us that I wondered how I could ever have failed
to observe the fact before. Even between the girls and ourselves there
seemed to have sprung up an invisible barrier. They, too, began to have
secrets among themselves, as well as to evince a desire to show off
their ever-lengthening skirts even as we boys did our trousers and
ankle-straps. As for Mimi, she appeared at luncheon, the first Sunday,
in such a gorgeous dress and with so many ribbons in her cap that it was
clear that we were no longer en campagne, and that everything was now
going to be different.

V. MY ELDER BROTHER

I was only a year and some odd months younger than Woloda, and from the
first we had grown up and studied and played together. Hitherto, the
difference between elder and younger brother had never been felt between
us, but at the period of which I am speaking, I began to have a
notion that I was not Woloda's equal either in years, in tastes, or in
capabilities. I even began to fancy that Woloda himself was aware of
his superiority and that he was proud of it, and, though, perhaps, I
was wrong, the idea wounded my conceit--already suffering from frequent
comparison with him. He was my superior in everything--in games, in
studies, in quarrels, and in deportment. All this brought about an
estrangement between us and occasioned me moral sufferings which I had
never hitherto experienced.

When for the first time Woloda wore Dutch pleated shirts, I at once said
that I was greatly put out at not being given similar ones, and each
time that he arranged his collar, I felt that he was doing so on purpose
to offend me. But, what tormented me most of all was the idea that
Woloda could see through me, yet did not choose to show it.

Who has not known those secret, wordless communications which spring
from some barely perceptible smile or movement--from a casual glance
between two persons who live as constantly together as do brothers,
friends, man and wife, or master and servant--particularly if those
two persons do not in all things cultivate mutual frankness? How many
half-expressed wishes, thoughts, and meanings which one shrinks from
revealing are made plain by a single accidental glance which timidly and
irresolutely meets the eye!

However, in my own case I may have been deceived by my excessive
capacity for, and love of, analysis. Possibly Woloda did not feel at
all as I did. Passionate and frank, but unstable in his likings, he was
attracte