For the first time in my life I did not think of myself as a traveller who, passing for many years through countries that did not greatly interest him, feels his aches and pains, his money troubles, his discomforts and little personal irritations.

Then suddenly he crosses the border and the new land so possesses him that he is only a vessel for its beauty, to absorb it, to hold it, to carry the burden of it in safety....

I crossed the border.

For four years after that I pursued that enchanted journey.
Why did I love her?
Who can say?
Andrey Vassilievitch adored her with an utter devotion and had done so since the first moment of meeting her.

I have known many others, women and men, who felt that devotion.
On that first evening we were very quiet--only another woman, a cousin of hers.