The woman fairly revelled in the affair. Arina Petrovna recalled a number of incidents from her past, and did not fail to narrate them. First she told of her own pregnancies, what tortures she had had to stand from Simple Simon; how, while carrying Pavel Vladimirych, she travelled by post to Moscow, changing horses at every stage so as not to miss the Dubrovino auction, and as a result nearly departed to the better world, etc., etc. All her deliveries had been remarkable for something or other. Yudushka's was the only one that had come easy.
"I didn't feel the least bit of heaviness," she said. "I would sit and think, 'Lord, am I really pregnant?' And when the time came I just lay down to rest for a few minutes and I don't know how it happened—I gave birth to him. He was the easiest son to me, the very, very easiest."
Then followed stories about domestics, how she herself "caught some of them in the act," how others were spied upon by her trusties, Ulita being generally the leader. Her old woman's memory faithfully guarded these remarkably distinct recollections. In all her drab past—always devoted to hoarding on both a petty and a large scale, the tracking of lust-stricken domestics was the only romantic element that touched a living chord in her.
It was as if in a dull magazine where the reader expects to find treatises on dry fogs and Ovid's grave, he suddenly comes upon "See the troika, gaily dashing," or some such spirited song of gaiety or sadness. The dénouement of these simple love affairs of the maids' room was generally drastic and even cruel. The woman was married off into a remote village, by all means to a widower with a large family, the male culprit was degraded to the position of a cattle tender or even pressed into military service. Arina Petrovna's recollection of the closing chapters of such romances had faded (cultured people have a memory indulgent of their own past), but the spying out of the amorous intrigues passed before her eyes in all its vividness. And no wonder. In those days there was the same absorbing interest in spying of that sort as there is nowadays in the serial "evening story," in which the author, instead of at once crowning the mutual longing of the hero and the heroine, breaks off at the most pathetic place and writes, "to be continued."
"Those girls gave me no end of trouble. Some would keep up the pretense to the last minute, and would feign and sham in the hope of eluding me. But no, my dear, you can't fool me. I am an old hand at it myself," she added almost sternly, as if threatening some one.
Finally came the stories of diplomatic pregnancies, so to speak, in which Arina Petrovna had figured not as the chastiser, but as the accomplice and concealer.
For example, her father Piotr Ivanych, when he was an old, tottering man of seventy, had also had a "mistress," who had also been discovered with an "increment"; and for higher considerations it had been necessary to conceal the "increment" from the old man. As ill luck would have it, Arina Petrovna was then at odds with her brother Piotr Petrovich who, also for some diplomatic reasons, had wanted to spy upon the pregnancy and leave his father in no doubt as to his lady-love's position.
"And what do you think? We carried the whole thing through almost in front of father's nose. The old dear slept in his bedroom, and the two of us, alongside of him, went on with our work, quietly, in a whisper and on tiptoe. I myself with my own hands closed up her mouth, so she could not scream, disposed of the linen, and then grabbed hold of her baby—he was a fine, big fellow—and dispatched him to the foundling asylum. When brother learned about it a week later he only gasped."
There had been another diplomatic pregnancy. Her cousin Varvara Mikhailovna had been involved in the case. Her husband had left on a campaign against the Turks, and she had not been sufficiently careful. She came galloping to Golovliovo like one possessed and had shouted "Save me, cousin!"
"Well, though we were on the outs with her at that time, I did not make her feel it. I welcomed her in the most hospitable way, calmed her, reassured her, pretended she had just come to us on a visit, and fixed the matter up so that her husband did not know a thing about it till his dying day."
Thus ran the tales of Arina Petrovna, and seldom has a narrator found more attentive listeners. Yevpraksia swallowed every word as if the incidents of a wonderful fairy tale were actually passing before her eyes. As to Ulita, she as an erstwhile participant in most of it, only made smacking sounds with the corners of her lips.
Ulita also brightened up and felt more comfortable than she had for a long time. Hers was a restless life. Even in childhood she had burned with servile ambitions. Sleeping and waking, she would dream about gaining favor in her master's eyes and getting the whiphand over those in her own station in life. But her dreams never came true. As soon as she set foot on the rung higher up, she would be tugged back and plunged into the inferno by an unseen, mysterious power. She possessed in perfection the qualities of an all-round servant of the gentlefolk. She was venomous, evil-tongued and always ready for treachery, but also slavishly ready to go anywhere and do anything that neutralized her viciousness. In former days, when it was necessary to follow up an event in the maid servants' room, or settle any dubious affair, Arina Petrovna had gladly made use of her services, though she had never appreciated them and had not admitted her to any office of trust. Ulita would then make loud complaints, and sting with her tongue, but no one paid attention to her grumblings, for she was well known as a malevolent woman, ready to curse herself and others to eternal damnation, but the next moment at a mere wink willing to come running and sit up on her hind legs prepared to do her master's bidding.
And so she had been knocked about, always trying to get somewhere and never getting there, till the abolition of serfdom put an end to her slavish ambitions.
One event in Ulita's youth had kindled in her great hopes. Porfiry Vladimirych, on one of his visits to Golovliovo, had become intimate with her, and, as tradition had it, had even had a child by her. That had brought down upon him the wrath of Arina Petrovna. It is uncertain whether the relationship had been kept up on his subsequent visits; at any rate, when Yudushka decided to establish himself permanently at Golovliovo, Ulita's hopes had been shattered grievously. Immediately after his arrival she came to him with a heap of gossip, in which Arina Petrovna was accused of all sorts of fraud. The master listened very affably to her gossip, but gave Ulita a cold look, evidently failing to remember her former "good services." Offended and deceived in her hopes, Ulita transferred herself to Dubrovino, where Pavel Vladimirych, because of his hatred for his dear brother Porfiry Vladimirych, received her gladly and even made her his housekeeper. Here for a long time her condition seemed to improve. Pavel Vladimirych would sit in the entresol and sip one glass of vodka after another, and she would run busily from storeroom to cellar, clanging a bunch of keys, and rattling her tongue. She had even quarrelled with Arina Petrovna, whom the sly wench nearly drove to her grave.
But Ulita loved treachery too well to be content with the peace and quiet that had come with her "good living." That was when Pavel Vladimirych had become so addicted to drink that his end could readily be foreseen. Porfiry Vladimirych was alive to Ulita's priceless value at this juncture, and he snapped his fingers again and summoned her. He ordered her never for a moment to leave his prey, not to contradict Pavel in anything, not even in his hatred of his brother Porfiry, and by all means to eliminate the interference of Arina Petrovna. This had been one of those domestic crimes which Yudushka had a gift of perpetrating without previous deliberation, spontaneously, and as a matter of course. Needless to say, Ulita carried out his orders most faithfully. Pavel Vladimirych never ceased to hate his brother, and the more he hated him, the more he drank his vodka, and the less capable he became of heeding the remarks and advice of Arina Petrovna as to "making provisions." Every moment of the dying man, every word uttered were at once reported to Golovliovo, so that Yudushka, equipped with a full knowledge of the facts, could determine the exact moment he should have to leave his ambush and step in as master of the situation that he had created. And so he had! He had come to Dubrovino at the very moment that he could get the estate for the asking. Porfiry Vladimirych had rewarded Ulita's services by making her a gift of cloth for a woolen dress, but he never admitted her close to him.
