"Yes. I believe I am a sort of uncle to you."

"Vladimir Nikolaitch has a kind heart,"--said Liza:--"he is clever;
mamma is very fond of him."

"And do you like him?"

"He is a nice man: why should not I like him?"

"Ah!"--said Lavretzky, and relapsed into silence. A half-mournful,
half-sneering expression flitted across his face. His tenacious gaze
discomfited Liza, but she continued to smile. "Well, God grant them
happiness!"--he muttered, at last, as though to himself, and turned away
his head.

Liza blushed.

"You are mistaken, Feodor Ivanitch,"--she said:--"there is no cause for
your thinking.... But do not you like Vladimir Nikolaitch?"

"I do not."

"Why?"

"It seems to me, that he has no heart."

The smile vanished from Liza's face.

"You have become accustomed to judge people harshly,"--she said, after a
long silence.

"I think not. What right have I to judge others harshly, when I myself
stand in need of indulgence? Or have you forgotten that a lazy man is the
only one who does not laugh at me?... Well,"--he added:--"and have you
kept your promise?"

"What promise?"

"Have you prayed for me?"

"Yes, I have prayed, and I do pray for you every day. But please do not
speak lightly of that."

Lavretzky began to assure Liza, that such a thing had never entered his
head, that he entertained a profound respect for all convictions; then he
entered upon a discussion of religion, its significance in the history of
mankind, the significance of Christianity....

"One must be a Christian,"--said Liza, not without a certain
effort:--"not in order to understand heavenly things ... yonder ...
earthly things, but because every man must die."

Lavretzky, with involuntary surprise, raised his eyes to Liza's, and
encountered her glance.

"What a word you have uttered!"--said he.

"The word is not mine,"--she replied.

"It is not yours.... But why do you speak of death?"

"I do not know. I often think about it."

"Often?"

"Yes."

"One would not say so, to look at you now: you have such a merry, bright
face, you are smiling...."

"Yes, I am very merry now,"--returned Liza ingenuously.

Lavretzky felt like seizing both her hands, and clasping them tightly.

"Liza, Liza!"--called Marya Dmitrievna,--"come hither, look! What a
carp I have caught!"

"Immediately, _maman_,"--replied Liza, and went to her, but Lavretzky
remained on his willow-tree.

"I talk with her as though I were not a ma