The light disappeared from Liza’s room.

“A quiet night to you, dear girl,” whispered Lavretsky, still sitting where he was without moving, and not taking his eyes off the darkened window.

Suddenly a light appeared at one of the windows of the lower story, crossed to another window, and then to a third.  Some one was carrying a candle through the room.  “Can it be Liza?  It cannot be,” thought Lavretsky.  He rose.  A well-known face glimmered in the darkness, and Liza appeared in the drawing-room, wearing a white dress, her hair hanging loosely about her shoulders.  Quietly approaching the table, she leant over it, put down the candle and began looking for something.  Then she turned towards the garden, and crossed to the open door; presently her light, slender, white-robed form stood still on the threshold.

A kind of shiver ran over Lavretsky’s limbs, and the word “Liza!” escaped all but inaudibly from his lips.

She started, and then began to peer anxiously into the darkness.

“Liza!” said Lavretsky louder than before, and came out from the shadow of the alley.

Liza was startled.  For a moment she bent forward; then she shrank back.  She had recognized him.  For the third time he called her, and held out his hands towards her.  She passed out from the doorway and came into the garden.

“You!” she said.  “You here!”

“I—­I—­Come and hear what I have to say,” whispered Lavretsky; and then, taking her hand, he led her to the bench.

She followed him without a word; but her pale face, her fixed look, and all her movements, testified her unutterable astonishment.  Lavretsky made her sit down on the bench, and remained standing in front of her.

“I did not think of coming here,” he began.  “I was led here—­I—­I—­I love you,” he ended by saying, feeling very nervous in spite of himself.

Liza slowly looked up at him.  It seemed as if it had not been till that moment that she understood where she was, and what was happening to her.  She would have risen, but she could not.  Then she hid her face in her hands.

“Liza!” exclaimed Lavretsky; “Liza!” he repeated, and knelt down at her feet.

A slight shudder ran over her shoulders; she pressed the fingers of her white hands closer to her face.

“What is it?” said Lavretsky.  Then he heard a low sound of sobbing, and his heart sank within him.  He understood the meaning of those tears.

“Can it be that you love me?” he whispered, with a caressing gesture of the hand.

“Stand up, stand up, Fedor Ivanovich,” she at last succeeded in saying.  “What are we doing?”

He rose from his knees, and sat down by her side on the bench.  She was no longer crying, but her eyes, as she looked at him earnestly, were wet with tears.

“I am frightened!  What are we doing?” she said again.

“I love you,” he repeated.  “I am ready to give my whole life for you.”