A little sharp-nosed woman with black hair and keen eyes even in her old age, Marfa Timofyevna walked briskly, held herself upright and spoke quickly and clearly in a sharp ringing voice.

She always wore a white cap and a white dressing-jacket.
"What's the matter with you ?" she asked Marya Dmitrievna suddenly.

"What are you sighing about, pray ?" "Nothing," answered the latter.

"What exquisite clouds!" "You feel sorry for them, eh ?" Marya Dmitrievna made no reply.
"Why is it Gedeonovsky does not come ?" observed Marfa Timofyevna, moving her knitting needles quickly.

(She was knitting a large woolen scarf.) "He would have sighed with you--or at least he'd have had some fib to tell you." "How hard you always are on him! Sergei Petrovitch is a worthy man." "Worthy!" repeated the old lady scornfully.
"And how devoted he was to my poor husband!" observed Marya Dmitrievna; "even now he cannot speak of him without emotion." "And no wonder! It was he who picked him out of the gutter," muttered Marfa Timofyevna, and her knitting needles moved faster than ever.
"He looks so meek and mild," she began again, "with his grey head, but he no sooner opens his mouth than out comes a lie or a slander.