Family happiness.

Very briefly The story of a young girl's love for her late father's friend, their marriage and the first few years of their married life, including some chilling and quarrels.

Seventeen-year-old girl Masha remains an orphan. She lives in the countryside with her maid Katya, her younger sister Sonya and other servants. All members of the household are in a state of mourning and longing for the dead mother, the only hope for women's society is the arrival of the guardian and old friend of the late father.

Sergei Mikhailovich helps to deal with family matters and helps to defuse the difficult situation in the house. Masha gradually falls in love with her patron; falls in love with Masha and 37-year-old Sergei Mikhailovich, although he constantly doubts his choice and tells Masha about this:

Would it not be a misfortune for you to join your life with an old, obsolete person who only wants to sit, while God knows what is wandering around there, what you want.

Masha convinces Sergei Mikhailovich of the sincerity of her feelings, and they decide to marry. After the wedding, Masha moves to the estate with her husband, and a happy family life covers them from the head.

After some time, Masha begins to get bored and weighed down. village life where nothing new happens. Sergei Mikhailovich guesses the mood of his wife and offers to go to St. Petersburg.

In the city, Masha meets secular society, she is popular among men and this is very flattering to her. At some point, Masha realizes that her husband is weary of life in the city and decides to go back to the village, but Sergei Mikhailovich's cousin persuades Masha to go to the party, where Prince M., who has wanted to meet Masha since the last ball, will come specially. A quarrel arises between Sergei Mikhailovich and Masha from misunderstanding on both sides: Masha says that she is ready to “sacrifice” the reception and go to the village, and Sergei Mikhailovich is outraged by Masha’s “sacrifice”. From that day on, their relationship changed.

Our relations ‹…› seemed to have stopped, froze and could not get worse or better.

The family has the first son, but maternal feeling takes possession of Masha for a short time and she again begins to be burdened by a calm and even family life although they live most time in the city.

The family goes abroad to the waters, Masha is already 21. On the waters, Masha finds herself surrounded by gentlemen, in which the Italian Marquis D. is especially active, persistently showing her passion for Masha: this greatly embarrasses her; for her, everyone in male society is not different from each other.

Once, while walking around the castle, together with an old friend L.M. Masha finds herself in an awkward situation, which ends with the Italian kissing Masha. Feeling ashamed and disgusted by the situation, Masha goes to her husband, who at that time was in another city. Masha persuades Sergei Mikhailovich to immediately go to the village, but at the same time does not tell him anything about what happened to her. In the village, everything returns to normal, but Masha is burdened by an unspoken feeling of resentment and remorse, it seems to her that her husband has moved away from her, and she wants to return the original feeling of love that was between them.

The novel ends with Masha and Sergei Mikhailovich expressing to each other all their feelings and accumulated grievances: the husband admits that the former feeling cannot be returned and that the former love has grown into another feeling. Masha understands and accepts her husband's position.

From that day my romance with my husband ended; the old feeling became a dear, irrevocable memory, and the new feeling of love for the children and for the father of my children laid the foundation for another, but completely different happy life which I have not yet lived at the present moment ...

I

We wore mourning for our mother, who died in the autumn, and lived all winter in the country, alone with Katya and Sonya.

Katya was old friend at home, the governess who nursed us all, and whom I remembered and loved since I could remember myself. Sonya was my younger sister. We spent a gloomy and sad winter in our old Pokrovsky house. The weather was cold and windy, so that the snowdrifts piled up above the windows; the windows were almost always cold and dim, and for almost a whole winter we did not go anywhere or go anywhere. Few people came to us; Yes, whoever came did not add fun and joy to our house. Everyone had sad faces, everyone spoke quietly, as if afraid to wake someone up, did not laugh, sighed and often cried, looking at me and especially at little Sonya in a black dress. Death still seemed to be felt in the house; sadness and horror of death were in the air. Mother's room was locked, and I felt terrible, and something pulled me to look into this cold and empty room when I went to sleep past her.

