Matvey Savitch muttered something in his sleep and turned over on the
other side.

Late at night when Dyudya and the old woman and the neighbouring
watchman were all asleep, Sofya went out to the gate and sat down on the
bench. She felt stifled and her head ached from weeping. The street was
a wide and long one; it stretched for nearly two miles to the right and
as far to the left, and the end of it was out of sight. The moon was
now not over the yard, but behind the church. One side of the street was
flooded with moonlight, while the other side lay in black shadow. The
long shadows of the poplars and the starling-cotes stretched right
across the street, while the church cast a broad shadow, black and
terrible that enfolded Dyudya's gates and half his house. The street
was still and deserted. From time to time the strains of mu sic floated
faintly from the end of the street--Alyoshka, most likely, playing his
concertina.

Someone moved in the shadow near the church enclosure, and Sofya could
not make out whether it were a man or a cow, or perhaps merely a big
bird rustling in the trees. But then a figure stepped out of the shadow,
halted, and said something in a man's voice, then vanished down the
turning by the church. A little later, not three yards from the gate,
another figure came into sight; it walked straight from the church to
the gate and stopped short, seeing Sofya on the bench.

"Varvara, is that you?" said Sofya.

"And if it were?"

It was Varvara. She stood still a minute, then came up to the bench and