itself. He had received five marks-the maximum! The next day, he sped on
his way with the same good wishes and the same anxiety for his success,
and was welcomed home with the same eagerness and joy.
This lasted for nine days. On the tenth day there was to be the last and
most difficult examination of all--the one in divinity.
We all stood at the window, and watched for him with greater impatience
than ever. Two o'clock, and yet no Woloda.
'Here they come, Papa! Here they come!' suddenly screamed Lubotshka as
she peered through the window.
Sure enough the phaeton was driving up with St. Jerome and Woloda--the
latter no longer in his grey cap and blue frockcoat, but in the uniform
of a student of the University, with its embroidered blue collar,
three-cornered hat, and gilded sword.
'Ah! If only SHE had been alive now!' exclaimed Grandmamma on seeing
Woloda in this dress, and swooned away.
Woloda enters the anteroom with a beaming face, and embraces myself,
Lubotshka, Mimi, and Katenka--the latter blushing to her ears. He hardly
knows himself for joy. And how smart he looks in that uniform! How well
the blue collar suits his budding, dark moustache! What a tall, elegant
figure is his, and what a distinguished walk!
On that memorable day we all lunched together in Grandmamma's room.
Every face expressed delight, and with the dessert which followed the
meal the servants, with grave but gratified faces, brought in bottles of
champagne.
Grandmamma, for the first time since Mamma's death, drank a full glass
of the wine to Woloda's health, and wept for joy as she looked at him.
Henceforth Woloda drove his own turn-out, invited his own friends,
smoked, and went to balls. On one occasion, I even saw him sharing a
couple of bottles of champagne with some guests in his room, and the
whole company drinking a toast, with each glass, to some mysterious
being, and then quarrelling as to who should have the bottom of the
bottle!
Nevertheless he always lunched at home, and after the meal would stretch
himself on a sofa and talk confidentially to Katenka: yet from what I
overheard (while pretending, of course, to pay no attention) I gathered
that they were only talking of the heroes and heroines of novels which
they had read, or else of jealousy and love, and so on. Never could I
understand what they found so attractive in these conversations, nor why
they smiled so happily and discussed things with such animation.
Altogether I could see that, in addition to the friendship natural to
persons who had been companions from childhood, there existed between
Woloda and Katenka a relation which differentiated them from us, and
united them mysteriously to one another.
XXI. KATENKA AND LUBOTSHKA
Katenka was now sixteen years old--quite a grown-up girl; and although
at that age the angular figures, the bashfulness, and the gaucherie
peculiar to girls passing from childhood to youth usually replace the
comely freshness and graceful, half-developed bloom of childhood, she
had in no way altered. Still the blue eyes with their merry glance were
hers, the well-shaped nose with firm nostrils and almost forming a line
with the forehead, the little mouth with its charming smile, the dimples
in the rosy cheeks, and the small white hands. To her, the epithet of
'girl,' pure and simple, was pre-eminently applicable, for in her the
only new features were a new and 'young-lady-like' arrangement of her
thick flaxen hair and a youthful bosom--the latter an addition which at
once caused her great joy and made her very bashful.
Although Lubotshka and she had grown up together and received the same