Again Ulita had been plunged from the heights of grandeur into the depths of inferno. It seemed to be her last fall. No one would snap his fingers again and summon her for service. As a sign of special favor and in consideration of her "nursing dear brother in his last days," she had been allotted a nook in the house where all the deserving old servants, who had remained after the abolition of serfdom, had found shelter. Here Ulita had become completely cowed, and when Porfiry Vladimirych made his choice of Yevpraksia, she not only had not shown any obstinacy, but had even been first to come to do homage to the master's love and had kissed her shoulder.
And now, when she had given herself up as forgotten and abandoned, she struck luck once more in Yevpraksia's pregnancy. It was suddenly recalled that somewhere in the servants' room there was a handy person. Somebody snapped her fingers and summoned Ulita. True, it was not the master who had snapped his fingers. But that he offered no obstacles was in itself sufficient grace. Ulita celebrated her entry into the Golovliovo manor by taking the samovar from Yevpraksia's hands. Bending sidewise a bit, with the weight of it, she walked smartly into the dining-room, where Porfiry Vladimirych was already seated. The master said not a word. He even smiled, she thought, when upon another occasion, as she was bringing in the samovar, she shouted from a distance, "Step to one side, master, or I'll scald you."
When Ulita answered the summons to the family council she made wry faces at first and refused to be seated. But when Arina Petrovna shouted at her in a kindly way, "Sit down,—will you? What's the use of your tricks? God made us all equal—be seated." Ulita sat down and kept silence a while. Very shortly, however, her tongue unloosened.
She, too, had her reminiscences. Her memory was stuffed with filth from the days of her serfdom. Beside the carrying out of delicate commissions like dogging the amorous doings of the maids' room, Ulita had also held the office of leech and apothecary in the Golovliovo manor. It was she who made all the injections, and applied the cupping-glasses and mustard plasters. She had given even the old master, Vladimir Mikhailych and Arina Petrovna injections, and the young master, too—every one of them. She retained the most grateful memories, and now there was a boundless field for all her reminiscences.
A new mysterious life animated the Golovliovo manor. Arina Petrovna would come over from Pogorelka every now and then to pay her "good son" a visit and supervise preparations that as yet were given no name. After the evening, the three women would go into Yevpraksia's room, would eat some homemade jam, play fool, and, till late into the night, would revel in reminiscences that would often make the heroine of the occasion blush. The least incident, the smallest trifle, served as a pretext for endless narrations. Yevpraksia brought some raspberry jam, and Arina Petrovna began a story that when she was carrying her daughter Sonya she could not stand even the smell of raspberries.
"No sooner did a raspberry come into the house than I began to yell at the top of my voice, 'Out, out with that damned thing!' After my confinement it was all right again; I liked raspberries again."
Yevpraksia brought some caviar—and Arina Petrovna had an incident to recall in connection with caviar, too.
"A really wonderful thing happened to me in connection with caviar. It was a month or two after I was married and suddenly I was seized with such a strong desire for caviar that I simply had to have it at any cost. I would sneak into the cellar and eat as much as I could. And once I said to my husband, 'Vladimir Mikhailych, why is it that I eat caviar all the time?' He smiled at me, you know, and said, 'My dear, it is because you are pregnant.' And surely enough, just nine months afterward I gave birth to Simple Simon."
But Porfiry Vladimirych continued to be noncommittal, never once admitting that he had anything to do with Yevpraksia's condition. Quite naturally this attitude of his embarrassed the women and dampened their effusions in his presence, so that he came to be completely abandoned. They chased him without ceremony from Yevpraksia's room when he came in the evening to rest up and have a chat.
"Be gone, you fine fellow!" Arina Petrovna said gaily. "You did your part. Now it's none of your business any more, it's the women's business. It's our turn now."
Yudushka took himself off in all meekness. Though not neglecting to reproach his mother dear for being unkind to him, he rejoiced inwardly that she was taking so much interest in the embarrassing affair, and that he was left alone. If not for his mother's participation, God knows what he would have had to undergo in order to hush up the nasty affair, the very thought of which made him spit out in disgust. Now, thanks to the experience of Arina Petrovna and the skill of Ulita, he hoped the "trouble" would pass without gaining publicity, and he himself, perhaps, would learn of the results after all was over.
Porfiry Vladimirych's hopes were not realized. First occurred the catastrophe with Petenka, then Arina Petrovna's death. And there was no possibility in sight of his extricating himself by means of some ugly machinations. He could not dismiss Yevpraksia for dissolute conduct, because Arina Petrovna had carried the affair too far and made it too widely known. Nor was Ulita so very reliable. Dexterous woman though she was, yet if he put his trust in her, he might have to deal with the coroner. For the first time in his life Yudushka seriously and sincerely regretted his loneliness; for the first time he realized vaguely that the people around him were not mere pawns to be played with.
"Why didn't she wait a while to die?" Yudushka reproached his mother dear. "She should have fixed it all up quietly and with good sense, and then—as she pleased! If it's time to die—you can't help it. I am sorry for the old woman. But if God wills it so, all our tears, and the doctors, and the cures, and all of us are naught before the power of God. The old woman lived long enough. She had her day—was herself a mistress all her life, and left her children a gentry estate. She lived to old age—well that's enough."
And as usual his idle mind, not used to dwell on a matter presenting practical obstacles, skipped to the easier topic that gave occasion to endless, unhampered verbiage.
"And to think how she died! Why, her death was worthy of a saint," he lied to himself, not knowing, though, whether he lied or spoke the truth. "Without ailment, without trouble—just so. She heaved a sigh, and before we knew it, she was no more. Oh, mother dear! And her smile, and the glow of her cheeks! Her hands placed together as if she wanted to confer a blessing. She shut her eyes and—good-by!"
But in the very heat of his sentimental babblings, something would suddenly prick him. That filthy business again. Fi, fi! "And really why didn't she wait a while! It was only a matter of a month or so, and now, look what she did!"
For some time he attempted to pretend ignorance, and answered Ulita's inquiries just as he had answered his mother's, "I don't know, I don't know anything."
But Ulita, an impudent woman, who had suddenly become conscious of her power, could not be dismissed like that.
"DoIknow? Have I brought this business on?" she cut him short. And then he realized that from that moment on the happy combination of the rôle of adulterer with the rôle of the unconcerned observer of the consequences of his adultery had become quite impossible.
Nearer and nearer came the disaster, inevitable, tangible. It pursued him relentlessly and—what was worst of all—it paralyzed his idle mind. He exerted all possible efforts to rid himself of the thought of the approaching calamity, to drown it in a torrent of idle words, but he succeeded only in part. He tried to hide behind the infallibility of the law of Providence and, as was his custom, turned it into a ball of thread which he could wind and unwind without end. There was the parable of the hair falling from a man's head, and the legend of the house built on sand; but just at the moment when his idle thoughts were about to roll down into a kind of mysterious abyss, when the endless winding of the ball seemed quite assured, a single word suddenly jumped out from the ambush and broke the thread. Alas! That one word was "adultery" and designated an act of which Yudushka did not wish to confess himself guilty even to himself.
