“Ah, but it is ill work to congratulate oneself only upon the past,” remarked the old man despondently. “The past is like wine which has been drunk. What good does it contain? ‘Tis like an old coat—fit only to be thrown away.”

“Yet it can remake itself,” interrupted Katerina with a forced smile, while two great tears which had formed themselves on her eyelashes hung suspended there, like diamonds. “No one can live their whole life alone. The heart of a young girl is gay—too gay even for yours to beat in full unison with it. Do you understand what I say, old man? . . . See, see! One of my tears has fallen into your cup!”

“Have you received happiness—much happiness—in return for your sorrow?” said Ordynov in a voice which trembled with emotion.

“Perhaps, sir, you have ‘much happiness’ to sell?” interposed Murin. “Why do you interrupt when you have not been spoken to?” And he glared with a bitter, insolent smile.

“Yes, I have received a little happiness in return for my sorrow,” said Katerina with a note of discontent in her tone. “What appears much to one person may appear very little to another. One person may wish always to be giving and never to receive, while another person may wish always to be receiving and never to be a giver. You at least” (this was said to Ordynov, accompanied with a look that was almost hard) “have no right to reproach me. One person may be of one kind, and another of another. Do you know any one to whom life has been wholly pleasant? . . . Old man, drink deep of your cup—drink deep! Drink to the happiness of your well-beloved—of her who has ever been your willing slave. Fill and drink.”

“Be it so! But do you also drink,” said the old man as he took the wine from her.

“As you will. But stay a moment. I would first say a word or two.”

Katerina leaned her elbows upon the table, and sought to plumb the old man’s eyes with her own. A curious air of resolve had settled upon her face. She seemed to be all on fire, and her movements were brusque and sudden. Undoubtedly a change had taken place in her mood. Her beauty, too, increased with her animation. Her lips, half-parted in a smile, revealed the whiteness of her teeth; her breath came in pants which made her nostrils dilate and contract; her temples were lightly spotted with sweat; and her hair—until now triply plaited upon the nape of her neck—had fallen, in disarray, over her left ear.