I was then seventeen years old, and in the very year of her death my mother wanted to move to the city to take me out. The loss of my mother was a great grief for me, but I must admit that because of this grief, it was also felt that I was young, good, as everyone told me, but for nothing, in solitude, I kill the second winter in the village. Before the end of winter, this feeling of longing of loneliness and simply boredom increased to such an extent that I did not leave the room, did not open the piano and did not pick up books. When Katya persuaded me to do this or that, I answered: I don’t want to, I can’t, but in my heart I said: why? Why do anything when my best time? What for? And on why there was no other answer than tears.

I was told that I lost weight and became ugly at this time, but it did not even interest me. What for? for whom? It seemed to me that my whole life should pass in this lonely wilderness and helpless anguish, from which I myself, alone, had no strength and even no desire to get out. At the end of winter, Katya began to fear for me and decided to take me abroad at all costs. But this needed money, and we hardly knew what was left of us after our mother, and every day we were waiting for a guardian who was supposed to come and sort out our affairs.

In March, a guardian arrived.

- Well, thank God! - Katya once said to me, when I, like a shadow, idle, without thought, without desires, went from corner to corner, - Sergey Mikhailych came, sent to ask about us and wanted to be at dinner. Shake yourself up, my Masha," she added, "or what will he think of you? He loved all of you so much.

Sergei Mikhailovich was a close neighbor of ours and a friend of our late father, although much younger than he was. In addition to the fact that his arrival changed our plans and made it possible to leave the village, from childhood I got used to love and respect him, and Katya, advising me to shake things up, guessed that of all the people I knew, it would be most painful for me to appear in an unfavorable light in front of Sergei Mikhailovich . In addition to the fact that I, like everyone else in the house, from Katya and Sonya, his goddaughter, to the last coachman, loved him out of habit, he had special meaning one word my mother said in front of me. She said that she would like such a husband for me. Then it seemed to me surprising and even unpleasant; My hero was completely different. My hero was thin, lean, pale and sad. Sergei Mikhailovich was no longer young, tall, stout, and, it seemed to me, always cheerful; but despite the fact that these words of my mother sunk into my imagination, and six years ago, when I was eleven years old and he told me you, played with me and nicknamed me violet girl, I sometimes asked myself, not without fear, what would I do if he suddenly wanted to marry me?

Before dinner, to which Katya added a cream cake and spinach sauce, Sergei Mikhailovich arrived. I saw through the window how he drove up to the house in a small sled, but as soon as he drove around the corner, I hurried into the living room and wanted to pretend that I did not expect him at all. But, hearing the sound of feet in the hall, his loud voice and Katya's steps, I could not resist and went to meet him myself. He, holding Katya by the hand, spoke loudly and smiled. Seeing me, he stopped and looked at me for some time without bowing. I felt embarrassed and felt myself blush.

– Ah! is it you? he said with his resolute and simple manner, spreading his arms and coming up to me. - Is it possible to change like that! how you have grown! Here are those and the violet! You have become a rose.

He took his big hand my hand and shook so hard, honestly, it just didn't hurt. I thought that he would kiss my hand, and I bent down to him, but he shook my hand again and looked straight into my eyes with his firm and cheerful look.

I haven't seen him for six years. He has changed a lot; aged, blackened and overgrown with whiskers, which did not go well with him; but they were the same simple tricks, an open, honest face with large features, intelligent sparkling eyes and an affectionate, as if childish, smile.

Five minutes later he ceased to be a guest, but became his own person for all of us, even for people who, it was clear from their helpfulness, were especially happy about his arrival.

He did not behave at all like the neighbors who came after the death of my mother and considered it necessary to be silent and cry while sitting with us; he, on the contrary, was talkative, cheerful, and did not say a word about my mother, so that at first this indifference seemed to me strange and even indecent on the part of such loved one. But then I realized that it was not indifference, but sincerity, and I was grateful for it.

