in her of late: she became so depressed, she would remain silent
for hours at a time; you couldn't get a word out of her. I once asked
her: 'Has any one offended you, Katerina Semyonovna?' Because I knew her
disposition: she could not endure an insult. She held her peace, and
that was the end of it! Even her success on the stage did not cheer her
up; they would shower her with bouquets ... and she would not smile! She
gave one glance at the gold inkstand,--and put it aside!--She complained
that no one would write her a genuine part, as she conceived it. And she
gave up singing entirely. I am to blame, brother!... I repeated to her
that thou didst not think she had any _school_. But nevertheless ... why
she poisoned herself is incomprehensible! And the way she did it
too...."

"In what part did she have the greatest success?".... Aratoff wanted to
find out what part she had played that last time, but for some reason or
other he asked something else.

"In Ostrovsky's' Grunya'[62] I believe. But I repeat to thee: she had no
love-affairs! Judge for thyself by one thing: she lived in her mother's
house.... Thou knowest what some of those merchants' houses are like; a
glass case filled with holy images in every corner and a shrine lamp in
front of the case; deadly, stifling heat; a sour odour; in the
drawing-room nothing but chairs ranged along the wall, and geraniums in
the windows;--and when a visitor arrives, the hostess begins to groan as
though an enemy were approaching. What chance is there for love-making,
and amours in such a place? Sometimes it happened that they would not
even admit me. Their maid-servant, a robust peasant-woman, in a Turkey
red cotton sarafan,[63] and pendulous breasts, would place herself
across the path in the anteroom and roar: 'Whither away?' No, I
positively cannot understand what made her poison herself. She must have
grown tired of life," Kupfer philosophically wound up his remarks.

Aratoff sat with drooping head.--"Canst thou give me the address of
that house in Kazan?" he said at last.

"I can; but what dost thou want of it?--Dost thou wish to send a letter
thither?"

"Perhaps so."

"Well, as thou wilt. Only the old woman will not answer thee. Her sister
might ... the clever sister!--But again, brother, I marvel at thee! Such
indifference formerly ... and now so much attention! All that comes of
living a solitary life, my dear fellow!"

Aratoff made no reply to this remark and we