"Have the horses put in!" cried the count, as he entered the sitting-room of the hotel with all his friends including the gypsies.
"Sashka,—not the gypsy Sashka, but mine,—tell the superintendent that if the horses are poor I will flog him. Now give us some tea. Zavalshevsky, make some tea; I am going to Ilyin's; I want to find how things have gone with him," added Turbin; and he went out into the corridor, and directed his steps to the uhlan's room.
Ilyin was just through playing, and, having lost all his money down to his last kopek, had thrown himself face down on the worn-out haircloth sofa, and was picking the hairs out one by one, sticking them in his mouth, biting them into two, and spitting them out again.
Two tallow candles, one of which was already burnt down to the paper, stood on the card-cluttered ombre-table, and mingled their feeble rays with the morning light which was beginning to shine through the window.
The uhlan's mind was vacant of all thought: that strange thick fog of the gambling-passion muffled all the capabilities of his mind so that there was not even room for regret.
Once he endeavored to think what was left for him to do, how he should get away without a kopek, how he should pay back the fifteen thousand rubles ofpublic money that he had lost in gambling, what his colonel would say, what his mother would say, what his comrades would say; and such fear came over him, and such disgust at himself, that, in his anxiety to rid himself of the thought of it, he arose and began to walk up and down through the room, trying only to walk on the cracks of the floor; and then once more he began to recall all the least details of the evening.
He vividly imagined that he was winning the whole back again: he takes a nine, and lays down a king of spades on two thousand rubles; a queen lies at the right, at the left an ace, at the right a king of diamonds—and all was lost! but if he had had a six at the right and a king of diamonds at the left, then he would have won it all back, he would have staked all again on P, and would have won back his fifteen thousand rubles, then he would have bought a good pacer of the colonel, an extra pair of horses, and a phaëton. And what else besides? Ah! indeed it would have been a splendid, splendid thing!
Again he threw himself down on the sofa, and began to bite the hairs once more.
"Why are they singing songs in No. 7?" he wondered. "It must be, they are having a jollification in Turbin's room. I'm of a good mind to go there, and have a little drink."
Just at this moment the count came in.
"Well, have you been losing, brother, hey?" he cried.
"I will pretend to be asleep, otherwise I shall have to talk with him, and I really want to sleep now."
Nevertheless Turbin went up to him, and laid his hand caressingly on his head.... "Well, my dear little friend, have you been losing? have you had bad luck? Tell me."
Ilyin made no reply.
The count took him by the arm.
"I have been losing. What is it to you?" muttered Ilyin, in a sleepy voice expressing indifference and vexation; he did not change his position.
"Every thing?"
"Well, yes. What harm is there in it? All! What is it to you?"
"Listen: tell me the truth, as to a comrade," said the count, who, under the influence of the wine that he had been drinking, was disposed to be tender, and continued to smooth the other's hair. "You know I have taken a fancy to you. Tell me the truth. If you have lost the public money, I will help you; if you don't, it will be too late.... Was it public money?"
Ilyin leaped up from the sofa.
"If you wish me to tell you, don't speak to me so, because ... and I beg of you don't speak to me.... I will blow my brains out—that's the only thing that's left for me now!" he exclaimed with genuine despair, letting his head sink into his hands, and bursting into tears, although but the moment before he had been calmly thinking about his horses.
"Ekh!you're a pretty young girl! Well, who might not have the same thing happen to him? It isn't as bad as it might be; perhaps we can straighten things out: wait for me here."
The count hastened from the room.
"Where is thepomyeshchik[69]Lukhnof's room?" he demanded of the hall-boy.
The hall-boy offered to show the count the way. The count in spite of the objections of the lackey,who said that his master had only just come in and was preparing to retire, entered the room.
Lukhnof in his dressing-gown was sitting in front of a table, counting over a number of packages of bank-notes piled up before him. On the table was a bottle of Rheinwein, of which he was very fond. He had procured himself this pleasure from his winnings.
Coldly, sternly, Lukhnof looked at the count over his glasses, affecting not to recognize him.
"It seems that you do not know me," said the count, proceeding toward the table with resolute steps.
Lukhnof recognized the count, and asked,—
"What is your pleasure?"
"I wish to play with you," said Turbin, sitting down on the sofa.
"Now?"
"Yes."
"Another time I should be most happy, count; but now I am tired, and am getting ready to go to bed. Won't you have some wine? It is excellent wine."
"But I wish to play with you for a little whilenow."
"I am not prepared to play any more. Maybe some of the other guests will.I will not, count! I beg of you to excuse me."
"Then you will not?"
Lukhnof shrugged his shoulders as though to express his regret at not being able to fulfil the count's desires.
"Will you not play under any consideration?"
The same gesture.
"I am very desirous of playing with you.... Say, will you play, or not?"
Silence.
"Will you play?" asked the count a second time.
The same silence, and a quick glance over his glasses at the count's face, which was beginning to grow sinister.
"Will you play?" cried the count in a loud voice, striking his hand on the table so violently that the bottle of Rheinwein toppled over and the wine ran out. "You have been cheating, have you not? Will you play? I ask you the third time."
"I have told you, no! This is truly strange, count, ... perfectly unjustifiable, to come this way, and put your knife at a man's throat," remarked Lukhnof, not lifting his eyes.
A brief silence followed, during which the count's face grew paler and paler. Suddenly Lukhnof received a terrible blow on the head, which stunned him. He fell back on the divan, trying to grasp the money, and screamed in a penetratingly despairing tone, such as was scarcely to be expected from him, he was always so calm and imposing in his deportment.
Turbin gathered up the remaining bank-notes that were lying on the table, pushed away the servant who had come to his master's assistance, and with quick steps left the room.
"If you wish satisfaction, I am at your service; I shall be in my room for half an hour yet,—No. 7," added the count, turning back as he reached the door.
"Villain! thief!" cried a voice from within the room.... "I will have satisfaction at law!"
Ilyin, who had not paid any heed to the count's promise to help him, was still lying on the sofa in his room, drowned in tears of despair.
The count's caresses and sympathy had awakened him to a consciousness of the reality, and now, amidst the fog of strange thoughts and recollections which filled his mind, it made itself more and more felt.
His youth, rich in hopes, honor, his social position, the dreams of love and friendship, were all destroyed forever. The fountain of his tears began to run dry, a too calm feeling of hopelessness took possession of him; and the thought of suicide, now bringing no sense of repulsion or terror, more and more frequently recurred to him.
