“You think so,” answered Lemm, “because, most likely, experience—­”

He stopped short, and turned away in confusion.

Lavretsky uttered a forced laugh.  Then he too turned away from his companion, and began looking out along the road.

The stars had already begun to grow pale, and the sky to turn grey, when the carriage arrived before the steps of the little house at Vasilievskoe.  Lavretsky conducted his guest to his allotted room, then went to his study, and sat down in front of the window.  Out in the garden a nightingale was singing its last song before the dawn.  Lavretsky remembered that at the Kalitines’ also a nightingale had sung in the garden.  He remembered also the quiet movement of Liza’s eyes when, at its first notes, she had turned toward the dark casement.  He began to think of her, and his heart grew calm.

“Pure maiden,” he said, in a half-whisper, “pure stars,” he added, with a smile, and then quietly lay down to sleep.

But Lemm sat for a long time on his bed, with a sheet of music on his knees.  It seemed as if some sweet melody, yet unborn, were intending to visit him.  He already underwent the feverish agitation, he already felt the fatigue and the delight, of its vicinity; but it always eluded him.

“Neither poet nor musician!” he whispered at last; and his weary head sank heavily upon the pillow.

* * * * *

The next morning Lavretsky and his guest drank their tea in the garden, under an old lime-tree.

“Maestro,” said Lavretsky, among other things, “you will soon have to compose a festal cantata.”

“On what occasion?”

“Why, on that of Mr. Panshine’s marriage with Liza.  Didn’t you observe what attention he paid her yesterday?  All goes smoothly with them evidently.”

“That will never be!” exclaimed Lemm.

“Why?”

“Because it’s impossible.  However,” he added after pausing awhile, “in this world everything is possible.  Especially in this country of yours—­in Russia.”

“Let us leave Russia out of the question for the present.  But what do you see objectionable in that marriage?”

“Every thing is objectionable—­every thing.  Lizaveta Mikhailovna is a serious, true-hearted girl, with lofty sentiments.  But he—­he is, to describe him by one word, a dil-le-tante”

“But doesn’t she love him?”

Lemm rose from his bench.

“No, she does not love him.  That is to say, she is very pure of heart, and does not herself know the meaning of the words, ‘to love.’  Madame Von Kalitine tells her that he is an excellent young man; and she obeys Madame Von Kalitine because she is still quite a child, although she is now nineteen.  She says her prayers every morning; she says her prayers every evening—­and that is very praiseworthy.  But she does not love him.  She can love only what is noble.  But he is not noble; that is to say, his soul is not noble.”