There was something rugged and dogged which the girl had inherited from her father--that Slavonic love of pain for its own sake--which makes Russian patriots and thinkers strange, incomprehensible beings.
"I question it, Catrina," said the elder lady; "but perhaps it is a matter of health.

Dr.Stantovitch told me, quite between ourselves, that if I had given way to my grief at the time of the trial he would not have held himself responsible for the consequences." "Dr.Stantovitch," said Catrina, "is a humbug." "My dear child!" exclaimed the countess, "he attends all the noble ladies of Petersburg." "Precisely," answered Catrina.
She was woman enough to enter into futile arguments with her mother, and man enough to despise herself for doing it.
"Why do you want to go back to Thors so soon ?" murmured the elder lady, with a little sigh of despair.

She knew she was playing a losing game very badly.

She was mentally shuddering at the recollection of former sleigh-journeying from Tver to Thors.
"Because I am sure father would like us to be there this hard winter." "But your father is in Siberia," put in the countess, which remark was ignored.
"Because if we do not go before the snow begins to melt we shall have to do the journey in carriages over bad roads, which is sure to knock you up.

Because our place is at Thors, and no one wants us here.