At this moment the count's firm steps were heard.
On Turbin's face were still visible the last traces of his recent wrath, his hands trembled slightly; but in his eyes shone a kindly gayety and self-satisfaction.
"There! It has been won back for you!" he cried, tossing upon the table several packages of bank-notes. "Count them; are they all there? Then come as soon as possible to the sitting-room; I am going off right away," he added, as though he did not perceive the tremendous revulsion of joy and gratefulness which rushed over the uhlan's face. Then, humming a gypsy song, he left the room.
Sashka, tightening his girdle, was waiting for the horses to be harnessed, but was anxious to go first and get the count's cloak, which, with the collar, must have been worth three hundred rubles, and return that miserable blue-lined shuba to that rascally man who had exchanged with the count at the marshal's. But Turbin said that it was not necessary, and went to his room to change his clothes.
The cavalryman kept hiccoughing as he sat silently by his gypsy maiden. The isprávnik called for vodka, and invited all the gentlemen to come and breakfast with him, promising them that his wife would, without fail, dance the national dance with the gypsies.
The handsome young man was earnestly arguing with Ilyushka that there was more soul in the piano-forte, and that it was impossible to take B-flat on the guitar. The chinovnik was gloomily drinking tea in one corner, and apparently the daylight made him feel ashamed of his dissipation.
The gypsies were conversing together in Romany, and urging that they should once more enliven the gentlemen; to which Stioshka objected, declaring that it would only vex thebarorai,—that is, in Romany, count or prince, or rather great bárin.
For the most part, the last spark of the orgy was dying out.
"Well, then, one more song for a farewell, and thenhome with you," exclaimed the count, fresh, gay, and radiant above all the others, as he came into the room ready dressed in his travelling suit.
The gypsies had again formed their circle, and were just getting ready to sing, when Ilyin came in with a package of bank-notes in his hand, and drew the count to one side.
"I had only fifteen thousand rubles of public money, but you gave me sixteen thousand three hundred," said the uhlan; "this is yours, of course."
"That's a fine arrangement. Let me have it."
Ilyin handed him the money, looking timidly at the count, and opened his mouth to say something; but then he reddened so painfully that the tears came into his eyes, and he seized the count's hand, and began to squeeze it.
"Away with you, Ilyushka ... listen to me! Now, here's your money, but you must accompany me with your songs to the city limits!" And he threw on his guitar the thirteen hundred rubles which Ilyin had brought him. But the count had forgotten to repay the cavalryman the one hundred rubles which he had borrowed of him the evening before.
It was now ten o'clock in the morning. The little sun was rising above the housetops, the streets were beginning to fill with people, the merchants had long ago opened their shops, nobles and chinovniks were riding up and down through the streets, and ladies were out shopping, when the band of gypsies, the isprávnik, the cavalryman, the handsome young fellow, Ilyin, and the count who was wrapped up in his blue-lined bear-skin shuba, came out on the door-steps of the hotel.
It was a sunny day, and it thawed. Three hiredtróïkas, with their tails knotted, and splashing through the liquid mud, pranced up to the steps; and the whole jolly company prepared to take their places. The count, Ilyin, Stioshka, Ilyushka, and Sashka the count's man,[70]mounted the first sledge.
Blücher was beside himself with delight, and, wagging his tail, barked at the shaft-horse.
The other gentlemen, together with the gypsies, men and women, climbed into the other sledges. From the very hotel the sledges flew off side by side, and the gypsies set up a merry chorus and song.
The tróïkas, with the songs and jingling bells, dashed through the whole length of the city to the gates, compelling all the equipages which they met to rein up on the very sidewalks.
Merchants and passers-by who did not know them, and especially those who did, were filled with astonishment to see nobles of high rank, in the midst of "the white day," dashing through the streets with intoxicated gypsies, singing at the tops of their voices.
When they reached the city limits, the tróïkas stopped, and all the party took farewell of the count.
Ilyin, who had drunk considerable at the leave-taking, and had all the time been driving the horses, suddenly became melancholy, and began to urge the count to stay just one day more; but when he was assured that this was impossible, quite unexpectedly threw himself into his arms, and began to kiss his new friend, and promised him that as soon as he got to camp, he would petition to be transferred into the regiment of hussars in which Count Turbin served.
The count was extraordinarily hilarious; he tipped into a snow-drift the cavalryman, who, since morning,had definitely taken to sayingthouto him; he set Blücher on the isprávnik; he took Stioshka into his arms, and threatened to carry her off with him to Moscow; but at last he tucked himself into the sledge, and stationed Blücher by his side, who was always ready to ride. Sashka took his place on the box, after once more asking the cavalryman to secure the count's cloak fromthem, and to send it to him. The count cried "Go on,"[71]took off his cap, waved it over his head, and whistled in post-boy fashion to the horses. The tróïkas parted company.
As far as the eye could see, stretched a monotonous snow-covered plain, over which wound the yellowish muddy ribbon of the road.
The bright sunlight, dancing, glistened on the melting snow, which was covered with a thin crust of transparent ice, and pleasantly warmed the face and back.
The steam arose from the sweaty horses. The bells jingled.
A peasant[72]with a creaking sledge, heavily loaded, slowly turned out into the slushy snow, twitching his hempen reins, and tramping with his well-soaked sabots.[73]
A stout, handsome peasant woman, with a child wrapped in a sheep-skin on her lap, who was seated on another load, used the end of her reins to whip up a white mangy-tailed old nag.
Suddenly the count remembered Anna Fedorovna.
"Turn round!" he cried.
The driver did not understand.
"Turn round and drive back; back to the city! Be quick about it." The tróïka again passed the city gate, and quickly drew up in front of the boarded steps of the Zaïtsova dwelling.
The count briskly mounted the steps, passed through the vestibule and the parlor, and finding the widow still asleep he took her in his arms, lifting her from her bed, and kissed her sleeping eyes again and again, and then darted back to the sledge.
Anna Fedorovna awoke from her slumber, and demanded, "What has happened?"
The count took his seat in his sledge, shouted to the driver, and now no longer delaying, and thinking not of Lukhnof nor of the little widow, nor of Stioshka, but only of what was awaiting him in Moscow, rapidly left the city of K. behind him.