When all his efforts to forget the disaster or to do away with it proved futile, when he realized at last that he was caught, his soul became filled with anguish. He walked back and forth in the room, thinking of nothing, and he felt that something inside of him trembled and ached. It was a check that his idle mind felt for the first time. Up to now, wherever his idle and empty imagination carried him, it always found boundless space, space that gave room to all possible kinds of combinations. Even the deaths of Volodka and Petka, even the death of Arina Petrovna had not baffled his flow of idle thoughts and words. Those were common, well recognized situations, met by well recognized, well established forms—requiems, funeral dinners, and the like. All this he had done in strict accordance with the custom and thus vindicated himself, so to speak, before the laws of man and Providence. But adultery—what was that? Why, that meant an arraignment of his entire life, the showing up of its inner sham. Though he had formerly been known as a pettifogger, even as a Bloodsucker, gossip had had so little legal background that he could safely retort, "Prove it!"
And now, all of a sudden—adulterer! A known, convicted adulterer. He had not even resorted to "measures," so great had been his confidence in Arina Petrovna; he had not even worked up a story to cover the thing. And on a Lenten day at that. The shame of it!
In these inner talks with himself, in spite of their confusion, there was something like an awakening of conscience. But the question was whether Yudushka would continue along that path or whether his idle mind would even in this grave matter perform its usual function of finding a loophole through which he could crawl out and emerge unscathed.
While Yudushka was thus smarting under his own mental vacuity, Yevpraksia was undergoing an unexpected inner change. Evidently the anticipation of motherhood untied the mental fetters that had hitherto held her bound. Up to that time she had been indifferent to everything and regarded Porfiry Vladimirych as a "master" in relation to whom she was a mere subordinate. Now, for the first time, she grasped a definite idea. It began to dawn on her that here was a state of affairs where she was the most important figure, and where she could not be driven about with impunity. As a consequence, even her face, usually blank and stolid, became lighted up and intelligent.
The death of Arina Petrovna had been the first fact in her semi-conscious life that produced a sobering effect upon her. No matter how peculiar the attitude of the old mistress to Yevpraksia's prospective motherhood was, still there were glimpses of sympathy in it and nothing of the disgusting evasiveness of Yudushka. So Yevpraksia had begun to see a protector in Arina Petrovna, as if expecting that some kind of attack was being planned against her. The forebodings of that attack were all the more persistent since they were not illuminated by consciousness, but merely filled the whole of her being with vague anxiety. Her mind was not vigorous enough to tell her definitely the point from which the attack would come and the form it would take; but her instincts had already been so aroused that the very sight of Yudushka filled her with an inexplicable fear. "Yes, that's where it will come from," reverberated in the inner chambers of her soul—from that coffin filled with dead dust, from that coffin she had so long been tending like a hireling, from that coffin which by some miracle had become the father and lord ofherchild! The feeling this thought awakened in her was akin to hatred and would inevitably have passed into hatred had it not been diverted by the sympathy and interest of Arina Petrovna, who, by constant chatter, never gave Yevpraksia a chance to think.
But Arina Petrovna retired to Pogorelka, and then vanished entirely. The feeling of anxiety and uneasiness in Yevpraksia became still more intense.
The stillness in which the Golovliovo manor became engulfed was broken only by a rustle announcing that Yudushka was stealing through the corridors, listening at the doors. Or sometimes, some one of the servants would come running from the yard and bang the door of the maids' room. But then stillness would again creep in from all sides. It was a dead stillness that filled Yevpraksia's being with superstitions and anguish. And since she was nearing her time, she had not even the sleepy feeling to look forward to that came in the evening after a day of household chores.
She tried once or twice to be affectionate with Porfiry Vladimirych and engage his kindly sympathies. Her attempts only resulted in brief but mean scenes that reacted painfully even on her crude sensibilities. All that was left to her was to sit with her arms folded and think, that is, be alarmed. And as to the causes for alarm, they multiplied daily. The death of Arina Petrovna had untied Yudushka's hands and introduced into the Golovliovo manor a new element of tale-bearing, which thereafter became the one thing in which Yudushka's soul reveled.
Ulita was aware that Porfiry Vladimirych was afraid and that with his idle, empty, perfidious character fear bordered on hatred. Besides, she knew very well that he was incapable not only of attachment but even of simple pity, and he kept Yevpraksia only because, thanks to her, his daily life flowed on in an undeviating rut. Equipped with these simple data, Ulita was in a position to nurse the feeling of hatred that arose in Yudushka whenever he was reminded of the coming "disaster."
Soon Yevpraksia became entangled in a web of gossip. Ulita every now and then "reported" to the master. In one instance she complained about the wasteful disposal of house provisions.
"I am afraid, master, your stuff is spent a bit too fast. I went to the cellar a while ago to get cured beef. I remembered a new tub had been begun not long ago, and—would you believe it? I look into the tub and find only two or three slices at the bottom."
"Is it possible?" said Porfiry Vladimirych, staring at her.
"If I had not seen it myself, I shouldn't have believed it, either. It's surprising what heaps of stuff are used up! Butter, barley, pickles—everything. Other folk feed their servants on gruel and goose-fat, but our servants must have it with butter, and sweet butter at that."
"Is that so?" exclaimed Porfiry Vladimirych, almost frightened.
At another time she entered casually and "reported" about the master's linen.
"Master, I think you ought to stop Yevpraksia, really. Of course, she is a girl, inexperienced, but still, take the linen for instance. She wasted piles of it on bed sheets and swaddling clothes, and it's all fine linen, you know."
Porfiry Vladimirych merely cast a fiery glance, but the whole of his empty being was thrown into convulsions by her "report."
"Of course, she cares for her infant," continued Ulita, in a mellifluous voice. "She thinks Lord knows what, a prince is going to be born. And I think that he, I mean the infant, could well sleep on fustian bedding—with such a mother."
At times she simply teased Yudushka.
"Do you know, master, what I was going to ask you?" she began. "What are you going to do about the infant? Are you going to make him your son, or will you, like other folk, put him in the foundling asylum."
At this Porfiry Vladimirych flashed such a fierce glance at her that she was instantly silenced.
And amidst the hatred that was rising from every corner, the moment drew nearer and nearer when the appearance of a tiny, crying, "servant of God" would in one way or another bring order into the moral chaos of the Golovliovo manor, and would increase the number of the "servants of God" that inhabit this universe.
It was seven o'clock in the evening. Porfiry Vladimirych had had his after-dinner nap and was in his study filling up sheets of paper with columns of figures. He was busy with the following problem: How much money would he now have had, if his dear mother Arina Petrovna had not appropriated the hundred ruble note his grandfather had given him on the day of his birth, but had placed it in the bank to the credit of the minor Porfiry? It came out not much—only eight hundred rubles in notes.
"It isn't a lot of money, let's say," Yudushka mused idly, "but still it's good to know that you have it for a rainy day. Any time you need it—you can just go and get it. You don't have to bow to anybody, or ask favors—just take your own money, given to you by your grandfather. Oh, mother dear! How could you have acted so rashly?"
Porfiry Vladimirych had allayed the fears that had only recently paralyzed his capacity for thinking idle nonsense. The glimmerings of conscience awakened by the difficult position in which Yevpraksia's pregnancy put him, and by the sudden death of Arina Petrovna, little by little faded away. His idle mind had done its work, and Yudushka had finally succeeded by great effort, it is true, in drowning all thought of the impending "disaster" in his bottomless pit of verbiage. One could not say he had made up his mind consciously, but rather intuitively. It was instinct in him that made him revert to his favorite formula: "I don't know anything, I allow nothing, I forbid everything," which he applied in every difficulty. On this occasion, too, it put an end to the inner turbulence that had briefly agitated him.
