In the drawing room the conversation
was still going on.
"Ah, my dear,"
said the countess,
"my life is not all roses either.
Don't I know that at the rate
we are living our means won't last long?
It's all the Club and his easygoing nature.
Even in the country do we get any rest?
Theatricals, hunting, and heaven knows what besides!
But don't let's talk about me;
tell me how you managed everything.
I often wonder at you,
Annette-
how at your age you can
rush off alone in a carriage to Moscow,
to Petersburg, to those ministers and great people,
and know how to deal with them all!
It's quite astonishing.
How did you get things settled?
I couldn't possibly, do it."
"Ah, my love,"
answered Anna Mikhaylovna,
"God grant you never know
what it is to be left a widow without means
and with a son you love to distraction!
One learns many things then,"
she added with a certain pride.
"That lawsuit taught me much.
When I want to see one of
those big people I write a note:
'Princess So-and-So desires an
interview with So and-So,'
and then I take a cab and go myself two,three,
or four times- till I get what I want.
I don't mind what they think of me."
"Well, and to whom did you apply about Bory?"
asked the countess.
"You see yours is already an officer in the Guards,
while my Nicholas is going as a cadet.
There's no one to interest himself for him.
To whom did you apply?"
"To Prince Vasili. He was so kind.
He at once agreed to everything,
and put the matter before the Emperor,"
said Princess Anna
Mikhaylovna enthusiastically,
quite forgetting all the humiliation
she had endured to gain her end.