ed, walked out, and flew down the stairs in his splendour,
cleaving the air with his expensive cane. . . .

"Home," he said to the cabman. "I am starting at five o'clock
to-morrow morning. . . . You will come; if I am asleep, you will
wake me. We are driving out of town."

II

It was a lovely August evening. The sun, set in a golden background
lightly flecked with purple, stood above the western horizon on the
point of sinking behind the far-away tumuli. In the garden, shadows
and half-shadows had vanished, and the air had grown damp, but the
golden light was still playing on the tree-tops. . . . It was warm.
. . . Rain had just fallen, and made the fresh, transparent fragrant
air still fresher.

I am not describing the August of Petersburg or Moscow, foggy,
tearful, and dark, with its cold, incredibly damp sunsets. God
forbid! I am not describing our cruel northern August. I ask the
reader to move with me to the Crimea, to one of its shores, not far
from Feodosia, the spot where stands the villa of one of our heroes.
It is a pretty, neat villa surrounded by flower-beds and clipped
bushes. A hundred paces behind it is an orchard in which its inmates
walk. . . . Groholsky pays a high rent for that villa, a thousand
roubles a year, I believe. . . . The villa is not worth that rent,
but it is pretty. . . . Tall, with delicate walls and very delicate
parapets, fragile, slender, painted a pale blue colour, hung with
curtains, _portieres_, draperies, it suggests a charming, fragile
Chinese lady. . . .

On the evening described above, Groholsky and Liza were sitting on
the verandah of this villa. Groholsky was reading _Novoye Vremya_
and drinking milk out of a green mug. A syphon of Seltzer water was
standing on the table before him. Groholsky imagined that he was
suffering from catarrh of the lungs, and by the advice of Dr.
Dmitriev consumed an immense quantity of grapes, milk, and Seltzer
water. Liza was sitting in a soft easy chair some distance from the
table. With her elbows on the parapet, and her little face propped
on her little fists, she was gazing at the villa opposite. . . .
The sun was playing upon the windows of the villa opposite, the
glittering panes reflected the dazzling light. . . . Beyond the
little garden and the few trees that surrounded the villa there was
a glimpse of the sea with its waves, its dark blue colour, its
immensity, its white masts. . . . It was so delightful! Groholsky
was reading a