Fedor Ivanovich Lavretsky (we must ask our reader's permission to break off the thread of the story for a time) sprang from a noble family of long descent. The founder of the race migrated from Prussia during the reign of Basil the Blind,[A] and was favored with a grant of two hundredchetverts[B] of land in the district of Biejetsk. Many of his descendants filled various official positions, and were appointed to governorships in distant places, under princes and influential personages, but none of them obtained any great amount of property, or arrived at a higher dignity, than that of inspector of the Czar's table.
[Footnote A: In the fifteenth century.]
[Footnote B: An old measure of land, variously estimated at from two to six acres.]
The richest and most influential of all the Lavretskys was Fedor Ivanovich's paternal great-grandfather Andrei, a man who was harsh, insolent, shrewd, and crafty. Even up to the present day men have never ceased to talk about his despotic manners, his furious temper, his senseless prodigality, and his insatiable avarice. He was very tall and stout, his complexion was swarthy, and he wore no beard. He lisped, and he generally seemed half asleep. But the more quietly he spoke, the more did all around him tremble. He had found a wife not unlike himself. She had a round face, a yellow complexion, prominent eyes, and the nose of a hawk. A gypsy by descent, passionate and vindictive in temper, she refused to yield in any thing to her husband, who all but brought her to her grave, and whom, although she had been eternally squabbling with him, she could net bear long to survive.
Andrei's son, Peter, our Fedor's grandfather, did not take after his father. He was a simple country gentleman; rather odd, noisy in voice and slow in action, rough but not malicious, hospitable, and devoted to coursing. He was more than thirty years old when he inherited from his father two thousand souls,[A] all in excellent condition; but he soon began to squander his property, a part of which he disposed of by sale, and he spoilt his household. His large, warm, and dirty rooms were full of people of small degree, known and unknown, who swarmed in from all sides like cockroaches. All these visitors gorged themselves with whatever came in their way, drank their fill to intoxication, and carried off what they could, extolling and glorifying their affable host. As for their host, when he was out of humor with them, he called them scamps and parasites; but when deprived of their company, he soon found himself bored.
[Footnote A: Male serfs.]
The wife of Peter Andreich was a quiet creature whom he had taken from a neighboring family in acquiescence with his father's choice and command. Her name was Anna Pavlovna. She never interfered in any thing, received her guests cordially, and went out into society herself with pleasure—although "it was death" to her, to use her own phrase, to have to powder herself. "They put a felt cap on your head," she used to say in her old age; "they combed all your hair straight up on end, they smeared it with grease, they strewed it with flour, they stuck it full of iron pins; you couldn't wash it away afterwards. But to pay a visit without powdering was impossible. People would have taken offence. What a torment it was!" She liked to drive fast, and was ready to play at cards from morning until evening. When her husband approached the card-table, she was always in the habit of covering with her hand the trumpery losses scored up against her; but she had made over to him, without reserve, all her dowry, all the money she had. She brought him two children—a son named Ivan, our Fedor's father, and a daughter, Glafira.[A]
[Footnote A: The accent should be on the second syllable of this name.]
Ivan was not brought up at home, but in the house of an old and wealthy maiden aunt, Princess Kubensky. She styled him her heir (if it had not been for that, his father would not have let him go), dressed him like a doll, gave him teachers of every kind, and placed him under the care of a French tutor—an ex-abbé, a pupil of Jean Jacques Rousseau—a certain M. Courtin de Vaucelles an adroit and subtle intriguer—"the veryfine fleurof the emigration," as she expressed herself; and she ended by marrying thisfine fleurwhen she was almost seventy years old. She transferred all her property to his name, and soon afterwards, rouged, perfumed with amberá la Richelieu, surrounded by negro boys, Italian grey-hounds, and noisy parrots, she died, stretched on a crooked silken couch of the style of Louis the Fifteenth, with an enamelled snuff-box of Petitot's work in her hands—and died deserted by her husband. The insinuating M. Courtin had preferred to take himself and her money off to Paris.