A score of years have passed. Much water has run since then, many men have died, many children have been born, many have grown up and become old; still more thoughts have been born and perished. Much that was beautiful and much that was ugly in the past have disappeared; much that is beautiful in the new has been brought forth, and still more that is incomplete and abortive of the new has appeared in God's world.
Count Feódor Turbin was long ago killed in a duel with some foreigner whom he struck on the street with his long whip. His son, who was as like him as two drops of water, had already reached the age of two or three and twenty, and was a lovely fellow, already serving in the cavalry.
Morally the young Count Turbin was entirely different from his father. There was not a shadow of those fiery, passionate, and in truth be it said, corrupt inclinations, peculiar to the last century.
Together with intelligence, cultivation, and inherited natural gifts, a love for the proprieties and amenities of life, a practical view of men and circumstances, wisdom and forethought, were his chief characteristics.
The young count made admirable progress in his profession; at twenty-three he was already lieutenant.... When war broke out, he came to the conclusion that it would be more for his interests to enter theregular army; and he joined a regiment of hussars as captain of cavalry, where he soon was given command of a battalion.
In the month of May, 1848, the S. regiment of hussars was on its way through the government of K., and the very battalion which the young Count Turbin commanded was obliged to be quartered for one night at Morozovka, Anna Fedorovna's village. Anna Fedorovna was still alive, but was now so far from being young that she no longer called herself young, which, for a woman, means much.
She had grown very stout, and this, it is said, restores youth in a woman. But that was not the worst of it: over her pale, stout flesh was a net-work of coarse, flabby wrinkles. She no longer went to the city, she even found it hard to mount into her carriage; but still she was just as good-natured and as completely vacant-minded as ever,—the truth might safely be told, now that it was no longer palliated by her beauty.
Under her roof lived her daughter Liza, a rustic Russian belle of twenty-three summers, and her brother, our acquaintance the cavalryman, who had spent all his patrimony in behalf of others, and now, in his old age, had taken refuge with Anna Fedorovna.
The hair on his head had become perfectly gray; his upper lip was sunken, but the mustache that it wore was carefully dyed. Wrinkles covered not only his brow and cheeks, but also his nose and neck; and yet his weak bow-legs gave evidence of the old cavalryman.
Anna Fedorovna's whole family and household were gathered in the small parlor of the ancient house. The balcony door and windows, looking out into a star-shaped garden shaded by lindens, were open. Anna Fedorovna, in her gray hair and a lilac-colored gown,[74]was sitting on the sofa, before a small round mahogany table, shuffling cards. The old brother, dressed in spruce white pantaloons and a blue coat, had taken up his position near the window, knitting strips of white cotton on a fork, an occupation which his niece had taught him, and which gave him great enjoyment, as he had nothing else to do, his eyes not being strong enough to enable him to read newspapers, which was his favorite occupation. Near him Pímotchka, aprotégéeof Anna Fedorovna, was studying her lessons under the guidance of Liza, who with wooden knitting-needles was knitting stockings of goat-wool for her uncle.
The last rays of the setting sun, as always at this time, threw under the linden alley their soft reflections on the last window-panes and the littleétagèrewhich stood near it.
In the garden it was so still that one could hear the swift rush of a swallow's wings, and so quiet in the room that Anna Fedorovna's gentle sigh, or the old man's cough as he kept changing the position of his legs, was the only sound.
"How does this go, Lízanka? show me, please. I keep forgetting," said Anna Fedorovna, pausing in the midst of her game of patience. Liza, without stopping her work, went over to her mother, and, glancing at the cards, "Ah!" says she. "You have mixed them all up, dear mamasha," said she, arranging the cards. "That is the way they should be placed. Now they come as you desired," she added, secretly withdrawing one card.
"Now you are always managing to deceive me! You said that it would go."
"No, truly; it goes, I assure you. It has come out right."
"Very well, then; very well, you rogue! But isn't it time for tea?"
"I have just ordered the samovár heated. I will go and see about it immediately. Shall we have it brought here?... Now, Pímotchka, hasten and finish your lessons, and we will go and take a run."
And Liza started for the door.
"Lízotchka! Lízanka!" cried her uncle, steadfastly regarding his fork, "again it seems to me I have dropped a stitch. Arrange it for me, my darling."[75]
"In a moment, in a moment. First I must have the sugar broken up."
And in point of fact, within three minutes, she came running into the room, went up to her uncle, and took him by the ear.
"That's to pay you for dropping stitches," said she laughing. "You have not been knitting as I taught you."
"Now, that'll do, that'll do, adjust it for me; there seems to be some sort of a knot."
Liza took the fork, pulled out a pin from her kerchief, which was blown back a little by the breeze coming through the window, picked it out a couple of times, and handed it back to her uncle.
"Now you must kiss me for that," said she, putting up her rosy cheek toward him, and re-adjusting her kerchief. "You shall have rum in your tea to-day. To-day is Friday, you see."
And again she went to the tea-room.
"Uncle dear, come and look! some hussars are riding up toward the house!" her ringing voice was heard to say. Anna Fedorovna and her brother hastened into the tea-room, the windows of whichfaced the village, and looked at the hussars. Very little was to be seen; through the cloud of dust it could be judged only that a body of men was advancing.
"What a pity, sister," remarked the uncle to Anna Fedorovna, "what a pity that we are so cramped, and the wing is not built yet, so that we might invite the officers here. Officers of the hussars! they are such glorious, gay young fellows! I should like to have a glimpse at them."
"Well, I should be heartily glad, but you know yourself that there is nowhere to put them: my sleeping-room, Liza's room, the parlor, and then your room,—judge for yourself. Mikháïlo Matveef has put thestárosta's[76]house in order for them; he says it will be nice there."
"But we must find you a husband, Lízotchka, among them,—a glorious hussar!" said the uncle.
"No, I do not want a hussar: I want an uhlan. Let me see, you served among the uhlans, didn't you, uncle?... I don't care to know these hussars. They say they are desperate fellows."
And Liza blushed a little, and then once more her ringing laugh was heard. "There's Ustiushka running: we must ask her what she saw," said she. Anna Fedorovna sent to have Ustiushka brought in.
"She has no idea of sticking to her work, she must always be running off to look at the soldiers," said Anna Fedorovna.... "Now, where have they lodged the officers?"
