صفحة 4 من 2288

Stepan Arkadyevitch's eyes twinkled gaily, and he pondered with a

smile. "Yes, it was nice, very nice. There was a great deal more

that was delightful, only there's no putting it into words, or

even expressing it in one's thoughts awake." And noticing a gleam

of light peeping in beside one of the serge curtains, he

cheerfully dropped his feet over the edge of the sofa, and felt

about with them for his slippers, a present on his last birthday,

worked for him by his wife on gold-colored morocco. And, as he

had done every day for the last nine years, he stretched out his

hand, without getting up, towards the place where his

dressing-gown always hung in his bedroom. And thereupon he

suddenly remembered that he was not sleeping in his wife's room,

but in his study, and why: the smile vanished from his face, he

knitted his brows.