up. She gazed into the darkness, sighed, and turned over on the
other side. Five minutes afterwards she turned over again and shut
her eyes more firmly but she could not get to sleep again. After
sighing and tossing from side to side for a time, she got up, crept
over her husband, and putting on her slippers, went to the window.

It was dark outside. She could see nothing but the outlines of the
trees and the roof of the stables. There was a faint pallor in the
east, but this pallor was beginning to be clouded over. There was
perfect stillness in the air wrapped in slumber and darkness. Even
the watchman, paid to disturb the stillness of night, was silent;
even the corncrake--the only wild creature of the feathered tribe
that does not shun the proximity of summer visitors--was silent.

The stillness was broken by Marya Mihalovna herself. Standing at
the window and gazing into the yard, she suddenly uttered a cry.
She fancied that from the flower garden with the gaunt, clipped
poplar, a dark figure was creeping towards the house. For the first
minute she thought it was a cow or a horse, then, rubbing her eyes,
she distinguished clearly the outlines of a man.

Then she fancied the dark figure approached the window of the kitchen
and, standing still a moment, apparently undecided, put one foot
on the window ledge and disappeared into the darkness of the window.

"A burglar!" flashed into her mind and a deathly pallor overspread
her face.

And in one instant her imagination had drawn the picture so dreaded
by lady visitors in country places--a burglar creeps into the