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RUDIN Konstantin Diomiditch, bowing affably in all directions, and running his plump white hand with its triangular cut nails through his faultlessly arranged hair.

‘And is Volintsev coming too?’

‘Yes.’

‘So, according to you, African Semenitch,’ continued Darya Mihailovna, turning to Pigasov, ‘all young ladies are affected?’

Pigasov’s mouth twitched, and he plucked nervously at his elbow.

‘I say,’ he began in a measured voice—in his most violent moods of exasperation he always spoke slowly and precisely. ‘I say that young ladies, in general—of present company, of course, I say nothing.’

‘But that does not prevent your thinking of them,’ put in Darya Mihailovna.

‘I say nothing of them,’ repeated Pigasov. ‘All young ladies, in general, are affected to the most extreme point—affected in the expression of their feelings. If a young lady is frightened, for instance, or pleased with anything, or distressed, she is certain first to throw her person into some such elegant attitude (and 28