She was glad that of late Laevsky had been cold to her, reserved
and polite, and at times even harsh and rude; in the past she had
met all his outbursts, all his contemptuous, cold or strange
incomprehensible glances, with tears, reproaches, and threats to
leave him or to starve herself to death; now she only blushed,
looked guiltily at him, and was glad he was not affectionate to
her. If he had abused her, threatened her, it would have been better
and pleasanter, since she felt hopelessly guilty towards him. She
felt she was to blame, in the first place, for not sympathising
with the dreams of a life of hard work, for the sake of which he
had given up Petersburg and had come here to the Caucasus, and she
was convinced that he had been angry with her of late for precisely
that. When she was travelling to the Caucasus, it seemed that she
would find here on the first day a cosy nook by the sea, a snug
little garden with shade, with birds, with little brooks, where she
could grow flowers and vegetables, rear ducks and hens, entertain
her neighbours, doctor poor peasants and distribute little books
amongst them. It had turned out that the Caucasus was nothing but
bare mountains, forests, and huge valleys, where it took a long
time and a great deal of effort to find anything and settle down;
that there were no neighbours of any sort; that it was very hot and
one might be robbed. Laevsky had been in no hurry to obtain a piece
of land; she was glad of it, and they seemed to be in a tacit compact
never to allude to a life of hard work. He was silent about it, she
thought, because he was angry with her for being silent about it.

In the second place, she had without his knowledge during those two
years bought various trifles to the value of three hundred roubles
at Atchmianov's shop. She had bought the things by degrees, at one