Page:The Bet and Other Stories.djvu/50

38 by degrees I grow calm, and, of course, surrender. The aspirant will receive a valueless subject from me, will write under my observation a needless thesis, will pass his tedious disputation cum laude and will get a useless and learned degree.

The rings follow in endless succession, but here I confine myself to four. The fourth ring sounds, and I hear the familiar steps, the rustling dress, the dear voice.

Eighteen years ago my dear friend, the oculist, died and left behind him a seven year old daughter, Katy, and sixty thousand roubles. By his will he made me guardian. Katy lived in my family till she was ten. Afterwards she was sent to College and lived with me only in her holidays in the summer months. I had no time to attend to her education. I watched only by fits and starts; so that I can say very little about her childhood.

The chief thing I remember, the one I love to dwell upon in memory, is the extraordinary confidence which she had when she entered my house, when she had to have the doctor,—a confidence which was always shining in her darling face. She would sit in a corner somewhere with her face tied up, and would be sure to be absorbed in watching something. Whether she was watching me write and read books, or my wife bustling about, or the cook peeling the potatoes in the kitchen or the dog playing about—her eyes invariably expressed the same thing: "Everything