Katerina Lvovna walks through empty rooms, starts yawning out of boredom and climbs the stairs to her marital bedchamber, arranged on a high small mezzanine. She'll sit here too, watch how hemp is hung or grain is poured out at the barns, and she'll yawn again, and she's glad: she'll take a nap for an hour or two, and wake up — again the same Russian boredom, the boredom of a merchant's house, from which it's fun, they say, even to strangle herself. Katerina Lvovna was not a fan of reading, and besides, there were no books in the house except for the Kiev paterik. Katerina Lvovna lived a boring life in her rich mother-in-law's house for five whole years of her life with an unfriendly husband; but no one, as usual, paid the slightest attention to this boredom of hers. On the sixth spring of Katerina Lvovna's marriage, the Izmailovs' mill dam burst. At that time, as if on purpose, a lot of work was brought to the mill, but a huge hole was made: the water went under the lower bed of the idle tower, and it was not possible to capture it with an ambulance. Zinovy Borisych drove people to the mill from the whole neighborhood and sat there himself without leaving; The city affairs were already ruled by an old man, and Katerina Lvovna was at home all day alone. At first, it was even more boring for her without her husband, but then it seemed even better: she became freer alone. Her heart had never really been in him, and without him, there was at least one less commander over her. Once Katerina Lvovna was sitting on her tower under the window, yawning, yawning, not thinking about anything specific, and finally she was ashamed to yawn. And the weather is so wonderful outside: it's warm, bright, fun, and through the green wooden lattice of the garden you can see how different birds are fluttering through the trees from twig to twig. "What am I really yawning at? Katerina Lvovna thought. "Well, at least I'll get up and take a walk in the yard or go to the garden." Katerina Lvovna put on an old damask fur coat and went out.