Page:Leo Tolstoy - Father Sergius and Other Stories and Plays - ed. Charles Theodore Hagberg Wright (1911).djvu/75

 Rh laugh; then, knowing that he would hear, and would be moved by it, just as she wanted him to be, she laughed louder. The kind, cheerful, natural laughter did indeed affect him just as she had wished.

"I could love a man like that—such eyes, and his simple, noble face, passionate in spite of all the prayers it mutters! There's no fooling us women in that. The instant he put his face against the window-pane and saw me, he knew me and understood me. The glimmer of it was in his eyes and a seal was set upon it for ever. That instant he began to love me and to want me. Yes, he wants me," she said, finally getting off her shoe and fumbling at her stocking.

To remove those long stockings fastened with elastic she had to raise her skirts. She felt embarrassed and said, "Don't come in." But there was no answer from the other side, and she heard the same monotonous murmurs and movements.

"I suppose he's bowing down to the ground," she thought. "But that won't help him. He's thinking about me just as I'm thinking about him. He's thinking about these very feet of mine," she said, taking off the wet stockings and sitting up on the couch barefooted, with her hands clasped about her knees. She sat awhile like this, gazing pensively before her.