Lucy Redcomb

Family happiness

Vivien put the book aside and closed her eyes. A light breeze played with a strand of her dark hair that had fallen out of her hairdo, the warm rays of the sun caressed her skin. The sweet aroma of rose hips mingled with the smell of lime blossoms, but Viv, no matter how hard she tried, could not get rid of the smell of burning ... and, as soon as she covered her eyelashes, how scary picture appeared again and again before her eyes.

Mother Mother! - Little Jefferson William Hartley pounded his hand on her knee. - There is such a beetle ... terrible, terrible ...

Don't be afraid, darling, he won't hurt you. Vivien stroked her son's blond head. - Run, play. Your dad will pick us up soon.

Four years ago, on the site of this square stood old house where she spent her childhood. Here she and Jeff were intimate for the first time...

Now that only memories of the house remained, Vivien often came here to sit, reflecting on the life she had lived.

And we must ... Well, you understand?

Vivienne looked with pity at the frightened face of the young man, who at that moment looked more like a victim doomed to the slaughter than an ardent lover.

Kiss? Of course not,” she said firmly, and the shadow of a fleeting smile touched her lips in response to his sigh of relief.

Chris leaned back heavily on the leather sofa, square his thin shoulders.

I have nothing against you,” he added with a frown, stealing a glance at Vivienne.

Don't worry, I'll survive, - she answered seriously, although a spark of amusement flashed in her wide-open dark brown eyes.

Perhaps you can't deny Dick the power of persuasion, Vivien thought, annoyed that she had succumbed to her brother's persuasion and now she was forced to sit here, on this chic leather sofa, next to the frightened kid, feeling like a complete idiot.

AT luxury home parents Christian Rous Vivien had to constantly overcome awe. She did not know that Dick was friends with the son of such rich people! Everything in this amazing house spoke of good taste and very big money.

She had to rent a black silk dress especially for the occasion. She had never worn anything like this before in her life, and not only because she could not afford such a luxury. It's just that Viv is used to buying clothes for practicality and convenience, and not to splurge. She always wore jeans, and in her wardrobe there was only one skirt, which she wore to friends' weddings, relatives' funerals and meetings with a bank manager.

Now it seemed to her that in this breathtaking outfit she looked ridiculous. And poor Chris, it seemed, was ready to run from her wherever his eyes looked.

Be patient, there is not much left, - Vivien promised, and immediately remembered that she had not checked the clock with Dick when he gave her instructions.

She glanced at Christian and tried to put on a smile of motherly warmth on her face. She succeeded without much difficulty, because the boy was almost five years younger, and she felt like an old woman next to him.

Are your parents gone for a long time? Viv asked.

Why the hell did I let myself be dragged into this story? - she thought, feeling her cheekbones already cramped from a forced smile. What am I going to do if Chris faints before Dick and his buddies get here?

Mom was going to spend a week or two in Mexico, - answered Christian, - and dad, probably, will return earlier. He left on business.

Or maybe spit on everything and run away, Viv looked hopefully at the heavy door trimmed with bog oak. She had dated Henry Rose, Chris' father. He appeared to be a likeable, sensible man who was perfectly capable of handling his son's problems without outside help.

They are lucky. I would love to run away from here somewhere, - she sighed, cursing her kindness and gullibility.

Mom doesn't like to leave for a long time, - said Chris.

Still, having such a house! Vivien thought, not without envy, and sighed softly. Next month she can afford to buy kitchen paint, but a warm new jacket can wait...

Not like Uncle Jeff. Wherever he went! - continued the young man.

family happiness
Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy

family happiness

Part one

We wore mourning for our mother, who died in the autumn, and lived all winter in the country, alone with Katya and Sonya.

Katya was an old friend of the house, the governess who nursed us all, and whom I remembered and loved from as long as I could remember myself. Sonya was my younger sister. We spent a gloomy and sad winter in our old Pokrovsky house. The weather was cold and windy, so that the snowdrifts piled up above the windows; the windows were almost always cold and dim, and for almost a whole winter we did not go anywhere or go anywhere. Few people came to us; Yes, whoever came did not add fun and joy to our house. Everyone had sad faces, everyone spoke quietly, as if afraid to wake someone up, did not laugh, sighed and often cried, looking at me and especially at little Sonya in a black dress. Death still seemed to be felt in the house; sadness and horror of death were in the air. Mother's room was locked, and I felt terrible, and something pulled me to look into this cold and empty room when I went to sleep past her.