Ivan was in his twentieth year when this unexpected blow struck him. We speak of the Princess's marriage, not her death. In his aunt's house, in which he had suddenly passed from the position of a wealthy heir to that of a hanger-on, he would not slay any longer. In Petersburg, the society in which he had grown up closed its doors upon him. For the lower ranks of the public service, and the laborious and obscure life they involved, he felt a strong repugnance. All this, it must be remembered, took place in the earliest part of the reign of the Emperor Alexander I[A]. He was obliged, greatly against his will, to return to his father's country house. Dirty, poor, and miserable did the paternal nest seem to him. The solitude and the dullness of a retired country life offended him at every step. He was devoured by ennui; besides, every one in the house, except his mother, regarded him with unloving eyes. His father disliked his metropolitan habits, his dress-coats and shirt-frills, his books, his flute, his cleanliness—from which he justly argued that his son regarded him with a feeling of aversion. He was always grumbling at his son, and complaining of his conduct.
[Footnote A: When corruption was the rule in the public service.]
"Nothing we have here pleases him," he used to say. "He is so fastidious at table, he eats nothing. He cannot bear the air and the smell of the room. The sight of drunken people upsets him; and as to beating anyone before him, you musn't dare to do it. Then he won't enter the service; his health is delicate, forsooth! Bah! What an effeminate creature!—and all because his head is full of Voltaire!" The old man particularly disliked Voltaire, and also the "infidel" Diderot, although he had never read a word of their works. Reading was not in his line.
Peter Andreich was not mistaken. Both Diderot and Voltaire really were in his son's head; and not they alone. Rousseau and Raynal and Helvetius also, and many other similar writers, were in his head; but in his head only. Ivan Petrovich's former tutor, the retired Abbé and encyclopaedist, had satisfied himself with pouring all the collective wisdom of the eighteenth century over his pupil; and so the pupil existed, saturated with it. It held its own in him without mixing with his blood, without sinking into his mind, without resolving into fixed convictions. And would it be reasonable to ask for convictions from a youngster half a century ago, when we have not even yet acquired any?
Ivan Petrovich disconcerted the visitors also in his father's house. He was too proud to have anything to do with them; they feared him. With his sister Glafira, too, who was twelve years his senior, he did not at all agree. This Glafira was a strange being. Plain, deformed, meagre—with staring and severe eyes, and with thin, compressed lips—she, in her face and her voice, and in her angular and quick movements, resembled her grandmother, the gipsy Andrei's wife. Obstinate, and fond of power, she would not even hear of marriage. Ivan Petrovich's return home was by no means to her taste. So long as the Princess Kubensky kept him with her, Glafira had hoped to obtain at least half of her father's property; and in her avarice, as well as in other points, she resembled her grandmother. Besides this, Glafira was jealous of her brother. He had been educated so well; he spoke French so correctly, with a Parisian accent; and she scarcely knew how to say "Bonjour" and "Comment vous portez vous?" It is true that her parents were entirely ignorant of French, but that did not make things any better for her.
As to Ivan Petrovich, he did not know what to do with himself for vexation and ennui; he had not spent quite a year in the country, but even this time seemed to him like ten years. It was only with his mother that he was at ease in spirit; and for whole hours he used to sit in her low suite of rooms listening to the good lady's simple, unconnected talk, and stuffing himself with preserves. It happened that among Anna Pavlovna's maids there was a very pretty girl named Malania. Intelligent and modest, with calm, sweet eyes, and finely-cut features, she pleased Ivan Petrovich from the very first, and he soon fell in love with her. He loved her timid gait, her modest replies, her gentle voice, her quiet smile. Every day she seemed to him more attractive than before. And she attached herself to Ivan Petrovich with the whole strength of her soul—as only Russian girls know how to devote themselves—and gave herself to him. In a country house no secret can be preserved long; in a short time almost every one knew of the young master's fondness for Malania. At last the news reached Peter Andreich himself. At another time it is probable that he would have paid very little attention to so unimportant an affair; but he had long nursed a grudge against his son, and he was delighted to have an opportunity of disgracing the philosophical exquisite from St. Petersburg. There ensued a storm, attended by noise and outcry. Malania was locked up in the store-room.[A] Ivan Petrovich was summoned into his father's presence. Anna Pavlovna also came running to the scene of confusion, and tried to appease her husband; but he would not listen to a word she said. Like a hawk, he pounced upon his son charging him with immorality, atheism, and hypocrisy. He eagerly availed himself of so good an opportunity of discharging on him all his long-gathered spite against the Princess Kubensky, and overwhelmed him with insulting expressions.
