Page:The Novels of Ivan Turgenev (volume VII).djvu/87

Rh would have talked and looked quite differently. 'But,' he reflected,'since that has never happened to me, I can't tell, of course, what I should look like if it did.' He remembered an Irish girl whom he had once seen in a shop behind the counter; he remembered what wonderful, almost black, hair she had, her blue eyes and thick lashes, and how she had looked sadly and wistfully at him, and how long afterwards he had walked up and down the street before her windows, how excited he had been, and how he had kept asking himself, should he make her acquaintance or not? He was then staying in London. His employer had sent him there with a sum of money to make purchases for him. Solomin had been on the point of stopping on in London, of sending the money back to his employer, so strong was the impression made on him by the lovely Polly. (He had found out her name; one of the other shopgirls had addressed her by it.) He had mastered himself, however, and went back to his employer. Polly had been far more beautiful than Marianna, but this girl had the same sad, wistful look in her eyes and she was a Russian.

'But what am I thinking about?' said Solomin, half aloud, 'bothering my head about other men's sweethearts!' and he gave a shake to the