it really does not matter which. She is looking for something,
pretends not to have noticed me, and is humming to herself:

"Dost thou remember that song full of tenderness?"

I read through what I have written and want to continue, but the
young lady pretends to have just caught sight of me, and says in a
mournful voice:

"Good morning, Nikolay Andreitch. Only fancy what a misfortune I
have had! I went for a walk yesterday and lost the little ball off
my bracelet!"

I read through once more the opening of my dissertation, I trim up
the tail of the letter "g" and mean to go on, but the young lady
persists.

"Nikolay Andreitch," she says, "won't you see me home? The Karelins
have such a huge dog that I simply daren't pass it alone."

There is no getting out of it. I lay down my pen and go down to
her. Nadenka (or Varenka) takes my arm and we set off in the direction
of her villa.

When the duty of walking arm-in-arm with a lady falls to my lot,
for some reason or other I always feel like a peg with a heavy cloak
hanging on it. Nadenka (or Varenka), between ourselves, of an ardent
temperament (her grandfather was an Armenian), has a peculiar art
of throwing her whole weight on one's arm and clinging to one's
side like a leech. And so we walk along.