too. When the driver
stopped the horses, Sofya Lvovna jumped out of the sledge and,
unescorted and alone, went quickly up to the gate.

"Make haste, please!" her husband called to her. "It's late already."

She went in at the dark gateway, then by the avenue that led from
the gate to the chief church. The snow crunched under her feet, and
the ringing was just above her head, and seemed to vibrate through
her whole being. Here was the church door, then three steps down,
and an ante-room with ikons of the saints on both sides, a fragrance
of juniper and incense, another door, and a dark figure opening it
and bowing very low. The service had not yet begun. One nun was
walking by the ikon-screen and lighting the candles on the tall
standard candlesticks, another was lighting the chandelier. Here
and there, by the columns and the side chapels, there stood black,
motionless figures. "I suppose they must remain standing as they
are now till the morning," thought Sofya Lvovna, and it seemed to
her dark, cold, and dreary--drearier than a graveyard. She looked
with a feeling of dreariness at the still, motionless figures and
suddenly felt a pang at her heart. For some reason, in one short
nun, with thin shoulders and a black kerchief on her head, she
recognised Olga, though when Olga went into the nunnery she had
been plump and had looked taller. Hesitating and extremely agitated,
Sofya Lvovna went up to the nun, and looking over her shoulder into
her face, recognised her as Olga.

"Olga!" she cried, throwing up her hands, and could not speak from
emotion. "Olga!"

The nun knew her at once; she raised her eyebrows in surprise, and
her pale, freshly washed face, and even, it seemed, the white
headcloth that she wore under her wimple, beamed with pleasure.

"What a miracle from God!" she said, and she, too, threw up her
thin, pale little hands.

Sofya Lvovna hugged her and kissed her warmly, and was afraid as
she did so that she might smell of spirits.

"We were just driving past, and we thought of you," she said,
breathing hard, as though she had been running. "Dear me! How pale
you are! I . . . I'm very glad to see you. Well, tell me how are
you? Are you dull?"

Sofya Lvovna looked round at the other nuns, and went on in a subdued
voice:

"There've been so many changes at home . . . you know, I'm married
to Colonel Yagitch. You remember him, no doubt. . . . I am very
happy with him."

"Well, thank God for that. And