denly said to his mother:

"What is this new acquisition you have made, mother? A little
fair-haired Raphael opened the gate for me this morning."

The countess thought for a moment.

"Ah! I know," said she; "it's Mavra--a virtue--my dear child. A
strange little creature, who adores me."

"She is quite right," replied the son respectfully. "What do you do
with her?"

"She embroiders in the afternoon, and in the morning she attends on
me; but, Serge, you must be prudent. My house is strictly kept; don't
you go and amuse yourself making gallant speeches to my girls."

"Oh, mother! what do you take me for?" carelessly replied the young
man. "I think of a woman only when she is in a casket suited to her
style of beauty. Now here you may have pearls, but the casket is
totally wanting."

They burst out laughing together. Only those who thoroughly understood
these two beings could have guessed beneath this light talk the strict
propriety of the mother and the son's respect for the maternal home.
But Russians of the _grande monde_ are so constituted that when they
have no vice, they take all imaginable trouble to affect it.

On leaving the dining room the countess and her son directed their
steps toward the garden. In front of the house, in the courtyard, they
met Mavra stooping under the weight of an enormous pile of linen,
which she was carrying from the laundry. The sheets held in under her
crossed hands reached so high that she had to raise her chin and turn
her head sideways in order to see before her.

"See, there she is," said the countess in French, stopping to look at
her.

"It is hard to say whether she is a Raphael or a Greuze," said Serge.
"This morning she had more the look of a Raphael, with a Russian
nose; it is a hybrid style of beauty, but it has a certain charm."

They continued their walk, while Mavra entered the workroom with her
pile of linen; when her hands were free, she stood trembling and
silent, as though she had been guilty of a crime.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" said one of the girls, pulling her
by the apron.

"I don't know," replied Mavra. "I feel as if I had received a blow,
and my hands keep on trembling."

"You carried too heavy a load for your strength. Sit down, and you
will see it will pass off."

And in fact it did pass away in a few minutes, but from that moment
Mavra was haunted by a pair of black eyes, whose owner little
suspected her infatuation.

Her venerat