Here the lady could not follow at all. She did not understand what he meant by a “two-men family” nor “charitableness.” She only heard sounds and observed the nankeen buttons on the steward’s coat. The top one, which he probably did not button up so often, was fixed on tightly; the middle one was hanging by a thread, and ought long ago to have been sewn on. But it is a well-known fact that in a conversation, especially a business conversation, it is not at all necessary to understand what is being said to you, but only to remember what you yourself want to say. The lady acted accordingly.

“How is it you won’t understand, Egór Miháylovitch?” she said. “I have not the least desire that a Doútlof should go as a soldier. One would think that, knowing me as you do, you might credit me with the wish to do everything in my power to help my serfs, and that I don’t desire their misfortune, and that I would sacrifice all I possess to escape from this sad necessity and to send neither Doútlof nor Polikoúshka.” (I don’t know whether it occurred to the steward that to escape the sad necessity there was no need to sacrifice everything⁠—that, in fact, three hundred roubles would be sufficient; but this thought might easily have occurred to him.)