of her dress close to her bony little chest, ran after Natásha down the passage into the sitting room with flushed face and light, joyous steps. At the visitors’ request the young people sang the quartet, “The Brook,” with which everyone was delighted. Then Nikoláy sang a song he had just learned:
At nighttime in the moon’s fair glow How sweet, as fancies wander free, To feel that in this world there’s one Who still is thinking but of thee!
That while her fingers touch the harp Wafting sweet music o’er the lea, It is for thee thus swells her heart, Sighing its message out to thee. …
A day or two, then bliss unspoilt, But oh! till then I cannot live! …
He had not finished the last verse before the young people began to get ready to dance