"Let's have a regular picnic to-day, Marya Alekséyevna. I want to drink away my quarrel with those parents. Why shouldn't we have a picnic, Marya Alekséyevna? I get along first rate with my sweetheart. Shan't we live well, shan't we live happily, Marya Alekséyevna?"
"Yes indeed, bátiushka Dmitri Sergéitch. That's the reason [to-to]; I see that you are so flush with your money, which I never expected of you because you are a man of solid understanding. Evidently you must have had a little advance from your bride's dowry, ain't that so?"
"No, Marya Alekséyevna; but as long as I have money in my pocket, we may as well picnic. What do you mean by the little advance on the dowry? You have to do business in a straightforward way else suspicions'll be aroused. Besides, it is not high-toned, Marya Alekséyevna."
"It ain't high-toned, Dmitri Sergéitch, that's a fact; it ain't high-toned. Accordin' to my idee, one must be high-toned in everything."
"You are right, Marya Alekséyevna."
The half or three-quarters of an hour remaining before dinner time passed in the most amiable conversation of this sort, touching on all sorts of noble sentiments. Dmitri Sergéitch, among other things, declared in a transport of confidence that his marriage would soon take place.
"And how is it about Viéra Pavlovna's marriage?"
Marya Alekséyevna is not able to answer because she is not bringing any pressure upon her daughter. Of course not, but in his opinion Viéra Pavlovna will soon make up her mind to marry; to be sure, she had not told him anything, but he had eyes of his own. "You and I, Marya Alekséyevna, are old sparrows, you know; and we can't be caught with chaff. Though my years aren't so very many, still I'm an old sparrow, a tough roll [kalatch]. Isn't that so, Marya Alekséyevna?"
"Yes, that's so, bátiushka, a tough roll, a tough roll!"
In a word, this pleasant, confidential conversation with Marya Alekséyevna had so enlivened Dmitri Sergéitch that he forgot all about his melancholy. He was livelier than Marya Alekséyevna had ever seen him before. ("What a cute rogue he is! a clever rascal [shelma]! He must have got out of his sweetheart [bride] more than one thousand; and prob'ly her folks found out how he was stuffin' his pockets, and when they went for him, I reckon he tol' 'em:—'No,
