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diff --git a/9911-h/9911-h.htm b/9911-h/9911-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d3bd0ca --- /dev/null +++ b/9911-h/9911-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,13425 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" +"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Torrents of Spring, by Ivan Turgenev</title> + +<style type="text/css"> + +body { margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; + text-align: justify; } + +h1, h2, h3, h4, h5 {text-align: center; font-style: normal; font-weight: +normal; line-height: 1.5; margin-top: .5em; margin-bottom: .5em;} + +h1 {font-size: 300%; + margin-top: 0.6em; + margin-bottom: 0.6em; + letter-spacing: 0.12em; + word-spacing: 0.2em; + text-indent: 0em;} +h2 {font-size: 150%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} +h3 {font-size: 150%; margin-top: 2em;} +h4 {font-size: 120%;} +h5 {font-size: 110%;} + +hr {width: 80%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;} + +div.chapter {page-break-before: always; margin-top: 4em;} + +p {text-indent: 1em; + margin-top: 0.25em; + margin-bottom: 0.25em; } + +.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} + +p.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: 90%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.letter {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +p.center {text-align: center; + text-indent: 0em; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.right {text-align: right; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.footnote {font-size: 90%; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +sup { vertical-align: top; font-size: 0.6em; } + +div.fig { display:block; + margin:0 auto; + text-align:center; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em;} + +a:link {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:visited {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:hover {color:red} + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + +<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Torrents of Spring, by Ivan Turgenev</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The Torrents of Spring</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Ivan Turgenev</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Translator: Constance Garnett</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: October 30, 2003 [eBook #9911]<br /> +[Most recently updated: December 17, 2022]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Keren Vergon, William Flis, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TORRENTS OF SPRING ***</div> + +<h1>The Torrents of Spring</h1> + +<h2>by Ivan Turgenev</h2> + +<p class="center"> +Translated from the Russian +</p> + +<h4>BY CONSTANCE GARNETT</h4> + +<p class="center"> +1897 +</p> + +<hr /> + +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<table summary="" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto"> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap01">THE TORRENTS OF SPRING</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap02">FIRST LOVE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap03">MUMU</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a>THE TORRENTS OF SPRING</h2> + +<p class="poem"> + “Years of gladness,<br/> + Days of joy,<br/> + Like the torrents of spring<br/> + They hurried away.”<br/> +<br/> + —<i>From an Old Ballad</i>. +</p> + +<p> +… At two o’clock in the night he had gone back to his study. He had +dismissed the servant after the candles were lighted, and throwing himself into +a low chair by the hearth, he hid his face in both hands. +</p> + +<p> +Never had he felt such weariness of body and of spirit. He had passed the whole +evening in the company of charming ladies and cultivated men; some of the +ladies were beautiful, almost all the men were distinguished by intellect or +talent; he himself had talked with great success, even with brilliance … and, +for all that, never yet had the <i>taedium vitae</i> of which the Romans talked +of old, the “disgust for life,” taken hold of him with such +irresistible, such suffocating force. Had he been a little younger, he would +have cried with misery, weariness, and exasperation: a biting, burning +bitterness, like the bitter of wormwood, filled his whole soul. A sort of +clinging repugnance, a weight of loathing closed in upon him on all sides like +a dark night of autumn; and he did not know how to get free from this darkness, +this bitterness. Sleep it was useless to reckon upon; he knew he should not +sleep. +</p> + +<p> +He fell to thinking … slowly, listlessly, wrathfully. He thought of the vanity, +the uselessness, the vulgar falsity of all things human. All the stages of +man’s life passed in order before his mental gaze (he had himself lately +reached his fifty-second year), and not one found grace in his eyes. Everywhere +the same ever-lasting pouring of water into a sieve, the ever-lasting beating +of the air, everywhere the same self-deception—half in good faith, half +conscious—any toy to amuse the child, so long as it keeps him from +crying. And then, all of a sudden, old age drops down like snow on the head, +and with it the ever-growing, ever-gnawing, and devouring dread of death … and +the plunge into the abyss! Lucky indeed if life works out so to the end! May +be, before the end, like rust on iron, sufferings, infirmities come…. He did +not picture life’s sea, as the poets depict it, covered with tempestuous +waves; no, he thought of that sea as a smooth, untroubled surface, stagnant and +transparent to its darkest depths. He himself sits in a little tottering boat, +and down below in those dark oozy depths, like prodigious fishes, he can just +make out the shapes of hideous monsters: all the ills of life, diseases, +sorrows, madness, poverty, blindness…. He gazes, and behold, one of these +monsters separates itself off from the darkness, rises higher and higher, +stands out more and more distinct, more and more loathsomely distinct…. An +instant yet, and the boat that bears him will be overturned! But behold, it +grows dim again, it withdraws, sinks down to the bottom, and there it lies, +faintly stirring in the slime…. But the fated day will come, and it will +overturn the boat. +</p> + +<p> +He shook his head, jumped up from his low chair, took two turns up and down the +room, sat down to the writing-table, and opening one drawer after another, +began to rummage among his papers, among old letters, mostly from women. He +could not have said why he was doing it; he was not looking for +anything—he simply wanted by some kind of external occupation to get away +from the thoughts oppressing him. Opening several letters at random (in one of +them there was a withered flower tied with a bit of faded ribbon), he merely +shrugged his shoulders, and glancing at the hearth, he tossed them on one side, +probably with the idea of burning all this useless rubbish. Hurriedly, +thrusting his hands first into one, and then into another drawer, he suddenly +opened his eyes wide, and slowly bringing out a little octagonal box of +old-fashioned make, he slowly raised its lid. In the box, under two layers of +cotton wool, yellow with age, was a little garnet cross. +</p> + +<p> +For a few instants he looked in perplexity at this cross—suddenly he gave +a faint cry…. Something between regret and delight was expressed in his +features. Such an expression a man’s face wears when he suddenly meets +some one whom he has long lost sight of, whom he has at one time tenderly +loved, and who suddenly springs up before his eyes, still the same, and utterly +transformed by the years. +</p> + +<p> +He got up, and going back to the hearth, he sat down again in the arm-chair, +and again hid his face in his hands…. “Why to-day? just to-day?” +was his thought, and he remembered many things, long since past. +</p> + +<p> +This is what he remembered…. +</p> + +<p> +But first I must mention his name, his father’s name and his +surname. He was called Dimitri Pavlovitch Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +Here follows what he remembered. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p> +It was the summer of 1840. Sanin was in his twenty-second year, and he was in +Frankfort on his way home from Italy to Russia. He was a man of small property, +but independent, almost without family ties. By the death of a distant +relative, he had come into a few thousand roubles, and he had decided to spend +this sum abroad before entering the service, before finally putting on the +government yoke, without which he could not obtain a secure livelihood. Sanin +had carried out this intention, and had fitted things in to such a nicety that +on the day of his arrival in Frankfort he had only just enough money left to +take him back to Petersburg. In the year 1840 there were few railroads in +existence; tourists travelled by diligence. Sanin had taken a place in the +“<i>bei-wagon</i>”; but the diligence did not start till eleven +o’clock in the evening. There was a great deal of time to be got through +before then. Fortunately it was lovely weather, and Sanin after dining at a +hotel, famous in those days, the White Swan, set off to stroll about the town. +He went in to look at Danneker’s Ariadne, which he did not much care for, +visited the house of Goethe, of whose works he had, however, only read +<i>Werter</i>, and that in the French translation. He walked along the bank of +the Maine, and was bored as a well-conducted tourist should be; at last at six +o’clock in the evening, tired, and with dusty boots, he found himself in +one of the least remarkable streets in Frankfort. That street he was fated not +to forget long, long after. On one of its few houses he saw a signboard: +“Giovanni Roselli, Italian confectionery,” was announced upon it. +Sanin went into it to get a glass of lemonade; but in the shop, where, behind +the modest counter, on the shelves of a stained cupboard, recalling a +chemist’s shop, stood a few bottles with gold labels, and as many glass +jars of biscuits, chocolate cakes, and sweetmeats—in this room, there was +not a soul; only a grey cat blinked and purred, sharpening its claws on a tall +wicker chair near the window and a bright patch of colour was made in the +evening sunlight, by a big ball of red wool lying on the floor beside a carved +wooden basket turned upside down. A confused noise was audible in the next +room. Sanin stood a moment, and making the bell on the door ring its loudest, +he called, raising his voice, “Is there no one here?” At that +instant the door from an inner room was thrown open, and Sanin was struck dumb +with amazement. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p> +A young girl of nineteen ran impetuously into the shop, her dark curls hanging +in disorder on her bare shoulders, her bare arms stretched out in front of her. +Seeing Sanin, she rushed up to him at once, seized him by the hand, and pulled +him after her, saying in a breathless voice, “Quick, quick, here, save +him!” Not through disinclination to obey, but simply from excess of +amazement, Sanin did not at once follow the girl. He stood, as it were, rooted +to the spot; he had never in his life seen such a beautiful creature. She +turned towards him, and with such despair in her voice, in her eyes, in the +gesture of her clenched hand, which was lifted with a spasmodic movement to her +pale cheek, she articulated, “Come, come!” that he at once darted +after her to the open door. +</p> + +<p> +In the room, into which he ran behind the girl, on an old-fashioned horse-hair +sofa, lay a boy of fourteen, white all over—white, with a yellowish tinge +like wax or old marble—he was strikingly like the girl, obviously her +brother. His eyes were closed, a patch of shadow fell from his thick black hair +on a forehead like stone, and delicate, motionless eyebrows; between the blue +lips could be seen clenched teeth. He seemed not to be breathing; one arm hung +down to the floor, the other he had tossed above his head. The boy was dressed, +and his clothes were closely buttoned; a tight cravat was twisted round his +neck. +</p> + +<p> +The girl rushed up to him with a wail of distress. “He is dead, he is +dead!” she cried; “he was sitting here just now, talking to +me—and all of a sudden he fell down and became rigid…. My God! can +nothing be done to help him? And mamma not here! Pantaleone, Pantaleone, the +doctor!” she went on suddenly in Italian. “Have you been for the +doctor?” +</p> + +<p> +“Signora, I did not go, I sent Luise,” said a hoarse voice at the +door, and a little bandy-legged old man came hobbling into the room in a +lavender frock coat with black buttons, a high white cravat, short nankeen +trousers, and blue worsted stockings. His diminutive little face was positively +lost in a mass of iron-grey hair. Standing up in all directions, and falling +back in ragged tufts, it gave the old man’s figure a resemblance to a +crested hen—a resemblance the more striking, that under the dark-grey +mass nothing could be distinguished but a beak nose and round yellow eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“Luise will run fast, and I can’t run,” the old man went on +in Italian, dragging his flat gouty feet, shod in high slippers with knots of +ribbon. “I’ve brought some water.” +</p> + +<p> +In his withered, knotted fingers, he clutched a long bottle neck. +</p> + +<p> +“But meanwhile Emil will die!” cried the girl, and holding out her +hand to Sanin, “O, sir, O <i>mein Herr</i>! can’t you do something +for him?” +</p> + +<p> +“He ought to be bled—it’s an apoplectic fit,” observed +the old man addressed as Pantaleone. +</p> + +<p> +Though Sanin had not the slightest notion of medicine, he knew one thing for +certain, that boys of fourteen do not have apoplectic fits. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s a swoon, not a fit,” he said, turning to Pantaleone. +“Have you got any brushes?” +</p> + +<p> +The old man raised his little face. “Eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“Brushes, brushes,” repeated Sanin in German and in French. +“Brushes,” he added, making as though he would brush his clothes. +</p> + +<p> +The little old man understood him at last. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, brushes! <i>Spazzette</i>! to be sure we have!” +</p> + +<p> +“Bring them here; we will take off his coat and try rubbing him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good … <i>Benone</i>! And ought we not to sprinkle water on his +head?” +</p> + +<p> +“No … later on; get the brushes now as quick as you can.” +</p> + +<p> +Pantaleone put the bottle on the floor, ran out and returned at once with two +brushes, one a hair-brush, and one a clothes-brush. A curly poodle followed him +in, and vigorously wagging its tail, it looked up inquisitively at the old man, +the girl, and even Sanin, as though it wanted to know what was the meaning of +all this fuss. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin quickly took the boy’s coat off, unbuttoned his collar, and pushed +up his shirt-sleeves, and arming himself with a brush, he began brushing his +chest and arms with all his might. Pantaleone as zealously brushed away with +the other—the hair-brush—at his boots and trousers. The girl flung +herself on her knees by the sofa, and, clutching her head in both hands, +fastened her eyes, not an eyelash quivering, on her brother. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin rubbed on, and kept stealing glances at her. Mercy! what a beautiful +creature she was! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p> +Her nose was rather large, but handsome, aquiline-shaped; her upper lip was +shaded by a light down; but then the colour of her face, smooth, uniform, like +ivory or very pale milky amber, the wavering shimmer of her hair, like that of +the Judith of Allorio in the Palazzo-Pitti; and above all, her eyes, dark-grey, +with a black ring round the pupils, splendid, triumphant eyes, even now, when +terror and distress dimmed their lustre…. Sanin could not help recalling the +marvellous country he had just come from…. But even in Italy he had never met +anything like her! The girl drew slow, uneven breaths; she seemed between each +breath to be waiting to see whether her brother would not begin to breathe. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin went on rubbing him, but he did not only watch the girl. The original +figure of Pantaleone drew his attention too. The old man was quite exhausted +and panting; at every movement of the brush he hopped up and down and groaned +noisily, while his immense tufts of hair, soaked with perspiration, flapped +heavily from side to side, like the roots of some strong plant, torn up by the +water. +</p> + +<p> +“You’d better, at least, take off his boots,” Sanin was just +saying to him. +</p> + +<p> +The poodle, probably excited by the unusualness of all the proceedings, +suddenly sank on to its front paws and began barking. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Tartaglia—canaglia</i>!” the old man hissed at it. But at +that instant the girl’s face was transformed. Her eyebrows rose, her eyes +grew wider, and shone with joy. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin looked round … A flush had over-spread the lad’s face; his eyelids +stirred … his nostrils twitched. He drew in a breath through his still clenched +teeth, sighed…. +</p> + +<p> +“Emil!” cried the girl … “Emilio mio!” +</p> + +<p> +Slowly the big black eyes opened. They still had a dazed look, but already +smiled faintly; the same faint smile hovered on his pale lips. Then he moved +the arm that hung down, and laid it on his chest. +</p> + +<p> +“Emilio!” repeated the girl, and she got up. The expression on her +face was so tense and vivid, that it seemed that in an instant either she would +burst into tears or break into laughter. +</p> + +<p> +“Emil! what is it? Emil!” was heard outside, and a neatly-dressed +lady with silvery grey hair and a dark face came with rapid steps into the +room. +</p> + +<p> +A middle-aged man followed her; the head of a maid-servant was visible over +their shoulders. +</p> + +<p> +The girl ran to meet them. +</p> + +<p> +“He is saved, mother, he is alive!” she cried, impulsively +embracing the lady who had just entered. +</p> + +<p> +“But what is it?” she repeated. “I come back … and all of a +sudden I meet the doctor and Luise …” +</p> + +<p> +The girl proceeded to explain what had happened, while the doctor went up to +the invalid who was coming more and more to himself, and was still smiling: he +seemed to be beginning to feel shy at the commotion he had caused. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve been using friction with brushes, I see,” said the +doctor to Sanin and Pantaleone, “and you did very well…. A very good idea +… and now let us see what further measures …” +</p> + +<p> +He felt the youth’s pulse. “H’m! show me your tongue!” +</p> + +<p> +The lady bent anxiously over him. He smiled still more ingenuously, raised his +eyes to her, and blushed a little. +</p> + +<p> +It struck Sanin that he was no longer wanted; he went into the shop. But before +he had time to touch the handle of the street-door, the girl was once more +before him; she stopped him. +</p> + +<p> +“You are going,” she began, looking warmly into his face; “I +will not keep you, but you must be sure to come to see us this evening: we are +so indebted to you—you, perhaps, saved my brother’s life, we want +to thank you—mother wants to. You must tell us who you are, you must +rejoice with us …” +</p> + +<p> +“But I am leaving for Berlin to-day,” Sanin faltered out. +</p> + +<p> +“You will have time though,” the girl rejoined eagerly. “Come +to us in an hour’s time to drink a cup of chocolate with us. You promise? +I must go back to him! You will come?” +</p> + +<p> +What could Sanin do? +</p> + +<p> +“I will come,” he replied. +</p> + +<p> +The beautiful girl pressed his hand, fluttered away, and he found himself in +the street. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p> +When Sanin, an hour and a half later, returned to the Rosellis’ shop he +was received there like one of the family. Emilio was sitting on the same sofa, +on which he had been rubbed; the doctor had prescribed him medicine and +recommended “great discretion in avoiding strong emotions” as being +a subject of nervous temperament with a tendency to weakness of the heart. He +had previously been liable to fainting-fits; but never had he lost +consciousness so completely and for so long. However, the doctor declared that +all danger was over. Emil, as was only suitable for an invalid, was dressed in +a comfortable dressing-gown; his mother wound a blue woollen wrap round his +neck; but he had a cheerful, almost a festive air; indeed everything had a +festive air. Before the sofa, on a round table, covered with a clean cloth, +towered a huge china coffee-pot, filled with fragrant chocolate, and encircled +by cups, decanters of liqueur, biscuits and rolls, and even flowers; six +slender wax candles were burning in two old-fashioned silver chandeliers; on +one side of the sofa, a comfortable lounge-chair offered its soft embraces, and +in this chair they made Sanin sit. All the inhabitants of the +confectioner’s shop, with whom he had made acquaintance that day, were +present, not excluding the poodle, Tartaglia, and the cat; they all seemed +happy beyond expression; the poodle positively sneezed with delight, only the +cat was coy and blinked sleepily as before. They made Sanin tell them who he +was, where he came from, and what was his name; when he said he was a Russian, +both the ladies were a little surprised, uttered ejaculations of wonder, and +declared with one voice that he spoke German splendidly; but if he preferred to +speak French, he might make use of that language, as they both understood it +and spoke it well. Sanin at once availed himself of this suggestion. +“Sanin! Sanin!” The ladies would never have expected that a Russian +surname could be so easy to pronounce. His Christian +name—“Dimitri”—they liked very much too. The elder lady +observed that in her youth she had heard a fine opera—“Demetrio e +Polibio”—but that “Dimitri” was much nicer than +“Demetrio.” In this way Sanin talked for about an hour. The ladies +on their side initiated him into all the details of their own life. The talking +was mostly done by the mother, the lady with grey hair. Sanin learnt from her +that her name was Leonora Roselli; that she had lost her husband, Giovanni +Battista Roselli, who had settled in Frankfort as a confectioner +twenty-five years ago; that Giovanni Battista had come from Vicenza and +had been a most excellent, though fiery and irascible man, and a republican +withal! At those words Signora Roselli pointed to his portrait, painted in +oil-colours, and hanging over the sofa. It must be presumed that the painter, +“also a republican!” as Signora Roselli observed with a sigh, had +not fully succeeded in catching a likeness, for in his portrait the late +Giovanni Battista appeared as a morose and gloomy brigand, after the style of +Rinaldo Rinaldini! Signora Roselli herself had come from “the ancient and +splendid city of Parma where there is the wonderful cupola, painted by the +immortal Correggio!” But from her long residence in Germany she had +become almost completely Germanised. Then she added, mournfully shaking her +head, that all she had left was <i>this</i> daughter and <i>this</i> son +(pointing to each in turn with her finger); that the daughter’s name was +Gemma, and the son’s Emilio; that they were both very good and obedient +children—especially Emilio … (“Me not obedient!” her daughter +put in at that point. “Oh, you’re a republican, too!” +answered her mother). That the business, of course, was not what it had been in +the days of her husband, who had a great gift for the confectionery line … +(“<i>Un grand uomo</i>!” Pantaleone confirmed with a severe air); +but that still, thank God, they managed to get along! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p> +Gemma listened to her mother, and at one minute laughed, then sighed, then +patted her on the shoulder, and shook her finger at her, and then looked at +Sanin; at last, she got up, embraced her mother and kissed her in the hollow of +her neck, which made the latter laugh extremely and shriek a little. Pantaleone +too was presented to Sanin. It appeared he had once been an opera singer, a +baritone, but had long ago given up the theatre, and occupied in the Roselli +family a position between that of a family friend and a servant. In spite of +his prolonged residence in Germany, he had learnt very little German, and only +knew how to swear in it, mercilessly distorting even the terms of abuse. +“<i>Ferroflucto spitchebubbio</i>” was his favourite epithet for +almost every German. He spoke Italian with a perfect accent—for was he +not by birth from Sinigali, where may be heard “<i>lingua toscana in +bocca romana</i>”! Emilio, obviously, played the invalid and indulged +himself in the pleasant sensations of one who has only just escaped a danger or +is returning to health after illness; it was evident, too, that the family +spoiled him. He thanked Sanin bashfully, but devoted himself chiefly to the +biscuits and sweetmeats. Sanin was compelled to drink two large cups of +excellent chocolate, and to eat a considerable number of biscuits; no sooner +had he swallowed one than Gemma offered him another—and to refuse was +impossible! He soon felt at home: the time flew by with incredible swiftness. +He had to tell them a great deal—about Russia in general, the Russian +climate, Russian society, the Russian peasant—and especially about the +Cossacks; about the war of 1812, about Peter the Great, about the Kremlin, and +the Russian songs and bells. Both ladies had a very faint conception of our +vast and remote fatherland; Signora Roselli, or as she was more often called, +Frau Lenore, positively dumfoundered Sanin with the question, whether there was +still existing at Petersburg the celebrated house of ice, built last century, +about which she had lately read a very curious article in one of her +husband’s books, “<i>Bettezze delle arti</i>.” And in reply +to Sanin’s exclamation, “Do you really suppose that there is never +any summer in Russia?” Frau Lenore replied that till then she had always +pictured Russia like this—eternal snow, every one going about in furs, +and all military men, but the greatest hospitality, and all the peasants very +submissive! Sanin tried to impart to her and her daughter some more exact +information. When the conversation touched on Russian music, they begged him at +once to sing some Russian air and showed him a diminutive piano with black keys +instead of white and white instead of black. He obeyed without making much ado +and accompanying himself with two fingers of the right hand and three of the +left (the first, second, and little finger) he sang in a thin nasal tenor, +first “The Sarafan,” then “Along a Paved Street.” The +ladies praised his voice and the music, but were more struck with the softness +and sonorousness of the Russian language and asked for a translation of the +text. Sanin complied with their wishes—but as the words of “The +Sarafan,” and still more of “Along a Paved Street’ (<i>sur +une rue pavée une jeune fille allait à l’eau</i> was how he rendered the +sense of the original) were not calculated to inspire his listeners with an +exalted idea of Russian poetry, he first recited, then translated, and then +sang Pushkin’s, “I remember a marvellous moment,” set to +music by Glinka, whose minor bars he did not render quite faithfully. Then the +ladies went into ecstasies. Frau Lenore positively discovered in Russian a +wonderful likeness to the Italian. Even the names Pushkin (she pronounced it +Pussekin) and Glinka sounded somewhat familiar to her. Sanin on his side begged +the ladies to sing something; they too did not wait to be pressed. Frau Lenore +sat down to the piano and sang with Gemma some duets and +“stornelle.” The mother had once had a fine contralto; the +daughter’s voice was not strong, but was pleasing. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>VI</h3> + +<p> +But it was not Gemma’s voice—it was herself Sanin was admiring. He +was sitting a little behind and on one side of her, and kept thinking to +himself that no palm-tree, even in the poems of Benediktov—the poet in +fashion in those days—could rival the slender grace of her figure. When, +at the most emotional passages, she raised her eyes upwards—it seemed to +him no heaven could fail to open at such a look! Even the old man, Pantaleone, +who with his shoulder propped against the doorpost, and his chin and mouth +tucked into his capacious cravat, was listening solemnly with the air of a +connoisseur—even he was admiring the girl’s lovely face and +marvelling at it, though one would have thought he must have been used to it! +When she had finished the duet with her daughter, Frau Lenore observed that +Emilio had a fine voice, like a silver bell, but that now he was at the age +when the voice changes—he did, in fact, talk in a sort of bass constantly +falling into falsetto—and that he was therefore forbidden to sing; but +that Pantaleone now really might try his skill of old days in honour of their +guest! Pantaleone promptly put on a displeased air, frowned, ruffled up his +hair, and declared that he had given it all up long ago, though he could +certainly in his youth hold his own, and indeed had belonged to that great +period, when there were real classical singers, not to be compared to the +squeaking performers of to-day! and a real school of singing; that he, +Pantaleone Cippatola of Varese, had once been brought a laurel wreath from +Modena, and that on that occasion some white doves had positively been let fly +in the theatre; that among others a Russian prince Tarbusky—“<i>il +principe Tarbusski</i>”—with whom he had been on the most friendly +terms, had after supper persistently invited him to Russia, promising him +mountains of gold, mountains!… but that he had been unwilling to leave Italy, +the land of Dante—<i>il paese del Dante!</i> Afterward, to be sure, there +came … unfortunate circumstances, he had himself been imprudent…. At this point +the old man broke off, sighed deeply twice, looked dejected, and began again +talking of the classical period of singing, of the celebrated tenor Garcia, for +whom he cherished a devout, unbounded veneration. “He was a man!” +he exclaimed. “Never had the great Garcia (<i>il gran Garcia</i>) +demeaned himself by singing falsetto like the paltry tenors of +to-day—<i>tenoracci</i>; always from the chest, from the chest, <i>voce +di petto, si!</i>” and the old man aimed a vigorous blow with his little +shrivelled fist at his own shirt-front! “And what an actor! A volcano, +<i>signori miei</i>, a volcano, <i>un Vesuvio</i>! I had the honour and the +happiness of singing with him in the <i>opera dell’ illustrissimo +maestro</i> Rossini—in Otello! Garcia was Otello,—I was +Iago—and when he rendered the phrase”:—here Pantaleone threw +himself into an attitude and began singing in a hoarse and shaky, but still +moving voice: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“L’i … ra daver … so daver … so il fato<br/> +lo più no … no … no … non temerò!” +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +The theatre was all a-quiver, <i>signori miei</i>! though I too did not fall +short, I too after him. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“L’i ra daver … so daver … so il fato<br/> +Temèr più non davro!” +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +And all of a sudden, he crashed like lightning, like a tiger: <i>Morro!… ma +vendicato …</i> Again when he was singing … when he was singing that celebrated +air from “<i>Matrimonio segreto</i>,” <i>Pria che spunti</i> … then he, <i>il +gran Garcia</i>, after the words, “<i>I cavalli di galoppo</i>”—at the +words, “<i>Senza posa cacciera</i>,”—listen, how stupendous, <i>come è +stupendo</i>! At that point he made …” The old man began a sort of +extraordinary flourish, and at the tenth note broke down, cleared his throat, +and with a wave of his arm turned away, muttering, “Why do you torment +me?” Gemma jumped up at once and clapping loudly and shouting, bravo!… +bravo!… she ran to the poor old super-annuated Iago and with both hands patted +him affectionately on the shoulders. Only Emil laughed ruthlessly. <i>Cet âge +est sans pitié</i>—that age knows no mercy—Lafontaine has said +already. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin tried to soothe the aged singer and began talking to him in +Italian—(he had picked up a smattering during his last tour +there)—began talking of “<i>paese del Dante, dove il si +suona</i>.” This phrase, together with “<i>Lasciate ogni +speranza</i>,” made up the whole stock of poetic Italian of the young +tourist; but Pantaleone was not won over by his blandishments. Tucking his chin +deeper than ever into his cravat and sullenly rolling his eyes, he was once +more like a bird, an angry one too,—a crow or a kite. Then Emil, with a +faint momentary blush, such as one so often sees in spoilt children, addressing +his sister, said if she wanted to entertain their guest, she could do nothing +better than read him one of those little comedies of Malz, that she read so +nicely. Gemma laughed, slapped her brother on the arm, exclaimed that he +“always had such ideas!” She went promptly, however, to her room, +and returning thence with a small book in her hand, seated herself at the table +before the lamp, looked round, lifted one finger as much as to say, +“hush!”—a typically Italian gesture—and began reading. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>VII</h3> + +<p> +Malz was a writer flourishing at Frankfort about 1830, whose short comedies, +written in a light vein in the local dialect, hit off local Frankfort types +with bright and amusing, though not deep, humour. It turned out that Gemma +really did read excellently—quite like an actress in fact. She indicated +each personage, and sustained the character capitally, making full use of the +talent of mimicry she had inherited with her Italian blood; she had no mercy on +her soft voice or her lovely face, and when she had to represent some old crone +in her dotage, or a stupid burgomaster, she made the drollest grimaces, +screwing up her eyes, wrinkling up her nose, lisping, squeaking…. She did not +herself laugh during the reading; but when her audience (with the exception of +Pantaleone: he had walked off in indignation so soon as the conversation turned +<i>o quel ferroflucto Tedesco</i>) interrupted her by an outburst of unanimous +laughter, she dropped the book on her knee, and laughed musically too, her head +thrown back, and her black hair dancing in little ringlets on her neck and her +shaking shoulders. When the laughter ceased, she picked up the book at once, +and again resuming a suitable expression, began the reading seriously. Sanin +could not get over his admiration; he was particularly astonished at the +marvellous way in which a face so ideally beautiful assumed suddenly a comic, +sometimes almost a vulgar expression. Gemma was less successful in the parts of +young girls—of so-called “<i>jeunes premières</i>”; in the +love-scenes in particular she failed; she was conscious of this herself, and +for that reason gave them a faint shade of irony as though she did not quite +believe in all these rapturous vows and elevated sentiments, of which the +author, however, was himself rather sparing—so far as he could be. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin did not notice how the evening was flying by, and only recollected the +journey before him when the clock struck ten. He leaped up from his seat as +though he had been stung. +</p> + +<p> +“What is the matter?” inquired Frau Lenore. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, I had to start for Berlin to-night, and I have taken a place in the +diligence!” +</p> + +<p> +“And when does the diligence start?” +</p> + +<p> +“At half-past ten!” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, then, you won’t catch it now,” observed Gemma; +“you must stay … and I will go on reading.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you paid the whole fare or only given a deposit?” Frau Lenore +queried. +</p> + +<p> +“The whole fare!” Sanin said dolefully with a gloomy face. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma looked at him, half closed her eyes, and laughed, while her mother +scolded her: +</p> + +<p> +“The young gentleman has paid away his money for nothing, and you +laugh!” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind,” answered Gemma; “it won’t ruin him, and +we will try and amuse him. Will you have some lemonade?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin drank a glass of lemonade, Gemma took up Malz once more; and all went +merrily again. +</p> + +<p> +The clock struck twelve. Sanin rose to take leave. +</p> + +<p> +“You must stay some days now in Frankfort,” said Gemma: “why +should you hurry away? It would be no nicer in any other town.” She +paused. “It wouldn’t, really,” she added with a smile. Sanin +made no reply, and reflected that considering the emptiness of his purse, he +would have no choice about remaining in Frankfort till he got an answer from a +friend in Berlin, to whom he proposed writing for money. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, do stay,” urged Frau Lenore too. “We will introduce you +to Mr. Karl Klüber, who is engaged to Gemma. He could not come to-day, as he +was very busy at his shop … you must have seen the biggest draper’s and +silk mercer’s shop in the <i>Zeile</i>. Well, he is the manager there. +But he will be delighted to call on you himself.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin—heaven knows why—was slightly disconcerted by this piece of +information. “He’s a lucky fellow, that fiancé!” flashed +across his mind. He looked at Gemma, and fancied he detected an ironical look +in her eyes. He began saying good-bye. +</p> + +<p> +“Till to-morrow? Till to-morrow, isn’t it?” queried Frau +Lenore. +</p> + +<p> +“Till to-morrow!” Gemma declared in a tone not of interrogation, +but of affirmation, as though it could not be otherwise. +</p> + +<p> +“Till to-morrow!” echoed Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +Emil, Pantaleone, and the poodle Tartaglia accompanied him to the corner of the +street. Pantaleone could not refrain from expressing his displeasure at +Gemma’s reading. +</p> + +<p> +“She ought to be ashamed! She mouths and whines, <i>una caricatura</i>! +She ought to represent Merope or Clytemnaestra—something grand, +tragic—and she apes some wretched German woman! I can do that … <i>merz, +kerz, smerz</i>,” he went on in a hoarse voice poking his face forward, +and brandishing his fingers. Tartaglia began barking at him, while Emil burst +out laughing. The old man turned sharply back. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin went back to the White Swan (he had left his things there in the public +hall) in a rather confused frame of mind. All the talk he had had in French, +German, and Italian was ringing in his ears. +</p> + +<p> +“Engaged!” he whispered as he lay in bed, in the modest apartment +assigned to him. “And what a beauty! But what did I stay for?” +</p> + +<p> +Next day he sent a letter to his friend in Berlin. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>VIII</h3> + +<p> +He had not finished dressing, when a waiter announced the arrival of two +gentlemen. One of them turned out to be Emil; the other, a good-looking and +well-grown young man, with a handsome face, was Herr Karl Klüber, the betrothed +of the lovely Gemma. +</p> + +<p> +One may safely assume that at that time in all Frankfort, there was not in a +single shop a manager as civil, as decorous, as dignified, and as affable as +Herr Klüber. The irreproachable perfection of his get-up was on a level with +the dignity of his deportment, with the elegance—a little affected and +stiff, it is true, in the English style (he had spent two years in +England)—but still fascinating, elegance of his manners! It was clear +from the first glance that this handsome, rather severe, excellently brought-up +and superbly washed young man was accustomed to obey his superior and to +command his inferior, and that behind the counter of his shop he must +infallibly inspire respect even in his customers! Of his supernatural honesty +there could never be a particle of doubt: one had but to look at his stiffly +starched collars! And his voice, it appeared, was just what one would expect; +deep, and of a self-confident richness, but not too loud, with positively a +certain caressing note in its timbre. Such a voice was peculiarly fitted to +give orders to assistants under his control: “Show the crimson Lyons +velvet!” or, “Hand the lady a chair!” +</p> + +<p> +Herr Klüber began with introducing himself; as he did so, he bowed with such +loftiness, moved his legs with such an agreeable air, and drew his heels +together with such polished courtesy that no one could fail to feel, +“that man has both linen and moral principles of the first +quality!” The finish of his bare right hand—(the left, in a suède +glove, held a hat shining like a looking-glass, with the right glove placed +within it)—the finish of the right hand, proffered modestly but +resolutely to Sanin, surpassed all belief; each finger-nail was a perfection in +its own way! Then he proceeded to explain in the choicest German that he was +anxious to express his respect and his indebtedness to the foreign gentleman +who had performed so signal a service to his future kinsman, the brother of his +betrothed; as he spoke, he waved his left hand with the hat in it in the +direction of Emil, who seemed bashful and turning away to the window, put his +finger in his mouth. Herr Klüber added that he should esteem himself happy +should he be able in return to do anything for the foreign gentleman. Sanin, +with some difficulty, replied, also in German, that he was delighted … that the +service was not worth speaking of … and he begged his guests to sit down. Herr +Klüber thanked him, and lifting his coat-tails, sat down on a chair; but he +perched there so lightly and with such a transitory air that no one could fail +to realise, “this man is sitting down from politeness, and will fly up +again in an instant.” And he did in fact fly up again quickly, and +advancing with two discreet little dance-steps, he announced that to his regret +he was unable to stay any longer, as he had to hasten to his +shop—business before everything! but as the next day was Sunday, he had, +with the consent of Frau Lenore and Fräulein Gemma, arranged a holiday +excursion to Soden, to which he had the honour of inviting the foreign +gentleman, and he cherished the hope that he would not refuse to grace the +party with his presence. Sanin did not refuse so to grace it; and Herr Klüber +repeating once more his complimentary sentiments, took leave, his pea-green +trousers making a spot of cheerful colour, and his brand-new boots squeaking +cheerfully as he moved. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>IX</h3> + +<p> +Emil, who had continued to stand with his face to the window, even after +Sanin’s invitation to him to sit down, turned round directly his future +kinsman had gone out, and with a childish pout and blush, asked Sanin if he +might remain a little while with him. “I am much better to-day,” he +added, “but the doctor has forbidden me to do any work.” +</p> + +<p> +“Stay by all means! You won’t be in the least in my way,” +Sanin cried at once. Like every true Russian he was glad to clutch at any +excuse that saved him from the necessity of doing anything himself. +</p> + +<p> +Emil thanked him, and in a very short time he was completely at home with him +and with his room; he looked at all his things, asked him about almost every +one of them, where he had bought it, and what was its value. He helped him to +shave, observing that it was a mistake not to let his moustache grow; and +finally told him a number of details about his mother, his sister, Pantaleone, +the poodle Tartaglia, and all their daily life. Every semblance of timidity +vanished in Emil; he suddenly felt extraordinarily attracted to Sanin—not +at all because he had saved his life the day before, but because he was such a +nice person! He lost no time in confiding all his secrets to Sanin. He +expatiated with special warmth on the fact that his mother was set on making +him a shopkeeper, while he <i>knew</i>, knew for certain, that he was born an +artist, a musician, a singer; that Pantaleone even encouraged him, but that +Herr Klüber supported mamma, over whom he had great influence; that the very +idea of his being a shopkeeper really originated with Herr Klüber, who +considered that nothing in the world could compare with trade! To measure out +cloth—and cheat the public, extorting from it “<i>Narren—oder +Russen Preise</i>” (fools’—or Russian prices)—that was +his ideal!<a href="#fn-1" name="fnref-1" id="fnref-1"><sup>[1]</sup></a> +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +<a name="fn-1" id="fn-1"></a> <a href="#fnref-1">[1]</a> +In former days—and very likely it is not different now—when, from +May onwards, a great number of Russians visited Frankfort, prices rose in all +the shops, and were called “Russians’,” or, alas! +“fools’ prices.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come! now you must come and see us!” he cried, directly Sanin had +finished his toilet and written his letter to Berlin. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s early yet,” observed Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s no matter,” replied Emil caressingly. “Come +along! We’ll go to the post—and from there to our place. Gemma will +be so glad to see you! You must have lunch with us…. You might say a word to +mamma about me, my career….” +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, let’s go,” said Sanin, and they set off. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>X</h3> + +<p> +Gemma certainly was delighted to see him, and Frau Lenore gave him a very +friendly welcome; he had obviously made a good impression on both of them the +evening before. Emil ran to see to getting lunch ready, after a preliminary +whisper, “don’t forget!” in Sanin’s ear. +</p> + +<p> +“I won’t forget,” responded Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +Frau Lenore was not quite well; she had a sick headache, and, half-lying down +in an easy chair, she tried to keep perfectly still. Gemma wore a full yellow +blouse, with a black leather belt round the waist; she too seemed exhausted, +and was rather pale; there were dark rings round her eyes, but their lustre was +not the less for it; it added something of charm and mystery to the classical +lines of her face. Sanin was especially struck that day by the exquisite beauty +of her hands; when she smoothed and put back her dark, glossy tresses he could +not take his eyes off her long supple fingers, held slightly apart from one +another like the hand of Raphael’s Fornarina. +</p> + +<p> +It was very hot out-of-doors; after lunch Sanin was about to take leave, but +they told him that on such a day the best thing was to stay where one was, and +he agreed; he stayed. In the back room where he was sitting with the ladies of +the household, coolness reigned supreme; the windows looked out upon a little +garden overgrown with acacias. Multitudes of bees, wasps, and humming beetles +kept up a steady, eager buzz in their thick branches, which were studded with +golden blossoms; through the half-drawn curtains and the lowered blinds this +never-ceasing hum made its way into the room, telling of the sultry heat in the +air outside, and making the cool of the closed and snug abode seem the sweeter. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin talked a great deal, as on the day before, but not of Russia, nor of +Russian life. Being anxious to please his young friend, who had been sent off +to Herr Klüber’s immediately after lunch, to acquire a knowledge of +book-keeping, he turned the conversation on the comparative advantages and +disadvantages of art and commerce. He was not surprised at Frau Lenore’s +standing up for commerce—he had expected that; but Gemma too shared her +opinion. +</p> + +<p> +“If one’s an artist, and especially a singer,” she declared +with a vigorous downward sweep of her hand, “one’s got to be +first-rate! Second-rate’s worse than nothing; and who can tell if one +will arrive at being first-rate?” Pantaleone, who took part too in the +conversation—(as an old servant and an old man he had the privilege of +sitting down in the presence of the ladies of the house; Italians are not, as a +rule, strict in matters of etiquette)—Pantaleone, as a matter of course, +stood like a rock for art. To tell the truth, his arguments were somewhat +feeble; he kept expatiating for the most part on the necessity, before all +things, of possessing “<i>un certo estro +d’inspirazione</i>”—a certain force of inspiration! Frau +Lenore remarked to him that he had, to be sure, possessed such an +“<i>estro</i>”—and yet … “I had enemies,” +Pantaleone observed gloomily. “And how do you know that Emil will not +have enemies, even if this “<i>estro</i>” is found in him?” “Very +well, make a tradesman of him, then,” retorted Pantaleone in vexation; +“but Giovan’ Battista would never have done it, though he was a +confectioner himself!” “Giovan’ Battista, my husband, was a +reasonable man, and even though he was in his youth led away …” But the +old man would hear nothing more, and walked away, repeating reproachfully, +“Ah! Giovan’ Battista!…” Gemma exclaimed that if Emil felt +like a patriot, and wanted to devote all his powers to the liberation of Italy, +then, of course, for such a high and holy cause he might sacrifice the security +of the future—but not for the theatre! Thereupon Frau Lenore became much +agitated, and began to implore her daughter to refrain at least from turning +her brother’s head, and to content herself with being such a desperate +republican herself! Frau Lenore groaned as she uttered these words, and began +complaining of her head, which was “ready to split.” (Frau Lenore, +in deference to their guest, talked to her daughter in French.) +</p> + +<p> +Gemma began at once to wait upon her; she moistened her forehead with +eau-de-Cologne, gently blew on it, gently kissed her cheek, made her lay her +head on a pillow, forbade her to speak, and kissed her again. Then, turning to +Sanin, she began telling him in a half-joking, half-tender tone what a splendid +mother she had, and what a beauty she had been. “‘Had been,’ did I say? +she is charming now! Look, look, what eyes!” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma instantly pulled a white handkerchief out of her pocket, covered her +mother’s face with it, and slowly drawing it downwards, gradually +uncovered Frau Lenore’s forehead, eyebrows, and eyes; she waited a moment +and asked her to open them. Her mother obeyed; Gemma cried out in ecstasy (Frau +Lenore’s eyes really were very beautiful), and rapidly sliding the +handkerchief over the lower, less regular part of the face, fell to kissing her +again. Frau Lenore laughed, and turning a little away, with a pretence of +violence, pushed her daughter away. She too pretended to struggle with her +mother, and lavished caresses on her—not like a cat, in the French +manner, but with that special Italian grace in which is always felt the +presence of power. +</p> + +<p> +At last Frau Lenore declared she was tired out … Then Gemma at once advised her +to have a little nap, where she was, in her chair, “and I and the Russian +gentleman—‘<i>avec le monsieur russe</i>’—will be as +quiet, as quiet … as little mice … ‘<i>comme des petites +souris</i>.’” Frau Lenore smiled at her in reply, closed her eyes, +and after a few sighs began to doze. Gemma quickly dropped down on a bench +beside her and did not stir again, only from time to time she put a finger of +one hand to her lips—with the other hand she was holding up a pillow +behind her mother’s head—and said softly, “sh-sh!” with +a sidelong look at Sanin, if he permitted himself the smallest movement. In the +end he too sank into a kind of dream, and sat motionless as though spell-bound, +while all his faculties were absorbed in admiring the picture presented him by +the half-dark room, here and there spotted with patches of light crimson, where +fresh, luxuriant roses stood in the old-fashioned green glasses, and the +sleeping woman with demurely folded hands and kind, weary face, framed in the +snowy whiteness of the pillow, and the young, keenly-alert and also kind, +clever, pure, and unspeakably beautiful creature with such black, deep, +overshadowed, yet shining eyes…. What was it? A dream? a fairy tale? And how +came <i>he</i> to be in it? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XI</h3> + +<p> +The bell tinkled at the outer door. A young peasant lad in a fur cap and a red +waistcoat came into the shop from the street. Not one customer had looked into +it since early morning … “You see how much business we do!” Frau +Lenore observed to Sanin at lunch-time with a sigh. She was still asleep; Gemma +was afraid to take her arm from the pillow, and whispered to Sanin: “You +go, and mind the shop for me!” Sanin went on tiptoe into the shop at +once. The boy wanted a quarter of a pound of peppermints. “How much must +I take?” Sanin whispered from the door to Gemma. “Six +kreutzers!” she answered in the same whisper. Sanin weighed out a quarter +of a pound, found some paper, twisted it into a cone, tipped the peppermints +into it, spilt them, tipped them in again, spilt them again, at last handed +them to the boy, and took the money…. The boy gazed at him in amazement, +twisting his cap in his hands on his stomach, and in the next room, Gemma was +stifling with suppressed laughter. Before the first customer had walked out, a +second appeared, then a third…. “I bring luck, it’s clear!” +thought Sanin. The second customer wanted a glass of orangeade, the third, +half-a-pound of sweets. Sanin satisfied their needs, zealously clattering the +spoons, changing the saucers, and eagerly plunging his fingers into drawers and +jars. On reckoning up, it appeared that he had charged too little for the +orangeade, and taken two kreutzers too much for the sweets. Gemma did not cease +laughing softly, and Sanin too was aware of an extraordinary lightness of +heart, a peculiarly happy state of mind. He felt as if he had for ever been +standing behind the counter and dealing in orangeade and sweetmeats, with that +exquisite creature looking at him through the doorway with affectionately +mocking eyes, while the summer sun, forcing its way through the sturdy leafage +of the chestnuts that grew in front of the windows, filled the whole room with +the greenish-gold of the midday light and shade, and the heart grew soft in the +sweet languor of idleness, carelessness, and youth—first youth! +</p> + +<p> +A fourth customer asked for a cup of coffee; Pantaleone had to be appealed to. +(Emil had not yet come back from Herr Klüber’s shop.) Sanin went and sat +by Gemma again. Frau Lenore still went on sleeping, to her daughter’s +great delight. “Mamma always sleeps off her sick headaches,” she +observed. Sanin began talking—in a whisper, of course, as before—of +his minding the shop; very seriously inquired the price of various articles of +confectionery; Gemma just as seriously told him these prices, and meanwhile +both of them were inwardly laughing together, as though conscious they were +playing in a very amusing farce. All of a sudden, an organ-grinder in the +street began playing an air from the Freischütz: “<i>Durch die Felder, +durch die Auen</i> …” The dance tune fell shrill and quivering on the +motionless air. Gemma started … “He will wake mamma!” Sanin +promptly darted out into the street, thrust a few kreutzers into the +organ-grinder’s hand, and made him cease playing and move away. When he +came back, Gemma thanked him with a little nod of the head, and with a pensive +smile she began herself just audibly humming the beautiful melody of +Weber’s, in which Max expresses all the perplexities of first love. Then +she asked Sanin whether he knew “Freischütz,” whether he was fond +of Weber, and added that though she was herself an Italian, she liked +<i>such</i> music best of all. From Weber the conversation glided off on to +poetry and romanticism, on to Hoffmann, whom every one was still reading at +that time. +</p> + +<p> +And Frau Lenore still slept, and even snored just a little, and the sunbeams, +piercing in narrow streaks through the shutters, were incessantly and +imperceptibly shifting and travelling over the floor, the furniture, +Gemma’s dress, and the leaves and petals of the flowers. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XII</h3> + +<p> +It appeared that Gemma was not very fond of Hoffmann, that she even thought him +… tedious! The fantastic, misty northern element in his stories was too remote +from her clear, southern nature. “It’s all fairy-tales, all written +for children!” she declared with some contempt. She was vaguely +conscious, too, of the lack of poetry in Hoffmann. But there was one of his +stories, the title of which she had forgotten, which she greatly liked; more +precisely speaking, it was only the beginning of this story that she liked; the +end she had either not read or had forgotten. The story was about a young man +who in some place, a sort of restaurant perhaps, meets a girl of striking +beauty, a Greek; she is accompanied by a mysterious and strange, wicked old +man. The young man falls in love with the girl at first sight; she looks at him +so mournfully, as though beseeching him to deliver her…. He goes out for an +instant, and, coming back into the restaurant, finds there neither the girl nor +the old man; he rushes off in pursuit of her, continually comes upon fresh +traces of her, follows them up, and can never by any means come upon her +anywhere. The lovely girl has vanished for him for ever and ever, and he is +never able to forget her imploring glance, and is tortured by the thought that +all the happiness of his life, perhaps, has slipped through his fingers. +</p> + +<p> +Hoffmann does not end his story quite in that way; but so it had taken shape, +so it had remained, in Gemma’s memory. +</p> + +<p> +“I fancy,” she said, “such meetings and such partings happen +oftener in the world than we suppose.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was silent … and soon after he began talking … of Herr Klüber. It was the +first time he had referred to him; he had not once remembered him till that +instant. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma was silent in her turn, and sank into thought, biting the nail of her +forefinger and fixing her eyes away. Then she began to speak in praise of her +betrothed, alluded to the excursion he had planned for the next day, and, +glancing swiftly at Sanin, was silent again. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin did not know on what subject to turn the conversation. +</p> + +<p> +Emil ran in noisily and waked Frau Lenore … Sanin was relieved by his +appearance. +</p> + +<p> +Frau Lenore got up from her low chair. Pantaleone came in and announced that +dinner was ready. The friend of the family, ex-singer, and servant also +performed the duties of cook. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XIII</h3> + +<p> +Sanin stayed on after dinner too. They did not let him go, still on the same +pretext of the terrible heat; and when the heat began to decrease, they +proposed going out into the garden to drink coffee in the shade of the acacias. +Sanin consented. He felt very happy. In the quietly monotonous, smooth current +of life lie hid great delights, and he gave himself up to these delights with +zest, asking nothing much of the present day, but also thinking nothing of the +morrow, nor recalling the day before. How much the mere society of such a girl +as Gemma meant to him! He would shortly part from her and, most likely, for +ever; but so long as they were borne, as in Uhland’s song, in one skiff +over the sea of life, untossed by tempest, well might the traveller rejoice and +be glad. And everything seemed sweet and delightful to the happy voyager. Frau +Lenore offered to play against him and Pantaleone at “tresette,” +instructed him in this not complicated Italian game, and won a few kreutzers +from him, and he was well content. Pantaleone, at Emil’s request, made +the poodle, Tartaglia, perform all his tricks, and Tartaglia jumped over a +stick “spoke,” that is, barked, sneezed, shut the door with his +nose, fetched his master’s trodden-down slippers; and, finally, with an +old cap on his head, he portrayed Marshal Bernadotte, subjected to the +bitterest upbraidings by the Emperor Napoleon on account of his treachery. +Napoleon’s part was, of course, performed by Pantaleone, and very +faithfully he performed it: he folded his arms across his chest, pulled a +cocked hat over his eyes, and spoke very gruffly and sternly, in +French—and heavens! what French! Tartaglia sat before his sovereign, all +huddled up, with dejected tail, and eyes blinking and twitching in confusion, +under the peak of his cap which was stuck on awry; from time to time when +Napoleon raised his voice, Bernadotte rose on his hind paws. “<i>Fuori, +traditore!</i>” cried Napoleon at last, forgetting in the excess of his +wrath that he had to sustain his rôle as a Frenchman to the end; and Bernadotte +promptly flew under the sofa, but quickly darted out again with a joyful bark, +as though to announce that the performance was over. All the spectators +laughed, and Sanin more than all. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma had a particularly charming, continual, soft laugh, with very droll +little shrieks…. Sanin was fairly enchanted by that laugh—he could have +kissed her for those shrieks! +</p> + +<p> +Night came on at last. He had in decency to take leave! After saying good-bye +several times over to every one, and repeating several times to all, +“till to-morrow!”—Emil he went so far as to kiss—Sanin +started home, carrying with him the image of the young girl, at one time +laughing, at another thoughtful, calm, and even indifferent—but always +attractive! Her eyes, at one time wide open, clear and bright as day, at +another time half shrouded by the lashes and deep and dark as night, seemed to +float before his eyes, piercing in a strange sweet way across all other images +and recollections. +</p> + +<p> +Of Herr Klüber, of the causes impelling him to remain in Frankfort—in +short, of everything that had disturbed his mind the evening before—he +never thought once. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XIV</h3> + +<p> +We must, however, say a few words about Sanin himself. +</p> + +<p> +In the first place, he was very, very good-looking. A handsome, graceful +figure, agreeable, rather unformed features, kindly bluish eyes, golden hair, a +clear white and red skin, and, above all, that peculiar, naïvely-cheerful, +confiding, open, at the first glance, somewhat foolish expression, by which in +former days one could recognise directly the children of steady-going, noble +families, “sons of their fathers,” fine young landowners, born and +reared in our open, half-wild country parts,—a hesitating gait, a voice +with a lisp, a smile like a child’s the minute you looked at him … +lastly, freshness, health, softness, softness, softness,—there you have +the whole of Sanin. And secondly, he was not stupid and had picked up a fair +amount of knowledge. Fresh he had remained, for all his foreign tour; the +disturbing emotions in which the greater part of the young people of that day +were tempest-tossed were very little known to him. +</p> + +<p> +Of late years, in response to the assiduous search for “new types,” +young men have begun to appear in our literature, determined at all hazards to +be “fresh”… as fresh as Flensburg oysters, when they reach +Petersburg…. Sanin was not like them. Since we have had recourse already to +simile, he rather recalled a young, leafy, freshly-grafted apple-tree in one of +our fertile orchards—or better still, a well-groomed, sleek, +sturdy-limbed, tender young “three-year-old” in some old-fashioned +seignorial stud stable, a young horse that they have hardly begun to break in +to the traces…. Those who came across Sanin in later years, when life had +knocked him about a good deal, and the sleekness and plumpness of youth had +long vanished, saw in him a totally different man. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +Next day Sanin was still in bed when Emil, in his best clothes, with a cane in +his hand and much pomade on his head, burst into his room, announcing that Herr +Klüber would be here directly with the carriage, that the weather promised to +be exquisite, that they had everything ready by now, but that mamma was not +going, as her head was bad again. He began to hurry Sanin, telling him that +there was not a minute to lose…. And Herr Klüber did, in fact, find Sanin still +at his toilet. He knocked at the door, came in, bowed with a bend from the +waist, expressed his readiness to wait as long as might be desired, and sat +down, his hat balanced elegantly on his knees. The handsome shop-manager had +got himself up and perfumed himself to excess: his every action was accompanied +by a powerful whiff of the most refined aroma. He arrived in a comfortable open +carriage—one of the kind called landau—drawn by two tall and +powerful but not well-shaped horses. A quarter of an hour later Sanin, Klüber, +and Emil, in this same carriage, drew up triumphantly at the steps of the +confectioner’s shop. Madame Roselli resolutely refused to join the party; +Gemma wanted to stay with her mother; but she simply turned her out. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t want any one,” she declared; “I shall go to +sleep. I would send Pantaleone with you too, only there would be no one to mind +the shop.” +</p> + +<p> +“May we take Tartaglia?” asked Emil. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course you may.” +</p> + +<p> +Tartaglia immediately scrambled, with delighted struggles, on to the box and +sat there, licking himself; it was obviously a thing he was accustomed to. +Gemma put on a large straw hat with brown ribbons; the hat was bent down in +front, so as to shade almost the whole of her face from the sun. The line of +shadow stopped just at her lips; they wore a tender maiden flush, like the +petals of a centifoil rose, and her teeth gleamed stealthily—innocently +too, as when children smile. Gemma sat facing the horses, with Sanin; Klüber +and Emil sat opposite. The pale face of Frau Lenore appeared at the window; +Gemma waved her handkerchief to her, and the horses started. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XV</h3> + +<p> +Soden is a little town half an hour’s distance from Frankfort. It lies in +a beautiful country among the spurs of the Taunus Mountains, and is known among +us in Russia for its waters, which are supposed to be beneficial to people with +weak lungs. The Frankforters visit it more for purposes of recreation, as Soden +possesses a fine park and various “wirthschaften,” where one may +drink beer and coffee in the shade of the tall limes and maples. The road from +Frankfort to Soden runs along the right bank of the Maine, and is planted all +along with fruit trees. While the carriage was rolling slowly along an +excellent road, Sanin stealthily watched how Gemma behaved to her betrothed; it +was the first time he had seen them together. <i>She</i> was quiet and simple +in her manner, but rather more reserved and serious than usual; <i>he</i> had +the air of a condescending schoolmaster, permitting himself and those under his +authority a discreet and decorous pleasure. Sanin saw no signs in him of any +marked attentiveness, of what the French call +“<i>empressement</i>,” in his demeanour to Gemma. It was clear that +Herr Klüber considered that it was a matter settled once for all, and that +therefore he saw no reason to trouble or excite himself. But his condescension +never left him for an instant! Even during a long ramble before dinner about +the wooded hills and valleys behind Soden, even when enjoying the beauties of +nature, he treated nature itself with the same condescension, through which his +habitual magisterial severity peeped out from time to time. So, for example, he +observed in regard to one stream that it ran too straight through the glade, +instead of making a few picturesque curves; he disapproved, too, of the conduct +of a bird—a chaffinch—for singing so monotonously. Gemma was not +bored, and even, apparently, was enjoying herself; but Sanin did not recognise +her as the Gemma of the preceding days; it was not that she seemed under a +cloud—her beauty had never been more dazzling—but her soul seemed +to have withdrawn into herself. With her parasol open and her gloves still +buttoned up, she walked sedately, deliberately, as well-bred young girls walk, +and spoke little. Emil, too, felt stiff, and Sanin more so than all. He was +somewhat embarrassed too by the fact that the conversation was all the time in +German. Only Tartaglia was in high spirits! He darted, barking frantically, +after blackbirds, leaped over ravines, stumps and roots, rushed headlong into +the water, lapped at it in desperate haste, shook himself, whining, and was off +like an arrow, his red tongue trailing after him almost to his shoulder. Herr +Klüber, for his part, did everything he supposed conducive to the mirthfulness +of the company; he begged them to sit down in the shade of a spreading +oak-tree, and taking out of a side pocket a small booklet entitled, +“<i>Knallerbsen; oder du sollst und wirst lachen!</i>” (Squibs; or +you must and shall laugh!) began reading the funny anecdotes of which the +little book was full. He read them twelve specimens; he aroused very little +mirth, however; only Sanin smiled, from politeness, and he himself, Herr +Klüber, after each anecdote, gave vent to a brief, business-like, but still +condescending laugh. At twelve o’clock the whole party returned to Soden +to the best tavern there. +</p> + +<p> +They had to make arrangements about dinner. Herr Klüber proposed that the +dinner should be served in a summer-house closed in on all +sides—“<i>im Gartensalon</i>”; but at this point Gemma +rebelled and declared that she would have dinner in the open air, in the +garden, at one of the little tables set before the tavern; that she was tired +of being all the while with the same faces, and she wanted to see fresh ones. +At some of the little tables, groups of visitors were already sitting. +</p> + +<p> +While Herr Klüber, yielding condescendingly to “the caprice of his +betrothed,” went off to interview the head waiter, Gemma stood immovable, +biting her lips and looking on the ground; she was conscious that Sanin was +persistently and, as it were, inquiringly looking at her—it seemed to +enrage her. At last Herr Klüber returned, announced that dinner would be ready +in half an hour, and proposed their employing the interval in a game of +skittles, adding that this was very good for the appetite, he, he, he! Skittles +he played in masterly fashion; as he threw the ball, he put himself into +amazingly heroic postures, with artistic play of the muscles, with artistic +flourish and shake of the leg. In his own way he was an athlete—and was +superbly built! His hands, too, were so white and handsome, and he wiped them +on such a sumptuous, gold-striped, Indian bandana! +</p> + +<p> +The moment of dinner arrived, and the whole party seated themselves at the +table. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XVI</h3> + +<p> +Who does not know what a German dinner is like? Watery soup with knobby +dumplings and pieces of cinnamon, boiled beef dry as cork, with white fat +attached, slimy potatoes, soft beetroot and mashed horseradish, a bluish eel +with French capers and vinegar, a roast joint with jam, and the inevitable +“<i>Mehlspeise</i>,” something of the nature of a pudding with +sourish red sauce; but to make up, the beer and wine first-rate! With just such +a dinner the tavernkeeper at Soden regaled his customers. The dinner, itself, +however, went off satisfactorily. No special liveliness was perceptible, +certainly; not even when Herr Klüber proposed the toast “What we +like!” (Was wir lieben!) But at least everything was decorous and seemly. +After dinner, coffee was served, thin, reddish, typically German coffee. Herr +Klüber, with true gallantry, asked Gemma’s permission to smoke a cigar…. +But at this point suddenly something occurred, unexpected, and decidedly +unpleasant, and even unseemly! +</p> + +<p> +At one of the tables near were sitting several officers of the garrison of the +Maine. From their glances and whispering together it was easy to perceive that +they were struck by Gemma’s beauty; one of them, who had probably stayed +in Frankfort, stared at her persistently, as at a figure familiar to him; he +obviously knew who she was. He suddenly got up, and glass in hand—all the +officers had been drinking hard, and the cloth before them was crowded with +bottles—approached the table at which Gemma was sitting. He was a very +young flaxen-haired man, with a rather pleasing and even attractive face, but +his features were distorted with the wine he had drunk, his cheeks were +twitching, his blood-shot eyes wandered, and wore an insolent expression. His +companions at first tried to hold him back, but afterwards let him go, +interested apparently to see what he would do, and how it would end. Slightly +unsteady on his legs, the officer stopped before Gemma, and in an unnaturally +screaming voice, in which, in spite of himself, an inward struggle could be +discerned, he articulated, “I drink to the health of the prettiest +confectioner in all Frankfort, in all the world (he emptied his glass), and in +return I take this flower, picked by her divine little fingers!” He took +from the table a rose that lay beside Gemma’s plate. At first she was +astonished, alarmed, and turned fearfully white … then alarm was replaced by +indignation; she suddenly crimsoned all over, to her very hair—and her +eyes, fastened directly on the offender, at the same time darkened and flamed, +they were filled with black gloom, and burned with the fire of irrepressible +fury. The officer must have been confused by this look; he muttered something +unintelligible, bowed, and walked back to his friends. They greeted him with a +laugh, and faint applause. +</p> + +<p> +Herr Klüber rose spasmodically from his seat, drew himself up to his full +height, and putting on his hat pronounced with dignity, but not too loud, +“Unheard of! Unheard of! Unheard of impertinence!” and at once +calling up the waiter, in a severe voice asked for the bill … more than that, +ordered the carriage to be put to, adding that it was impossible for +respectable people to frequent the establishment if they were exposed to +insult! At those words Gemma, who still sat in her place without +stirring—her bosom was heaving violently—Gemma raised her eyes to +Herr Klüber … and she gazed as intently, with the same expression at him as at +the officer. Emil was simply shaking with rage. +</p> + +<p> +“Get up, <i>mein Fräulein</i>,” Klüber admonished her with the same +severity, “it is not proper for you to remain here. We will go inside, in +the tavern!” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma rose in silence; he offered her his arm, she gave him hers, and he walked +into the tavern with a majestic step, which became, with his whole bearing, +more majestic and haughty the farther he got from the place where they had +dined. Poor Emil dragged himself after them. +</p> + +<p> +But while Herr Klüber was settling up with the waiter, to whom, by way of +punishment, he gave not a single kreutzer for himself, Sanin with rapid steps +approached the table at which the officers were sitting, and addressing +Gemma’s assailant, who was at that instant offering her rose to his +companions in turns to smell, he uttered very distinctly in French, “What +you have just done, sir, is conduct unworthy of an honest man, unworthy of the +uniform you wear, and I have come to tell you you are an ill-bred cur!” +The young man leaped on to his feet, but another officer, rather older, checked +him with a gesture, made him sit down, and turning to Sanin asked him also in +French, “Was he a relation, brother, or betrothed of the girl?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am nothing to her at all,” cried Sanin, “I am a Russian, +but I cannot look on at such insolence with indifference; but here is my card +and my address; <i>monsieur l’officier</i> can find me.” +</p> + +<p> +As he uttered these words, Sanin threw his visiting-card on the table, and at +the same moment hastily snatched Gemma’s rose, which one of the officers +sitting at the table had dropped into his plate. The young man was again on the +point of jumping up from the table, but his companion again checked him, +saying, “Dönhof, be quiet! Dönhof, sit still.” Then he got up +himself, and putting his hand to the peak of his cap, with a certain shade of +respectfulness in his voice and manner, told Sanin that to-morrow morning an +officer of the regiment would have the honour of calling upon him. Sanin +replied with a short bow, and hurriedly returned to his friends. +</p> + +<p> +Herr Klüber pretended he had not noticed either Sanin’s absence nor his +interview with the officers; he was urging on the coachman, who was putting in +the horses, and was furiously angry at his deliberateness. Gemma too said +nothing to Sanin, she did not even look at him; from her knitted brows, from +her pale and compressed lips, from her very immobility it could be seen that +she was suffering inwardly. Only Emil obviously wanted to speak to Sanin, +wanted to question him; he had seen Sanin go up to the officers, he had seen +him give them something white—a scrap of paper, a note, or a card…. The +poor boy’s heart was beating, his cheeks burned, he was ready to throw +himself on Sanin’s neck, ready to cry, or to go with him at once to crush +all those accursed officers into dust and ashes! He controlled himself, +however, and did no more than watch intently every movement of his noble +Russian friend. +</p> + +<p> +The coachman had at last harnessed the horses; the whole party seated +themselves in the carriage. Emil climbed on to the box, after Tartaglia; he was +more comfortable there, and had not Klüber, whom he could hardly bear the sight +of, sitting opposite to him. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +The whole way home Herr Klüber discoursed … and he discoursed alone; no one, +absolutely no one, opposed him, nor did any one agree with him. He especially +insisted on the point that they had been wrong in not following his advice when +he suggested dining in a shut-up summer-house. There no unpleasantness could +have occurred! Then he expressed a few decided and even liberal sentiments on +the unpardonable way in which the government favoured the military, neglected +their discipline, and did not sufficiently consider the civilian element in +society (<i>das bürgerliche Element in der Societät</i>!), and foretold that in +time this cause would give rise to discontent, which might well pass into +revolution, of which (here he dropped a sympathetic though severe sigh) France +had given them a sorrowful example! He added, however, that he personally had +the greatest respect for authority, and never … no, never!… could be a +revolutionist—but he could not but express his … disapprobation at the +sight of such licence! Then he made a few general observations on morality and +immorality, good-breeding, and the sense of dignity. +</p> + +<p> +During all these lucubrations, Gemma, who even while they were walking before +dinner had not seemed quite pleased with Herr Klüber, and had therefore held +rather aloof from Sanin, and had been, as it were, embarrassed by his +presence—Gemma was unmistakably ashamed of her betrothed! Towards the end +of the drive she was positively wretched, and though, as before, she did not +address a word to Sanin, she suddenly flung an imploring glance at him…. He, +for his part, felt much more sorry for her than indignant with Herr Klüber; he +was even secretly, half-consciously, delighted at what had happened in the +course of that day, even though he had every reason to expect a challenge next +morning. +</p> + +<p> +This miserable <i>partie de plaisir</i> came to an end at last. As he helped +Gemma out of the carriage at the confectionery shop, Sanin without a word put +into her hand the rose he had recovered. She flushed crimson, pressed his hand, +and instantly hid the rose. He did not want to go into the house, though the +evening was only just beginning. She did not even invite him. Moreover +Pantaleone, who came out on the steps, announced that Frau Lenore was asleep. +Emil took a shy good-bye of Sanin; he felt as it were in awe of him; he greatly +admired him. Klüber saw Sanin to his lodging, and took leave of him stiffly. +The well-regulated German, for all his self-confidence, felt awkward. And +indeed every one felt awkward. +</p> + +<p> +But in Sanin this feeling of awkwardness soon passed off. It was replaced by a +vague, but pleasant, even triumphant feeling. He walked up and down his room, +whistling, and not caring to think about anything, and was very well pleased +with himself. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XVII</h3> + +<p> +“I will wait for the officer’s visit till ten o’clock,” +he reflected next morning, as he dressed, “and then let him come and look +for me!” But Germans rise early: it had not yet struck nine when the +waiter informed Sanin that the Herr Seconde Lieutenant von Richter wished to +see him. Sanin made haste to put on his coat, and told him to ask him up. Herr +Richter turned out, contrary to Sanin’s expectation, to be a very young +man, almost a boy. He tried to give an expression of dignity to his beardless +face, but did not succeed at all: he could not even conceal his embarrassment, +and as he sat down on a chair, he tripped over his sword, and almost fell. +Stammering and hesitating, he announced to Sanin in bad French that he had come +with a message from his friend, Baron von Dönhof; that this message was to +demand from Herr von Sanin an apology for the insulting expressions used by him +on the previous day; and in case of refusal on the part of Herr von Sanin, +Baron von Dönhof would ask for satisfaction. Sanin replied that he did not mean +to apologise, but was ready to give him satisfaction. Then Herr von Richter, +still with the same hesitation, asked with whom, at what time and place, should +he arrange the necessary preliminaries. Sanin answered that he might come to +him in two hours’ time, and that meanwhile, he, Sanin, would try and find +a second. (“Who the devil is there I can have for a second?” he was +thinking to himself meantime.) Herr von Richter got up and began to take leave +… but at the doorway he stopped, as though stung by a prick of conscience, and +turning to Sanin observed that his friend, Baron von Dönhof, could not but +recognise … that he had been … to a certain extent, to blame himself in the +incident of the previous day, and would, therefore, be satisfied with slight +apologies (“<i>des exghizes léchères</i>.”) To this Sanin replied +that he did not intend to make any apology whatever, either slight or +considerable, since he did not consider himself to blame. “In that +case,” answered Herr von Richter, blushing more than ever, “you +will have to exchange friendly shots—<i>des goups de bisdolet à +l’amiaple</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t understand that at all,” observed Sanin; “are +we to fire in the air or what?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, not exactly that,” stammered the sub-lieutenant, utterly +disconcerted, “but I supposed since it is an affair between men of honour +… I will talk to your second,” he broke off, and went away. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin dropped into a chair directly he had gone, and stared at the floor. +“What does it all mean? How is it my life has taken such a turn all of a +sudden? All the past, all the future has suddenly vanished, gone,—and all +that’s left is that I am going to fight some one about something in +Frankfort.” He recalled a crazy aunt of his who used to dance and sing: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“O my lieutenant!<br/> +My little cucumber!<br/> +My little love!<br/> +Dance with me, my little dove!” +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +And he laughed and hummed as she used to: “O my lieutenant! Dance with +me, little dove!” “But I must act, though, I mustn’t waste +time,” he cried aloud—jumped up and saw Pantaleone facing him with +a note in his hand. +</p> + +<p> +“I knocked several times, but you did not answer; I thought you +weren’t at home,” said the old man, as he gave him the note. +“From Signorina Gemma.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin took the note, mechanically, as they say, tore it open, and read it. +Gemma wrote to him that she was very anxious—about he knew what—and +would be very glad to see him at once. +</p> + +<p> +“The Signorina is anxious,” began Pantaleone, who obviously knew +what was in the note, “she told me to see what you are doing and to bring +you to her.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin glanced at the old Italian, and pondered. A sudden idea flashed upon his +brain. For the first instant it struck him as too absurd to be possible. +</p> + +<p> +“After all … why not?” he asked himself. +</p> + +<p> +“M. Pantaleone!” he said aloud. +</p> + +<p> +The old man started, tucked his chin into his cravat and stared at Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know,” pursued Sanin, “what happened +yesterday?” +</p> + +<p> +Pantaleone chewed his lips and shook his immense top-knot of hair. +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +(Emil had told him all about it directly he got home.) +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, you know! Well, an officer has just this minute left me. That +scoundrel challenges me to a duel. I have accepted his challenge. But I have no +second. Will <i>you</i> be my second?” +</p> + +<p> +Pantaleone started and raised his eyebrows so high that they were lost under +his overhanging hair. +</p> + +<p> +“You are absolutely obliged to fight?” he said at last in Italian; +till that instant he had made use of French. +</p> + +<p> +“Absolutely. I can’t do otherwise—it would mean disgracing +myself for ever.” +</p> + +<p> +“H’m. If I don’t consent to be your second you will find some +one else.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes … undoubtedly.” +</p> + +<p> +Pantaleone looked down. “But allow me to ask you, Signor de Tsanin, will +not your duel throw a slur on the reputation of a certain lady?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t suppose so; but in any case, there’s no help for +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“H’m!” Pantaleone retired altogether into his cravat. +“Hey, but that <i>ferroflucto Klüberio</i>—what’s he +about?” he cried all of a sudden, looking up again. +</p> + +<p> +“He? Nothing.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Che</i>!” Pantaleone shrugged his shoulders contemptuously. +“I have, in any case, to thank you,” he articulated at last in an +unsteady voice “that even in my present humble condition you recognise +that I am a gentleman—<i>un galant’uomo</i>! In that way you have +shown yourself to be a real <i>galant’uomo</i>. But I must consider your +proposal.” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s no time to lose, dear Signor Ci … cippa …” +</p> + +<p> +“Tola,” the old man chimed in. “I ask only for one hour for +reflection…. The daughter of my benefactor is involved in this…. And, +therefore, I ought, I am bound, to reflect!… In an hour, in three-quarters of +an hour, you shall know my decision.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very well; I will wait.” +</p> + +<p> +“And now … what answer am I to give to Signorina Gemma?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin took a sheet of paper, wrote on it, “Set your mind at rest, dear +friend; in three hours’ time I will come to you, and everything shall be +explained. I thank you from my heart for your sympathy,” and handed this +sheet to Pantaleone. +</p> + +<p> +He put it carefully into his side-pocket, and once more repeating “In an +hour!” made towards the door; but turning sharply back, ran up to Sanin, +seized his hand, and pressing it to his shirt-front, cried, with his eyes to +the ceiling: “Noble youth! Great heart! (<i>Nobil giovanotto! Gran +cuore!</i>) permit a weak old man (<i>a un vecchiotto!</i>) to press your +valorous right hand (<i>la vostra valorosa destra!</i>)” Then he skipped +back a pace or two, threw up both hands, and went away. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin looked after him … took up the newspaper and tried to read. But his eyes +wandered in vain over the lines: he understood nothing. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XVIII</h3> + +<p> +An hour later the waiter came in again to Sanin, and handed him an old, soiled +visiting-card, on which were the following words: “Pantaleone Cippatola +of Varese, court singer (<i>cantante di camera</i>) to his Royal Highness the +Duke of Modena”; and behind the waiter in walked Pantaleone himself. He +had changed his clothes from top to toe. He had on a black frock coat, reddish +with long wear, and a white piqué waistcoat, upon which a pinchbeck chain +meandered playfully; a heavy cornelian seal hung low down on to his narrow +black trousers. In his right hand he carried a black beaver hat, in his left +two stout chamois gloves; he had tied his cravat in a taller and broader bow +than ever, and had stuck into his starched shirt-front a pin with a stone, a +so-called “cat’s eye.” On his forefinger was displayed a +ring, consisting of two clasped hands with a burning heart between them. A +smell of garments long laid by, a smell of camphor and of musk hung about the +whole person of the old man; the anxious solemnity of his deportment must have +struck the most casual spectator! Sanin rose to meet him. +</p> + +<p> +“I am your second,” Pantaleone announced in French, and he bowed +bending his whole body forward, and turning out his toes like a dancer. +“I have come for instructions. Do you want to fight to the death?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why to the death, my dear Signor Cippatola? I will not for any +consideration take back my words—but I am not a bloodthirsty person!… But +come, wait a little, my opponent’s second will be here directly. I will +go into the next room, and you can make arrangements with him. Believe me I +shall never forget your kindness, and I thank you from my heart.” +</p> + +<p> +“Honour before everything!” answered Pantaleone, and he sank into +an arm-chair, without waiting for Sanin to ask him to sit down. “If that +<i>ferroflucto spitchebubbio</i>,” he said, passing from French into +Italian, “if that counter-jumper Klüberio could not appreciate his +obvious duty or was afraid, so much the worse for him!… A cheap soul, and +that’s all about it!… As for the conditions of the duel, I am your +second, and your interests are sacred to me!… When I lived in Padua there was a +regiment of the white dragoons stationed there, and I was very intimate with +many of the officers!… I was quite familiar with their whole code. And I used +often to converse on these subjects with your principe Tarbuski too…. Is this +second to come soon?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am expecting him every minute—and here he comes,” added +Sanin, looking into the street. +</p> + +<p> +Pantaleone got up, looked at his watch, straightened his topknot of hair, and +hurriedly stuffed into his shoe an end of tape which was sticking out below his +trouser-leg, and the young sub-lieutenant came in, as red and embarrassed as +ever. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin presented the seconds to each other. “M. Richter, sous-lieutenant, +M. Cippatola, artiste!” The sub-lieutenant was slightly disconcerted by +the old man’s appearance … Oh, what would he have said had any one +whispered to him at that instant that the “artist” presented to him +was also employed in the culinary art! But Pantaleone assumed an air as though +taking part in the preliminaries of duels was for him the most everyday affair: +probably he was assisted at this juncture by the recollections of his +theatrical career, and he played the part of second simply as a part. Both he +and the sub-lieutenant were silent for a little. +</p> + +<p> +“Well? Let us come to business!” Pantaleone spoke first, playing +with his cornelian seal. +</p> + +<p> +“By all means,” responded the sub-lieutenant, “but … the +presence of one of the principals …” +</p> + +<p> +“I will leave you at once, gentlemen,” cried Sanin, and with a bow +he went away into the bedroom and closed the door after him. +</p> + +<p> +He flung himself on the bed and began thinking of Gemma … but the conversation +of the seconds reached him through the shut door. It was conducted in the +French language; both maltreated it mercilessly, each after his own fashion. +Pantaleone again alluded to the dragoons in Padua, and Principe Tarbuski; the +sub-lieutenant to “<i>exghizes léchères</i>” and “<i>goups de +bistolet à l’amiaple</i>.” But the old man would not even hear of +any <i>exghizes</i>! To Sanin’s horror, he suddenly proceeded to talk of +a certain young lady, an innocent maiden, whose little finger was worth more +than all the officers in the world … (<i>oune zeune damigella innoucenta, +qu’a elle sola dans soun péti doa vale piu que tout le zouffissié del +mondo!</i>), and repeated several times with heat: “It’s shameful! +it’s shameful!” (<i>E ouna onta, ouna onta</i>!) The sub-lieutenant +at first made him no reply, but presently an angry quiver could be heard in the +young man’s voice, and he observed that he had not come there to listen +to sermonising. +</p> + +<p> +“At your age it is always a good thing to hear the truth!” +cried Pantaleone. +</p> + +<p> +The debate between the seconds several times became stormy; it lasted over an +hour, and was concluded at last on the following conditions: “Baron von +Dönhof and M. de Sanin to meet the next day at ten o’clock in a small +wood near Hanau, at the distance of twenty paces; each to have the right to +fire twice at a signal given by the seconds, the pistols to be single-triggered +and not rifle-barrelled.” Herr von Richter withdrew, and Pantaleone +solemnly opened the bedroom door, and after communicating the result of their +deliberations, cried again: “<i>Bravo Russo! Bravo giovanotto!</i> You +will be victor!” +</p> + +<p> +A few minutes later they both set off to the Rosellis’ shop. Sanin, as a +preliminary measure, had exacted a promise from Pantaleone to keep the affair +of the duel a most profound secret. In reply, the old man had merely held up +his finger, and half closing his eyes, whispered twice over, <i>Segredezza</i>! +He was obviously in good spirits, and even walked with a freer step. All these +unusual incidents, unpleasant though they might be, carried him vividly back to +the time when he himself both received and gave challenges—only, it is +true, on the stage. Baritones, as we all know, have a great deal of strutting +and fuming to do in their parts. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XIX</h3> + +<p> +Emil ran out to meet Sanin—he had been watching for his arrival over an +hour—and hurriedly whispered into his ear that his mother knew nothing of +the disagreeable incident of the day before, that he must not even hint of it +to her, and that he was being sent to Klüber’s shop again!… but that he +wouldn’t go there, but would hide somewhere! Communicating all this +information in a few seconds, he suddenly fell on Sanin’s shoulder, +kissed him impulsively, and rushed away down the street. Gemma met Sanin in the +shop; tried to say something and could not. Her lips were trembling a little, +while her eyes were half-closed and turned away. He made haste to soothe her by +the assurance that the whole affair had ended … in utter nonsense. +</p> + +<p> +“Has no one been to see you to-day?” she asked. +</p> + +<p> +“A person did come to me and we had an explanation, and we … we came to +the most satisfactory conclusion.” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma went back behind the counter. +</p> + +<p> +“She does not believe me!” he thought … he went into the next room, +however, and there found Frau Lenore. +</p> + +<p> +Her sick headache had passed off, but she was in a depressed state of mind. She +gave him a smile of welcome, but warned him at the same time that he would be +dull with her to-day, as she was not in a mood to entertain him. He sat down +beside her, and noticed that her eyelids were red and swollen. +</p> + +<p> +“What is wrong, Frau Lenore? You’ve never been crying, +surely?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!” she whispered, nodding her head towards the room where her +daughter was. “Don’t speak of it … aloud.” +</p> + +<p> +“But what have you been crying for?” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, M’sieu Sanin, I don’t know myself what for!” +</p> + +<p> +“No one has hurt your feelings?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh no!… I felt very low all of a sudden. I thought of Giovanni Battista +… of my youth … Then how quickly it had all passed away. I have grown old, my +friend, and I can’t reconcile myself to that anyhow. I feel I’m +just the same as I was … but old age—it’s here! it is here!” +Tears came into Frau Lenore’s eyes. “You look at me, I see, and +wonder…. But you will get old too, my friend, and will find out how bitter it +is!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin tried to comfort her, spoke of her children, in whom her own youth lived +again, even attempted to scoff at her a little, declaring that she was fishing +for compliments … but she quite seriously begged him to leave off, and for the +first time he realised that for such a sorrow, the despondency of old age, +there is no comfort or cure; one has to wait till it passes off of itself. He +proposed a game of tresette, and he could have thought of nothing better. She +agreed at once and seemed to get more cheerful. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin played with her until dinner-time and after dinner Pantaleone too took a +hand in the game. Never had his topknot hung so low over his forehead, never +had his chin retreated so far into his cravat! Every movement was accompanied +by such intense solemnity that as one looked at him the thought involuntarily +arose, “What secret is that man guarding with such determination?” +But <i>segredezza! segredezza!</i> +</p> + +<p> +During the whole of that day he tried in every possible way to show the +profoundest respect for Sanin; at table, passing by the ladies, he solemnly and +sedately handed the dishes first to him; when they were at cards he +intentionally gave him the game; he announced, apropos of nothing at all, that +the Russians were the most great-hearted, brave, and resolute people in the +world! +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, you old flatterer!” Sanin thought to himself. +</p> + +<p> +And he was not so much surprised at Signora Roselli’s unexpected state of +mind, as at the way her daughter behaved to him. It was not that she avoided +him … on the contrary she sat continually a little distance from him, listened +to what he said, and looked at him; but she absolutely declined to get into +conversation with him, and directly he began talking to her, she softly rose +from her place, and went out for some instants. Then she came in again, and +again seated herself in some corner, and sat without stirring, seeming +meditative and perplexed … perplexed above all. Frau Lenore herself noticed at +last, that she was not as usual, and asked her twice what was the matter. +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing,” answered Gemma; “you know I am sometimes like +this.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is true,” her mother assented. +</p> + +<p> +So passed all that long day, neither gaily nor drearily—neither +cheerfully nor sadly. Had Gemma been different—Sanin … who knows?… might +not perhaps have been able to resist the temptation for a little +display—or he might simply have succumbed to melancholy at the +possibility of a separation for ever…. But as he did not once succeed in +getting a word with Gemma, he was obliged to confine himself to striking minor +chords on the piano for a quarter of an hour before evening coffee. +</p> + +<p> +Emil came home late, and to avoid questions about Herr Klüber, beat a hasty +retreat. The time came for Sanin too to retire. +</p> + +<p> +He began saying good-bye to Gemma. He recollected for some reason +Lensky’s parting from Olga in <i>Oniegin</i>. He pressed her hand warmly, +and tried to get a look at her face, but she turned a little away and released +her fingers. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XX</h3> + +<p> +It was bright starlight when he came out on the steps. What multitudes of +stars, big and little, yellow, red, blue and white were scattered over the sky! +They seemed all flashing, swarming, twinkling unceasingly. There was no moon in +the sky, but without it every object could be clearly discerned in the +half-clear, shadowless twilight. Sanin walked down the street to the end … He +did not want to go home at once; he felt a desire to wander about a little in +the fresh air. He turned back and had hardly got on a level with the house, +where was the Rosellis’ shop, when one of the windows looking out on the +street, suddenly creaked and opened; in its square of blackness—there was +no light in the room—appeared a woman’s figure, and he heard his +name—“Monsieur Dimitri!” +</p> + +<p> +He rushed at once up to the window … Gemma! She was leaning with her elbows on +the window-sill, bending forward. +</p> + +<p> +“Monsieur Dimitri,” she began in a cautious voice, “I have +been wanting all day long to give you something … but I could not make up my +mind to; and just now, seeing you, quite unexpectedly again, I thought that it +seems it is fated” … +</p> + +<p> +Gemma was forced to stop at this word. She could not go on; something +extraordinary happened at that instant. +</p> + +<p> +All of a sudden, in the midst of the profound stillness, over the perfectly +unclouded sky, there blew such a violent blast of wind, that the very earth +seemed shaking underfoot, the delicate starlight seemed quivering and +trembling, the air went round in a whirlwind. The wind, not cold, but hot, +almost sultry, smote against the trees, the roof of the house, its walls, and +the street; it instantaneously snatched off Sanin’s hat, crumpled up and +tangled Gemma’s curls. Sanin’s head was on a level with the +window-sill; he could not help clinging close to it, and Gemma clutched hold of +his shoulders with both hands, and pressed her bosom against his head. The +roar, the din, and the rattle lasted about a minute…. Like a flock of huge +birds the revelling whirlwind darted revelling away. A profound stillness +reigned once more. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin raised his head and saw above him such an exquisite, scared, excited +face, such immense, large, magnificent eyes—it was such a beautiful +creature he saw, that his heart stood still within him, he pressed his lips to +the delicate tress of hair, that had fallen on his bosom, and could only +murmur, “O Gemma!” +</p> + +<p> +“What was that? Lightning?” she asked, her eyes wandering afar, +while she did not take her bare arms from his shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +“Gemma!” repeated Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +She sighed, looked around behind her into the room, and with a rapid movement +pulling the now faded rose out of her bodice, she threw it to Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“I wanted to give you this flower.” +</p> + +<p> +He recognised the rose, which he had won back the day before…. +</p> + +<p> +But already the window had slammed-to, and through the dark pane nothing could +be seen, no trace of white. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin went home without his hat…. He did not even notice that he had lost it. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXI</h3> + +<p> +It was quite morning when he fell asleep. And no wonder! In the blast of that +instantaneous summer hurricane, he had almost as instantaneously felt, not that +Gemma was lovely, not that he liked her—that he had known before … but +that he almost … loved her! As suddenly as that blast of wind, had love pounced +down upon him. And then this senseless duel! He began to be tormented by +mournful forebodings. And even suppose they didn’t kill him…. What could +come of his love for this girl, another man’s betrothed? Even supposing +this “other man” was no danger, that Gemma herself would care for +him, or even cared for him already … What would come of it? How ask what! Such +a lovely creature!… +</p> + +<p> +He walked about the room, sat down to the table, took a sheet of paper, traced +a few lines on it, and at once blotted them out…. He recalled Gemma’s +wonderful figure in the dark window, in the starlight, set all a-fluttering by +the warm hurricane; he remembered her marble arms, like the arms of the +Olympian goddesses, felt their living weight on his shoulders…. Then he took +the rose she had thrown him, and it seemed to him that its half-withered petals +exhaled a fragrance of her, more delicate than the ordinary scent of the rose. +</p> + +<p> +“And would they kill him straight away or maim him?” +</p> + +<p> +He did not go to bed, and fell asleep in his clothes on the sofa. +</p> + +<p> +Some one slapped him on the shoulder…. He opened his eyes, and saw Pantaleone. +</p> + +<p> +“He sleeps like Alexander of Macedon on the eve of the battle of +Babylon!” cried the old man. +</p> + +<p> +“What o’clock is it?” inquired Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“A quarter to seven; it’s a two hours’ drive to Hanau, and we +must be the first on the field. Russians are always beforehand with their +enemies! I have engaged the best carriage in Frankfort!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin began washing. “And where are the pistols?” +</p> + +<p> +“That <i>ferroflucto Tedesco</i> will bring the pistols. He’ll +bring a doctor too.” +</p> + +<p> +Pantaleone was obviously putting a good face on it as he had done the day +before; but when he was seated in the carriage with Sanin, when the coachman +had cracked his whip and the horses had started off at a gallop, a sudden +change came over the old singer and friend of Paduan dragoons. He began to be +confused and positively faint-hearted. Something seemed to have given way in +him, like a badly built wall. +</p> + +<p> +“What are we doing, my God, <i>Santissima Madonna!</i>” he cried in +an unexpectedly high pipe, and he clutched at his head. “What am I about, +old fool, madman, <i>frenetico</i>?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin wondered and laughed, and putting his arm lightly round +Pantaleone’s waist, he reminded him of the French proverb: “<i>Le +vin est tiré—il faut le boire</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, yes,” answered the old man, “we will drain the cup +together to the dregs—but still I’m a madman! I’m a madman! +All was going on so quietly, so well … and all of a sudden: ta-ta-ta, +tra-ta-ta!” +</p> + +<p> +“Like the <i>tutti</i> in the orchestra,” observed Sanin with a +forced smile. “But it’s not your fault.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know it’s not. I should think not indeed! And yet … such +insolent conduct! <i>Diavolo, diavolo</i>!” repeated Pantaleone, sighing +and shaking his topknot. +</p> + +<p> +The carriage still rolled on and on. +</p> + +<p> +It was an exquisite morning. The streets of Frankfort, which were just +beginning to show signs of life, looked so clean and snug; the windows of the +houses glittered in flashes like tinfoil; and as soon as the carriage had +driven beyond the city walls, from overhead, from a blue but not yet glaring +sky, the larks’ loud trills showered down in floods. Suddenly at a turn +in the road, a familiar figure came from behind a tall poplar, took a few steps +forward and stood still. Sanin looked more closely…. Heavens! it was Emil! +</p> + +<p> +“But does he know anything about it?” he demanded of Pantaleone. +</p> + +<p> +“I tell you I’m a madman,” the poor Italian wailed +despairingly, almost in a shriek. “The wretched boy gave me no peace all +night, and this morning at last I revealed all to him!” +</p> + +<p> +“So much for your <i>segredezza</i>!” thought Sanin. The carriage +had got up to Emil. Sanin told the coachman to stop the horses, and called the +“wretched boy” up to him. Emil approached with hesitating steps, +pale as he had been on the day he fainted. He could scarcely stand. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you doing here?” Sanin asked him sternly. “Why +aren’t you at home?” +</p> + +<p> +“Let … let me come with you,” faltered Emil in a trembling voice, +and he clasped his hands. His teeth were chattering as in a fever. “I +won’t get in your way—only take me.” +</p> + +<p> +“If you feel the very slightest affection or respect for me,” said +Sanin, “you will go at once home or to Herr Klüber’s shop, and you +won’t say one word to any one, and will wait for my return!” +</p> + +<p> +“Your return,” moaned Emil—and his voice quivered and broke, +“but if you’re—” +</p> + +<p> +“Emil!” Sanin interrupted—and he pointed to the coachman, +“do control yourself! Emil, please, go home! Listen to me, my dear! You +say you love me. Well, I beg you!” He held out his hand to him. Emil bent +forward, sobbed, pressed it to his lips, and darting away from the road, ran +back towards Frankfort across country. +</p> + +<p> +“A noble heart too,” muttered Pantaleone; but Sanin glanced +severely at him…. The old man shrank into the corner of the carriage. He was +conscious of his fault; and moreover, he felt more and more bewildered every +instant; could it really be he who was acting as second, who had got horses, +and had made all arrangements, and had left his peaceful abode at six +o’clock? Besides, his legs were stiff and aching. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin thought it as well to cheer him up, and he chanced on the very thing, he +hit on the right word. +</p> + +<p> +“Where is your old spirit, Signor Cippatola? Where is <i>il antico +valor</i>?” +</p> + +<p> +Signor Cippatola drew himself up and scowled “<i>Il antico +valor</i>?” he boomed in a bass voice. “<i>Non è ancora spento</i> +(it’s not all lost yet), <i>il antico valor!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +He put himself in a dignified attitude, began talking of his career, of the +opera, of the great tenor Garcia—and arrived at Hanau a hero. +</p> + +<p> +After all, if you think of it, nothing is stronger in the world … and +weaker—than a word! +</p> + +<h3>XXII</h3> + +<p> +The copse in which the duel was to take place was a quarter of a mile from +Hanau. Sanin and Pantaleone arrived there first, as the latter had predicted; +they gave orders for the carriage to remain outside the wood, and they plunged +into the shade of the rather thick and close-growing trees. They had to wait +about an hour. +</p> + +<p> +The time of waiting did not seem particularly disagreeable to Sanin; he walked +up and down the path, listened to the birds singing, watched the dragonflies in +their flight, and like the majority of Russians in similar circumstances, tried +not to think. He only once dropped into reflection; he came across a young +lime-tree, broken down, in all probability by the squall of the previous night. +It was unmistakably dying … all the leaves on it were dead. “What is it? +an omen?” was the thought that flashed across his mind; but he promptly +began whistling, leaped over the very tree, and paced up and down the path. As +for Pantaleone, he was grumbling, abusing the Germans, sighing and moaning, +rubbing first his back and then his knees. He even yawned from agitation, which +gave a very comic expression to his tiny shrivelled-up face. Sanin could +scarcely help laughing when he looked at him. +</p> + +<p> +They heard, at last, the rolling of wheels along the soft road. +“It’s they!” said Pantaleone, and he was on the alert and +drew himself up, not without a momentary nervous shiver, which he made haste, +however, to cover with the ejaculation “B-r-r!” and the remark that +the morning was rather fresh. A heavy dew drenched the grass and leaves, but +the sultry heat penetrated even into the wood. +</p> + +<p> +Both the officers quickly made their appearance under its arched avenues; they +were accompanied by a little thick-set man, with a phlegmatic, almost sleepy, +expression of face—the army doctor. He carried in one hand an earthenware +pitcher of water—to be ready for any emergency; a satchel with surgical +instruments and bandages hung on his left shoulder. It was obvious that he was +thoroughly used to such excursions; they constituted one of the sources of his +income; each duel yielded him eight gold crowns—four from each of the +combatants. Herr von Richter carried a case of pistols, Herr von +Dönhof—probably considering it the thing—was swinging in his hand a +little cane. +</p> + +<p> +“Pantaleone!” Sanin whispered to the old man; “if … if +I’m killed—anything may happen—take out of my side pocket a +paper—there’s a flower wrapped up in it—and give the paper to +Signorina Gemma. Do you hear? You promise?” +</p> + +<p> +The old man looked dejectedly at him, and nodded his head affirmatively…. But +God knows whether he understood what Sanin was asking him to do. +</p> + +<p> +The combatants and the seconds exchanged the customary bows; the doctor alone +did not move as much as an eyelash; he sat down yawning on the grass, as much +as to say, “I’m not here for expressions of chivalrous +courtesy.” Herr von Richter proposed to Herr “Tshibadola” +that he should select the place; Herr “Tshibadola” responded, +moving his tongue with difficulty—“the wall” within him had +completely given way again. “You act, my dear sir; I will watch….” +</p> + +<p> +And Herr von Richter proceeded to act. He picked out in the wood close by a +very pretty clearing all studded with flowers; he measured out the steps, and +marked the two extreme points with sticks, which he cut and pointed. He took +the pistols out of the case, and squatting on his heels, he rammed in the +bullets; in short, he fussed about and exerted himself to the utmost, +continually mopping his perspiring brow with a white handkerchief. Pantaleone, +who accompanied him, was more like a man frozen. During all these preparations, +the two principals stood at a little distance, looking like two schoolboys who +have been punished, and are sulky with their tutors. +</p> + +<p> +The decisive moment arrived…. “Each took his pistol….” +</p> + +<p> +But at this point Herr von Richter observed to Pantaleone that it was his duty, +as the senior second, according to the rules of the duel, to address a final +word of advice and exhortation to be reconciled to the combatants, before +uttering the fatal “one! two! three!”; that although this +exhortation had no effect of any sort and was, as a rule, nothing but an empty +formality, still, by the performance of this formality, Herr Cippatola would be +rid of a certain share of responsibility; that, properly speaking, such an +admonition formed the direct duty of the so-called “impartial +witness” (<i>unpartheiischer Zeuge</i>) but since they had no such person +present, he, Herr von Richter, would readily yield this privilege to his +honoured colleague. Pantaleone, who had already succeeded in obliterating +himself behind a bush, so as not to see the offending officer at all, at first +made out nothing at all of Herr von Richter’s speech, especially, as it +had been delivered through the nose, but all of a sudden he started, stepped +hurriedly forward, and convulsively thumping at his chest, in a hoarse voice +wailed out in his mixed jargon: “<i>A la la la … Che bestialita! Deux +zeun ommes comme ça que si battono—perchè? Che diavolo? Andata a +casa!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“I will not consent to a reconciliation,” Sanin intervened +hurriedly. +</p> + +<p> +“And I too will not,” his opponent repeated after him. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, then shout one, two, three!” von Richter said, addressing +the distracted Pantaleone. The latter promptly ducked behind the bush again, +and from there, all huddled together, his eyes screwed up, and his head turned +away, he shouted at the top of his voice: “<i>Una … due … tre!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +The first shot was Sanin’s, and he missed. His bullet went ping against a +tree. Baron von Dönhof shot directly after him—intentionally, to one +side, into the air. +</p> + +<p> +A constrained silence followed…. No one moved. Pantaleone uttered a faint moan. +</p> + +<p> +“Is it your wish to go on?” said Dönhof. +</p> + +<p> +“Why did you shoot in the air?” inquired Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s nothing to do with you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Will you shoot in the air the second time?” Sanin asked again. +</p> + +<p> +“Possibly: I don’t know.” +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me, excuse me, gentlemen …” began von Richter; +“duellists have not the right to talk together. That’s out of +order.” +</p> + +<p> +“I decline my shot,” said Sanin, and he threw his pistol on the +ground. +</p> + +<p> +“And I too do not intend to go on with the duel,” cried Dönhof, and +he too threw his pistol on the ground. “And more than that, I am prepared +to own that I was in the wrong—the day before yesterday.” +</p> + +<p> +He moved uneasily, and hesitatingly held out his hand. Sanin went rapidly up to +him and shook it. Both the young men looked at each other with a smile, and +both their faces flushed crimson. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Bravi! bravi!</i>” Pantaleone roared suddenly as if he had gone +mad, and clapping his hands, he rushed like a whirlwind from behind the bush; +while the doctor, who had been sitting on one side on a felled tree, promptly +rose, poured the water out of the jug and walked off with a lazy, rolling step +out of the wood. +</p> + +<p> +“Honour is satisfied, and the duel is over!” von Richter announced. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Fuori!</i>” Pantaleone boomed once more, through old +associations. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +When he had exchanged bows with the officers, and taken his seat in the +carriage, Sanin certainly felt all over him, if not a sense of pleasure, at +least a certain lightness of heart, as after an operation is over; but there +was another feeling astir within him too, a feeling akin to shame…. The duel, +in which he had just played his part, struck him as something false, a got-up +formality, a common officers’ and students’ farce. He recalled the +phlegmatic doctor, he recalled how he had grinned, that is, wrinkled up his +nose when he saw him coming out of the wood almost arm-in-arm with Baron +Dönhof. And afterwards when Pantaleone had paid him the four crowns due to him +… Ah! there was something nasty about it! +</p> + +<p> +Yes, Sanin was a little conscience-smitten and ashamed … though, on the other +hand, what was there for him to have done? Could he have left the young +officer’s insolence unrebuked? could he have behaved like Herr Klüber? He +had stood up for Gemma, he had championed her … that was so; and yet, there was +an uneasy pang in his heart, and he was conscience-smitten, and even ashamed. +</p> + +<p> +Not so Pantaleone—he was simply in his glory! He was suddenly possessed +by a feeling of pride. A victorious general, returning from the field of battle +he has won, could not have looked about him with greater self-satisfaction. +Sanin’s demeanour during the duel filled him with enthusiasm. He called +him a hero, and would not listen to his exhortations and even his entreaties. +He compared him to a monument of marble or of bronze, with the statue of the +commander in Don Juan! For himself he admitted he had been conscious of some +perturbation of mind, “but, of course, I am an artist,” he +observed; “I have a highly-strung nature, while you are the son of the +snows and the granite rocks.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was positively at a loss how to quiet the jubilant artist. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +Almost at the same place in the road where two hours before they had come upon +Emil, he again jumped out from behind a tree, and, with a cry of joy upon his +lips, waving his cap and leaping into the air, he rushed straight at the +carriage, almost fell under the wheel, and, without waiting for the horses to +stop, clambered up over the carriage-door and fairly clung to Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“You are alive, you are not wounded!” he kept repeating. +“Forgive me, I did not obey you, I did not go back to Frankfort … I could +not! I waited for you here … Tell me how was it? You … killed him?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin with some difficulty pacified Emil and made him sit down. +</p> + +<p> +With great verbosity, with evident pleasure, Pantaleone communicated to him all +the details of the duel, and, of course, did not omit to refer again to the +monument of bronze and the statue of the commander. He even rose from his seat +and, standing with his feet wide apart to preserve his equilibrium, folding his +arm on his chest and looking contemptuously over his shoulder, gave an ocular +representation of the commander—Sanin! Emil listened with awe, +occasionally interrupting the narrative with an exclamation, or swiftly getting +up and as swiftly kissing his heroic friend. +</p> + +<p> +The carriage wheels rumbled over the paved roads of Frankfort, and stopped at +last before the hotel where Sanin was living. +</p> + +<p> +Escorted by his two companions, he went up the stairs, when suddenly a woman +came with hurried steps out of the dark corridor; her face was hidden by a +veil, she stood still, facing Sanin, wavered a little, gave a trembling sigh, +at once ran down into the street and vanished, to the great astonishment of the +waiter, who explained that “that lady had been for over an hour waiting +for the return of the foreign gentleman.” Momentary as was the +apparition, Sanin recognised Gemma. He recognised her eyes under the thick silk +of her brown veil. +</p> + +<p> +“Did Fräulein Gemma know, then?”… he said slowly in a displeased +voice in German, addressing Emil and Pantaleone, who were following close on +his heels. +</p> + +<p> +Emil blushed and was confused. +</p> + +<p> +“I was obliged to tell her all,” he faltered; “she guessed, +and I could not help it…. But now that’s of no consequence,” he +hurried to add eagerly, “everything has ended so splendidly, and she has +seen you well and uninjured!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin turned away. +</p> + +<p> +“What a couple of chatterboxes you are!” he observed in a tone of +annoyance, as he went into his room and sat down on a chair. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t be angry, please,” Emil implored. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, I won’t be angry”—(Sanin was not, in fact, +angry—and, after all, he could hardly have desired that Gemma should know +nothing about it). “Very well … that’s enough embracing. You get +along now. I want to be alone. I’m going to sleep. I’m +tired.” +</p> + +<p> +“An excellent idea!” cried Pantaleone. “You need repose! You +have fully earned it, noble signor! Come along, Emilio! On tip-toe! On tip-toe! +Sh—sh—sh!” +</p> + +<p> +When he said he wanted to go to sleep, Sanin had simply wished to get rid of +his companions; but when he was left alone, he was really aware of considerable +weariness in all his limbs; he had hardly closed his eyes all the preceding +night, and throwing himself on his bed he fell immediately into a sound sleep. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXIII</h3> + +<p> +He slept for some hours without waking. Then he began to dream that he was once +more fighting a duel, that the antagonist standing facing him was Herr Klüber, +and on a fir-tree was sitting a parrot, and this parrot was Pantaleone, and he +kept tapping with his beak: one, one, one! +</p> + +<p> +“One … one … one!” he heard the tapping too distinctly; he opened +his eyes, raised his head … some one was knocking at his door. +</p> + +<p> +“Come in!” called Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +The waiter came in and answered that a lady very particularly wished to see +him. +</p> + +<p> +“Gemma!” flashed into his head … but the lady turned out to be her +mother, Frau Lenore. +</p> + +<p> +Directly she came in, she dropped at once into a chair and began to cry. +</p> + +<p> +“What is the matter, my dear, good Madame Roselli?” began Sanin, +sitting beside her and softly touching her hand. “What has happened? calm +yourself, I entreat you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, Herr Dimitri, I am very … very miserable!” +</p> + +<p> +“You are miserable?” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, very! Could I have foreseen such a thing? All of a sudden, like +thunder from a clear sky …” +</p> + +<p> +She caught her breath. +</p> + +<p> +“But what is it? Explain! Would you like a glass of water?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, thank you.” Frau Lenore wiped her eyes with her handkerchief +and began to cry with renewed energy. “I know all, you see! All!” +</p> + +<p> +“All? that is to say?” +</p> + +<p> +“Everything that took place to-day! And the cause … I know that too! You +acted like an honourable man; but what an unfortunate combination of +circumstances! I was quite right in not liking that excursion to Soden … quite +right!” (Frau Lenore had said nothing of the sort on the day of the +excursion, but she was convinced now that she had foreseen “all” +even then.) “I have come to you as to an honourable man, as to a friend, +though I only saw you for the first time five days ago…. But you know I am a +widow, a lonely woman…. My daughter …” +</p> + +<p> +Tears choked Frau Lenore’s voice. Sanin did not know what to think. +“Your daughter?” he repeated. +</p> + +<p> +“My daughter, Gemma,” broke almost with a groan from Frau Lenore, +behind the tear-soaked handkerchief, “informed me to-day that she would +not marry Herr Klüber, and that I must refuse him!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin positively started back a little; he had not expected that. +</p> + +<p> +“I won’t say anything now,” Frau Lenore went on, “of +the disgrace of it, of its being something unheard of in the world for a girl +to jilt her betrothed; but you see it’s ruin for us, Herr Dimitri!” +Frau Lenore slowly and carefully twisted up her handkerchief in a tiny, tiny +little ball, as though she would enclose all her grief within it. “We +can’t go on living on the takings of our shop, Herr Dimitri! and Herr +Klüber is very rich, and will be richer still. And what is he to be refused +for? Because he did not defend his betrothed? Allowing that was not very +handsome on his part, still, he’s a civilian, has not had a university +education, and as a solid business man, it was for him to look with contempt on +the frivolous prank of some unknown little officer. And what sort of insult was +it, after all, Herr Dimitri?” +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me, Frau Lenore, you seem to be blaming me.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am not blaming you in the least, not in the least! You’re quite +another matter; you are, like all Russians, a military man …” +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me, I’m not at all …” +</p> + +<p> +“You’re a foreigner, a visitor, and I’m grateful to +you,” Frau Lenore went on, not heeding Sanin. She sighed, waved her +hands, unwound her handkerchief again, and blew her nose. Simply from the way +in which her distress expressed itself, it could be seen that she had not been +born under a northern sky. +</p> + +<p> +“And how is Herr Klüber to look after his shop, if he is to fight with +his customers? It’s utterly inconsistent! And now I am to send him away! +But what are we going to live on? At one time we were the only people that made +angel cakes, and nougat of pistachio nuts, and we had plenty of customers; but +now all the shops make angel cakes! Only consider; even without this, +they’ll talk in the town about your duel … it’s impossible to keep +it secret. And all of a sudden, the marriage broken off! It will be a scandal, +a scandal! Gemma is a splendid girl, she loves me; but she’s an obstinate +republican, she doesn’t care for the opinion of others. You’re the +only person that can persuade her!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was more amazed than ever. “I, Frau Lenore?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, you alone … you alone. That’s why I have come to you; I could +not think of anything else to do! You are so clever, so good! You have fought +in her defence. She will trust you! She is bound to trust you—why, you +have risked your life on her account! You will make her understand, for I can +do nothing more; you make her understand that she will bring ruin on herself +and all of us. You saved my son—save my daughter too! God Himself sent +you here … I am ready on my knees to beseech you….” And Frau Lenore half +rose from her seat as though about to fall at Sanin’s feet…. He +restrained her. +</p> + +<p> +“Frau Lenore! For mercy’s sake! What are you doing?” +</p> + +<p> +She clutched his hand impulsively. “You promise …” +</p> + +<p> +“Frau Lenore, think a moment; what right have I …” +</p> + +<p> +“You promise? You don’t want me to die here at once before your +eyes?