[Footnote A: A sort of closet under the stairs.]
At first Ivan Petrovich kept silence, and maintained his hold over himself; but when his father thought fit to threaten him with a disgraceful punishment, he could bear it no longer. "Ah!" he thought, "the infidel Diderot is going to be brought forward again. Well, then, I will put his teaching in action." And so with a quiet and even voice, although with a secret shuddering in all his limbs, he told his father that it was a mistake to accuse him of immorality; that he had no intention of justifying his fault, but that he was ready to make amends for it, and that all the more willingly, inasmuch as he felt himself superior to all prejudices; and, in fact—that he was ready to marry Malania. In uttering these words Ivan Petrovich undoubtedly attained the end he had in view. Peter Andreich was so confounded that he opened his eyes wide, and for a moment was struck dumb; but he immediately recovered his senses, and then and there, just as he was, wrapped in a dressing-gown trimmed with squirrels' fur, and with slippers on his bare feet, he rushed with clenched fists at his son, who, as if on purpose, had dressed his hair that daya la Titus, and had put on a blue dress-coat, quite new and made in the English fashion, tasselled boots, and dandified, tight-fitting buckskin pantaloons. Anna Pavlovna uttered a loud shriek, and hid her face in her hands; meanwhile her son ran right through the house, jumped into the court-yard, threw himself first into the kitchen garden and then into the flower garden, flew across the park into the road, and ran and ran, without once looking back, until at last he ceased to hear behind him the sound of his father's heavy feet, the loud and broken cries with which his father sobbed out, "Stop, villain! Stop, or I will curse you!"
Ivan Petrovich took refuge in the house of a neighbor,[A] and his father returned home utterly exhausted, and bathed in perspiration. There he announced, almost before he had given himself time to recover breath, that he withdrew his blessing and his property from his son, whose stupid books he condemned to be burnt; and he gave orders to have the girl Malania sent, with out delay, to a distant village. Some good people found out where Ivan Petrovich was, and told him everything. Full of shame and rage, he swore vengeance upon his father; and that very night, having lain in wait for the peasant's cart on which Malania was being sent away, he carried her off by force, galloped with her to the nearest town, and there married her. He was supplied with the necessary means by a neighbor, a hard-drinking, retired sailor, who was exceedingly good-natured, and a very great lover of all "noble histories," as he called them.
[Footnote A: Literally, "of a neighboringOdnodvorets." That word signifies one who belongs by descent to the class of nobles and proprietors, but who has no serfs belonging to him, and is really a moujik, or peasant. Some villages are composed of inhabitants of this class, who are often intelligent, though uneducated.]
The next day Ivan Petrovich sent his father a letter, which was frigidly and ironically polite, and then betook himself to the estate of two of his second cousins,—Dmitry Pestof, and his sister Marfa Timofeevna, with the latter of whom the reader is already acquainted. He told them everything that had happened, announced his intention of going to St. Petersburg to seek an appointment, and begged them to give shelter to his wife, even if only for a time. At the word "wife" he sobbed bitterly; and, in spite of his metropolitan education, and his philosophy, he humbly, like a thorough Russian peasant, knelt down at the feet of his relations, and even touched the floor with his forehead.