"With the Yeremkins, your ladyship. There are two of them, such lovely men! One of them is a count, they tell me."
"What's his name?"
"Kazárof or Turbínof. I don't remember, excuse me."
"There now, you're a goose, you don't know how to tell any thing at all. You might have remembered his name!"
"Well, I'll run and find out."
"I know that you are quite able to do that. But no, let Danílo go.—Brother, go and tell him to go; have him ask if there is not something which the officers may need; every thing must be done in good form; have them understand that it is the lady of the house who has sent to find out."
The old people sat down again in the tea-room, and Liza went to the servants' room to put the lumps of sugar in the sugar-bowl. Ustiushka was telling them there about the hussars.
"O my dear young lady, what a handsome man he is! that count!" she said, "absolutely a little cherubim,[77]with black eyebrows. You ought to have such a husband as that; what a lovely little couple you would make!" The other maids smiled approvingly; the old nurse, sitting by the window with her stocking, sighed, and, drawing a long breath, murmured a prayer.
"It seems to me that the hussars have given you a great deal of pleasure," said Liza. "You are a master hand at description. Bring me themors,[78]Ustiushka, please; we must give the officers something sour to drink." And Liza, laughing, went out with the sugar-bowl.
"But I should like to see what sort of a man this hussar is,—whether he is brunet or blondin. And I imagine he would not object to making our acquaintance.But he will go away, and never know that I was here and was thinking about him. And how many have passed by me in this way! No one ever sees me except uncle and Ustiushka! How many times I have arranged my hair, how many pairs of cuffs I have put on, and yet no one ever sees me or falls in love with me," she thought with a sigh, contemplating her white, plump hand.
"He must be tall, and have big eyes, and a nice little black mustache.... No! I am already over twenty-two, and no one has ever fallen in love with me except the pock-marked Iván Ipátuitch. And four years ago I was still better-looking; and so my girlhood has gone, and no one is the better for it. Ah! I am an unhappy country maiden!"
Her mother's voice, calling her to bring the tea, aroused the country maiden from this momentary revery.
She shook her little head, and went into the tea-room.
The best things always happen unexpectedly; and the more you try to force them, the worse they come out. In the country it is rare that any attempt is made to impart education, and therefore when a good one is found it is generally a surprise. And thus it happened, in a notable degree, in the case of Liza. Anna Fedorovna, through her own lack of intelligence and natural laziness, had not given Liza any education at all; had not taught her music, nor the French language which is so indispensable. But the girl had fortunately been a healthy, bright little child: she had intrusted her to a wet-nurse and a day-nurse; she had fed her, and dressed her in print dresses and goat-skin shoes, and let her run wild and gather mushroomsand berries; had her taught reading and arithmetic by a resident seminarist. And thus, as fate would have it, at the age of sixteen, she found in her daughter a companion, a soul who was always cheerful and good-natured, and the actual mistress of the house.
Through her goodness of heart, Anna Fedorovna always had in her house someprotégée, either a serf or some foundling. Liza, from the time she was ten years old, had begun to take care of them; to teach them, clothe them, take them to church, and keep them still when they were inclined to be mischievous.
Then her old broken-down but good-natured uncle made his appearance, and he had to be taken care of like a child. Then the domestic servants and the peasants began to come to the young mistress with their desires and their ailments; and she treated them with elderberry, mint, and spirits of camphor. Then the domestic management of the house fell into her hands entirely. Then came the unsatisfied craving for love, which found expression only in nature and religion.
Thus Liza, by chance, grew into an active, good-naturedly cheerful, self-poised, pure, and deeply religious young woman.
To be sure, she had her little fits of jealousy and envy when she saw, all around her in church, her neighbors dressed in new, fashionable hats that came from K.; she was sometimes vexed to tears by her old, irritable mother, and her caprices; she had her dreams of love in the most absurd and even the crudest forms, but her healthy activity, which she could not shirk, drove them away; and now, at twenty-two, not a single spot, not a single compunction, had touched the fresh, calm soul of this maiden, nowdeveloped into the fulness of perfect physical and moral beauty.
Liza was of medium height, rather plump than lean; her eyes were brown, small, with a soft dark shade on the lower lid; she wore her flaxen hair in a long braid.
In walking she took long steps, and swayed like a duck, as the saying is.
The expression of her face, when she was occupied with her duties, and nothing especially disturbed her, seemed to say to all who looked into it, "Life in this world is good and pleasant to one who has a heart full of love, and a pure conscience."
Even in moments of vexation, of trouble, of unrest, or of melancholy, in spite of her tears, of the drawing-down of the left brow, of the compressed lips, of the petulance of her desires, even then in the dimples of her cheeks, in the corners of her mouth, and in her brilliant eyes, so used to smile and rejoice in life,—even then there shone a heart good and upright, and unspoiled by knowledge.
It was still rather warm, though the sun was already set, when the battalion arrived at Morozovka. In front of them, along the dusty village street, trotted a brindled cow, separated from the herd, bellowing, and occasionally stopping to look round, and never once perceiving that all she had to do was to turn out and let the battalion pass.
Peasants, old men, women, children, and domestic serfs, crowding both sides of the road, gazed curiously at the hussars.
Through a thick cloud of dust the hussars rode along on raven-black horses, curvetting and occasionally snorting.
At the right of the battalion, gracefully mounted on beautiful black steeds, rode two officers. One was the commander, Count Turbin; the other a very young man, who had recently been promoted from the yunkers; his name was Polózof.
A hussar, in a white kittel, came from the best of the cottages, and, taking off his cap, approached the officers.
"What quarters have been assigned to us?" asked the count.
"For your excellency?" replied the quartermaster, his whole body shuddering. "Here at thestárosta's; he has put his cottage in order. I tried to get a roomat the mansion,[79]but they said no; the proprietress is so ill-tempered."
"Well, all right," said the count, dismounting and stretching his legs as he reached thestárosta'scottage. "Tell me, has my carriage come?"
"It has deigned to arrive, your excellency," replied the quartermaster, indicating with his cap the leathern carriage-top which was to be seen inside the gate, and then hastening ahead into the entry of the cottage, which was crowded with the family of serfs, gathered to have a look at the officer.
He even tripped over an old woman, as he hastily opened the door of the neatly cleaned cottage, and stood aside to let the count pass.
