Marianna turned away, and again walked along the path.
'You had such a long conversation with her', she uttered thickly.
'I hardly said a single word,' answered Nezhdanov; she was talking all the while alone.'
Marianna walked on in silence; but at this point the path turned aside, the pines, as it were, made way, and a small lawn stretched before them, with a hollow weeping birch in the middle and a round seat encircling the trunk of the old tree. Marianna sat down on this seat; Nezhdanov placed himself beside her; the long hanging branches, covered with tiny green leaves, swayed above both their heads. Around them lilies-of-the-valley peeped out white in the fine grass, and from the whole clearing rose the fresh scent of the young herbage, sweetly refreshing after the oppressive resinous odour of the pines.
'You want to come with me to look at the school here,' began Marianna. 'Well, then, let us go.. . . Only . . . I don't know. It will not be much pleasure to you. You've heard─our principal teacher is the deacon. He's a good-natured man, but you can't imagine what he talks about to his pupils! There is one boy among them. . . . His name is Garasei. He's an orphan,
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