The Pestofs, who were kind and compassionate people, willingly consented to his request. With them he spent three weeks, secretly expecting an answer from his father. But no answer came; no answer could come. Peter Andreich, when he received the news of the marriage, took to his bed, and gave orders that his son's name should never again be mentioned to him; but Ivan's mother, without her husband's knowledge, borrowed five hundred paper roubles from a neighboring priest,[A] and sent them to her son, with a little sacred picture for his wife. She was afraid of writing, but she told her messenger, a spare little peasant who could walk sixty versts in a day, to say to Ivan that he was not to fret too much; that please God, all would yet go right, and his father's wrath would turn to kindness—that she, too, would have preferred a different daughter-in-law; but that evidently God had willed it as it was, and that she sent her paternal benediction to Malania Sergievna. The spare little peasant had a rouble given him, asked leave to see the new mistress, whose gossip[B] he was, kissed her hand, and returned home.
[Footnote A: Literally, "from theBlagochinny" an ecclesiastic who exercises supervision over a number of churches or parishes, a sort of Rural Dean.]
[Footnote A: The word is used in its old meaning of fellow-sponsor.]
So Ivan Petrovich betook himself to St. Petersburg with a light heart. An unknown future lay before him. Poverty might menace him; but he had broken with the hateful life in the country, and, above all, he had not fallen short of his instructors; he had really "put into action," and indeed done justice to, the doctrines of Rousseau, Diderot, and the "Declaration of the Rights of Man." The conviction of having accomplished a duty, a sense of pride and of triumph, filled his soul; and the fact of having to separate from his wife did not greatly alarm him; he would far sooner have been troubled by the necessity of having constantly to live with her. He had now to think of other affairs. One task was finished.
In St. Petersburg, contrary to his own expectations, he was successful. The Princess Kubensky—whom M. Courtin had already flung aside, but who had not yet contrived to die—in order that she might at least to some extent, make amends for her conduct towards her nephew, recommended him to all her friends, and gave him five thousand roubles—almost all the money she had left—and a watch, with his crest wrought on its back surrounded by a wreath of Cupids.
Three months had not gone by before he received an appointment on the staff of the Russian embassy in London, whither he set sail (steamers were not even talked about then) in the first homeward bound English vessel he could find. A few months later he received a letter from Pestof. The kind-hearted gentleman congratulated him on the birth of a son, who had come into the world at the village of Pokrovskoe, on the 20th of August, 1807, and had been named Fedor, in honor of the holy martyr Fedor Stratilates. On account of her extreme weakness, Malania Sergievna could add only a few lines. But even those few astonished Ivan Petrovich; he was not aware that Marfa Timofeevna had taught his wife to read and write.
It must not be supposed that Ivan Petrovich gave himself up for any length of time to the sweet emotion caused by paternal feeling. He was just then paying court to one of the celebrated Phrynes or Laises of the day—classical names were still in vogue at that time. The peace of Tilset was only just concluded,[A] and every one was hastening to enjoy himself, every one was being swept round by a giddy whirlwind. The black eyes of a bold beauty had helped to turn his head also. He had very little money, but he played cards luckily, made friends, joined in all possible diversions—in a word, he sailed with all sail set.
[Footnote A: In consequence of which the Russian embassy was withdrawn from London, and Ivan Petrovich probably went to Paris.]
For a long time the old Lavretsky could not forgive his son for his marriage. If, at the end of six months, Ivan Petrovich had appeared before him with contrite mien, and had fallen at his feet, the old man would, perhaps, have pardoned the offender—after having soundly abused him, and given him a tap with his crutch by way of frightening him. But Ivan Petrovich went on living abroad, and, apparently, troubled himself but little about his father. "Silence! don't dare to say another word!" exclaimed Peter Andreich to his wife, every time she tried to mollify him. "That puppy ought to be always praying to God for me, since I have not laid my curse upon him, the good-for-nothing fellow! Why, my late father would have killed him with his own hands, and he would have done well." All that Anna Pavlovna could do was to cross herself stealthily when she heard such terrible words as these. As to his son's wife, Peter Andreich would not so much as hear of her at first; and even when he had to answer a letter in which his daughter-in-law was mentioned by Pestof, he ordered a message to be sent to him to say that he did not know of any one who could be his daughter-in-law, and that it was contrary to the law to shelter runaway female serfs, a fact of which he considered it a duty to warn him. But afterwards, on learning the birth of his grandson, his heart softened a little; he gave orders that inquiries should be secretly made on his behalf about the mother's health, and he sent her—but still, not as if it came from himself—a small sum of money.