The cottage was large and commodious, but not perfectly clean. The German body-servant,[80]dressed like a bárin, was standing in the cottage, and, having just finished setting up the iron bed, was taking out clean linen from a trunk.
"Phu!what a nasty lodging!" exclaimed the count in vexation. "Diádenko! Is it impossible to find me better quarters at the proprietor's or somewhere?"
"If your excellency command, I will go up to the mansion," replied Diádenko; "but the house is small and wretched, and seems not much better than the cottage."
"Well, that's all now. You can go."
And the count threw himself down on the bed, supporting his head with his hands.
"Johann!" he cried to his body-servant; "again you have made a hump in the middle. Why can't you learn to make a bed decently?"
Johann was anxious to make it over again.
"No, you need not trouble about it now!... Where's my dressing-gown?" he proceeded to ask in a petulant voice. The servant gave him the dressing-gown.
The count, before he put it on, examined the skirt. "There it is! You have not taken that spot out! Could it be possible for any one to be a worse servant than you are?" he added, snatching the garment from the servant's hands, and putting it on. "Now tell me, do you do this way on purpose? Is tea ready?"
"I haven't had time to make it," replied Johann.
"Fool!"
After this, the count took a French novel which was at hand, and read for some time without speaking; but Johann went out into the entry to blow up the coals in the samovár.
It was plain to see that the count was in a bad humor; it must have been owing to weariness, to the dust on his face, to his tightly-fitting clothes, and to his empty stomach. "Johann!" he cried again, "give me an account of those ten rubles. What did you get in town?"
The count looked over the account which the servant handed him, and made some dissatisfied remarks about the high prices paid.
"Give me the rum for the tea."
"I did not get any rum," said Johann.
"Delightful! How many times have I told you always to have rum?"
"I didn't have money enough."
"Why didn't Polózof buy it? You might have got some from his man."
"The cornet Polózof? I do not know. He bought tea and sugar."
"Beast! Get you gone. You are the only man who has the power to exhaust my patience! You know that I always take rum in my tea when I am on the march."
"Here are two letters one of the staff brought for you," said the body-servant.
The count, as he lay on the bed, tore open the letters, and began to read them. At this moment the cornet came in with gay countenance, having quartered the battalion.
"Well, how is it, Turbin? It's first-rate here, seems to me. I am tired out, I confess it. It has been a warm day."
"First-rate! I should think so! A dirty, stinking hut! and no rum, thanks to you. Your stupid did not buy any, nor this one either. You might have said something anyway!"
And he went on with his reading. After he had read the letter through, he crumpled it up, and threw it on the floor.
"Whydidn't you buy some rum?" the cornet in a whisper demanded of his servant in the entry. "Didn't you have any money?"
"Well, why should we be always the ones to spend the money? I have enough to spend for without that, andhisGerman does nothing but smoke his pipe,—that's all."
The second letter was evidently not disagreeable, because the count smiled as he read it.
"Who's that from?" asked Polózof, returning to the room, and trying to arrange for himself a couch on the floor, near the oven.
"From Mina," replied the count gayly, handing him the letter. "Would you like to read it? Whata lovely woman she is! Now, she's better than our young ladies, that's a fact. Just see what feeling and what wit in that letter! There's only one thing that I don't like,—she asks me for money!"
"No, that's not pleasant," replied the cornet.
"Well it's true I promised to give her some; but this expedition—And besides, if I am commander of the battalion, at the end of three months I will send some to her. I should not regret it; she's really a lovely woman. Isn't she?" he asked with a smile, following with his eyes Polózof's expression as he read the letter.
"Horribly misspelled, but sweet; it seems to me she really loves you," replied the cornet.
"Hm! I should think so! Only these women truly love when they do love."
"But who was that other letter from?" asked the cornet, pointing to the one which he had read.
"That? Oh, that's from a certain man, very ugly, to whom I owe a gambling debt, and this is the third time that he has reminded me of it. I can't pay it to him now. It's a stupid letter," replied the count, evidently nettled by the recollection of it.
The two officers remained silent for some little time. The cornet, who, it seemed, had come under Turbin's influence, drank his tea without speaking, though he occasionally cast a glance at the clouded face of the handsome count, who gazed steadily out of the window. He did not venture to renew the conversation.
"Well, then, I think it can be accomplished without difficulty," suddenly exclaimed the count, turning to Polózof, and gayly nodding his head. "If we who are in the line get promoted this year, yes, and if we take part in some engagement, then I can overtake my former captains of the guard."
They were drinking their second cup of tea, and the conversation was still dwelling on this theme, when the old Danílo came with the message from Anna Fedorovna.
"And she would also like to know whether you are not pleased to be the son of Feódor Ivánovitch Turbin," he added, on his own responsibility, as he had found out the officer's name, and still remembered the late count's visit to the city of K. "Our mistress,[81]Anna Fedorovna, used to be very well acquainted with him."
"He was my father. Now tell the lady that I am very much obliged, but that I need nothing; only, if it would not be possible to give me a cleaner room in the mansion, say, or somewhere."
"Now, why did you do that?" asked Polózof after Danílo had gone. "Isn't it just the same thing? For one night isn't it just as well here? And it will put them to inconvenience."
"There it is again! It seems to me we have had enough of being sent round among these smoky hovels.[82]It's easy enough to see that you are not a practical man. Why shouldn't we seize the opportunity, when we can, of sleeping, even if it's for only one night, like decent men? And they, contrary to what you think, will be mighty glad. There's only one thing objectionable. If this lady used to know my father," continued the count, with a smile that discovered his white gleaming teeth,—"somehow I always feel a little ashamed of my late papasha; there's always some scandalous story, or some debt or other. And so I can't endure to meet any of my father's acquaintances. However, that was an entirely different age," he added seriously.
"Oh! I did not tell you," rejoined Polózof. "I recently met Ilyin, the brigade commander of uhlans. He is very anxious to see you; he is passionately fond of your father."
"I think that he is terrible trash, that Ilyin. But the worst is that all these gentlemen who imagine that they knew my father in order to make friends with me, insist upon telling me, as though it were very pleasant for me to hear, about escapades of his that make me blush. It is true I am not impulsive, and I look upon things dispassionately; while he was too hot-spirited a man, and sometimes he played exceedingly reprehensible tricks. However, that was all due to his time. In our day and generation, maybe, he would have been a very sensible man, for he had tremendous abilities; one must give him credit for that."
