"Whom have I to ask? It's all the same to my aunt, and as I'm responsible for his upbringing how can I marry you. Perhaps you would treat him harshly. Isn't it so, Mishka, that you're afraid of his harshness?"
"No, Nadya," said Misha, looking out with one eye from behind his handkerchief. "I'm not afraid of his harshness. Why should I? But I am afraid that Pavel Vassilyevitch would spoil me and not allow you to put me in the corner."
"Believe me, Nadezhda Vassilyevna," said Volodin, pressing his hands to his heart, "I won't spoil Mishenka. I always think: 'Why should a boy be spoiled?' He's well fed, well dressed, well shod, as for spoiling—no! I too can put him into the corner and not spoil him at all. I can do even more. As you're a girl, that is, a young lady, it's a little inconvenient to you, but I could easily birch him."
"He's not only going to put me into a corner," said Misha whimpering, having again covered his face with his handkerchief, "but he'll even birch me! No, that doesn't suit me. No, Nadya, don't you dare to marry him."
"Well, do you hear? I decidedly can't," said Nadezhda.
"It seems very strange to me, Nadezhda Vassilyevna, that you're acting in this way," said Volodin. "I come to you with all my affections and one might even say with fiery feelings, and you give your brother as an excuse. If you now give your brother as an excuse, another might give her sister, a third her nephew, or perhaps some other relative, and so no one would marry—so that the whole human race would come to an end."
"Don't worry about that, Pavel Vassilyevitch," said Nadezhda, "the world is not threatened yet by such a possibility. I don't want to marry without Misha's consent, and he, as you have heard, is not willing. Besides, as it's clear that you have promised to beat him straight away, you might also beat me."
"Please, Nadezhda Vassilyevna, surely you don't think that I would permit myself such a disgraceful action," exclaimed Volodin desperately.
Nadezhda smiled.
"And I myself have no desire to marry," she said.