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was utterly nonplussed. It was the first time in his life he had had to +deal with any one of ardent Italian blood. +</p> + +<p> +“I will do whatever you like,” he cried. “I will talk to +Fräulein Gemma….” +</p> + +<p> +Frau Lenore uttered a cry of delight. +</p> + +<p> +“Only I really can’t say what result will come of it …” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, don’t go back, don’t go back from your words!” +cried Frau Lenore in an imploring voice; “you have already consented! The +result is certain to be excellent. Any way, <i>I</i> can do nothing more! She +won’t listen to <i>me</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +“Has she so positively stated her disinclination to marry Herr +Klüber?” Sanin inquired after a short silence. +</p> + +<p> +“As if she’d cut the knot with a knife! She’s her father all +over, Giovanni Battista! Wilful girl!” +</p> + +<p> +“Wilful? Is she!” … Sanin said slowly. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes … yes … but she’s an angel too. She will mind you. Are you +coming soon? Oh, my dear Russian friend!” Frau Lenore rose impulsively +from her chair, and as impulsively clasped the head of Sanin, who was sitting +opposite her. “Accept a mother’s blessing—and give me some +water!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin brought Signora Roselli a glass of water, gave her his word of honour +that he would come directly, escorted her down the stairs to the street, and +when he was back in his own room, positively threw up his arms and opened his +eyes wide in his amazement. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” he thought, “well, <i>now</i> life is going round in +a whirl! And it’s whirling so that I’m giddy.” He did not +attempt to look within, to realise what was going on in himself: it was all +uproar and confusion, and that was all he knew! What a day it had been! His +lips murmured unconsciously: “Wilful … her mother says … and I have got +to advise her … her! And advise her what?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin, really, was giddy, and above all this whirl of shifting sensations and +impressions and unfinished thoughts, there floated continually the image of +Gemma, the image so ineffaceably impressed on his memory on that hot night, +quivering with electricity, in that dark window, in the light of the swarming +stars! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXIV</h3> + +<p> +With hesitating footsteps Sanin approached the house of Signora Roselli. His +heart was beating violently; he distinctly felt, and even heard it thumping at +his side. What should he say to Gemma, how should he begin? He went into the +house, not through the shop, but by the back entrance. In the little outer room +he met Frau Lenore. She was both relieved and scared at the sight of him. +</p> + +<p> +“I have been expecting you,” she said in a whisper, squeezing his +hand with each of hers in turn. “Go into the garden; she is there. Mind, +I rely on you!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin went into the garden. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma was sitting on a garden-seat near the path, she was sorting a big basket +full of cherries, picking out the ripest, and putting them on a dish. The sun +was low—it was seven o’clock in the evening—and there was +more purple than gold in the full slanting light with which it flooded the +whole of Signora Roselli’s little garden. From time to time, faintly +audibly, and as it were deliberately, the leaves rustled, and belated bees +buzzed abruptly as they flew from one flower to the next, and somewhere a dove +was cooing a never-changing, unceasing note. Gemma had on the same round hat in +which she had driven to Soden. She peeped at Sanin from under its turned-down +brim, and again bent over the basket. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin went up to Gemma, unconsciously making each step shorter, and … and … and +nothing better could he find to say to her than to ask why was she sorting the +cherries. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma was in no haste to reply. +</p> + +<p> +“These are riper,” she observed at last, “they will go into +jam, and those are for tarts. You know the round sweet tarts we sell?” +</p> + +<p> +As she said those words, Gemma bent her head still lower, and her right hand +with two cherries in her fingers was suspended in the air between the basket +and the dish. +</p> + +<p> +“May I sit by you?” asked Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” Gemma moved a little along on the seat. Sanin placed himself +beside her. “How am I to begin?” was his thought. But Gemma got him +out of his difficulty. +</p> + +<p> +“You have fought a duel to-day,” she began eagerly, and she turned +all her lovely, bashfully flushing face to him—and what depths of +gratitude were shining in those eyes! “And you are so calm! I suppose for +you danger does not exist?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, come! I have not been exposed to any danger. Everything went off +very satisfactorily and inoffensively.” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma passed her finger to right and to left before her eyes … Also an Italian +gesture. “No! no! don’t say that! You won’t deceive me! +Pantaleone has told me everything!” +</p> + +<p> +“He’s a trustworthy witness! Did he compare me to the statue of the +commander?” +</p> + +<p> +“His expressions may be ridiculous, but his feeling is not ridiculous, +nor is what you have done to-day. And all that on my account … for me … I shall +never forget it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I assure you, Fräulein Gemma …” +</p> + +<p> +“I shall never forget it,” she said deliberately; once more she +looked intently at him, and turned away. +</p> + +<p> +He could now see her delicate pure profile, and it seemed to him that he had +never seen anything like it, and had never known anything like what he was +feeling at that instant. His soul was on fire. +</p> + +<p> +“And my promise!” flashed in among his thoughts. +</p> + +<p> +“Fräulein Gemma …” he began after a momentary hesitation. +</p> + +<p> +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +She did not turn to him, she went on sorting the cherries, carefully taking +them by their stalks with her finger-tips, assiduously picking out the leaves…. +But what a confiding caress could be heard in that one word, +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +“Has your mother said nothing to you … about …” +</p> + +<p> +“About?” +</p> + +<p> +“About me?” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma suddenly flung back into the basket the cherries she had taken. +</p> + +<p> +“Has she been talking to you?” she asked in her turn. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“What has she been saying to you?” +</p> + +<p> +“She told me that you … that you have suddenly decided to change … your +former intention.” Gemma’s head was bent again. She vanished +altogether under her hat; nothing could be seen but her neck, supple and tender +as the stalk of a big flower. +</p> + +<p> +“What intentions?” +</p> + +<p> +“Your intentions … relative to … the future arrangement of your +life.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is … you are speaking … of Herr Klüber?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mamma told you I don’t want to be Herr Klüber’s wife?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma moved forward on the seat. The basket tottered, fell … a few cherries +rolled on to the path. A minute passed by … another. +</p> + +<p> +“Why did she tell you so?” he heard her voice saying. Sanin as +before could only see Gemma’s neck. Her bosom rose and fell more rapidly +than before. +</p> + +<p> +“Why? Your mother thought that as you and I, in a short time, have +become, so to say, friends, and you have some confidence in me, I am in a +position to give you good advice—and you would mind what I say.” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma’s hands slowly slid on to her knees. She began plucking at the +folds of her dress. +</p> + +<p> +“What advice will you give me, Monsieur Dimitri?” she asked, after +a short pause. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin saw that Gemma’s fingers were trembling on her knees…. She was only +plucking at the folds of her dress to hide their trembling. He softly laid his +hand on those pale, shaking fingers. +</p> + +<p> +“Gemma,” he said, “why don’t you look at me?” She +instantly tossed her hat back on to her shoulder, and bent her eyes upon him, +confiding and grateful as before. She waited for him to speak…. But the sight +of her face had bewildered, and, as it were, dazed him. The warm glow of the +evening sun lighted up her youthful head, and the expression of that head was +brighter, more radiant than its glow. +</p> + +<p> +“I will mind what you say, Monsieur Dimitri,” she said, faintly +smiling, and faintly arching her brows; “but what advice do you give +me?” +</p> + +<p> +“What advice?” repeated Sanin. “Well, you see, your mother +considers that to dismiss Herr Klüber simply because he did not show any +special courage the day before yesterday …” +</p> + +<p> +“Simply because?” said Gemma. She bent down, picked up the basket, +and set it beside her on the garden seat. +</p> + +<p> +“That … altogether … to dismiss him, would be, on your part … +unreasonable; that it is a step, all the consequences of which ought to be +thoroughly weighed; that in fact the very position of your affairs imposes +certain obligations on every member of your family …” +</p> + +<p> +“All that is mamma’s opinion,” Gemma interposed; “those +are her words; but what is your opinion?” +</p> + +<p> +“Mine?” Sanin was silent for a while. He felt a lump rising in his +throat and catching at his breath. “I too consider,” he began with +an effort … +</p> + +<p> +Gemma drew herself up. “Too? You too?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes … that is …” Sanin was unable, positively unable to add a +single word more. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well,” said Gemma. “If you, as a friend, advise me to +change my decision—that is, not to change my former decision—I will +think it over.” Not knowing what she was doing, she began to tip the +cherries back from the plate into the basket…. “Mamma hopes that I will +mind what you say. Well … perhaps I really will mind what you say.” +</p> + +<p> +“But excuse me, Fräulein Gemma, I should like first to know what reason +impelled you …” +</p> + +<p> +“I will mind what you say,” Gemma repeated, her face right up to +her brows was working, her cheeks were white, she was biting her lower lip. +“You have done so much for me, that I am bound to do as you wish; bound +to carry out your wishes. I will tell mamma … I will think again. Here she is, +by the way, coming here.” +</p> + +<p> +Frau Lenore did in fact appear in the doorway leading from the house to the +garden. She was in an agony of impatience; she could not keep still. According +to her calculations, Sanin must long ago have finished all he had to say to +Gemma, though his conversation with her had not lasted a quarter of an hour. +</p> + +<p> +“No, no, no, for God’s sake, don’t tell her anything +yet,” Sanin articulated hurriedly, almost in alarm. “Wait a little +… I will tell you, I will write to you … and till then don’t decide on +anything … wait!” +</p> + +<p> +He pressed Gemma’s hand, jumped up from the seat, and to Frau +Lenore’s great amazement, rushed past her, and raising his hat, muttered +something unintelligible—and vanished. +</p> + +<p> +She went up to her daughter. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me, please, Gemma…” +</p> + +<p> +The latter suddenly got up and hugged her. “Dear mamma, can you wait a +little, a tiny bit … till to-morrow? Can you? And till to-morrow not a word?… +Ah!…” +</p> + +<p> +She burst into sudden happy tears, incomprehensible to herself. This surprised +Frau Lenore, the more as the expression of Gemma’s face was far from +sorrowful,—rather joyful in fact. +</p> + +<p> +“What is it?” she asked. “You never cry and here, all at once +…” +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing, mamma, never mind! you only wait. We must both wait a little. +Don’t ask me anything till to-morrow—and let us sort the cherries +before the sun has set.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you will be reasonable?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I’m very reasonable!” Gemma shook her head +significantly. She began to make up little bunches of cherries, holding them +high above her flushed face. She did not wipe away her tears; they had dried of +themselves. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXV</h3> + +<p> +Almost running, Sanin returned to his hotel room. He felt, he knew that only +there, only by himself, would it be clear to him at last what was the matter, +what was happening to him. And so it was; directly he had got inside his room, +directly he had sat down to the writing-table, with both elbows on the table +and both hands pressed to his face, he cried in a sad and choked voice, +“I love her, love her madly!” and he was all aglow within, like a +fire when a thick layer of dead ash has been suddenly blown off. An instant +more … and he was utterly unable to understand how he could have sat beside her +… her!—and talked to her and not have felt that he worshipped the very +hem of her garment, that he was ready as young people express it “to die +at her feet.” The last interview in the garden had decided everything. +Now when he thought of her, she did not appear to him with blazing curls in the +shining starlight; he saw her sitting on the garden-seat, saw her all at once +tossing back her hat, and gazing at him so confidingly … and the tremor and +hunger of love ran through all his veins. He remembered the rose which he had +been carrying about in his pocket for three days: he snatched it out, and +pressed it with such feverish violence to his lips, that he could not help +frowning with the pain. Now he considered nothing, reflected on nothing, did +not deliberate, and did not look forward; he had done with all his past, he +leaped forward into the future; from the dreary bank of his lonely bachelor +life he plunged headlong into that glad, seething, mighty torrent—and +little he cared, little he wished to know, where it would carry him, or whether +it would dash him against a rock! No more the soft-flowing currents of the +Uhland song, which had lulled him not long ago … These were mighty, +irresistible torrents! They rush flying onwards and he flies with them…. +</p> + +<p> +He took a sheet of paper, and without blotting out a word, almost with one +sweep of the pen, wrote as follows:— +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +“D<small>EAR</small> G<small>EMMA</small>,—You know what advice I +undertook to give you, what your mother desired, and what she asked of me; but +what you don’t know and what I must tell you now is, that I love you, +love you with all the ardour of a heart that loves for the first time! This +passion has flamed up in me suddenly, but with such force that I can find no +words for it! When your mother came to me and asked me, it was still only +smouldering in me, or else I should certainly, as an honest man, have refused +to carry out her request…. The confession I make you now is the confession of +an honest man. You ought to know whom you have to do with—between us +there should exist no misunderstandings. You see that I cannot give you any +advice…. I love you, love you, love you—and I have nothing +else—either in my head or in my heart!! +</p> + +<p class="right"> +“D<small>M</small>. S<small>ANIN</small>.” +</p> + +<p> +When he had folded and sealed this note, Sanin was on the point of ringing for +the waiter and sending it by him…. “No!” he thought, “it +would be awkward…. By Emil? But to go to the shop, and seek him out there among +the other employés, would be awkward too. Besides, it’s dark by now, and +he has probably left the shop.” Reflecting after this fashion, Sanin put +on his hat, however, and went into the street; he turned a corner, another, and +to his unspeakable delight, saw Emil before him. With a satchel under his arm, +and a roll of papers in his hand, the young enthusiast was hurrying home. +</p> + +<p> +“They may well say every lover has a lucky star,” thought Sanin, +and he called to Emil. +</p> + +<p> +The latter turned and at once rushed to him. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin cut short his transports, handed him the note, and explained to whom and +how he was to deliver it…. Emil listened attentively. +</p> + +<p> +“So that no one sees?” he inquired, assuming an important and +mysterious air, that said, “We understand the inner meaning of it +all!” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, my friend,” said Sanin and he was a little disconcerted; +however, he patted Emil on the cheek…. “And if there should be an +answer…. You will bring me the answer, won’t you? I will stay at +home.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t worry yourself about that!” Emil whispered gaily; he +ran off, and as he ran nodded once more to him. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin went back home, and without lighting a candle, flung himself on the sofa, +put his hands behind his head, and abandoned himself to those sensations of +newly conscious love, which it is no good even to describe. One who has felt +them knows their languor and sweetness; to one who has felt them not, one could +never make them known. +</p> + +<p> +The door opened—Emil’s head appeared. +</p> + +<p> +“I have brought it,” he said in a whisper: “here it +is—the answer!” +</p> + +<p> +He showed and waved above his head a folded sheet of paper. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin leaped up from the sofa and snatched it out of Emil’s hand. Passion +was working too powerfully within him: he had no thought of reserve now, nor of +the observance of a suitable demeanour—even before this boy, her brother. +He would have been scrupulous, he would have controlled himself—if he +could! +</p> + +<p> +He went to the window, and by the light of a street lamp which stood just +opposite the house, he read the following lines:— +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +I beg you, I beseech you—<i>don’t come to see us, don’t show +yourself all day to-morrow</i>. It’s necessary, absolutely necessary for +me, and then everything shall be settled. I know you will not say no, because … +</p> + +<p class="right"> +“G<small>EMMA</small>.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin read this note twice through. Oh, how touchingly sweet and beautiful her +handwriting seemed to him! He thought a little, and turning to Emil, who, +wishing to give him to understand what a discreet young person he was, was +standing with his face to the wall, and scratching on it with his finger-nails, +he called him aloud by name. +</p> + +<p> +Emil ran at once to Sanin. “What do you want me to do?” +</p> + +<p> +“Listen, my young friend…” +</p> + +<p> +“Monsieur Dimitri,” Emil interrupted in a plaintive voice, +“why do you address me so formally?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin laughed. “Oh, very well. Listen, my dearest boy—(Emil gave a +little skip of delight)—listen; <i>there</i> you understand, there, you +will say, that everything shall be done exactly as is wished—(Emil +compressed his lips and nodded solemnly)—and as for me … what are you +doing to-morrow, my dear boy?” +</p> + +<p> +“I? what am I doing? What would you like me to do?” +</p> + +<p> +“If you can, come to me early in the morning—and we will walk about +the country round Frankfort till evening…. Would you like to?” +</p> + +<p> +Emil gave another little skip. “I say, what in the world could be +jollier? Go a walk with you—why, it’s simply glorious! I’ll +be sure to come!” +</p> + +<p> +“And if they won’t let you?” +</p> + +<p> +“They will let me!” +</p> + +<p> +“Listen … Don’t say <i>there</i> that I asked you to come for the +whole day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why should I? But I’ll get away all the same! What does it +matter?” +</p> + +<p> +Emil warmly kissed Sanin, and ran away. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin walked up and down the room a long while, and went late to bed. He gave +himself up to the same delicate and sweet sensations, the same joyous thrill at +facing a new life. Sanin was very glad that the idea had occurred to him to +invite Emil to spend the next day with him; he was like his sister. “He +will recall her,” was his thought. +</p> + +<p> +But most of all, he marvelled how he could have been yesterday other than he +was to-day. It seemed to him that he had loved Gemma for all time; and that he +had loved her just as he loved her to-day. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXVI</h3> + +<p> +At eight o’clock next morning, Emil arrived at Sanin’s hotel +leading Tartaglia by a string. Had he sprung of German parentage, he could not +have shown greater practicality. He had told a lie at home; he had said he was +going for a walk with Sanin till lunch-time, and then going to the shop. While +Sanin was dressing, Emil began to talk to him, rather hesitatingly, it is true, +about Gemma, about her rupture with Herr Klüber; but Sanin preserved an austere +silence in reply, and Emil, looking as though he understood why so serious a +matter should not be touched on lightly, did not return to the subject, and +only assumed from time to time an intense and even severe expression. +</p> + +<p> +After drinking coffee, the two friends set off together—on foot, of +course—to Hausen, a little village lying a short distance from Frankfort, +and surrounded by woods. The whole chain of the Taunus mountains could be seen +clearly from there. The weather was lovely; the sunshine was bright and warm, +but not blazing hot; a fresh wind rustled briskly among the green leaves; the +shadows of high, round clouds glided swiftly and smoothly in small patches over +the earth. The two young people soon got out of the town, and stepped out +boldly and gaily along the well-kept road. They reached the woods, and wandered +about there a long time; then they lunched very heartily at a country inn; then +climbed on to the mountains, admired the views, rolled stones down and clapped +their hands, watching the queer droll way in which the stones hopped along like +rabbits, till a man passing below, unseen by them, began abusing them in a loud +ringing voice. Then they lay full length on the short dry moss of +yellowish-violet colour; then they drank beer at another inn; ran races, and +tried for a wager which could jump farthest. They discovered an echo, and began +to call to it; sang songs, hallooed, wrestled, broke up dry twigs, decked their +hats with fern, and even danced. Tartaglia, as far as he could, shared in all +these pastimes; he did not throw stones, it is true, but he rolled head over +heels after them; he howled when they were singing, and even drank beer, though +with evident aversion; he had been trained in this art by a student to whom he +had once belonged. But he was not prompt in obeying Emil—not as he was +with his master Pantaleone—and when Emil ordered him to +“speak,” or to “sneeze,” he only wagged his tail and +thrust out his tongue like a pipe. +</p> + +<p> +The young people talked, too. At the beginning of the walk, Sanin, as the +elder, and so more reflective, turned the conversation on fate and +predestination, and the nature and meaning of man’s destiny; but the +conversation quickly took a less serious turn. Emil began to question his +friend and patron about Russia, how duels were fought there, and whether the +women there were beautiful, and whether one could learn Russian quickly, and +what he had felt when the officer took aim at him. Sanin, on his side, +questioned Emil about his father, his mother, and in general about their family +affairs, trying every time not to mention Gemma’s name—and thinking +only of her. To speak more precisely, it was not of her he was thinking, but of +the morrow, the mysterious morrow which was to bring him new, unknown +happiness! It was as though a veil, a delicate, bright veil, hung faintly +fluttering before his mental vision; and behind this veil he felt … felt the +presence of a youthful, motionless, divine image, with a tender smile on its +lips, and eyelids severely—with affected severity—downcast. And this +image was not the face of Gemma, it was the face of happiness itself! For, +behold, at last <i>his</i> hour had come, the veil had vanished, the lips were +parting, the eyelashes are raised—his divinity has looked upon +him—and at once light as from the sun, and joy and bliss unending! He +dreamed of this morrow—and his soul thrilled with joy again in the +melting torture of ever-growing expectation! +</p> + +<p> +And this expectation, this torture, hindered nothing. It accompanied every +action, and did not prevent anything. It did not prevent him from dining +capitally at a third inn with Emil; and only occasionally, like a brief flash +of lightning, the thought shot across him, What if any one in the world knew? +This suspense did not prevent him from playing leap-frog with Emil after +dinner. The game took place on an open green lawn. And the confusion, the +stupefaction of Sanin may be imagined! At the very moment when, accompanied by +a sharp bark from Tartaglia, he was flying like a bird, with his legs outspread +over Emil, who was bent double, he suddenly saw on the farthest border of the +lawn two officers, in whom he recognised at once his adversary and his second, +Herr von Dönhof and Herr von Richter! Each of them had stuck an eyeglass in his +eye, and was staring at him, chuckling!… Sanin got on his feet, turned away +hurriedly, put on the coat he had flung down, jerked out a word to Emil; the +latter, too, put on his jacket, and they both immediately made off. +</p> + +<p> +It was late when they got back to Frankfort. “They’ll scold +me,” Emil said to Sanin as he said good-bye to him. “Well, what +does it matter? I’ve had such a splendid, splendid day!” +</p> + +<p> +When he got home to his hotel, Sanin found a note there from Gemma. She fixed a +meeting with him for next day, at seven o’clock in the morning, in one of +the public gardens which surround Frankfort on all sides. +</p> + +<p> +How his heart throbbed! How glad he was that he had obeyed her so +unconditionally! And, my God, what was promised … what was not promised, by +that unknown, unique, impossible, and undubitably certain morrow! +</p> + +<p> +He feasted his eyes on Gemma’s note. The long, elegant tail of the letter +G, the first letter of her name, which stood at the bottom of the sheet, +reminded him of her lovely fingers, her hand…. He thought that he had not once +touched that hand with his lips…. “Italian women,” he mused, +“in spite of what’s said of them, are modest and severe…. And Gemma +above all! Queen … goddess … pure, virginal marble….” +</p> + +<p> +“But the time will come; and it is not far off….” There was that +night in Frankfort one happy man…. He slept; but he might have said of himself +in the words of the poet: +</p> + +<p> + “I sleep … but my watchful heart sleeps not.” +</p> + +<p> +And it fluttered as lightly as a butterfly flutters his wings, as he stoops +over the flowers in the summer sunshine. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXVII</h3> + +<p> +At five o’clock Sanin woke up, at six he was dressed, at half-past six he +was walking up and down the public garden within sight of the little arbour +which Gemma had mentioned in her note. It was a still, warm, grey morning. It +sometimes seemed as though it were beginning to rain; but the outstretched hand +felt nothing, and only looking at one’s coat-sleeve, one could see traces +of tiny drops like diminutive beads, but even these were soon gone. It seemed +there had never been a breath of wind in the world. Every sound moved not, but +was shed around in the stillness. In the distance was a faint thickening of +whitish mist; in the air there was a scent of mignonette and white acacia +flowers. +</p> + +<p> +In the streets the shops were not open yet, but there were already some people +walking about; occasionally a solitary carriage rumbled along … there was no +one walking in the garden. A gardener was in a leisurely way scraping the path +with a spade, and a decrepit old woman in a black woollen cloak was hobbling +across the garden walk. Sanin could not for one instant mistake this poor old +creature for Gemma; and yet his heart leaped, and he watched attentively the +retreating patch of black. +</p> + +<p> +Seven! chimed the clock on the tower. Sanin stood still. Was it possible she +would not come? A shiver of cold suddenly ran through his limbs. The same +shiver came again an instant later, but from a different cause. Sanin heard +behind him light footsteps, the light rustle of a woman’s dress…. He +turned round: she! +</p> + +<p> +Gemma was coming up behind him along the path. She was wearing a grey cape and +a small dark hat. She glanced at Sanin, turned her head away, and catching him +up, passed rapidly by him. +</p> + +<p> +“Gemma,” he articulated, hardly audibly. +</p> + +<p> +She gave him a little nod, and continued to walk on in front. He followed her. +</p> + +<p> +He breathed in broken gasps. His legs shook under him. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma passed by the arbour, turned to the right, passed by a small flat +fountain, in which the sparrows were splashing busily, and, going behind a +clump of high lilacs, sank down on a bench. The place was snug and hidden. +Sanin sat down beside her. +</p> + +<p> +A minute passed, and neither he nor she uttered a word. She did not even look +at him; and he gazed not at her face, but at her clasped hands, in which she +held a small parasol. What was there to tell, what was there to say, which +could compare, in importance, with the simple fact of their presence there, +together, alone, so early, so close to each other. +</p> + +<p> +“You … are not angry with me?” Sanin articulated at last. +</p> + +<p> +It would have been difficult for Sanin to have said anything more foolish than +these words … he was conscious of it himself…. But, at any rate, the silence +was broken. +</p> + +<p> +“Angry?” she answered. “What for? No.” +</p> + +<p> +“And you believe me?” he went on. +</p> + +<p> +“In what you wrote?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma’s head sank, and she said nothing. The parasol slipped out of her +hands. She hastily caught it before it dropped on the path. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, believe me! believe what I wrote to you!” cried Sanin; all his +timidity suddenly vanished, he spoke with heat; “if there is truth on +earth—sacred, absolute truth—it’s that I love, love you +passionately, Gemma.” +</p> + +<p> +She flung him a sideway, momentary glance, and again almost dropped the +parasol. +</p> + +<p> +“Believe me! believe me!” he repeated. He besought her, held out +his hands to her, and did not dare to touch her. “What do you want me to +do … to convince you?” +</p> + +<p> +She glanced at him again. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me, Monsieur Dimitri,” she began; “the day before +yesterday, when you came to talk to me, you did not, I imagine, know then … did +not feel …” +</p> + +<p> +“I felt it,” Sanin broke in; “but I did not know it. I have +loved you from the very instant I saw you; but I did not realise at once what +you had become to me! And besides, I heard that you were solemnly betrothed…. +As far as your mother’s request is concerned—in the first place, +how could I refuse?—and secondly, I think I carried out her request in +such a way that you could guess….” +</p> + +<p> +They heard a heavy tread, and a rather stout gentleman with a knapsack over his +shoulder, apparently a foreigner, emerged from behind the clump, and staring, +with the unceremoniousness of a tourist, at the couple sitting on the +garden-seat, gave a loud cough and went on. +</p> + +<p> +“Your mother,” Sanin began, as soon as the sound of the heavy +footsteps had ceased, “told me your breaking off your engagement would +cause a scandal”—Gemma frowned a little—that I was myself in +part responsible for unpleasant gossip, and that … consequently … I was, to +some extent, under an obligation to advise you not to break with your +betrothed, Herr Klüber….” +</p> + +<p> +“Monsieur Dimitri,” said Gemma, and she passed her hand over her +hair on the side turned towards Sanin, “don’t, please, call Herr +Klüber my betrothed. I shall never be his wife. I have broken with him.” +</p> + +<p> +“You have broken with him? when?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yesterday.” +</p> + +<p> +“You saw him?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. At our house. He came to see us.” +</p> + +<p> +“Gemma? Then you love me?” +</p> + +<p> +She turned to him. +</p> + +<p> +“Should … I have come here, if not?” she whispered, and both her +hands fell on the seat. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin snatched those powerless, upturned palms, and pressed them to his eyes, +to his lips…. Now the veil was lifted of which he had dreamed the night before! +Here was happiness, here was its radiant form! +</p> + +<p> +He raised his head, and looked at Gemma, boldly and directly. She, too, looked +at him, a little downwards. Her half-shut eyes faintly glistened, dim with +light, blissful tears. Her face was not smiling … no! it laughed, with a +blissful, noiseless laugh. +</p> + +<p> +He tried to draw her to him, but she drew back, and never ceasing to laugh the +same noiseless laugh, shook her head. “Wait a little,” her happy +eyes seemed to say. +</p> + +<p> +“O Gemma!” cried Sanin: “I never dreamed that you would love +me!” +</p> + +<p> +“I did not expect this myself,” Gemma said softly. +</p> + +<p> +“How could I ever have dreamed,” Sanin went on, “when I came +to Frankfort, where I only expected to remain a few hours, that I should find +here the happiness of all my life!” +</p> + +<p> +“All your life? Really?” queried Gemma. +</p> + +<p> +“All my life, for ever and ever!” cried Sanin with fresh ardour. +</p> + +<p> +The gardener’s spade suddenly scraped two paces from where they were +sitting. +</p> + +<p> +“Let’s go home,” whispered Gemma: “we’ll go +together—will you?” +</p> + +<p> +If she had said to him at that instant “Throw yourself in the sea, will +you?” he would have been flying headlong into the ocean before she had +uttered the last word. +</p> + +<p> +They went together out of the garden and turned homewards, not by the streets +of the town, but through the outskirts. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXVIII</h3> + +<p> +Sanin walked along, at one time by Gemma’s side, at another time a little +behind her. He never took his eyes off her and never ceased smiling. She seemed +to hasten … seemed to linger. As a matter of fact, they both—he all pale, +and she all flushed with emotion—were moving along as in a dream. What +they had done together a few instants before—that surrender of each soul +to another soul—was so intense, so new, and so moving; so suddenly +everything in their lives had been changed and displaced that they could not +recover themselves, and were only aware of a whirlwind carrying them along, +like the whirlwind on that night, which had almost flung them into each +other’s arms. Sanin walked along, and felt that he even looked at Gemma +with other eyes; he instantly noted some peculiarities in her walk, in her +movements,—and heavens! how infinitely sweet and precious they were to +him! And she felt that that was how he was looking at her. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin and she were in love for the first time; all the miracles of first love +were working in them. First love is like a revolution; the uniformly regular +routine of ordered life is broken down and shattered in one instant; youth +mounts the barricade, waves high its bright flag, and whatever awaits it in the +future—death or a new life—all alike it goes to meet with ecstatic +welcome. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s this? Isn’t that our old friend?” said Sanin, +pointing to a muffled-up figure, which hurriedly slipped a little aside as +though trying to remain unobserved. In the midst of his abundant happiness he +felt a need to talk to Gemma, not of love—that was a settled thing and +holy—but of something else. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, it’s Pantaleone,” Gemma answered gaily and happily. +“Most likely he has been following me ever since I left home; all day +yesterday he kept watching every movement I made … He guesses!” +</p> + +<p> +“He guesses!” Sanin repeated in ecstasy. What could Gemma have said +at which he would not have been in ecstasy? +</p> + +<p> +Then he asked her to tell him in detail all that had passed the day before. +</p> + +<p> +And she began at once telling him, with haste, and confusion, and smiles, and +brief sighs, and brief bright looks exchanged with Sanin. She said that after +their conversation the day before yesterday, mamma had kept trying to get out +of her something positive; but that she had put off Frau Lenore with a promise +to tell her her decision within twenty-four hours; how she had demanded this +limit of time for herself, and how difficult it had been to get it; how utterly +unexpectedly Herr Klüber had made his appearance more starched and affected +than ever; how he had given vent to his indignation at the childish, +unpardonable action of the Russian stranger—“he meant your duel, +Dimitri,”—which he described as deeply insulting to him, Klüber, +and how he had demanded that “you should be at once refused admittance to +the house, Dimitri.” “For,” he had added—and here Gemma +slightly mimicked his voice and manner—“‘it casts a slur on my +honour; as though I were not able to defend my betrothed, had I thought it +necessary or advisable! All Frankfort will know by to-morrow that an outsider +has fought a duel with an officer on account of my betrothed—did any one +ever hear of such a thing! It tarnishes my honour!” Mamma agreed with +him—fancy!—but then I suddenly told him that he was troubling +himself unnecessarily about his honour and his character, and was unnecessarily +annoyed at the gossip about his betrothed, for I was no longer betrothed to him +and would never be his wife! I must own, I had meant to talk to you first … +before breaking with him finally; but he came … and I could not restrain +myself. Mamma positively screamed with horror, but I went into the next room +and got his ring—you didn’t notice, I took it off two days +ago—and gave it to him. He was fearfully offended, but as he is fearfully +self-conscious and conceited, he did not say much, and went away. Of course I +had to go through a great deal with mamma, and it made me very wretched to see +how distressed she was, and I thought I had been a little hasty; but you see I +had your note, and even apart from it I knew …” +</p> + +<p> +“That I love you,” put in Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes … that you were in love with me.” +</p> + +<p> +So Gemma talked, hesitating and smiling and dropping her voice or stopping +altogether every time any one met them or passed by. And Sanin listened +ecstatically, enjoying the very sound of her voice, as the day before he had +gloated over her handwriting. +</p> + +<p> +“Mamma is very much distressed,” Gemma began again, and her words +flew very rapidly one after another; “she refuses to take into +consideration that I dislike Herr Klüber, that I never was betrothed to him +from love, but only because of her urgent entreaties…. She suspects—you, +Dimitri; that’s to say, to speak plainly, she’s convinced I’m +in love with you, and she is more unhappy about it because only the day before +yesterday nothing of the sort had occurred to her, and she even begged you to +advise me…. It was a strange request, wasn’t it? Now she calls you … +Dimitri, a hypocrite and a cunning fellow, says that you have betrayed her +confidence, and predicts that you will deceive me….” +</p> + +<p> +“But, Gemma,” cried Sanin, “do you mean to say you +didn’t tell her?…” +</p> + +<p> +“I told her nothing! What right had I without consulting you?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin threw up his arms. “Gemma, I hope that now, at least, you will tell +all to her and take me to her…. I want to convince your mother that I am not a +base deceiver!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin’s bosom fairly heaved with the flood of generous and ardent +emotions. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma looked him full in the face. “You really want to go with me now to +mamma? to mamma, who maintains that … all this between us is +impossible—and can never come to pass?” There was one word Gemma +could not bring herself to utter…. It burnt her lips; but all the more eagerly +Sanin pronounced it. +</p> + +<p> +“Marry you, Gemma, be your husband—I can imagine no bliss +greater!” +</p> + +<p> +To his love, his magnanimity, his determination—he was aware of no limits +now. +</p> + +<p> +When she heard those words, Gemma, who had stopped still for an instant, went +on faster than ever…. She seemed trying to run away from this too great and +unexpected happiness! But suddenly her steps faltered. Round the corner of a +turning, a few paces from her, in a new hat and coat, straight as an arrow and +curled like a poodle—emerged Herr Klüber. He caught sight of Gemma, +caught sight of Sanin, and with a sort of inward snort and a backward bend of +his supple figure, he advanced with a dashing swing to meet them. Sanin felt a +pang; but glancing at Klüber’s face, to which its owner endeavoured, as +far as in him lay, to give an expression of scornful amazement, and even +commiseration, glancing at that red-cheeked, vulgar face, he felt a sudden rush +of anger, and took a step forward. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma seized his arm, and with quiet decision, giving him hers, she looked her +former betrothed full in the face…. The latter screwed up his face, shrugged +his shoulders, shuffled to one side, and muttering between his teeth, +“The usual end to the song!” (Das alte Ende vom +Liede!)—walked away with the same dashing, slightly skipping gait. +</p> + +<p> +“What did he say, the wretched creature?” asked Sanin, and would +have rushed after Klüber; but Gemma held him back and walked on with him, not +taking away the arm she had slipped into his. +</p> + +<p> +The Rosellis’ shop came into sight. Gemma stopped once more. +</p> + +<p> +“Dimitri, Monsieur Dimitri,” she said, “we are not there yet, +we have not seen mamma yet…. If you would rather think a little, if … you are +still free, Dimitri!” +</p> + +<p> +In reply Sanin pressed her hand tightly to his bosom, and drew her on. +</p> + +<p> +“Mamma,” said Gemma, going with Sanin to the room where Frau Lenore +was sitting, “I have brought the real one!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXIX</h3> + +<p> +If Gemma had announced that she had brought with her cholera or death itself, +one can hardly imagine that Frau Lenore could have received the news with +greater despair. She immediately sat down in a corner, with her face to the +wall, and burst into floods of tears, positively wailed, for all the world like +a Russian peasant woman on the grave of her husband or her son. For the first +minute Gemma was so taken aback that she did not even go up to her mother, but +stood still like a statue in the middle of the room; while Sanin was utterly +stupefied, to the point of almost bursting into tears himself! For a whole hour +that inconsolable wail went on—a whole hour! Pantaleone thought it better +to shut the outer door of the shop, so that no stranger should come; luckily, +it was still early. The old man himself did not know what to think, and in any +case, did not approve of the haste with which Gemma and Sanin had acted; he +could not bring himself to blame them, and was prepared to give them his +support in case of need: he greatly disliked Klüber! Emil regarded himself as +the medium of communication between his friend and his sister, and almost +prided himself on its all having turned out so splendidly! He was positively +unable to conceive why Frau Lenore was so upset, and in his heart he decided on +the spot that women, even the best of them, suffer from a lack of reasoning +power! Sanin fared worst of all. Frau Lenore rose to a howl and waved him off +with her hands, directly he approached her; and it was in vain that he +attempted once or twice to shout aloud, standing at a distance, “I ask +you for your daughter’s hand!” Frau Lenore was particularly angry +with herself. “How could she have been so blind—have seen nothing? +Had my Giovann’ Battista been alive,” she persisted through her +tears, “nothing of this sort would have happened!” “Heavens, +what’s it all about?” thought Sanin; “why, it’s +positively senseless!” He did not dare to look at Gemma, nor could she +pluck up courage to lift her eyes to him. She restricted herself to waiting +patiently on her mother, who at first repelled even her…. +</p> + +<p> +At last, by degrees, the storm abated. Frau Lenore gave over weeping, permitted +Gemma to bring her out of the corner, where she sat huddled up, to put her into +an arm-chair near the window, and to give her some orange-flower water to +drink. She permitted Sanin—not to approach … oh, no!—but, at any +rate, to remain in the room—she had kept clamouring for him to go +away—and did not interrupt him when he spoke. Sanin immediately availed +himself of the calm as it set in, and displayed an astounding eloquence. He +could hardly have explained his intentions and emotions with more fire and +persuasive force even to Gemma herself. Those emotions were of the sincerest, +those intentions were of the purest, like Almaviva’s in the <i>Barber of +Seville</i>. He did not conceal from Frau Lenore nor from himself the +disadvantageous side of those intentions; but the disadvantages were only +apparent! It is true he was a foreigner; they had not known him long, they knew +nothing positive about himself or his means; but he was prepared to bring +forward all the necessary evidence that he was a respectable person and not +poor; he would refer them to the most unimpeachable testimony of his +fellow-countrymen! He hoped Gemma would be happy with him, and that he would be +able to make up to her for the separation from her own people!… The allusion to +“separation”—the mere word +“separation”—almost spoiled the whole business…. Frau Lenore +began to tremble all over and move about uneasily…. Sanin hastened to observe +that the separation would only be temporary, and that, in fact, possibly it +would not take place at all! +</p> + +<p> +Sanin’s eloquence was not thrown away. Frau Lenore began to glance at +him, though still with bitterness and reproach, no longer with the same +aversion and fury; then she suffered him to come near her, and even to sit down +beside her (Gemma was sitting on the other side); then she fell to reproaching +him,—not in looks only, but in words, which already indicated a certain +softening of heart; she fell to complaining, and her complaints became quieter +and gentler; they were interspersed with questions addressed at one time to her +daughter, and at another to Sanin; then she suffered him to take her hand and +did not at once pull it away … then she wept again, but her tears were now +quite of another kind…. Then she smiled mournfully, and lamented the absence of +Giovanni Battista, but quite on different grounds from before…. An instant more +and the two criminals, Sanin and Gemma, were on their knees at her feet, and +she was laying her hands on their heads in turn; another instant and they were +embracing and kissing her, and Emil, his face beaming rapturously, ran into the +room and added himself to the group so warmly united. +</p> + +<p> +Pantaleone peeped into the room, smiled and frowned at the same time, and going +into the shop, opened the front door. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXX</h3> + +<p> +The transition from despair to sadness, and from that to “gentle +resignation,” was accomplished fairly quickly in Frau Lenore; but that +gentle resignation, too, was not slow in changing into a secret satisfaction, +which was, however, concealed in every way and suppressed for the sake of +appearances. Sanin had won Frau Lenore’s heart from the first day of +their acquaintance; as she got used to the idea of his being her son-in-law, +she found nothing particularly distasteful in it, though she thought it her +duty to preserve a somewhat hurt, or rather careworn, expression on her face. +Besides, everything that had happened the last few days had been so +extraordinary…. One thing upon the top of another. As a practical woman and a +mother, Frau Lenore considered it her duty also to put Sanin through various +questions; and Sanin, who, on setting out that morning to meet Gemma, had not a +notion that he should marry her—it is true he did not think of anything +at all at that time, but simply gave himself up to the current of his +passion—Sanin entered, with perfect readiness, one might even say with +zeal, into his part—the part of the betrothed lover, and answered all her +inquiries circumstantially, exactly, with alacrity. When she had satisfied +herself that he was a real nobleman by birth, and had even expressed some +surprise that he was not a prince, Frau Lenore assumed a serious air and +“warned him betimes” that she should be quite unceremoniously frank +with him, as she was forced to be so by her sacred duty as a mother! To which +Sanin replied that he expected nothing else from her, and that he earnestly +begged her not to spare him! +</p> + +<p> +Then Frau Lenore observed that Herr Klüber—as she uttered the name, she +sighed faintly, tightened her lips, and hesitated—Herr Klüber, +Gemma’s former betrothed, already possessed an income of eight thousand +guldens, and that with every year this sum would rapidly be increased; and what +was his, Herr Sanin’s income? “Eight thousand guldens,” Sanin +repeated deliberately…. “That’s in our money … about fifteen +thousand roubles…. My income is much smaller. I have a small estate in the +province of Tula…. With good management, it might yield—and, in fact, it +could not fail to yield—five or six thousand … and if I go into the +government service, I can easily get a salary of two thousand a year.” +</p> + +<p> +“Into the service in Russia?” cried Frau Lenore, “Then I must +part with Gemma!” +</p> + +<p> +“One might be able to enter in the diplomatic service,” Sanin put +in; “I have some connections…. There one’s duties lie abroad. Or +else, this is what one might do, and that’s much the best of all: sell my +estate and employ the sum received for it in some profitable undertaking; for +instance, the improvement of your shop.” Sanin was aware that he was +saying something absurd, but he was possessed by an incomprehensible +recklessness! He looked at Gemma, who, ever since the “practical” +conversation began, kept getting up, walking about the room, and sitting down +again—he looked at her—and no obstacle existed for him, and he was +ready to arrange everything at once in the best way, if only she were not +troubled! +</p> + +<p> +“Herr Klüber, too, had intended to give me a small sum for the +improvement of the shop,” Lenore observed after a slight hesitation. +</p> + +<p> +“Mother! for mercy’s sake, mother!” cried Gemma in Italian. +</p> + +<p> +“These things must be discussed in good time, my daughter,” Frau +Lenore replied in the same language. She addressed herself again to Sanin, and +began questioning him as to the laws existing in Russia as to marriage, and +whether there were no obstacles to contracting marriages with Catholics as in +Prussia. (At that time, in 1840, all Germany still remembered the controversy +between the Prussian Government and the Archbishop of Cologne upon mixed +marriages.) When Frau Lenore heard that by marrying a Russian nobleman, her +daughter would herself become of noble rank, she evinced a certain +satisfaction. “But, of course, you will first have to go to +Russia?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why? Why, to obtain the permission of your Tsar.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin explained to her that that was not at all necessary … but that he might +certainly have to go to Russia for a very short time before his +marriage—(he said these words, and his heart ached painfully, Gemma +watching him, knew it was aching, and blushed and grew dreamy)—and that +he would try to take advantage of being in his own country to sell his estate … +in any case he would bring back the money needed. +</p> + +<p> +“I would ask you to bring me back some good Astrakhan lambskin for a +cape,” said Frau Lenore. “They’re wonderfully good, I hear, +and wonderfully cheap!” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly, with the greatest pleasure, I will bring some for you and for +Gemma!” cried Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“And for me a morocco cap worked in silver,” Emil interposed, +putting his head in from the next room. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, I will bring it you … and some slippers for +Pantaleone.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come, that’s nonsense, nonsense,” observed Frau Lenore. +“We are talking now of serious matters. But there’s another +point,” added the practical lady. “You talk of selling your estate. +But how will you do that? Will you sell your peasants then, too?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin felt something like a stab at his heart. He remembered that in a +conversation with Signora Roselli and her daughter about serfdom, which, in his +own words, aroused his deepest indignation, he had repeatedly assured them that +never on any account would he sell his peasants, as he regarded such a sale as +an immoral act. +</p> + +<p> +“I will try and sell my estate to some man I know something of,” he +articulated, not without faltering, “or perhaps the peasants themselves +will want to buy their freedom.” +</p> + +<p> +“That would be best of all,” Frau Lenore agreed. “Though +indeed selling live people …” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Barbari</i>!” grumbled Pantaleone, who showed himself behind +Emil in the doorway, shook his topknot, and vanished. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s a bad business!” Sanin thought to himself, and stole a +look at Gemma. She seemed not to have heard his last words. “Well, never +mind!” he thought again. In this way the practical talk continued almost +uninterruptedly till dinner-time. Frau Lenore was completely softened at last, +and already called Sanin “Dimitri,” shook her finger affectionately +at him, and promised she would punish him for his treachery. She asked many and +minute questions about his relations, because “that too is very +important”; asked him to describe the ceremony of marriage as performed +by the ritual of the Russian Church, and was in raptures already at Gemma in a +white dress, with a gold crown on her head. +</p> + +<p> +“She’s as lovely as a queen,” she murmured with motherly +pride, “indeed there’s no queen like her in the world!” +</p> + +<p> +“There is no one like Gemma in the world!” Sanin chimed in. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; that’s why she is Gemma!” (Gemma, as every one knows, +means in Italian a precious stone.) +</p> + +<p> +Gemma flew to kiss her mother…. It seemed as if only then she breathed freely +again, and the load that had been oppressing her dropped from off her soul. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin felt all at once so happy, his heart was filled with such childish gaiety +at the thought, that here, after all, the dreams had come true to which he had +abandoned himself not long ago in these very rooms, his whole being was in such +a turmoil that he went quickly out into the shop. He felt a great desire, come +what might, to sell something in the shop, as he had done a few days before…. +“I have a full right to do so now!” he felt. “Why, I am one +of the family now!” And he actually stood behind the counter, and +actually kept shop, that is, sold two little girls, who came in, a pound of +sweets, giving them fully two pounds, and only taking half the price from them. +</p> + +<p> +At dinner he received an official position, as betrothed, beside Gemma. Frau +Lenore pursued her practical investigations. Emil kept laughing and urging +Sanin to take him with him to Russia. It was decided that Sanin should set off +in a fortnight. Only Pantaleone showed a somewhat sullen face, so much so that +Frau Lenore reproached him. “And he was his second!” Pantaleone +gave her a glance from under his brows. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma was silent almost all the time, but her face had never been lovelier or +brighter. After dinner she called Sanin out a minute into the garden, and +stopping beside the very garden-seat where she had been sorting the cherries +two days before, she said to him. “Dimitri, don’t be angry with me; +but I must remind you once more that you are not to consider yourself bound +…” +</p> + +<p> +He did not let her go on…. +</p> + +<p> +Gemma turned away her face. “And as for what mamma spoke of, do you +remember, the difference of our religion—see here!…” +</p> + +<p> +She snatched the garnet cross that hung round her neck on a thin cord, gave it +a violent tug, snapped the cord, and handed him the cross. +</p> + +<p> +“If I am yours, your faith is my faith!” Sanin’s eyes were +still wet when he went back with Gemma into the house. +</p> + +<p> +By the evening everything went on in its accustomed way. They even played a +game of <i>tresette</i>. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXI</h3> + +<p> +Sanin woke up very early. He found himself at the highest pinnacle of human +happiness; but it was not that prevented him from sleeping; the question, the +vital, fateful question—how he could dispose of his estate as quickly and +as advantageously as possible—disturbed his rest. The most diverse plans +were mixed up in his head, but nothing had as yet come out clearly. He went out +of the house to get air and freshen himself. He wanted to present himself to +Gemma with a project ready prepared and not without. +</p> + +<p> +What was the figure, somewhat ponderous and thick in the legs, but +well-dressed, walking in front of him, with a slight roll and waddle in his +gait? Where had he seen that head, covered with tufts of flaxen hair, and as it +were set right into the shoulders, that soft cushiony back, those plump arms +hanging straight down at his sides? Could it be Polozov, his old schoolfellow, +whom he had lost sight of for the last five years? Sanin overtook the figure +walking in front of him, turned round…. A broad, yellowish face, little +pig’s eyes, with white lashes and eyebrows, a short flat nose, thick lips +that looked glued together, a round smooth chin, and that expression, sour, +sluggish, and mistrustful—yes; it was he, it was Ippolit Polozov! +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t my lucky star working for me again?” flashed through +Sanin’s mind. +</p> + +<p> +“Polozov! Ippolit Sidorovitch! Is it you?” +</p> + +<p> +The figure stopped, raised his diminutive eyes, waited a little, and ungluing +his lips at last, brought out in a rather hoarse falsetto, “Dimitri +Sanin?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s me!” cried Sanin, and he shook one of Polozov’s +hands; arrayed in tight kid-gloves of an ashen-grey colour, they hung as +lifeless as before beside his barrel-shaped legs. “Have you been here +long? Where have you come from? Where are you stopping?” +</p> + +<p> +“I came yesterday from Wiesbaden,” Polozov replied in deliberate +tones, “to do some shopping for my wife, and I’m going back to +Wiesbaden to-day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes! You’re married, to be sure, and they say, to such a +beauty!” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov turned his eyes away. “Yes, they say so.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin laughed. “I see you’re just the same … as phlegmatic as you +were at school.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why should I be different?” +</p> + +<p> +“And they do say,” Sanin added with special emphasis on the word +“do,” “that your wife is very rich.” +</p> + +<p> +“They say that too.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean to say, Ippolit Sidorovitch, you are not certain on that +point?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t meddle, my dear Dimitri … Pavlovitch? Yes, +Pavlovitch!—in my wife’s affairs.” +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t meddle? Not in any of her affairs?” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov again shifted his eyes. “Not in any, my boy. She does as she +likes, and so do I.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where are you going now?” Sanin inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m not going anywhere just now; I’m standing in the street +and talking to you; but when we’ve finished talking, I’m going back +to my hotel, and am going to have lunch.” +</p> + +<p> +“Would you care for my company?” +</p> + +<p> +“You mean at lunch?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Delighted, it’s much pleasanter to eat in company. You’re +not a great talker, are you?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think not.” +</p> + +<p> +“So much the better.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov went on. Sanin walked beside him. And Sanin +speculated—Polozov’s lips were glued together, again he snorted +heavily, and waddled along in silence—Sanin speculated in what way had +this booby succeeded in catching a rich and beautiful wife. He was not rich +himself, nor distinguished, nor clever; at school he had passed for a dull, +slow-witted boy, sleepy, and greedy, and had borne the nickname +“driveller.” It was marvellous! +</p> + +<p> +“But if his wife is very rich, they say she’s the daughter of some +sort of a contractor, won’t she buy my estate? Though he does say he +doesn’t interfere in any of his wife’s affairs, that passes belief, +really! Besides, I will name a moderate, reasonable price! Why not try? +Perhaps, it’s all my lucky star…. Resolved! I’ll have a try!” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov led Sanin to one of the best hotels in Frankfort, in which he was, of +course, occupying the best apartments. On the tables and chairs lay piles of +packages, cardboard boxes, and parcels. “All purchases, my boy, for Maria +Nikolaevna!” (that was the name of the wife of Ippolit Sidorovitch). +Polozov dropped into an arm-chair, groaned, “Oh, the heat!” and +loosened his cravat. Then he rang up the head-waiter, and ordered with intense +care a very lavish luncheon. “And at one, the carriage is to be ready! Do +you hear, at one o’clock sharp!” +</p> + +<p> +The head-waiter obsequiously bowed, and cringingly withdrew. +</p> + +<p> +Polozov unbuttoned his waistcoat. From the very way in which he raised his +eyebrows, gasped, and wrinkled up his nose, one could see that talking would be +a great labour to him, and that he was waiting in some trepidation to see +whether Sanin was going to oblige him to use his tongue, or whether he would +take the task of keeping up the conversation on himself. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin understood his companion’s disposition of mind, and so he did not +burden him with questions; he restricted himself to the most essential. He +learnt that he had been for two years in the service (in the Uhlans! how nice +he must have looked in the short uniform jacket!) that he had married three +years before, and had now been for two years abroad with his wife, “who +is now undergoing some sort of cure at Wiesbaden,” and was then going to +Paris. On his side too, Sanin did not enlarge much on his past life and his +plans; he went straight to the principal point—that is, he began talking +of his intention of selling his estate. +</p> + +<p> +Polozov listened to him in silence, his eyes straying from time to time to the +door, by which the luncheon was to appear. The luncheon did appear at last. The +head-waiter, accompanied by two other attendants, brought in several dishes +under silver covers. +</p> + +<p> +“Is the property in the Tula province?” said Polozov, seating +himself at the table, and tucking a napkin into his shirt collar. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“In the Efremovsky district … I know it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know my place, Aleksyevka?” Sanin asked, sitting down too +at the table. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I know it.” Polozov thrust in his mouth a piece of omelette +with truffles. “Maria Nikolaevna, my wife, has an estate in that +neighbourhood…. Uncork that bottle, waiter! You’ve a good piece of land, +only your peasants have cut down the timber. Why are you selling it?” +</p> + +<p> +“I want the money, my friend. I would sell it cheap. Come, you might as +well buy it … by the way.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov gulped down a glass of wine, wiped his lips with the napkin, and again +set to work chewing slowly and noisily. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh,” he enunciated at last…. “I don’t go in for buying +estates; I’ve no capital. Pass the butter. Perhaps my wife now would buy +it. You talk to her about it. If you don’t ask too much, she’s not +above thinking of that…. What asses these Germans are, really! They can’t +cook fish. What could be simpler, one wonders? And yet they go on about +‘uniting the Fatherland.’ Waiter, take away that beastly stuff!” +</p> + +<p> +“Does your wife really manage … business matters herself?” Sanin +inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. Try the cutlets—they’re good. I can recommend them. +I’ve told you already, Dimitri Pavlovitch, I don’t interfere in any +of my wife’s concerns, and I tell you so again.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov went on munching. +</p> + +<p> +“H’m…. But how can I have a talk with her, Ippolit +Sidorovitch?” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s very simple, Dimitri Pavlovitch. Go to Wiesbaden. It’s +not far from here. Waiter, haven’t you any English mustard? No? Brutes! +Only don’t lose any time. We’re starting the day after to-morrow. +Let me pour you out a glass of wine; it’s wine with a bouquet—no +vinegary stuff.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov’s face was flushed and animated; it was never animated but when +he was eating—or drinking. +</p> + +<p> +“Really, I don’t know, how that could be managed,” Sanin +muttered. +</p> + +<p> +“But what makes you in such a hurry about it all of a sudden?” +</p> + +<p> +“There is a reason for being in a hurry, brother.” +</p> + +<p> +“And do you need a lot of money?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, a lot. I … how can I tell you? I propose … getting married.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov set the glass he had been lifting to his lips on the table. +</p> + +<p> +“Getting married!” he articulated in a voice thick with +astonishment, and he folded his podgy hands on his stomach. “So +suddenly?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes … soon.” +</p> + +<p> +“Your intended is in Russia, of course?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, not in Russia.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where then?” +</p> + +<p> +“Here in Frankfort.” +</p> + +<p> +“And who is she?” +</p> + +<p> +“A German; that is, no—an Italian. A resident here.” +</p> + +<p> +“With a fortune?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, without a fortune.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then I suppose your love is very ardent?” +</p> + +<p> +“How absurd you are! Yes, very ardent.” +</p> + +<p> +“And it’s for that you must have money?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, yes … yes, yes.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov gulped down his wine, rinsed his mouth, and washed his hands, carefully +wiped them on the napkin, took out and lighted a cigar. Sanin watched him in +silence. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s one means,” Polozov grunted at last, throwing his +head back, and blowing out the smoke in a thin ring. “Go to my wife. If +she likes, she can take all the bother off your hands.” +</p> + +<p> +“But how can I see your wife? You say you are starting the day after +to-morrow?” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov closed his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll tell you what,” he said at last, rolling the cigar in +his lips, and sighing. “Go home, get ready as quick as you can, and come +here. At one o’clock I am going, there’s plenty of room in my +carriage. I’ll take you with me. That’s the best plan. And now +I’m going to have a nap. I must always have a nap, brother, after a meal. +Nature demands it, and I won’t go against it. And don’t you disturb +me.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin thought and thought, and suddenly raised his head; he had made up his +mind. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, agreed, and thank you. At half-past twelve I’ll be +here, and we’ll go together to Wiesbaden. I hope your wife won’t be +angry….” +</p> + +<p> +But Polozov was already snoring. He muttered, “Don’t disturb +me!” gave a kick, and fell asleep, like a baby. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin once more scanned his clumsy figure, his head, his neck, his upturned +chin, round as an apple, and going out of the hotel, set off with rapid strides +to the Rosellis’ shop. He had to let Gemma know. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXII</h3> + +<p> +He found her in the shop with her mother. Frau Lenore was stooping down, +measuring with a big folding foot-rule the space between the windows. On seeing +Sanin, she stood up, and greeted him cheerfully, though with a shade of +embarrassment. +</p> + +<p> +“What you said yesterday,” she began, “has set my head in a +whirl with ideas as to how we could improve our shop. Here, I fancy we might +put a couple of cupboards with shelves of looking-glass. You know, that’s +the fashion nowadays. And then …” +</p> + +<p> +“Excellent, excellent,” Sanin broke in, “we must think it all +over…. But come here, I want to tell you something.” He took Frau Lenore +and Gemma by the arm, and led them into the next room. Frau Lenore was alarmed, +and the foot-rule slipped out of her hands. Gemma too was almost frightened, +but she took an intent look at Sanin, and was reassured. His face, though +preoccupied, expressed at the same time keen self-confidence and determination. +He asked both the women to sit down, while he remained standing before them, +and gesticulating with his hands and ruffling up his hair, he told them all his +story; his meeting with Polozov, his proposed expedition to Wiesbaden, the +chance of selling the estate. “Imagine my happiness,” he cried in +conclusion: “things have taken such a turn that I may even, perhaps, not +have to go to Russia! And we can have our wedding much sooner than I had +anticipated!” +</p> + +<p> +“When must you go?” asked Gemma. +</p> + +<p> +“To-day, in an hour’s time; my friend has ordered a +carriage—he will take me.” +</p> + +<p> +“You will write to us?” +</p> + +<p> +“At once! directly I have had a talk with this lady, I will write.” +</p> + +<p> +“This lady, you say, is very rich?” queried the practical Frau +Lenore. +</p> + +<p> +“Exceedingly rich! her father was a millionaire, and he left everything +to her.” +</p> + +<p> +“Everything—to her alone? Well, that’s so much the better for +you. Only mind, don’t let your property go too cheap! Be sensible and +firm. Don’t let yourself be carried away! I understand your wishing to be +Gemma’s husband as soon as possible … but prudence before everything! +Don’t forget: the better price you get for your estate, the more there +will be for you two, and for your children.” +</p> + +<p> +Gemma turned away, and Sanin gave another wave of his hand. “You can rely +on my prudence, Frau Lenore! Indeed, I shan’t do any bargaining with her. +I shall tell her the fair price; if she’ll give it—good; if not, +let her go.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know her—this lady?” asked Gemma. +</p> + +<p> +“I have never seen her.” +</p> + +<p> +“And when will you come back?” +</p> + +<p> +“If our negotiations come to nothing—the day after to-morrow; if +they turn out favourably, perhaps I may have to stay a day or two longer. In +any case I shall not linger a minute beyond what’s necessary. I am +leaving my heart here, you know! But I have said what I had to say to you, and +I must run home before setting off too…. Give me your hand for luck, Frau +Lenore—that’s what we always do in Russia.” +</p> + +<p> +“The right or the left?” +</p> + +<p> +“The left, it’s nearer the heart. I shall reappear the day after +to-morrow with my shield or on it! Something tells me I shall come back in +triumph! Good-bye, my good dear ones….” +</p> + +<p> +He embraced and kissed Frau Lenore, but he asked Gemma to follow him into her +room—for just a minute—as he must tell her something of great +importance. He simply wanted to say good-bye to her alone. Frau Lenore saw +that, and felt no curiosity as to the matter of such great importance. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin had never been in Gemma’s room before. All the magic of love, all +its fire and rapture and sweet terror, seemed to flame up and burst into his +soul, directly he crossed its sacred threshold…. He cast a look of tenderness +about him, fell at the sweet girl’s feet and pressed his face against her +waist…. +</p> + +<p> +“You are mine,” she whispered: “you will be back soon?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am yours. I will come back,” he declared, catching his breath. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall be longing for you back, my dear one!” +</p> + +<p> +A few instants later Sanin was running along the street to his lodging. He did +not even notice that Pantaleone, all dishevelled, had darted out of the +shop-door after him, and was shouting something to him and was shaking, as +though in menace, his lifted hand. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +Exactly at a quarter to one Sanin presented himself before Polozov. The +carriage with four horses was already standing at the hotel gates. On seeing +Sanin, Polozov merely commented, “Oh! you’ve made up your +mind?” and putting on his hat, cloak, and over-shoes, and stuffing +cotton-wool into his ears, though it was summer-time, went out on to the steps. +The waiters, by his directions, disposed all his numerous purchases in the +inside of the carriage, lined the place where he was to sit with silk cushions, +bags, and bundles, put a hamper of provisions for his feet to rest on, and tied +a trunk on to the box. Polozov paid with a liberal hand, and supported by the +deferential door-keeper, whose face was still respectful, though he was unseen +behind him, he climbed gasping into the carriage, sat down, disarranged +everything about him thoroughly, took out and lighted a cigar, and only then +extended a finger to Sanin, as though to say, “Get in, you too!” +Sanin placed himself beside him. Polozov sent orders by the door-keeper to the +postillion to drive carefully—if he wanted drinks; the carriage steps +grated, the doors slammed, and the carriage rolled off. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXIII</h3> + +<p> +It takes less than an hour in these days by rail from Frankfort to Wiesbaden; +at that time the extra post did it in three hours. They changed horses five +times. Part of the time Polozov dozed and part of the time he simply shook from +side to side, holding a cigar in his teeth; he talked very little; he did not +once look out of the window; picturesque views did not interest them; he even +announced that “nature was the death of him!” Sanin did not speak +either, nor did he admire the scenery; he had no thought for it. He was all +absorbed in reflections and memories. At the stations Polozov paid with +exactness, took the time by his watch, and tipped the postillions—more or +less—according to their zeal. When they had gone half way, he took two +oranges out of the hamper of edibles, and choosing out the better, offered the +other to Sanin. Sanin looked steadily at his companion, and suddenly burst out +laughing. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you laughing at?” the latter inquired, very carefully +peeling his orange with his short white nails. +</p> + +<p> +“What at?” repeated Sanin. “Why, at our journey +together.” +</p> + +<p> +“What about it?” Polozov inquired again, dropping into his mouth +one of the longitudinal sections into which an orange parts. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s so very strange. Yesterday I must confess I thought no more +of you than of the Emperor of China, and to-day I’m driving with you to +sell my estate to your wife, of whom, too, I have not the slightest +idea.” +</p> + +<p> +“Anything may happen,” responded Polozov. “When you’ve +lived a bit longer, you won’t be surprised at anything. For instance, can +you fancy me riding as an orderly officer? But I did, and the Grand Duke Mihail +Pavlovitch gave the order, “Trot! let him trot, that fat cornet! Trot +now! Look sharp!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin scratched behind his ear. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me, please, Ippolit Sidorovitch, what is your wife like? What is +her character? It’s very necessary for me to know that, you see.” +</p> + +<p> +“It was very well for him to shout, ‘Trot!’” Polozov went on with +sudden vehemence, “But me! how about me? I thought to myself, ‘You can +take your honours and epaulettes—and leave me in peace!’ But … you asked +about my wife? What my wife is? A person like any one else. Don’t wear +your heart upon your sleeve with her—she doesn’t like that. The +great thing is to talk a lot to her … something for her to laugh at. Tell her +about your love, or something … but make it more amusing, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +“How more amusing?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, you told me, you know, that you were in love, wanting to get +married. Well, then, describe that.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was offended. “What do you find laughable in that?” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov only rolled his eyes. The juice from the orange was trickling down his +chin. +</p> + +<p> +“Was it your wife sent you to Frankfort to shop for her?” asked +Sanin after a short time. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, it was she.” +</p> + +<p> +“What are the purchases?” +</p> + +<p> +“Toys, of course.” +</p> + +<p> +“Toys? have you any children?” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov positively moved away from Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s likely! What do I want with children? Feminine fallals … +finery. For the toilet.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean to say you understand such things?” +</p> + +<p> +“To be sure I do.” +</p> + +<p> +“But didn’t you tell me you didn’t interfere in any of your +wife’s affairs?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t in any other. But this … is no consequence. To pass the +time—one may do it. And my wife has confidence in my taste. And I’m +a first-rate hand at bargaining.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov began to speak by jerks; he was exhausted already. “And is your +wife very rich?” +</p> + +<p> +“Rich; yes, rather! Only she keeps the most of it for herself.” +</p> + +<p> +“But I expect you can’t complain either?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I’m her husband. I’m hardly likely not to get some +benefit from it! And I’m of use to her. With me she can do just as she +likes! I’m easy-going!” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov wiped his face with a silk handkerchief and puffed painfully, as though +to say, “Have mercy on me; don’t force me to utter another word. +You see how hard it is for me.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin left him in peace, and again sank into meditation. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +The hotel in Wiesbaden, before which the carriage stopped, was exactly like a +palace. Bells were promptly set ringing in its inmost recesses; a fuss and +bustle arose; men of good appearance in black frock-coats skipped out at the +principal entrance; a door-keeper who was a blaze of gold opened the carriage +doors with a flourish. +</p> + +<p> +Like some triumphant general Polozov alighted and began to ascend a staircase +strewn with rugs and smelling of agreeable perfumes. To him flew up another +man, also very well dressed but with a Russian face—his valet. Polozov +observed to him that for the future he should always take him everywhere with +him, for the night before at Frankfort, he, Polozov, had been left for the +night without hot water! The valet portrayed his horror on his face, and +bending down quickly, took off his master’s goloshes. +</p> + +<p> +“Is Maria Nikolaevna at home?” inquired Polozov. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, sir. Madam is pleased to be dressing. Madam is pleased to be dining +to-night at the Countess Lasunsky’s.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! there?… Stay! There are things there in the carriage; get them all +yourself and bring them up. And you, Dmitri Pavlovitch,” added Polozov, +“take a room for yourself and come in in three-quarters of an hour. We +will dine together.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov waddled off, while Sanin asked for an inexpensive room for himself; and +after setting his attire to rights, and resting a little, he repaired to the +immense apartment occupied by his Serenity (Durchlaucht) Prince von Polozov. +</p> + +<p> +He found this “prince” enthroned in a luxurious velvet arm-chair in +the middle of a most magnificent drawing-room. Sanin’s phlegmatic friend +had already had time to have a bath and to array himself in a most sumptuous +satin dressing-gown; he had put a crimson fez on his head. Sanin approached him +and scrutinised him for some time. Polozov was sitting rigid as an idol; he did +not even turn his face in his direction, did not even move an eyebrow, did not +utter a sound. It was truly a sublime spectacle! After having admired him for a +couple of minutes, Sanin was on the point of speaking, of breaking this +hallowed silence, when suddenly the door from the next room was thrown open, +and in the doorway appeared a young and beautiful lady in a white silk dress +trimmed with black lace, and with diamonds on her arms and neck—Maria +Nikolaevna Polozov. Her thick fair hair fell on both sides of her head, +braided, but not fastened up into a knot. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXIV</h3> + +<p> +“Ah, I beg your pardon!” she said with a smile half-embarrassed, +half-ironical, instantly taking hold of one end of a plait of her hair and +fastening on Sanin her large, grey, clear eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“I did not think you had come yet.” +</p> + +<p> +“Sanin, Dmitri Pavlovitch—known him from a boy,” observed +Polozov, as before not turning towards him and not getting up, but pointing at +him with one finger. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes…. I know…. You told me before. Very glad to make your acquaintance. +But I wanted to ask you, Ippolit Sidorovitch…. My maid seems to have lost her +senses to-day …” +</p> + +<p> +“To do your hair up?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, yes, please. I beg your pardon,” Maria Nikolaevna repeated +with the same smile. She nodded to Sanin, and turning swiftly, vanished through +the doorway, leaving behind her a fleeting but graceful impression of a +charming neck, exquisite shoulders, an exquisite figure. +</p> + +<p> +Polozov got up, and rolling ponderously, went out by the same door. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin did not doubt for a single second that his presence in “Prince +Polozov’s” drawing-room was a fact perfectly well known to its +mistress; the whole point of her entry had been the display of her hair, which +was certainly beautiful. Sanin was inwardly delighted indeed at this freak on +the part of Madame Polozov; if, he thought, she is anxious to impress me, to +dazzle me, perhaps, who knows, she will be accommodating about the price of the +estate. His heart was so full of Gemma that all other women had absolutely no +significance for him; he hardly noticed them; and this time he went no further +than thinking, “Yes, it was the truth they told me; that lady’s +really magnificent to look at!” +</p> + +<p> +But had he not been in such an exceptional state of mind he would most likely +have expressed himself differently; Maria Nikolaevna Polozov, by birth +Kolishkin, was a very striking personality. And not that she was of a beauty to +which no exception could be taken; traces of her plebeian origin were rather +clearly apparent in her. Her forehead was low, her nose rather fleshy and +turned up; she could boast neither of the delicacy of her skin nor of the +elegance of her hands and feet—but what did all that matter? Any one +meeting her would not, to use Pushkin’s words, have stood still before +“the holy shrine of beauty,” but before the sorcery of a +half-Russian, half-Gipsy woman’s body in its full flower and full power … +and he would have been nothing loath to stand still! +</p> + +<p> +But Gemma’s image preserved Sanin like the three-fold armour of which the +poets sing. +</p> + +<p> +Ten minutes later Maria Nikolaevna appeared again, escorted by her husband. She +went up to Sanin … and her walk was such that some eccentrics of +that—alas!—already, distant day, were simply crazy over her walk +alone. “That woman, when she comes towards one, seems as though she is +bringing all the happiness of one’s life to meet one,” one of them +used to say. She went up to Sanin, and holding out her hand to him, said in her +caressing and, as it were, subdued voice in Russian, “You will wait for +me, won’t you? I’ll be back soon.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin bowed respectfully, while Maria Nikolaevna vanished behind the curtain +over the outside door; and as she vanished turned her head back over her +shoulder, and smiled again, and again left behind her the same impression of +grace. +</p> + +<p> +When she smiled, not one and not two, but three dimples came out on each cheek, +and her eyes smiled more than her lips—long, crimson, juicy lips with two +tiny moles on the left side of them. +</p> + +<p> +Polozov waddled into the room and again established himself in the arm-chair. +He was speechless as before; but from time to time a queer smile puffed out his +colourless and already wrinkled cheeks. He looked like an old man, though he +was only three years older than Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +The dinner with which he regaled his guest would of course have satisfied the +most exacting gourmand, but to Sanin it seemed endless, insupportable! Polozov +ate slowly, “with feeling, with judgment, with deliberation,” +bending attentively over his plate, and sniffing at almost every morsel. First +he rinsed his mouth with wine, then swallowed it and smacked his lips…. Over +the roast meat he suddenly began to talk—but of what? Of merino sheep, of +which he was intending to order a whole flock, and in such detail, with such +tenderness, using all the while endearing pet names for them. After drinking a +cup of coffee, hot to boiling point (he had several times in a voice of tearful +irritation mentioned to the waiter that he had been served the evening before +with coffee, cold—cold as ice!) and bitten off the end of a Havannah +cigar with his crooked yellow teeth, he dropped off, as his habit was, into a +nap, to the intense delight of Sanin, who began walking up and down with +noiseless steps on the soft carpet, and dreaming of his life with Gemma and of +what news he would bring back to her. Polozov, however, awoke, as he remarked +himself, earlier than usual—he had slept only an hour and a +half—and after drinking a glass of iced seltzer water, and swallowing +eight spoonfuls of jam, Russian jam, which his valet brought him in a +dark-green genuine “Kiev” jar, and without which, in his own words, +he could not live, he stared with his swollen eyes at Sanin and asked him +wouldn’t he like to play a game of “fools” with him. Sanin +agreed readily; he was afraid that Polozov would begin talking again about +lambs and ewes and fat tails. The host and the visitor both adjourned to the +drawing-room, the waiter brought in the cards, and the game began, +not,—of course, for money. +</p> + +<p> +At this innocent diversion Maria Nikolaevna found them on her return from the +Countess Lasunsky’s. She laughed aloud directly she came into the room +and saw the cards and the open card-table. Sanin jumped up, but she cried, +“Sit still; go on with the game. I’ll change my dress directly and +come back to you,” and vanished again with a swish of her dress, pulling +off her gloves as she went. +</p> + +<p> +She did in fact return very soon. Her evening dress she had exchanged for a +full lilac silk tea-gown, with open hanging sleeves; a thick twisted cord was +fastened round her waist. She sat down by her husband, and, waiting till he was +left “fool,” said to him, “Come, dumpling, that’s +enough!” (At the word “dumpling” Sanin glanced at her in +surprise, and she smiled gaily, answering his look with a look, and displaying +all the dimples on her cheeks.) “I see you are sleepy; kiss my hand and +get along; and Monsieur Sanin and I will have a chat together alone.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m not sleepy,” observed Polozov, getting up ponderously +from his easy-chair; “but as for getting along, I’m ready to get +along and to kiss your hand.” She gave him the palm of her hand, still +smiling and looking at Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +Polozov, too, looked at him, and went away without taking leave of him. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, tell me, tell me,” said Maria Nikolaevna eagerly, setting +both her bare elbows on the table and impatiently tapping the nails of one hand +against the nails of the other, “Is it true, they say, you are going to +be married?” +</p> + +<p> +As she said these words, Maria Nikolaevna positively bent her head a little on +one side so as to look more intently and piercingly into Sanin’s eyes. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXV</h3> + +<p> +The free and easy deportment of Madame Polozov would probably for the first +moment have disconcerted Sanin—though he was not quite a novice and had +knocked about the world a little—if he had not again seen in this very +freedom and familiarity a good omen for his undertaking. “We must humour +this rich lady’s caprices,” he decided inwardly; and as +unconstrainedly as she had questioned him he answered, “Yes; I am going +to be married.” +</p> + +<p> +“To whom? To a foreigner?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did you get acquainted with her lately? In Frankfort?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what is she? May I know?” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly. She is a confectioner’s daughter.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna opened her eyes wide and lifted her eyebrows. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, this is delightful,” she commented in a drawling voice; +“this is exquisite! I imagined that young men like you were not to be met +with anywhere in these days. A confectioner’s daughter!” +</p> + +<p> +“I see that surprises you,” observed Sanin with some dignity; +“but in the first place, I have none of these prejudices …” +</p> + +<p> +“In the first place, it doesn’t surprise me in the least,” +Maria Nikolaevna interrupted; “I have no prejudices either. I’m the +daughter of a peasant myself. There! what can you say to that? What does +surprise and delight me is to have come across a man who’s not afraid to +love. You do love her, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Is she very pretty?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was slightly stung by this last question…. However, there was no drawing +back. +</p> + +<p> +“You know, Maria Nikolaevna,” he began, “every man thinks the +face of his beloved better than all others; but my betrothed is really +beautiful.” +</p> + +<p> +“Really? In what style? Italian? antique?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; she has very regular features.” +</p> + +<p> +“You have not got her portrait with you?” +</p> + +<p> +“No.” (At that time photography was not yet talked off. +Daguerrotypes had hardly begun to be common.) +</p> + +<p> +“What’s her name?” +</p> + +<p> +“Her name is Gemma.” +</p> + +<p> +“And yours?” +</p> + +<p> +“Dimitri.” +</p> + +<p> +“And your father’s?” +</p> + +<p> +“Pavlovitch.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know,” Maria Nikolaevna said, still in the same drawling +voice, “I like you very much, Dimitri Pavlovitch. You must be an +excellent fellow. Give me your hand. Let us be friends.” +</p> + +<p> +She pressed his hand tightly in her beautiful, white, strong fingers. Her hand +was a little smaller than his hand, but much warmer and smoother and whiter and +more full of life. +</p> + +<p> +“Only, do you know what strikes me?” +</p> + +<p> +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +“You won’t be angry? No? You say she is betrothed to you. But was +that … was that quite necessary?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin frowned. “I don’t understand you, Maria Nikolaevna.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna gave a soft low laugh, and shaking her head tossed back the +hair that was falling on her cheeks. “Decidedly—he’s +delightful,” she commented half pensively, half carelessly. “A +perfect knight! After that, there’s no believing in the people who +maintain that the race of idealists is extinct!” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna talked Russian all the time, an astonishingly pure true Moscow +Russian, such as the people, not the nobles speak. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve been brought up at home, I expect, in a God-fearing, old +orthodox family?” she queried. “You’re from what +province?” +</p> + +<p> +“Tula.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh! so we’re from the same part. My father … I daresay you know +who my father was?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I know.” +</p> + +<p> +“He was born in Tula…. He was a Tula man. Well … well. Come, let us get +to business now.” +</p> + +<p> +“That is … how come to business? What do you mean to say by that?” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna half-closed her eyes. “Why, what did you come here +for?” (when she screwed up her eyes, their expression became very kindly +and a little bantering, when she opened them wide, into their clear, almost +cold brilliancy, there came something ill-natured … something menacing. Her +eyes gained a peculiar beauty from her eyebrows, which were thick, and met in +the centre, and had the smoothness of sable fur). “Don’t you want +me to buy your estate? You want money for your nuptials? Don’t +you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“And do you want much?” +</p> + +<p> +“I should be satisfied with a few thousand francs at first. Your husband +knows my estate. You can consult him—I would take a very moderate +price.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna tossed her head from left to right. “<i>In the first +place</i>,” she began in deliberate tones, drumming with the tips of her +fingers on the cuff of Sanin’s coat, “I am not in the habit of +consulting my husband, except about matters of dress—he’s my right +hand in that; <i>and in the second place</i>, why do you say that you will fix +a low price? I don’t want to take advantage of your being very much in +love at the moment, and ready to make any sacrifices…. I won’t accept +sacrifices of any kind from you. What? Instead of encouraging you … come, how +is one to express it properly?—in your noble sentiments, eh? am I to +fleece you? that’s not my way. I can be hard on people, on +occasion—only not in that way.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was utterly unable to make out whether she was laughing at him or +speaking seriously, and only said to himself: “Oh, I can see one has to +mind what one’s about with you!” +</p> + +<p> +A man-servant came in with a Russian samovar, tea-things, cream, biscuits, +etc., on a big tray; he set all these good things on the table between Sanin +and Madame Polozov, and retired. +</p> + +<p> +She poured him out a cup of tea. “You don’t object?” she +queried, as she put sugar in his cup with her fingers … though sugar-tongs were +lying close by. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, please!… From such a lovely hand …” +</p> + +<p> +He did not finish his phrase, and almost choked over a sip of tea, while she +watched him attentively and brightly. +</p> + +<p> +“I spoke of a moderate price for my land,” he went on, +“because as you are abroad just now, I can hardly suppose you have a +great deal of cash available, and in fact, I feel myself that the sale … the +purchase of my land, under such conditions is something exceptional, and I +ought to take that into consideration.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin got confused, and lost the thread of what he was saying, while Maria +Nikolaevna softly leaned back in her easy-chair, folded her arms, and watched +him with the same attentive bright look. He was silent at last. +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind, go on, go on,” she said, as it were coming to his +aid; “I’m listening to you. I like to hear you; go on +talking.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin fell to describing his estate, how many acres it contained, and where it +was situated, and what were its agricultural advantages, and what profit could +be made from it … he even referred to the picturesque situation of the house; +while Maria Nikolaevna still watched him, and watched more and more intently +and radiantly, and her lips faintly stirred, without smiling: she bit them. He +felt awkward at last; he was silent a second time. +</p> + +<p> +“Dimitri Pavlovitch,” began Maria Nikolaevna, and sank into thought +again…. “Dimitri Pavlovitch,” she repeated…. “Do you know +what: I am sure the purchase of your estate will be a very profitable +transaction for me, and that we shall come to terms; but you must give me two +days…. Yes, two days’ grace. You are able to endure two days’ +separation from your betrothed, aren’t you? Longer I won’t keep you +against your will—I give you my word of honour. But if you want five or +six thousand francs at once, I am ready with great pleasure to let you have it +as a loan, and then we’ll settle later.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin got up. “I must thank you, Maria Nikolaevna, for your kindhearted +and friendly readiness to do a service to a man almost unknown to you. But if +that is your decided wish, then I prefer to await your decision about my +estate—I will stay here two days.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; that is my wish, Dimitri Pavlovitch. And will it be very hard for +you? Very? Tell me.” +</p> + +<p> +“I love my betrothed, Maria Nikolaevna, and to be separated from her is +hard for me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! you’re a heart of gold!” Maria Nikolaevna commented with +a sigh. “I promise not to torment you too much. Are you going?” +</p> + +<p> +“It is late,” observed Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“And you want to rest after your journey, and your game of ‘fools’ with +my husband. Tell me, were you a great friend of Ippolit Sidorovitch, my +husband?” +</p> + +<p> +“We were educated at the same school.” +</p> + +<p> +“And was he the same then?” +</p> + +<p> +“The same as what?” inquired Sanin. Maria Nikolaevna burst out +laughing, and laughed till she was red in the face; she put her handkerchief to +her lips, rose from her chair, and swaying as though she were tired, went up to +Sanin, and held out her hand to him. +</p> + +<p> +He bowed over it, and went towards the door. +</p> + +<p> +“Come early to-morrow—do you hear?” she called after him. He +looked back as he went out of the room, and saw that she had again dropped into +an easy-chair, and flung both arms behind her head. The loose sleeves of her +tea-gown fell open almost to her shoulders, and it was impossible not to admit +that the pose of the arms, that the whole figure, was enchantingly beautiful. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXVI</h3> + +<p> +Long after midnight the lamp was burning in Sanin’s room. He sat down to +the table and wrote to “his Gemma.” He told her everything; he +described the Polozovs—husband and wife—but, more than all, +enlarged on his own feelings, and ended by appointing a meeting with her in +three days!!! (with three marks of exclamation). Early in the morning he took +this letter to the post, and went for a walk in the garden of the Kurhaus, +where music was already being played. There were few people in it as yet; he +stood before the arbour in which the orchestra was placed, listened to an +adaptation of airs from “Robert le Diable,” and after drinking some +coffee, turned into a solitary side walk, sat down on a bench, and fell into a +reverie. The handle of a parasol gave him a rapid, and rather vigorous, thump +on the shoulder. He started…. Before him in a light, grey-green barége dress, +in a white tulle hat, and <i>suède</i> gloves, stood Maria Nikolaevna, fresh +and rosy as a summer morning, though the languor of sound unbroken sleep had +not yet quite vanished from her movements and her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“Good-morning,” she said. “I sent after you to-day, but +you’d already gone out. I’ve only just drunk my second +glass—they’re making me drink the water here, you +know—whatever for, there’s no telling … am I not healthy enough? +And now I have to walk for a whole hour. Will you be my companion? And then +we’ll have some coffee.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve had some already,” Sanin observed, getting up; +“but I shall be very glad to have a walk with you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, give me your arm then; don’t be afraid: your betrothed +is not here—she won’t see you.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin gave a constrained smile. He experienced a disagreeable sensation every +time Maria Nikolaevna referred to Gemma. However, he made haste to bend towards +her obediently…. Maria Nikolaevna’s arm slipped slowly and softly into +his arm, and glided over it, and seemed to cling tight to it. +</p> + +<p> +“Come—this way,” she said to him, putting up her open parasol +over her shoulder. “I’m quite at home in this park; I will take you +to the best places. And do you know what? (she very often made use of this +expression), we won’t talk just now about that sale, we’ll have a +thorough discussion of that after lunch; but you must tell me now about +yourself … so that I may know whom I have to do with. And afterwards, if you +like, I will tell you about myself. Do you agree?” +</p> + +<p> +“But, Maria Nikolaevna, what interest can there be for you …” +</p> + +<p> +“Stop, stop. You don’t understand me. I don’t want to flirt +with you.” Maria Nikolaevna shrugged her shoulders. “He’s got +a betrothed like an antique statue, is it likely I am going to flirt with him? +But you’ve something to sell, and I’m the purchaser. I want to know +what your goods are like. Well, of course, you must show what they are like. I +don’t only want to know what I’m buying, but whom I’m buying +from. That was my father’s rule. Come, begin … come, if not from +childhood—come now, have you been long abroad? And where have you been up +till now? Only don’t walk so fast, we’re in no hurry.” +</p> + +<p> +“I came here from Italy, where I spent several months.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, you feel, it seems, a special attraction towards everything Italian. +It’s strange you didn’t find your lady-love there. Are you fond of +art? of pictures? or more of music?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am fond of art…. I like everything beautiful.” +</p> + +<p> +“And music?” +</p> + +<p> +“I like music too.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I don’t at all. I don’t care for anything but Russian +songs—and that in the country and in the spring—with dancing, you +know … red shirts, wreaths of beads, the young grass in the meadows, the smell +of smoke … delicious! But we weren’t talking of me. Go on, tell +me.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna walked on, and kept looking at Sanin. She was tall—her +face was almost on a level with his face. +</p> + +<p> +He began to talk—at first reluctantly, unskilfully—but afterwards +he talked more freely, chattered away in fact. Maria Nikolaevna was a very good +listener; and moreover she seemed herself so frank, that she led others +unconsciously on to frankness. She possessed that great gift of +“intimateness”—<i>le terrible don de la +familiarité</i>—to which Cardinal Retz refers. Sanin talked of his +travels, of his life in Petersburg, of his youth…. Had Maria Nikolaevna been a +lady of fashion, with refined manners, he would never have opened out so; but +she herself spoke of herself as a “good fellow,” who had no +patience with ceremony of any sort; it was in those words that she +characterised herself to Sanin. And at the same time this “good +fellow” walked by his side with feline grace, slightly bending towards +him, and peeping into his face; and this “good fellow” walked in +the form of a young feminine creature, full of the tormenting, fiery, soft and +seductive charm, of which—for the undoing of us poor weak sinful +men—only Slav natures are possessed, and but few of them, and those never +of pure Slav blood, with no foreign alloy. Sanin’s walk with Maria +Nikolaevna, Sanin’s talk with Maria Nikolaevna lasted over an hour. And +they did not stop once; they kept walking about the endless avenues of the +park, now mounting a hill and admiring the view as they went, and now going +down into the valley, and getting hidden in the thick shadows,—and all +the while arm-in-arm. At times Sanin felt positively irritated; he had never +walked so long with Gemma, his darling Gemma … but this lady had simply taken +possession of him, and there was no escape! “Aren’t you +tired?” he said to her more than once. “I never get tired,” +she answered. Now and then they met other people walking in the park; almost +all of them bowed—some respectfully, others even cringingly. To one of +them, a very handsome, fashionably dressed dark man, she called from a distance +with the best Parisian accent, “<i>Comte, vous savez, il ne faut pas +venir me voir—ni aujourd’hui ni demain</i>.” The man took off +his hat, without speaking, and dropped a low bow. +</p> + +<p> +“Who’s that?” asked Sanin with the bad habit of asking +questions characteristic of all Russians. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, a Frenchman, there are lots of them here … He’s dancing +attendance on me too. It’s time for our coffee, though. Let’s go +home; you must be hungry by this time, I should say. My better half must have +got his eye-peeps open by now.” +</p> + +<p> +“Better half! Eye-peeps!” Sanin repeated to himself … “And +speaks French so well … what a strange creature!” +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +Maria Nikolaevna was not mistaken. When she went back into the hotel with +Sanin, her “better half” or “dumpling” was already seated, the +invariable fez on his head, before a table laid for breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve been waiting for you!” he cried, making a sour face. +“I was on the point of having coffee without you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind, never mind,” Maria Nikolaevna responded cheerfully. +“Are you angry? That’s good for you; without that you’d turn +into a mummy altogether. Here I’ve brought a visitor. Make haste and +ring! Let us have coffee—the best coffee—in Saxony cups on a +snow-white cloth!” +</p> + +<p> +She threw off her hat and gloves, and clapped her hands. +</p> + +<p> +Polozov looked at her from under his brows. +</p> + +<p> +“What makes you so skittish to-day, Maria Nikolaevna?” he said in +an undertone. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s no business of yours, Ippolit Sidoritch! Ring! Dimitri +Pavlovitch, sit down and have some coffee for the second time. Ah, how nice it +is to give orders! There’s no pleasure on earth like it!” +</p> + +<p> +“When you’re obeyed,” grumbled her husband again. +</p> + +<p> +“Just so, when one’s obeyed! That’s why I’m so happy! +Especially with you. Isn’t it so, dumpling? Ah, here’s the +coffee.” +</p> + +<p> +On the immense tray, which the waiter brought in, there lay also a playbill. +Maria Nikolaevna snatched it up at once. +</p> + +<p> +“A drama!” she pronounced with indignation, “a German drama. +No matter; it’s better than a German comedy. Order a box for +me—<i>baignoire</i>—or no … better the <i>Fremden-Loge</i>,” +she turned to the waiter. “Do you hear: the <i>Fremden-Loge</i> it must +be!” +</p> + +<p> +“But if the <i>Fremden-Loge</i> has been already taken by his excellency, +the director of the town (<i>seine Excellenz der Herr +Stadt-Director</i>),” the waiter ventured to demur. +</p> + +<p> +“Give his excellency ten <i>thalers</i>, and let the box be mine! Do you +hear!” +</p> + +<p> +The waiter bent his head humbly and mournfully. +</p> + +<p> +“Dimitri Pavlovitch, you will go with me to the theatre? the German +actors are awful, but you will go … Yes? Yes? How obliging you are! Dumpling, +are you not coming? +</p> + +<p> +“You settle it,” Polozov observed into the cup he had lifted to his +lips. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know what, you stay at home. You always go to sleep at the +theatre, and you don’t understand much German. I’ll tell you what +you’d better do, write an answer to the overseer—you remember, +about our mill … about the peasants’ grinding. Tell him that I +won’t have it, and I won’t and that’s all about it! +There’s occupation for you for the whole evening.” +</p> + +<p> +“All right,” answered Polozov. +</p> + +<p> +“Well then, that’s first-rate. You’re a darling. And now, +gentlemen, as we have just been speaking of my overseer, let’s talk about +our great business. Come, directly the waiter has cleared the table, you shall +tell me all, Dimitri Pavlovitch, about your estate, what price you will sell it +for, how much you want paid down in advance, everything, in fact! (At last, +thought Sanin, thank God!) You have told me something about it already, you +remember, you described your garden delightfully, but dumpling wasn’t +here…. Let him hear, he may pick a hole somewhere! I’m delighted to think +that I can help you to get married, besides, I promised you that I would go +into your business after lunch, and I always keep my promises, isn’t that +the truth, Ippolit Sidoritch?” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov rubbed his face with his open hand. “The truth’s the +truth. You don’t deceive any one.” +</p> + +<p> +“Never! and I never will deceive any one. Well, Dimitri Pavlovitch, +expound the case as we express it in the senate.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXVII</h3> + +<p> +Sanin proceeded to expound his case, that is to say, again, a second time, to +describe his property, not touching this time on the beauties of nature, and +now and then appealing to Polozov for confirmation of his “facts and +figures.” But Polozov simply gasped and shook his head, whether in +approval or disapproval, it would have puzzled the devil, one might fancy, to +decide. However, Maria Nikolaevna stood in no need of his aid. She exhibited +commercial and administrative abilities that were really astonishing! She was +familiar with all the ins-and-outs of farming; she asked questions about +everything with great exactitude, went into every point; every word of hers +went straight to the root of the matter, and hit the nail on the head. Sanin +had not expected such a close inquiry, he had not prepared himself for it. And +this inquiry lasted for fully an hour and a half. Sanin experienced all the +sensations of the criminal on his trial, sitting on a narrow bench confronted +by a stern and penetrating judge. “Why, it’s a +cross-examination!” he murmured to himself dejectedly. Maria Nikolaevna +kept laughing all the while, as though it were a joke; but Sanin felt none the +more at ease for that; and when in the course of the +“cross-examination” it turned out that he had not clearly realised +the exact meaning of the words “repartition” and +“tilth,” he was in a cold perspiration all over. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that’s all right!” Maria Nikolaevna decided at last. +“I know your estate now … as well as you do. What price do you suggest +per soul?” (At that time, as every one knows, the prices of estates were +reckoned by the souls living as serfs on them.) +</p> + +<p> +“Well … I imagine … I could not take less than five hundred roubles for +each,” Sanin articulated with difficulty. O Pantaleone, Pantaleone, where +were you! This was when you ought to have cried again, “Barbari!” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna turned her eyes upwards as though she were calculating. +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” she said at last. “I think there’s no harm in +that price. But I reserved for myself two days’ grace, and you must wait +till to-morrow. I imagine we shall come to an arrangement, and then you will +tell me how much you want paid down. And now, <i>basta cosi</i>!” she +cried, noticing Sanin was about to make some reply. “We’ve spent +enough time over filthy lucre … <i>à demain les affaires</i>. Do you know what, +I’ll let you go now … (she glanced at a little enamelled watch, stuck in +her belt) … till three o’clock … I must let you rest. Go and play +roulette.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never play games of chance,” observed Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“Really? Why, you’re a paragon. Though I don’t either. +It’s stupid throwing away one’s money when one’s no chance. +But go into the gambling saloon, and look at the faces. Very comic ones there +are there. There’s one old woman with a rustic headband and a moustache, +simply delicious! Our prince there’s another, a good one too. A majestic +figure with a nose like an eagle’s, and when he puts down a +<i>thaler</i>, he crosses himself under his waistcoat. Read the papers, go a +walk, do what you like, in fact. But at three o’clock I expect you … +<i>de pied ferme</i>. We shall have to dine a little earlier. The theatre among +these absurd Germans begins at half-past six. She held out her hand. +“<i>Sans rancune, n’est-ce pas?</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“Really, Maria Nikolaevna, what reason have I to be annoyed?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, because I’ve been tormenting you. Wait a little, you’ll +see. There’s worse to come,” she added, fluttering her eyelids, and +all her dimples suddenly came out on her flushing cheeks. “Till we +meet!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin bowed and went out. A merry laugh rang out after him, and in the +looking-glass which he was passing at that instant, the following scene was +reflected: Maria Nikolaevna had pulled her husband’s fez over his eyes, +and he was helplessly struggling with both hands. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXVIII</h3> + +<p> +Oh, what a deep sigh of delight Sanin heaved, when he found himself in his +room! Indeed, Maria Nikolaevna had spoken the truth, he needed rest, rest from +all these new acquaintances, collisions, conversations, from this suffocating +atmosphere which was affecting his head and his heart, from this enigmatical, +uninvited intimacy with a woman, so alien to him! And when was all this taking +place? Almost the day after he had learnt that Gemma loved him, after he had +become betrothed to her. Why, it was sacrilege! A thousand times he mentally +asked forgiveness of his pure chaste dove, though he could not really blame +himself for anything; a thousand times over he kissed the cross she had given +him. Had he not the hope of bringing the business, for which he had come to +Wiesbaden, to a speedy and successful conclusion, he would have rushed off +headlong, back again, to sweet Frankfort, to that dear house, now his own home, +to her, to throw himself at her loved feet…. But there was no help for it! The +cup must be drunk to the dregs, he must dress, go to dinner, and from there to +the theatre…. If only she would let him go to-morrow! +</p> + +<p> +One other thing confounded him, angered him; with love, with tenderness, with +grateful transport he dreamed of Gemma, of their life together, of the +happiness awaiting him in the future, and yet this strange woman, this Madame +Polozov persistently floated—no! not floated, poked herself, so Sanin +with special vindictiveness expressed it—<i>poked herself</i> in and +faced his eyes, and he could not rid himself of her image, could not help +hearing her voice, recalling her words, could not help being aware even of the +special scent, delicate, fresh and penetrating, like the scent of yellow +lilies, that was wafted from her garments. This lady was obviously fooling him, +and trying in every way to get over him … what for? what did she want? Could it +be merely the caprice of a spoiled, rich, and most likely unprincipled woman? +And that husband! What a creature he was! What were his relations with her? And +why would these questions keep coming into his head, when he, Sanin, had really +no interest whatever in either Polozov or his wife? Why could he not drive away +that intrusive image, even when he turned with his whole soul to another image, +clear and bright as God’s sunshine? How, through those almost divine +features, dare <i>those others</i> force themselves upon him? And not only +that; those other features smiled insolently at him. Those grey, rapacious +eyes, those dimples, those snake-like tresses, how was it all that seemed to +cleave to him, and to shake it all off, and fling it away, he was unable, had +not the power? +</p> + +<p> +Nonsense! nonsense! to-morrow it would all vanish and leave no trace…. But +would she let him go to-morrow? +</p> + +<p> +Yes…. All these question he put to himself, but the time was moving on to three +o’clock, and he put on a black frockcoat and after a turn in the park, +went in to the Polozovs! +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +He found in their drawing-room a secretary of the legation, a very tall +light-haired German, with the profile of a horse, and his hair parted down the +back of his head (at that time a new fashion), and … oh, wonder! whom besides? +Von Dönhof, the very officer with whom he had fought a few days before! He had +not the slightest expectation of meeting him there and could not help being +taken aback. He greeted him, however. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you acquainted?” asked Maria Nikolaevna who had not failed to +notice Sanin’s embarrassment. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes … I have already had the honour,” said Dönhof, and bending a +little aside, in an undertone he added to Maria Nikolaevna, with a smile, +“The very man … your compatriot … the Russian …” +</p> + +<p> +“Impossible!” she exclaimed also in an undertone; she shook her +finger at him, and at once began to bid good-bye both to him and the long +secretary, who was, to judge by every symptom, head over ears in love with her; +he positively gaped every time he looked at her. Dönhof promptly took leave +with amiable docility, like a friend of the family who understands at half a +word what is expected of him; the secretary showed signs of restiveness, but +Maria Nikolaevna turned him out without any kind of ceremony. +</p> + +<p> +“Get along to your sovereign mistress,” she said to him (there was +at that time in Wiesbaden a certain princess di Monaco, who looked surprisingly +like a <i>cocotte</i> of the poorer sort); “what do you want to stay with +a plebeian like me for?” +</p> + +<p> +“Really, dear madam,” protested the luckless secretary, “all +the princesses in the world….” +</p> + +<p> +But Maria Nikolaevna was remorseless, and the secretary went away, parting and +all. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna was dressed that day very much “to her advantage,” +as our grandmothers used to say. She wore a pink glacé silk dress, with sleeves +<i>à la Fontange</i>, and a big diamond in each ear. Her eyes sparkled as much +as her diamonds; she seemed in a good humour and in high spirits. +</p> + +<p> +She made Sanin sit beside her, and began talking to him about Paris, where she +was intending to go in a few days, of how sick she was of Germans, how stupid +they were when they tried to be clever, and how inappropriately clever +sometimes when they were stupid; and suddenly, point-blank, as they +say—<i>à brûle pourpoint</i>—asked him, was it true that he had +fought a duel with the very officer who had been there just now, only a few +days ago, on account of a lady? +</p> + +<p> +“How did you know that?” muttered Sanin, dumfoundered. +</p> + +<p> +“The earth is full of rumours, Dimitri Pavlovitch; but anyway, I know you +were quite right, perfectly right, and behaved like a knight. Tell me, was that +lady your betrothed?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin slightly frowned … +</p> + +<p> +“There, I won’t, I won’t,” Maria Nikolaevna hastened to +say. “You don’t like it, forgive me, I won’t do it, +don’t be angry!” Polozov came in from the next room with a +newspaper in his hand. “What do you want? Or is dinner ready?” +</p> + +<p> +“Dinner’ll be ready directly, but just see what I’ve read in +the <i>Northern Bee</i> … Prince Gromoboy is dead.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna raised her head. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! I wish him the joys of Paradise! He used,” she turned to +Sanin, “to fill all my rooms with camellias every February on my +birthday. But it wasn’t worth spending the winter in Petersburg for that. +He must have been over seventy, I should say?” she said to her husband. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, he was. They describe his funeral in the paper. All the court were +present. And here’s a poem too, of Prince Kovrizhkin’s on the +occasion.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s nice!” +</p> + +<p> +“Shall I read them? The prince calls him the good man of wise +counsel.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, don’t. The good man of wise counsel? He was simply the goodman +of Tatiana Yurevna. Come to dinner. Life is for the living. Dimitri Pavlovitch, +your arm.” +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +The dinner was, as on the day before, superb, and the meal was a very lively +one. Maria Nikolaevna knew how to tell a story … a rare gift in a woman, and +especially in a Russian one! She did not restrict herself in her expressions; +her countrywomen received particularly severe treatment at her hands. Sanin was +more than once set laughing by some bold and well-directed word. Above all, +Maria Nikolaevna had no patience with hypocrisy, cant, and humbug. She +discovered it almost everywhere. She, as it were, plumed herself on and boasted +of the humble surroundings in which she had begun life. She told rather queer +anecdotes of her relations in the days of her childhood, spoke of herself as +quite as much of a clodhopper as Natalya Kirilovna Narishkin. It became +apparent to Sanin that she had been through a great deal more in her time than +the majority of women of her age. +</p> + +<p> +Polozov ate meditatively, drank attentively, and only occasionally cast first +on his wife, then on Sanin, his lightish, dim-looking, but, in reality, very +keen eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“What a clever darling you are!” cried Maria Nikolaevna, turning to +him; “how well you carried out all my commissions in Frankfort! I could +give you a kiss on your forehead for it, but you’re not very keen after +kisses.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m not,” responded Polozov, and he cut a pine-apple with a +silver knife. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna looked at him and drummed with her fingers on the table. +“So our bet’s on, isn’t it?” she said significantly. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, it’s on.” +</p> + +<p> +“All right. You’ll lose it.” +</p> + +<p> +Polozov stuck out his chin. “Well, this time you mustn’t be too +sanguine, Maria Nikolaevna, maybe you will lose.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is the bet? May I know?” asked Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“No … not now,” answered Maria Nikolaevna, and she laughed. +</p> + +<p> +It struck seven. The waiter announced that the carriage was ready. Polozov saw +his wife out, and at once waddled back to his easy-chair. +</p> + +<p> +“Mind now! Don’t forget the letter to the overseer,” Maria +Nikolaevna shouted to him from the hall. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll write, don’t worry yourself. I’m a business-like +person.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXXIX</h3> + +<p> +In the year 1840, the theatre at Wiesbaden was a poor affair even externally, +and its company, for affected and pitiful mediocrity, for studious and vulgar +commonplaceness, not one hair’s-breadth above the level, which might be +regarded up to now as the normal one in all German theatres, and which has been +displayed in perfection lately by the company in Carlsruhe, under the +“illustrious” direction of Herr Devrient. At the back of the box +taken for her “Serenity Madame von Polozov” (how the waiter devised +the means of getting it, God knows, he can hardly have really bribed the +stadt-director!) was a little room, with sofas all round it; before she went +into the box, Maria Nikolaevna asked Sanin to draw up the screen that shut the +box off from the theatre. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t want to be seen,” she said, “or else +they’ll be swarming round directly, you know.” She made him sit +down beside her with his back to the house so that the box seemed to be empty. +The orchestra played the overture from the <i>Marriage of Figaro</i>. The +curtain rose, the play began. +</p> + +<p> +It was one of those numerous home-raised products in which well-read but +talentless authors, in choice, but dead language, studiously and cautiously +enunciated some “profound” or “vital and palpitating” +idea, portrayed a so-called tragic conflict, and produced dulness … an Asiatic +dulness, like Asiatic cholera. Maria Nikolaevna listened patiently to half an +act, but when the first lover, discovering the treachery of his mistress (he +was dressed in a cinnamon-coloured coat with “puffs” and a plush +collar, a striped waistcoat with mother-of-pearl buttons, green trousers with +straps of varnished leather, and white chamois leather gloves), when this lover +pressed both fists to his bosom, and poking his two elbows out at an acute +angle, howled like a dog, Maria Nikolaevna could not stand it. +</p> + +<p> +“The humblest French actor in the humblest little provincial town acts +better and more naturally than the highest German celebrity,” she cried +in indignation; and she moved away and sat down in the little room at the back. +“Come here,” she said to Sanin, patting the sofa beside her. +“Let’s talk.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin obeyed. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna glanced at him. “Ah, I see you’re as soft as silk! +Your wife will have an easy time of it with you. That buffoon,” she went +on, pointing with her fan towards the howling actor (he was acting the part of +a tutor), “reminded me of my young days; I, too, was in love with a +teacher. It was my first … no, my second passion. The first time I fell in love +with a young monk of the Don monastery. I was twelve years old. I only saw him +on Sundays. He used to wear a short velvet cassock, smelt of lavender water, +and as he made his way through the crowd with the censer, used to say to the +ladies in French, ‘<i>Pardon, excusez</i>’ but never lifted his eyes, and he +had eyelashes like that!” Maria Nikolaevna marked off with the nail of +her middle finger quite half the length of the little finger and showed Sanin. +“My tutor was called—Monsieur Gaston! I must tell you he was an +awfully learned and very severe person, a Swiss,—and with such an +energetic face! Whiskers black as pitch, a Greek profile, and lips that looked +like cast iron! I was afraid of him! He was the only man I have ever been +afraid of in my life. He was tutor to my brother, who died … was drowned. A +gipsy woman has foretold a violent death for me too, but that’s all +moonshine. I don’t believe in it. Only fancy Ippolit Sidoritch with a +dagger!” +</p> + +<p> +“One may die from something else than a dagger,” observed Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“All that’s moonshine! Are you superstitious? I’m not a bit. +What is to be, will be. Monsieur Gaston used to live in our house, in the room +over my head. Sometimes I’d wake up at night and hear his +footstep—he used to go to bed very late—and my heart would stand +still with veneration, or some other feeling. My father could hardly read and +write himself, but he gave us an excellent education. Do you know, I learnt +Latin!” +</p> + +<p> +“You? learnt Latin?