during those two years in spite of all sorts of unguents, rouge and powder--about two o'clock in the afternoon went out with her lap dog and her folding parasol for a stroll before dinner in her neat little German garden. With a faint rustle of her starched petticoats, she walked with tiny steps along the sandy path between two rows of erect, stiffly tied-up dahlias, when she was suddenly overtaken by our old acquaintance Kirillovna, who announced respectfully that a merchant desired to speak to her on important business. Kirillovna was still high in her mistress's favour (in reality it was she who managed Madame Kuntse's estate) and she had some time before obtained permission to wear a white cap, which gave still more acerbity to the sharp features of her swarthy face.

"A merchant?" said her mistress; "what does he want?"

"I don't know what he wants," answered Kirillovna in an insinuating voice, "only I think he wants to buy something from you."

Lizaveta Prohorovna went back into the drawing-room, sat down in her usual seat--an armchair with a canopy over it, upon which a climbing plant twined gracefully--and gave orders that the merchant should be summoned.

Naum appeared, bowed, and stood still by the door.

"I hear that you want to buy something of me," said Lizaveta Prohorovna, and thought to herself, "What a handsome man this merchant is."

"Just so, madam."

"What is it?"

"Would you be willing to sell your inn?"

"What inn?"

"Why, the one on the high road not far from here."

"But that inn is not mine, it is Akim's."

"Not yours? Why, it stands on your land."

"Yes, the land is mine ... bought in my name; but the inn is his."

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