Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 01.djvu/80

52 say, "We ought to ask Natálya Sávishna," and, indeed, after rummaging awhile, she would find the necessary article and declare, "Luckily I have put it away." In these coffers there were thousands of such articles of which nobody in the house knew anything, and for which no one cared, except she.

Once I was angry with her. It happened like this. At dinner, as I was pouring out a glass of kvas, I dropped the bottle and spoiled the table-cloth.

"Call Natálya Sávishna to see what her darling child has done," said mamma.

Natálya Sávishna entered, and, seeing the puddle which I had made, shook her head; then mamma said something in her ear, and she went out threatening me with her finger.

After dinner I went into the parlour, leaping about in the happiest frame of mind, when suddenly Natálya Sávishna jumped from behind the door, with the table-cloth in her hands, caught me, and began to wipe my face with the wet part of it, all the time saying: "Don't soil table-cloths, don't soil table-cloths!" That so incensed me, that I bawled from anger.

"What!" said I to myself, as I walked about the parlour and choked with tears, "Natálya Sávishna, simple Natálya, says 'thou' to me, and strikes my face with a wet table-cloth, as if I were a common village boy. No, that is terrible!"

When Natálya Sávishna saw that I was blubbering, she ran away, but I continued to strut about and to consider how to repay insolent Natálya for the insult which she had offered me.

A few minutes later Natálya Sávishna returned, timidly accosted me, and began to console me.

"Do stop, my dear one, stop weeping — forgive me, foolish woman — I have done wrong — you will forgive me, my darling — here is something for you."