"Good-evening, Woldemar! Ah, what a splendid horse! From whom did you buy it?"
"From our remount-officer. He made me pay dear for it, the rascal."
"What is it's name?"
"Orlando. But that's a stupid name. I want to change it. Eh bien, eh bien, mon garçon. What a restless creature it is!"
The horse neighed, pawed the air, and tossed the foam from its nostrils.
"Come and stroke it, Lenochka; don't be afraid."
Lenochka stretched out her hand from the window, but Orlando suddenly reared and shied. But its rider, who took its proceedings very quietly, gripped the saddle firmly with his knees, laid his whip across the horse's neck, and forced it, in spite of its resistance, to return to the window, "Prenez garde, prenez garde," Maria Dmitrievna kept calling out.
"Now then, stroke him, Lenochka," repeated the horseman; "I don't mean to let him have his own way."
Lenochka stretched out her hand a second time, and timidly touched the quivering nostrils of Orlando, who champed his bit, and kept incessantly fidgeting.
"Bravo!" exclaimed Maria Dmitrievna; "but now get off, and come in."