I was then seventeen years old, and in the very year of her death my mother wanted to move to the city to take me out. The loss of my mother was a great grief for me, but I must admit that because of this grief, it was also felt that I was young, good, as everyone told me, but for nothing, in solitude, I kill the second winter in the village. Before the end of winter, this feeling of longing of loneliness and simply boredom increased to such an extent that I did not leave the room, did not open the piano and did not pick up books. When Katya persuaded me to do this or that, I answered: I don’t want to, I can’t, but in my heart I said: why? Why do anything when my best time is wasted so much? What for? And to _why_ there was no other answer than tears.

I was told that I lost weight and became ugly at this time, but it did not even interest me. What for? for whom? It seemed to me that my whole life should pass in this lonely wilderness and helpless anguish, from which I myself, alone, had no strength and even no desire to get out. At the end of winter, Katya began to fear for me and decided to take me abroad at all costs. But this needed money, and we hardly knew what was left of us after our mother, and every day we were waiting for a guardian who was supposed to come and sort out our affairs.

In March, a guardian arrived.

- Well, thank God! - Katya once said to me, when I, like a shadow, idle, without thought, without desires, went from corner to corner, - Sergey Mikhailych came, sent to ask about us and wanted to be at dinner. Shake yourself up, my Masha," she added, "or what will he think of you? He loved all of you so much.

Sergei Mikhailovich was a close neighbor of ours and a friend of our late father, although much younger than he was. In addition to the fact that his arrival changed our plans and made it possible to leave the village, from childhood I got used to love and respect him, and Katya, advising me to shake things up, guessed that of all the people I knew, it would be most painful for me to appear in an unfavorable light in front of Sergei Mikhailovich . In addition to the fact that I, like everyone in the house, from Katya and Sonya, his goddaughter, to the last coachman, loved him out of habit, he had a special meaning for me from one word spoken by my mother in my presence. She said that she would like such a husband for me. Then it seemed to me surprising and even unpleasant; My hero was completely different. My hero was thin, lean, pale and sad. Sergei Mikhailovich was no longer young, tall, stout, and, it seemed to me, always cheerful; but, despite the fact, these words of my mother sunk into my imagination, and six years ago, when I was eleven years old and he told me _you_ played with me and called me _ violet girl,_ I sometimes asked not without fear myself, what will I do if he suddenly wants to marry me?

Before dinner, to which Katya added a cream cake and spinach sauce, Sergei Mikhailovich arrived. I saw through the window how he drove up to the house in a small sled, but as soon as he drove around the corner, I hurried into the living room and wanted to pretend that I did not expect him at all. But, hearing the sound of feet in the hall, his loud voice and Katya's steps, I could not resist and went to meet him myself. He, holding Katya by the hand, spoke loudly and smiled. Seeing me, he stopped and looked at me for some time without bowing. I felt embarrassed and felt myself blush.

– Ah! is it you? he said with his resolute and simple manner, spreading his arms and coming up to me. - Is it possible to change like that! how you have grown! Here are those and the violet! You have become a rose.

He took my hand with his big hand and shook me so hard, honestly, it just didn't hurt. I thought that he would kiss my hand, and I bent down to him, but he shook my hand again and looked straight into my eyes with his firm and cheerful look.

I haven't seen him for six years. He has changed a lot; aged, blackened and overgrown with whiskers, which did not go well with him; but there were the same simple methods, an open, honest face with large features, intelligent sparkling eyes, and an affectionate, as if childish, smile.

Five minutes later he ceased to be a guest, but became his own person for all of us, even for people who, it was clear from their helpfulness, were especially happy about his arrival.