Now, this matter of the coming birth was of no concern to him, and his face assumed an indifferent, impenetrable look. He almost ignored Yevpraksia, not even calling her by name. If ever he did inquire about her he would say, "How about that woman—still sick?" He proved to be so strong that eyen Ulita, who had been through the school of serfdom and had learned quite a lot about reading people's minds, realized that to battle with a man who had no scruples and who would go to any lengths was quite impossible.
The Golovliovo manor was plunged in darkness. Only Yudushka's study and the side room occupied by Yevpraksia were illuminated by a glimmering light. Stillness reigned in Yudushka's rooms, broken only by the rattle of the beads on the counting board and the faint squeak of Yudushka's pencil.
Suddenly, in the dead stillness he heard a distant but piercing groan. Yudushka trembled, his lips quivered, his pencil jerked.
"One hundred and twenty rubles plus twelve rubles and ten kopeks," whispered Porfiry Vladimirych, endeavoring to stifle the unpleasant sensation produced by the groan.
But the groans were now coming with increasing frequency. Finally they got to be annoying. It became so difficult for him to work that he left the desk. First he paced back and forth trying not to hear; but little by little curiosity gained the upper hand. He opened the door cautiously, put his head into the darkness of the adjacent room and listened in an attitude of watchful expectation.
"My, I think I forgot to light the lamp before the ikon of the Holy Virgin, the Assuager of Our Sorrows," flashed through his mind.
Suddenly he heard quick footsteps in the corridor, and he darted back into his study, cautiously closing the door and mincing on tiptoe to the ikon.
A moment later he was already in "proper form," so that when the door opened wide and Ulita rushed into the room, she found him in a pose of prayer with folded hands.
"I am afraid Yevpraksia's life is in danger," said Ulita, not hesitating to interrupt Yudushka's prayers. But Porfiry Vladimirych did not even turn his face; he began to move his lips faster than before, and instead of answering waved his hand in the air as if to chase away an annoying fly.
"What's the use of waving your hand? I say Yevpraksia is doing poorly. She may die any moment," Ulita insisted gruffly.
This time Yudushka turned toward her, but his face was as calm and unctuous as if he had just been in communion with the Deity, and had cast off all earthly cares, and did not even understand what could make people disturb him.
"Though it's sinful to chide after prayer, still as a human being I cannot keep from complaining. How many times have I not asked you not to disturb me when I say my prayers?" he said in a voice befitting his worshipful mood, and permitting himself only a shake of his head as a sign of Christian reproach. "Well, what has happened?"
"What could have happened? Yevpraksia is in labor and cannot give birth. As if you haven't heard it before. Oh, you! Go and look at her at least."
"What is there to look at? Am I a doctor? Can I give her advice, or what? I don't know anything, I don't know any of your business. I know there is a sick woman in the house, but why she is sick and what her sickness is, that, I confess, I never had the curiosity to find out. Send for the priest if the patient is in danger. That's one piece of advice I can give you. Send for the priest, pray with him, light the ikon lamps. And then I'll have tea with the parson."
Porfiry Vladimirych was glad that he expressed himself so well in this most decisive moment. He looked at Ulita firmly as if he meant to say, "Well refute me, if you can."
Even she was baffled by his equanimity. "Suppose you do come and take a look," she repeated.
"I will not go because I have nothing to do there. If it were business, I would go without being called. If I have to go five versts on business, I'll go five versts, and if ten versts, I'll go ten. It may be in wind and storm, but I'll go. For I know there is business to attend to and I've got to go whether I want to or not."
Ulita thought she was asleep and that in her sleep she saw Satan himself standing before her and discoursing.
"To send for the priest—that's business! A prayer—do you know what the Scriptures say about a prayer? 'A prayer cures the afflicted.' That's what it says. So see to it. Send for the priest, pray together, and I, too, will pray in the meantime. You will pray there, in the ikon room, and I will invoke God's mercy here in my study. By joint effort, you on one side, I on the other, we may after all succeed in making our prayers heard in Heaven."
The priest was sent for, but before he came, Yevpraksia, in agony, delivered herself of the child. From the hurried steps and banging doors, Porfiry Vladimirych understood that something decisive had happened. And, indeed, in a few minutes hurried steps were heard in the corridor, and Ulita rushed in holding a tiny creature wrapped up in linen.
"Here! Look at it!" she exclaimed triumphantly, bringing the child close to the face of Porfiry Vladimirych.
For a moment it looked as if Yudushka were hesitating. His body swayed forward and a bright spark flashed in his eyes. But only for a moment. The next instant he turned up his nose squeamishly and waved his hand.
"No, no! I am afraid. I don't like them. Go away, go away!" he began to stammer, with infinite aversion in his face.
"Why don't you at least ask if it's a boy or a girl?" Ulita pleaded with him.
"No, no! What for? It's none of my business. It's your affair, and I don't know anything. I don't know anything, and I don't want to know either. Go away, for Christ's sake, be gone!"
Again Ulita felt as though she were in a nightmare with Satan standing in front of her. It exasperated her.
"I'll take him and put him on your sofa. Go nurse him!" That was a threat.
But Yudushka was not the man to be moved. While Ulita was threatening, he was already facing the ikon, with hands stretched upward. Evidently he was imploring God to forgive all people, those who sinned knowingly, and those who sinned unknowingly; those who sinned in word and those who sinned in deed; and he thanked the Lord that he himself was not a sinner or an adulterer, and that the Lord in His grace had led him in the righteous path. Even his nose trembled with the solemnity of his feeling. Ulita observed him for some time, blew out her lips in disgust and left.
"God took one Volodka and gave another Volodka," flashed up in Yudushka's mind quite irrelevantly; but he at once became aware of this sudden play of thought and spat inwardly in annoyance.
Soon the priest came and chanted and burned incense. Yudushka heard the drawl of the sexton as he was chanting, "Oh, Zealous Protectress!" and gladly chimed in. Soon Ulita came running to the door again and shouted, "He was christened Volodimir!"
Yudushka was moved by the strange coincidence of this circumstance and his recent aberration of mind. He saw the will of God in it, and this time he did not spit, but said to himself:
"Well, then, thank God! He took one Volodka and gave another. That's what God can do. You lose something in one place and you think it's gone, but God, if He wishes, rewards you for it a hundredfold."
At last it was announced that the samovar was on the table and the priest was waiting in the dining-room. Porfiry Vladimirych became quite peaceful and solemn. The Golovliovo priest, Father Aleksandr, was a polite man, and he endeavored to give his intercourse with Yudushka a worldly tone. In the landlord's manor there were all-night vigils every week and on the eve of every principal holiday, in addition to the ceremonial services performed every first of the month. That meant an income of over a hundred rubles a year. Father Aleksandr was not unmindful of this, nor of the fact that the landmarks between the church lands and Yudushka's lands had not yet been settled upon, and Yudushka, on passing the church meadows, would many times exclaim, "My, what fine meadows!" So the priest's worldly behavior toward Yudushka was tempered by fear, which came out every time the priest visited the manor. He would work himself up into gay spirits, though he really had no occasion to feel happy. And when Porfiry Vladimirych gave expression to heresies concerning the ways of Providence, the after-life, and so forth, the priest, though not quite approving of the heresies, still did not consider them sacrilegious and blasphemous, but ascribed them to the temerity of spirit characteristic of the gentry.
