Glasha goes. She hurries to the veranda staircase.
Here she washes herself a second time in a clay turn-over basin, which
is attached by a rope to one of the posts of the veranda; she quickly
plunges her face and hands in the water that had been left there
overnight. She splashes the water a long way off on the green grass, on
the lilac-grey planks of the staircase and on her feet, which are red
from the early morning freshness and from the tender contact with the
dewy grass in the vegetable garden. She laughs happily at
herself—because she is a young, healthy girl, because the early morning
freshness caresses the length of her strong, swift body with brisk cool
strokes; and finally, because not far away, in the village, there is a
lively and handsome young fellow, not unlike herself, who pays
attention to her and whom she is rather fond of. It is true that her
mother scolds her on his account, because the young man is poor. But
what’s that to Glasha? Not for nothing is there an adage:
“Without bread ’tis very sad,
Still sadder ’tis without a lad.”
Glasha laughs loudly and merrily.
Stepanida cries at her from the kitchen window: “Glash, Glash, why do
you neigh like a horse?”
Glasha laughs, makes no reply, and goes off.
Stepanida puts her simple, red face out of the window and asks: “I
wonder what’s the matter with her.”
She receives no answer, for there is no one to reply. Out of doors all
is deserted. Only somewhere from behind the barn the languid voices of
working-men can be heard.