“Now I will enter upon my duties,” she said with a smile after a pause, as she wiped away the traces of tears. “I am going to Seryozha. Only in the last extremity shall I apply to you.” And she got up and went out.

Countess Lidia Ivanovna went into Seryozha’s part of the house, and dropping tears on the scared child’s cheeks, she told him that his father was a saint and his mother was dead.