During the past two days things have been moving fast. Princess Mary definitely hates me. I've already been told of two or three rather biting, but nevertheless very flattering, epigrams pointed at me. It strikes her as very odd that I, who am so accustomed to good society and on such intimate terms with her Petersburg cousins and aunts, would make no effort to make her acquaintance. We see each other every day at the spring and on the boulevard, and I do my best to entice her admirers, the glittering adjutants, white-faced Muscovites and others-with almost invariable success. I have always hated entertaining, but now I have a full house every day, for dinner, supper and a game of cards, and, there we are, my champagne triumphs over the magnetism of her eyes!

Yesterday I met her at Chelakhov's shop where she was bargaining for a splendid Persian rug. The princess pleaded with her mother not to refuse to spend the money, for the rug would look so well in her room... I overbid her by forty rubles and walked away with the rug, and was rewarded with a look of the most bewitching fury. At dinner time, I deliberately had my Circassian horse led past her windows with the rug thrown over its back. Werner, who was visiting them at the time, told me that the effect of the spectacle was most dramatic. Princess Mary wants to mount a campaign against me; I have already noticed that in her presence two of the adjutants give me very curt nods, though they dine at my table every day.

Grushnitsky has assumed a mysterious air-he walks with his hands behind his back oblivious of everybody. His leg has suddenly healed, so that he scarcely limps. He found an occasion to engage the old princess in conversation and to pay a compliment to Princess Mary. The latter apparently is not too discriminating, for ever since she has been responding to his bows with the most charming smile.

"You are sure you do not wish to meet the Ligovskoys?" he asked me yesterday. .

"Positive."

"Really! It's the most pleasant house at the spa. All the best local society..."

"My dear friend, I'm frightfully fed up with non-local society, let alone the local. Have you been calling on them?"

"Not yet. I've no more than spoken with Princess Mary once or twice. You know how unpleasant it is to fish for an invitation, though it is done here... It'd be another matter if I had my epaulets."

"My dear fellow! You are far more interesting as you are. You simply do not know how to take advantage of your favorable position. Don't you know that a soldier's overcoat makes you a hero and a martyr in the eyes of any sensitive young lady?"

Grushnitsky smiled complacently.

"What nonsense!" he said.

"I am sure," I went on, "that the young princess has already fallen in love with you."

He blushed to the roots of his hair and puffed himself up.

Oh vanity! Thou art the lever with which Archimedes hoped to raise the globe!...

"You're always joking," he said, pretending to be angry. "In the first place, she hardly knows me..."

"Women love only the men they don't know."

"But I make no pretense toward pleasing her. I merely wish to get to know a pleasant household, and it would indeed be absurd to entertain any hopes whatsoever... Now you Petersburg lady killers are another matter: you only have to look once for a woman to melt... By the way, Pechorin, do you know what the young princess said about you?"

"What? Has she already spoken to you about me?"

"You have no reason to rejoice, though. Once, quite by chance, I entered into conversation with her at the spring; almost her first remark was, 'Who is that gentleman with the unpleasant, heavy-eyed expression? He was with you when...' She blushed and was reluctant to mention the day, recalling her charming little exploit. 'You need not mention the day,' I replied, 'for I will always remember it...' Pechorin, my friend, I cannot congratulate you, for you are in her bad books... It's a pity, really, because my Mary[92] is very charming!"

It must be noted that Grushnitsky is one of those who in speaking of a woman they hardly know call her "my Mary" or "my Sophie", if she has had the good fortune to attract them.

Taking on a serious face, I replied: "Yes, she is rather good-looking... Only be careful, Grushnitsky! Russian young ladies for the most part go in only for Platonic love with no intention of marriage, and Platonic love is the most disturbing. It seems to me that Princess Mary is one of those women who wish to be amused. If she is bored for two minutes in your company, you are doomed forever. Your silence must arouse her curiosity, your conversation must never completely satisfy her. You must keep her in a state of suspense all the time. Ten times she will defy public opinion for your sake and call it sacrifice, and in return she will begin to torment you and end up saying simply that she cannot tolerate you. If you don't get the advantage over her, even her first kiss will not give you the right to a second. She'll flirt with you to her heart's content and a year or two later marry an ugly man in obedience to her mother's will; then she will begin to assure you that she is unhappy, that she had loved only one man-that is, you-but that fate had not ordained that she be joined to him because he wore a soldier's overcoat, though beneath that thick gray garment there beat an ardent and noble heart... ."

Grushnitsky hit the table with his fist and began to pace up and down the room.

I shook with laughter inwardly and even smiled a couple of times, but luckily he didn't notice. He's clearly in love, for he has become more credulous than ever: he even wears a new niello-silver ring of local workmanship, which struck me as suspicious. On closer inspection what do you think I saw? The name Mary engraved in small letters on the inside and next to it the date when she picked up that famous glass. I said nothing of my discovery. I don't want to extract any confessions from him; I want him to make me his confidant by his own choice-and that's when I am going to enjoy myself...

Today I got up late, and by the time I reached the spring no one was there. It was getting hot. White fluffy clouds raced across the sky, away from the snow-capped mountains and promising a thunderstorm. Mashuk's summit was smoking like an extinguished torch, and around it gray pieces of clouds, stopped in their flight and seemingly caught in the mountain brambles, writhed and crawled like serpents. The atmosphere was charged with electricity. I took the vine-flanked avenue leading to the grotto-I felt depressed. I was thinking of the young woman with the mole on her cheek, whom the doctor had mentioned. What was she doing here? And was it she? And why'd I think it was she? Why was I so certain about it? Are there so few women with moles on their cheeks? Thinking all this over, I reached the grotto. A woman sat on a stone bench in the cool shade of its roof. She was wearing a straw hat. A black shawl was wrapped round her shoulders, and her head was lowered so that the hat concealed her face. I was about to turn back, so as not to disturb her meditations, when she looked up at me.

"Vera!" I cried out involuntarily.

She jumped and turned pale. "I knew you were here," she said. I sat down next to her and took her hands. A long-forgotten tremor shot through my veins at the sound of that sweet voice. Her deep, tranquil eyes looked straight into mine. In them I could read distress and something like a reproach.

"We have not seen each other for so long," said I.

"Yes, and we both have changed a great deal."