Nadia started, surprised to find a story so like her own. “Tell me about it,” she said, sitting down beside Katinka.
“It is Anna, my husband’s sister,” responded the maid, brokenly. “I was so happy with my Yegor, he was so kind to me; and Pauline Vassilievna had promised to have a cottage built for us close to her own country-house, so that I might be near her still. But Anna always hated me, because I came from the town, and she was jealous because Yegor was so fond of me, and because of the new house. She never showed her enmity to me—if she had I could have guarded against it—but she made up lies about me, and told them to Yegor. He was passionate, and I was proud. I told him that if he could listen to such things about me it was enough to show that he did not love me in the least. He told me to deny them, and I would not. He went to her for advice, and she told him even worse tales, and then he left me without another word, and I have never seen him since. And now Anton Gregorievitch says that I must forgive Anna, though she has ruined my home and taken away my husband and spoilt my whole life. And I cannot do it.”
“I am like you, Katinka,” said Nadia. “I also have an enemy whom I cannot forgive. He spoils even my prayers.”
“But you are a great lady, Nadia Mikhailovna,” said Katinka, in surprise. “Who can have injured you?”
“He could not have injured me if I had not allowed him—helped him to do it,” said Nadia. “That is why I can’t forgive him, Katinka.”
“But that is like me,” said Katinka. “If I had not been too proud to explain, Yegor would have believed me at once, I am sure. Have we both helped our enemies by doing wrong ourselves?”
“I believe we have,” said Nadia, and both girls sat silent for a while, Nadia in her velvet and furs beside the sempstress in her peasant dress. At last Katinka looked up.
“I have been thinking,” she said. “After all, Anna was fond of Yegor; she had brought him up, and kept house for him until we were married. Perhaps I was not as kind to her as I might have been, and a great deal of the trouble was my own fault—and I want to be forgiven myself, Nadia Mikhailovna——”
“And so do I,” said Nadia, softly.
“Somehow,” said Katinka, “looking at it in this way, I seem to have been worse than I thought, and Anna not so bad. It is not so hard to forgive—I will, I can forgive her.”