‘And his daughter Sophia, do you know her?’
‘I’ve seen her twice.’
‘Only fancy, she’s run away!’
‘How’s that?’
‘Well, I don’t know. Three months ago she disappeared, and nothing’s been heard of her. And the astonishing thing is no one can make out whom she’s run off with. Fancy, they’ve not the slightest idea, not the smallest suspicion! She’d refused all the offers made her, and she was most proper in her behaviour. Ah, these quiet, religious girls are the ones! It’s made an awful scandal all over the province! B.‘s in despair.... And whatever need had she to run away? Her father carried out her wishes in everything. And what’s so unaccountable, all the Lovelaces of the province are there all right, not one’s missing.’
‘And they’ve not found her up till now?’
‘I tell you she might as well be at the bottom of the sea! It’s one rich heiress less in the world, that’s the worst of it.’
This piece of news greatly astonished me. It did not seem at all in keeping with the recollection I had of Sophia B. But there! anything may happen.
In the autumn of the same year fate brought me—again on official business—into the S—— province, which is, as every one knows, next to the province of T——. It was cold and rainy weather; the worn-out posting-horses could scarcely drag my light trap through the black slush of the highroad. One day, I remember, was particularly unlucky: three times we got ‘stuck’ in the mud up to the axles of the wheels; my driver was continually giving up one rut and with moans and grunts trudging across to the other, and finding things no better with that. In fact, towards evening I was so exhausted that on reaching the posting-station I decided to spend the night at the inn. I was given a room with a broken-down wooden sofa, a sloping floor, and torn paper on the walls; there was a smell in it of kvas, bast-mats, onions, and even turpentine, and swarms of flies were on everything; but at any rate I could find shelter there from the weather, and the rain had set in, as they say, for the whole day. I ordered a samovar to be brought, and, sitting on the sofa, settled down to those cheerless wayside reflections so familiar to travellers in Russia.