The Duel and Other Stories

ood two unknown steamers with dirty white funnels, obviously foreign cargo vessels. Some men dressed in white and wearing white shoes were walking

dyezhda Fyodorovna rem

ancied she looked very charming. She thought that in the whole town there was only one young, pretty, intellectual woman, and that was herself, and that she was the only one who knew how to dress herself cheaply, elegantly, and with taste. Tha

first place, for not sympathising with the dreams of a life of hard work, for the sake of which he had given up Petersburg and had come here to the Caucasus, and she was convinced that he had been angry with her of late for precisely that. When she was travelling to the Caucasus, it seemed that she would find here on the first day a cosy nook by the sea, a snug little garden with shade, with birds, with little brooks, where she could grow flowers and vegetables, rear ducks and hens, entertain her neighbours, doctor poor peasants and distribute

to the value of three hundred roubles at Atchmianov's shop. She had bought the things by degree

ide, but at once reflected that in Laevsky's present moo

and stifling nights, and the whole manner of living, when from morning to night one is at a loss to fill up the useless hours, and the persistent thought that she was the prettiest young woman in the town, and that her youth was passing and being wasted, and Laevsky himself, though honest and idealistic, always the same, always lounging about in his slippers, biting his nails, and wearying her with his caprices

uge hall; together with the shouts of French she heard the strains of a waltz, an

t she was jealous of him, was sorry for him, and missed him when he was away. Kirilin had turned out to be very mediocre, rather coarse though handsome; everything was broken of

f fifteen; both of them were sitting on a bench undressing. Marya Konstantinovna was a good-natured, enthusiastic, and genteel person, who talked in a drawling and pathetic voice. She had been a governess until she was thirty-two, and then ha

ing an expression which all her acquaintances called "almond-oily." "My dear

dress and chemise, and be

yezhda Fyodorovna, shrinking at the coarse touch of t

believe it? I bathed yesterday three times! Just imagine,

vna, looking at Olga and the official's wife; she glanced

s very charming!" she said.

stantinovna, with a forced la

he noticed that Olga looked scornfully at her white body. Olga, a young soldier's wife, was living with her lawful husband, and so considered herself superior to her mist

rg, summer villa life

so many friends! We ou

s an engineer?" said Mary

acquaintances. But unfortunately his mother is

hrew herself into the

a and Katya made th

onventional ideas in

"and life is not s

erness in aristocratic families and who

ed to dress for lunch as well as for dinner, so that, like an actress, I

nd Katya as though to screen her daughte

e sea they could see some one swimming a

s our Kostya

nstantinovna cackled

ted, "Come back!

ived and swam farther, but began to be exhausted and hurried back, and from his st

lmer. "Before you can turn round, he will break his neck. Ah, my dear, how sweet it i

steamers, the people on the sea-front, the town; and all this, together with the sultry heat and the soft, transparent waves, excited her and whispered that she must live, l

ladies dressed and

ternate day, and yet I

licking her lips, wh

with a smile to the bo

p, and now I believe I

s no constitutional tendency to stoutness, no diet is

matter; it

ill of joy, and had a vague memory of some big hall in which she had once danced, or of which, perhaps, she had once dreamed. And som

her gate and asked her to come i

t the same time she looked at Nadyezhda Fyodorovna with a

a Fyodorovna, accepting. "You

he reports were very good, but to make them seem even better, she complained, with a sigh, how difficult the lessons at school were now. . . . She made much of her visitor, and was sorry for her, though at the same time she was harassed by the thought that Nadyezhda Fyodo

ing, and that Von Koren had particularly begged her to say nothing about it to the "Japanese monkeys"-that is

ou will c