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By Root 2332 0

a look that he felt ashamed of his insipid, empty talk. At times she seemed so weary of the daily senseless rushing about and chatter that Stolz had suddenly to discuss some subject which he seldom and reluctantly discussed with women. How much mental resourcefulness and thought he had to spend so that Olga’s deep questioning eyes should grow bright and calm and should not seek for some answer from someone else. How upset he was when, as a result of a careless explanation, her look became dry and stern, her eyebrows contracted, and a shadow of silent but profound dissatisfaction fell over her face. And he had to spend the next two or three days in applying all the subtlety and even cunning of which he was capable, all his fervour and skill in dealing with women, in order to call forth, little by little and not without difficulty, a glimmer of serenity on her face and the gentleness of reconciliation in her eyes and her smile. Sometimes he returned home in the evening worn out by this struggle, and he was happy when he emerged from it victorious.

‘Dear me, how mature she has grown! How this little girl has developed! Who was her teacher? Where did she take her lessons in life? From the baron? But he is so smooth you can learn nothing from his exquisitely turned phrases! Not from Ilya, surely?’

He could not understand Olga, and he ran to her again the next day; but this time he read her expression cautiously and with fear; he often felt baffled, and it was only his intelligence and knowledge of life that helped him to deal with the questions, doubts, demands, and everything else he divined in Olga’s features. With the torch of experience in his hands, he ventured into the labyrinth of her mind and character, and each day he discovered new facts and new traits, but was still far from fathoming her, merely watching with amazement and alarm how her mind demanded its daily sustenance and how her soul never ceased asking for life and experience. Every day the life and activity of another person attached itself to Stolz’s life and activity. Having surrounded Olga with flowers, books, music, and albums, Stolz stopped worrying in the belief that he had provided plenty of occupation for his friend’s leisure hours, and he went to work, or to inspect some mine or some model farm, or into society to meet and exchange views with new or remarkable men; then he returned to her tired out, to sit by her piano and rest at the sound of her voice. And suddenly he found in her face new questions and in her eyes an insistent demand for an answer. Gradually, imperceptibly and involuntarily, he laid before her what he had seen that day and why. Sometimes she expressed a wish to see and learn for herself what he had seen and learnt. And he went over his work again: went with her to inspect a building or some place, or an engine, or to read some historical event inscribed on stones or walls. Gradually and imperceptibly he acquired the habit of thinking and feeling aloud in her presence; and one day he suddenly discovered, after subjecting himself to a stern self-examination, that he had someone to share his life with him, and that this had started on the day he met Olga. Almost unconsciously, as though talking to himself, he began to estimate aloud in her presence the value of some treasure he had acquired, and was amazed at himself and her; then he checked up carefully to see whether there was still a question left in her eyes, whether the gleam of satisfied thought was reflected in her face, and whether her eyes followed him as a conqueror. If that was so, he went home with pride, with tremulous emotion, and for hours at night he prepared himself for the next day. The most tedious and indispensable work did not seem dry to him, but merely indispensable: it entered deeper into the very foundation and texture of his life; thoughts, observations, and events were not put away negligently and in silence into the archives of memory, but lent a brilliant colour to every day that passed. What a warm glow spread over Olga’s pale face when, without waiting