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 her motionless eyes fixed on a corner of the carpet. Kitty glanced up at her sister, but the cold and rather stern expression of her face underwent no change.

"I am going now, and I may be confined at home, and it will be impossible for you to see me," said Darya Aleksandrovna, sitting down near her sister; "I wanted to have a little talk with you."

"What about?" asked Kitty, quickly raising her head in alarm.

"What else than about your sorrow?"

"I have no sorrow."

"That'll do, Kitty. "Do you really imagine that I don't know? I know everything; and believe me, this is such a trifle .... All of us have been through this."

Kitty said nothing, and her face resumed its severe expression.

"He is not worth the trouble that you have given yourself because of him," continued Darya Aleksandrovna, coming right to the point.

"Yes! because he jilted me!" murmured Kitty, with trembling voice. "Don't speak of it, please don't speak of it!"

"But who said that to you? No one said such a thing! I am sure that he was in love with you,—that he is still in love with you; but .... "

"Ah! nothing exasperates me so as compassion," cried Kitty, in a sudden rage. She turned around in her chair, flushed scarlet, and moved her belt-buckle back and forth from one hand to the other, clutching it in her fingers.

Dolly well knew this habit of her sister when she was provoked. She knew that she was capable of forgetting herself, and saying harsh and cruel things in moments of petulance, and she tried to calm her; but it was too late.

"What, what do you wish me to understand? what is it?" cried Kitty, talking fast:—"that I was in love with a man who did not care for me, and that I am dying of love for him? And it is my sister who says this to me!—my sister who thinks that .... that .... that .... she