In a quarter of an hour the servant returned, and brought an invitation for them to come and spend the night at the mansion.
As soon as Anna Fedorovna learned that the officer of hussars was the son of Count Feódor Turbin, she was thrown into a great state of excitement.
"Oh! great heavens![83]he is my darling! Danílo! run, hurry, tell them the lady invites them to stay at her house," she cried, in great agitation, and hastening to the servants' room. "Lízanka! Ustiushka! You must have your room put in order, Liza. You can go into your uncle's room; and you, brother,—brother, you can sleep to-night in the parlor. It's for only one night."
"That's nothing, sister! I would sleep on the floor."
"He must be a handsome fellow, I think, if he's like his father. Only let me see him, the turtle-dove! You shall see for yourself, Liza. Ah! his father was handsome! Where shall we put the table? Let it go there," said Anna Fedorovna, running about here and there. "There now, bring in two beds; get one from the overseer, and get from theétagèrethe glass candlestick which my brother gave me for my birthday, and put in a wax candle."
At last all was ready. Liza, in spite of her mother's interference, arranged her room in her own way for the two officers.
She brought out clean linen sheets, fragrant ofmignonnette, and had the beds made; she ordered a carafe of water and candles near it on the little table. She burned scented paper in the girls' room, and moved her own little bed into her uncle's chamber.
Anna Fedorovna gradually became calm, and sat down again in her usual place; she even took out her cards; but instead of shuffling them, she leaned on her fat elbow, and gave herself up to her thoughts.
"How time has gone! how time has gone!" she exclaimed in a whisper. "It is long! long! isn't it? I seem to see him now!Akh!he was a scamp!"
And the tears came into her eyes. "Now here is Lízanka, but she isn't at all what I was at her age. She is a nice girl; but no, not quite....
"Lízanka, you had better wear your mousselin-de-laine dress this evening."
"But are you going to invite them down-stairs, mamasha? You had better not do it," rejoined Liza, with a feeling of invincible agitation at the thought of seeing the officers. "You had better not, mamasha!"
In point of fact, she did not so much desire to see them, as she felt apprehensive of some painful pleasure awaiting her, as it seemed to her.
"Perhaps they themselves would like to make our acquaintance, Lízotchka," said Anna Fedorovna, glancing at her daughter's hair, and at the same time thinking, "No, not such hair as I had at her age. No, Lízotchka, how much I could wish for you!" And she really wished something very excellent for her daughter, but she could scarcely look forward to a match with the count; she could not desire such a relationship as she herself had formed with his father; but that something good would come of it, she wished very, very much for her daughter. She possiblyhad the desire to live over again in her daughter's happiness all the life which she lived with the late count.
The old cavalryman was also somewhat excited by the count's coming. He went to his room, and shut himself up in it. At the end of a quarter of an hour, he re-appeared dressed in a Hungarian coat and blue pantaloons; and with a troubled-happy expression of countenance, such as a girl wears when she puts on her first ball-dress, he started for the room assigned to the guests.
"We shall have a glimpse of some of the hussars of to-day, sister. The late count was indeed a genuine hussar. We shall see! we shall see!"
The officers had by this time come in by the back entrance, and were in the room that had been put at their service.
"There now," said the count, stretching himself out in his dusty boots on the bed which had just been made for him, "if we aren't better off here than we were there in that hovel with the cockroaches!"
"Better? of course; but think what obligations we are putting ourselves under to the people here."
"What rubbish! You must always be a practical man. They are mighty glad to have us, of course. Fellow!" cried the count, "ask some one to put a curtain up at this window, else there'll be a draught in the night."
At this moment the old man came in to make the acquaintance of the officers. Though he was somewhat confused, he did not fail to tell how he had been a comrade of the late count's, who had been very congenial to him, and he even went so far as to say that more than once he had been under obligations to thelate count. Whether he meant, in speaking of the obligations to the late count, a reference to the hundred rubles which the count had borrowed and never returned, or to his throwing him into the snow-drift, or to the slap in the face, the old man failed to explain.
However, the count was very urbane with the old cavalryman, and thanked him for his hospitality.
"You must excuse us if it is not very luxurious, count,"—he almost said "your excellency," as he had got out of the habit of meeting with men of rank. "My sister's house is rather small. As for the window here, we will find something to serve as a curtain right away, and it will be first-rate," added the little old man; and under the pretext of going for a curtain, but really because he wanted to give his report about the officers as quickly as possible, he left the room. The pretty little Ustiushka came, bringing her mistress's shawl to serve as a curtain. She was also commissioned to ask if the gentlemen would not like some tea.
The cheerful hospitality had had a manifestly beneficent influence upon the count's spirits. He laughed and jested with Ustiushka gayly, and went to such lengths that she even called him a bad man; he asked her if her mistress was pretty, and in reply to her question whether he would like some tea, replied that she might please bring him some, but above all, as his supper was not ready, he would like some vodka now, and a little lunch, and some sherry if there was any.
The old uncle was in raptures over the young count's politeness, and praised to the skies the young generation of officers, saying that the men of the present day were far preferable to those of the past.
Anna Fedorovna could not agree to that,—no onecould be any better than Count Feódor Ivánovitch,—and she was beginning to grow seriously angry, and remarked dryly, "For you, brother, the one who flatters you last is the best! Without any question, the men of our time are better educated, but still Feódor Ivánovitch could dance the schottische, and was so amiable that everybody in his day, you might say, was stupid compared to him! only he did not care for any one else beside me. Oh, certainly there were fine men in the old time!"
At this moment came the message requesting the vodka, the lunch, and the sherry.
"There now, just like you, brother! You never do things right. We ought to have had supper prepared.... Liza, attend to it, that's my darling."
Liza hastened to the storeroom for mushrooms and fresh cream butter, and told the cook to prepare beef cutlets.
"How much sherry is there? Haven't you any left, brother?"
"No, sister; I never have had any."
"What! no sherry? but what is it you drink in your tea?"
"That is rum, Anna Fedorovna."
"Isn't that the same thing? Give them some of that. It is all the same, it'll make no difference. Or would it not be better to invite them down here, brother? You know all about it. They would not be offended, I imagine, would they?"
The cavalryman assured her that he would answer for it that the count, in his goodness of heart, would not decline, and that he would certainly bring them.
