Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 01.djvu/406

366 added, slapping my forehead and really killing a mosquito, "it is no good at all."

"You do not seem to love Nature," said Várenka to me, without turning her head.

"I find that it is a barren, useless occupation," I answered, quite satisfied at having said an unpleasant thing to her, and an original one at that. Várenka barely raised her brows for a moment, with an expression of pity, and just as calmly continued to gaze ahead of her.

I was vexed at her, and yet, the gray, faded railing of the bridge against which she leaned, the reflection of the pendent branch of the overhanging birch in the dusky pond, striving to unite with the drooping branches above, the swampy odour, the feeling of a crushed mosquito on my forehead, and her attentive gaze and majestic attitude frequently afterward appeared suddenly in my imagination.