When her first baby was born, she being already divorced from her husband, it died at once; and her relations, knowing how susceptible she was and fearing that this news might kill her, changed her dead child for one who had been born that night in the same house in Petersburg, the daughter of a chef at a palace. That child was Varenka.
Il suo primo bambino, nato dopo il divorzio, era morto appena venuto al mondo, e i parenti della signora Stahl, conoscendo la sua sensibilità e temendo che questa notizia potesse ucciderla, sostituirono il bambino con la figlia del cuoco di corte, nata in quella stessa notte e nella stessa casa, a Pietroburgo.