“Yes, I believe you,” said Ivan Kouzmitch; “the wife is not one of the timid ones.”
“And Maria Ivanovna,” I asked, “is she as brave as you?”
“Masha brave?” replied her mother. “No, Masha is a coward. Up to the present time she has never been able to hear the report of a gun without trembling all over. Two years ago, when Ivan Kouzmitch took the idea into his head to fire off our cannon on my name-day,[9] my little dove was so frightened that she nearly died through terror. Since then we have never fired off the accursed cannon.”
We rose from the table. The Captain and his wife went to indulge in a nap, and I accompanied Shvabrin to his quarters, where I spent the whole evening.
[1] A verst is two-thirds of an English mile.
[2] A tributary of the Oural.
[3] Taken from the Turks in 1737 by the Russian troops under Count Münich.
[4] Ivan (John), son of Kouzma.
[5] Little father (batyushka). A familiar idiom peculiar to the Russian language.