He did not behave at all like the neighbors who came after the death of my mother and considered it necessary to be silent and cry while sitting with us; he, on the contrary, was talkative, cheerful, and did not say a word about my mother, so that at first this indifference seemed to me strange and even indecent on the part of such a close person. But then I realized that it was not indifference, but sincerity, and I was grateful for it.

In the evening Katya sat down to pour tea in the old place in the drawing-room, as she used to do with her mother; Sonya and I sat down beside her; old Grigory brought him a pipe he had found, and he, as in the old days, began to pace up and down the room.

- How many terrible changes in this house, as you think! he said, stopping.

“Yes,” said Katya with a sigh and, covering the samovar with a lid, looked at him, ready to burst into tears.

“You remember your father, I think?” he turned to me.

“Not enough,” I replied.

“And how good it would be for you now with him!” he said, looking quietly and thoughtfully at my head above my eyes. “I loved your father very much! he added even more quietly, and it seemed to me that his eyes became shining.

And then God took her! - Katya said and immediately put the napkin on the teapot, took out a handkerchief and began to cry.

“Yes, terrible changes in this house,” he repeated, turning away. “Sonya, show me the toys,” he added after a while and went out into the hall. I looked at Katya with tear-filled eyes when he left.

- This is such a good friend! - she said. And indeed, somehow I felt warm and good from the sympathy of this stranger and good man.

Sonya's squeaking and his fussing with her were heard from the living room. I sent him tea; and one could hear how he sat down at the pianoforte and began to beat the keys with Sonya's little hands.

I was pleased that he addressed me in such a simple and friendly-imperious manner; I got up and walked over to him.

“Play this,” he said, opening Beethoven's notebook to the adagio of the quasi una fantasia sonata. “Let’s see how you play,” he added, and walked away with a glass to a corner of the hall.

For some reason, I felt that it was impossible for me to refuse and make prefaces with him, that I was playing badly; I obediently sat down at the clavichord and began to play as well as I could, although I was afraid of the court, knowing that he understood and loved music. The adagio was in the tone of that feeling of reminiscence that was evoked by the conversation over tea, and I seemed to play decently. But he wouldn't let me play the _scherzo_. “No, you don’t play well,” he said, coming up to me, “leave that one, but the first one is not bad. You seem to understand music." This moderate praise pleased me so much that I even blushed. It was so new and pleasant for me that he, my father's friend and equal, spoke to me one on one seriously, and no longer as with a child, as before. Katya went upstairs to put Sonya to bed, and the two of us remained in the hall.

He told me about my father, about how he got along with him, how they lived happily once, when I was still sitting at books and toys; and my father in his stories for the first time seemed to me a simple and sweet man, as I had not known him until now. He also asked me about what I like, what I read, what I intend to do, and gave advice. He was now for me not a joker and a merry fellow who teased me and made toys, but a serious, simple and loving person, for whom I felt an involuntary respect and sympathy. It was easy and pleasant for me, and at the same time I felt an involuntary tension when talking to him. I was afraid for my every word; I wanted so much to earn his love myself, which was already acquired by me only because I was my father's daughter.

After putting Sonya to bed, Katya joined us and complained to him about my apathy, about which I did not say anything.

“She didn’t tell me the most important thing,” he said, smiling and shaking his head reproachfully at me.

- What to tell! - I said, - it's very boring, and it will pass. (It really seemed to me now that not only would my melancholy pass, but that it had already passed and that it had never been.)

“It’s not good not to be able to endure loneliness,” he said, “are you really a young lady?

“Of course, young lady,” I answered, laughing.

- No, a bad young lady who is only alive while they admire her, and as soon as one is left, she sinks, and nothing is sweet to her; everything is just for show, but nothing for yourself.

“You have a good opinion of me,” I said, to say something.

- Not! - he said, after a pause for a while, - it’s not for nothing that you look like your father, you _have_, _-_ and his kind, attentive look again flattered me and joyfully embarrassed me.

It was only now that I noticed, because of his seemingly cheerful face, this look that belonged to him alone - at first clear, and then more and more attentive and somewhat sad.

