"So you really think, Krondide Feodorovitch, that this dreadful weakness can be conquered?"
"Yes, I think there is no impossibility whatever in it."
"Ah, God grant it, God grant it!... But you must know she is not telling you everything. She is so patient, so patient; but of course I can see how she suffers!"
And mamma, in spite of her daughter, begins in an agitated and lugubrious voice to relate to Krondide Feodorovitch in the most detailed manner how Mimotchka gets out of breath going upstairs, how she cries without any cause, how cross she gets with her maid and with baby, how thin she is getting, which is evident from the bodices of her dresses, how yesterday at dinner she only ate half a cutlet, and to-day—and so on and on.
"So," says the doctor, writing out a prescription, "and what do you think of doing this summer?"
"Ah, Krondide Feodorovitch, that is the chief reason why we came to you. We will do whatever you tell us. Wherever you send us.... You know that we have both money and time to spare. I had already thought that perhaps sea-bathing ... abroad ..."
"Yes, of course; abroad is all very well. But what would you say to the Caucasus? You were never in the Caucasus?"
"No; but I have heard from many people that it is still very primitive there, nothing properly arranged ... no lodgings nor doctors.... They say there are only most awful veterinary surgeons there.... And nothing whatever to eat." ...