When Yudushka entered, the priest hurriedly gave him his blessing and just as hurriedly pulled his hand back as if afraid the Bloodsucker would bite it. He wanted to congratulate his spiritual son on the birth of the new little Vladimir, but uncertain how Yudushka was taking the matter, he decided not to congratulate him.
"It's misty outdoors," the priest began. "By popular signs, in which one may say there seems to be a great deal of superstition, such a state of the atmosphere signifies that thawing weather is near."
"And maybe it will turn out to be a frost. We are foretelling thawing weather and God will go ahead and send us a frost," retorted Yudushka, with a bustling; air of gaiety, and seated himself at the table, this time attended by the butler Prokhor.
"It is true that man in his aspirations strives to attain the unattainable and to gain access to the inaccessible; and as a consequence he incurs cause for penance, or even veritable grief."
"That is why we ought to refrain from guessing and foretelling and be satisfied with what God sends us. If He sends us warm weather, we ought to be satisfied with warm weather; if He send us frost, let us welcome the frost. We'll order the stoves heated more than usual, and those who travel will wrap themselves tight in fur coats, and there you are—we're all warm."
"Quite true."
"There are many nowadays who go circling round. They don't like this and they are dissatisfied with that, and the other thing is not after their heart, but I don't approve. I don't make forecasts myself, and I don't care for it in others. It is haughtiness of spirit—that's what I call it."
"That's true, too."
"We are all pilgrims here, that's how I look at it. Well, as to having a glass of tea, or a light bite, or something, we are allowed to do that, for God gave us our body and limbs. Even the government would not forbid us that. 'You can eat, if you want to,' it says, 'but hold your tongue.'"
"Also perfectly true," exclaimed the priest, tapping the saucer with the bottom of his empty tea-glass in exultation over the harmony between them.
"As I understand it, God gave man reason not to explore the unknown, but to refrain from sin. If I, for instance, feel a craving of the flesh or a temptation of some kind, I call my reason to the rescue and say, 'Show me, forsooth, the ways by which I may overcome this craving,' and I am quite right, for in such cases reason can really be of great use."
"Still, faith is superior, in a way," the priest offered in slight correction.
"Faith is one thing and reason is another. Faith points out the goal, and reason finds the way. It goes searching in every direction till at last it finds something. Take, for instance, all these drugs and plasters and healing herbs and potions—all of them have been invented by reason. But we ought to see to it that such invention is in accordance with faith, to our salvation and not to our ruin."
"I cannot disagree with you in this, either."
"There is a certain book, father, that I read some time ago. It says that one must not disdain the offices of reason if the latter is guided by faith, for a man without reason soon becomes the plaything of passion; and I even think that the first downfall of man came about because the devil in the shape of the serpent beclouded the human reason."
The reverend father did not object to this either, though he refrained from assent, since it was not yet clear to him what Yudushka had up his sleeve.
"We often see that people not only fall into sinful thought, but even commit crimes, all because of lack of reason. The flesh tempts, and if there is no reason, man falls into the abyss. Man craves something sweet, he craves gaiety and pleasure, especially when it comes through women. How will you preserve yourself without the aid of reason? And if, let's say, for instance, I do possess reason, I'll take some camphor and rub it in where necessary, and put some in other parts, and before you know, the craving is over as if it had never been there."
Yudushka became silent as if waiting to hear what the priest had to say in response, but the priest was still uncertain what Yudushka was driving at and therefore he only coughed and said quite irrelevantly:
"There are hens in my yard—very restless on account of the change of season. They run and jump about, and can't find a place for themselves."
"All because neither birds nor beasts nor reptiles possess reason. What is a bird? It has no worry, no cares—just flies about. The other day, for instance, I looked out of the window and saw some sparrows pecking at manure. Manure is enough for them but not for man."
"Yet in some cases even the Scriptures take birds as examples."
"In some cases, that's true. Where faith without reason can be a man's salvation, we must do as the birds do, pray to God, compose verses."
Porfiry Vladimirych grew silent. Though talkative by nature and though the event of the day naturally lent itself to a lengthy discussion, the most suitable form for the remarks on the subject had evidently not yet ripened in his mind.
"Birds need no reason," he said at last, "because they have no temptations. Or, rather, they have temptations but they are never called to answer for their doings. Birds lead a natural life. They have no property to take care of, no legitimate marriages, hence no widowhood. They are responsible neither to God nor to the authorities. They have only one lord—the cock."
"The cock! That's true. The cock is a sort of Sultan of Turkey to them."
"But man has so arranged his life, that he has given up the liberties granted to him by nature, and therefore he needs much reason: first, to keep himself from falling into sin, and second, not to tempt others. Am I right, father?"
"It is gospel truth. The Scriptures advise us to pluck out the tempting eye."
"That is, if you understand it literally, but there may be a way of avoiding sin not by plucking out the eyes, but by seeing to it that the eye is not tempted. One must have more frequent recourse to prayer, and curb the unruly flesh. Take me, for instance. I am in good health and vigor, I dare say. Well, I have female servants. Still that does not disturb me in the least. I know I can't get along without servants, well then, I keep them. I keep male servants, and female servants of every kind. A maid is needed in the household to fetch something from the cellar, to pour the tea, bring in something to eat—well—God bless her!—She does her work and I do mine, and so we get along very nicely indeed."
While speaking Yudushka tried to look into the priest's eyes, and the latter in his turn, tried to look into Yudushka's. But happily, there was a burning candle between them, so that they could look at each other to their hearts' content and see nothing but the flame of the candle.
"And then again, I take it this way. If you become intimate with your female servants, they'll begin to have their way in the house. And you'll have squabbles and disorder and quarrels and impertinence. I like to keep away from such things."
The priest stared so steadily that his eyes began to swim. Good manners, he knew, demanded that in a general conversation one should every now and then join in with at least a word. So he shook his head and muttered:
"Tss——"
"And if, at that, one behaves as other folks do, as my dear neighbor, Mr. Anpetov, for example, or my other neighbor, Mr. Utrobin, then you can fall into sin before you know it. Utrobin has six offspring on his place begot in that disgraceful way. But I don't want it. I say that if God took away my guardian angel, it means that such was His holy will, that He wanted me to be a widower. And if I am a widower by the grace of God, I must observe my widowerhood honestly and not contaminate my bed. Am I right, father?"
"It's hard, sir."
"I know it's hard, but still I observe it. Some say it's hard, and I say the harder the better, provided God is with you! We can't all have it sweet and easy. Some of us must bear hardships in the name of God. If you deny yourself somethinghere,you will obtain itthere. Hereit is called hardship andthere,virtue. Am I right?"
"As right as can be."
"And talking about virtues—they are not all of the same kind. Some virtues are great, others are small. What do you think?"
"Yes, quite possible, there may be small virtues and great virtues."
"That's just what I say. If a man is careful in his behavior, if he does not speak vile words, if he does not speak vain words, if he does not judge others, if, in addition to all this, he does not vex anybody or take away what is not his—that man will have a clear conscience, and no mud can soil him. And if anyone secretly speaks ill of a man like that, give it no heed. Spit at his insinuations—that's the long and short of it."
"In such cases the precepts of Christianity recommend forgiveness."