“You shouldn’t and shouldn’t be bored,” he said, “you have music that you understand, books, learning, you have a whole life ahead of you, for which now you can only prepare so as not to regret later. In a year it will be too late.

He spoke to me like a father or an uncle, and I felt that he was constantly held back to be on a par with me. I was both offended that he considered me below himself, and pleased that for one of me he considers it necessary to try to be different.

The rest of the evening he talked about business with Katya.

“Well, goodbye, dear friends,” he said, getting up and coming up to me and taking my hand.

- When will we see you again? Katya asked.

“In the spring,” he answered, continuing to hold my hand, “now I will go to Danilovka (our other village); I’ll find out there, I’ll arrange what I can, I’ll stop by Moscow - on my own business, and we’ll see each other in the summer.

- Well, why are you so long? I said terribly sad; and indeed, I hoped to see him every day, and I suddenly felt sorry and afraid that my longing would return again. It must have been expressed in my look and tone.

- Yes; do more, don’t be moping,” he said, in what seemed to me a too coldly simple tone. “And in the spring I will examine you,” he added, releasing my hand and not looking at me.

In the hall, where we stood seeing him off, he hurried on, putting on his fur coat, and again glanced around me. “In vain he tries! I thought. "Does he really think I'm so pleased to have him look at me?" He is a good man, very good... but that's all."

However, that evening, Katya and I did not fall asleep for a long time and everyone talked, not about him, but about how we would spend this summer, where and how we would live the winter. scary question: why? - no longer seemed to me. It seemed to me very simple and clear that one had to live in order to be happy, and there was much happiness in the future. As if suddenly our old, gloomy pokrovskiy house was filled with life and light.

Meanwhile, spring came. My former melancholy passed away and was replaced by a dreamy springtime melancholy of incomprehensible hopes and desires. Although I didn’t live the way I did at the beginning of winter, but occupied myself with Sonya, and music, and reading, I often went to the garden and for a long, long time wandered alone along the alleys or sat on a bench, God knows what, thinking, wishing and hoping . Sometimes for whole nights, especially when I was on my period, I would sit until morning at the window of my room, sometimes in one blouse, quietly from Katya, I would go out into the garden and run through the dew to the pond, and once I even went out into the field and alone at night went around the whole garden around .

Now it is difficult for me to remember and understand the dreams that then filled my imagination. Even when I remember, I can’t believe that these were definitely my dreams. So they were strange and far from life.

At the end of May, Sergei Mikhailovich, as promised, returned from his trip.

The first time he arrived in the evening, when we did not expect him at all. We sat on the terrace and were going to drink tea. The garden was already full of greenery, nightingales had already settled in the overgrown flower beds for all petrovkas. Curly lilac bushes here and there seemed to have been sprinkled on top with something white and purple. These flowers were about to bloom. The foliage of the birch alley was all transparent in the setting sun. There was fresh shade on the terrace. Strong evening dew should have fallen on the grass. In the yard behind the garden the last sounds of the day were heard, the noise of the driven herd; fool Nikon rode along the path in front of the terrace with a barrel, and a cold jet of water from a watering can ink circles around the dug-up earth near the trunks of dahlias and props. On our terrace, on a white tablecloth, a light-cleaned samovar gleamed and boiled, there were cream, pretzels, and biscuits. Katia plump hands washed the cups at home. I, without waiting for tea and hungry after bathing, ate bread with thick fresh cream. I was wearing a canvas blouse with open sleeves, and a handkerchief was tied around my head through my wet hair. Katya was the first to see him through the window.

- BUT! Sergei Mikhailovich! she said, “we were just talking about you.

I got up and wanted to leave to change, but he caught me while I was already at the door.

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy

Part one

We wore mourning for our mother, who died in the autumn, and lived all winter in the country, alone with Katya and Sonya.

