But toward evening the women awaken
and get ready for the following night.
And so without end, day after day, for months and years, they live
a strange, incredible life in their public harems, outcast by
society, accursed by the family, victims of the social
temperament, cloacas for the excess of the city's sensuality, the
guardians of the honour of the family--four hundred foolish, lazy,
hysterical, barren women.
CHAPTER II.
Two in the afternoon. In the second-rate, two-rouble establishment
of Anna Markovna everything is plunged in sleep. The large square
parlor with mirrors in gilt frames, with a score of plush chairs
placed decorously along the walls, with oleograph pictures of
Makovsky's Feast of the Russian Noblemen, and Bathing, with a
crystal lustre in the middle, is also sleeping, and in the quiet
and semi-darkness it seems unwontedly pensive, austere, strangely
sad. Yesterday here, as on every evening, lights burned, the most
rollicking of music rang out, blue tobacco smoke swirled, men and
women careered in couples, shaking their hips and throwing their
legs on high.
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