My first romantic love

ark copper-coloured face, surly little pig’s eyes, and such deep furrows on his forehead and temples as I had never beheld in my life. He was carrying a pl

’ I inquired. ‘Vonifaty!’ a jarrin

he extremely threadbare hindpart of his livery with a solitary reddish

n. The man muttered something in reply. ‘Eh… . Has some one come?’ I

g his appearance once more, and picking up the plate from the

rriedly set down where it stood. At the window in an easy-chair with a broken arm was sitting a woman of fifty, barehea

to her a

of addressing the

e the son of Mr. V.?’ ‘Yes. I have come

ifaty, where are my ke

. She heard me out, drumming with her fat red fingers on the wi

he observed at last. ‘But how young

lied, with an in

papers covered with writing, raised them right

und restlessly on her chair. ‘And do you, pray, m

g her unprepossessing person wit

way stood the girl I had seen the previous evening in the garde

ting her with her elbow. ‘Zinotchka, the son of our

up, and stuttering in my excit

rovi

se name was Vladimir Petrovitch too. Vonifaty! d

the same smile, faintly fluttering her eyeli

The silvery note of her voice ran through me with a

ase,’ I

hat?’ asked

ess did not ans

st now?’ she said, not taki

Come in here, to me.’ She nodded to me and

. Though, indeed, at the moment, I was scarcely capable of noticing anything; I moved as in a

arefully untied the skein and laid it across my hands. All this she did in silence with a sort of dro

could not help dropping my eyes. When her eyes, which were generally half closed, opened to the

ieu Voldemar?’ she asked after a brief p

t nothing … how can I?…

You, I have just heard, are sixteen, and I am twenty-one: you see I’m a great deal older than you, and so you o

smile of approbation. ‘Look at me,’ she said, dropping her voice caressingly: ‘I don’t dislike that

… ’ I was

a bad habit for children’ – (she corrected herself) ‘for young people – not to say straig

o show her that she had not a mere boy to deal with, and assuming as easy and serious an air as I cou

eliberately. ‘Have you a

d a tutor for a

e I had parted with my Frenchman. ‘Oh

Hold your hands straight!’ And she appl

at first stealthily, then more and more boldly. Her face struck me as even

o me! It seemed to me I had known her a long while and had never known anything nor lived at all till I met her… . She was wearing a dark and rather shabby dress and an apron; I would gladly, I felt, have kissed every fold of that dress and apron. The tips of her little shoes peeped out from under her skirt;

nd I could have stayed in that room

d once more her clear eyes shone k

said slowly, and she hel

es all,’ flashed through my mind. ‘And how

– the clink of a sabre. ‘Zina!’ screamed the

you a

from her chair impetuously, she flung th

the room, a tabby kitten was lying with outstretched paws; Zinaïda was on her knees before it, cautiously lifting up its little face. Near the old prin

d its eyes are not grey, but green, and what long ea

ng men I had seen the evening before, smiled an

in of h

to possess a tabby kitten with long ears … so I o

iffing the ground. ‘It’s hungry!’ cried Z

r neck, came in with a saucer of milk and set it before t

inaïda, putting her head almost on the ground

ough began to purr and m

ing to the maid said car

, with a simper and a shrug of his strongly-built fr

t her hands to him. While he was kissing

hing, or to be silent. Suddenly through the open door into the passage I caught sigh

you want?

d in a whisper. ‘She is angry that yo

en here long?’

and going back to the drawing- room I be

oung princess asked, glancing

added, addressing the old lady, ‘t

ay so, my

ok snuff so loudly that I positively jumped. ‘Do you s

hat sensation of awkwardness in my spine which a very youn

in, M’sieu Voldemar,’ Zinaïda

e with an air of disapprobation. My mother scolded me and wondered what ever I could have been doing so long at the princess’s. I