“I don’t understand everything of this,” she explained to him. “This is my first lesson that I give. This position of Russian professor belongs to my husband, but he is ill, and they kindly permit me to take his place for this little while. Now we must not waste more time!”
She opened the book again, and studied it with serious regard.
“A difficult language,” she said; “but so very beautiful! The English and Americans can never learn to pronounce our consonant sounds—never! Could you say this?”
She uttered a sound, and he tried to imitate her, but failed. She smiled with a sort of benevolent triumph.
“Ah, it cannot be done—not ever! Now, on the contrary, we Russians have no difficulty whatsoever with any of the English words. I don’t know—it is the Russian soul, perhaps. We have so great a sympathy. Nothing is strange to us, nothing is foreign—nothing at all. We are at home in all languages, in all countries. It is our mystery.”
“You speak English very well,” he said.
“Why not? I lived for years in England; but in this country, only three months.”
She fell silent.
“Why is it that you wish to learn Russian?” she asked suddenly.
“Well, I thought of going to Russia, you know—to study the people and write a book.”