Before Fedor was a year old, his grandmother, Anna Pavlovna, was struck down by a mortal complaint. A few days before her death, when she could no longer rise from her bed, she told her husband in the presence of the priest, while her dying eyes swam with timid tears, that she wished to see her daughter-in-law, and to bid her farewell, and to bless her grandson. The old man, who was greatly moved, bade her set her mind at rest, and immediately sent his own carriage for his daughter-in-law, calling her, for the first time, Malania Sergievna.[A] Malania arrived with her boy, and with Marfa Timofeevna, whom nothing would have induced to allow her to go alone, and who was determined not to allow her to meet with any harm. Half dead with fright, Malania Sergievna entered her father-in-law's study, a nurse carrying Fedia behind her. Peter Andreich looked at her in silence. She drew near and took his hand, on which her quivering lips could scarcely press a silent kiss.
[Footnote A: That is to say, no longer speaking of her as if she were still a servant.]
"Well, noble lady,"[A] he said at last,—"Good-day to you; let's go to my wife's room."
[Footnote A: Literally "thrashed-while-damp noblewoman,"i.e., hastily ennobled. Much corn is thrashed in Russia before it has had time to get dry.]
He rose and bent over Fedia; the babe smiled and stretched out its tiny white hands towards him. The old man was touched.
"Ah, my orphaned one!" he said. "You have successfully pleaded your father's cause. I will not desert you, little bird."
As soon as Malania Sergievna entered Anna Pavlovna's bed-room, she fell on her knees near the door. Anna Pavlovna, having made her a sign to come to her bedside, embraced her, and blessed her child. Then, turning towards her husband a face worn by cruel suffering, she would have spoken to him, but he prevented her.
"I know, I know what you want to ask," he said; "don't worry yourself.She shall remain with us, and for her sake I will forgive Vanka."[A]
[Footnote A: A diminutive of Ivan, somewhat expressive of contemptVanya is the affectionate form.]
Anna Pavlovna succeeded by a great effort in getting hold of her husband's hand and pressing it to her lips. That same evening she died.
Peter Andreich kept his word. He let his son know that out of respect to his mother's last moments, and for the sake of the little Fedor, he gave him back his blessing, and would keep Malania Sergievna in his house. A couple of small rooms up-stairs were accordingly given to Malania, and he presented her to his most important acquaintances, the one-eyed Brigadier Skurekhine and his wife. He also placed two maid-servants at her disposal, and a page to run her errands.
After Marfa Timofeevna had left her—who had conceived a perfect hatred for Glafira, and had quarrelled with her three times in the course of a single day—the poor woman at first found her position difficult and painful. But after a time she attained endurance, and grew accustomed to her father-in-law. He, on his part, grew accustomed to her, and became fond of her, though he scarcely ever spoke to her, although in his caresses themselves a certain involuntary contempt showed itself. But it was her sister-in-law who made Malania suffer the most. Even during her mother's lifetime, Glafira had gradually succeeded in getting the entire management of the house into her own hands. Every one, from her father downwards, yielded to her. Without her permission not even a lump of sugar was to be got. She would have preferred to die rather than to delegate her authority to another housewife—and such a housewife too! She had been even more irritated than Peter Andreich by her brother's marriage, so she determined to read the upstart a good lesson, and from the very first Malania Sergievna became her slave. And Malania, utterly without defence, weak in health, constantly a prey to trouble and alarm—how could she have striven against the proud and strong-willed Glafira? Not a day passed without Glafira reminding her of her former position, and praising her for not forgetting herself. Malania Sergievna would willingly have acquiesced in these remindings and praisings, however bitter they might be—but her child had been taken away from her. This drove her to despair. Under the pretext that she was not qualified to see after his education, she was scarcely ever allowed to go near him. Glafira undertook the task. The child passed entirely into her keeping.
