agitation frightened Lubov, but she lacked the courage to interrupt her
father, and she looked at his stern and gloomy face in silence.

"The road has been paved by our fathers, and you must walk on it. I have
worked for fifty years to what purpose? That my children may resume it
after I am gone. My children! Where are my children?"

The old man drooped his head mournfully, his voice broke down, and he
said sadly, as if he were speaking unto himself:

"One is a convict, utterly ruined; the other, a drunkard. I have little
hope in him. My daughter, to whom, then, shall I leave my labour before
my death? If I had but a son-in-law. I thought Foma would become a man
and would be sharpened up, then I would give you unto him, and with you
all I have--there! But Foma is good for nothing, and I see no one else
in his stead. What sort of people we have now! In former days the
people were as of iron, while now they are of india-rubber. They are all
bending now. And nothing--they have no firmness in them. What is it? Why
is it so?"

Mayakin looked at his daughter with alarm. She was silent.

"Tell me," he asked her, "what do you need? How, in your opinion, is it
proper to live? What do you want? You have studied, read, tell me what
is it that you need?"

The questions fell on Lubov's head quite unexpectedly to her, and she
was embarrassed. She was pleased that her father asked her about this
matter, and was at the same time afraid to reply, lest she should
be lowered in his estimation. And then, gathering courage, as though
preparing to jump across the table, she said irresolutely and in a
trembling voice:

"That all the people should be happy and contented; that all the people
should be equal, all the people have an equal right to life, to the
bliss of life, all must have freedom, even as they have air. And
equality in everything!"

At the beginning of her agitated speech her father looked at her face
with anxious curiosity in his eyes, but as she went on hastily hurling
her words at him his eyes assumed an altogether different expression,
and finally he said to her with calm contempt:

"I knew it before--you are a gilded fool!"

She lowered her head, but immediately raised it and exclaimed sadly:

"You have said so yourself--freedom."

"You had better hold your tongue!" the old man shouted at her rudely.
"You cannot see even that which is visibly forced outside of each man.
How can all the people be happy and equa