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RUDIN Darya Mihailovna. ‘What a genius you have for defining a man! But Pigasov certainly would not have even understood you. He loves nothing but his own individuality.’

‘And he finds fault with that so as to have the right to find fault with others,’ Rudin put in.

Darya Mihailovna laughed.

‘“He judges the sound,” as the saying is, “the sound by the sick.” By the way, what do you think of the baron?’

‘The baron? He is an excellent man, with a good heart and a knowledge but he has no character  and he will remain all his life half a savant, half a man of the world, that is to say, a dilettante, that is to say, to speak plainly,—neither one thing nor the other. But it’s a pity!’

‘That was my own idea,’ observed Darya Mihailovna. ‘I read his article. Entre nous cela a assez peu de fond!’

‘Who else have you here?’ asked Rudin, after a pause.

Darya Mihailovna knocked off the ash of her cigarette with her little finger.

‘Oh, there is hardly any one more. Madame 72