ore breaking
through to an even cadence, in a hopeless, calm rumble, it grew in
volume, pealed forth, and melted and dissolved in the broad flourish of
humid notes--which continued to sigh with equal force and calmness,
never wearying.

At first the sounds failed to touch the mother. They were
incomprehensible to her, nothing but a ringing chaos. Her ear could
not gather a melody from the intricate mass of notes. Half asleep she
looked at Nikolay sitting with his feet crossed under him at the other
end of the long sofa, and at the severe profile of Sofya with her head
enveloped in a mass of golden hair. The sun shone into the room. A
single ray, trembling pensively, at first lighted up her hair and
shoulder, then settled upon the keys of the piano, and quivered under
the pressure of her fingers. The branches of the acacia rocked to and
fro outside the window. The room became music-filled, and unawares to
her, the mother's heart was stirred. Three notes of nearly the same
pitch, resonant as the voice of Fedya Mazin, sparkled in the stream of
sounds, like three silvery fish in a brook. At times another note
united with these in a simple song, which enfolded the heart in a kind
yet sad caress. She began to watch for them, to await their warble, and
she heard only their music, distinguished from the tumultuous chaos of
sound, to which her ears gradually became deaf.

And for some reason there rose before her out of the obscure depths of
her past, wrongs long forgotten.

Once her husband came home late, extremely intoxicated. He grasped her
hand, threw her from the bed to the floor, kicked her in the side with
his foot, and said:

"Get out! I'm sick of you! Get out!"

In order to protect herself from his blows, she quickly gathered her
two-year-old son into her arms, and kneeling covered herself with his
body as with a shield. He cried, struggled in her arms, frightened,
naked, and warm.

"Get out!" bellowed her husband.

She jumped to her feet, rushed into the kitchen, threw a jacket over
her shoulders, wrapped the baby in a shawl, and silently, without
outcries or complaints, barefoot, in nothing but a shirt under her
jacket, walked out into the street. It was in the month of May, and
the night was fresh. The cold, damp dust of the street stuck to her
feet, and got between her toes. The child wept and struggled. She
opened her breast, pressed her son to her body, and pursued by fear
walked down t