In her sorrow, Malania Sergievna began to implore her husband in her letters to return quickly. Peter Andreich himself wished to see his son, but Ivan Petrovich merely sent letters in reply. He thanked his father for what had been done for his wife, and for the money which had been sent to himself, and he promised to come home soon—but he did not come.
At last the year 1812 recalled him from abroad. On seeing each other for the first time after a separation of six years, the father and the son met in a warm embrace, and did not say a single word in reference to their former quarrels. Nor was it a time for that. All Russia was rising against the foe, and they both felt that Russian blood flowed in their veins, Peter Andreich equipped a whole regiment of volunteers at his own expense. But the war ended; the danger passed away. Ivan Petrovich once more became bored, once more he was allured into the distance, into that world in which he had grown up, and in which he felt himself at home. Malania could not hold him back; she was valued at very little in his eyes. Even what she really had hoped had not been fulfilled. Like the rest, her husband thought that it was decidedly most expedient to confide Fedia's education to Glafira. Ivan's poor wife could not bear up against this blow, could not endure this second separation. Without a murmur, at the end of a few days, she quietly passed away.
In the course of her whole life she had never been able to resist any thing; and so with her illness, also, she did not struggle. When she could no longer speak, and the shadows of death already lay on her face, her features still retained their old expression of patient perplexity, of unruffled and submissive sweetness. With her usual silent humility, she gazed at Glafira; and as Anna Pavlovna on her death-bed had kissed the hand of Peter Andreich, so she pressed her lips to Glafira's hand, as she confided to Glafira's care her only child. So did this good and quiet being end her earthly career. Like a shrub torn from its native soil, and the next moment flung aside, its roots upturned to the sun, she withered and disappeared, leaving no trace behind, and no one to grieve for her. It is true that her maids regretted her, and so did Peter Andreich. The old man missed her kindly face, her silent presence. "Forgive—farewell—my quiet one!" he said, as he took leave of her for the last time, in the church. He wept as he threw a handful of earth into her grave.
He did not long survive her—not more than five years. In the winter of 1819, he died peacefully in Moscow, whither he had gone with Glafira and his grandson. In his will he desired to be buried by the side of Anna Pavlovna and "Malasha."[A]
[Footnote A: Diminutive of Malania.]
Ivan Petrovich was at that time amusing himself in Paris, having retired from the service soon after the year 1815. On receiving the news of his father's death, he determined to return to Russia. The organization of his property had to be considered. Besides, according to Glafira's letter, Fedia had finished his twelfth year; and the time had come for taking serious thought about his education.
Ivan Petrovich returned to Russia an Anglomaniac. Short hair, starched frills, a pea-green, long-skirted coat with a number of little collars; a soar expression of countenance, something trenchant and at the same time careless in his demeanor, an utterance through the teeth, an abrupt wooden laugh, an absence of smile, a habit of conversing only on political or politico-economical subjects, a passion for under-done roast beef and port wine—every thing in him breathed, so to speak, of Great Britain. He seemed entirely imbued by its spirit. But strange to say, while becoming an Anglomaniac, Ivan Petrovich had also become a patriot,—at all events he called himself a patriot,—although he knew very little about Russia, he had not retained a single Russian habit, and he expressed himself in Russian oddly. In ordinary talk, his language was colorless and unwieldy, and absolutely bristled with Gallicisms. But the moment that the conversation turned upon serious topics, Ivan Petrovich immediately began to give utterance to such expressions as "to render manifest abnormal symptoms of enthusiasm," or "this is extravagantly inconsistent with the essential nature of circumstances," and so forth. He had brought with him some manuscript plans, intended to assist in the organization and improvement of the empire. For he was greatly discontented with what he saw taking place. It was the absence of system which especially aroused his indignation.