Anna Fedorovna went off to put on, for some reason or other, her gros-grain dress and a new cap; but Lizawas so busy that she had no time to take off her pink gingham dress with wide sleeves. Moreover, she was terribly wrought up; it seemed to her that something astonishing, like a very low black cloud, was sweeping down upon her soul.
This count-hussar, this handsome fellow, seemed to her an absolutely novel and unexpected but beautiful creature. His character, his habits, his words, it seemed to her, must be something extraordinary, such as had never come into the range of her experience. All that he thought and said must be bright and true; all that he did must be honorable; his whole appearance must be beautiful. She could have no doubt of that. If he had demanded not merely a lunch and sherry, but even a bath in spirits of salvia, she would not have been surprised, she would not have blamed him, and she would have been convinced that this was just and reasonable.
The count immediately accepted when the cavalryman brought him his sister's invitation; he combed his hair, put on his coat, and took his cigar-case.
"Will you come?" he asked of Polózof.
"Indeed we had better not go," replied the cornet; "ils feront des frais pour nous recevoir."
"Rubbish! it will make them happy. Besides, I have been making inquiries ... there's a pretty daughter here.... Come along," said the count in French.
"Je vous en prie, messieurs," said the cavalryman, merely for the sake of giving them to understand that he also could speak French, and understood what the officers were saying.
Liza, red in the face and with downcast eyes, was ostensibly occupied with filling up the teapot, and did not dare to look at the officers as they entered the room.
Anna Fedorovna, on the contrary, briskly jumped up and bowed, and without taking her eyes from the count's face began to talk to him, now finding an extraordinary resemblance to his father, now presenting her daughter, now offering him tea, meats, or jelly-cakes.
No one paid any attention to the cornet, thanks to his modest behavior; and he was very glad of it, because it gave him a chance, within the limits of propriety, to observe and study the details of Liza's beauty, which had evidently come over him with the force of a surprise.
The uncle listening to his sister's conversation had a speech ready on his lips, and was waiting for a chance to relate his cavalry experiences.
The count smoked his cigar over his tea, so that Liza had great difficulty in refraining from coughing, but he was very talkative and amiable; at first, in the infrequent pauses of Anna Fedorovna's conversation, he introduced his own stories, and finally he took the conversation into his own hands.
One thing struck his listeners as rather strange: in his talk he often used words, which, though not consideredreprehensible in his own set, were here rather audacious, so that Anna Fedorovna was a little abashed, and Liza blushed to the roots of her hair. But this the count did not notice, and continued to be just as natural and amiable as ever.
Liza filled the glasses in silence, not putting them into the hands of the guests, but pushing them toward them; she had not entirely recovered from her agitation, but listened eagerly to the count's anecdotes.
The count's pointless tales, and the pauses in the conversation, gradually re-assured her. The bright things that she had expected from him were not forthcoming, nor did she find in him that surpassing elegance for which she had confusedly hoped. Even as soon as the third glass of tea, when her timid eyes once encountered his, and he did not avoid them, but continued almost too boldly to stare at her, with a lurking smile, she became conscious of a certain feeling of hostility against him; and she soon discovered that there was not only nothing out of the ordinary in him, but that he was very little different from those whom she had already seen; in fact, that there was no reason to be afraid of him. She noticed that he had long and neat finger-nails, but otherwise there was no mark of special beauty about him.
Liza suddenly, not without some inward sorrow, renouncing her dream, regained her self-possession; and only the undemonstrative cornet's glance, which she felt fixed upon her, disquieted her.
"Perhaps it is not the count, but the other," she said to herself.
After tea, the old lady invited her guests into the other room, and again sat down in her usual place. "But perhaps you would like to rest, count?" she asked. "Well, then, what would you like to amuse yourselves with, my dear guests?" she proceeded to ask after she had been assured to the contrary. "You play cards, do you not, count?—Here, brother, you might take a hand in some game or other."...
"Why, you yourself can playpréférence," replied the cavalryman. "You had better take a hand, then. The count will play, will he not? And you?"
The officers were agreeable to every thing that might satisfy their amiable hosts.
Liza brought from her room her old cards which she used for divining whether her mother would speedily recover of a cold, or whether her uncle would return on such and such a day from the city if he chanced to have gone there, or whether her neighbor would be in during the day, and other like things. These cards, though they had been in use for two months, were less soiled than those which Anna Fedorovna used for the same purpose.
"Perhaps you are not accustomed to playing for small stakes," suggested the uncle. "Anna Fedorovna and I play for half-kopeks, and then she always gets the better of all of us."
"Ah! make your own arrangements. I shall be perfectly satisfied," said the count.
"Well, then, be it in paper kopeks for the sake of our dear guests; only let me gain, as I am old," said Anna Fedorovna, settling herself in her chair, and adjusting her mantilla. "Maybe I shall win a ruble of them," thought Anna Fedorovna, who in her old age felt a little passion for cards.
"If you would like, I will teach you to play with tablets," said the count, "and with themiséries. It is very jolly."
Everybody was delighted with this new Petersburg fashion. The uncle went so far as to assert that he knew it, and that it was just the same thing asboston, but that he had forgotten somewhat about it.
Anna Fedorovna did not comprehend it at all; and it took her so long to get into it, that she felt under the necessity of smiling and nodding her head assuringly, to give the impression that she now understood, and that now it was all perfectly clear to her. But there was no little amusement created when in the midst of the game Anna Fedorovna, with ace and king blank, called "misérie," and remained with the six. She even began to grow confused, smiled timidly, and hastened to assure them that she had not as yet become accustomed to the new way.
Nevertheless they put down the points against her, and many of them too; the more because the count, through his practice of playing on large stakes, played carefully, led very prudently, and never at all understood what the cornet meant by sundry raps with his foot under the table, or why he made such stupid blunders in playing.
Liza brought in more jelly-cakes, three kinds of preserves, and apples cooked in some manner with port-wine; and then, standing behind her mother's chair,she looked on at the game, and occasionally watched the officers, and especially the count's white hands with their delicate long finger-nails, as he with such skill, assurance, and grace, threw the cards, and took the tricks.
Once more Anna Fedorovna, with some show of temper going beyond the others, bid as high as seven, and lost three points; and when, at her brother's instigation, she tried to make some calculation, she found herself utterly confused and off the track.