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; I did. Monsieur Gaston taught me. I read the <i>Æneid</i> with +him. It’s a dull thing, but there are fine passages. Do you remember when +Dido and Æneas are in the forest?…” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, yes, I remember,” Sanin answered hurriedly. He had long ago +forgotten all his Latin, and had only very faint notions about the +<i>Æneid</i>. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna glanced at him, as her way was, a little from one side and +looking upwards. “Don’t imagine, though, that I am very learned. +Mercy on us! no; I’m not learned, and I’ve no talents of any sort. +I scarcely know how to write … really; I can’t read aloud; nor play the +piano, nor draw, nor sew—nothing! That’s what I am—there you +have me!” +</p> + +<p> +She threw out her hands. “I tell you all this,” she said, +“first, so as not to hear those fools (she pointed to the stage where at +that instant the actor’s place was being filled by an actress, also +howling, and also with her elbows projecting before her) and secondly, because +I’m in your debt; you told me all about yourself yesterday.” +</p> + +<p> +“It was your pleasure to question me,” observed Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna suddenly turned to him. “And it’s not your +pleasure to know just what sort of woman I am? I can’t wonder at it, +though,” she went on, leaning back again on the sofa cushions. “A +man just going to be married, and for love, and after a duel…. What thoughts +could he have for anything else?” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna relapsed into dreamy silence, and began biting the handle of +her fan with her big, but even, milkwhite teeth. +</p> + +<p> +And Sanin felt mounting to his head again that intoxication which he had not +been able to get rid of for the last two days. +</p> + +<p> +The conversation between him and Maria Nikolaevna was carried on in an +undertone, almost in a whisper, and this irritated and disturbed him the more…. +</p> + +<p> +When would it all end? +</p> + +<p> +Weak people never put an end to things themselves—they always wait for +the end. +</p> + +<p> +Some one sneezed on the stage; this sneeze had been put into the play by the +author as the “comic relief” or “element”; there was +certainly no other comic element in it; and the audience made the most of it; +they laughed. +</p> + +<p> +This laugh, too, jarred upon Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +There were moments when he actually did not know whether he was furious or +delighted, bored or amused. Oh, if Gemma could have seen him! +</p> + +<p> +“It’s really curious,” Maria Nikolaevna began all at once. +“A man informs one and in such a calm voice, ‘I am going to get married’; +but no one calmly says to one, ‘I’m going to throw myself in the water.’ +And yet what difference is there? It’s curious, really.” +</p> + +<p> +Annoyance got the upper hand of Sanin. “There’s a great difference, +Maria Nikolaevna! It’s not dreadful at all to throw oneself in the water +if one can swim; and besides … as to the strangeness of marriages, if you come +to that …” +</p> + +<p> +He stopped short abruptly and bit his tongue. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna slapped her open hand with her fan. +</p> + +<p> +“Go on, Dimitri Pavlovitch, go on—I know what you were going to +say. ‘If it comes to that, my dear madam, Maria Nikolaevna Polozov,’ you were +going to say, ‘anything more curious than <i>your</i> marriage it would be +impossible to conceive…. I know your husband well, from a child!’ That’s +what you were going to say, you who can swim!” +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me,” Sanin was beginning…. +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t it the truth? Isn’t it the truth?” Maria +Nikolaevna pronounced insistently. +</p> + +<p> +“Come, look me in the face and tell me I was wrong!” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin did not know what to do with his eyes. “Well, if you like; +it’s the truth, if you absolutely insist upon it,” he said at last. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna shook her head. “Quite so, quite so. Well, and did you +ask yourself, you who can swim, what could be the reason of such a strange … +step on the part of a woman, not poor … and not a fool … and not ugly? All that +does not interest you, perhaps, but no matter. I’ll tell you the reason +not this minute, but directly the <i>entr’acte</i> is over. I am in +continual uneasiness for fear some one should come in….” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna had hardly uttered this last word when the outer door actually +was half opened, and into the box was thrust a head—red, oily, +perspiring, still young, but toothless; with sleek long hair, a pendent nose, +huge ears like a bat’s, with gold spectacles on inquisitive dull eyes, +and a <i>pince-nez</i> over the spectacles. The head looked round, saw Maria +Nikolaevna, gave a nasty grin, nodded…. A scraggy neck craned in after it…. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna shook her handkerchief at it. “I’m not at home! +<i>Ich bin nicht zu Hause, Herr P…! Ich bin nicht zu Hause…. Ksh-sk! +ksh-sh-sh!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +The head was disconcerted, gave a forced laugh, said with a sort of sob, in +imitation of Liszt, at whose feet he had once reverently grovelled, +“<i>Sehr gut, sehr gut!</i>” and vanished. +</p> + +<p> +“What is that object?” inquired Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, a Wiesbaden critic. A literary man or a flunkey, as you like. He is +in the pay of a local speculator here, and so is bound to praise everything and +be ecstatic over every one, though for his part he is soaked through and +through with the nastiest venom, to which he does not dare to give vent. I am +afraid he’s an awful scandalmonger; he’ll run at once to tell every +one I’m in the theatre. Well, what does it matter?” +</p> + +<p> +The orchestra played through a waltz, the curtain floated up again…. The +grimacing and whimpering began again on the stage. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” began Maria Nikolaevna, sinking again on to the sofa. +“Since you are here and obliged to sit with me, instead of enjoying the +society of your betrothed—don’t turn away your eyes and get +cross—I understand you, and have promised already to let you go to the +other end of the earth—but now hear my confession. Do you care to know +what I like more than anything?” +</p> + +<p> +“Freedom,” hazarded Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna laid her hand on his hand. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Dimitri Pavlovitch,” she said, and in her voice there was a +note of something special, a sort of unmistakable sincerity and gravity, +“freedom, more than all and before all. And don’t imagine I am +boasting of this—there is nothing praiseworthy in it; only it’s +<i>so</i> and always will be <i>so</i> with me to the day of my death. I +suppose it must have been that I saw a great deal of slavery in my childhood +and suffered enough from it. Yes, and Monsieur Gaston, my tutor, opened my eyes +too. Now you can, perhaps, understand why I married Ippolit Sidoritch: with him +I’m free, perfectly free as air, as the wind…. And I knew that before +marriage; I knew that with him I should be a free Cossack!” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna paused and flung her fan aside. +</p> + +<p> +“I will tell you one thing more; I have no distaste for reflection … +it’s amusing, and indeed our brains are given us for that; but on the +consequences of what I do I never reflect, and if I suffer I don’t pity +myself—not a little bit; it’s not worth it. I have a favourite +saying: <i>Cela ne tire pas à conséquence</i>,—I don’t know how to +say that in Russian. And after all, what does <i>tire à consequence</i>? I +shan’t be asked to give an account of myself here, you see—in this +world; and up there (she pointed upwards with her finger), well, up +there—let them manage as best they can. When they come to judge me up +there, <i>I</i> shall not be <i>I</i>! Are you listening to me? Aren’t +you bored?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin was sitting bent up. He raised his head. “I’m not at all +bored, Maria Nikolaevna, and I am listening to you with curiosity. Only I … +confess … I wonder why you say all this to me?” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna edged a little away on the sofa. +</p> + +<p> +“You wonder?… Are you slow to guess? Or so modest?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin lifted his head higher than before. +</p> + +<p> +“I tell you all this,” Maria Nikolaevna continued in an unmoved +tone, which did not, however, at all correspond with the expression of her +face, “because I like you very much; yes, don’t be surprised, +I’m not joking; because since I have met you, it would be painful to me +that you had a disagreeable recollection of me … not disagreeable even, that I +shouldn’t mind, but untrue. That’s why I have made you come here, +and am staying alone with you and talking to you so openly…. Yes, yes, openly. +I’m not telling a lie. And observe, Dimitri Pavlovitch, I know +you’re in love with another woman, that you’re going to be married +to her…. Do justice to my disinterestedness! Though indeed it’s a good +opportunity for you to say in your turn: <i>Cela ne tire pas à +conséquence</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +She laughed, but her laugh suddenly broke off, and she stayed motionless, as +though her own words had suddenly struck her, and in her eyes, usually so gay +and bold, there was a gleam of something like timidity, even like sadness. +</p> + +<p> +“Snake! ah, she’s a snake!” Sanin was thinking meanwhile; +“but what a lovely snake!” +</p> + +<p> +“Give me my opera-glass,” Maria Nikolaevna said suddenly. “I +want to see whether this <i>jeune première</i> really is so ugly. Upon my word, +one might fancy the government appointed her in the interests of morality, so +that the young men might not lose their heads over her.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin handed her the opera-glass, and as she took it from him, swiftly, but +hardly audibly, she snatched his hand in both of hers. +</p> + +<p> +“Please don’t be serious,” she whispered with a smile. +“Do you know what, no one can put fetters on me, but then you see I put +no fetters on others. I love freedom, and I don’t acknowledge +duties—not only for myself. Now move to one side a little, and let us +listen to the play.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna turned her opera-glass upon the stage, and Sanin proceeded to +look in the same direction, sitting beside her in the half dark of the box, and +involuntarily drinking in the warmth and fragrance of her luxurious body, and +as involuntarily turning over and over in his head all she had said during the +evening—especially during the last minutes. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XL</h3> + +<p> +The play lasted over an hour longer, but Maria Nikolaevna and Sanin soon gave +up looking at the stage. A conversation sprang up between them again, and went +on the same lines as before; only this time Sanin was less silent. Inwardly he +was angry with himself and with Maria Nikolaevna; he tried to prove to her all +the inconsistency of her “theory,” as though she cared for +theories! He began arguing with her, at which she was secretly rejoiced; if a +man argues, it means that he is giving in or will give in. He had taken the +bait, was giving way, had left off keeping shyly aloof! She retorted, laughed, +agreed, mused dreamily, attacked him … and meanwhile his face and her face were +close together, his eyes no longer avoided her eyes…. Those eyes of hers seemed +to ramble, seemed to hover over his features, and he smiled in response to +them—a smile of civility, but still a smile. It was so much gained for +her that he had gone off into abstractions, that he was discoursing upon truth +in personal relations, upon duty, the sacredness of love and marriage…. It is +well known that these abstract propositions serve admirably as a beginning … as +a starting-point…. +</p> + +<p> +People who knew Maria Nikolaevna well used to maintain that when her strong and +vigorous personality showed signs of something soft and modest, something +almost of maidenly shamefacedness, though one wondered where she could have got +it from … then … then, things were taking a dangerous turn. +</p> + +<p> +Things had apparently taken such a turn for Sanin…. He would have felt contempt +for himself, if he could have succeeded in concentrating his attention for one +instant; but he had not time to concentrate his mind nor to despise himself. +</p> + +<p> +She wasted no time. And it all came from his being so very good-looking! One +can but exclaim, No man knows what may be his making or his undoing! +</p> + +<p> +The play was over. Maria Nikolaevna asked Sanin to put on her shawl and did not +stir, while he wrapped the soft fabric round her really queenly shoulders. Then +she took his arm, went out into the corridor, and almost cried out aloud. At +the very door of the box Dönhof sprang up like some apparition; while behind +his back she got a glimpse of the figure of the Wiesbaden critic. The +“literary man’s” oily face was positively radiant with +malignancy. +</p> + +<p> +“Is it your wish, madam, that I find you your carriage?” said the +young officer addressing Maria Nikolaevna with a quiver of ill-disguised fury +in his voice. +</p> + +<p> +“No, thank you,” she answered … “my man will find it. +Stop!” she added in an imperious whisper, and rapidly withdrew drawing +Sanin along with her. +</p> + +<p> +“Go to the devil! Why are you staring at me?” Dönhof roared +suddenly at the literary man. He had to vent his feelings upon some one! +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Sehr gut! sehr gut!</i>” muttered the literary man, and +shuffled off. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna’s footman, waiting for her in the entrance, found her +carriage in no time. She quickly took her seat in it; Sanin leapt in after her. +The doors were slammed to, and Maria Nikolaevna exploded in a burst of +laughter. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you laughing at?” Sanin inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, excuse me, please … but it struck me: what if Dönhof were to have +another duel with you … on my account…. wouldn’t that be +wonderful?” +</p> + +<p> +“Are you very great friends with him?” Sanin asked. +</p> + +<p> +“With him? that boy? He’s one of my followers. You needn’t +trouble yourself about him!” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I’m not troubling myself at all.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna sighed. “Ah, I know you’re not. But listen, do you +know what, you’re such a darling, you mustn’t refuse me one last +request. Remember in three days’ time I am going to Paris, and you are +returning to Frankfort…. Shall we ever meet again?” +</p> + +<p> +“What is this request?” +</p> + +<p> +“You can ride, of course?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, then, to-morrow morning I’ll take you with me, and +we’ll go a ride together out of the town. We’ll have splendid +horses. Then we’ll come home, wind up our business, and amen! Don’t +be surprised, don’t tell me it’s a caprice, and I’m a +madcap—all that’s very likely—but simply say, I +consent.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna turned her face towards him. It was dark in the carriage, but +her eyes glittered even in the darkness. +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, I consent,” said Sanin with a sigh. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! You sighed!” Maria Nikolaevna mimicked him. “That means +to say, as you’ve begun, you must go on to the bitter end. But no, no…. +You’re charming, you’re good, and I’ll keep my promise. +Here’s my hand, without a glove on it, the right one, for business. Take +it, and have faith in its pressure. What sort of a woman I am, I don’t +know; but I’m an honest fellow, and one can do business with me.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin, without knowing very well what he was doing, lifted the hand to his +lips. Maria Nikolaevna softly took it, and was suddenly still, and did not +speak again till the carriage stopped. +</p> + +<p> +She began getting out…. What was it? Sanin’s fancy? or did he really feel +on his cheek a swift burning kiss? +</p> + +<p> +“Till to-morrow!” whispered Maria Nikolaevna on the steps, in the +light of the four tapers of a candelabrum, held up on her appearance by the +gold-laced door-keeper. She kept her eyes cast down. “Till +to-morrow!” +</p> + +<p> +When he got back to his room, Sanin found on the table a letter from Gemma. He +felt a momentary dismay, and at once made haste to rejoice over it to disguise +his dismay from himself. It consisted of a few lines. She was delighted at the +“successful opening of negotiations,” advised him to be patient, +and added that all at home were well, and were already rejoicing at the +prospect of seeing him back again. Sanin felt the letter rather stiff, he took +pen and paper, however … and threw it all aside again. “Why write? I +shall be back myself to-morrow … it’s high time!” +</p> + +<p> +He went to bed immediately, and tried to get to sleep as quickly as possible. +If he had stayed up and remained on his legs, he would certainly have begun +thinking about Gemma, and he was for some reason … ashamed to think of her. His +conscience was stirring within him. But he consoled himself with the reflection +that to-morrow it would all be over for ever, and he would take leave for good +of this feather-brained lady, and would forget all this rotten idiocy!… +</p> + +<p> +Weak people in their mental colloquies, eagerly make use of strong expressions. +</p> + +<p> +<i>Et puis … cela ne tire pas à conséquence!</i> +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XLI</h3> + +<p> +Such were Sanin’s thoughts, as he went to bed; but what he thought next +morning when Maria Nikolaevna knocked impatiently at his door with the coral +handle of her riding-whip, when he saw her in the doorway, with the train of a +dark-blue riding habit over her arm, with a man’s small hat on her +thickly coiled curls, with a veil thrown back over her shoulder, with a smile +of invitation on her lips, in her eyes, over all her face—what he thought +then—history does not record. +</p> + +<p> +“Well? are you ready?” rang out a joyous voice. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin buttoned his coat, and took his hat in silence. Maria Nikolaevna flung +him a bright look, nodded to him, and ran swiftly down the staircase. And he +ran after her. +</p> + +<p> +The horses were already waiting in the street at the steps. There were three of +them, a golden chestnut thorough-bred mare, with a thin-lipped mouth, that +showed the teeth, with black prominent eyes, and legs like a stag’s, +rather thin but beautifully shaped, and full of fire and spirit, for Maria +Nikolaevna; a big, powerful, rather thick-set horse, raven black all over, for +Sanin; the third horse was destined for the groom. Maria Nikolaevna leaped +adroitly on to her mare, who stamped and wheeled round, lifting her tail, and +sinking on to her haunches. But Maria Nikolaevna, who was a first-rate +horse-woman, reined her in; they had to take leave of Polozov, who in his +inevitable fez and in an open dressing-gown, came out on to the balcony, and +from there waved a <i>batiste</i> handkerchief, without the faintest smile, +rather a frown, in fact, on his face. Sanin too mounted his horse; Maria +Nikolaevna saluted Polozov with her whip, then gave her mare a lash with it on +her arched and flat neck. The mare reared on her hind legs, made a dash +forward, moving with a smart and shortened step, quivering in every sinew, +biting the air and snorting abruptly. Sanin rode behind, and looked at Maria +Nikolaevna; her slender supple figure, moulded by close-fitting but easy stays, +swayed to and fro with self-confident grace and skill. She turned her head and +beckoned him with her eyes alone. He came alongside of her. +</p> + +<p> +“See now, how delightful it is,” she said. “I tell you at the +last, before parting, you are charming, and you shan’t regret it.” +</p> + +<p> +As she uttered those last words, she nodded her head several times as if to +confirm them and make him feel their full weight. +</p> + +<p> +She seemed so happy that Sanin was simply astonished; her face even wore at +times that sedate expression which children sometimes have when they are very … +very much pleased. +</p> + +<p> +They rode at a walking pace for the short distance to the city walls, but then +started off at a vigorous gallop along the high road. It was magnificent, real +summer weather; the wind blew in their faces, and sang and whistled sweetly in +their ears. They felt very happy; the sense of youth, health and life, of free +eager onward motion, gained possession of both; it grew stronger every instant. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna reined in her mare, and again went at a walking pace; Sanin +followed her example. +</p> + +<p> +“This,” she began with a deep blissful sigh, “this now is the +only thing worth living for. When you succeed in doing what you want to, what +seemed impossible—come, enjoy it, heart and soul, to the last +drop!” She passed her hand across her throat. “And how good and +kind one feels oneself then! I now, at this moment … how good I feel! I feel as +if I could embrace the whole world! No, not the whole world…. That man now I +couldn’t.” She pointed with her whip at a poorly dressed old man +who was stealing along on one side. “But I am ready to make him happy. +Here, take this,” she shouted loudly in German, and she flung a net purse +at his feet. The heavy little bag (leather purses were not thought of at that +time) fell with a ring on to the road. The old man was astounded, stood still, +while Maria Nikolaevna chuckled, and put her mare into a gallop. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you enjoy riding so much?” Sanin asked, as he overtook her. +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna reined her mare in once more: only in this way could she bring +her to a stop. +</p> + +<p> +“I only wanted to get away from thanks. If any one thanks me, he spoils +my pleasure. You see I didn’t do that for his sake, but for my own. How +dare he thank me? I didn’t hear what you asked me.” +</p> + +<p> +“I asked … I wanted to know what makes you so happy to-day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know what,” said Maria Nikolaevna; either she had again not +heard Sanin’s question, or she did not consider it necessary to answer +it. “I’m awfully sick of that groom, who sticks up there behind us, +and most likely does nothing but wonder when we gentlefolks are going home +again. How shall we get rid of him?” She hastily pulled a little +pocket-book out of her pocket. “Send him back to the town with a note? No +… that won’t do. Ah! I have it! What’s that in front of us? +Isn’t it an inn?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin looked in the direction she pointed. “Yes, I believe it is an +inn.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, that’s first-rate. I’ll tell him to stop at that inn +and drink beer till we come back.” +</p> + +<p> +“But what will he think?” +</p> + +<p> +“What does it matter to us? Besides, he won’t think at all; +he’ll drink beer—that’s all. Come, Sanin (it was the first +time she had used his surname alone), on, gallop!” +</p> + +<p> +When they reached the inn, Maria Nikolaevna called the groom up and told him +what she wished of him. The groom, a man of English extraction and English +temperament, raised his hand to the beak of his cap without a word, jumped off +his horse, and took him by the bridle. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, now we are free as the birds of the air!” cried Maria +Nikolaevna. “Where shall we go. North, south, east, or west? +Look—I’m like the Hungarian king at his coronation (she pointed her +whip in each direction in turn). All is ours! No, do you know what: see, those +glorious mountains—and that forest! Let’s go there, to the +mountains, to the mountains!” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>In die Berge wo die Freiheit thront!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +She turned off the high-road and galloped along a narrow untrodden track, which +certainly seemed to lead straight to the hills. Sanin galloped after her. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XLII</h3> + +<p> +This track soon changed into a tiny footpath, and at last disappeared +altogether, and was crossed by a stream. Sanin counselled turning back, but +Maria Nikolaevna said, “No! I want to get to the mountains! Let’s +go straight, as the birds fly,” and she made her mare leap the stream. +Sanin leaped it too. Beyond the stream began a wide meadow, at first dry, then +wet, and at last quite boggy; the water oozed up everywhere, and stood in pools +in some places. Maria Nikolaevna rode her mare straight through these pools on +purpose, laughed, and said, “Let’s be naughty children.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know,” she asked Sanin, “what is meant by +pool-hunting?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” answered Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“I had an uncle a huntsman,” she went on. +</p> + +<p> +“I used to go out hunting with him—in the spring. It was delicious! +Here we are now, on the pools with you. Only, I see, you’re a Russian, +and yet mean to marry an Italian. Well, that’s your sorrow. What’s +that? A stream again! Gee up!” +</p> + +<p> +The horse took the leap, but Maria Nikolaevna’s hat fell off her head, +and her curls tumbled loose over her shoulders. Sanin was just going to get off +his horse to pick up the hat, but she shouted to him, “Don’t touch +it, I’ll get it myself,” bent low down from the saddle, hooked the +handle of her whip into the veil, and actually did get the hat. She put it on +her head, but did not fasten up her hair, and again darted off, positively +holloaing. Sanin dashed along beside her, by her side leaped trenches, fences, +brooks, fell in and scrambled out, flew down hill, flew up hill, and kept +watching her face. What a face it was! It was all, as it were, wide open: +wide-open eyes, eager, bright, and wild; lips, nostrils, open too, and +breathing eagerly; she looked straight before her, and it seemed as though that +soul longed to master everything it saw, the earth, the sky, the sun, the air +itself; and would complain of one thing only—that dangers were so few, +and all she could overcome. “Sanin!” she cried, “why, this is +like Bürger’s Lenore! Only you’re not dead—eh? Not dead … I +am alive!” She let her force and daring have full fling. It seemed not an +Amazon on a galloping horse, but a young female centaur at full speed, +half-beast and half-god, and the sober, well-bred country seemed astounded, as +it was trampled underfoot in her wild riot! +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna at last drew up her foaming and bespattered mare; she was +staggering under her, and Sanin’s powerful but heavy horse was gasping +for breath. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, do you like it?” Maria Nikolaevna asked in a sort of +exquisite whisper. +</p> + +<p> +“I like it!” Sanin echoed back ecstatically. And his blood was on +fire. +</p> + +<p> +“This isn’t all, wait a bit.” She held out her hand. Her +glove was torn across. +</p> + +<p> +“I told you I would lead you to the forest, to the mountains…. Here they +are, the mountains!” The mountains, covered with tall forest, rose about +two hundred feet from the place they had reached in their wild ride. +“Look, here is the road; let us turn into it—and forwards. Only at +a walk. We must let our horses get their breath.” +</p> + +<p> +They rode on. With one vigorous sweep of her arm Maria Nikolaevna flung back +her hair. Then she looked at her gloves and took them off. “My hands will +smell of leather,” she said, “you won’t mind that, eh?” +… Maria Nikolaevna smiled, and Sanin smiled too. Their mad gallop together +seemed to have finally brought them together and made them friends. +</p> + +<p> +“How old are you?” she asked suddenly. +</p> + +<p> +“Twenty-two.” +</p> + +<p> +“Really? I’m twenty-two too. A nice age. Add both together and +you’re still far off old age. It’s hot, though. Am I very red, +eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“Like a poppy!” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna rubbed her face with her handkerchief. “We’ve only +to get to the forest and there it will be cool. Such an old forest is like an +old friend. Have you any friends?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin thought a little. “Yes … only few. No real ones.” +</p> + +<p> +“I have; real ones—but not old ones. This is a friend too—a +horse. How carefully it carries one! Ah, but it’s splendid here! Is it +possible I am going to Paris the day after to-morrow?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes … is it possible?” Sanin chimed in. +</p> + +<p> +“And you to Frankfort?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am certainly going to Frankfort.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, what of it? Good luck go with you! Anyway, to-day’s ours … +ours … ours!” +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +The horses reached the forest’s edge and pushed on into the forest. The +broad soft shade of the forest wrapt them round on all sides. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, but this is paradise!” cried Maria Nikolaevna. “Further, +deeper into the shade, Sanin!” +</p> + +<p> +The horses moved slowly on, “deeper into the shade,” slightly +swaying and snorting. The path, by which they had come in, suddenly turned off +and plunged into a rather narrow gorge. The smell of heather and bracken, of +the resin of the pines, and the decaying leaves of last year, seemed to hang, +close and drowsy, about it. Through the clefts of the big brown rocks came +strong currents of fresh air. On both sides of the path rose round hillocks +covered with green moss. +</p> + +<p> +“Stop!” cried Maria Nikolaevna, “I want to sit down and rest +on this velvet. Help me to get off.” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin leaped off his horse and ran up to her. She leaned on both his shoulders, +sprang instantly to the ground, and seated herself on one of the mossy mounds. +He stood before her, holding both the horses’ bridles in his hand. +</p> + +<p> +She lifted her eyes to him…. “Sanin, are you able to forget?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin recollected what had happened yesterday … in the carriage. “What +is that—a question … or a reproach?” +</p> + +<p> +“I have never in my life reproached any one for anything. Do you believe +in magic?” +</p> + +<p> +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +“In magic?—you know what is sung of in our ballads—our +Russian peasant ballads?” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! That’s what you’re speaking of,” Sanin said +slowly. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, that’s it. I believe in it … and you will believe in +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Magic is sorcery …” Sanin repeated, “Anything in the world +is possible. I used not to believe in it—but I do now. I don’t know +myself.” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna thought a moment and looked about her. “I fancy this +place seems familiar to me. Look, Sanin, behind that bushy oak—is there a +red wooden cross, or not?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin moved a few steps to one side. “Yes, there is.” Maria +Nikolaevna smiled. “Ah, that’s good! I know where we are. We +haven’t got lost as yet. What’s that tapping? A wood-cutter?” +</p> + +<p> +Sanin looked into the thicket. “Yes … there’s a man there chopping +up dry branches.” +</p> + +<p> +“I must put my hair to rights,” said Maria Nikolaevna. “Else +he’ll see me and be shocked.” She took off her hat and began +plaiting up her long hair, silently and seriously. Sanin stood facing her … All +the lines of her graceful limbs could be clearly seen through the dark folds of +her habit, dotted here and there with tufts of moss. +</p> + +<p> +One of the horses suddenly shook itself behind Sanin’s back; he himself +started and trembled from head to foot. Everything was in confusion within him, +his nerves were strung up like harpstrings. He might well say he did not know +himself…. He really was bewitched. His whole being was filled full of one thing +… one idea, one desire. Maria Nikolaevna turned a keen look upon him. +</p> + +<p> +“Come, now everything’s as it should be,” she observed, +putting on her hat. “Won’t you sit down? Here! No, wait a minute … +don’t sit down! What’s that?” +</p> + +<p> +Over the tree-tops, over the air of the forest, rolled a dull rumbling. +</p> + +<p> +“Can it be thunder?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think it really is thunder,” answered Sanin. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, this is a treat, a real treat! That was the only thing +wanting!” The dull rumble was heard a second time, rose, and fell in a +crash. “Bravo! Bis! Do you remember I spoke of the <i>Æneid</i> +yesterday? They too were overtaken by a storm in the forest, you know. We must +be off, though.” She rose swiftly to her feet. “Bring me my horse…. +Give me your hand. There, so. I’m not heavy.” +</p> + +<p> +She hopped like a bird into the saddle. Sanin too mounted his horse. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you going home?” he asked in an unsteady voice. +</p> + +<p> +“Home indeed!” she answered deliberately and picked up the reins. +“Follow me,” she commanded almost roughly. She came out on to the +road and passing the red cross, rode down into a hollow, clambered up again to +a cross road, turned to the right and again up the mountainside…. She obviously +knew where the path led, and the path led farther and farther into the heart of +the forest. She said nothing and did not look round; she moved imperiously in +front and humbly and submissively he followed without a spark of will in his +sinking heart. Rain began to fall in spots. She quickened her horse’s +pace, and he did not linger behind her. At last through the dark green of the +young firs under an overhanging grey rock, a tumbledown little hut peeped out +at him, with a low door in its wattle wall…. Maria Nikolaevna made her mare +push through the fir bushes, leaped off her, and appearing suddenly at the +entrance to the hut, turned to Sanin, and whispered “Æneas.” +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +Four hours later, Maria Nikolaevna and Sanin, accompanied by the groom, who was +nodding in the saddle, returned to Wiesbaden, to the hotel. Polozov met his +wife with the letter to the overseer in his hand. After staring rather intently +at her, he showed signs of some displeasure on his face, and even muttered, +“You don’t mean to say you’ve won your bet?” +</p> + +<p> +Maria Nikolaevna simply shrugged her shoulders. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +The same day, two hours later, Sanin was standing in his own room before her, +like one distraught, ruined…. +</p> + +<p> +“Where are you going, dear?” she asked him. “To Paris, or +to Frankfort?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am going where you will be, and will be with you till you drive me +away,” he answered with despair and pressed close to him the hands of his +sovereign. She freed her hands, laid them on his head, and clutched at his hair +with her fingers. She slowly turned over and twisted the unresisting hair, drew +herself up, her lips curled with triumph, while her eyes, wide and clear, +almost white, expressed nothing but the ruthlessness and glutted joy of +conquest. The hawk, as it clutches a captured bird, has eyes like that. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XLIII</h3> + +<p> +This was what Dimitri Sanin remembered when in the stillness of his room +turning over his old papers he found among them a garnet cross. The events we +have described rose clearly and consecutively before his mental vision…. But +when he reached the moment when he addressed that humiliating prayer to Madame +Polozov, when he grovelled at her feet, when his slavery began, he averted his +gaze from the images he had evoked, he tried to recall no more. And not that +his memory failed him, oh no! he knew only too well what followed upon that +moment, but he was stifled by shame, even now, so many years after; he dreaded +that feeling of self-contempt, which he knew for certain would overwhelm him, +and like a torrent, flood all other feelings if he did not bid his memory be +still. But try as he would to turn away from these memories, he could not +stifle them entirely. He remembered the scoundrelly, tearful, lying, pitiful +letter he had sent to Gemma, that never received an answer…. See her again, go +back to her, after such falsehood, such treachery, no! no! he could not, so +much conscience and honesty was left in him. Moreover, he had lost every trace +of confidence in himself, every atom of self-respect; he dared not rely on +himself for anything. Sanin recollected too how he had later on—oh, +ignominy!—sent the Polozovs’ footman to Frankfort for his things, +what cowardly terror he had felt, how he had had one thought only, to get away +as soon as might be to Paris—to Paris; how in obedience to Maria +Nikolaevna, he had humoured and tried to please Ippolit Sidoritch and been +amiable to Dönhof, on whose finger he noticed just such an iron ring as Maria +Nikolaevna had given him!!! Then followed memories still worse, more +ignominious … the waiter hands him a visiting card, and on it is the name, +“Pantaleone Cippatola, court singer to His Highness the Duke of +Modena!” He hides from the old man, but cannot escape meeting him in the +corridor, and a face of exasperation rises before him under an upstanding +topknot of grey hair; the old eyes blaze like red-hot coals, and he hears +menacing cries and curses: “<i>Maledizione!</i>” hears even the +terrible words: “<i>Codardo! Infame traditore!</i>” Sanin closes +his eyes, shakes his head, turns away again and again, but still he sees +himself sitting in a travelling carriage on the narrow front seat … In the +comfortable places facing the horses sit Maria Nikolaevna and Ippolit +Sidoritch, the four horses trotting all together fly along the paved roads of +Wiesbaden to Paris! to Paris! Ippolit Sidoritch is eating a pear which Sanin +has peeled for him, while Maria Nikolaevna watches him and smiles at him, her +bondslave, that smile he knows already, the smile of the proprietor, the +slave-owner…. But, good God, out there at the corner of the street not far from +the city walls, wasn’t it Pantaleone again, and who with him? Can it be +Emilio? Yes, it was he, the enthusiastic devoted boy! Not long since his young +face had been full of reverence before his hero, his ideal, but now his pale +handsome face, so handsome that Maria Nikolaevna noticed him and poked her head +out of the carriage window, that noble face is glowing with anger and contempt; +his eyes, so like <i>her</i> eyes! are fastened upon Sanin, and the tightly +compressed lips part to revile him…. +</p> + +<p> +And Pantaleone stretches out his hand and points Sanin out to Tartaglia +standing near, and Tartaglia barks at Sanin, and the very bark of the faithful +dog sounds like an unbearable reproach…. Hideous! +</p> + +<p> +And then, the life in Paris, and all the humiliations, all the loathsome +tortures of the slave, who dare not be jealous or complain, and who is cast +aside at last, like a worn-out garment…. +</p> + +<p> +Then the going home to his own country, the poisoned, the devastated life, the +petty interests and petty cares, bitter and fruitless regret, and as bitter and +fruitless apathy, a punishment not apparent, but of every minute, continuous, +like some trivial but incurable disease, the payment farthing by farthing of +the debt, which can never be settled…. +</p> + +<p> +The cup was full enough. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +How had the garnet cross given Sanin by Gemma existed till now, why had he not +sent it back, how had it happened that he had never come across it till that +day? A long, long while he sat deep in thought, and taught as he was by the +experience of so many years, he still could not comprehend how he could have +deserted Gemma, so tenderly and passionately loved, for a woman he did not love +at all…. Next day he surprised all his friends and acquaintances by announcing +that he was going abroad. +</p> + +<p> +The surprise was general in society. Sanin was leaving Petersburg, in the +middle of the winter, after having only just taken and furnished a capital +flat, and having even secured seats for all the performances of the Italian +Opera, in which Madame Patti … Patti, herself, herself, was to take part! His +friends and acquaintances wondered; but it is not human nature as a rule to be +interested long in other people’s affairs, and when Sanin set off for +abroad, none came to the railway station to see him off but a French tailor, +and he only in the hope of securing an unpaid account “<i>pour un +saute-en-barque en velours noir tout à fait chic</i>.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XLIV</h3> + +<p> +Sanin told his friends he was going abroad, but he did not say where exactly: +the reader will readily conjecture that he made straight for Frankfort. Thanks +to the general extension of railways, on the fourth day after leaving +Petersburg he was there. He had not visited the place since 1840. The hotel, +the White Swan, was standing in its old place and still flourishing, though no +longer regarded as first class. The <i>Zeile</i>, the principal street of +Frankfort was little changed, but there was not only no trace of Signora +Roselli’s house, the very street in which it stood had disappeared. Sanin +wandered like a man in a dream about the places once so familiar, and +recognised nothing; the old buildings had vanished; they were replaced by new +streets of huge continuous houses and fine villas; even the public garden, +where that last interview with Gemma had taken place, had so grown up and +altered that Sanin wondered if it really were the same garden. What was he to +do? How and where could he get information? Thirty years, no little thing! had +passed since those days. No one to whom he applied had even heard of the name +Roselli; the hotel-keeper advised him to have recourse to the public library, +there, he told him, he would find all the old newspapers, but what good he +would get from that, the hotel-keeper owned he didn’t see. Sanin in +despair made inquiries about Herr Klüber. That name the hotel-keeper knew well, +but there too no success awaited him. The elegant shop-manager, after making +much noise in the world and rising to the position of a capitalist, had +speculated, was made bankrupt, and died in prison…. This piece of news did not, +however, occasion Sanin the slightest regret. He was beginning to feel that his +journey had been rather precipitate…. But, behold, one day, as he was turning +over a Frankfort directory, he came on the name: Von Dönhof, retired major. He +promptly took a carriage and drove to the address, though why was this Von +Dönhof certain to be that Dönhof, and why even was the right Dönhof likely to +be able to tell him any news of the Roselli family? No matter, a drowning man +catches at straws. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin found the retired major von Dönhof at home, and in the grey-haired +gentleman who received him he recognised at once his adversary of bygone days. +Dönhof knew him too, and was positively delighted to see him; he recalled to +him his young days, the escapades of his youth. Sanin heard from him that the +Roselli family had long, long ago emigrated to America, to New York; that Gemma +had married a merchant; that he, Dönhof, had an acquaintance also a merchant, +who would probably know her husband’s address, as he did a great deal of +business with America. Sanin begged Dönhof to consult this friend, and, to his +delight, Dönhof brought him the address of Gemma’s husband, Mr. Jeremy +Slocum, New York, Broadway, No. 501. Only this address dated from the year +1863. +</p> + +<p> +“Let us hope,” cried Dönhof, “that our Frankfort belle is +still alive and has not left New York! By the way,” he added, dropping +his voice, “what about that Russian lady, who was staying, do you +remember, about that time at Wiesbaden—Madame von Bo … von Bolozov, is +she still living?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” answered Sanin, “she died long ago.” Dönhof +looked up, but observing that Sanin had turned away and was frowning, he did +not say another word, but took his leave. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +That same day Sanin sent a letter to Madame Gemma Slocum, at New York. In the +letter he told her he was writing to her from Frankfort, where he had come +solely with the object of finding traces of her, that he was very well aware +that he was absolutely without a right to expect that she would answer his +appeal; that he had not deserved her forgiveness, and could only hope that +among happy surroundings she had long ago forgotten his existence. He added +that he had made up his mind to recall himself to her memory in consequence of +a chance circumstance which had too vividly brought back to him the images of +the past; he described his life, solitary, childless, joyless; he implored her +to understand the grounds that had induced him to address her, not to let him +carry to the grave the bitter sense of his own wrongdoing, expiated long since +by suffering, but never forgiven, and to make him happy with even the briefest +news of her life in the new world to which she had gone away. “In writing +one word to me,” so Sanin ended his letter, “you will be doing a +good action worthy of your noble soul, and I shall thank you to my last breath. +I am stopping here at the <i>White Swan</i> (he underlined those words) and +shall wait, wait till spring, for your answer.” +</p> + +<p> +He despatched this letter, and proceeded to wait. For six whole weeks he lived +in the hotel, scarcely leaving his room, and resolutely seeing no one. No one +could write to him from Russia nor from anywhere; and that just suited his +mood; if a letter came addressed to him he would know at once that it was the +one he was waiting for. He read from morning till evening, and not journals, +but serious books—historical works. These prolonged studies, this +stillness, this hidden life, like a snail in its shell, suited his spiritual +condition to perfection; and for this, if nothing more, thanks to Gemma! But +was she alive? Would she answer? +</p> + +<p> +At last a letter came, with an American postmark, from New York, addressed to +him. The handwriting of the address on the envelope was English…. He did not +recognise it, and there was a pang at his heart. He could not at once bring +himself to break open the envelope. He glanced at the signature—Gemma! +The tears positively gushed from his eyes: the mere fact that she signed her +name, without a surname, was a pledge to him of reconciliation, of forgiveness! +He unfolded the thin sheet of blue notepaper: a photograph slipped out. He made +haste to pick it up—and was struck dumb with amazement: Gemma, Gemma +living, young as he had known her thirty years ago! The same eyes, the same +lips, the same form of the whole face! On the back of the photograph was +written, “My daughter Mariana.” The whole letter was very kind and +simple. Gemma thanked Sanin for not having hesitated to write to her, for +having confidence in her; she did not conceal from him that she had passed some +painful moments after his disappearance, but she added at once that for all +that she considered—and had always considered—her meeting him as a +happy thing, seeing that it was that meeting which had prevented her from +becoming the wife of Mr. Klüber, and in that way, though indirectly, had led to +her marriage with her husband, with whom she had now lived twenty-eight years, +in perfect happiness, comfort, and prosperity; their house was known to every +one in New York. Gemma informed Sanin that she was the mother of five children, +four sons and one daughter, a girl of eighteen, engaged to be married, and her +photograph she enclosed as she was generally considered very like her mother. +The sorrowful news Gemma kept for the end of the letter. Frau Lenore had died +in New York, where she had followed her daughter and son-in-law, but she had +lived long enough to rejoice in her children’s happiness and to nurse her +grandchildren. Pantaleone, too, had meant to come out to America, but he had +died on the very eve of leaving Frankfort. “Emilio, our beloved, +incomparable Emilio, died a glorious death for the freedom of his country in +Sicily, where he was one of the ‘Thousand’ under the leadership of the great +Garibaldi; we all bitterly lamented the loss of our priceless brother, but, +even in the midst of our tears, we were proud of him—and shall always be +proud of him—and hold his memory sacred! His lofty, disinterested soul +was worthy of a martyr’s crown!” Then Gemma expressed her regret +that Sanin’s life had apparently been so unsuccessful, wished him before +everything peace and a tranquil spirit, and said that she would be very glad to +see him again, though she realised how unlikely such a meeting was…. +</p> + +<p> +We will not attempt to describe the feelings Sanin experienced as he read this +letter. For such feelings there is no satisfactory expression; they are too +deep and too strong and too vague for any word. Only music could reproduce +them. +</p> + +<p> +Sanin answered at once; and as a wedding gift to the young girl, sent to +“Mariana Slocum, from an unknown friend,” a garnet cross, set in a +magnificent pearl necklace. This present, costly as it was, did not ruin him; +during the thirty years that had elapsed since his first visit to Frankfort, he +had succeeded in accumulating a considerable fortune. Early in May he went back +to Petersburg, but hardly for long. It is rumoured that he is selling all his +lands and preparing to go to America. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a>FIRST LOVE</h2> + +<p> +The party had long ago broken up. The clock struck half-past twelve. There was +left in the room only the master of the house and Sergei Nikolaevitch and +Vladimir Petrovitch. +</p> + +<p> +The master of the house rang and ordered the remains of the supper to be +cleared away. “And so it’s settled,” he observed, sitting +back farther in his easy-chair and lighting a cigar; “each of us is to +tell the story of his first love. It’s your turn, Sergei +Nikolaevitch.” +</p> + +<p> +Sergei Nikolaevitch, a round little man with a plump, light-complexioned face, +gazed first at the master of the house, then raised his eyes to the ceiling. +“I had no first love,” he said at last; “I began with the +second.” +</p> + +<p> +“How was that?” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s very simple. I was eighteen when I had my first flirtation +with a charming young lady, but I courted her just as though it were nothing +new to me; just as I courted others later on. To speak accurately, the first +and last time I was in love was with my nurse when I was six years old; but +that’s in the remote past. The details of our relations have slipped out +of my memory, and even if I remembered them, whom could they interest?” +</p> + +<p> +“Then how’s it to be?” began the master of the house. +“There was nothing much of interest about my first love either; I never +fell in love with any one till I met Anna Nikolaevna, now my wife,—and +everything went as smoothly as possible with us; our parents arranged the +match, we were very soon in love with each other, and got married without loss +of time. My story can be told in a couple of words. I must confess, gentlemen, +in bringing up the subject of first love, I reckoned upon you, I won’t +say old, but no longer young, bachelors. Can’t you enliven us with +something, Vladimir Petrovitch?” +</p> + +<p> +“My first love, certainly, was not quite an ordinary one,” +responded, with some reluctance, Vladimir Petrovitch, a man of forty, with +black hair turning grey. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah!” said the master of the house and Sergei Nikolaevitch with one +voice: “So much the better…. Tell us about it.” +</p> + +<p> +“If you wish it … or no; I won’t tell the story; I’m no hand +at telling a story; I make it dry and brief, or spun out and affected. If +you’ll allow me, I’ll write out all I remember and read it +you.” +</p> + +<p> +His friends at first would not agree, but Vladimir Petrovitch insisted on his +own way. A fortnight later they were together again, and Vladimir Petrovitch +kept his word. +</p> + +<p> +His manuscript contained the following story:— +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>I</h3> + +<p> +I was sixteen then. It happened in the summer of 1833. +</p> + +<p> +I lived in Moscow with my parents. They had taken a country house for the +summer near the Kalouga gate, facing the Neskutchny gardens. I was preparing +for the university, but did not work much and was in no hurry. +</p> + +<p> +No one interfered with my freedom. I did what I liked, especially after parting +with my last tutor, a Frenchman who had never been able to get used to the idea +that he had fallen “like a bomb” (<i>comme une bombe</i>) into +Russia, and would lie sluggishly in bed with an expression of exasperation on +his face for days together. My father treated me with careless kindness; my +mother scarcely noticed me, though she had no children except me; other cares +completely absorbed her. My father, a man still young and very handsome, had +married her from mercenary considerations; she was ten years older than he. My +mother led a melancholy life; she was for ever agitated, jealous and angry, but +not in my father’s presence; she was very much afraid of him, and he was +severe, cold, and distant in his behaviour…. I have never seen a man more +elaborately serene, self-confident, and commanding. +</p> + +<p> +I shall never forget the first weeks I spent at the country house. The weather +was magnificent; we left town on the 9th of May, on St. Nicholas’s day. I +used to walk about in our garden, in the Neskutchny gardens, and beyond the +town gates; I would take some book with me—Keidanov’s Course, for +instance—but I rarely looked into it, and more often than anything +declaimed verses aloud; I knew a great deal of poetry by heart; my blood was in +a ferment and my heart ached—so sweetly and absurdly; I was all hope and +anticipation, was a little frightened of something, and full of wonder at +everything, and was on the tiptoe of expectation; my imagination played +continually, fluttering rapidly about the same fancies, like martins about a +bell-tower at dawn; I dreamed, was sad, even wept; but through the tears and +through the sadness, inspired by a musical verse, or the beauty of evening, +shot up like grass in spring the delicious sense of youth and effervescent +life. +</p> + +<p> +I had a horse to ride; I used to saddle it myself and set off alone for long +rides, break into a rapid gallop and fancy myself a knight at a tournament. How +gaily the wind whistled in my ears! or turning my face towards the sky, I would +absorb its shining radiance and blue into my soul, that opened wide to welcome +it. +</p> + +<p> +I remember that at that time the image of woman, the vision of love, scarcely +ever arose in definite shape in my brain; but in all I thought, in all I felt, +lay hidden a half-conscious, shamefaced presentiment of something new, +unutterably sweet, feminine…. +</p> + +<p> +This presentiment, this expectation, permeated my whole being; I breathed in +it, it coursed through my veins with every drop of blood … it was destined to +be soon fulfilled. +</p> + +<p> +The place, where we settled for the summer, consisted of a wooden manor-house +with columns and two small lodges; in the lodge on the left there was a tiny +factory for the manufacture of cheap wall-papers…. I had more than once +strolled that way to look at about a dozen thin and dishevelled boys with +greasy smocks and worn faces, who were perpetually jumping on to wooden levers, +that pressed down the square blocks of the press, and so by the weight of their +feeble bodies struck off the variegated patterns of the wall-papers. The lodge +on the right stood empty, and was to let. One day—three weeks after the +9th of May—the blinds in the windows of this lodge were drawn up, +women’s faces appeared at them—some family had installed themselves +in it. I remember the same day at dinner, my mother inquired of the butler who +were our new neighbours, and hearing the name of the Princess Zasyekin, first +observed with some respect, “Ah! a princess!” … and then added, +“A poor one, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“They arrived in three hired flies,” the butler remarked +deferentially, as he handed a dish: “they don’t keep their own +carriage, and the furniture’s of the poorest.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah,” replied my mother, “so much the better.” +</p> + +<p> +My father gave her a chilly glance; she was silent. +</p> + +<p> +Certainly the Princess Zasyekin could not be a rich woman; the lodge she had +taken was so dilapidated and small and low-pitched that people, even moderately +well-off in the world, would hardly have consented to occupy it. At the time, +however, all this went in at one ear and out at the other. The princely title +had very little effect on me; I had just been reading Schiller’s +<i>Robbers</i>. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>II</h3> + +<p> +I was in the habit of wandering about our garden every evening on the look-out +for rooks. I had long cherished a hatred for those wary, sly, and rapacious +birds. On the day of which I have been speaking, I went as usual into the +garden, and after patrolling all the walks without success (the rooks knew me, +and merely cawed spasmodically at a distance), I chanced to go close to the low +fence which separated our domain from the narrow strip of garden stretching +beyond the lodge to the right, and belonging to it. I was walking along, my +eyes on the ground. Suddenly I heard a voice; I looked across the fence, and +was thunder-struck…. I was confronted with a curious spectacle. +</p> + +<p> +A few paces from me on the grass between the green raspberry bushes stood a +tall slender girl in a striped pink dress, with a white kerchief on her head; +four young men were close round her, and she was slapping them by turns on the +forehead with those small grey flowers, the name of which I don’t know, +though they are well known to children; the flowers form little bags, and burst +open with a pop when you strike them against anything hard. The young men +presented their foreheads so eagerly, and in the gestures of the girl (I saw +her in profile), there was something so fascinating, imperious, caressing, +mocking, and charming, that I almost cried out with admiration and delight, and +would, I thought, have given everything in the world on the spot only to have +had those exquisite fingers strike me on the forehead. My gun slipped on to the +grass, I forgot everything, I devoured with my eyes the graceful shape and neck +and lovely arms and the slightly disordered fair hair under the white kerchief, +and the half-closed clever eye, and the eyelashes and the soft cheek beneath +them…. +</p> + +<p> +“Young man, hey, young man,” said a voice suddenly near me: +“is it quite permissible to stare so at unknown young ladies?” +</p> + +<p> +I started, I was struck dumb…. Near me, the other side of the fence, stood a +man with close-cropped black hair, looking ironically at me. At the same +instant the girl too turned towards me…. I caught sight of big grey eyes in a +bright mobile face, and the whole face suddenly quivered and laughed, there was +a flash of white teeth, a droll lifting of the eyebrows…. I crimsoned, picked +up my gun from the ground, and pursued by a musical but not ill-natured laugh, +fled to my own room, flung myself on the bed, and hid my face in my hands. My +heart was fairly leaping; I was greatly ashamed and overjoyed; I felt an +excitement I had never known before. +</p> + +<p> +After a rest, I brushed my hair, washed, and went downstairs to tea. The image +of the young girl floated before me, my heart was no longer leaping, but was +full of a sort of sweet oppression. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s the matter?” my father asked me all at once: +“have you killed a rook?” +</p> + +<p> +I was on the point of telling him all about it, but I checked myself, and +merely smiled to myself. As I was going to bed, I rotated—I don’t +know why—three times on one leg, pomaded my hair, got into bed, and slept +like a top all night. Before morning I woke up for an instant, raised my head, +looked round me in ecstasy, and fell asleep again. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>III</h3> + +<p> +“How can I make their acquaintance?” was my first thought when I +waked in the morning. I went out in the garden before morning tea, but I did +not go too near the fence, and saw no one. After drinking tea, I walked several +times up and down the street before the house, and looked into the windows from +a distance…. I fancied her face at a curtain, and I hurried away in alarm. +</p> + +<p> +“I must make her acquaintance, though,” I thought, pacing +distractedly about the sandy plain that stretches before Neskutchny park … +“but how, that is the question.” I recalled the minutest details of +our meeting yesterday; I had for some reason or other a particularly vivid +recollection of how she had laughed at me…. But while I racked my brains, and +made various plans, fate had already provided for me. +</p> + +<p> +In my absence my mother had received from her new neighbour a letter on grey +paper, sealed with brown wax, such as is only used in notices from the +post-office or on the corks of bottles of cheap wine. In this letter, which was +written in illiterate language and in a slovenly hand, the princess begged my +mother to use her powerful influence in her behalf; my mother, in the words of +the princess, was very intimate with persons of high position, upon whom her +fortunes and her children’s fortunes depended, as she had some very +important business in hand. “I address myself to you,” she wrote, +“as one gentlewoman to another gentlewoman, and for that reason am glad +to avail myself of the opportunity.” Concluding, she begged my +mother’s permission to call upon her. I found my mother in an unpleasant +state of indecision; my father was not at home, and she had no one of whom to +ask advice. Not to answer a gentlewoman, and a princess into the bargain, was +impossible. But my mother was in a difficulty as to how to answer her. To write +a note in French struck her as unsuitable, and Russian spelling was not a +strong point with my mother herself, and she was aware of it, and did not care +to expose herself. She was overjoyed when I made my appearance, and at once +told me to go round to the princess’s, and to explain to her by word of +mouth that my mother would always be glad to do her excellency any service +within her powers, and begged her to come to see her at one o’clock. This +unexpectedly rapid fulfilment of my secret desires both delighted and appalled +me. I made no sign, however, of the perturbation which came over me, and as a +preliminary step went to my own room to put on a new necktie and tail coat; at +home I still wore short jackets and lay-down collars, much as I abominated +them. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>IV</h3> + +<p> +In the narrow and untidy passage of the lodge, which I entered with an +involuntary tremor in all my limbs, I was met by an old grey-headed servant +with a dark copper-coloured face, surly little pig’s eyes, and such deep +furrows on his forehead and temples as I had never beheld in my life. He was +carrying a plate containing the spine of a herring that had been gnawed at; and +shutting the door that led into the room with his foot, he jerked out, +“What do you want?” +</p> + +<p> +“Is the Princess Zasyekin at home?” I inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“Vonifaty!” a jarring female voice screamed from within. +</p> + +<p> +The man without a word turned his back on me, exhibiting as he did so the +extremely threadbare hindpart of his livery with a solitary reddish heraldic +button on it; he put the plate down on the floor, and went away. +</p> + +<p> +“Did you go to the police station?” the same female voice called +again. The man muttered something in reply. “Eh…. Has some one +come?” I heard again…. “The young gentleman from next door. Ask him +in, then.” +</p> + +<p> +“Will you step into the drawing-room?” said the servant, making his +appearance once more, and picking up the plate from the floor. I mastered my +emotions, and went into the drawing-room. +</p> + +<p> +I found myself in a small and not over clean apartment, containing some poor +furniture that looked as if it had been hurriedly set down where it stood. At +the window in an easy-chair with a broken arm was sitting a woman of fifty, +bareheaded and ugly, in an old green dress, and a striped worsted wrap about +her neck. Her small black eyes fixed me like pins. +</p> + +<p> +I went up to her and bowed. +</p> + +<p> +“I have the honour of addressing the Princess Zasyekin?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am the Princess Zasyekin; and you are the son of Mr. V.?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. I have come to you with a message from my mother.” +</p> + +<p> +“Sit down, please. Vonifaty, where are my keys, have you seen +them?” +</p> + +<p> +I communicated to Madame Zasyekin my mother’s reply to her note. She +heard me out, drumming with her fat red fingers on the window-pane, and when I +had finished, she stared at me once more. +</p> + +<p> +“Very good; I’ll be sure to come,” she observed at last. +“But how young you are! How old are you, may I ask?” +</p> + +<p> +“Sixteen,” I replied, with an involuntary stammer. +</p> + +<p> +The princess drew out of her pocket some greasy papers covered with writing, +raised them right up to her nose, and began looking through them. +</p> + +<p> +“A good age,” she ejaculated suddenly, turning round restlessly on +her chair. “And do you, pray, make yourself at home. I don’t stand +on ceremony.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, indeed,” I thought, scanning her unprepossessing person with a +disgust I could not restrain. +</p> + +<p> +At that instant another door flew open quickly, and in the doorway stood the +girl I had seen the previous evening in the garden. She lifted her hand, and a +mocking smile gleamed in her face. +</p> + +<p> +“Here is my daughter,” observed the princess, indicating her with +her elbow. “Zinotchka, the son of our neighbour, Mr. V. What is your +name, allow me to ask?” +</p> + +<p> +“Vladimir,” I answered, getting up, and stuttering in my +excitement. +</p> + +<p> +“And your father’s name?” +</p> + +<p> +“Petrovitch.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! I used to know a commissioner of police whose name was Vladimir +Petrovitch too. Vonifaty! don’t look for my keys; the keys are in my +pocket.” +</p> + +<p> +The young girl was still looking at me with the same smile, faintly fluttering +her eyelids, and putting her head a little on one side. +</p> + +<p> +“I have seen Monsieur Voldemar before,” she began. (The silvery +note of her voice ran through me with a sort of sweet shiver.) “You will +let me call you so?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, please,” I faltered. +</p> + +<p> +“Where was that?” asked the princess. +</p> + +<p> +The young princess did not answer her mother. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you anything to do just now?” she said, not taking her eyes +off me. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, no.” +</p> + +<p> +“Would you like to help me wind some wool? Come in here, to me.” +</p> + +<p> +She nodded to me and went out of the drawing-room. I followed her. +</p> + +<p> +In the room we went into, the furniture was a little better, and was arranged +with more taste. Though, indeed, at the moment, I was scarcely capable of +noticing anything; I moved as in a dream and felt all through my being a sort +of intense blissfulness that verged on imbecility. +</p> + +<p> +The young princess sat down, took out a skein of red wool and, motioning me to +a seat opposite her, carefully untied the skein and laid it across my hands. +All this she did in silence with a sort of droll deliberation and with the same +bright sly smile on her slightly parted lips. She began to wind the wool on a +bent card, and all at once she dazzled me with a glance so brilliant and rapid, +that I could not help dropping my eyes. When her eyes, which were generally +half closed, opened to their full extent, her face was completely transfigured; +it was as though it were flooded with light. +</p> + +<p> +“What did you think of me yesterday, M’sieu Voldemar?” she +asked after a brief pause. “You thought ill of me, I expect?” +</p> + +<p> +“I … princess … I thought nothing … how can I?…” I answered in +confusion. +</p> + +<p> +“Listen,” she rejoined. “You don’t know me yet. +I’m a very strange person; I like always to be told the truth. You, I +have just heard, are sixteen, and I am twenty-one: you see I’m a great +deal older than you, and so you ought always to tell me the truth … and to do +what I tell you,” she added. “Look at me: why don’t you look +at me?” +</p> + +<p> +I was still more abashed; however, I raised my eyes to her. She smiled, not her +former smile, but a smile of approbation. “Look at me,” she said, +dropping her voice caressingly: “I don’t dislike that … I like your +face; I have a presentiment we shall be friends. But do you like me?” she +added slyly. +</p> + +<p> +“Princess …” I was beginning. +</p> + +<p> +“In the first place, you must call me Zinaïda Alexandrovna, and in the +second place it’s a bad habit for children”—(she corrected +herself) “for young people—not to say straight out what they feel. +That’s all very well for grown-up people. You like me, don’t +you?” +</p> + +<p> +Though I was greatly delighted that she talked so freely to me, still I was a +little hurt. I wanted to show her that she had not a mere boy to deal with, and +assuming as easy and serious an air as I could, I observed, “Certainly. I +like you very much, Zinaïda Alexandrovna; I have no wish to conceal it.” +</p> + +<p> +She shook her head very deliberately. “Have you a tutor?” she asked +suddenly. +</p> + +<p> +“No; I’ve not had a tutor for a long, long while.” +</p> + +<p> +I told a lie; it was not a month since I had parted with my Frenchman. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh! I see then—you are quite grown-up.” +</p> + +<p> +She tapped me lightly on the fingers. “Hold your hands straight!” +And she applied herself busily to winding the ball. +</p> + +<p> +I seized the opportunity when she was looking down and fell to watching her, at +first stealthily, then more and more boldly. Her face struck me as even more +charming than on the previous evening; everything in it was so delicate, +clever, and sweet. She was sitting with her back to a window covered with a +white blind, the sunshine, streaming in through the blind, shed a soft light +over her fluffy golden curls, her innocent neck, her sloping shoulders, and +tender untroubled bosom. I gazed at her, and how dear and near she was already +to me! It seemed to me I had known her a long while and had never known +anything nor lived at all till I met her…. She was wearing a dark and rather +shabby dress and an apron; I would gladly, I felt, have kissed every fold of +that dress and apron. The tips of her little shoes peeped out from under her +skirt; I could have bowed down in adoration to those shoes…. “And here I +am sitting before her,” I thought; “I have made acquaintance with +her … what happiness, my God!” I could hardly keep from jumping up from +my chair in ecstasy, but I only swung my legs a little, like a small child who +has been given sweetmeats. +</p> + +<p> +I was as happy as a fish in water, and I could have stayed in that room for +ever, have never left that place. +</p> + +<p> +Her eyelids were slowly lifted, and once more her clear eyes shone kindly upon +me, and again she smiled. +</p> + +<p> +“How you look at me!” she said slowly, and she held up a +threatening finger. +</p> + +<p> +I blushed … “She understands it all, she sees all,” flashed through +my mind. “And how could she fail to understand and see it all?” +</p> + +<p> +All at once there was a sound in the next room—the clink of a sabre. +</p> + +<p> +“Zina!” screamed the princess in the drawing-room, +“Byelovzorov has brought you a kitten.” +</p> + +<p> +“A kitten!” cried Zinaïda, and getting up from her chair +impetuously, she flung the ball of worsted on my knees and ran away. +</p> + +<p> +I too got up and, laying the skein and the ball of wool on the window-sill, I +went into the drawing-room and stood still, hesitating. In the middle of the +room, a tabby kitten was lying with outstretched paws; Zinaïda was on her knees +before it, cautiously lifting up its little face. Near the old princess, and +filling up almost the whole space between the two windows, was a flaxen +curly-headed young man, a hussar, with a rosy face and prominent eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“What a funny little thing!” Zinaïda was saying; “and its +eyes are not grey, but green, and what long ears! Thank you, Viktor Yegoritch! +you are very kind.” +</p> + +<p> +The hussar, in whom I recognised one of the young men I had seen the evening +before, smiled and bowed with a clink of his spurs and a jingle of the chain of +his sabre. +</p> + +<p> +“You were pleased to say yesterday that you wished to possess a tabby +kitten with long ears … so I obtained it. Your word is law.” And he bowed +again. +</p> + +<p> +The kitten gave a feeble mew and began sniffing the ground. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s hungry!” cried Zinaïda. “Vonifaty, Sonia! bring +some milk.” +</p> + +<p> +A maid, in an old yellow gown with a faded kerchief at her neck, came in with a +saucer of milk and set it before the kitten. The kitten started, blinked, and +began lapping. +</p> + +<p> +“What a pink little tongue it has!” remarked Zinaïda, putting her +head almost on the ground and peeping at it sideways under its very nose. +</p> + +<p> +The kitten having had enough began to purr and move its paws affectedly. +Zinaïda got up, and turning to the maid said carelessly, “Take it +away.” +</p> + +<p> +“For the kitten—your little hand,” said the hussar, with a +simper and a shrug of his strongly-built frame, which was tightly buttoned up +in a new uniform. +</p> + +<p> +“Both,” replied Zinaïda, and she held out her hands to him. While +he was kissing them, she looked at me over his shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +I stood stockstill in the same place and did not know whether to laugh, to say +something, or to be silent. Suddenly through the open door into the passage I +caught sight of our footman, Fyodor. He was making signs to me. Mechanically I +went out to him. +</p> + +<p> +“What do you want?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Your mamma has sent for you,” he said in a whisper. “She is +angry that you have not come back with the answer.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, have I been here long?” +</p> + +<p> +“Over an hour.” +</p> + +<p> +“Over an hour!” I repeated unconsciously, and going back to the +drawing-room I began to make bows and scrape with my heels. +</p> + +<p> +“Where are you off to?” the young princess asked, glancing at me +from behind the hussar. +</p> + +<p> +“I must go home. So I am to say,” I added, addressing the old lady, +“that you will come to us about two.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you say so, my good sir.” +</p> + +<p> +The princess hurriedly pulled out her snuff-box and took snuff so loudly that I +positively jumped. “Do you say so,” she repeated, blinking +tearfully and sneezing. +</p> + +<p> +I bowed once more, turned, and went out of the room with that sensation of +awkwardness in my spine which a very young man feels when he knows he is being +looked at from behind. +</p> + +<p> +“Mind you come and see us again, M’sieu Voldemar,” Zinaïda +called, and she laughed again. +</p> + +<p> +“Why is it she’s always laughing?” I thought, as I went back +home escorted by Fyodor, who said nothing to me, but walked behind me with an +air of disapprobation. My mother scolded me and wondered what ever I could have +been doing so long at the princess’s. I made her no reply and went off to +my own room. I felt suddenly very sad…. I tried hard not to cry…. I was jealous +of the hussar. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>V</h3> + +<p> +The princess called on my mother as she had promised and made a disagreeable +impression on her. I was not present at their interview, but at table my mother +told my father that this Prince Zasyekin struck her as a <i>femme très +vulgaire</i>, that she had quite worn her out begging her to interest Prince +Sergei in their behalf, that she seemed to have no end of lawsuits and affairs +on hand—<i>de vilaines affaires d’argent</i>—and must be a +very troublesome and litigious person. My mother added, however, that she had +asked her and her daughter to dinner the next day (hearing the word +“daughter” I buried my nose in my plate), for after all she was a +neighbour and a person of title. Upon this my father informed my mother that he +remembered now who this lady was; that he had in his youth known the deceased +Prince Zasyekin, a very well-bred, but frivolous and absurd person; that he had +been nicknamed in society “<i>le Parisien</i>,” from having lived a +long while in Paris; that he had been very rich, but had gambled away all his +property; and for some unknown reason, probably for money, though indeed he +might have chosen better, if so, my father added with a cold smile, he had +married the daughter of an agent, and after his marriage had entered upon +speculations and ruined himself utterly. +</p> + +<p> +“If only she doesn’t try to borrow money,” observed my +mother. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s exceedingly possible,” my father responded +tranquilly. “Does she speak French?” +</p> + +<p> +“Very badly.” +</p> + +<p> +“H’m. It’s of no consequence anyway. I think you said you had +asked the daughter too; some one was telling me she was a very charming and +cultivated girl.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! Then she can’t take after her mother.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nor her father either,” rejoined my father. “He was +cultivated indeed, but a fool.” +</p> + +<p> +My mother sighed and sank into thought. My father said no more. I felt very +uncomfortable during this conversation. +</p> + +<p> +After dinner I went into the garden, but without my gun. I swore to myself that +I would not go near the Zasyekins’ garden, but an irresistible force drew +me thither, and not in vain. I had hardly reached the fence when I caught sight +of Zinaïda. This time she was alone. She held a book in her hands, and was +coming slowly along the path. She did not notice me. +</p> + +<p> +I almost let her pass by; but all at once I changed my mind and coughed. +</p> + +<p> +She turned round, but did not stop, pushed back with one hand the broad blue +ribbon of her round straw hat, looked at me, smiled slowly, and again bent her +eyes on the book. +</p> + +<p> +I took off my cap, and after hesitating a moment, walked away with a heavy +heart. “<i>Que suis-je pour elle?</i>” I thought (God knows why) in +French. +</p> + +<p> +Familiar footsteps sounded behind me; I looked round, my father came up to me +with his light, rapid walk. +</p> + +<p> +“Is that the young princess?” he asked me. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, do you know her?” +</p> + +<p> +“I saw her this morning at the princess’s.” +</p> + +<p> +My father stopped, and, turning sharply on his heel, went back. When he was on +a level with Zinaïda, he made her a courteous bow. She, too, bowed to him, with +some astonishment on her face, and dropped her book. I saw how she looked after +him. My father was always irreproachably dressed, simple and in a style of his +own; but his figure had never struck me as more graceful, never had his grey +hat sat more becomingly on his curls, which were scarcely perceptibly thinner +than they had once been. +</p> + +<p> +I bent my steps toward Zinaïda, but she did not even glance at me; she picked +up her book again and went away. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>VI</h3> + +<p> +The whole evening and the following day I spent in a sort of dejected apathy. I +remember I tried to work and took up Keidanov, but the boldly printed lines and +pages of the famous text-book passed before my eyes in vain. I read ten times +over the words: “Julius Caesar was distinguished by warlike +courage.” I did not understand anything and threw the book aside. Before +dinner-time I pomaded myself once more, and once more put on my tail-coat and +necktie. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s that for?” my mother demanded. “You’re +not a student yet, and God knows whether you’ll get through the +examination. And you’ve not long had a new jacket! You can’t throw +it away!” +</p> + +<p> +“There will be visitors,” I murmured almost in despair. +</p> + +<p> +“What nonsense! fine visitors indeed!” +</p> + +<p> +I had to submit. I changed my tail-coat for my jacket, but I did not take off +the necktie. The princess and her daughter made their appearance half an hour +before dinner-time; the old lady had put on, in addition to the green dress +with which I was already acquainted, a yellow shawl, and an old-fashioned cap +adorned with flame-coloured ribbons. She began talking at once about her money +difficulties, sighing, complaining of her poverty, and imploring assistance, +but she made herself at home; she took snuff as noisily, and fidgeted and +lolled about in her chair as freely as ever. It never seemed to have struck her +that she was a princess. Zinaïda on the other hand was rigid, almost haughty in +her demeanour, every inch a princess. There was a cold immobility and dignity +in her face. I should not have recognised it; I should not have known her +smiles, her glances, though I thought her exquisite in this new aspect too. She +wore a light barége dress with pale blue flowers on it; her hair fell in long +curls down her cheek in the English fashion; this style went well with the cold +expression of her face. My father sat beside her during dinner, and entertained +his neighbour with the finished and serene courtesy peculiar to him. He glanced +at her from time to time, and she glanced at him, but so strangely, almost with +hostility. Their conversation was carried on in French; I was surprised, I +remember, at the purity of Zinaïda’s accent. The princess, while we were +at table, as before made no ceremony; she ate a great deal, and praised the +dishes. My mother was obviously bored by her, and answered her with a sort of +weary indifference; my father faintly frowned now and then. My mother did not +like Zinaïda either. “A conceited minx,” she said next day. +“And fancy, what she has to be conceited about, <i>avec sa mine de +grisette</i>!” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s clear you have never seen any grisettes,” my father +observed to her. +</p> + +<p> +“Thank God, I haven’t!” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank God, to be sure … only how can you form an opinion of them, +then?” +</p> + +<p> +To me Zinaïda had paid no attention whatever. Soon after dinner the princess +got up to go. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall rely on your kind offices, Maria Nikolaevna and Piotr +Vassilitch,” she said in a doleful sing-song to my mother and father. +“I’ve no help for it! There were days, but they are over. Here I +am, an excellency, and a poor honour it is with nothing to eat!” +</p> + +<p> +My father made her a respectful bow and escorted her to the door of the hall. I +was standing there in my short jacket, staring at the floor, like a man under +sentence of death. Zinaïda’s treatment of me had crushed me utterly. What +was my astonishment, when, as she passed me, she whispered quickly with her +former kind expression in her eyes: “Come to see us at eight, do you +hear, be sure….” I simply threw up my hands, but already she was gone, +flinging a white scarf over her head. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>VII</h3> + +<p> +At eight o’clock precisely, in my tail-coat and with my hair brushed up +into a tuft on my head, I entered the passage of the lodge, where the princess +lived. The old servant looked crossly at me and got up unwillingly from his +bench. There was a sound of merry voices in the drawing-room. I opened the door +and fell back in amazement. In the middle of the room was the young princess, +standing on a chair, holding a man’s hat in front of her; round the chair +crowded some half a dozen men. They were trying to put their hands into the +hat, while she held it above their heads, shaking it violently. On seeing me, +she cried, “Stay, stay, another guest, he must have a ticket too,” +and leaping lightly down from the chair she took me by the cuff of my coat +“Come along,” she said, “why are you standing still? +<i>Messieurs</i>, let me make you acquainted: this is M’sieu Voldemar, +the son of our neighbour. And this,” she went on, addressing me, and +indicating her guests in turn, “Count Malevsky, Doctor Lushin, Meidanov +the poet, the retired captain Nirmatsky, and Byelovzorov the hussar, whom +you’ve seen already. I hope you will be good friends.” I was so +confused that I did not even bow to any one; in Doctor Lushin I recognised the +dark man who had so mercilessly put me to shame in the garden; the others were +unknown to me. +</p> + +<p> +“Count!” continued Zinaïda, “write M’sieu Voldemar a +ticket.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s not fair,” was objected in a slight Polish accent by +the count, a very handsome and fashionably dressed brunette, with expressive +brown eyes, a thin little white nose, and delicate little moustaches over a +tiny mouth. “This gentleman has not been playing forfeits with us.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s unfair,” repeated in chorus Byelovzorov and the +gentleman described as a retired captain, a man of forty, pock-marked to a +hideous degree, curly-headed as a negro, round-shouldered, bandy-legged, and +dressed in a military coat without epaulets, worn unbuttoned. +</p> + +<p> +“Write him a ticket, I tell you,” repeated the young princess. +“What’s this mutiny? M’sieu Voldemar is with us for the first +time, and there are no rules for him yet. It’s no use +grumbling—write it, I wish it.” +</p> + +<p> +The count shrugged his shoulders but bowed submissively, took the pen in his +white, ring-bedecked fingers, tore off a scrap of paper and wrote on it. +</p> + +<p> +“At least let us explain to Mr. Voldemar what we are about,” Lushin +began in a sarcastic voice, “or else he will be quite lost. Do you see, +young man, we are playing forfeits? the princess has to pay a forfeit, and the +one who draws the lucky lot is to have the privilege of kissing her hand. Do +you understand what I’ve told you?” +</p> + +<p> +I simply stared at him, and continued to stand still in bewilderment, while the +young princess jumped up on the chair again, and again began waving the hat. +They all stretched up to her, and I went after the rest. +</p> + +<p> +“Meidanov,” said the princess to a tall young man with a thin face, +little dim-sighted eyes, and exceedingly long black hair, “you as a poet +ought to be magnanimous, and give up your number to M’sieu Voldemar so +that he may have two chances instead of one.” +</p> + +<p> +But Meidanov shook his head in refusal, and tossed his hair. After all the +others I put my hand into the hat, and unfolded my lot…. Heavens! what was my +condition when I saw on it the word, Kiss! +</p> + +<p> +“Kiss!” I could not help crying aloud. +</p> + +<p> +“Bravo! he has won it,” the princess said quickly. “How glad +I am!” She came down from the chair and gave me such a bright sweet look, +that my heart bounded. “Are you glad?” she asked me. +</p> + +<p> +“Me?” … I faltered. +</p> + +<p> +“Sell me your lot,” Byelovzorov growled suddenly just in my ear. +“I’ll give you a hundred roubles.” +</p> + +<p> +I answered the hussar with such an indignant look, that Zinaïda clapped her +hands, while Lushin cried, “He’s a fine fellow!” +</p> + +<p> +“But, as master of the ceremonies,” he went on, “it’s +my duty to see that all the rules are kept. M’sieu Voldemar, go down on +one knee. That is our regulation.” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda stood in front of me, her head a little on one side as though to get a +better look at me; she held out her hand to me with dignity. A mist passed +before my eyes; I meant to drop on one knee, sank on both, and pressed my lips +to Zinaïda’s fingers so awkwardly that I scratched myself a little with +the tip of her nail. +</p> + +<p> +“Well done!” cried Lushin, and helped me to get up. +</p> + +<p> +The game of forfeits went on. Zinaïda sat me down beside her. She invented all +sorts of extraordinary forfeits! She had among other things to represent a +“statue,” and she chose as a pedestal the hideous Nirmatsky, told +him to bow down in an arch, and bend his head down on his breast. The laughter +never paused for an instant. For me, a boy constantly brought up in the +seclusion of a dignified manor-house, all this noise and uproar, this +unceremonious, almost riotous gaiety, these relations with unknown persons, +were simply intoxicating. My head went round, as though from wine. I began +laughing and talking louder than the others, so much so that the old princess, +who was sitting in the next room with some sort of clerk from the Tversky gate, +invited by her for consultation on business, positively came in to look at me. +But I felt so happy that I did not mind anything, I didn’t care a straw +for any one’s jeers, or dubious looks. Zinaïda continued to show me a +preference, and kept me at her side. In one forfeit, I had to sit by her, both +hidden under one silk handkerchief: I was to tell her <i>my secret</i>. I +remember our two heads being all at once in a warm, half-transparent, fragrant +darkness, the soft, close brightness of her eyes in the dark, and the burning +breath from her parted lips, and the gleam of her teeth and the ends of her +hair tickling me and setting me on fire. I was silent. She smiled slyly and +mysteriously, and at last whispered to me, “Well, what is it?” but +I merely blushed and laughed, and turned away, catching my breath. We got tired +of forfeits—we began to play a game with a string. My God! what were my +transports when, for not paying attention, I got a sharp and vigorous slap on +my fingers from her, and how I tried afterwards to pretend that I was +absent-minded, and she teased me, and would not touch the hands I held out to +her! What didn’t we do that evening! We played the piano, and sang and +danced and acted a gypsy encampment. Nirmatsky was dressed up as a bear, and +made to drink salt water. Count Malevsky showed us several sorts of card +tricks, and finished, after shuffling the cards, by dealing himself all the +trumps at whist, on which Lushin “had the honour of congratulating +him.” Meidanov recited portions from his poem “The Manslayer” +(romanticism was at its height at this period), which he intended to bring out +in a black cover with the title in blood-red letters; they stole the +clerk’s cap off his knee, and made him dance a Cossack dance by way of +ransom for it; they dressed up old Vonifaty in a woman’s cap, and the +young princess put on a man’s hat…. I could not enumerate all we did. +Only Byelovzorov kept more and more in the background, scowling and angry…. +Sometimes his eyes looked bloodshot, he flushed all over, and it seemed every +minute as though he would rush out upon us all and scatter us like shavings in +all directions; but the young princess would glance at him, and shake her +finger at him, and he would retire into his corner again. +</p> + +<p> +We were quite worn out at last. Even the old princess, though she was ready for +anything, as she expressed it, and no noise wearied her, felt tired at last, +and longed for peace and quiet. At twelve o’clock at night, supper was +served, consisting of a piece of stale dry cheese, and some cold turnovers of +minced ham, which seemed to me more delicious than any pastry I had ever +tasted; there was only one bottle of wine, and that was a strange one; a +dark-coloured bottle with a wide neck, and the wine in it was of a pink hue; no +one drank it, however. Tired out and faint with happiness, I left the lodge; at +parting Zinaïda pressed my hand warmly, and again smiled mysteriously. +</p> + +<p> +The night air was heavy and damp in my heated face; a storm seemed to be +gathering; black stormclouds grew and crept across the sky, their smoky +outlines visibly changing. A gust of wind shivered restlessly in the dark +trees, and somewhere, far away on the horizon, muffled thunder angrily muttered +as it were to itself. +</p> + +<p> +I made my way up to my room by the back stairs. My old man-nurse was asleep on +the floor, and I had to step over him; he waked up, saw me, and told me that my +mother had again been very angry with me, and had wished to send after me +again, but that my father had prevented her. (I had never gone to bed without +saying good-night to my mother, and asking her blessing. There was no help for +it now!) +</p> + +<p> +I told my man that I would undress and go to bed by myself, and I put out the +candle. But I did not undress, and did not go to bed. +</p> + +<p> +I sat down on a chair, and sat a long while, as though spell-bound. What I was +feeling was so new and so sweet…. I sat still, hardly looking round and not +moving, drew slow breaths, and only from time to time laughed silently at some +recollection, or turned cold within at the thought that I was in love, that +this was she, that this was love. Zinaïda’s face floated slowly before me +in the darkness—floated, and did not float away; her lips still wore the +same enigmatic smile, her eyes watched me, a little from one side, with a +questioning, dreamy, tender look … as at the instant of parting from her. At +last I got up, walked on tiptoe to my bed, and without undressing, laid my head +carefully on the pillow, as though I were afraid by an abrupt movement to +disturb what filled my soul…. I lay down, but did not even close my eyes. Soon +I noticed that faint glimmers of light of some sort were thrown continually +into the room…. I sat up and looked at the window. The window-frame could be +clearly distinguished from the mysteriously and dimly-lighted panes. It is a +storm, I thought; and a storm it really was, but it was raging so very far away +that the thunder could not be heard; only blurred, long, as it were branching, +gleams of lightning flashed continually over the sky; it was not flashing, +though, so much as quivering and twitching like the wing of a dying bird. I got +up, went to the window, and stood there till morning…. The lightning never +ceased for an instant; it was what is called among the peasants a <i>sparrow +night</i>. I gazed at the dumb sandy plain, at the dark mass of the Neskutchny +gardens, at the yellowish façades of the distant buildings, which seemed to +quiver too at each faint flash…. I gazed, and could not turn away; these silent +lightning flashes, these gleams seemed in response to the secret silent fires +which were aglow within me. Morning began to dawn; the sky was flushed in +patches of crimson. As the sun came nearer, the lightning grew gradually paler, +and ceased; the quivering gleams were fewer and fewer, and vanished at last, +drowned in the sobering positive light of the coming day…. +</p> + +<p> +And my lightning flashes vanished too. I felt great weariness and peace … but +Zinaïda’s image still floated triumphant over my soul. But it too, this +image, seemed more tranquil: like a swan rising out of the reeds of a bog, it +stood out from the other unbeautiful figures surrounding it, and as I fell +asleep, I flung myself before it in farewell, trusting adoration…. +</p> + +<p> +Oh, sweet emotions, gentle harmony, goodness and peace of the softened heart, +melting bliss of the first raptures of love, where are they, where are they? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>VIII</h3> + +<p> +The next morning, when I came down to tea, my mother scolded me—less +severely, however, than I had expected—and made me tell her how I had +spent the previous evening. I answered her in few words, omitting many details, +and trying to give the most innocent air to everything. +</p> + +<p> +“Anyway, they’re people who’re not <i>comme il +faut</i>,” my mother commented, “and you’ve no business to be +hanging about there, instead of preparing yourself for the examination, and +doing your work.” +</p> + +<p> +As I was well aware that my mother’s anxiety about my studies was +confined to these few words, I did not feel it necessary to make any rejoinder; +but after morning tea was over, my father took me by the arm, and turning into +the garden with me, forced me to tell him all I had seen at the +Zasyekins’. +</p> + +<p> +A curious influence my father had over me, and curious were the relations +existing between us. He took hardly any interest in my education, but he never +hurt my feelings; he respected my freedom, he treated me—if I may so +express it—with courtesy,… only he never let me be really close to him. I +loved him, I admired him, he was my ideal of a man—and Heavens! how +passionately devoted I should have been to him, if I had not been continually +conscious of his holding me off! But when he liked, he could almost +instantaneously, by a single word, a single gesture, call forth an unbounded +confidence in him. My soul expanded, I chattered away to him, as to a wise +friend, a kindly teacher … then he as suddenly got rid of me, and again he was +keeping me off, gently and affectionately, but still he kept me off. +</p> + +<p> +Sometimes he was in high spirits, and then he was ready to romp and frolic with +me, like a boy (he was fond of vigorous physical exercise of every sort); +once—it never happened a second time!—he caressed me with such +tenderness that I almost shed tears…. But high spirits and tenderness alike +vanished completely, and what had passed between us, gave me nothing to build +on for the future—it was as though I had dreamed it all. Sometimes I +would scrutinise his clever handsome bright face … my heart would throb, and my +whole being yearn to him … he would seem to feel what was going on within me, +would give me a passing pat on the cheek, and go away, or take up some work, or +suddenly freeze all over as only he knew how to freeze, and I shrank into +myself at once, and turned cold too. His rare fits of friendliness to me were +never called forth by my silent, but intelligible entreaties: they always +occurred unexpectedly. Thinking over my father’s character later, I have +come to the conclusion that he had no thoughts to spare for me and for family +life; his heart was in other things, and found complete satisfaction elsewhere. +“Take for yourself what you can, and don’t be ruled by others; to +belong to oneself—the whole savour of life lies in that,” he said +to me one day. Another time, I, as a young democrat, fell to airing my views on +liberty (he was “kind,” as I used to call it, that day; and at such +times I could talk to him as I liked). “Liberty,” he repeated; +“and do you know what can give a man liberty?” +</p> + +<p> +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +“Will, his own will, and it gives power, which is better than liberty. +Know how to will, and you will be free, and will lead.” +</p> + +<p> +“My father, before all, and above all, desired to live, and lived…. +Perhaps he had a presentiment that he would not have long to enjoy the +“savour” of life: he died at forty-two. +</p> + +<p> +I described my evening at the Zasyekins’ minutely to my father. Half +attentively, half carelessly, he listened to me, sitting on a garden seat, +drawing in the sand with his cane. Now and then he laughed, shot bright, droll +glances at me, and spurred me on with short questions and assents. At first I +could not bring myself even to utter the name of Zinaïda, but I could not +restrain myself long, and began singing her praises. My father still laughed; +then he grew thoughtful, stretched, and got up. I remembered that as he came +out of the house he had ordered his horse to be saddled. He was a splendid +horseman, and, long before Rarey, had the secret of breaking in the most +vicious horses. +</p> + +<p> +“Shall I come with you, father?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” he answered, and his face resumed its ordinary expression of +friendly indifference. “Go alone, if you like; and tell the coachman +I’m not going.” +</p> + +<p> +He turned his back on me and walked rapidly away. I looked after him; he +disappeared through the gates. I saw his hat moving along beside the fence; he +went into the Zasyekins’. +</p> + +<p> +He stayed there not more than an hour, but then departed at once for the town, +and did not return home till evening. +</p> + +<p> +After dinner I went myself to the Zasyekins’. In the drawing-room I found +only the old princess. On seeing me she scratched her head under her cap with a +knitting-needle, and suddenly asked me, could I copy a petition for her. +</p> + +<p> +“With pleasure,” I replied, sitting down on the edge of a chair. +</p> + +<p> +“Only mind and make the letters bigger,” observed the princess, +handing me a dirty sheet of paper; “and couldn’t you do it to-day, +my good sir?” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly, I will copy it to-day.” +</p> + +<p> +The door of the next room was just opened, and in the crack I saw the face of +Zinaïda, pale and pensive, her hair flung carelessly back; she stared at me +with big chilly eyes, and softly closed the door. +</p> + +<p> +“Zina, Zina!” called the old lady. Zinaïda made no response. I took +home the old lady’s petition and spent the whole evening over it. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>IX</h3> + +<p> +My “passion” dated from that day. I felt at that time, I recollect, +something like what a man must feel on entering the service: I had ceased now +to be simply a young boy; I was in love. I have said that my passion dated from +that day; I might have added that my sufferings too dated from the same day. +Away from Zinaïda I pined; nothing was to my mind; everything went wrong with +me; I spent whole days thinking intensely about her … I pined when away,… but +in her presence I was no better off. I was jealous; I was conscious of my +insignificance; I was stupidly sulky or stupidly abject, and, all the same, an +invincible force drew me to her, and I could not help a shudder of delight +whenever I stepped through the doorway of her room. Zinaïda guessed at once +that I was in love with her, and indeed I never even thought of concealing it. +She amused herself with my passion, made a fool of me, petted and tormented me. +There is a sweetness in being the sole source, the autocratic and irresponsible +cause of the greatest joy and profoundest pain to another, and I was like wax +in Zinaïda’s hands; though, indeed, I was not the only one in love with +her. All the men who visited the house were crazy over her, and she kept them +all in leading-strings at her feet. It amused her to arouse their hopes and +then their fears, to turn them round her finger (she used to call it knocking +their heads together), while they never dreamed of offering resistance and +eagerly submitted to her. About her whole being, so full of life and beauty, +there was a peculiarly bewitching mixture of slyness and carelessness, of +artificiality and simplicity, of composure and frolicsomeness; about everything +she did or said, about every action of hers, there clung a delicate, fine +charm, in which an individual power was manifest at work. And her face was ever +changing, working too; it expressed, almost at the same time, irony, +dreaminess, and passion. Various emotions, delicate and quick-changing as the +shadows of clouds on a sunny day of wind, chased one another continually over +her lips and eyes. +</p> + +<p> +Each of her adorers was necessary to her. Byelovzorov, whom she sometimes +called “my wild beast,” and sometimes simply “mine,” +would gladly have flung himself into the fire for her sake. With little +confidence in his intellectual abilities and other qualities, he was for ever +offering her marriage, hinting that the others were merely hanging about with +no serious intention. Meidanov responded to the poetic fibres of her nature; a +man of rather cold temperament, like almost all writers, he forced himself to +convince her, and perhaps himself, that he adored her, sang her praises in +endless verses, and read them to her with a peculiar enthusiasm, at once +affected and sincere. She sympathised with him, and at the same time jeered at +him a little; she had no great faith in him, and after listening to his +outpourings, she would make him read Pushkin, as she said, to clear the air. +Lushin, the ironical doctor, so cynical in words, knew her better than any of +them, and loved her more than all, though he abused her to her face and behind +her back. She could not help respecting him, but made him smart for it, and at +times, with a peculiar, malignant pleasure, made him feel that he too was at +her mercy. “I’m a flirt, I’m heartless, I’m an actress +in my instincts,” she said to him one day in my presence; “well and +good! Give me your hand then; I’ll stick this pin in it, you’ll be +ashamed of this young man’s seeing it, it will hurt you, but you’ll +laugh for all that, you truthful person.” Lushin crimsoned, turned away, +bit his lips, but ended by submitting his hand. She pricked it, and he did in +fact begin to laugh,… and she laughed, thrusting the pin in pretty deeply, and +peeping into his eyes, which he vainly strove to keep in other directions…. +</p> + +<p> +I understood least of all the relations existing between Zinaïda and Count +Malevsky. He was handsome, clever, and adroit, but something equivocal, +something false in him was apparent even to me, a boy of sixteen, and I +marvelled that Zinaïda did not notice it. But possibly she did notice this +element of falsity really and was not repelled by it. Her irregular education, +strange acquaintances and habits, the constant presence of her mother, the +poverty and disorder in their house, everything, from the very liberty the +young girl enjoyed, with the consciousness of her superiority to the people +around her, had developed in her a sort of half-contemptuous carelessness and +lack of fastidiousness. At any time anything might happen; Vonifaty might +announce that there was no sugar, or some revolting scandal would come to her +ears, or her guests would fall to quarrelling among themselves—she would +only shake her curls, and say, “What does it matter?” and care +little enough about it. +</p> + +<p> +But my blood, anyway, was sometimes on fire with indignation when Malevsky +approached her, with a sly, fox-like action, leaned gracefully on the back of +her chair, and began whispering in her ear with a self-satisfied and +ingratiating little smile, while she folded her arms across her bosom, looked +intently at him and smiled too, and shook her head. +</p> + +<p> +“What induces you to receive Count Malevsky?” I asked her one day. +</p> + +<p> +“He has such pretty moustaches,” she answered. “But +that’s rather beyond you.” +</p> + +<p> +“You needn’t think I care for him,” she said to me another +time. “No; I can’t care for people I have to look down upon. I must +have some one who can master me…. But, merciful heavens, I hope I may never +come across any one like that! I don’t want to be caught in any +one’s claws, not for anything.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll never be in love, then?” +</p> + +<p> +“And you? Don’t I love you?” she said, and she flicked me on +the nose with the tip of her glove. +</p> + +<p> +Yes, Zinaïda amused herself hugely at my expense. For three weeks I saw her +every day, and what didn’t she do with me! She rarely came to see us, and +I was not sorry for it; in our house she was transformed into a young lady, a +young princess, and I was a little overawed by her. I was afraid of betraying +myself before my mother; she had taken a great dislike to Zinaïda, and kept a +hostile eye upon us. My father I was not so much afraid of; he seemed not to +notice me. He talked little to her, but always with special cleverness and +significance. I gave up working and reading; I even gave up walking about the +neighbourhood and riding my horse. Like a beetle tied by the leg, I moved +continually round and round my beloved little lodge. I would gladly have +stopped there altogether, it seemed … but that was impossible. My mother +scolded me, and sometimes Zinaïda herself drove me away. Then I used to shut +myself up in my room, or go down to the very end of the garden, and climbing +into what was left of a tall stone greenhouse, now in ruins, sit for hours with +my legs hanging over the wall that looked on to the road, gazing and gazing and +seeing nothing. White butterflies flitted lazily by me, over the dusty nettles; +a saucy sparrow settled not far off on the half crumbling red brickwork and +twittered irritably, incessantly twisting and turning and preening his +tail-feathers; the still mistrustful rooks cawed now and then, sitting high, +high up on the bare top of a birch-tree; the sun and wind played softly on its +pliant branches; the tinkle of the bells of the Don monastery floated across to +me from time to time, peaceful and dreary; while I sat, gazed, listened, and +was filled full of a nameless sensation in which all was contained: sadness and +joy and the foretaste of the future, and the desire and dread of life. But at +that time I understood nothing of it, and could have given a name to nothing of +all that was passing at random within me, or should have called it all by one +name—the name of Zinaïda. +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda continued to play cat and mouse with me. She flirted with me, and I was +all agitation and rapture; then she would suddenly thrust me away, and I dared +not go near her—dared not look at her. +</p> + +<p> +I remember she was very cold to me for several days together; I was completely +crushed, and creeping timidly to their lodge, tried to keep close to the old +princess, regardless of the circumstance that she was particularly scolding and +grumbling just at that time; her financial affairs had been going badly, and +she had already had two “explanations” with the police officials. +</p> + +<p> +One day I was walking in the garden beside the familiar fence, and I caught +sight of Zinaïda; leaning on both arms, she was sitting on the grass, not +stirring a muscle. I was about to make off cautiously, but she suddenly raised +her head and beckoned me imperiously. My heart failed me; I did not understand +her at first. She repeated her signal. I promptly jumped over the fence and ran +joyfully up to her, but she brought me to a halt with a look, and motioned me +to the path two paces from her. In confusion, not knowing what to do, I fell on +my knees at the edge of the path. She was so pale, such bitter suffering, such +intense weariness, was expressed in every feature of her face, that it sent a +pang to my heart, and I muttered unconsciously, “What is the +matter?” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda stretched out her head, picked a blade of grass, bit it and flung it +away from her. +</p> + +<p> +“You love me very much?” she asked at last. “Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +I made no answer—indeed, what need was there to answer? +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” she repeated, looking at me as before. “That’s +so. The same eyes,”—she went on; sank into thought, and hid her +face in her hands. “Everything’s grown so loathsome to me,” +she whispered, “I would have gone to the other end of the world +first—I can’t bear it, I can’t get over it…. And what is +there before me!… Ah, I am wretched…. My God, how wretched I am!” +</p> + +<p> +“What for?” I asked timidly. +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda made no answer, she simply shrugged her shoulders. I remained kneeling, +gazing at her with intense sadness. Every word she had uttered simply cut me to +the heart. At that instant I felt I would gladly have given my life, if only +she should not grieve. I gazed at her—and though I could not understand +why she was wretched, I vividly pictured to myself, how in a fit of +insupportable anguish, she had suddenly come out into the garden, and sunk to +the earth, as though mown down by a scythe. It was all bright and green about +her; the wind was whispering in the leaves of the trees, and swinging now and +then a long branch of a raspberry bush over Zinaïda’s head. There was a +sound of the cooing of doves, and the bees hummed, flying low over the scanty +grass. Overhead the sun was radiantly blue—while I was so sorrowful…. +</p> + +<p> +“Read me some poetry,” said Zinaïda in an undertone, and she +propped herself on her elbow; “I like your reading poetry. You read it in +sing-song, but that’s no matter, that comes of being young. Read me ‘On +the Hills of Georgia.’ Only sit down first.” +</p> + +<p> +I sat down and read “On the Hills of Georgia.” +</p> + +<p> +“‘That the heart cannot choose but love,’” repeated Zinaïda. +“That’s where poetry’s so fine; it tells us what is not, and +what’s not only better than what is, but much more like the truth, +‘cannot choose but love,’—it might want not to, but it can’t help +it.” She was silent again, then all at once she started and got up. +“Come along. Meidanov’s indoors with mamma, he brought me his poem, +but I deserted him. His feelings are hurt too now … I can’t help it! +you’ll understand it all some day … only don’t be angry with +me!” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda hurriedly pressed my hand and ran on ahead. We went back into the +lodge. Meidanov set to reading us his “Manslayer,” which had just +appeared in print, but I did not hear him. He screamed and drawled his +four-foot iambic lines, the alternating rhythms jingled like little bells, +noisy and meaningless, while I still watched Zinaïda and tried to take in the +import of her last words. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“Perchance some unknown rival<br/> +Has surprised and mastered thee?” +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +Meidanov bawled suddenly through his nose—and my eyes and Zinaïda’s +met. She looked down and faintly blushed. I saw her blush, and grew cold with +terror. I had been jealous before, but only at that instant the idea of her +being in love flashed upon my mind. “Good God! she is in love!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>X</h3> + +<p> +My real torments began from that instant. I racked my brains, changed my mind, +and changed it back again, and kept an unremitting, though, as far as possible, +secret watch on Zinaïda. A change had come over her, that was obvious. She +began going walks alone—and long walks. Sometimes she would not see +visitors; she would sit for hours together in her room. This had never been a +habit of hers till now. I suddenly became—or fancied I had +become—extraordinarily penetrating. +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t it he? or isn’t it he?” I asked myself, passing +in inward agitation from one of her admirers to another. Count Malevsky +secretly struck me as more to be feared than the others, though, for +Zinaïda’s sake, I was ashamed to confess it to myself. +</p> + +<p> +My watchfulness did not see beyond the end of my nose, and its secrecy probably +deceived no one; any way, Doctor Lushin soon saw through me. But he, too, had +changed of late; he had grown thin, he laughed as often, but his laugh seemed +more hollow, more spiteful, shorter, an involuntary nervous irritability took +the place of his former light irony and assumed cynicism. +</p> + +<p> +“Why are you incessantly hanging about here, young man?” he said to +me one day, when we were left alone together in the Zasyekins’ +drawing-room. (The young princess had not come home from a walk, and the shrill +voice of the old princess could be heard within; she was scolding the maid.) +“You ought to be studying, working—while you’re +young—and what are you doing?” +</p> + +<p> +“You can’t tell whether I work at home,” I retorted with some +haughtiness, but also with some hesitation. +</p> + +<p> +“A great deal of work you do! that’s not what you’re thinking +about! Well, I won’t find fault with that … at your age that’s in +the natural order of things. But you’ve been awfully unlucky in your +choice. Don’t you see what this house is?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t understand you,” I observed. +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t understand? so much the worse for you. I regard it as a +duty to warn you. Old bachelors, like me, can come here, what harm can it do +us! we’re tough, nothing can hurt us, what harm can it do us; but your +skin’s tender yet—this air is bad for you—believe me, you may +get harm from it.” +</p> + +<p> +“How so?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, are you well now? Are you in a normal condition? Is what +you’re feeling—beneficial to you—good for you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, what am I feeling?” I said, while in my heart I knew the +doctor was right. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, young man, young man,” the doctor went on with an intonation +that suggested that something highly insulting to me was contained in these two +words, “what’s the use of your prevaricating, when, thank God, +what’s in your heart is in your face, so far? But there, what’s the +use of talking? I shouldn’t come here myself, if … (the doctor compressed +his lips) … if I weren’t such a queer fellow. Only this is what surprises +me; how it is, you, with your intelligence, don’t see what is going on +around you?” +</p> + +<p> +“And what is going on?” I put in, all on the alert. +</p> + +<p> +The doctor looked at me with a sort of ironical compassion. +</p> + +<p> +“Nice of me!” he said as though to himself, “as if he need +know anything of it. In fact, I tell you again,” he added, raising his +voice, “the atmosphere here is not fit for you. You like being here, but +what of that! it’s nice and sweet-smelling in a greenhouse—but +there’s no living in it. Yes! do as I tell you, and go back to your +Keidanov.” +</p> + +<p> +The old princess came in, and began complaining to the doctor of her toothache. +Then Zinaïda appeared. +</p> + +<p> +“Come,” said the old princess, “you must scold her, doctor. +She’s drinking iced water all day long; is that good for her, pray, with +her delicate chest?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why do you do that?” asked Lushin. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, what effect could it have?” +</p> + +<p> +“What effect? You might get a chill and die.” +</p> + +<p> +“Truly? Do you mean it? Very well—so much the better.” +</p> + +<p> +“A fine idea!” muttered the doctor. The old princess had gone out. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, a fine idea,” repeated Zinaïda. “Is life such a festive +affair? Just look about you…. Is it nice, eh? Or do you imagine I don’t +understand it, and don’t feel it? It gives me pleasure—drinking +iced water; and can you seriously assure me that such a life is worth too much +to be risked for an instant’s pleasure—happiness I won’t even +talk about.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, very well,” remarked Lushin, “caprice and +irresponsibility…. Those two words sum you up; your whole nature’s +contained in those two words.” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda laughed nervously. +</p> + +<p> +“You’re late for the post, my dear doctor. You don’t keep a +good look-out; you’re behind the times. Put on your spectacles. I’m +in no capricious humour now. To make fools of you, to make a fool of myself … +much fun there is in that!—and as for irresponsibility … M’sieu +Voldemar,” Zinaïda added suddenly, stamping, “don’t make such +a melancholy face. I can’t endure people to pity me.” She went +quickly out of the room. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s bad for you, very bad for you, this atmosphere, young +man,” Lushin said to me once more. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XI</h3> + +<p> +On the evening of the same day the usual guests were assembled at the +Zasyekins’. I was among them. +</p> + +<p> +The conversation turned on Meidanov’s poem. Zinaïda expressed genuine +admiration of it. “But do you know what?” she said to him. +“If I were a poet, I would choose quite different subjects. Perhaps +it’s all nonsense, but strange ideas sometimes come into my head, +especially when I’m not asleep in the early morning, when the sky begins +to turn rosy and grey both at once. I would, for instance … You won’t +laugh at me?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, no!” we all cried, with one voice. +</p> + +<p> +“I would describe,” she went on, folding her arms across her bosom +and looking away, “a whole company of young girls at night in a great +boat, on a silent river. The moon is shining, and they are all in white, and +wearing garlands of white flowers, and singing, you know, something in the +nature of a hymn.” +</p> + +<p> +“I see—I see; go on,” Meidanov commented with dreamy +significance. +</p> + +<p> +“All of a sudden, loud clamour, laughter, torches, tambourines on the +bank…. It’s a troop of Bacchantes dancing with songs and cries. +It’s your business to make a picture of it, Mr. Poet;… only I should like +the torches to be red and to smoke a great deal, and the Bacchantes’ eyes +to gleam under their wreaths, and the wreaths to be dusky. Don’t forget +the tiger-skins, too, and goblets and gold—lots of gold….” +</p> + +<p> +“Where ought the gold to be?” asked Meidanov, tossing back his +sleek hair and distending his nostrils. +</p> + +<p> +“Where? on their shoulders and arms and legs—everywhere. They say +in ancient times women wore gold rings on their ankles. The Bacchantes call the +girls in the boat to them. The girls have ceased singing their hymn—they +cannot go on with it, but they do not stir, the river carries them to the bank. +And suddenly one of them slowly rises…. This you must describe nicely: how she +slowly gets up in the moonlight, and how her companions are afraid…. She steps +over the edge of the boat, the Bacchantes surround her, whirl her away into +night and darkness…. Here put in smoke in clouds and everything in confusion. +There is nothing but the sound of their shrill cry, and her wreath left lying +on the bank.” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda ceased. (“Oh! she is in love!” I thought again.) +</p> + +<p> +“And is that all?” asked Meidanov. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all.” +</p> + +<p> +“That can’t be the subject of a whole poem,” he observed +pompously, “but I will make use of your idea for a lyrical +fragment.” +</p> + +<p> +“In the romantic style?” queried Malevsky. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course, in the romantic style—Byronic.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, to my mind, Hugo beats Byron,” the young count observed +negligently; “he’s more interesting.” +</p> + +<p> +“Hugo is a writer of the first class,” replied Meidanov; “and +my friend, Tonkosheev, in his Spanish romance, <i>El Trovador</i> …” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! is that the book with the question-marks turned upside +down?” Zinaïda interrupted. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. That’s the custom with the Spanish. I was about to observe +that Tonkosheev …” +</p> + +<p> +“Come! you’re going to argue about classicism and romanticism +again,” Zinaïda interrupted him a second time.” We’d much +better play… +</p> + +<p> +“Forfeits?” put in Lushin. +</p> + +<p> +“No, forfeits are a bore; at comparisons.” (This game Zinaïda had +invented herself. Some object was mentioned, every one tried to compare it with +something, and the one who chose the best comparison got a prize.) +</p> + +<p> +She went up to the window. The sun was just setting; high up in the sky were +large red clouds. +</p> + +<p> +“What are those clouds like?” questioned Zinaïda; and without +waiting for our answer, she said, “I think they are like the purple sails +on the golden ship of Cleopatra, when she sailed to meet Antony. Do you +remember, Meidanov, you were telling me about it not long ago?” +</p> + +<p> +All of us, like Polonius in <i>Hamlet</i>, opined that the clouds recalled +nothing so much as those sails, and that not one of us could discover a better +comparison. +</p> + +<p> +“And how old was Antony then?” inquired Zinaïda. +</p> + +<p> +“A young man, no doubt,” observed Malevsky. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, a young man,” Meidanov chimed in in confirmation. +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me,” cried Lushin, “he was over forty.” +</p> + +<p> +“Over forty,” repeated Zinaïda, giving him a rapid glance…. +</p> + +<p> +I soon went home. “She is in love,” my lips unconsciously +repeated…. “But with whom?” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XII</h3> + +<p> +The days passed by. Zinaïda became stranger and stranger, and more and more +incomprehensible. One day I went over to her, and saw her sitting in a +basket-chair, her head pressed to the sharp edge of the table. She drew herself +up … her whole face was wet with tears. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, you!” she said with a cruel smile. “Come here.” +</p> + +<p> +I went up to her. She put her hand on my head, and suddenly catching hold of my +hair, began pulling it. +</p> + +<p> +“It hurts me,” I said at last. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! does it? And do you suppose nothing hurts me?” she replied. +</p> + +<p> +“Ai!” she cried suddenly, seeing she had pulled a little tuft of +hair out. “What have I done? Poor M’sieu Voldemar!” +</p> + +<p> +She carefully smoothed the hair she had torn out, stroked it round her finger, +and twisted it into a ring. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall put your hair in a locket and wear it round my neck,” she +said, while the tears still glittered in her eyes. “That will be some +small consolation to you, perhaps … and now good-bye.” +</p> + +<p> +I went home, and found an unpleasant state of things there. My mother was +having a scene with my father; she was reproaching him with something, while +he, as his habit was, maintained a polite and chilly silence, and soon left +her. I could not hear what my mother was talking of, and indeed I had no +thought to spare for the subject; I only remember that when the interview was +over, she sent for me to her room, and referred with great displeasure to the +frequent visits I paid the princess, who was, in her words, <i>une femme +capable de tout</i>. I kissed her hand (this was what I always did when I +wanted to cut short a conversation) and went off to my room. Zinaïda’s +tears had completely overwhelmed me; I positively did not know what to think, +and was ready to cry myself; I was a child after all, in spite of my sixteen +years. I had now given up thinking about Malevsky, though Byelovzorov looked +more and more threatening every day, and glared at the wily count like a wolf +at a sheep; but I thought of nothing and of no one. I was lost in imaginings, +and was always seeking seclusion and solitude. I was particularly fond of the +ruined greenhouse. I would climb up on the high wall, and perch myself, and sit +there, such an unhappy, lonely, and melancholy youth, that I felt sorry for +myself—and how consolatory were those mournful sensations, how I +revelled in them!… +</p> + +<p> +One day I was sitting on the wall looking into the distance and listening to +the ringing of the bells…. Suddenly something floated up to me—not a +breath of wind and not a shiver, but as it were a whiff of fragrance—as +it were, a sense of some one’s being near…. I looked down. Below, on the +path, in a light greyish gown, with a pink parasol on her shoulder, was +Zinaïda, hurrying along. She caught sight of me, stopped, and pushing back the +brim of her straw hat, she raised her velvety eyes to me. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you doing up there at such a height?” she asked me with a +rather queer smile. “Come,” she went on, “you always declare +you love me; jump down into the road to me if you really do love me.” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda had hardly uttered those words when I flew down, just as though some +one had given me a violent push from behind. The wall was about fourteen feet +high. I reached the ground on my feet, but the shock was so great that I could +not keep my footing; I fell down, and for an instant fainted away. When I came +to myself again, without opening my eyes, I felt Zinaïda beside me. “My +dear boy,” she was saying, bending over me, and there was a note of +alarmed tenderness in her voice, “how could you do it, dear; how could +you obey?