"Yes, forgive also. That's what I always do. If someone speaks ill of me, I forgive him and even pray to God for him. He is the gainer because a prayer on his behalf goes to Heaven, and I, too, am the gainer, for after I have prayed I forget about the whole matter."
"That's correct. Nothing lightens one's heart as much as a prayer. Sorrow and anger, and even ailment, all run before it as does the darkness of night before the sun."
"Well, thank God, then. And we should always conduct ourselves so that our life is like a candle in a lantern—seen from every side. Then we will not be misjudged, for there will be no cause. Take us, for example. We sat down here a while ago, have been chatting and talking things over—who could find fault with us? And now let us go and pray to the Lord, and then—to bed. And tomorrow we shall rise again. Isn't that so, father?"
Yudushka rose noisily, shoving his chair aside in sign that the conversation was at an end. The priest also rose and made ready to raise his arm to bless, but Porfiry Vladimirych, as an indication of special favor, caught the priest's hand and pressed it in his own.
"So he was christened Vladimir, father?" said Yudushka, shaking his head sadly in the direction of Yevpraksia's room.
"In honor of the saintly Prince Vladimir, sir."
"Well, God be praised. She is a good and faithful servant, but as to intelligence—well, she hasn't much of it. That's why they fall into adultery."
The whole of the next day Porfiry Vladimirych remained in his study, praying to God for guidance. On the third day he emerged for morning tea, not in his dressing gown, as usual, but in full holiday attire, the way he always dressed when he intended to transact important business. His face was pale, but radiated inner serenity; a benign smile played upon his lips; his eyes looked kindly and all-forgiving. The tip of his nose was slightly red with elation.
He drank his three glasses of tea in silence, and between gulps moved his lips, folded his hands, and looked at the ikon as if, in spite of yesterday's vigil, he still expected speedy aid and intercession from it. Finally he sent for Ulita, and while waiting for her, kneeled again before the ikon, that he might once more strengthen himself by communion with God, and also that Ulita might see plainly that what was about to happen was not his doing, but the work of God. Ulita, however, as soon as she glanced at Yudushka, perceived there was treachery in the depth of his soul.
"Well, now I have prayed to God," began Porfiry Vladimirych, and in token of obedience to His holy will, he lowered his head and spread his arms.
"That's fine," answered Ulita, but her voice expressed such deep comprehension that Yudushka involuntarily raised his eyes.
She stood before him in her usual pose, one hand upon her breast, the other supporting her chin. But her face sparkled with suppressed laughter. Yudushka shook his head in sign of Christian reproach.
"I suppose God bestowed His grace upon you," continued Ulita, unperturbed by his gesture of warning.
"You always blaspheme," Yudushka blustered. "How many times have I warned you with kindness, and you are the same as ever. Yours is an evil tongue, a malicious tongue."
"It seems to me I haven't said anything. Generally when people have prayed to God, it means that God's grace is visited upon them."
"That's just it—'it seems!' But why do you prate about all that 'seems' to you? Why don't you learn how to hold your tongue when necessary? I am talking business and she—'it seems to me!'"
Instead of replying Ulita shifted from one foot to the other, as if to indicate that she knew everything Porfiry Vladimirych had to tell her by heart.
"Listen to me, you!" Yudushka began. "I prayed to the Lord all day yesterday, and to-day too, and—look at it from whatever angle you wish—we've got to provide for Volodka."
"Of course, you've got to provide for him. He is not a puppy, I dare say. You can't throw him into a pond."
"Wait a while! Let me say a word. You plague. So this is what I say. Take it any way you please, we've got to provide for Volodka. First, we must do it out of consideration for Yevpraksia and then we've got to make a man of him."
Porfiry Vladimirych glanced at Ulita in the hope that she might show her willingness to have a good long chat with him, but she took the matter plainly and even cynically.
"You mean me to take him to the foundling asylum?" she asked, looking straight at him.
"Oh, oh," exclaimed Yudushka, "you are very quick to decide. Oh, Ulita, Ulita! You always do things in a hurry and without due consideration. You're always ready to say something rash. How do you know? Maybe I don't intend to send him to the foundling asylum. Maybe I thought of something else for Volodka."
"Well, if you did, there's nothing bad about it."
"This is what I was going to say. On the one hand I feel for Volodka, but on the other hand, if you think the matter over and weigh it carefully, you see it's impossible to keep him here."
"Of course, what will people say? They'll say, 'How did a little baby boy come to the Golovliovo manor?'"
"Yes, they'll say that and other things. And besides, to stay here will be of no benefit to him. His mother is young, and she'll spoil him. I am old, and though I have nothing to do with the matter, still, in consideration of his mother's faithful service, I would also be easy with him. You can't help it, you know, the little fellow will have to be flogged for doing mischief, but how can you? It's this and that, and a woman's tears, and screams, and all. Am I right?"
"Yes, quite right. It is annoying."
"What I want is, that all should be well in our house. I want to see Volodka become a real man in time, a servant of God and a good subject of the Czar. If God wants him to be a peasant, I should like him to know how to plow, mow, chop wood—a little of everything. And if it will be his lot to be of a more exalted station, I want him to know some trade, some profession. Children from the foundling asylum sometimes rise to be teachers."
"From the foundling asylum? They are made generals at once, I suppose."
"Well, I wouldn't say generals, but still—maybe Volodka will live to be a famous man. And as to the manner they are brought up in there, it's excellent. I know all about it myself. Clean beds, healthy wet-nurses, white linen clothes, nipples, bottles, diapers, in a word, everything."
"Yes, it couldn't be better—for illegitimates!"
"And if he is placed in the country as a fosterchild, well, that will be just as good. He will get used to toil from his young days. Toil, you know, is as good as prayer. We, you see, pray in the regular way. We stand before the ikon, make the sign of the cross, and if our prayer pleases God, He rewards us for it. But the peasant—he toils. Sometimes he would be glad to pray in the proper way, but he hasn't the time for it. But God sees his labors and rewards him for his toil just as He rewards us for our prayers. We can't all live in palaces and go to balls and dances. Some of us must live in smoky hovels and take care of Mother Earth and nurse her. And as to where happiness lies, there are two guesses to it. Some live in palaces and in luxury, and yet shed tears; others live behind clay walls on bread and cider, yet feel as if they were in paradise. Am I right?"
"Nothing better if you feel as if you were in paradise."
"So, my dear, that's what we will do. Take that little rascal Volodka, wrap him up warm and cosy and go to Moscow at once with him. I'll order a roofed cart for you and a pair of good horses. The road is smooth, straight, fair, no puddles, no pitfalls. You'll roll along merrily. But see to it that everything is done in the best fashion, in Golovliovo fashion, just the way I like things to be done. The nipple should be clean, and the bottle, clothes, and sheets, and blankets, and diapers—take enough of everything. And if they won't give it all to you, come and tell me. When you get to Moscow, stop at an inn. Ask for enough to eat and a samovar and tea and all that. Oh, Volodka, dear! What trouble you are to me! It breaks my heart to part with you, but it can't be helped, my child. When you grow up, you'll see that it was for your own good, and you'll thank me for it."
Yudushka raised his hands slightly and moved his lips in sign of inner prayer. But that did not prevent him from glancing sideways at Ulita and noticing the sarcastic quivering of her face.
"Well, what—did you want to say something?"
"No, nothing. Of course, you know—he'll thank his benefactors—if he finds them."
