t
dangles.... See, she's got a little hunting horn!"

"Goodness gracious! See her knife?..."

"Isn't she a Tartar!"

"How is it you didn't go head over heels?" asked the boldest of all,
addressing Natasha directly.

"Uncle" dismounted at the porch of his little wooden house which
stood in the midst of an overgrown garden and, after a glance at his
retainers, shouted authoritatively that the superfluous ones should take
themselves off and that all necessary preparations should be made to
receive the guests and the visitors.

The serfs all dispersed. "Uncle" lifted Natasha off her horse and taking
her hand led her up the rickety wooden steps of the porch. The house,
with its bare, unplastered log walls, was not overclean--it did not seem
that those living in it aimed at keeping it spotless--but neither was
it noticeably neglected. In the entry there was a smell of fresh apples,
and wolf and fox skins hung about.

"Uncle" led the visitors through the anteroom into a small hall with a
folding table and red chairs, then into the drawing room with a round
birchwood table and a sofa, and finally into his private room where
there was a tattered sofa, a worn carpet, and portraits of Suvorov, of
the host's father and mother, and of himself in military uniform. The
study smelt strongly of tobacco and dogs. "Uncle" asked his visitors
to sit down and make themselves at home, and then went out of the room.
Rugay, his back still muddy, came into the room and lay down on the
sofa, cleaning himself with his tongue and teeth. Leading from the study
was a passage in which a partition with ragged curtains could be seen.
From behind this came women's laughter and whispers. Natasha, Nicholas,
and Petya took off their wraps and sat down on the sofa. Petya, leaning
on his elbow, fell asleep at once. Natasha and Nicholas were silent.
Their faces glowed, they were hungry and very cheerful. They looked
at one another (now that the hunt was over and they were in the house,
Nicholas no longer considered it necessary to show his manly superiority
over his sister), Natasha gave him a wink, and neither refrained long
from bursting into a peal of ringing laughter even before they had a
pretext ready to account for it.

After a while "Uncle" came in, in a Cossack coat, blue trousers, and
small top boots. And Natasha felt that this costume, the very one she
had regarded with surprise and amusement at Otradnoe, was just the right
thing and not at