grave; and he never loved any other woman' : she added, raising her voice and taking off her spectacles.
'And was she of a retiring disposition?' Aratov inquired, after a short silence.
'Retiring ! to be sure she was. As a woman should be. Bold ones have sprung up nowadays.'
'And were there no bold ones in your time?'
'There were in our time too . . . to be sure there were! But who were they? A pack of strumpets, shameless hussies. Draggle-tails — for ever gadding about after no good. . . . What do they care? It's little they take to heart. If some poor fool comes in their way, they pounce on him. But sensible folk looked down on them. Did you ever see, pray, the like of such in our house?'
Aratov made no reply, and went back to his study. Platonida Ivanovna looked after him, shook her head, put on her spectacles again, and again took up her comforter . . . but more than once sank into thought, and let her knitting-needles fall on her knees.
Aratov up till very night kept telling himself, no ! no ! but with the same irritation, the same exasperation, he fell again into musing on the note, on the 'gipsy girl,' on the appointed meeting, to which he would certainly not go!
