as when she had left him; he
was still further from the four-year-old baby, more grown and
thinner. How thin his face was, how short his hair was! What
long hands! How he had changed since she left him! But it was
he with his head, his lips, his soft neck and broad little
shoulders.

"Seryozha!" she repeated just in the child's ear.

He raised himself again on his elbow, turned his tangled head
from side to side as though looking for something, and opened his
eyes. Slowly and inquiringly he looked for several seconds at
his mother standing motionless before him, then all at once he
smiled a blissful smile, and shutting his eyes, rolled not
backwards but towards her into her arms.

"Seryozha! my darling boy!" she said, breathing hard and putting
her arms round his plump little body. "Mother!" he said,
wriggling about in her arms so as to touch her hands with
different parts of him.

Smiling sleepily still with closed eyes, he flung fat little arms
round her shoulders, rolled towards her, with the delicious
sleepy warmth and fragrance that is only found in children, and
began rubbing his face against her neck and shoulders.

"I know," he said, opening his eyes; "it's my birthday today. I
knew you'd come. I'll get up directly."

And saying that he dropped asleep.

Anna looked at him hungrily; she saw how he had grown and changed
in her absence. She knew, and did not know, the bare legs so
long now, that were thrust out below the quilt, those
short-cropped curls on his neck in which she had so often kissed
him. She touched all this and could say nothing; tears choked
her.

"What are you crying for, mother?" he said, waking completely up.
"Mother, what are you crying for?" he cried in a tearful voice.

"I won't cry...I'm crying for joy. It's so long since I've seen
you. I won't, I won't," she said, gulping down her tears and
turning away. "Come, it's time for you to dress now," she added,
after a pause, and, never letting go his hands, she sat down by
his bedside on the chair, where his clothes were put ready for
him.

"How do you dress without me? How..." she tried to begin talking
simply and cheerfully, but she could not, and again she turned
away.

"I don't have a cold bath, papa didn't order it. And you've not
seen Vassily Lukitch? He'll come in soon. Why, you're sitting
on my clothes!"

And Seryozha went off into a peal of laughter. She looked at him
and smiled.

"Mother, darling,