ut plainly enough which way
she intended to make her decision!

The incredulous amazement with which all regarded the prince did not
last long, for Nastasia herself appeared at the door and passed in,
pushing by the prince again.

"At last I've stormed the citadel! Why do you tie up your bell?" she
said, merrily, as she pressed Gania's hand, the latter having rushed
up to her as soon as she made her appearance. "What are you looking so
upset about? Introduce me, please!"

The bewildered Gania introduced her first to Varia, and both women,
before shaking hands, exchanged looks of strange import. Nastasia,
however, smiled amiably; but Varia did not try to look amiable, and kept
her gloomy expression. She did not even vouchsafe the usual courteous
smile of etiquette. Gania darted a terrible glance of wrath at her
for this, but Nina Alexandrovna, mended matters a little when Gania
introduced her at last. Hardly, however, had the old lady begun about
her "highly gratified feelings," and so on, when Nastasia left her, and
flounced into a chair by Gania's side in the corner by the window, and
cried: "Where's your study? and where are the--the lodgers? You do take
in lodgers, don't you?"

Gania looked dreadfully put out, and tried to say something in reply,
but Nastasia interrupted him:

"Why, where are you going to squeeze lodgers in here? Don't you use
a study? Does this sort of thing pay?" she added, turning to Nina
Alexandrovna.

"Well, it is troublesome, rather," said the latter; "but I suppose it
will 'pay' pretty well. We have only just begun, however--"

Again Nastasia Philipovna did not hear the sentence out. She glanced at
Gania, and cried, laughing, "What a face! My goodness, what a face you
have on at this moment!"

Indeed, Gania did not look in the least like himself. His bewilderment
and his alarmed perplexity passed off, however, and his lips now
twitched with rage as he continued to stare evilly at his laughing
guest, while his countenance became absolutely livid.

There was another witness, who, though standing at the door motionless
and bewildered himself, still managed to remark Gania's death-like
pallor, and the dreadful change that had come over his face. This
witness was the prince, who now advanced in alarm and muttered to Gania:

"Drink some water, and don't look like that!"

It was clear that he came out with these words quite spontaneously, on
the spur of the moment. But his speech was pr