XII.
VIÉROTCHKA'S FIRST DREAM.
And Viérotchka dreamed a dream.
She dreamed that she was locked up in a damp, gloomy cellar, and suddenly the door opened, and Viérotchka found herself in a field. She was running, frolicking, and she thinks: "How is it that I did not die in the cellar? It is because I had never seen the fields before! Had I seen them, I must have died in the cellar." And again she seemed to be running and frolicking. Then she dreamed that she was paralyzed, and she said to herself: "How is it that I have the paralysis? Old men, old women, have the paralysis, but young girls never have it!"
"Oh, yes, they do, very often," an unknown voice seemed to reply, "and very soon you will be well. Let me only touch your hand; you see you are well already; now get up!"
"Who was it that spoke? How relieved I am! All the pain has gone!"
And Viérotchka got up and began to walk, to run, and again she is in the field; again she is running and frolicking, and she thinks: "How could I have endured the paralysis? It was because I was born with paralysis and did not know how to walk and to run! Had I known, I could not have endured it."
And still she keeps on running and frolicking. And here comes a young girl across the field. How strange! her face and her gait, everything about her, keeps changing, changing constantly. Now she is English, French, now she is already German, Polish, and now she has become Russian, again English, again German, again Russian; and how is it that she has only the one face? An English girl does not look like a French girl, a German girl does not look like a Russian; but her face keeps changing, and yet it is the very same face. What a strange person! And the expression of her face is constantly changing: how gentle she is, how angry; now she is melancholy, now she is gay. She is always changing, and she is always kind; how is that? even when she is angry is she always kind? But only see what a beauty she is! no matter how her face changes, with every change