… You know I love you…. Get up.” +</p> + +<p> +Her bosom was heaving close to me, her hands were caressing my head, and +suddenly—what were my emotions at that moment—her soft, fresh lips +began covering my face with kisses … they touched my lips…. But then Zinaïda +probably guessed by the expression of my face that I had regained +consciousness, though I still kept my eyes closed, and rising rapidly to her +feet, she said: “Come, get up, naughty boy, silly, why are you lying in +the dust?” I got up. “Give me my parasol,” said Zinaïda, +“I threw it down somewhere, and don’t stare at me like that … what +ridiculous nonsense! you’re not hurt, are you? stung by the nettles, I +daresay? Don’t stare at me, I tell you…. But he doesn’t understand, +he doesn’t answer,” she added, as though to herself…. “Go +home, M’sieu’ Voldemar, brush yourself, and don’t dare to +follow me, or I shall be angry, and never again …” +</p> + +<p> +She did not finish her sentence, but walked rapidly away, while I sat down by +the side of the road … my legs would not support me. The nettles had stung my +hands, my back ached, and my head was giddy; but the feeling of rapture I +experienced then has never come a second time in my life. It turned to a sweet +ache in all my limbs and found expression at last in joyful hops and skips and +shouts. Yes, I was still a child. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XIII</h3> + +<p> +I was so proud and light-hearted all that day, I so vividly retained on my face +the feeling of Zinaïda’s kisses, with such a shudder of delight I +recalled every word she had uttered, I so hugged my unexpected happiness that I +felt positively afraid, positively unwilling to see her, who had given rise to +these new sensations. It seemed to me that now I could ask nothing more of +fate, that now I ought to “go, and draw a deep last sigh and die.” +But, next day, when I went into the lodge, I felt great embarrassment, which I +tried to conceal under a show of modest confidence, befitting a man who wishes +to make it apparent that he knows how to keep a secret. Zinaïda received me +very simply, without any emotion, she simply shook her finger at me and asked +me, whether I wasn’t black and blue? All my modest confidence and air of +mystery vanished instantaneously and with them my embarrassment. Of course, I +had not expected anything particular, but Zinaïda’s composure was like a +bucket of cold water thrown over me. I realised that in her eyes I was a child, +and was extremely miserable! Zinaïda walked up and down the room, giving me a +quick smile, whenever she caught my eye, but her thoughts were far away, I saw +that clearly…. “Shall I begin about what happened yesterday +myself,” I pondered; “ask her, where she was hurrying off so fast, +so as to find out once for all” … but with a gesture of despair, I merely +went and sat down in a corner. +</p> + +<p> +Byelovzorov came in; I felt relieved to see him. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve not been able to find you a quiet horse,” he said in a +sulky voice; “Freitag warrants one, but I don’t feel any confidence +in it, I am afraid.” +</p> + +<p> +“What are you afraid of?” said Zinaïda; “allow me to +inquire?” +</p> + +<p> +“What am I afraid of? Why, you don’t know how to ride. Lord save +us, what might happen! What whim is this has come over you all of a +sudden?” +</p> + +<p> +“Come, that’s my business, Sir Wild Beast. In that case I will ask +Piotr Vassilievitch.” … (My father’s name was Piotr Vassilievitch. +I was surprised at her mentioning his name so lightly and freely, as though she +were confident of his readiness to do her a service.) +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, indeed,” retorted Byelovzorov, “you mean to go out +riding with him then?” +</p> + +<p> +“With him or with some one else is nothing to do with you. Only not with +you, anyway.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not with me,” repeated Byelovzorov. “As you wish. Well, I +shall find you a horse.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, only mind now, don’t send some old cow. I warn you I want to +gallop.” +</p> + +<p> +“Gallop away by all means … with whom is it, with Malevsky, you are going +to ride?” +</p> + +<p> +“And why not with him, Mr. Pugnacity? Come, be quiet,” she added, +“and don’t glare. I’ll take you too. You know that to my mind +now Malevsky’s—ugh!” She shook her head. +</p> + +<p> +“You say that to console me,” growled Byelovzorov. +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda half closed her eyes. “Does that console you? O … O … O … Mr. +Pugnacity!” she said at last, as though she could find no other word. +“And you, M’sieu’ Voldemar, would you come with us?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t care to … in a large party,” I muttered, not raising +my eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“You prefer a <i>tête-à-tête</i>?… Well, freedom to the free, and heaven +to the saints,” she commented with a sigh. “Go along, Byelovzorov, +and bestir yourself. I must have a horse for to-morrow.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, and where’s the money to come from?” put in the old +princess. +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda scowled. +</p> + +<p> +“I won’t ask you for it; Byelovzorov will trust me.” +</p> + +<p> +“He’ll trust you, will he?” … grumbled the old princess, and +all of a sudden she screeched at the top of her voice, “Duniashka!” +</p> + +<p> +“Maman, I have given you a bell to ring,” observed Zinaïda. +</p> + +<p> +“Duniashka!” repeated the old lady. +</p> + +<p> +Byelovzorov took leave; I went away with him. Zinaïda did not try to detain me. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XIV</h3> + +<p> +The next day I got up early, cut myself a stick, and set off beyond the +town-gates. I thought I would walk off my sorrow. It was a lovely day, bright +and not too hot, a fresh sportive breeze roved over the earth with temperate +rustle and frolic, setting all things a-flutter and harassing nothing. I +wandered a long while over hills and through woods; I had not felt happy, I had +left home with the intention of giving myself up to melancholy, but youth, the +exquisite weather, the fresh air, the pleasure of rapid motion, the sweetness +of repose, lying on the thick grass in a solitary nook, gained the upper hand; +the memory of those never-to-be-forgotten words, those kisses, forced itself +once more upon my soul. It was sweet to me to think that Zinaïda could not, +anyway, fail to do justice to my courage, my heroism…. “Others may seem +better to her than I,” I mused, “let them! But others only say what +they would do, while I have done it. And what more would I not do for +her?” My fancy set to work. I began picturing to myself how I would save +her from the hands of enemies; how, covered with blood I would tear her by +force from prison, and expire at her feet. I remembered a picture hanging in +our drawing-room—Malek-Adel bearing away Matilda—but at that point +my attention was absorbed by the appearance of a speckled woodpecker who +climbed busily up the slender stem of a birch-tree and peeped out uneasily from +behind it, first to the right, then to the left, like a musician behind the +bass-viol. +</p> + +<p> +Then I sang “Not the white snows,” and passed from that to a song +well known at that period: “I await thee, when the wanton zephyr,” +then I began reading aloud Yermak’s address to the stars from +Homyakov’s tragedy. I made an attempt to compose something myself in a +sentimental vein, and invented the line which was to conclude each verse: +“O Zinaïda, Zinaïda!” but could get no further with it. Meanwhile +it was getting on towards dinner-time. I went down into the valley; a narrow +sandy path winding through it led to the town. I walked along this path…. The +dull thud of horses’ hoofs resounded behind me. I looked round +instinctively, stood still and took off my cap. I saw my father and Zinaïda. +They were riding side by side. My father was saying something to her, bending +right over to her, his hand propped on the horses’ neck, he was smiling. +Zinaïda listened to him in silence, her eyes severely cast down, and her lips +tightly pressed together. At first I saw them only; but a few instants later, +Byelovzorov came into sight round a bend in the glade, he was wearing a +hussar’s uniform with a pelisse, and riding a foaming black horse. The +gallant horse tossed its head, snorted and pranced from side to side, his rider +was at once holding him in and spurring him on. I stood aside. My father +gathered up the reins, moved away from Zinaïda, she slowly raised her eyes to +him, and both galloped off … Byelovzorov flew after them, his sabre clattering +behind him. “He’s as red as a crab,” I reflected, +“while she … why’s she so pale? out riding the whole morning, and +pale?” +</p> + +<p> +I redoubled my pace, and got home just at dinner-time. My father was already +sitting by my mother’s chair, dressed for dinner, washed and fresh; he +was reading an article from the <i>Journal des Débats</i> in his smooth musical +voice; but my mother heard him without attention, and when she saw me, asked +where I had been to all day long, and added that she didn’t like this +gadding about God knows where, and God knows in what company. “But I have +been walking alone,” I was on the point of replying, but I looked at my +father, and for some reason or other held my peace. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XV</h3> + +<p> +For the next five or six days I hardly saw Zinaïda; she said she was ill, which +did not, however, prevent the usual visitors from calling at the lodge to +pay—as they expressed it, their duty—all, that is, except Meidanov, +who promptly grew dejected and sulky when he had not an opportunity of being +enthusiastic. Byelovzorov sat sullen and red-faced in a corner, buttoned up to +the throat; on the refined face of Malevsky there flickered continually an evil +smile; he had really fallen into disfavour with Zinaïda, and waited with +special assiduity on the old princess, and even went with her in a hired coach +to call on the Governor-General. This expedition turned out unsuccessful, +however, and even led to an unpleasant experience for Malevsky; he was reminded +of some scandal to do with certain officers of the engineers, and was forced in +his explanations to plead his youth and inexperience at the time. Lushin came +twice a day, but did not stay long; I was rather afraid of him after our last +unreserved conversation, and at the same time felt a genuine attraction to him. +He went a walk with me one day in the Neskutchny gardens, was very good-natured +and nice, told me the names and properties of various plants and flowers, and +suddenly, <i>à propos</i> of nothing at all, cried, hitting himself on his +forehead, “And I, poor fool, thought her a flirt! it’s clear +self-sacrifice is sweet for some people!” +</p> + +<p> +“What do you mean by that?” I inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t mean to tell you anything,” Lushin replied abruptly. +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda avoided me; my presence—I could not help noticing +it—affected her disagreeably. She involuntarily turned away from me … +involuntarily; that was what was so bitter, that was what crushed me! But there +was no help for it, and I tried not to cross her path, and only to watch her +from a distance, in which I was not always successful. As before, something +incomprehensible was happening to her; her face was different, she was +different altogether. I was specially struck by the change that had taken place +in her one warm still evening. I was sitting on a low garden bench under a +spreading elderbush; I was fond of that nook; I could see from there the window +of Zinaïda’s room. I sat there; over my head a little bird was busily +hopping about in the darkness of the leaves; a grey cat, stretching herself at +full length, crept warily about the garden, and the first beetles were heavily +droning in the air, which was still clear, though it was not light. I sat and +gazed at the window, and waited to see if it would open; it did open, and +Zinaïda appeared at it. She had on a white dress, and she herself, her face, +shoulders, and arms, were pale to whiteness. She stayed a long while without +moving, and looked out straight before her from under her knitted brows. I had +never known such a look on her. Then she clasped her hands tightly, raised them +to her lips, to her forehead, and suddenly pulling her fingers apart, she +pushed back her hair behind her ears, tossed it, and with a sort of +determination nodded her head, and slammed-to the window. +</p> + +<p> +Three days later she met me in the garden. I was turning away, but she stopped +me of herself. +</p> + +<p> +“Give me your arm,” she said to me with her old affectionateness, +“it’s a long while since we have had a talk together.” +</p> + +<p> +I stole a look at her; her eyes were full of a soft light, and her face seemed +as it were smiling through a mist. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you still not well?” I asked her. +</p> + +<p> +“No, that’s all over now,” she answered, and she picked a +small red rose. “I am a little tired, but that too will pass off.” +</p> + +<p> +“And will you be as you used to be again?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda put the rose up to her face, and I fancied the reflection of its bright +petals had fallen on her cheeks. “Why, am I changed?” she +questioned me. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, you are changed,” I answered in a low voice. +</p> + +<p> +“I have been cold to you, I know,” began Zinaïda, “but you +mustn’t pay attention to that … I couldn’t help it…. Come, why talk +about it!” +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t want me to love you, that’s what it is!” I +cried gloomily, in an involuntary outburst. +</p> + +<p> +“No, love me, but not as you did.” +</p> + +<p> +“How then?” +</p> + +<p> +“Let us be friends—come now!” Zinaïda gave me the rose to +smell. “Listen, you know I’m much older than you—I might be +your aunt, really; well, not your aunt, but an older sister. And you …” +</p> + +<p> +“You think me a child,” I interrupted. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, yes, a child, but a dear, good clever one, whom I love very much. +Do you know what? From this day forth I confer on you the rank of page to me; +and don’t you forget that pages have to keep close to their ladies. Here +is the token of your new dignity,” she added, sticking the rose in the +buttonhole of my jacket, “the token of my favour.” +</p> + +<p> +“I once received other favours from you,” I muttered. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah!” commented Zinaïda, and she gave me a sidelong look, +“What a memory he has! Well? I’m quite ready now …” And +stooping to me, she imprinted on my forehead a pure, tranquil kiss. +</p> + +<p> +I only looked at her, while she turned away, and saying, “Follow me, my +page,” went into the lodge. I followed her—all in amazement. +“Can this gentle, reasonable girl,” I thought, “be the +Zinaïda I used to know?” I fancied her very walk was quieter, her whole +figure statelier and more graceful … +</p> + +<p> +And, mercy! with what fresh force love burned within me! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XVI</h3> + +<p> +After dinner the usual party assembled again at the lodge, and the young +princess came out to them. All were there in full force, just as on that first +evening which I never forgot; even Nirmatsky had limped to see her; Meidanov +came this time earliest of all, he brought some new verses. The games of +forfeits began again, but without the strange pranks, the practical jokes and +noise—the gipsy element had vanished. Zinaïda gave a different tone to +the proceedings. I sat beside her by virtue of my office as page. Among other +things, she proposed that any one who had to pay a forfeit should tell his +dream; but this was not successful. The dreams were either uninteresting +(Byelovzorov had dreamed that he fed his mare on carp, and that she had a +wooden head), or unnatural and invented. Meidanov regaled us with a regular +romance; there were sepulchres in it, and angels with lyres, and talking +flowers and music wafted from afar. Zinaïda did not let him finish. “If +we are to have compositions,” she said, “let every one tell +something made up, and no pretence about it.” The first who had to speak +was again Byelovzorov. +</p> + +<p> +The young hussar was confused. “I can’t make up anything!” he +cried. +</p> + +<p> +“What nonsense!” said Zinaïda. “Well, imagine, for instance, +you are married, and tell us how you would treat your wife. Would you lock her +up?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I should lock her up.” +</p> + +<p> +“And would you stay with her yourself?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I should certainly stay with her myself.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very good. Well, but if she got sick of that, and she deceived +you?” +</p> + +<p> +“I should kill her.” +</p> + +<p> +“And if she ran away?” +</p> + +<p> +“I should catch her up and kill her all the same.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh. And suppose now I were your wife, what would you do then?” +</p> + +<p> +Byelovzorov was silent a minute. “I should kill myself….” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda laughed. “I see yours is not a long story.” +</p> + +<p> +The next forfeit was Zinaïda’s. She looked at the ceiling and considered. +“Well, listen, she began at last, “what I have thought of…. Picture +to yourselves a magnificent palace, a summer night, and a marvellous ball. This +ball is given by a young queen. Everywhere gold and marble, crystal, silk, +lights, diamonds, flowers, fragrant scents, every caprice of luxury.” +</p> + +<p> +“You love luxury?” Lushin interposed. +</p> + +<p> +“Luxury is beautiful,” she retorted; “I love everything +beautiful.” +</p> + +<p> +“More than what is noble?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s something clever, I don’t understand it. Don’t +interrupt me. So the ball is magnificent. There are crowds of guests, all of +them are young, handsome, and brave, all are frantically in love with the +queen.” +</p> + +<p> +“Are there no women among the guests?” queried Malevsky. +</p> + +<p> +“No—or wait a minute—yes, there are some.” +</p> + +<p> +“Are they all ugly?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, charming. But the men are all in love with the queen. She is tall +and graceful; she has a little gold diadem on her black hair.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked at Zinaïda, and at that instant she seemed to me so much above all of +us, there was such bright intelligence, and such power about her unruffled +brows, that I thought: “You are that queen!” +</p> + +<p> +“They all throng about her,” Zinaïda went on, “and all lavish +the most flattering speeches upon her.” +</p> + +<p> +“And she likes flattery?” Lushin queried. +</p> + +<p> +“What an intolerable person! he keeps interrupting … who doesn’t +like flattery?” +</p> + +<p> +“One more last question,” observed Malevsky, “has the queen a +husband?” +</p> + +<p> +“I hadn’t thought about that. No, why should she have a +husband?” +</p> + +<p> +“To be sure,” assented Malevsky, “why should she have a +husband?” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Silence!</i>” cried Meidanov in French, which he spoke very +badly. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Merci!</i>” Zinaïda said to him. “And so the queen hears +their speeches, and hears the music, but does not look at one of the guests. +Six windows are open from top to bottom, from floor to ceiling, and beyond them +is a dark sky with big stars, a dark garden with big trees. The queen gazes out +into the garden. Out there among the trees is a fountain; it is white in the +darkness, and rises up tall, tall as an apparition. The queen hears, through +the talk and the music, the soft splash of its waters. She gazes and thinks: +you are all, gentlemen, noble, clever, and rich, you crowd round me, you +treasure every word I utter, you are all ready to die at my feet, I hold you in +my power … but out there, by the fountain, by that splashing water, stands and +waits he whom I love, who holds me in his power. He has neither rich raiment +nor precious stones, no one knows him, but he awaits me, and is certain I shall +come—and I shall come—and there is no power that could stop me when +I want to go out to him, and to stay with him, and be lost with him out there +in the darkness of the garden, under the whispering of the trees, and the +splash of the fountain …” Zinaïda ceased. +</p> + +<p> +“Is that a made-up story?” Malevsky inquired slyly. Zinaïda did not +even look at him. +</p> + +<p> +“And what should we have done, gentlemen?” Lushin began suddenly, +“if we had been among the guests, and had known of the lucky fellow at +the fountain?” +</p> + +<p> +“Stop a minute, stop a minute,” interposed Zinaïda, “I will +tell you myself what each of you would have done. You, Byelovzorov, would have +challenged him to a duel; you, Meidanov, would have written an epigram on him … +No, though, you can’t write epigrams, you would have made up a long poem +on him in the style of Barbier, and would have inserted your production in the +<i>Telegraph</i>. You, Nirmatsky, would have borrowed … no, you would have lent +him money at high interest; you, doctor,…” she stopped. “There, I +really don’t know what you would have done….” +</p> + +<p> +“In the capacity of court physician,” answered Lushin, “I +would have advised the queen not to give balls when she was not in the humour +for entertaining her guests….” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps you would have been right. And you, Count?…” +</p> + +<p> +“And I?” repeated Malevsky with his evil smile…. +</p> + +<p> +“You would offer him a poisoned sweetmeat.” Malevsky’s face +changed slightly, and assumed for an instant a Jewish expression, but he +laughed directly. +</p> + +<p> +“And as for you, Voldemar,…” Zinaïda went on, “but +that’s enough, though; let us play another game.” +</p> + +<p> +“M’sieu Voldemar, as the queen’s page, would have held up her +train when she ran into the garden,” Malevsky remarked malignantly. +</p> + +<p> +I was crimson with anger, but Zinaïda hurriedly laid a hand on my shoulder, and +getting up, said in a rather shaky voice: “I have never given your +excellency the right to be rude, and therefore I will ask you to leave +us.” She pointed to the door. +</p> + +<p> +“Upon my word, princess,” muttered Malevsky, and he turned quite +pale. +</p> + +<p> +“The princess is right,” cried Byelovzorov, and he too rose. +</p> + +<p> +“Good God, I’d not the least idea,” Malevsky went on, +“in my words there was nothing, I think, that could … I had no notion of +offending you…. Forgive me.” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda looked him up and down coldly, and coldly smiled. “Stay, then, +certainly,” she pronounced with a careless gesture of her arm. +</p> + +<p> +“M’sieu Voldemar and I were needlessly incensed. It is your +pleasure to sting … may it do you good.” +</p> + +<p> +“Forgive me,” Malevsky repeated once more; while I, my thoughts +dwelling on Zinaïda’s gesture, said to myself again that no real queen +could with greater dignity have shown a presumptuous subject to the door. +</p> + +<p> +The game of forfeits went on for a short time after this little scene; every +one felt rather ill at ease, not so much on account of this scene, as from +another, not quite definite, but oppressive feeling. No one spoke of it, but +every one was conscious of it in himself and in his neighbour. Meidanov read us +his verses; and Malevsky praised them with exaggerated warmth. “He wants +to show how good he is now,” Lushin whispered to me. We soon broke up. A +mood of reverie seemed to have come upon Zinaïda; the old princess sent word +that she had a headache; Nirmatsky began to complain of his rheumatism…. +</p> + +<p> +I could not for a long while get to sleep. I had been impressed by +Zinaïda’s story. “Can there have been a hint in it?” I asked +myself: “and at whom and at what was she hinting? And if there really is +anything to hint at … how is one to make up one’s mind? No, no, it +can’t be,” I whispered, turning over from one hot cheek on to the +other…. But I remembered the expression of Zinaïda’s face during her +story…. I remembered the exclamation that had broken from Lushin in the +Neskutchny gardens, the sudden change in her behaviour to me, and I was lost in +conjectures. “Who is he?” These three words seemed to stand before +my eyes traced upon the darkness; a lowering malignant cloud seemed hanging +over me, and I felt its oppressiveness, and waited for it to break. I had grown +used to many things of late; I had learned much from what I had seen at the +Zasyekins; their disorderly ways, tallow candle-ends, broken knives and forks, +grumpy Vonifaty, and shabby maid-servants, the manners of the old +princess—all their strange mode of life no longer struck me…. But what I +was dimly discerning now in Zinaïda, I could never get used to…. “An +adventuress!” my mother had said of her one day. An +adventuress—she, my idol, my divinity? This word stabbed me, I tried to +get away from it into my pillow, I was indignant—and at the same time +what would I not have agreed to, what would I not have given only to be that +lucky fellow at the fountain!… My blood was on fire and boiling within me. +“The garden … the fountain,” I mused…. “I will go into the +garden.” I dressed quickly and slipped out of the house. The night was +dark, the trees scarcely whispered, a soft chill air breathed down from the +sky, a smell of fennel trailed across from the kitchen garden. I went through +all the walks; the light sound of my own footsteps at once confused and +emboldened me; I stood still, waited and heard my heart beating fast and +loudly. At last I went up to the fence and leaned against the thin bar. +Suddenly, or was it my fancy, a woman’s figure flashed by, a few paces +from me … I strained my eyes eagerly into the darkness, I held my breath. What +was that? Did I hear steps, or was it my heart beating again? “Who is +here?” I faltered, hardly audibly. What was that again, a smothered laugh +… or a rustling in the leaves … or a sigh just at my ear? I felt afraid … +“Who is here?” I repeated still more softly. +</p> + +<p> +The air blew in a gust for an instant; a streak of fire flashed across the sky; +it was a star falling. “Zinaïda?” I wanted to call, but the word +died away on my lips. And all at once everything became profoundly still +around, as is often the case in the middle of the night…. Even the grasshoppers +ceased their churr in the trees—only a window rattled somewhere. I stood +and stood, and then went back to my room, to my chilled bed. I felt a strange +sensation; as though I had gone to a tryst, and had been left lonely, and had +passed close by another’s happiness. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XVII</h3> + +<p> +The following day I only had a passing glimpse of Zinaïda: she was driving +somewhere with the old princess in a cab. But I saw Lushin, who, however, +barely vouchsafed me a greeting, and Malevsky. The young count grinned, and +began affably talking to me. Of all those who visited at the lodge, he alone +had succeeded in forcing his way into our house, and had favourably impressed +my mother. My father did not take to him, and treated him with a civility +almost insulting. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, <i>monsieur le page</i>,” began Malevsky, “delighted to +meet you. What is your lovely queen doing?” +</p> + +<p> +His fresh handsome face was so detestable to me at that moment, and he looked +at me with such contemptuous amusement that I did not answer him at all. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you still angry?” he went on. “You’ve no reason to +be. It wasn’t I who called you a page, you know, and pages attend queens +especially. But allow me to remark that you perform your duties very +badly.” +</p> + +<p> +“How so?” +</p> + +<p> +“Pages ought to be inseparable from their mistresses; pages ought to know +everything they do, they ought, indeed, to watch over them,” he added, +lowering his voice, “day and night.” +</p> + +<p> +“What do you mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“What do I mean? I express myself pretty clearly, I fancy. Day and night. +By day it’s not so much matter; it’s light, and people are about in +the daytime; but by night, then look out for misfortune. I advise you not to +sleep at nights and to watch, watch with all your energies. You remember, in +the garden, by night, at the fountain, that’s where there’s need to +look out. You will thank me.” +</p> + +<p> +Malevsky laughed and turned his back on me. He, most likely, attached no great +importance to what he had said to me, he had a reputation for mystifying, and +was noted for his power of taking people in at masquerades, which was greatly +augmented by the almost unconscious falsity in which his whole nature was +steeped…. He only wanted to tease me; but every word he uttered was a poison +that ran through my veins. The blood rushed to my head. “Ah! so +that’s it!” I said to myself; “good! So there was reason for +me to feel drawn into the garden! That shan’t be so!” I cried +aloud, and struck myself on the chest with my fist, though precisely what +should not be so I could not have said. “Whether Malevsky himself goes +into the garden,” I thought (he was bragging, perhaps; he has insolence +enough for that), “or some one else (the fence of our garden was very +low, and there was no difficulty in getting over it), anyway, if any one falls +into my hands, it will be the worse for him! I don’t advise any one to +meet me! I will prove to all the world and to her, the traitress (I actually +used the word “traitress”) that I can be revenged!” +</p> + +<p> +I returned to my own room, took out of the writing-table an English knife I had +recently bought, felt its sharp edge, and knitting my brows with an air of cold +and concentrated determination, thrust it into my pocket, as though doing such +deeds was nothing out of the way for me, and not the first time. My heart +heaved angrily, and felt heavy as a stone. All day long I kept a scowling brow +and lips tightly compressed, and was continually walking up and down, +clutching, with my hand in my pocket, the knife, which was warm from my grasp, +while I prepared myself beforehand for something terrible. These new unknown +sensations so occupied and even delighted me, that I hardly thought of Zinaïda +herself. I was continually haunted by Aleko, the young gipsy—“Where +art thou going, young handsome man? Lie there,” and then, “thou art +all besprent with blood…. Oh, what hast thou done?… Naught!” With what a +cruel smile I repeated that “Naught!” My father was not at home; +but my mother, who had for some time past been in an almost continual state of +dumb exasperation, noticed my gloomy and heroic aspect, and said to me at +supper, “Why are you sulking like a mouse in a meal-tub?” I merely +smiled condescendingly in reply, and thought, “If only they knew!” +It struck eleven; I went to my room, but did not undress; I waited for +midnight; at last it struck. “The time has come!” I muttered +between my teeth; and buttoning myself up to the throat, and even pulling my +sleeves up, I went into the garden. +</p> + +<p> +I had already fixed on the spot from which to keep watch. At the end of the +garden, at the point where the fence, separating our domain from the +Zasyekins,’ joined the common wall, grew a pine-tree, standing alone. +Standing under its low thick branches, I could see well, as far as the darkness +of the night permitted, what took place around. Close by, ran a winding path +which had always seemed mysterious to me; it coiled like a snake under the +fence, which at that point bore traces of having been climbed over, and led to +a round arbour formed of thick acacias. I made my way to the pine-tree, leaned +my back against its trunk, and began my watch. +</p> + +<p> +The night was as still as the night before, but there were fewer clouds in the +sky, and the outlines of bushes, even of tall flowers, could be more distinctly +seen. The first moments of expectation were oppressive, almost terrible. I had +made up my mind to everything. I only debated how to act; whether to thunder, +“Where goest thou? Stand! show thyself—or death!” or simply +to strike…. Every sound, every whisper and rustle, seemed to me portentous and +extraordinary…. I prepared myself…. I bent forward…. But half-an-hour passed, +an hour passed; my blood had grown quieter, colder; the consciousness that I +was doing all this for nothing, that I was even a little absurd, that Malevsky +had been making fun of me, began to steal over me. I left my ambush, and walked +all about the garden. As if to taunt me, there was not the smallest sound to be +heard anywhere; everything was at rest. Even our dog was asleep, curled up into +a ball at the gate. I climbed up into the ruins of the greenhouse, saw the open +country far away before me, recalled my meeting with Zinaïda, and fell to +dreaming…. +</p> + +<p> +I started…. I fancied I heard the creak of a door opening, then the faint crack +of a broken twig. In two bounds I got down from the ruin, and stood still, all +aghast. Rapid, light, but cautious footsteps sounded distinctly in the garden. +They were approaching me. “Here he is … here he is, at last!” +flashed through my heart. With spasmodic haste, I pulled the knife out of my +pocket; with spasmodic haste, I opened it. Flashes of red were whirling before +my eyes; my hair stood up on my head in my fear and fury…. The steps were +coming straight towards me; I bent—I craned forward to meet him…. A man +came into view…. My God! it was my father! I recognised him at once, though he +was all muffled up in a dark cloak, and his hat was pulled down over his face. +On tip-toe he walked by. He did not notice me, though nothing concealed me; but +I was so huddled up and shrunk together that I fancy I was almost on the level +of the ground. The jealous Othello, ready for murder, was suddenly transformed +into a school-boy…. I was so taken aback by my father’s unexpected +appearance that for the first moment I did not notice where he had come from or +in what direction he disappeared. I only drew myself up, and thought, +“Why is it my father is walking about in the garden at night?” when +everything was still again. In my horror I had dropped my knife in the grass, +but I did not even attempt to look for it; I was very much ashamed of myself. I +was completely sobered at once. On my way to the house, however, I went up to +my seat under the elder-tree, and looked up at Zinaïda’s window. The +small slightly-convex panes of the window shone dimly blue in the faint light +thrown on them by the night sky. All at once—their colour began to +change…. Behind them—I saw this, saw it distinctly—softly and +cautiously a white blind was let down, let down right to the window-frame, and +so stayed. +</p> + +<p> +“What is that for?” I said aloud almost involuntarily when I found +myself once more in my room. “A dream, a chance, or …” The +suppositions which suddenly rushed into my head were so new and strange that I +did not dare to entertain them. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XVIII</h3> + +<p> +I got up in the morning with a headache. My emotion of the previous day had +vanished. It was replaced by a dreary sense of blankness and a sort of sadness +I had not known till then, as though something had died in me. +</p> + +<p> +“Why is it you’re looking like a rabbit with half its brain +removed?” said Lushin on meeting me. At lunch I stole a look first at my +father, then at my mother: he was composed, as usual; she was, as usual, +secretly irritated. I waited to see whether my father would make some friendly +remarks to me, as he sometimes did…. But he did not even bestow his everyday +cold greeting upon me. “Shall I tell Zinaïda all?” I wondered…. +“It’s all the same, anyway; all is at an end between us.” I +went to see her, but told her nothing, and, indeed, I could not even have +managed to get a talk with her if I had wanted to. The old princess’s +son, a cadet of twelve years old, had come from Petersburg for his holidays; +Zinaïda at once handed her brother over to me. “Here,” she +said, “my dear Volodya,”—it was the first time she had used +this pet-name to me—“is a companion for you. His name is Volodya, +too. Please, like him; he is still shy, but he has a good heart. Show him +Neskutchny gardens, go walks with him, take him under your protection. +You’ll do that, won’t you? you’re so good, too!” She +laid both her hands affectionately on my shoulders, and I was utterly +bewildered. The presence of this boy transformed me, too, into a boy. I looked +in silence at the cadet, who stared as silently at me. Zinaïda laughed, and +pushed us towards each other. “Embrace each other, children!” We +embraced each other. “Would you like me to show you the garden?” I +inquired of the cadet. “If you please,” he replied, in the regular +cadet’s hoarse voice. Zinaïda laughed again…. I had time to notice that +she had never had such an exquisite colour in her face before. I set off with +the cadet. There was an old-fashioned swing in our garden. I sat him down on +the narrow plank seat, and began swinging him. He sat rigid in his new little +uniform of stout cloth, with its broad gold braiding, and kept tight hold of +the cords. “You’d better unbutton your collar,” I said to +him. “It’s all right; we’re used to it,” he said, and +cleared his throat. He was like his sister. The eyes especially recalled her, I +liked being nice to him; and at the same time an aching sadness was gnawing at +my heart. “Now I certainly am a child,” I thought; “but +yesterday….” I remembered where I had dropped my knife the night before, +and looked for it. The cadet asked me for it, picked a thick stalk of wild +parsley, cut a pipe out of it, and began whistling. Othello whistled too. +</p> + +<p> +But in the evening how he wept, this Othello, in Zinaïda’s arms, when, +seeking him out in a corner of the garden, she asked him why he was so +depressed. My tears flowed with such violence that she was frightened. +“What is wrong with you? What is it, Volodya?” she repeated; and +seeing I made no answer, and did not cease weeping, she was about to kiss my +wet cheek. But I turned away from her, and whispered through my sobs, “I +know all. Why did you play with me?… What need had you of my love?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am to blame, Volodya …” said Zinaïda. “I am very much to +blame …” she added, wringing her hands. “How much there is bad and +black and sinful in me!… But I am not playing with you now. I love you; you +don’t even suspect why and how…. But what is it you know?” +</p> + +<p> +What could I say to her? She stood facing me, and looked at me; and I belonged +to her altogether from head to foot directly she looked at me…. A quarter of an +hour later I was running races with the cadet and Zinaïda. I was not crying, I +was laughing, though my swollen eyelids dropped a tear or two as I laughed. I +had Zinaïda’s ribbon round my neck for a cravat, and I shouted with +delight whenever I succeeded in catching her round the waist. She did just as +she liked with me. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XIX</h3> + +<p> +I should be in a great difficulty, if I were forced to describe exactly what +passed within me in the course of the week after my unsuccessful midnight +expedition. It was a strange feverish time, a sort of chaos, in which the most +violently opposed feelings, thoughts, suspicions, hopes, joys, and sufferings, +whirled together in a kind of hurricane. I was afraid to look into myself, if a +boy of sixteen ever can look into himself; I was afraid to take stock of +anything; I simply hastened to live through every day till evening; and at +night I slept … the light-heartedness of childhood came to my aid. I did not +want to know whether I was loved, and I did not want to acknowledge to myself +that I was not loved; my father I avoided—but Zinaïda I could not avoid…. +I burnt as in a fire in her presence … but what did I care to know what the +fire was in which I burned and melted—it was enough that it was sweet to +burn and melt. I gave myself up to all my passing sensations, and cheated +myself, turning away from memories, and shutting my eyes to what I foreboded +before me…. This weakness would not most likely have lasted long in any case … +a thunderbolt cut it all short in a moment, and flung me into a new track +altogether. +</p> + +<p> +Coming in one day to dinner from a rather long walk, I learnt with amazement +that I was to dine alone, that my father had gone away and my mother was +unwell, did not want any dinner, and had shut herself up in her bedroom. From +the faces of the footmen, I surmised that something extraordinary had taken +place…. I did not dare to cross-examine them, but I had a friend in the young +waiter Philip, who was passionately fond of poetry, and a performer on the +guitar. I addressed myself to him. From him I learned that a terrible scene had +taken place between my father and mother (and every word had been overheard in +the maids’ room; much of it had been in French, but Masha the +lady’s-maid had lived five years’ with a dressmaker from Paris, and +she understood it all); that my mother had reproached my father with +infidelity, with an intimacy with the young lady next door, that my father at +first had defended himself, but afterwards had lost his temper, and he too had +said something cruel, “reflecting on her age,” which had made my +mother cry; that my mother too had alluded to some loan which it seemed had +been made to the old princess, and had spoken very ill of her and of the young +lady too, and that then my father had threatened her. “And all the +mischief,” continued Philip, “came from an anonymous letter; and +who wrote it, no one knows, or else there’d have been no reason whatever +for the matter to have come out at all.” +</p> + +<p> +“But was there really any ground,” I brought out with difficulty, +while my hands and feet went cold, and a sort of shudder ran through my inmost +being. +</p> + +<p> +Philip winked meaningly. “There was. There’s no hiding those +things; for all that your father was careful this time—but there, you +see, he’d, for instance, to hire a carriage or something … no getting on +without servants, either.” +</p> + +<p> +I dismissed Philip, and fell on to my bed. I did not sob, I did not give myself +up to despair; I did not ask myself when and how this had happened; I did not +wonder how it was I had not guessed it before, long ago; I did not even upbraid +my father…. What I had learnt was more than I could take in; this sudden +revelation stunned me…. All was at an end. All the fair blossoms of my heart +were roughly plucked at once, and lay about me, flung on the ground, and +trampled underfoot. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XX</h3> + +<p> +My mother next day announced her intention of returning to the town. In the +morning my father had gone into her bedroom, and stayed there a long while +alone with her. No one had overheard what he said to her; but my mother wept no +more; she regained her composure, and asked for food, but did not make her +appearance nor change her plans. I remember I wandered about the whole day, but +did not go into the garden, and never once glanced at the lodge, and in the +evening I was the spectator of an amazing occurrence: my father conducted Count +Malevsky by the arm through the dining-room into the hall, and, in the presence +of a footman, said icily to him: “A few days ago your excellency was +shown the door in our house; and now I am not going to enter into any kind of +explanation with you, but I have the honour to announce to you that if you ever +visit me again, I shall throw you out of window. I don’t like your +handwriting.” The count bowed, bit his lips, shrank away, and vanished. +</p> + +<p> +Preparations were beginning for our removal to town, to Arbaty Street, where we +had a house. My father himself probably no longer cared to remain at the +country house; but clearly he had succeeded in persuading my mother not to make +a public scandal. Everything was done quietly, without hurry; my mother even +sent her compliments to the old princess, and expressed her regret that she was +prevented by indisposition from seeing her again before her departure. I +wandered about like one possessed, and only longed for one thing, for it all to +be over as soon as possible. One thought I could not get out of my head: how +could she, a young girl, and a princess too, after all, bring herself to such a +step, knowing that my father was not a free man, and having an opportunity of +marrying, for instance, Byelovzorov? What did she hope for? How was it she was +not afraid of ruining her whole future? Yes, I thought, this is love, this is +passion, this is devotion … and Lushin’s words came back to me: to +sacrifice oneself for some people is sweet. I chanced somehow to catch sight of +something white in one of the windows of the lodge…. “Can it be +Zinaïda’s face?” I thought … yes, it really was her face. I could +not restrain myself. I could not part from her without saying a last good-bye +to her. I seized a favourable instant, and went into the lodge. +</p> + +<p> +In the drawing-room the old princess met me with her usual slovenly and +careless greetings. +</p> + +<p> +“How’s this, my good man, your folks are off in such a +hurry?” she observed, thrusting snuff into her nose. I looked at her, and +a load was taken off my heart. The word “loan,” dropped by Philip, +had been torturing me. She had no suspicion … at least I thought so then. +Zinaïda came in from the next room, pale, and dressed in black, with her hair +hanging loose; she took me by the hand without a word, and drew me away with +her. +</p> + +<p> +“I heard your voice,” she began, “and came out at once. Is it +so easy for you to leave us, bad boy?” +</p> + +<p> +“I have come to say good-bye to you, princess,” I answered, +“probably for ever. You have heard, perhaps, we are going away.” +</p> + +<p> +Zinaïda looked intently at me. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I have heard. Thanks for coming. I was beginning to think I should +not see you again. Don’t remember evil against me. I have sometimes +tormented you, but all the same I am not what you imagine me.” She turned +away, and leaned against the window. +</p> + +<p> +“Really, I am not like that. I know you have a bad opinion of me.” +</p> + +<p> +“I?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, you … you.” +</p> + +<p> +“I?” I repeated mournfully, and my heart throbbed as of old under +the influence of her overpowering, indescribable fascination. “I? Believe +me, Zinaïda Alexandrovna, whatever you did, however you tormented me, I should +love and adore you to the end of my days.” +</p> + +<p> +She turned with a rapid motion to me, and flinging wide her arms, embraced my +head, and gave me a warm and passionate kiss. God knows whom that long farewell +kiss was seeking, but I eagerly tasted its sweetness. I knew that it would +never be repeated. “Good-bye, good-bye,” I kept saying … +</p> + +<p> +She tore herself away, and went out. And I went away. I cannot describe the +emotion with which I went away. I should not wish it ever to come again; but I +should think myself unfortunate had I never experienced such an emotion. +</p> + +<p> +We went back to town. I did not quickly shake off the past; I did not quickly +get to work. My wound slowly began to heal; but I had no ill-feeling against my +father. On the contrary he had, as it were, gained in my eyes … let +psychologists explain the contradiction as best they can. One day I was walking +along a boulevard, and to my indescribable delight, I came across Lushin. I +liked him for his straightforward and unaffected character, and besides he was +dear to me for the sake of the memories he aroused in me. I rushed up to him. +“Aha!” he said, knitting his brows,” so it’s you, young +man. Let me have a look at you. You’re still as yellow as ever, but yet +there’s not the same nonsense in your eyes. You look like a man, not a +lap-dog. That’s good. Well, what are you doing? working?” +</p> + +<p> +I gave a sigh. I did not like to tell a lie, while I was ashamed to tell the +truth. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, never mind,” Lushin went on, “don’t be shy. The +great thing is to lead a normal life, and not be the slave of your passions. +What do you get if not? Wherever you are carried by the tide—it’s +all a bad look-out; a man must stand on his own feet, if he can get nothing but +a rock to stand on. Here, I’ve got a cough … and Byelovzorov—have +you heard anything of him?” +</p> + +<p> +“No. What is it?” +</p> + +<p> +“He’s lost, and no news of him; they say he’s gone away to +the Caucasus. A lesson to you, young man. And it’s all from not knowing +how to part in time, to break out of the net. You seem to have got off very +well. Mind you don’t fall into the same snare again. Good-bye.” +</p> + +<p> +“I shan’t,” I thought…. “I shan’t see her +again.” But I was destined to see Zinaïda once more. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXI</h3> + +<p> +My father used every day to ride out on horse-back. He had a splendid English +mare, a chestnut piebald, with a long slender neck and long legs, an +inexhaustible and vicious beast. Her name was Electric. No one could ride her +except my father. One day he came up to me in a good humour, a frame of mind in +which I had not seen him for a long while; he was getting ready for his ride, +and had already put on his spurs. I began entreating him to take me with him. +</p> + +<p> +“We’d much better have a game of leap-frog,” my father +replied. “You’ll never keep up with me on your cob.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I will; I’ll put on spurs too.” +</p> + +<p> +“All right, come along then.” +</p> + +<p> +We set off. I had a shaggy black horse, strong, and fairly spirited. It is true +it had to gallop its utmost, when Electric went at full trot, still I was not +left behind. I have never seen any one ride like my father; he had such a fine +carelessly easy seat, that it seemed that the horse under him was conscious of +it, and proud of its rider. We rode through all the boulevards, reached the +“Maidens’ Field,” jumped several fences (at first I had been +afraid to take a leap, but my father had a contempt for cowards, and I soon +ceased to feel fear), twice crossed the river Moskva, and I was under the +impression that we were on our way home, especially as my father of his own +accord observed that my horse was tired, when suddenly he turned off away from +me at the Crimean ford, and galloped along the river-bank. I rode after him. +When he had reached a high stack of old timber, he slid quickly off Electric, +told me to dismount, and giving me his horse’s bridle, told me to wait +for him there at the timber-stack, and, turning off into a small street, +disappeared. I began walking up and down the river-bank, leading the horses, +and scolding Electric, who kept pulling, shaking her head, snorting and +neighing as she went; and when I stood still, never failed to paw the ground, +and whining, bite my cob on the neck; in fact she conducted herself altogether +like a spoilt thorough-bred. My father did not come back. A disagreeable damp +mist rose from the river; a fine rain began softly blowing up, and spotting +with tiny dark flecks the stupid grey timber-stack, which I kept passing and +repassing, and was deadly sick of by now. I was terribly bored, and still my +father did not come. A sort of sentry-man, a Fin, grey all over like the +timber, and with a huge old-fashioned shako, like a pot, on his head, and with +a halberd (and how ever came a sentry, if you think of it, on the banks of the +Moskva!) drew near, and turning his wrinkled face, like an old woman’s, +towards me, he observed, “What are you doing here with the horses, young +master? Let me hold them.” +</p> + +<p> +I made him no reply. He asked me for tobacco. To get rid of him (I was in a +fret of impatience, too), I took a few steps in the direction in which my +father had disappeared, then walked along the little street to the end, turned +the corner, and stood still. In the street, forty paces from me, at the open +window of a little wooden house, stood my father, his back turned to me; he was +leaning forward over the window-sill, and in the house, half hidden by a +curtain, sat a woman in a dark dress talking to my father; this woman was +Zinaïda. +</p> + +<p> +I was petrified. This, I confess, I had never expected. My first impulse was to +run away. “My father will look round,” I thought, “and I am +lost …” but a strange feeling—a feeling stronger than curiosity, +stronger than jealousy, stronger even than fear—held me there. I began to +watch; I strained my ears to listen. It seemed as though my father were +insisting on something. Zinaïda would not consent. I seem to see her face +now—mournful, serious, lovely, and with an inexpressible impress of +devotion, grief, love, and a sort of despair—I can find no other word for +it. She uttered monosyllables, not raising her eyes, simply +smiling—submissively, but without yielding. By that smile alone, I should +have known my Zinaïda of old days. My father shrugged his shoulders, and +straightened his hat on his head, which was always a sign of impatience with +him…. Then I caught the words: “<i>Vous devez vous séparer de +cette…</i>” Zinaïda sat up, and stretched out her arm…. Suddenly, before +my very eyes, the impossible happened. My father suddenly lifted the whip, with +which he had been switching the dust off his coat, and I heard a sharp blow on +that arm, bare to the elbow. I could scarcely restrain myself from crying out; +while Zinaïda shuddered, looked without a word at my father, and slowly raising +her arm to her lips, kissed the streak of red upon it. My father flung away the +whip, and running quickly up the steps, dashed into the house…. Zinaïda turned +round, and with outstretched arms and downcast head, she too moved away from +the window. +</p> + +<p> +My heart sinking with panic, with a sort of awe-struck horror, I rushed back, +and running down the lane, almost letting go my hold of Electric, went back to +the bank of the river. I could not think clearly of anything. I knew that my +cold and reserved father was sometimes seized by fits of fury; and all the +same, I could never comprehend what I had just seen…. But I felt at the time +that, however long I lived, I could never forget the gesture, the glance, the +smile, of Zinaïda; that her image, this image so suddenly presented to me, was +imprinted for ever on my memory. I stared vacantly at the river, and never +noticed that my tears were streaming. “She is beaten,” I was +thinking,… “beaten … beaten….” +</p> + +<p> +“Hullo! what are you doing? Give me the mare!” I heard my +father’s voice saying behind me. +</p> + +<p> +Mechanically I gave him the bridle. He leaped on to Electric … the mare, chill +with standing, reared on her haunches, and leaped ten feet away … but my father +soon subdued her; he drove the spurs into her sides, and gave her a blow on the +neck with his fist…. “Ah, I’ve no whip,” he muttered. +</p> + +<p> +I remembered the swish and fall of the whip, heard so short a time before, and +shuddered. +</p> + +<p> +“Where did you put it?” I asked my father, after a brief pause. +</p> + +<p> +My father made no answer, and galloped on ahead. I overtook him. I felt that I +must see his face. +</p> + +<p> +“Were you bored waiting for me?” he muttered through his teeth. +</p> + +<p> +“A little. Where did you drop your whip?” I asked again. +</p> + +<p> +My father glanced quickly at me. “I didn’t drop it,” he +replied; “I threw it away.” He sank into thought, and dropped his +head … and then, for the first, and almost for the last time, I saw how much +tenderness and pity his stern features were capable of expressing. +</p> + +<p> +He galloped on again, and this time I could not overtake him; I got home a +quarter-of-an-hour after him. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s love,” I said to myself again, as I sat at night +before my writing-table, on which books and papers had begun to make their +appearance; “that’s passion!… To think of not revolting, of bearing +a blow from any one whatever … even the dearest hand! But it seems one can, if +one loves…. While I … I imagined …” +</p> + +<p> +I had grown much older during the last month; and my love, with all its +transports and sufferings, struck me myself as something small and childish and +pitiful beside this other unimagined something, which I could hardly fully +grasp, and which frightened me like an unknown, beautiful, but menacing face, +which one strives in vain to make out clearly in the half-darkness…. +</p> + +<p> +A strange and fearful dream came to me that same night. I dreamed I went into a +low dark room…. My father was standing with a whip in his hand, stamping with +anger; in the corner crouched Zinaïda, and not on her arm, but on her forehead, +was a stripe of red … while behind them both towered Byelovzorov, covered with +blood; he opened his white lips, and wrathfully threatened my father. +</p> + +<p> +Two months later, I entered the university; and within six months my father +died of a stroke in Petersburg, where he had just moved with my mother and me. +A few days before his death he received a letter from Moscow which threw him +into a violent agitation…. He went to my mother to beg some favour of her: and, +I was told, he positively shed tears—he, my father! On the very morning +of the day when he was stricken down, he had begun a letter to me in French. +“My son,” he wrote to me, “fear the love of woman; fear that +bliss, that poison….” After his death, my mother sent a considerable sum +of money to Moscow. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h3>XXII</h3> + +<p> +Four years passed. I had just left the university, and did not know exactly +what to do with myself, at what door to knock; I was hanging about for a time +with nothing to do. One fine evening I met Meidanov at the theatre. He had got +married, and had entered the civil service; but I found no change in him. He +fell into ecstasies in just the same superfluous way, and just as suddenly grew +depressed again. +</p> + +<p> +“You know,” he told me among other things, “Madame +Dolsky’s here.” +</p> + +<p> +“What Madame Dolsky?” +</p> + +<p> +“Can you have forgotten her?—the young Princess Zasyekin whom we +were all in love with, and you too. Do you remember at the country-house near +Neskutchny gardens?” +</p> + +<p> +“She married a Dolsky?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“And is she here, in the theatre?” +</p> + +<p> +“No: but she’s in Petersburg. She came here a few days ago. +She’s going abroad.” +</p> + +<p> +“What sort of fellow is her husband?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“A splendid fellow, with property. He’s a colleague of mine in +Moscow. You can well understand—after the scandal … you must know all +about it …” (Meidanov smiled significantly) “it was no easy task +for her to make a good marriage; there were consequences … but with her +cleverness, everything is possible. Go and see her; she’ll be delighted +to see you. She’s prettier than ever.” +</p> + +<p> +Meidanov gave me Zinaïda’s address. She was staying at the Hotel Demut. +Old memories were astir within me…. I determined next day to go to see my +former “flame.” But some business happened to turn up; a week +passed, and then another, and when at last I went to the Hotel Demut and asked +for Madame Dolsky, I learnt that four days before, she had died, almost +suddenly, in childbirth. +</p> + +<p> +I felt a sort of stab at my heart. The thought that I might have seen her, and +had not seen her, and should never see her—that bitter thought stung me +with all the force of overwhelming reproach. “She is dead!” I +repeated, staring stupidly at the hall-porter. I slowly made my way back to the +street, and walked on without knowing myself where I was going. All the past +swam up and rose at once before me. So this was the solution, this was the goal +to which that young, ardent, brilliant life had striven, all haste and +agitation! I mused on this; I fancied those dear features, those eyes, those +curls—in the narrow box, in the damp underground darkness—lying +here, not far from me—while I was still alive, and, maybe, a few paces +from my father…. I thought all this; I strained my imagination, and yet all the +while the lines: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“From lips indifferent of her death I heard,<br/> +Indifferently I listened to it, too,” +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +were echoing in my heart. O youth, youth! little dost thou care for anything; +thou art master, as it were, of all the treasures of the universe—even +sorrow gives thee pleasure, even grief thou canst turn to thy profit; thou art +self-confident and insolent; thou sayest, “I alone am living—look +you!”—but thy days fly by all the while, and vanish without trace +or reckoning; and everything in thee vanishes, like wax in the sun, like snow…. +And, perhaps, the whole secret of thy charm lies, not in being able to do +anything, but in being able to think thou wilt do anything; lies just in thy +throwing to the winds, forces which thou couldst not make other use of; in each +of us gravely regarding himself as a prodigal, gravely supposing that he is +justified in saying, “Oh, what might I not have done if I had not wasted +my time!” +</p> + +<p> +I, now … what did I hope for, what did I expect, what rich future did I +foresee, when the phantom of my first love, rising up for an instant, barely +called forth one sigh, one mournful sentiment? +</p> + +<p> +And what has come to pass of all I hoped for? And now, when the shades of +evening begin to steal over my life, what have I left fresher, more precious, +than the memories of the storm—so soon over—of early morning, of +spring? +</p> + +<p> +But I do myself injustice. Even then, in those light-hearted young days, I was +not deaf to the voice of sorrow, when it called upon me, to the solemn strains +floating to me from beyond the tomb. I remember, a few days after I heard of +Zinaïda’s death, I was present, through a peculiar, irresistible impulse, +at the death of a poor old woman who lived in the same house as we. Covered +with rags, lying on hard boards, with a sack under her head, she died hardly +and painfully. Her whole life had been passed in the bitter struggle with daily +want; she had known no joy, had not tasted the honey of happiness. One would +have thought, surely she would rejoice at death, at her deliverance, her rest. +But yet, as long as her decrepit body held out, as long as her breast still +heaved in agony under the icy hand weighing upon it, until her last forces left +her, the old woman crossed herself, and kept whispering, “Lord, forgive +my sins”; and only with the last spark of consciousness, vanished from +her eyes the look of fear, of horror of the end. And I remember that then, by +the death-bed of that poor old woman, I felt aghast for Zinaïda, and longed to +pray for her, for my father—and for myself. