
waiting till the sun had set, I would go back dissatisfied and
dreary, wondering why Masha had not come; at the gate or in the
garden I would be met by a sweet, unexpected apparition--it was
she! It would turn out that she had come by rail, and had walked
from the station. What a festival it was! In a simple woollen dress
with a kerchief on her head, with a modest sunshade, but laced in,
slender, in expensive foreign boots--it was a talented actress
playing the part of a little workgirl. We looked round our domain
and decided which should be her room, and which mine, where we would
have our avenue, our kitchen garden, our beehives.

We already had hens, ducks, and geese, which we loved because they
were ours. We had, all ready for sowing, oats, clover, timothy
grass, buckwheat, and vegetable seeds, and we always looked at all
these stores and discussed at length the crop we might get; and
everything Masha said to me seemed extraordinarily clever, and fine.
This was the happiest time of my life.

Soon after St. Thomas's week we were married at our parish church
in the village of Kurilovka, two miles from Dubetchnya. Masha