At his interview with his sister, he informed her in the first words he spoke that he meant to introduce radical reforms on his property, and that for the future all his affairs would be conducted on a new system. Glafira made no reply, but she clenched her teeth and thought, "What is to become of me then?" However, when she had gone with her brother and her nephew to the estate, her mind was soon set at ease. It is true that a few changes were made in the house, and the hangers-on and parasites were put to immediate flight. Among their number suffered two old women, the one blind, the other paralyzed, and also a worn-out major of the Ochakof[A] days, who, on account of his great voracity, was fed upon nothing but black bread and lentiles. An order was given also not to receive any of the former visitors; they were replaced by a distant neighbor, a certain blonde and scrofulous baron, an exceedingly well brought-up and remarkably dull man. New furniture was sent from Moscow; spittoons, bells, and washhand basins were introduced; the breakfast was served in a novel fashion; foreign wines replaced the old national spirits and liquors; new liveries were given to the servants, and to the family coat of arms was added the motto, "In recto virtus."
[Footnote A: Ochakof is a town which was taken from the Turks by theRussians in 1788.]
In reality, however, the power of Glafira did not diminish; all receipts and expenditures were settled, as before, by her. A Valet, who had been brought from abroad, a native of Alsace, tried to compete with her, and lost his place, in spite of the protection which his master generally afforded him. In all that related to house-keeping, and also to the administration of the estate (for with these things too Glafira interfered)—in spite of the intention often expressed by Ivan Petrovich "to breathe new life into the chaos,"—all remained on the old footing. Only theobrok[A] remained on the old footing, and thebarshina[B] became heavier, and the peasants were forbidden to go straight to Ivan Petrovich. The patriot already despised his fellow-citizens heartily. Ivan Petrovich's system was applied in its full development only to Fedia. The boy's education really underwent "a radical reform." His father undertook the sole direction of it himself.
[Footnote A: What the peasant paid his lord in money.]
[Footnote B: What the peasant paid his lord in labor.]
Until the return of Ivan Petrovich from abroad, Fedia remained, as we have already said, in the hands of Glafira Petrovna. He was not yet eight years old when his mother died. It was not every day that he had been allowed to see her, but he had become passionately attached to her. His recollections of her, especially of her pale and gentle face, her mournful eyes, and her timid caresses, were indelibly impressed upon his heart. It was but vaguely that he understood her position in the house, but he felt that between him and her there existed a barrier which she dared not and could not destroy. He felt shy of his father, who, on his part, never caressed him. His grandfather sometimes smoothed his hair and gave him his hand to kiss, but called him a savage and thought him a fool. After Malania's death, his aunt took him regularly in hand. Fedia feared her, feared her bright sharp eyes, her cutting voice; he never dared to make the slightest noise in her presence; if by chance he stirred ever so little on his chair, she would immediately exclaim in her hissing voice, "Where are you going? sit still!"
On Sundays, after mass, he was allowed to play—that is to say, a thick book was given to him, a mysterious book, the work of a certain Maksimovich-Ambodik, bearing the title of "Symbols and Emblems." In this book there were to be found about a thousand, for the most part, very puzzling pictures, with equally puzzling explanations in five languages. Cupid, represented with a naked and chubby body, played a great part in these pictures. To one of them, the title of which was "Saffron and the Rainbow," was appended the explanation, "The effect of this is great." Opposite another, which represented "A Stork, flying with a violet in its beak," stood this motto, "To thee they are all known;" and "Cupid, and a bear licking its cub," was styled "Little by Little." Fedia used to pore over these pictures. He was familiar with them all even to their minutest details. Some of them—it was always the same ones—made him reflect, and excited his imagination: of other diversions he knew nothing.
When the time came for teaching him languages and music, Glafira Petrovna hired an old maid for a mere trifle, a Swede, whose eyes looked sideways, like a hare's, who spoke French and German more or less badly, played the piano so so, and pickled cucumbers to perfection. In the company of this governess, of his aunt, and of an old servant maid called Vasilievna, Fedia passed four whole years. Sometimes he would sit in a corner with his "Emblems"—there he would sit and sit. A scent of geraniums filled the low room, one tallow candle burnt dimly, the cricket chirped monotonously as if it were bored, the little clock ticked busily on the wall, a mouse scratched stealthily and gnawed behind the tapestry; and the three old maids, like the three Fates, knitted away silently and swiftly, the shadows of their hands now scampering along, now mysteriously quivering in the dusk; and strange, no less dusky, thoughts were being born in the child's mind.