"It's nothing, mamasha; you'll win it back again," said Liza, with a smile, anxious to rescue her mother from her ridiculous position. "Some time you'll put a fine on uncle: then he will be caught."
"But you might help me, Lízotchka," cried Anna Fedorovna, looking with an expression of dismay at her daughter; "I don't know how this"....
"But I don't know how to play this either," rejoined Liza, carefully calculating her mother's losses. "But if you go on at this rate, mamasha, you will lose a good deal, and Pímotchka will not have her new dress," she added in jest.
"Yes, in this way it is quite possible to lose ten silver rubles," said the cornet, looking at Liza, and anxious to draw her into conversation.
"Aren't we playing for paper money?" asked Anna Fedorovna, gazing round at the rest.
"I don't know, I am sure," replied the count. "But I don't know how to reckon in bank-notes. What are they? what do you mean by bank-notes?"[84]
"Why, no one nowadays reckons in bank-notes," explained the cavalryman, who was playing like a hero and was on the winning side.
The old lady ordered some sparkling wine, drank two glasses herself, grew quite flushed, and seemed to abandon all hope. One braid of her gray hair escaped from under her cap, and she did not even put it up. It was evident that she thought herself losing millions, and that she was entirely ruined. The cornet kept nudging the count's leg more and more emphatically. The count was noting down the old lady's losses.
At last the game came to an end. In spite of Anna Fedorovna's efforts to bring her reckoning higher than it should be, and to pretend that she had been cheated in her account, and that it could not be correct, in spite of her dismay at the magnitude of her losses, at last the account was made out, and she was found to have lost nine hundred and twenty points.
"Isn't that equal to nine paper rubles?" she asked again and again; and she did not begin to realize how great her forfeit was, until her brother, to her horror, explained that she was "out" thirty-two and a half paper rubles, and that it was absolutely necessary for her to pay it.
The count did not even sum up his gains, but, as soon as the game was over, arose and went over to the window where Liza was arranging the lunch, and putting potted mushrooms on a plate. There he did with perfect calmness and naturalness what the cornet had been anxious and yet unable to effect all the evening,—he engaged her in conversation about the weather.
The cornet at this time was brought into a thoroughly unpleasant predicament. Anna Fedorovna, in the absence of the count and Liza, who had managed to keep her in a jovial frame of mind, became really angry.
"Indeed, it is too bad that we have caused you to lose so heavily," said Polózof, in order to say something. "It is simply shameful."
"I should think these tablets andmisérieswere something of your own invention. I don't know any thing about them. How many paper rubles does the whole amount to?" she demanded.
"Thirty-two rubles, thirty-two and a half," insisted the cavalryman, who, from the effect of having been on the winning side, was in a very waggish frame of mind. "Give him the money, sister.... Give it to him."
"I will give all I owe, only you must not ask for any more. No, I shall never win it back in my life."
And Anna Fedorovna went to her room, all in excitement, hurried back, and brought nine paper rubles. Only on the old man's strenuous insistence she was induced to pay the whole sum. Polózof had some fear that the old lady would pour out on him the vials of her wrath if he entered into conversation with her. He silently, without attracting attention, turned away, and rejoined the count and Liza, who were talking at the open window.
On the table, which was now spread for the supper, stood two tallow candles, whose flame occasionally flickered in the gentle breeze of the mild May night. Through the window opening into the garden came a very different light from that which filled the room. The moon, almost at its full, already beginning to lose its golden radiance, was pouring over the tops of the lofty lindens, and making brighter and brighter the delicate fleecy clouds that occasionally overcast it.
From the pond, the surface of which, silvered in oneplace by the moon, could be seen through the trees, came the voices of the frogs. In the sweet-scented lilac-bush under the very window, which from time to time slowly shook its heavy-laden blossoms, birds were darting and fluttering.
"What marvellous weather!" said the count, as he joined Liza, and sat down in the low window-seat. "I suppose you go to walk a good deal, don't you?"
"Yes," rejoined Liza, not experiencing the slightest embarrassment in the count's company. "Every morning, at seven o'clock, I make the tour of the estate, and sometimes I take a walk with Pímotchka,—mamma'sprotégée."
"It's pleasant living in the country," cried the count, putting his monocle to his eye, and gazing first at the garden, and then at Liza. "But don't you like to take a walk on moonlight nights?"
"No. Three years ago my uncle and I used to go out walking every moonlight night. He had some sort of strange illness,—insomnia. Whenever there was a full moon, he could not sleep. His room like this opens into the garden, and the window is low. The moon shines right into it."
"Strange," remarked the count. "Then this is your room."
"No, I only sleep there for this one night. You occupy my room."
"Is it possible? ... oh, good heavens![85]I shall never in the world forgive myself for the trouble that I have caused," said the count, casting the monocle from his eye as a sign of sincerity.... "If I had only known that I was going to"....
"How much trouble was it? On the contrary, I amvery glad. My uncle's room is so nice and jolly: there's a low window there. I shall sit down in it before I go to bed, or perhaps I shall go down, out into the garden, and take a little walk."
"What a glorious girl!" said the count to himself, replacing the monocle, and staring at her, and while pretending to change his seat in the window, trying to touch her foot with his. "And how shrewdly she gave me to understand that I might meet her in the garden at the window, if I would come down!"
Liza even lost in the count's eyes a large share of her charm, so easy did the conquest of her seem to him.
"And how blissful it must be," said the count dreamily, gazing into the shadow-haunted alley, "to spend such a night in the garden with the object of one's love!"
Liza was somewhat abashed by these words, and by a second evidently deliberate pressure upon her foot. Before she thought, she made some reply for the sake of dissimulating her embarrassment.
She said, "Yes, it is splendid to walk in the moonlight."
There was something disagreeable about the whole conversation. She put the cover on the jar from which she had been taking the mushrooms, and was just turning from the window, when the cornet came toward her, and she felt a curiosity to know what kind of a man he was.
"What a lovely night!" said he.
"They can only talk about the weather," thought Liza.
"What a wonderful view!" continued the cornet, "only I should think it would be tiresome," he added through a strange propensity, peculiar to him, of sayingthings sure to offend the people who pleased him very much.
"Why should you think so? Always the same cooking and always the same dress might become tiresome; but a lovely garden can never be tiresome when you enjoy walking, and especially when there's a moon rising higher and higher. From my uncle's room you can see the whole pond. I shall see it from there to-night."