“Enough, Nikolay Dmitrievitch!” said Marya Nikolaevna, stretching out her plump, bare arm towards the decanter.

“Let it be! Don’t insist! I’ll beat you!” he shouted.

Marya Nikolaevna smiled a sweet and good-humored smile, which was at once reflected on Nikolay’s face, and she took the bottle.

“And do you suppose she understands nothing?” said Nikolay. “She understands it all better than any of us. Isn’t it true there’s something good and sweet in her?”

“Were you never before in Moscow?” Konstantin said to her, for the sake of saying something.

“Only you mustn’t be polite and stiff with her. It frightens her. No one ever spoke to her so but the justices of the peace who tried her for trying to get out of a house of ill-fame. Mercy on us, the senselessness in the world!” he cried suddenly. “These new institutions, these justices of the peace, rural councils, what hideousness it all is!”