ng on?"

Merik bent down to Lyubka and whispered something in her ear; she
looked towards the door and laughed through her tears.

"He is asleep, the puffed-up devil . . ." she said.

Merik embraced her, kissed her vigorously, and went out. Yergunov
thrust his revolver into his pocket, jumped up, and ran after him.

"Get out of the way!" he said to Lyubka, who hurriedly bolted the
door of the entry and stood across the threshold. "Let me pass! Why
are you standing here?"

"What do you want to go out for?"

"To have a look at my horse."

Lyubka gazed up at him with a sly and caressing look.

"Why look at it? You had better look at me . . . ." she said, then
she bent down and touched with her finger the gilt watch-key that
hung on his chain.

"Let me pass, or he will go off on my horse," said Yergunov. "Let
me go, you devil!" he shouted, and giving her an angry blow on the
shoulder, he pressed his chest against her with all his might to
push her away from the door, but she kept tight hold of the bolt,
and was like iron.

"Let me go!" he shouted, exhausted; "he will go off with it, I tell
you."

"Why should he? He won't." Breathing hard and rubbing her shoulder,
which hurt, she looked up at him again, flushed a little and laughed.
"Don't go away, dear heart," she said; "I am dull alone."

Yergunov looked into her eyes, hesitated, and put his arms round
her; she did not resist.

"Come, no nonsense; let me go," he begged her. She did not speak.

"I heard you just now," he said, "telling Merik that you love him.

"I dare say. . . . My heart knows who it is I love."

She put her finger on the key again, and said softly: "Give me
that."

Yergunov unfastened the key and gave it to her. She suddenly craned
her neck and listened with a grave face, and her expression struck
Yergunov as cold and cunning; he thought of his horse, and now
easily pushed her aside and ran out into the yard. In the shed a
sleepy pig was grunting with lazy regularity and a cow was knocking
her horn. Yergunov lighted a match and saw the pig, and the cow,
and the dogs, which rushed at him on all sides at seeing the light,
but there was no trace of the horse. Shouting and waving his arms
at the dogs, stumbling over the drifts and sticking in the snow,
he ran out at the gate and fell to gazing into the darkness. He
strained his eyes to the utmost, and saw only the snow flying and
the snowflakes distinctly forming into all sorts of shape