lelechka was about to fall asleep. no sooner had she climbed into her little bed, protected by a network on all sides, than her eyes began to close from fatigue. her mother covered her with a blue blanket. lelechka drew her sweet little hands from under the blanket and stretched them out to embrace her mother. her mother bent down. lelechka, with a tender expression on her sleepy face, kissed her mother and let her head fall on the pillow. as her hands hid themselves under the blanket lelechka whispered: “the hands tiu-tiu!”

the mother’s heart seemed to stop—lelechka lay there so small, so frail, so quiet. lelechka smiled gently, closed her eyes and said quietly: “the eyes tiu-tiu!”

then even more quietly: “lelechka tiu-tiu!”

with these words she fell asleep, her face pressing the pillow. she seemed so small and so frail under the blanket that covered her. her mother looked at her with sad eyes.

serafima aleksandrovna remained standing over lelechka’s bed a long while, and she kept looking at lelechka with tenderness and fear.

“i’m a mother: is it possible that i shouldn’t be able to protect her?” she thought, as she imagined the various ills that might befall lelechka.

she prayed long that night, but the prayer did not relieve her sadness.