nto a sweet, mincing, even coquettish
smile, asked:

"Your Excellency, and would it be possible for my husband to get a
post again?"

"I am going . . . I am ill . . ." said Kistunov in a weary voice.
"I have dreadful palpitations."

When he had driven home Alexey Nikolaitch sent Nikita for some
laurel drops, and, after taking twenty drops each, all the clerks
set to work, while Madame Shtchukin stayed another two hours in the
vestibule, talking to the porter and waiting for Kistunov to
return. . . .

She came again next day.

AN ENIGMATIC NATURE

ON the red velvet seat of a first-class railway carriage a pretty
lady sits half reclining. An expensive fluffy fan trembles in her
tightly closed fingers, a pince-nez keeps dropping off her pretty
little nose, the brooch heaves and falls on her bosom, like a boat
on the ocean. She is greatly agitated.

On the seat opposite sits the Provincial Secretary of Special
Commissions, a budding young author, who from time to time publishes
long stories of high life, or "Novelli" as he calls them, in the
leading paper of the province. He is gazing into her face, gazing
intently, with the eyes of a connoisseur. He is watching, studying,
catching every shade of this exceptional, enigmatic nature. He
understands it, he fathoms it. Her soul, her whole psychology lies
open before him.

"Oh, I understand, I understand you to your inmost depths!" says
the Secretary of Special Commissions, kissing her hand near the
bracelet. "Your sensitive, responsive soul is seeking to escape
from the maze of ---- Yes, the struggle is terrific, titanic. But
do not lose heart, you will be triumphant! Yes!"

"Write about me, Voldemar!" says the pretty lady, with a mournful
smile. "My life has been so full, so varied, so chequered. Above
all, I am unhappy. I am a suffering soul in some page of Dostoevsky.
Reveal my soul to the world, Voldemar. Reveal that hapless soul.
You are a psychologist. We have not been in the train an hour
together, and you have already fathomed my heart."

"Tell me! I beseech you, tell me!"

"Listen. My father was a poor clerk in the Service. He had a good
heart and was not without intelligence; but the spirit of the age
--of his environment--_vous comprenez?_--I do not blame my
poor father. He drank, gambled, took bribes. My mother--but why
say more? Poverty, the struggle for daily bread, the consciousness
of insignificance--ah, do not force me to recall it! I had to