Lark was a good girl, a very good one, and the only joy of their lives. Akush kept repeating this to himself and to others. He knew the poor thing wasn't pretty, and that had pained him for a long time, but then he saw her differently. He washed away her image, covered it with a sharp mist, thought nothing of her, and loved her just the same to infinity. Five years, perhaps ten, had passed since he had given up all hope, and it had never occurred to him that he would marry her. But when that event happened to the girl: Lark changed her hairstyle, put on her winter coat as autumn passed, and put on new clothes with the arrival of spring, Akush felt sad because he was unaccustomed to seeing her like that. And now he suffered too. He pitied Lark, and to assuage his pity, he tormented himself. He looked at her attentively, scrutinizing her appearance in an almost insulting way: this unfamiliar face that was both fat and thin, the fleshy nose, the wide nostrils like a horse's, the harsh, manly eyelashes, the small, praying eyes that reminded him of his own. He had never understood women in his entire life, but he felt strongly that his daughter was ugly. She was not only ugly now, but a true spinster, old and withered. All this was revealed only under the rosy flood of light from the parasol, in this stage-like illumination. Like a caterpillar under a rosebush, he thought. She went, she went in her burgundy-grey dress, and when they reached Széchenyi Square—the only large square in Charsig, its marketplace, its center—he unconsciously took a few steps ahead of her so as not to have to walk beside her.