"Oh, you wicked thing! You think we'll place him there without a proper card? Why, of course, you'll take out a card, from which document we'll be able to find him. They'll bring him up and teach him sense, and then we'll come with the card and say, 'Here, now, let's have our fellow, our Volodka.' With the card we'll get him from the bottom of the sea. Am I right?"
Ulita made no reply. The caustic quivering of her face showed more distinctly than before and it exasperated Porfiry Vladimirych.
"You are a mean thing," he said. "The devil dwells in you. Fi, fi! Well, enough. To-morrow, before the sun is up, you'll take Volodka and quickly, so that Yevpraksia does not hear you, and set out for Moscow. You know where the Foundling Asylum is?"
"I've carried them," Ulita answered laconically, as if hinting at something in the past.
"Well, if you are used to it—all the better for you. You must know all the ins and outs of the place. Be sure to place him there and bow low before the authorities—like this." Yudushka rose and bowed, touching the floor with his hands.
"Beg of them to make him comfortable. And be sure to get the card, don't forget! The card will help us find him anywhere. I'll allow you two twenty-five ruble bills for expenses. I know how it is—you'll have to give some here and put a couple of rubles there. Ah, ah, how sinful man is! We are all human beings, nothing but human beings! We all like sweets and dainties. Why, even our Volodka! Look at him—he is no bigger than my finger nail—and see the money I've already spent on him."
Yudushka crossed himself and bowed low before Ulita, silently begging her to take good care of the little rascal.
Thus, in the simplest way, was the future of the little illegitimate arranged for.
The next morning, while the young mother was tossing about in delirium, Porfiry Vladimirych was standing at the window in the dining-room, moving his lips and making the sign of the cross on the window pane. A cart, roofed over with mats, was leaving the front yard. It was carrying Volodka away.
It climbed up the hill, drove by the church, turned to the left and vanished in the village. Yudushka made another sign of the cross and sighed:
"The other day the priest was speaking about thawing weather," he said to himself, "but God sent us a frost instead. And a fine frost, at that. So it always is with us. We dream, we build castles in the air, we philosophize proudly and think we'll excel God Himself in His wisdom, but God in a trice turns our haughtiness of spirit into nothingness."
Yudushka's agony commenced when the resources of loquaciousness, in which he had so freely indulged, began to give out. A void had formed around him. Some had died, others had deserted him. Even Anninka preferred the miserable future of a nomadic actress to the flesh-pots of Golovliovo. Yevpraksia alone remained. But Yevpraksia's conversational gifts were limited, and, more than that, Yevpraksia was now a changed person. It was the difference that had occurred in her which convinced Yudushka that his halcyon days were gone forever.
Till then Yevpraksia had been so helpless that Porfiry Vladimirych could tyrannize over her without the slightest risk, and her mental development was so backward and her character so flabby that she had not even felt the oppression. During Yudushka's harangues she would look into his eyes apathetically, and think of something else. But now suddenly she grasped something important, and the first consequence of awakened understanding was repugnance, sudden and half-conscious, but vicious and insuperable.
Anninka's stay had evidently not been without results for Yevpraksia. The casual conversations with the young actress had quite upset her. Previously she would never have dreamed of wondering why Porfiry Vladimirych, as soon as he met a man, instantly started to weave around him an oppressive net of words, sinister in their emptiness. Now she perceived it was not talking that Yudushka did, but tyrannizing, and it would be well worth the while to pull him up short and make him feel the time had come for him, too, to go easy. So, from now on, she listened to his endless flow of words and soon realized that the one purpose of Yudushka's talk was to worry, annoy, nag.
"The mistress herself said she didn't know why he talked so much," Yevpraksia reasoned. "No, it's his meanness working in him. He knows who is unprotected and at his mercy. And so he turns and twists them anyway he wants to."
But that was only secondary. The main effect of Anninka's visit was that it stirred up the instincts of youth in Yevpraksia, which had hitherto smouldered in her undeveloped mind and now suddenly flared up in a blaze. Many things became clear to her—for instance, why Anninka had refused to remain at Golovliovo and why she had said flatly, "It's horrible here!" She had acted that way because she was young and wanted to enjoy life. Yevpraksia, too, was young, indeed she was! It only seemed that her youth was crushed under a load of fat, in reality it manifested itself quite boldly. It called and lured her; its flame now died down, now flared up. She had thought Yudushka would do for her, but now she perceived her mistake. "The old, rotten stump, how he got round me!" ran through her mind. "Wouldn't it be fine now to live with a real lover, young and handsome? He would hug me and kiss me and whisper caressing words in my ear. The old scarecrow, how did he ever tempt me? The Pogorelka lady must have a lover, I'm sure. That's why she gathered up her skirts and sailed away so rapidly. And I must sit here, in a jail, chained to that old man."
Of course, some time passed before Yevpraksia mutinied openly; but once on the road of revolt she did not halt. A storm was brewing within her, and her hatred grew each minute. Yudushka, for his part, remained in ignorance of her state of mind. Yevpraksia began with general complaints, such as "he has spoiled my life." Then came comparisons. "In Mazulina," she reflected, "Pelageyushka lives with her master as a housekeeper. She never does a stroke of work, and wears silk dresses. She sits in a cosy little room doing bead embroidery. How I hate you now, you old fright; How I hate you, I hate you!" she wound up with a cry.
In addition to this, the main cause of irritation, there was another one, one that was valuable because it could serve as a good occasion for the declaration of war against Yudushka. It was her confinement and the disappearance of her son Volodya.
At the time of the child's removal Yevpraksia had been rather indifferent. Porfiry Vladimirych had curtly announced that the baby had been entrusted to reliable people, and he presented her with a new shawl by way of solace. Then life resumed its course, and Yevpraksia plunged into the mire of household affairs with greater industry than before, as if to atone for her unsuccessful motherhood. But whether the mother feeling continued to smoulder in her, or whether it was merely a whim, at any rate, the memory of Volodka came back to her, and at the precise moment when Yevpraksia felt the breath of freedom and it began to dawn upon her that there existed another life different from that at Golovliovo. The occasion was too good not to be taken advantage of.
"To think of what the scoundrel has done!" she reflected, trying consciously to work herself into a rage. "He has robbed me of my own child. Just as one drowns a pup in the pond."
Little by little the thought filled her mind completely. She came to believe that she had always longed for her child passionately. Her hatred of Porfiry Vladimirych fed on this new and rapidly growing obsession.
"At least, I should have had something to amuse me now. Volodya, Volodyushka! My dear little son! Where are you now? He must have shipped you to some wretched peasant woman. God curse them, the damned gentry. They bring children in the world and then throw them like pups into a ditch, and no one takes them to account. It would have been better for me to cut my throat than to allow that shameless old brute to outrage me."
Her hatred was now ripe. She felt a desire to vex and pester him and spoil life for him. War began, the most unbearable of wars, squabbles and provocations, and petty pricking. It was the only form of warfare that could have subdued Porfiry Vladimirych.
One morning when Porfiry Vladimirych was sitting at tea, he was unpleasantly surprised. He was discharging masses of verbal pus, while Yevpraksia, with a saucer of tea in her hand and a piece of sugar between her teeth, was listening in silence, snorting from time to time. Warm, fresh-baked bread had been served, and he had just begun to develop a theory of his own to the effect that there are two kinds of bread, visible bread which we eat and thereby sustain our bodies, and the invisible, spiritual bread of which we partake for the good of our soul. Suddenly Yevpraksia broke in upon his discourse most unceremoniously.
