'No, do tell me, do tell me!'
'Really, I don't know.'
'Nonsense, come now!'
'That... what's her name... Mashenka's all right; not bad-looking.'
'There, you see...' said Kister—and he said no more.
Five days later Lutchkov of his own accord suggested that they should call on the Perekatovs.
Alone he would not have gone to see them; in Fyodor Fedoritch's absence he would have had to keep up a conversation, and that he could not do, and as far as possible avoided.
On the second visit of the two friends, Masha was much more at her ease. She was by now secretly glad that she had not disturbed her mamma by an uninvited avowal. Before dinner, Avdey had offered to try a young horse, not yet broken in, and, in spite of its frantic rearing, he mastered it completely. In the evening he thawed, and fell into joking and laughing—and though he soon pulled himself up, yet he had succeeded in making a momentary unpleasant impression on Masha. She could not yet be sure herself what the feeling exactly was that Lutchkov excited in her, but everything she did not like in him she set down to the influence of misfortune, of loneliness.
V
The friends began to pay frequent visits to the Perekatovs'. Kister's position became more and more painful. He did not regret his action... no, but he desired at least to cut short the time of his trial. His devotion to Masha increased daily; she too felt warmly towards him; but to be nothing more than a go-between, a confidant, a friend even—it's a dreary, thankless business! Coldly idealistic people talk a great deal about the sacredness of suffering, the bliss of suffering... but to Kister's warm and simple heart his sufferings were not a source of any bliss whatever. At last, one day, when Lutchkov, ready dressed, came to fetch him, and the carriage was waiting at the steps, Fyodor Fedoritch, to the astonishment of his friend, announced point-blank that he should stay at home. Lutchkov entreated him, was vexed and angry... Kister pleaded a headache. Lutchkov set off alone.