nd I'll fall. Go away!"

"Why are you so shy?" the mother said pensively. "You'd better embrace
and kiss. Press hard, hard!"

"Do you want to?" asked Pavel softly.

"We--ell, why not?" answered the Little Russian, rising.

Pavel dropped on his knees, and grasping each other firmly, they sank
for a moment into each other's embrace--two bodies and one soul
passionately and evenly burning with a profound feeling of friendship.

Tears ran down the mother's face, but this time they were easy tears.
Drying them she said in embarrassment:

"A woman likes to cry. She cries when she is in sorrow, she cries when
she is in joy!"

The Little Russian pushed Pavel away, and with a light movement, also
wiping his eyes with his fingers, he said:

"Enough! When the calves have had their frolic, they must go to the
shambles. What beastly coal this is! I blew and blew on it, and got
some of the dust in my eyes."

Pavel sat at the window with bent head, and said mildly:

"You needn't be ashamed of such tears."

The mother walked up to him, and sat down beside him. Her heart was
wrapped in a soft, warm, daring feeling. She felt sad, but pleasant
and at ease.

"It's all the same!" she thought, stroking her son's hand. "It can't
be helped; it must be so!"

She recalled other such commonplace words, to which she had been
accustomed for a long time; but they did not give adequate expression
to all she had lived through that moment.

"I'll put the dishes on the table; you stay where you are, mother,"
said the Little Russian, rising from the floor, and going into the
room. "Rest a while. Your heart has been worn out with such blows!"

And from the room his singing voice, raised to a higher pitch, was
heard.

"It's not a nice thing to boast of, yet I must say we tasted the right
life just now, real, human, loving life. It does us good."

"Yes," said Pavel, looking at the mother.

"It's all different now," she returned. "The sorrow is different, and
the joy is different. I do not know anything, of course! I do not
understand what it is I live by--and I can't express my feelings in
words!"

"This is the way it ought to be!" said the Little Russian, returning.
"Because, mark you, mother dear, a new heart is coming into existence,
a new heart is growing up in life. All hearts are smitten in the
conflict of interests, all are consumed with a blind greed, eaten up
with envy, stricken, wounded, and dripping with