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a>MUMU</h2> + +<p> +In one of the outlying streets of Moscow, in a grey house with white columns +and a balcony, warped all askew, there was once living a lady, a widow, +surrounded by a numerous household of serfs. Her sons were in the government +service at Petersburg; her daughters were married; she went out very little, +and in solitude lived through the last years of her miserly and dreary old age. +Her day, a joyless and gloomy day, had long been over; but the evening of her +life was blacker than night. +</p> + +<p> +Of all her servants, the most remarkable personage was the porter, Gerasim, a +man full twelve inches over the normal height, of heroic build, and deaf and +dumb from his birth. The lady, his owner, had brought him up from the village +where he lived alone in a little hut, apart from his brothers, and was reckoned +about the most punctual of her peasants in the payment of the seignorial dues. +Endowed with extraordinary strength, he did the work of four men; work flew +apace under his hands, and it was a pleasant sight to see him when he was +ploughing, while, with his huge palms pressing hard upon the plough, he seemed +alone, unaided by his poor horse, to cleave the yielding bosom of the earth, or +when, about St. Peter’s Day, he plied his scythe with a furious energy +that might have mown a young birch copse up by the roots, or swiftly and +untiringly wielded a flail over two yards long; while the hard oblong muscles +of his shoulders rose and fell like a lever. His perpetual silence lent a +solemn dignity to his unwearying labour. He was a splendid peasant, and, except +for his affliction, any girl would have been glad to marry him…. But now they +had taken Gerasim to Moscow, bought him boots, had him made a full-skirted coat +for summer, a sheepskin for winter, put into his hand a broom and a spade, and +appointed him porter. +</p> + +<p> +At first he intensely disliked his new mode of life. From his childhood he had +been used to field labour, to village life. Shut off by his affliction from the +society of men, he had grown up, dumb and mighty, as a tree grows on a fruitful +soil. When he was transported to the town, he could not understand what was +being done with him; he was miserable and stupefied, with the stupefaction of +some strong young bull, taken straight from the meadow, where the rich grass +stood up to his belly, taken and put in the truck of a railway train, and +there, while smoke and sparks and gusts of steam puff out upon the sturdy +beast, he is whirled onwards, whirled along with loud roar and whistle, +whither—God knows! What Gerasim had to do in his new duties seemed a mere +trifle to him after his hard toil as a peasant; in half-an-hour, all his work +was done, and he would once more stand stock-still in the middle of the +courtyard, staring open-mouthed at all the passers-by, as though trying to +wrest from them the explanation of his perplexing position; or he would +suddenly go off into some corner, and flinging a long way off the broom or the +spade, throw himself on his face on the ground, and lie for hours together +without stirring, like a caged beast. But man gets used to anything, and +Gerasim got used at last to living in town. He had little work to do; his whole +duty consisted in keeping the courtyard clean, bringing in a barrel of water +twice a day, splitting and dragging in wood for the kitchen and the house, +keeping out strangers, and watching at night. And it must be said he did his +duty zealously. In his courtyard there was never a shaving lying about, never a +speck of dust; if sometimes, in the muddy season, the wretched nag, put under +his charge for fetching water, got stuck in the road, he would simply give it a +shove with his shoulder, and set not only the cart but the horse itself moving. +If he set to chopping wood, the axe fairly rang like glass, and chips and +chunks flew in all directions. And as for strangers, after he had one night +caught two thieves and knocked their heads together—knocked them so that +there was not the slightest need to take them to the police-station +afterwards—every one in the neighbourhood began to feel a great respect +for him; even those who came in the day-time, by no means robbers, but simply +unknown persons, at the sight of the terrible porter, waved and shouted to him +as though he could hear their shouts. With all the rest of the servants, +Gerasim was on terms, hardly friendly—they were afraid of him—but +familiar; he regarded them as his fellows. They explained themselves to him by +signs, and he understood them, and exactly carried out all orders, but knew his +own rights too, and soon no one dared to take his seat at the table. Gerasim +was altogether of a strict and serious temper, he liked order in everything; +even the cocks did not dare to fight in his presence, or woe betide them! +directly he caught sight of them, he would seize them by the legs, swing them +ten times round in the air like a wheel, and throw them in different +directions. There were geese, too, kept in the yard; but the goose, as is well +known, is a dignified and reasonable bird; Gerasim felt a respect for them, +looked after them, and fed them; he was himself not unlike a gander of the +steppes. He was assigned a little garret over the kitchen; he arranged it +himself to his own liking, made a bedstead in it of oak boards on four stumps +of wood for legs—a truly Titanic bedstead; one might have put a ton or +two on it—it would not have bent under the load; under the bed was a +solid chest; in a corner stood a little table of the same strong kind, and near +the table a three-legged stool, so solid and squat that Gerasim himself would +sometimes pick it up and drop it again with a smile of delight. The garret was +locked up by means of a padlock that looked like a kalatch or basket-shaped +loaf, only black; the key of this padlock Gerasim always carried about him in +his girdle. He did not like people to come to his garret. +</p> + +<p> +So passed a year, at the end of which a little incident befell Gerasim. +</p> + +<p> +The old lady, in whose service he lived as porter, adhered in everything to the +ancient ways, and kept a large number of servants. In her house were not only +laundresses, sempstresses, carpenters, tailors and tailoresses, there was even +a harness-maker—he was reckoned as a veterinary surgeon, too,—and a +doctor for the servants; there was a household doctor for the mistress; there +was, lastly, a shoemaker, by name Kapiton Klimov, a sad drunkard. Klimov +regarded himself as an injured creature, whose merits were unappreciated, a +cultivated man from Petersburg, who ought not to be living in Moscow without +occupation—in the wilds, so to speak; and if he drank, as he himself +expressed it emphatically, with a blow on his chest, it was sorrow drove him to +it. So one day his mistress had a conversation about him with her head steward, +Gavrila, a man whom, judging solely from his little yellow eyes and nose like a +duck’s beak, fate itself, it seemed, had marked out as a person in +authority. The lady expressed her regret at the corruption of the morals of +Kapiton, who had, only the evening before, been picked up somewhere in the +street. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, Gavrila,” she observed, all of a sudden, “now, if we +were to marry him, what do you think, perhaps he would be steadier?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why not marry him, indeed, ’m? He could be married, +’m,” answered Gavrila, “and it would be a very good thing, to +be sure, ’m.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; only who is to marry him?” +</p> + +<p> +“Ay, ’m. But that’s at your pleasure, ’m. He may, any +way, so to say, be wanted for something; he can’t be turned adrift +altogether.” +</p> + +<p> +“I fancy he likes Tatiana.” +</p> + +<p> +Gavrila was on the point of making some reply, but he shut his lips tightly. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes!… let him marry Tatiana,” the lady decided, taking a pinch of +snuff complacently, “Do you hear?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, ’m,” Gavrila articulated, and he withdrew. +</p> + +<p> +Returning to his own room (it was in a little lodge, and was almost filled up +with metal-bound trunks), Gavrila first sent his wife away, and then sat down +at the window and pondered. His mistress’s unexpected arrangement had +clearly put him in a difficulty. At last he got up and sent to call Kapiton. +Kapiton made his appearance…. But before reporting their conversation to the +reader, we consider it not out of place to relate in few words who was this +Tatiana, whom it was to be Kapiton’s lot to marry, and why the great +lady’s order had disturbed the steward. +</p> + +<p> +Tatiana, one of the laundresses referred to above (as a trained and skilful +laundress she was in charge of the fine linen only), was a woman of +twenty-eight, thin, fair-haired, with moles on her left cheek. Moles on the +left cheek are regarded as of evil omen in Russia—a token of unhappy +life…. Tatiana could not boast of her good luck. From her earliest youth she +had been badly treated; she had done the work of two, and had never known +affection; she had been poorly clothed and had received the smallest wages. +Relations she had practically none; an uncle she had once had, a butler, left +behind in the country as useless, and other uncles of hers were +peasants—that was all. At one time she had passed for a beauty, but her +good looks were very soon over. In disposition, she was very meek, or, rather, +scared; towards herself, she felt perfect indifference; of others, she stood in +mortal dread; she thought of nothing but how to get her work done in good time, +never talked to any one, and trembled at the very name of her mistress, though +the latter scarcely knew her by sight. When Gerasim was brought from the +country, she was ready to die with fear on seeing his huge figure, tried all +she could to avoid meeting him, even dropped her eyelids when sometimes she +chanced to run past him, hurrying from the house to the laundry. Gerasim at +first paid no special attention to her, then he used to smile when she came his +way, then he began even to stare admiringly at her, and at last he never took +his eyes off her. She took his fancy, whether by the mild expression of her +face or the timidity of her movements, who can tell? So one day she was +stealing across the yard, with a starched dressing-jacket of her +mistress’s carefully poised on her outspread fingers … some one suddenly +grasped her vigorously by the elbow; she turned round and fairly screamed; +behind her stood Gerasim. With a foolish smile, making inarticulate caressing +grunts, he held out to her a gingerbread cock with gold tinsel on his tail and +wings. She was about to refuse it, but he thrust it forcibly into her hand, +shook his head, walked away, and turning round, once more grunted something +very affectionately to her. From that day forward he gave her no peace; +wherever she went, he was on the spot at once, coming to meet her, smiling, +grunting, waving his hands; all at once he would pull a ribbon out of the bosom +of his smock and put it in her hand, or would sweep the dust out of her way. +The poor girl simply did not know how to behave or what to do. Soon the whole +household knew of the dumb porter’s wiles; jeers, jokes, sly hints were +showered upon Tatiana. At Gerasim, however, it was not every one who would dare +to scoff; he did not like jokes; indeed, in his presence, she, too, was left in +peace. Whether she liked it or not, the girl found herself to be under his +protection. Like all deaf-mutes, he was very suspicious, and very readily +perceived when they were laughing at him or at her. One day, at dinner, the +wardrobe-keeper, Tatiana’s superior, fell to nagging, as it is called, at +her, and brought the poor thing to such a state that she did not know where to +look, and was almost crying with vexation. Gerasim got up all of a sudden, +stretched out his gigantic hand, laid it on the wardrobe-maid’s head, and +looked into her face with such grim ferocity that her head positively flopped +upon the table. Every one was still. Gerasim took up his spoon again and went +on with his cabbage-soup. “Look at him, the dumb devil, the +wood-demon!” they all muttered in under-tones, while the wardrobe-maid +got up and went out into the maids’ room. Another time, noticing that +Kapiton—the same Kapiton who was the subject of the conversation reported +above—was gossiping somewhat too attentively with Tatiana, Gerasim +beckoned him to him, led him into the cartshed, and taking up a shaft that was +standing in a corner by one end, lightly, but most significantly, menaced him +with it. Since then no one addressed a word to Tatiana. And all this cost him +nothing. It is true the wardrobe-maid, as soon as she reached the maids’ +room, promptly fell into a fainting-fit, and behaved altogether so skilfully +that Gerasim’s rough action reached his mistress’s knowledge the +same day. But the capricious old lady only laughed, and several times, to the +great offence of the wardrobe-maid, forced her to repeat “how he bent +your head down with his heavy hand,” and next day she sent Gerasim a +rouble. She looked on him with favour as a strong and faithful watchman. +Gerasim stood in considerable awe of her, but, all the same, he had hopes of +her favour, and was preparing to go to her with a petition for leave to marry +Tatiana. He was only waiting for a new coat, promised him by the steward, to +present a proper appearance before his mistress, when this same mistress +suddenly took it into her head to marry Tatiana to Kapiton. +</p> + +<p> +The reader will now readily understand the perturbation of mind that overtook +the steward Gavrila after his conversation with his mistress. “My +lady,” he thought, as he sat at the window, “favours Gerasim, to be +sure”—(Gavrila was well aware of this, and that was why he himself +looked on him with an indulgent eye)—“still he is a speechless +creature. I could not, indeed, put it before the mistress that Gerasim’s +courting Tatiana. But, after all, it’s true enough; he’s a queer +sort of husband. But on the other hand, that devil, God forgive me, has only +got to find out they’re marrying Tatiana to Kapiton, he’ll smash up +everything in the house, ’pon my soul! There’s no reasoning with +him; why, he’s such a devil, God forgive my sins, there’s no +getting over him no how … ’pon my soul!” +</p> + +<p> +Kapiton’s entrance broke the thread of Gavrila’s reflections. The +dissipated shoemaker came in, his hands behind him, and lounging carelessly +against a projecting angle of the wall, near the door, crossed his right foot +in front of his left, and tossed his head, as much as to say, “What do +you want?” +</p> + +<p> +Gavrila looked at Kapiton, and drummed with his fingers on the window-frame. +Kapiton merely screwed up his leaden eyes a little, but he did not look down, +he even grinned slightly, and passed his hand over his whitish locks which were +sticking up in all directions. “Well, here I am. What is it?” +</p> + +<p> +“You’re a pretty fellow,” said Gavrila, and paused. “A +pretty fellow you are, there’s no denying!” +</p> + +<p> +Kapiton only twitched his little shoulders. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you any better, pray?” he thought to himself. +</p> + +<p> +“Just look at yourself, now, look at yourself,” Gavrila went on +reproachfully; “now, what ever do you look like?” +</p> + +<p> +Kapiton serenely surveyed his shabby tattered coat, and his patched trousers, +and with special attention stared at his burst boots, especially the one on the +tip-toe of which his right foot so gracefully poised, and he fixed his eyes +again on the steward. +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well?” repeated Gavrila. “Well? And then you say well? You +look like old Nick himself, God forgive my saying so, that’s what you +look like.” +</p> + +<p> +Kapiton blinked rapidly. +</p> + +<p> +“Go on abusing me, go on, if you like, Gavrila Andreitch,” he +thought to himself again. +</p> + +<p> +“Here you’ve been drunk again,” Gavrila began, “drunk +again, haven’t you? Eh? Come, answer me!” +</p> + +<p> +“Owing to the weakness of my health, I have exposed myself to spirituous +beverages, certainly,” replied Kapiton. +</p> + +<p> +“Owing to the weakness of your health!… They let you off too easy, +that’s what it is; and you’ve been apprenticed in Petersburg…. Much +you learned in your apprenticeship! You simply eat your bread in +idleness.” +</p> + +<p> +“In that matter, Gavrila Andreitch, there is one to judge me, the Lord +God Himself, and no one else. He also knows what manner of man I be in this +world, and whether I eat my bread in idleness. And as concerning your +contention regarding drunkenness, in that matter, too, I am not to blame, but +rather a friend; he led me into temptation, but was diplomatic and got away, +while I….” +</p> + +<p> +“While you were left, like a goose, in the street. Ah, you’re a +dissolute fellow! But that’s not the point,” the steward went on, +“I’ve something to tell you. Our lady…” here he paused a +minute, “it’s our lady’s pleasure that you should be married. +Do you hear? She imagines you may be steadier when you’re married. Do you +understand?” +</p> + +<p> +“To be sure I do.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, then. For my part I think it would be better to give you a good +hiding. But there—it’s her business. Well? are you +agreeable?” +</p> + +<p> +Kapiton grinned. +</p> + +<p> +“Matrimony is an excellent thing for any one, Gavrila Andreitch; and, as +far as I am concerned, I shall be quite agreeable.” +</p> + +<p> +“Very well, then,” replied Gavrila, while he reflected to himself: +“there’s no denying the man expresses himself very properly. Only +there’s one thing,” he pursued aloud: “the wife our +lady’s picked out for you is an unlucky choice.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, who is she, permit me to inquire?” +</p> + +<p> +“Tatiana.” +</p> + +<p> +“Tatiana?” +</p> + +<p> +And Kapiton opened his eyes, and moved a little away from the wall. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, what are you in such a taking for?… Isn’t she to your taste, +hey?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not to my taste, do you say, Gavrila Andreitch! She’s right +enough, a hard-working steady girl…. But you know very well yourself, Gavrila +Andreitch, why that fellow, that wild man of the woods, that monster of the +steppes, he’s after her, you know….” +</p> + +<p> +“I know, mate, I know all about it,” the butler cut him short in a +tone of annoyance: “but there, you see….” +</p> + +<p> +“But upon my soul, Gavrila Andreitch! why, he’ll kill me, by God, +he will, he’ll crush me like some fly; why, he’s got a +fist—why, you kindly look yourself what a fist he’s got; why, +he’s simply got a fist like Minin Pozharsky’s. You see he’s +deaf, he beats and does not hear how he’s beating! He swings his great +fists, as if he’s asleep. And there’s no possibility of pacifying +him; and for why? Why, because, as you know yourself, Gavrila Andreitch, +he’s deaf, and what’s more, has no more wit than the heel of my +foot. Why, he’s a sort of beast, a heathen idol, Gavrila Andreitch, and +worse … a block of wood; what have I done that I should have to suffer from him +now? Sure it is, it’s all over with me now; I’ve knocked about, +I’ve had enough to put up with, I’ve been battered like an +earthenware pot, but still I’m a man, after all, and not a worthless +pot.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know, I know, don’t go talking away….” +</p> + +<p> +“Lord, my God!” the shoemaker continued warmly, “when is the +end? when, O Lord! A poor wretch I am, a poor wretch whose sufferings are +endless! What a life, what a life mine’s been, come to think of it! In my +young days, I was beaten by a German I was ’prentice to; in the prime of +life beaten by my own countrymen, and last of all, in ripe years, see what I +have been brought to….” +</p> + +<p> +“Ugh, you flabby soul!” said Gavrila Andreitch. “Why do you +make so many words about it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, do you say, Gavrila Andreitch? It’s not a beating I’m +afraid of, Gavrila Andreitch. A gentleman may chastise me in private, but give +me a civil word before folks, and I’m a man still; but see now, whom +I’ve to do with….” +</p> + +<p> +“Come, get along,” Gavrila interposed impatiently. Kapiton turned +away and staggered off. +</p> + +<p> +“But, if it were not for him,” the steward shouted after him, +“you would consent for your part?” +</p> + +<p> +“I signify my acquiescence,” retorted Kapiton as he disappeared. +</p> + +<p> +His fine language did not desert him, even in the most trying positions. +</p> + +<p> +The steward walked several times up and down the room. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, call Tatiana now,” he said at last. +</p> + +<p> +A few instants later, Tatiana had come up almost noiselessly, and was standing +in the doorway. +</p> + +<p> +“What are your orders, Gavrila Andreitch?” she said in a soft +voice. +</p> + +<p> +The steward looked at her intently. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Taniusha,” he said, “would you like to be married? Our +lady has chosen a husband for you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Gavrila Andreitch. And whom has she deigned to name as a husband +for me?” she added falteringly. +</p> + +<p> +“Kapiton, the shoemaker.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“He’s a feather-brained fellow, that’s certain. But +it’s just for that the mistress reckons upon you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, sir.” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s one difficulty … you know the deaf man, Gerasim, +he’s courting you, you see. How did you come to bewitch such a bear? But +you see, he’ll kill you, very like, he’s such a bear….” +</p> + +<p> +“He’ll kill me, Gavrila Andreitch, he’ll kill me, and no +mistake.” +</p> + +<p> +“Kill you…. Well, we shall see about that. What do you mean by saying +he’ll kill you? Has he any right to kill you? tell me yourself.” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know, Gavrila Andreitch, about his having any right or +not.” +</p> + +<p> +“What a woman! why, you’ve made him no promise, I suppose….” +</p> + +<p> +“What are you pleased to ask of me?” +</p> + +<p> +The steward was silent for a little, thinking, “You’re a meek soul! +Well, that’s right,” he said aloud; “we’ll have another +talk with you later, now you can go, Taniusha; I see you’re not unruly, +certainly.” +</p> + +<p> +Tatiana turned, steadied herself a little against the doorpost, and went away. +</p> + +<p> +“And, perhaps, our lady will forget all about this wedding by +to-morrow,” thought the steward; “and here am I worrying myself for +nothing! As for that insolent fellow, we must tie him down, if it comes to +that, we must let the police know” … “Ustinya Fyedorovna!” he +shouted in a loud voice to his wife, “heat the samovar, my good +soul….” All that day Tatiana hardly went out of the laundry. At first she +had started crying, then she wiped away her tears, and set to work as before. +Kapiton stayed till late at night at the ginshop with a friend of his, a man of +gloomy appearance, to whom he related in detail how he used to live in +Petersburg with a gentleman, who would have been all right, except he was a bit +too strict, and he had a slight weakness besides, he was too fond of drink; +and, as to the fair sex, he didn’t stick at anything. His gloomy +companion merely said yes; but when Kapiton announced at last that, in a +certain event, he would have to lay hands on himself to-morrow, his gloomy +companion remarked that it was bedtime. And they parted in surly silence. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile, the steward’s anticipations were not fulfilled. The old lady +was so much taken up with the idea of Kapiton’s wedding, that even in the +night she talked of nothing else to one of her companions, who was kept in her +house solely to entertain her in case of sleeplessness, and, like a night +cabman, slept in the day. When Gavrila came to her after morning tea with his +report, her first question was: “And how about our wedding—is it +getting on all right?” He replied, of course, that it was getting on +first rate, and that Kapiton would appear before her to pay his reverence to +her that day. The old lady was not quite well; she did not give much time to +business. The steward went back to his own room, and called a council. The +matter certainly called for serious consideration. Tatiana would make no +difficulty, of course; but Kapiton had declared in the hearing of all that he +had but one head to lose, not two or three…. Gerasim turned rapid sullen looks +on every one, would not budge from the steps of the maids’ quarters, and +seemed to guess that some mischief was being hatched against him. They met +together. Among them was an old sideboard waiter, nicknamed Uncle Tail, to whom +every one looked respectfully for counsel, though all they got out of him was, +“Here’s a pretty pass! to be sure, to be sure, to be sure!” +As a preliminary measure of security, to provide against contingencies, they +locked Kapiton up in the lumber-room where the filter was kept; then considered +the question with the gravest deliberation. It would, to be sure, be easy to +have recourse to force. But Heaven save us! there would be an uproar, the +mistress would be put out—it would be awful! What should they do? They +thought and thought, and at last thought out a solution. It had many a time +been observed that Gerasim could not bear drunkards…. As he sat at the gates, +he would always turn away with disgust when some one passed by intoxicated, +with unsteady steps and his cap on one side of his ear. They resolved that +Tatiana should be instructed to pretend to be tipsy, and should pass by Gerasim +staggering and reeling about. The poor girl refused for a long while to agree +to this, but they persuaded her at last; she saw, too, that it was the only +possible way of getting rid of her adorer. She went out. Kapiton was released +from the lumber-room; for, after all, he had an interest in the affair. Gerasim +was sitting on the curb-stone at the gates, scraping the ground with a spade…. +From behind every corner, from behind every window-blind, the others were +watching him…. The trick succeeded beyond all expectations. On seeing Tatiana, +at first, he nodded as usual, making caressing, inarticulate sounds; then he +looked carefully at her, dropped his spade, jumped up, went up to her, brought +his face close to her face…. In her fright she staggered more than ever, and +shut her eyes…. He took her by the arm, whirled her right across the yard, and +going into the room where the council had been sitting, pushed her straight at +Kapiton. Tatiana fairly swooned away…. Gerasim stood, looked at her, waved his +hand, laughed, and went off, stepping heavily, to his garret…. For the next +twenty-four hours, he did not come out of it. The postillion Antipka said +afterwards that he saw Gerasim through a crack in the wall, sitting on his +bedstead, his face in his hand. From time to time he uttered soft regular +sounds; he was wailing a dirge, that is, swaying backwards and forwards with +his eyes shut, and shaking his head as drivers or bargemen do when they chant +their melancholy songs. Antipka could not bear it, and he came away from the +crack. When Gerasim came out of the garret next day, no particular change could +be observed in him. He only seemed, as it were, more morose, and took not the +slightest notice of Tatiana or Kapiton. The same evening, they both had to +appear before their mistress with geese under their arms, and in a week’s +time they were married. Even on the day of the wedding Gerasim showed no change +of any sort in his behaviour. Only, he came back from the river without water, +he had somehow broken the barrel on the road; and at night, in the stable, he +washed and rubbed down his horse so vigorously, that it swayed like a blade of +grass in the wind, and staggered from one leg to the other under his fists of +iron. +</p> + +<p> +All this had taken place in the spring. Another year passed by, during which +Kapiton became a hopeless drunkard, and as being absolutely of no use for +anything, was sent away with the store waggons to a distant village with his +wife. On the day of his departure, he put a very good face on it at first, and +declared that he would always be at home, send him where they would, even to +the other end of the world; but later on he lost heart, began grumbling that he +was being taken to uneducated people, and collapsed so completely at last that +he could not even put his own hat on. Some charitable soul stuck it on his +forehead, set the peak straight in front, and thrust it on with a slap from +above. When everything was quite ready, and the peasants already held the reins +in their hands, and were only waiting for the words “With God’s +blessing!” to start, Gerasim came out of his garret, went up to Tatiana, +and gave her as a parting present a red cotton handkerchief he had bought for +her a year ago. Tatiana, who had up to that instant borne all the revolting +details of her life with great indifference, could not control herself upon +that; she burst into tears, and as she took her seat in the cart, she kissed +Gerasim three times like a good Christian. He meant to accompany her as far as +the town-barrier, and did walk beside her cart for a while, but he stopped +suddenly at the Crimean ford, waved his hand, and walked away along the +riverside. +</p> + +<p> +It was getting towards evening. He walked slowly, watching the water. All of a +sudden he fancied something was floundering in the mud close to the bank. He +stooped over, and saw a little white-and-black puppy, who, in spite of all its +efforts, could not get out of the water; it was struggling, slipping back, and +trembling all over its thin wet little body. Gerasim looked at the unlucky +little dog, picked it up with one hand, put it into the bosom of his coat, and +hurried with long steps homewards. He went into his garret, put the rescued +puppy on his bed, covered it with his thick overcoat, ran first to the stable +for straw, and then to the kitchen for a cup of milk. Carefully folding back +the overcoat, and spreading out the straw, he set the milk on the bedstead. The +poor little puppy was not more than three weeks old, its eyes were only just +open—one eye still seemed rather larger than the other; it did not know +how to lap out of a cup, and did nothing but shiver and blink. Gerasim took +hold of its head softly with two fingers, and dipped its little nose into the +milk. The pup suddenly began lapping greedily, sniffing, shaking itself, and +choking. Gerasim watched and watched it, and all at once he laughed outright…. +All night long he was waiting on it, keeping it covered, and rubbing it dry. He +fell asleep himself at last, and slept quietly and happily by its side. +</p> + +<p> +No mother could have looked after her baby as Gerasim looked after his little +nursling. At first, she—for the pup turned out to be a bitch—was +very weak, feeble, and ugly, but by degrees she grew stronger and improved in +looks, and thanks to the unflagging care of her preserver, in eight +months’ time she was transformed into a very pretty dog of the spaniel +breed, with long ears, a bushy spiral tail, and large expressive eyes. She was +devotedly attached to Gerasim, and was never a yard from his side; she always +followed him about wagging her tail. He had even given her a name—the +dumb know that their inarticulate noises call the attention of others. He +called her Mumu. All the servants in the house liked her, and called her Mumu, +too. She was very intelligent, she was friendly with every one, but was only +fond of Gerasim. Gerasim, on his side, loved her passionately, and he did not +like it when other people stroked her; whether he was afraid for her, or +jealous—God knows! She used to wake him in the morning, pulling at his +coat; she used to take the reins in her mouth, and bring him up the old horse +that carried the water, with whom she was on very friendly terms. With a face +of great importance, she used to go with him to the river; she used to watch +his brooms and spades, and never allowed any one to go into his garret. He cut +a little hole in his door on purpose for her, and she seemed to feel that only +in Gerasim’s garret she was completely mistress and at home; and directly +she went in, she used to jump with a satisfied air upon the bed. At night she +did not sleep at all, but she never barked without sufficient cause, like some +stupid house-dog, who, sitting on its hind-legs, blinking, with its nose in the +air, barks simply from dulness, at the stars, usually three times in +succession. No! Mumu’s delicate little voice was never raised without +good reason; either some stranger was passing close to the fence, or there was +some suspicious sound or rustle somewhere…. In fact, she was an excellent +watch-dog. It is true that there was another dog in the yard, a tawny old dog +with brown spots, called Wolf, but he was never, even at night, let off the +chain; and, indeed, he was so decrepit that he did not even wish for freedom. +He used to lie curled up in his kennel, and only rarely uttered a sleepy, +almost noiseless bark, which broke off at once, as though he were himself aware +of its uselessness. Mumu never went into the mistress’s house; and when +Gerasim carried wood into the rooms, she always stayed behind, impatiently +waiting for him at the steps, pricking up her ears and turning her head to +right and to left at the slightest creak of the door…. +</p> + +<p> +So passed another year. Gerasim went on performing his duties as house-porter, +and was very well content with his lot, when suddenly an unexpected incident +occurred…. One fine summer day the old lady was walking up and down the +drawing-room with her dependants. She was in high spirits; she laughed and made +jokes. Her servile companions laughed and joked too, but they did not feel +particularly mirthful; the household did not much like it, when their mistress +was in a lively mood, for, to begin with, she expected from every one prompt +and complete participation in her merriment, and was furious if any one showed +a face that did not beam with delight, and secondly, these outbursts never +lasted long with her, and were usually followed by a sour and gloomy mood. That +day she had got up in a lucky hour; at cards she took the four knaves, which +means the fulfilment of one’s wishes (she used to try her fortune on the +cards every morning), and her tea struck her as particularly delicious, for +which her maid was rewarded by words of praise, and by twopence in money. With +a sweet smile on her wrinkled lips, the lady walked about the drawing-room and +went up to the window. A flower-garden had been laid out before the window, and +in the very middle bed, under a rose-bush, lay Mumu busily gnawing a bone. The +lady caught sight of her. +</p> + +<p> +“Mercy on us!” she cried suddenly; “what dog is that?” +</p> + +<p> +The companion, addressed by the old lady, hesitated, poor thing, in that +wretched state of uneasiness which is common in any person in a dependent +position who doesn’t know very well what significance to give to the +exclamation of a superior. +</p> + +<p> +“I d … d … don’t know,” she faltered: “I fancy +it’s the dumb man’s dog.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mercy!” the lady cut her short: “but it’s a charming +little dog! order it to be brought in. Has he had it long? How is it I’ve +never seen it before?… Order it to be brought in.” +</p> + +<p> +The companion flew at once into the hall. +</p> + +<p> +“Boy, boy!” she shouted: “bring Mumu in at once! She’s +in the flower-garden.” +</p> + +<p> +“Her name’s Mumu then,” observed the lady: “a very nice +name.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, very, indeed!” chimed in the companion. “Make haste, +Stepan!” +</p> + +<p> +Stepan, a sturdily-built young fellow, whose duties were those of a footman, +rushed headlong into the flower-garden, and tried to capture Mumu, but she +cleverly slipped from his fingers, and with her tail in the air, fled full +speed to Gerasim, who was at that instant in the kitchen, knocking out and +cleaning a barrel, turning it upside down in his hands like a child’s +drum. Stepan ran after her, and tried to catch her just at her master’s +feet; but the sensible dog would not let a stranger touch her, and with a +bound, she got away. Gerasim looked on with a smile at all this ado; at last, +Stepan got up, much amazed, and hurriedly explained to him by signs that the +mistress wanted the dog brought in to her. Gerasim was a little astonished; he +called Mumu, however, picked her up, and handed her over to Stepan. Stepan +carried her into the drawing-room, and put her down on the parquette floor. The +old lady began calling the dog to her in a coaxing voice. Mumu, who had never +in her life been in such magnificent apartments, was very much frightened, and +made a rush for the door, but, being driven back by the obsequious Stepan, she +began trembling, and huddled close up against the wall. +</p> + +<p> +“Mumu, Mumu, come to me, come to your mistress,” said the lady; +“come, silly thing … don’t be afraid.” +</p> + +<p> +“Come, Mumu, come to the mistress,” repeated the companions. +“Come along!” +</p> + +<p> +But Mumu looked round her uneasily, and did not stir. +</p> + +<p> +“Bring her something to eat,” said the old lady. “How stupid +she is! she won’t come to her mistress. What’s she afraid +of?” +</p> + +<p> +“She’s not used to your honour yet,” ventured one of the +companions in a timid and conciliatory voice. +</p> + +<p> +Stepan brought in a saucer of milk, and set it down before Mumu, but Mumu would +not even sniff at the milk, and still shivered, and looked round as before. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, what a silly you are!” said the lady, and going up to her, she +stooped down, and was about to stroke her, but Mumu turned her head abruptly, +and showed her teeth. The lady hurriedly drew back her hand…. +</p> + +<p> +A momentary silence followed. Mumu gave a faint whine, as though she would +complain and apologise…. The old lady moved back, scowling. The dog’s +sudden movement had frightened her. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah!” shrieked all the companions at once, “she’s not +bitten you, has she? Heaven forbid! (Mumu had never bitten any one in her +life.) Ah! ah!” +</p> + +<p> +“Take her away,” said the old lady in a changed voice. +“Wretched little dog! What a spiteful creature!” +</p> + +<p> +And, turning round deliberately, she went towards her boudoir. Her companions +looked timidly at one another, and were about to follow her, but she stopped, +stared coldly at them, and said, “What’s that for, pray? I’ve +not called you,” and went out. +</p> + +<p> +The companions waved their hands to Stepan in despair. He picked up Mumu, and +flung her promptly outside the door, just at Gerasim’s feet, and +half-an-hour later a profound stillness reigned in the house, and the old lady +sat on her sofa looking blacker than a thunder-cloud. +</p> + +<p> +What trifles, if you think of it, will sometimes disturb any one! +</p> + +<p> +Till evening the lady was out of humour; she did not talk to any one, did not +play cards, and passed a bad night. She fancied the eau-de-Cologne they gave +her was not the same as she usually had, and that her pillow smelt of soap, and +she made the wardrobe-maid smell all the bed linen—in fact she was very +upset and cross altogether. Next morning she ordered Gavrila to be summoned an +hour earlier than usual. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me, please,” she began, directly the latter, not without some +inward trepidation, crossed the threshold of her boudoir, “what dog was +that barking all night in our yard? It wouldn’t let me sleep!” +</p> + +<p> +“A dog, ’m … what dog, ’m … may be, the dumb man’s dog, +’m,” he brought out in a rather unsteady voice. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know whether it was the dumb man’s or whose, but it +wouldn’t let me sleep. And I wonder what we have such a lot of dogs for! +I wish to know. We have a yard dog, haven’t we?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh yes, ’m, we have, ’m. Wolf, ’m.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, why more, what do we want more dogs for? It’s simply +introducing disorder. There’s no one in control in the +house—that’s what it is. And what does the dumb man want with a +dog? Who gave him leave to keep dogs in my yard? Yesterday I went to the +window, and there it was lying in the flower-garden; it had dragged in +some nastiness it was gnawing, and my roses are planted there….” +</p> + +<p> +The lady ceased. +</p> + +<p> +“Let her be gone from to-day … do you hear?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, ’m.” +</p> + +<p> +“To-day. Now go. I will send for you later for the report.” +</p> + +<p> +Gavrila went away. +</p> + +<p> +As he went through the drawing-room, the steward by way of maintaining order +moved a bell from one table to another; he stealthily blew his duck-like nose +in the hall, and went into the outer-hall. In the outer-hall, on a locker was +Stepan asleep in the attitude of a slain warrior in a battalion picture, his +bare legs thrust out below the coat which served him for a blanket. The steward +gave him a shove, and whispered some instructions to him, to which Stepan +responded with something between a yawn and a laugh. The steward went away, and +Stepan got up, put on his coat and his boots, went out and stood on the steps. +Five minutes had not passed before Gerasim made his appearance with a huge +bundle of hewn logs on his back, accompanied by the inseparable Mumu. (The lady +had given orders that her bedroom and boudoir should be heated at times even in +the summer.) Gerasim turned sideways before the door, shoved it open with his +shoulder, and staggered into the house with his load. Mumu, as usual, stayed +behind to wait for him. Then Stepan, seizing his chance, suddenly pounced on +her, like a kite on a chicken, held her down to the ground, gathered her up in +his arms, and without even putting on his cap, ran out of the yard with her, +got into the first fly he met, and galloped off to a market-place. There he +soon found a purchaser, to whom he sold her for a shilling, on condition that +he would keep her for at least a week tied up; then he returned at once. But +before he got home, he got off the fly, and going right round the yard, jumped +over the fence into the yard from a back street. He was afraid to go in at the +gate for fear of meeting Gerasim. +</p> + +<p> +His anxiety was unnecessary, however; Gerasim was no longer in the yard. On +coming out of the house he had at once missed Mumu. He never remembered her +failing to wait for his return, and began running up and down, looking for her, +and calling her in his own way…. He rushed up to his garret, up to the +hay-loft, ran out into the street, this way and that…. She was lost! He turned +to the other serfs, with the most despairing signs, questioned them about her, +pointing to her height from the ground, describing her with his hands…. Some of +them really did not know what had become of Mumu, and merely shook their heads, +others did know, and smiled to him for all response, while the steward assumed +an important air, and began scolding the coachmen. Then Gerasim ran right away +out of the yard. +</p> + +<p> +It was dark by the time he came back. From his worn-out look, his unsteady +walk, and his dusty clothes, it might be surmised that he had been running over +half Moscow. He stood still opposite the windows of the mistress’ house, +took a searching look at the steps where a group of house-serfs were crowded +together, turned away, and uttered once more his inarticulate +“Mumu.” Mumu did not answer. He went away. Every one looked after +him, but no one smiled or said a word, and the inquisitive postillion Antipka +reported next morning in the kitchen that the dumb man had been groaning all +night. +</p> + +<p> +All the next day Gerasim did not show himself, so that they were obliged to +send the coachman Potap for water instead of him, at which the coachman Potap +was anything but pleased. The lady asked Gavrila if her orders had been carried +out. Gavrila replied that they had. The next morning Gerasim came out of his +garret, and went about his work. He came in to his dinner, ate it, and went out +again, without a greeting to any one. His face, which had always been lifeless, +as with all deaf-mutes, seemed now to be turned to stone. After dinner he went +out of the yard again, but not for long; he came back, and went straight up to +the hay-loft. Night came on, a clear moonlight night. Gerasim lay breathing +heavily, and incessantly turning from side to side. Suddenly he felt something +pull at the skirt of his coat. He started, but did not raise his head, and even +shut his eyes tighter. But again there was a pull, stronger than before; he +jumped up … before him, with an end of string round her neck, was Mumu, +twisting and turning. A prolonged cry of delight broke from his speechless +breast; he caught up Mumu, and hugged her tight in his arms, she licked his +nose and eyes, and beard and moustache, all in one instant…. He stood a little, +thought a minute, crept cautiously down from the hay-loft, looked round, and +having satisfied himself that no one could see him, made his way successfully +to his garret. Gerasim had guessed before that his dog had not got lost by her +own doing, that she must have been taken away by the mistress’ orders; +the servants had explained to him by signs that his Mumu had snapped at her, +and he determined to take his own measures. First he fed Mumu with a bit of +bread, fondled her, and put her to bed, then he fell to meditating, and spent +the whole night long in meditating how he could best conceal her. At last he +decided to leave her all day in the garret, and only to come in now and then to +see her, and to take her out at night. The hole in the door he stopped up +effectually with his old overcoat, and almost before it was light he was +already in the yard, as though nothing had happened, even—innocent +guile!—the same expression of melancholy on his face. It did not even +occur to the poor deaf man that Mumu would betray herself by her whining; in +reality, every one in the house was soon aware that the dumb man’s dog +had come back, and was locked up in his garret, but from sympathy with him and +with her, and partly, perhaps, from dread of him, they did not let him know +that they had found out his secret. The steward scratched his hand, and gave a +despairing wave of his hand, as much as to say, “Well, well, God have +mercy on him! If only it doesn’t come to the mistress’ ears!” +</p> + +<p> +But the dumb man had never shown such energy as on that day; he cleaned and +scraped the whole courtyard, pulled up every single weed with his own hand, +tugged up every stake in the fence of the flower-garden, to satisfy himself +that they were strong enough, and unaided drove them in again; in fact, he +toiled and laboured so that even the old lady noticed his zeal. Twice in the +course of the day Gerasim went stealthily in to see his prisoner; when night +came on, he lay down to sleep with her in the garret, not in the hay-loft, and +only at two o’clock in the night he went out to take her a turn in the +fresh air. After walking about the courtyard a good while with her, he was just +turning back, when suddenly a rustle was heard behind the fence on the side of +the back street. Mumu pricked up her ears, growled—went up to the fence, +sniffed, and gave vent to a loud shrill bark. Some drunkard had thought fit to +take refuge under the fence for the night. At that very time the old lady had +just fallen asleep after a prolonged fit of “nervous agitation”; +these fits of agitation always overtook her after too hearty a supper. The +sudden bark waked her up: her heart palpitated, and she felt faint. +“Girls, girls!” she moaned. “Girls!” The terrified +maids ran into her bedroom. “Oh, oh, I am dying!” she said, +flinging her arms about in her agitation. “Again, that dog again!… Oh, +send for the doctor. They mean to be the death of me…. The dog, the dog again! +Oh!” And she let her head fall back, which always signified a swoon. They +rushed for the doctor, that is, for the household physician, Hariton. This +doctor, whose whole qualification consisted in wearing soft-soled boots, knew +how to feel the pulse delicately. He used to sleep fourteen hours out of the +twenty-four, but the rest of the time he was always sighing, and continually +dosing the old lady with cherrybay drops. This doctor ran up at once, fumigated +the room with burnt feathers, and when the old lady opened her eyes, promptly +offered her a wineglass of the hallowed drops on a silver tray. The old lady +took them, but began again at once in a tearful voice complaining of the dog, +of Gavrila, and of her fate, declaring that she was a poor old woman, and that +every one had forsaken her, no one pitied her, every one wished her dead. +Meanwhile the luckless Mumu had gone on barking, while Gerasim tried in vain to +call her away from the fence. “There … there … again,” groaned the +old lady, and once more she turned up the whites of her eyes. The doctor +whispered to a maid, she rushed into the outer-hall, and shook Stepan, he ran +to wake Gavrila, Gavrila in a fury ordered the whole household to get up. +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim turned round, saw lights and shadows moving in the windows, and with an +instinct of coming trouble in his heart, put Mumu under his arm, ran into his +garret, and locked himself in. A few minutes later five men were banging at his +door, but feeling the resistance of the bolt, they stopped. Gavrila ran up in a +fearful state of mind, and ordered them all to wait there and watch till +morning. Then he flew off himself to the maids’ quarter, and through an +old companion, Liubov Liubimovna, with whose assistance he used to steal tea, +sugar, and other groceries and to falsify the accounts, sent word to the +mistress that the dog had unhappily run back from somewhere, but that to-morrow +she should be killed, and would the mistress be so gracious as not to be angry +and to overlook it. The old lady would probably not have been so soon appeased, +but the doctor had in his haste given her fully forty drops instead of twelve. +The strong dose of narcotic acted; in a quarter of an hour the old lady was in +a sound and peaceful sleep; while Gerasim was lying with a white face on his +bed, holding Mumu’s mouth tightly shut. +</p> + +<p> +Next morning the lady woke up rather late. Gavrila was waiting till she should +be awake, to give the order for a final assault on Gerasim’s stronghold, +while he prepared himself to face a fearful storm. But the storm did not come +off. The old lady lay in bed and sent for the eldest of her dependent +companions. +</p> + +<p> +“Liubov Liubimovna,” she began in a subdued weak voice—she +was fond of playing the part of an oppressed and forsaken victim; needless to +say, every one in the house was made extremely uncomfortable at such +times—“Liubov Liubimovna, you see my position; go, my love to +Gavrila Andreitch, and talk to him a little. Can he really prize some wretched +cur above the repose—the very life—of his mistress? I could not +bear to think so,” she added, with an expression of deep feeling. +“Go, my love; be so good as to go to Gavrila Andreitch for me.” +</p> + +<p> +Liubov Liubimovna went to Gavrila’s room. What conversation passed +between them is not known, but a short time after, a whole crowd of people was +moving across the yard in the direction of Gerasim’s garret. Gavrila +walked in front, holding his cap on with his hand, though there was no wind. +The footmen and cooks were close behind him; Uncle Tail was looking out of a +window, giving instructions, that is to say, simply waving his hands. At the +rear there was a crowd of small boys skipping and hopping along; half of them +were outsiders who had run up. On the narrow staircase leading to the garret +sat one guard; at the door were standing two more with sticks. They began to +mount the stairs, which they entirely blocked up. Gavrila went up to the door, +knocked with his fist, shouting, “Open the door!” +</p> + +<p> +A stifled bark was audible, but there was no answer. +</p> + +<p> +“Open the door, I tell you,” he repeated. +</p> + +<p> +“But, Gavrila Andreitch,” Stepan observed from below, +“he’s deaf, you know—he doesn’t hear.” +</p> + +<p> +They all laughed. +</p> + +<p> +“What are we to do?” Gavrila rejoined from above. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, there’s a hole there in the door,” answered Stepan, +“so you shake the stick in there.” +</p> + +<p> +Gavrila bent down. +</p> + +<p> +“He’s stuffed it up with a coat or something.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, you just push the coat in.” +</p> + +<p> +At this moment a smothered bark was heard again. +</p> + +<p> +“See, see—she speaks for herself,” was remarked in the crowd, +and again they laughed. +</p> + +<p> +Gavrila scratched his ear. +</p> + +<p> +“No, mate,” he responded at last, “you can poke the coat in +yourself, if you like.” +</p> + +<p> +“All right, let me.” +</p> + +<p> +And Stepan scrambled up, took the stick, pushed in the coat, and began waving +the stick about in the opening, saying, “Come out, come out!” as he +did so. He was still waving the stick, when suddenly the door of the garret was +flung open; all the crowd flew pell-mell down the stairs instantly, Gavrila +first of all. Uncle Tail locked the window. +</p> + +<p> +“Come, come, come,” shouted Gavrila from the yard, “mind what +you’re about.” +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim stood without stirring in his doorway. The crowd gathered at the foot +of the stairs. Gerasim, with his arms akimbo, looked down at all these poor +creatures in German coats; in his red peasant’s shirt he looked like a +giant before them. Gavrila took a step forward. +</p> + +<p> +“Mind, mate,” said he, “don’t be insolent.” +</p> + +<p> +And he began to explain to him by signs that the mistress insists on having his +dog; that he must hand it over at once, or it would be the worse for him. +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim looked at him, pointed to the dog, made a motion with his hand round +his neck, as though he were pulling a noose tight, and glanced with a face of +inquiry at the steward. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, yes,” the latter assented, nodding; “yes, just +so.” +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim dropped his eyes, then all of a sudden roused himself and pointed to +Mumu, who was all the while standing beside him, innocently wagging her tail +and pricking up her ears inquisitively. Then he repeated the strangling action +round his neck and significantly struck himself on the breast, as though +announcing he would take upon himself the task of killing Mumu. +</p> + +<p> +“But you’ll deceive us,” Gavrila waved back in response. +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim looked at him, smiled scornfully, struck himself again on the breast, +and slammed-to the door. +</p> + +<p> +They all looked at one another in silence. +</p> + +<p> +“What does that mean?” Gavrila began. “He’s locked +himself in.” +</p> + +<p> +“Let him be, Gavrila Andreitch,” Stepan advised; “he’ll +do it if he’s promised. He’s like that, you know…. If he makes a +promise, it’s a certain thing. He’s not like us others in that. The +truth’s the truth with him. Yes, indeed.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” they all repeated, nodding their heads, +“yes—that’s so—yes.” +</p> + +<p> +Uncle Tail opened his window, and he too said, “Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, may be, we shall see,” responded Gavrila; “any way, we +won’t take off the guard. Here you, Eroshka!” he added, addressing +a poor fellow in a yellow nankeen coat, who considered himself to be a +gardener, “what have you to do? Take a stick and sit here, and if +anything happens, run to me at once!” +</p> + +<p> +Eroshka took a stick, and sat down on the bottom stair. The crowd dispersed, +all except a few inquisitive small boys, while Gavrila went home and sent word +through Liubov Liubimovna to the mistress, that everything had been done, while +he sent a postillion for a policeman in case of need. The old lady tied a knot +in her handkerchief, sprinkled some eau-de-Cologne on it, sniffed at it, and +rubbed her temples with it, drank some tea, and, being still under the +influence of the cherrybay drops, fell asleep again. +</p> + +<p> +An hour after all this hubbub the garret door opened, and Gerasim showed +himself. He had on his best coat; he was leading Mumu by a string. Eroshka +moved aside and let him pass. Gerasim went to the gates. All the small boys in +the yard stared at him in silence. He did not even turn round; he only put his +cap on in the street. Gavrila sent the same Eroshka to follow him and keep +watch on him as a spy. Eroshka, seeing from a distance that he had gone into a +cookshop with his dog, waited for him to come out again. +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim was well known at the cookshop, and his signs were understood. He asked +for cabbage soup with meat in it, and sat down with his arms on the table. Mumu +stood beside his chair, looking calmly at him with her intelligent eyes. Her +coat was glossy; one could see she had just been combed down. They brought +Gerasim the soup. He crumbled some bread into it, cut the meat up small, and +put the plate on the ground. Mumu began eating in her usual refined way, her +little muzzle daintily held so as scarcely to touch her food. Gerasim gazed a +long while at her; two big tears suddenly rolled from his eyes; one fell on the +dog’s brow, the other into the soup. He shaded his face with his hand. +Mumu ate up half the plateful, and came away from it, licking her lips. Gerasim +got up, paid for the soup, and went out, followed by the rather perplexed +glances of the waiter. Eroshka, seeing Gerasim, hid round a corner, and letting +him get in front, followed him again. +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim walked without haste, still holding Mumu by a string. When he got to +the corner of the street, he stood still as though reflecting, and suddenly set +off with rapid steps to the Crimean Ford. On the way he went into the yard of a +house, where a lodge was being built, and carried away two bricks under his +arm. At the Crimean Ford, he turned along the bank, went to a place where there +were two little rowing-boats fastened to stakes (he had noticed them there +before), and jumped into one of them with Mumu. A lame old man came out of a +shed in the corner of a kitchen-garden and shouted after him; but Gerasim only +nodded, and began rowing so vigorously, though against stream, that in an +instant he had darted two hundred yards away. The old man stood for a while, +scratched his back first with the left and then with the right hand, and went +back hobbling to the shed. +</p> + +<p> +Gerasim rowed on and on. Moscow was soon left behind. Meadows stretched each +side of the bank, market gardens, fields, and copses; peasants’ huts +began to make their appearance. There was the fragrance of the country. He +threw down his oars, bent his head down to Mumu, who was sitting facing him on +a dry cross seat—the bottom of the boat was full of water—and +stayed motionless, his mighty hands clasped upon her back, while the boat was +gradually carried back by the current towards the town. At last Gerasim drew +himself up hurriedly, with a sort of sick anger in his face, he tied up the +bricks he had taken with string, made a running noose, put it round +Mumu’s neck, lifted her up over the river, and for the last time looked +at her…. she watched him confidingly and without any fear, faintly wagging her +tail. He turned away, frowned, and wrung his hands…. Gerasim heard nothing, +neither the quick shrill whine of Mumu as she fell, nor the heavy splash of the +water; for him the noisiest day was soundless and silent as even the stillest +night is not silent to us. When he opened his eyes again, little wavelets were +hurrying over the river, chasing one another; as before they broke against the +boat’s side, and only far away behind wide circles moved widening to the +bank. +</p> + +<p> +Directly Gerasim had vanished from Eroshka’s sight, the latter returned +home and reported what he had seen. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, then,” observed Stepan, “he’ll drown her. Now we +can feel easy about it. If he once promises a thing….” +</p> + +<p> +No one saw Gerasim during the day. He did not have dinner at home. Evening came +on; they were all gathered together to supper, except him. +</p> + +<p> +“What a strange creature that Gerasim is!” piped a fat laundrymaid; +“fancy, upsetting himself like that over a dog…. Upon my word!” +</p> + +<p> +“But Gerasim has been here,” Stepan cried all at once, scraping up +his porridge with a spoon. +</p> + +<p> +“How? when?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, a couple of hours ago. Yes, indeed! I ran against him at the gate; +he was going out again from here; he was coming out of the yard. I tried to ask +him about his dog, but he wasn’t in the best of humours, I could see. +Well, he gave me a shove; I suppose he only meant to put me out of his way, as +if he’d say, ‘Let me go, do!’ but he fetched me such a crack on my neck, +so seriously, that—oh! oh!” And Stepan, who could not help +laughing, shrugged up and rubbed the back of his head. “Yes,” he +added; “he has got a fist; it’s something like a fist, +there’s no denying that!” +</p> + +<p> +They all laughed at Stepan, and after supper they separated to go to bed. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile, at that very time, a gigantic figure with a bag on his shoulders and +a stick in his hand, was eagerly and persistently stepping out along the +T—— highroad. It was Gerasim. He was hurrying on without looking +round; hurrying homewards, to his own village, to his own country. After +drowning poor Mumu, he had run back to his garret, hurriedly packed a few +things together in an old horsecloth, tied it up in a bundle, tossed it on his +shoulder, and so was ready. He had noticed the road carefully when he was +brought to Moscow; the village his mistress had taken him from lay only about +twenty miles off the highroad. He walked along it with a sort of invincible +purpose, a desperate and at the same time joyous determination. He walked, his +shoulders thrown back and his chest expanded; his eyes were fixed greedily +straight before him. He hastened as though his old mother were waiting for him +at home, as though she were calling him to her after long wanderings in strange +parts, among strangers. The summer night, that was just drawing in, was still +and warm; on one side, where the sun had set, the horizon was still light and +faintly flushed with the last glow of the vanished day; on the other side a +blue-grey twilight had already risen up. The night was coming up from that +quarter. Quails were in hundreds around; corncrakes were calling to one another +in the thickets…. Gerasim could not hear them; he could not hear the delicate +night-whispering of the trees, by which his strong legs carried him, but he +smelt the familiar scent of the ripening rye, which was wafted from the dark +fields; he felt the wind, flying to meet him—the wind from +home—beat caressingly upon his face, and play with his hair and his +beard. He saw before him the whitening road homewards, straight as an arrow. He +saw in the sky stars innumerable, lighting up his way, and stepped out, strong +and bold as a lion, so that when the rising sun shed its moist rosy light upon +the still fresh and unwearied traveller, already thirty miles lay between him +and Moscow. +</p> + +<p> +In a couple of days he was at home, in his little hut, to the great +astonishment of the soldier’s wife who had been put in there. After +praying before the holy pictures, he set off at once to the village elder. The +village elder was at first surprised; but the haycutting had just begun; +Gerasim was a first-rate mower, and they put a scythe into his hand on the +spot, and he went to mow in his old way, mowing so that the peasants were +fairly astounded as they watched his wide sweeping strokes and the heaps he +raked together…. +</p> + +<p> +In Moscow the day after Gerasim’s flight they missed him. They went to +his garret, rummaged about in it, and spoke to Gavrila. He came, looked, +shrugged his shoulders, and decided that the dumb man had either run away or +had drowned himself with his stupid dog. They gave information to the police, +and informed the lady. The old lady was furious, burst into tears, gave orders +that he was to be found whatever happened, declared she had never ordered the +dog to be destroyed, and, in fact, gave Gavrila such a rating that he could do +nothing all day but shake his head and murmur, “Well!” until Uncle +Tail checked him at last, sympathetically echoing “We-ell!” At last +the news came from the country of Gerasim’s being there. The old lady was +somewhat pacified; at first she issued a mandate for him to be brought back +without delay to Moscow; afterwards, however, she declared that such an +ungrateful creature was absolutely of no use to her. Soon after this she died +herself; and her heirs had no thought to spare for Gerasim; they let their +mother’s other servants redeem their freedom on payment of an annual +rent. +</p> + +<p> +And Gerasim is living still, a lonely man in his lonely hut; he is strong and +healthy as before, and does the work of four men as before, and as before is +serious and steady. But his neighbours have observed that ever since his return +from Moscow he has quite given up the society of women; he will not even look +at them, and does not keep even a single dog. “It’s his good luck, +though,” the peasants reason; “that he can get on without female +folk; and as for a dog—what need has he of a dog? you wouldn’t get +a thief to go into his yard for any money!” Such is the fame of the dumb +man’s Titanic strength. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TORRENTS OF SPRING ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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