black-eyed three-year-old Natásha, her father’s pet, having learned from her brother that Papa was asleep and Mamma was in the sitting room, ran to her father unobserved by her mother. The dark-eyed little girl boldly opened the creaking door, went up to the sofa with energetic steps of her sturdy little legs, and having examined the position of her father, who was asleep with his back to her, rose on tiptoe and kissed the hand which lay under his head. Nikoláy turned with a tender smile on his face.
“Natásha, Natásha!” came Countess Márya’s frightened whisper from the door. “Papa wants to sleep.”
“No, Mamma, he doesn’t want to sleep,” said little Natásha with conviction. “He’s laughing.”
Nikoláy lowered his legs, rose, and took his daughter in his arms.
“Come in, Másha,” he said to his wife.
She went in and sat down by her husband.
“I did not notice him following me,” she said timidly. “I just looked in.”
Holding his little girl with one arm, Nikoláy glanced at his wife and, seeing her guilty expression, put his other arm around her and kissed her hair.
“May I kiss Mamma?” he asked Natásha.
Natásha smiled bashfully.
“Again!” she commanded, pointing with a peremptory gesture to the spot where Nikoláy had placed the kiss.
“I don’t know why you think I am cross,” said Nikoláy, replying to the question he knew was in his wife’s mind.