Katya was an old friend of the house, the governess who nursed us all, and whom I remembered and loved from as long as I could remember myself. Sonya was my younger sister. We spent a gloomy and sad winter in our old Pokrovsky house. The weather was cold and windy, so that the snowdrifts piled up above the windows; the windows were almost always cold and dim, and for almost a whole winter we did not go anywhere or go anywhere. Few people came to us; Yes, whoever came did not add fun and joy to our house. Everyone had sad faces, everyone spoke quietly, as if afraid to wake someone up, did not laugh, sighed and often cried, looking at me and especially at little Sonya in a black dress. Death still seemed to be felt in the house; sadness and horror of death were in the air. Mother's room was locked, and I felt terrible, and something pulled me to look into this cold and empty room when I went to sleep past her.

I was then seventeen years old, and in the very year of her death my mother wanted to move to the city to take me out. The loss of my mother was a great grief for me, but I must admit that because of this grief, it was also felt that I was young, good, as everyone told me, but for nothing, in solitude, I kill the second winter in the village. Before the end of winter, this feeling of longing of loneliness and simply boredom increased to such an extent that I did not leave the room, did not open the piano and did not pick up books. When Katya persuaded me to do this or that, I answered: I don’t want to, I can’t, but in my heart I said: why? Why do anything when my best time is wasted so much? What for? And why there was no other answer than tears.

I was told that I lost weight and became ugly at this time, but it did not even interest me. What for? for whom? It seemed to me that my whole life should pass in this lonely wilderness and helpless anguish, from which I myself, alone, had no strength and even no desire to get out. At the end of winter, Katya began to fear for me and decided to take me abroad at all costs. But this needed money, and we hardly knew what was left of us after our mother, and every day we were waiting for a guardian who was supposed to come and sort out our affairs.

In March, a guardian arrived.

- Well, thank God! - Katya once said to me, when I, like a shadow, idle, without thought, without desires, went from corner to corner, - Sergey Mikhailych came, sent to ask about us and wanted to be at dinner. Shake yourself up, my Masha," she added, "or what will he think of you? He loved all of you so much.

Sergei Mikhailovich was a close neighbor of ours and a friend of our late father, although much younger than he was. In addition to the fact that his arrival changed our plans and made it possible to leave the village, from childhood I got used to love and respect him, and Katya, advising me to shake things up, guessed that of all the people I knew, it would be most painful for me to appear in an unfavorable light in front of Sergei Mikhailovich . In addition to the fact that I, like everyone in the house, from Katya and Sonya, his goddaughter, to the last coachman, loved him out of habit, he had a special meaning for me from one word spoken by my mother in my presence. She said that she would like such a husband for me. Then it seemed to me surprising and even unpleasant; My hero was completely different. My hero was thin, lean, pale and sad. Sergei Mikhailovich was no longer young, tall, stout, and, it seemed to me, always cheerful; but, despite the fact that these words of my mother sunk into my imagination, and even six years ago, when I was eleven years old and he told me you, played with me and called me the violet girl, I sometimes asked myself, not without fear, what will I do if he suddenly wants to marry me?

Before dinner, to which Katya added a cream cake and spinach sauce, Sergei Mikhailovich arrived. I saw through the window how he drove up to the house in a small sled, but as soon as he drove around the corner, I hurried into the living room and wanted to pretend that I did not expect him at all. But, hearing the sound of feet in the hall, his loud voice and Katya's steps, I could not resist and went to meet him myself. He, holding Katya by the hand, spoke loudly and smiled. Seeing me, he stopped and looked at me for some time without bowing. I felt embarrassed and felt myself blush.

– Ah! is it you? he said with his resolute and simple manner, spreading his arms and coming up to me. - Is it possible to change like that! how you have grown! Here are those and the violet! You have become a rose.

He took my hand with his big hand and shook me so hard, honestly, it just didn't hurt. I thought that he would kiss my hand, and I bent down to him, but he shook my hand again and looked straight into my eyes with his firm and cheerful look.

I haven't seen him for six years. He has changed a lot; aged, blackened and overgrown with whiskers, which did not go well with him; but there were the same simple methods, an open, honest face with large features, intelligent sparkling eyes, and an affectionate, as if childish, smile.

