de things. In fact,
if I had remained in that vein till to-day I should have become a
famous blackmailer. Well, a week passed. Another person's secret
irritated and fretted me like a splinter in my soul. I longed at
all costs to blurt it out and gloat over the effect. And one day
at dinner, when we had a lot of visitors, I gave a stupid snigger,
looked fiendishly at Zinotchka and said:

"'I know. Gy--y! I saw! . . .'

"'What do you know?' asked my mother.

"I looked still more fiendishly at Zinotchka and Sasha. You ought
to have seen how the girl flushed up, and how furious Sasha's eyes
were! I bit my tongue and did not go on. Zinotchka gradually turned
pale, clenched her teeth, and ate no more dinner. At our evening
lessons that day I noticed a striking change in Zinotchka's face.
It looked sterner, colder, as it were, more like marble, while her
eyes gazed strangely straight into my face, and I give you my word
of honour I have never seen such terrible, annihilating eyes, even
in hounds when they overtake the wolf. I understood their expression
perfectly, when in the middle of a lesson she suddenly clenched her
teeth and hissed through them:

"'I hate you! Oh, you vile, loathsome creature, if you knew how I
hate you, how I detest your cropped head, your vulgar, prominent
ears!'

"But at once she took fright and said:

"'I am not speaking to you, I am repeating a part out of a
play. . . .'

"Then, my friends, at night I saw her come to my bedside and gaze
a long time into my face. She hated me passionately, and could not
exist away from me. The contemplation of my hated pug of a face had
become a necessity to her. I remember a lovely summer evening . . .
with the scent of hay, perfect stillness, and so on. The moon was
shining. I was walking up and down the avenue, thinking of cherry
jam. Suddenly Zinotchka, looking pale and lovely, came up to me,
she caught hold of my hand, and breathlessly began expressing
herself:

"'Oh, how I hate you! I wish no one harm as I do you! Let me tell
you that! I want you to understand that!'

"You understand, moonlight, her pale face, breathless with passion,
the stillness . . . little pig as I was I actually enjoyed it. I
listened to her, looked at her eyes. . . . At first I liked it, and
enjoyed the novelty. Then I was suddenly seized with terror, I gave
a scream, and ran into the house at breakneck speed.

"I made up my mind that the best thing to do was to complain to