“No; tell me, mamma, what do you think?”

“Why, what is one to think? He” (he meant Sergey Ivanovitch) “might at any time have been a match for anyone in Russia; now, of course, he’s not quite a young man, still I know ever so many girls would be glad to marry him even now.... She’s a very nice girl, but he might...”

“Oh, no, mamma, do understand why, for him and for her too, nothing better could be imagined. In the first place, she’s charming!” said Kitty, crooking one of her fingers.

“He thinks her very attractive, that’s certain,” assented Dolly.

“Then he occupies such a position in society that he has no need to look for either fortune or position in his wife. All he needs is a good, sweet wife—�a