Five minutes later he ceased to be a guest, but became his own person for all of us, even for people who, it was clear from their helpfulness, were especially happy about his arrival.

He did not behave at all like the neighbors who came after the death of my mother and considered it necessary to be silent and cry while sitting with us; he, on the contrary, was talkative, cheerful, and did not say a word about my mother, so that at first this indifference seemed to me strange and even indecent on the part of such a close person. But then I realized that it was not indifference, but sincerity, and I was grateful for it.

In the evening Katya sat down to pour tea in the old place in the drawing-room, as she used to do with her mother; Sonya and I sat down beside her; old Grigory brought him a pipe he had found, and he, as in the old days, began to pace up and down the room.

- How many terrible changes in this house, as you think! he said, stopping.

“Yes,” said Katya with a sigh and, covering the samovar with a lid, looked at him, ready to burst into tears.

“You remember your father, I think?” he turned to me.

“Not enough,” I replied.

“And how good it would be for you now with him!” he said, looking quietly and thoughtfully at my head above my eyes. “I loved your father very much! he added even more quietly, and it seemed to me that his eyes became shining.

And then God took her! - Katya said and immediately put the napkin on the teapot, took out a handkerchief and began to cry.

“Yes, terrible changes in this house,” he repeated, turning away. “Sonya, show me the toys,” he added after a while and went out into the hall. I looked at Katya with tear-filled eyes when he left.

- This is such a good friend! - she said. And indeed, I somehow felt warm and good from the sympathy of this strange and good person.

Sonya's squeaking and his fussing with her were heard from the living room. I sent him tea; and one could hear how he sat down at the pianoforte and began to beat the keys with Sonya's little hands.

I was pleased that he addressed me in such a simple and friendly-imperious manner; I got up and walked over to him.

“Play this,” he said, opening Beethoven's notebook to the adagio of the quasi una fantasia sonata. “Let’s see how you play,” he added, and walked away with a glass to a corner of the hall.

For some reason, I felt that it was impossible for me to refuse and make prefaces with him, that I was playing badly; I obediently sat down at the clavichord and began to play as well as I could, although I was afraid of the court, knowing that he understood and loved music. The adagio was in the tone of that feeling of reminiscence that was evoked by the conversation over tea, and I seemed to play decently. But he wouldn't let me play the scherzo. “No, you don’t play well,” he said, coming up to me, “leave that one, but the first one is not bad. You seem to understand music." This moderate praise pleased me so much that I even blushed. It was so new and pleasant for me that he, my father's friend and equal, spoke to me one on one seriously, and no longer as with a child, as before. Katya went upstairs to put Sonya to bed, and the two of us remained in the hall.

He told me about my father, about how he got along with him, how they lived happily once, when I was still sitting at books and toys; and my father in his stories for the first time seemed to me a simple and sweet man, as I had not known him until now. He also asked me about what I like, what I read, what I intend to do, and gave advice. He was now for me not a joker and a merry fellow who teased me and made toys, but a serious, simple and loving person, for whom I felt an involuntary respect and sympathy. It was easy and pleasant for me, and at the same time I felt an involuntary tension when talking to him. I was afraid for my every word; I wanted so much to earn his love myself, which was already acquired by me only because I was my father's daughter.

After putting Sonya to bed, Katya joined us and complained to him about my apathy, about which I did not say anything.

“She didn’t tell me the most important thing,” he said, smiling and shaking his head reproachfully at me.

- What to tell! - I said, - it's very boring, and it will pass. (It really seemed to me now that not only would my melancholy pass, but that it had already passed and that it had never been.)

“It’s not good not to be able to endure loneliness,” he said, “are you really a young lady?

“Of course, young lady,” I answered, laughing.

- No, a bad young lady who is only alive while they admire her, and as soon as one is left, she sinks, and nothing is sweet to her; everything is just for show, but nothing for yourself.

“You have a good opinion of me,” I said, to say something.

- Not! - ...

By decision of the copyright holder, the book "Family Happiness" is presented as a fragment