"People say Palageyushka lives so well at Mazulino," she began, turning her entire body round to the window and swinging her crossed feet with impudent nonchalance.
Yudushka was somewhat startled by the unexpected remark, but attributed no peculiar importance to it.
"In case we don't eat visible bread for a long time," he went on, "we feel bodily hunger; and if we don't partake of the spiritual bread for some length of time——"
"I say, Palageyushka certainly lives well at Mazulino," Yevpraksia interrupted again.
Porfiry Vladimirych, somewhat startled, looked at her in amazement, but refrained from scolding, evidently smelling a rat.
"If Palageyushka has a fine life, let her," he replied meekly.
"Her master," Yevpraksia kept on provokingly, "makes it nice and easy for her, he does not compel her to work, and dresses her in silk."
Yudushka's amazement grew. Yevpraksia's words were so preposterous that he was taken completely by surprise.
"A different dress every day, one to-day, one to-morrow, and another for holidays. She drives to church in a four-horse carriage. She goes first, and the master follows. When the priest sees her carriage, he has the bells rung. Then she sits in her own room. If her master wishes to spend some time with her, she receives him in her room. And her maid entertains her, or she does bead embroidery."
"Well, what of it?" asked Porfiry Vladimirych, at last coming to his senses.
"I was just telling what a pleasant life Palageyushka leads."
"And you, is your life worse? My, my, aren't you insatiable!"
Had Yevpraksia left his remark unanswered, Porfiry Vladimirych would have belched forth a torrent of empty words to drown her foolish hints. He would have resumed his twaddle. But apparently Yevpraksia had no intention of holding her tongue.
"I can't say that," she snapped back. "My life is not a sad one. Thank goodness I don't wear tick. Last year you bought me two calico dresses and paid five rubles for each. How generous!"
"And how about the woolen dress? And for whom was a shawl bought lately? My, my!"
Instead of answering, Yevpraksia placed her elbows on the table and flashed on Yudushka a side glance brimming over with such deep contempt that, unaccustomed to such looks, he was overcome with something like dread.
"Do you know how the Lord punishes ingratitude?" he mumbled feebly, hoping the reference to God would bring the woman to her senses. But his remark did not placate the mutineer. She cut him short at once.
"Don't talk me blind!" she exclaimed, "and don't drag in God. I'm not a baby. Enough! I've had enough of your tyranny."
Porfiry Vladimirych grew silent. His glass of tea stood untouched. His face grew pale, his lips trembled, as if trying vainly to curl up into a grin.
"These are Anninka's tricks," he said finally, though without a clear perception of what he was saying. "It's she, the snake, who has incited you."
"What tricks do you mean?"
"I mean the way you are talking to me. She, she taught you. No one else!" he foamed in a rage. "Give her silk dresses! The impudence! Do you know, you shameless creature, who in your position wears silk dresses?"
"Tell me and I will know."
"The most—the most dissolute ones. They are the only ones who wear silk dresses."
But Yevpraksia was not impressed. On the contrary, she answered him back with saucy arguments.
"I don't know why you call them dissolute. Everybody knows it's the masters that insist upon it. If a master seduces one of us, well, she lives with him. You and I are not so saintly either, we are doing the same as the Mazulina master and his queen."
"Oh, you! Fie, fie, for shame!"
Yudushka stared at his rebellious companion in utter consternation. A flow of empty words came tripping to his tongue, but for the first time in his life he felt a vague suspicion that there are occasions when even talk is useless.
"Well, my friend, I see there's no use talking to you to-day," he said, rising from the table.
"Neither to-day, nor to-morrow—never! No more of your tyranny! I've listened to you enough; now it's time for you to listen to me."
Porfiry Vladimirych made a movement as if to throw himself at her with clenched fists, but she protruded her chest with such determination that he lost heart. He turned his face to the ikon, lifted up his hands prayerfully, mumbled a prayer, and trudged slowly away into his room.
The whole day he felt uneasy. He had no definite fears for the future, but the feeling that something had broken in upon his well-ordered life and had passed unpunished greatly upset him. He did not go to dinner, pleading ill health, and in a meek, feeble voice asked that his food be brought into his room. In the evening after tea, which passed in silence for the first time in his life, he rose, as was his habit, to say his prayers. In vain did his lips seek to whisper the customary words. His agitated mind refused to follow the prayer. A persistent enervating anxiety pervaded his being, and he involuntarily strained his ear to catch the dying echoes of the day, which were lingering in the various corners of the vast manor-house. Finally, when even the yawning of the people could be heard no more, and the house was plunged in the profoundest quiet, he could not hold out any longer. Stealing noiselessly along the corridor, he went to Yevpraksia's room and put his ear to the door to listen. She was alone, and Yudushka heard her yawning and saying, "Lord! Savior! Holy Virgin," as she scratched her back.
Porfiry Vladimirych tried the knob, but the door was locked.
"Yevpraksia, darling, are you there?" he called.
"Yes, but not for you!" she snapped, so rudely that he immediately retreated to his room.
The next morning there was another conversation. Yevpraksia intentionally selected morning tea for launching her attacks on Porfiry Vladimirych. She felt instinctively that a spoiled morning would fill the entire day with anxiety and pain.
"I'd like to see how some people live," she began in a rather enigmatic manner.
Yudushka changed countenance. "It's beginning," flashed through his mind; but he held his tongue and waited for what would come next.
"It's fine to live with a handsome young friend, upon my word. You walk about in the rooms and look at each other. Not a cross word exchanged. 'My darling' and 'my heart'—that's your whole conversation. Lovely and noble!"
The subject was peculiarly hateful to Porfiry Vladimirych. Although of necessity he tolerated adultery within strict limits, he nevertheless considered lovemaking a diabolical temptation. This time, however, he restrained himself, all the more so because he wanted his tea. The tea-pot had been boiling on the samovar for quite some time, but Yevpraksia seemed to have forgotten about filling the glasses.
"Of course, many of us women are foolish," she went on, impudently swinging in her chair and drumming on the table with her fingers. "Some are so silly that they are ready to do anything for a calico dress; others give themselves away for nothing at all. 'Cider,' you said, 'drink as much as you please,' A fine thing to seduce a woman with!"
"Is it from interest alone that——" Yudushka risked a timid remark, watching the tea-pot from which steam had begun to escape.
"Who says from interest alone? Is it I who am a selfish woman?" cried Yevpraksia heatedly, suddenly shifting the conversation. "Do you mean to reproach me for the bread I eat?"
"I don't reproach you. I only said that not from interest alone do people——"
"'I said'! Talk, but talk sensibly. The idea! I serve from interest! Kindly permit me to ask you what particular advantage I have derived except cider and gherkins?"
"Well, cider and gherkins are not the only things——" ventured Yudushka, unable to restrain himself.
"What else have I gotten? Let me hear, let me hear!"
"Who sends four sacks of flour to your parents every month?"
"Four sacks. What else?"
"Groats, hemp-seed oil and other things——"
"So you are begrudging my poor parents the wretched groats and oil you send them? Oh, you!"
"I am not begrudging them. It's you——"
"Now you are accusing me. I can't eat a crust of bread without being reproached for it, and it's I who am blamed for everything."