“Here comes Oustúshka running; we must ask her what she has seen,” said she.
Anna Fyódorovna told her to call Oustúshka.
“It’s not in you to keep at your work; you must needs run off to see the soldiers,” said Anna Fyódorovna. “Well, where have the officers been put up?”
“In Erómkin’s house, mistress. There are two of them, such handsome ones. One’s a Count, they say!”
“And what’s his name?”
“Kazárof or Tourbínof. I beg your pardon—I forget.”
“There’s a fool; can’t even tell us anything. You might at least have found out the name.”
“Well, I’ll run back.”
“Yes, I know, you’re first-rate at that sort of thing. … No, let Daniel go. Tell him, brother, to go and to ask whether the officers want anything. One ought, after all, to show them some politeness; say the mistress sent to inquire.”
The old people returned to the tearoom, and Lisa went into the servants’ room to put away into a box the sugar they had broken up. Oustúshka was there telling about the hussars.
“Darling miss, what a beauty that Count is!” she said; “a regular cherubim with black eyebrows. There now, if you had a bridegroom like that, you would be a couple of the right sort.”
The other maids smiled approvingly; the old nurse, who sat knitting at a window, sighed, and even whispered a prayer, drawing in her breath.