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RUDIN

Natalya looked down and repeated:

‘You shall never hear his name from me.’

‘Well, well,’ answered Darya Mihailovna with a smile, ‘I believe you. But the day before yesterday, do you remember how—There, we will pass that over. It is all over and buried and forgotten. Isn’t it? Come, I know you again now; but I was altogether puzzled then. There, kiss me like a sensible girl!’

Natalya lifted Darya Mihailovna’s hand to her lips, and Darya Mihailovna kissed her stooping head.

‘Always listen to my advice. Do not forget that you are a Lasunsky and my daughter,’ she added, ‘and you will be happy. And now you may go.’

Natalya went away in silence. Darya Mihailovna looked after her and thought: ‘She is like me—she too will let herself be carried away by her feelings; mais ella aura moins d’abandon.’ And Darya Mihailovna fell to musing over memories of the past . . . of the distant past.

Then she summoned Mlle. Boncourt and remained a long while closeted with her.

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