marvellous tales;
thus, for instance, they said that in the countess's drawing-room,
where the portraits of all the kings of Poland hung on the walls,
there was a big table-clock in the form of a rock, on the rock a
gold horse with diamond eyes, rearing, and on the horse the figure
of a rider also of gold, who brandished his sword to right and to
left whenever the clock struck. They said, too, that twice a year
the countess used to give a ball, to which the gentry and officials
of the whole province were invited, and to which even Varlamov used
to come; all the visitors drank tea from silver samovars, ate all
sorts of extraordinary things (they had strawberries and raspberries,
for instance, in winter at Christmas), and danced to a band which
played day and night. . . .

"And how beautiful she is," thought Yegorushka, remembering her
face and smile.

Kuzmitchov, too, was probably thinking about the countess. For when
the chaise had driven a mile and a half he said:

"But doesn't that Kazimir Mihalovitch plunder her right and left!
The year before last when, do you remember, I bought some wool from
her, he made over three thousand from my purchase alone."

"That is just what you would expect from a Pole," said Father
Christopher.

"And little does it trouble her. Young and foolish, as they say,
her head is full of nonsense."

Yegorushka, for some reason, longed to think of nothing but Varlamov
and the countess, particularly the latter. His drowsy brain utterly
refused ordinary thoughts, was in a cloud and retained only fantastic
fairy-tale images, which have the advantage of springing into the
brain of themselves without any effort on the part of the thinker,
and completely vanishing of themselves at a mere shake of the head;
and, indeed, nothing that was around him disposed to ordinary
thoughts. On the right there were the dark hills which seemed to
be screening something unseen and terrible; on the left the whole
sky about the horizon was covered with a crimson glow, and it was
hard to tell whether there was a fire somewhere, or whether it was
the moon about to rise. As by day the distance could be seen, but
its tender lilac tint had gone, quenched by the evening darkness,
in which the whole steppe was hidden like Moisey Moisevitch's
children under the quilt.

Corncrakes and quails do not call in the July nights, the nightingale
does not sing in the woodland marsh, and there is no scent of
flowers, but stil