First Love, and Other Stories

THE guests had long since departed. The clock struck half-past twelve. There remained in the room only the host, Sergy i Nikol evitch, and Vlad mir Petr vitch. The host rang and ordered the remains of the supper to be removed.-"So then, the matter is settled,"-he said, ensconcing himself more deeply in his arm-chair, and lighting a cigar: -"each of us is to narrate the history of his first love. 'Tis your turn, Sergy i Nikol evitch." Sergy i Nikol evitch, a rather corpulent man, with a plump, fair-skinned face, first looked at the host, then raised his eyes to the ceiling.-"I had no first love,"-he began at last: -"I began straight off with the second." "How was that?" "Very simply. I was eighteen years of age when, for the first time, I dangled after a very charming young lady; but I courted her as though it were no new thing to me: exactly as I courted others afterward. To tell the truth, I fell in love, for the first and last time, at the age of six, with my nurse;-but that is a very long time ago. The details of our relations have been erased from my memory; but even if I remembered them, who would be interested in them?"