The position seemed hopeless.

But in the Oblonskys' household, as in all families indeed, there was one inconspicuous but most valuable and useful person, Marya Philimonovna.

She soothed her mistress, assured her that everything would _come round_ (it was her expression, and Matvey had borrowed it from her), and without fuss or hurry proceeded to set to work herself.

She had immediately made friends with the bailiff's wife, and on the very first day she drank tea with her and the bailiff under the acacias, and reviewed all the circumstances of the position.

Very soon Marya Philimonovna had established her club, so to say, under the acacias, and there it was, in this club, consisting of the bailiff's wife, the village elder, and the counting house clerk, that the difficulties of existence were gradually smoothed away, and in a week's time everything actually had come round.