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44 be, will depend on our experience, that we have not dared to ask God for such a husband for you. Do you agree, Viéra?"

"No," said Viérotchka.

"What is that you say, Viéra?" cried Pavel Konstantinuitch. The thing was so plain that even he could cry out, not asking his wife how to act.

"Have you lost your senses, you fool? Repeat that if you dare, you disobedient thing!" cried Marya Alekséyevna, doubling her fists against her daughter.

"Forgive me, mámenka," said Viéra, rising; "if you touch me, I will leave the house; if you lock me up, I will jump out of the window. I knew how you would take my refusal, and I have resolved how to act. Take a seat, and sit down, or I shall go."

Marya Alekséyevna sat down again. "What a piece of stupidity! that front door is not under lock and key; she would push away the bolt in a second; we could not ketch her. She would run away! she is crazy!"

"I shall not marry him! Without my consent, they can't marry me!"

"Viéra, you are losing your senses," said Marya Alekséyevna in a choking voice.

"How can that be? What answer can we give him to-morrow?" exclaimed her father.

"You are not to blame towards him, but I will not consent."

This scene lasted about two hours. Marya Alekséyevna was in a stew; twenty times she began to cry out, and clench her fists, but Viérotchka said: "Don't get up, or I shall leave!" They kept beating about the bush, but they could not do anything. It ended when Matrióna came in to ask whether she would put on the dinner. "The pirog [pie] was overdone."

"Think till evening, Viéra. Come to your senses, you fool!" said Marya Alekséyevna, and whispered something to Matrióna.

"Mámenka, you are going to do something to me! to take out the key from my bedroom, or something else. Don't you do it, or it will be worse!"

Marya Alekséyevna said to the cook, "No matter. What a beast she is! this Viérka! If it were not that he wanted her on account of her face, I would beat her till she bled! But now how can I touch her? She will disfigure herself, the confounded fool!"