No one would have called Fedia an interesting child. He was rather pale, but stout, badly built, and awkward—a regular moujik, to use the expression employed by Glafira Petrovna. The pallor would soon have vanished from his face if they had let him go out more into the fresh air. He learnt his lessons pretty well, though he was often idle. He never cried, but he sometimes evinced a savage obstinacy. At those times no one could do any thing with him. Fedia did not love a single one of the persons by whom he was surrounded. Alas for that heart which has not loved in youth!
Such did Ivan Petrovich find him when he returned; and, without losing time he at once began to apply his system to him.
"I want, above all, to make a man of him—un homme," he said to Glafira Petrovna "and not only a man, but a Spartan." This plan he began to carry out by dressing his boy in Highland costume. The twelve-year-old little fellow had to go about with bare legs, and with a cock's feather in his cap. The Swedish governess was replaced by a young tutor from Switzerland, who was acquainted with all the niceties of gymnastics. Music was utterly forbidden, as an accomplishment unworthy of a man. Natural science, international law, and mathematics, as well as carpentry, which was selected in accordance with the advice of Jean Jacques Rousseau; and heraldry, which was introduced for the maintenance of chivalrous ideas—these were the subjects to which the future "man" had to give his attention. He had to get up at four in the morning and take a cold bath immediately, after which he had to run round a high pole at the end of a cord. He had one meal a day, consisting of one dish; he rode on horseback, and he shot with a cross-bow. On every fitting occasion he had to exercise himself, in imitation of his father, in gaining strength of will; and every evening he used to write, in a book reserved for that purpose, an account of how he had spent the day, and what were his ideas on the subject. Ivan Petrovich, on his side, wrote instructions for him in French, in which he styled himmon fils, and addressed him asvous. Fedia used to say "thou" to his father in Russian, but he did not dare to sit down in his presence.
The "system" muddled the boy's brains, confused his ideas, and cramped his mind; but, as far as his physical health was concerned, the new kind of life acted on him beneficially. At first he fell ill with a fever, but he soon recovered and became a fine fellow. His father grew proud of him, and styled him in his curious language, "the child of nature, my creation." When Fedia reached the age of sixteen, Ivan Petrovich considered it a duty to inspire him in good time with contempt for the female sex—and so the young Spartan, with the first down beginning to appear upon his lips, timid in feeling, but with a body full of blood, and strength, and energy, already tried to seem careless, and cold, and rough.
Meanwhile time passed by. Ivan Petrovich spent the greater part of the year at Lavriki—that was the name of his chief hereditary estate; but in winter he used to go by himself to Moscow, where he put up at a hotel, attended his club assiduously, aired his eloquence freely, explained his plans in society, and more than ever gave himself out as an Anglomaniac, a grumbler, and a statesman. But the year 1825 came and brought with it much trouble[A]. Ivan Petrovich's intimate friends and acquaintances underwent a heavy tribulation. He made haste to betake himself far away into the country, and there he shut himself up in his house. Another year passed and Ivan Petrovich suddenly broke down, became feeble, and utterly gave way. His health having deserted him, the freethinker began to go to church, and to order prayers to be said for him[B]; the European began to steam himself in the Russian bath, to dine at two o'clock, to go to bed at nine, to be talked to sleep by the gossip of an old house-steward; the statesman burnt all his plans and all his correspondence, trembled before the governor, and treated theIspravnik[C] with uneasy civility; the man of iron will whimpered and complained whenever he was troubled by a boil, or when his soup had got cold before he was served with it. Glafira again ruled supreme in the house; again did inspectors, overseers[D], and simple peasants begin to go up the back staircase to the rooms occupied by the "old witch"—as she was called by the servants of the house.
[Footnote A: Arising from the conspiracy of the "Decembrists" and their attempts at a revolution, on the occasion of the death of Alexander I., and the accession of Nicholas to the throne.]
[Footnote B:Molebni: prayers in which the name of the person who has paid for them is mentioned.]
[Footnote C: Inspector of rural police.]
[Footnote D:PrikashchikiandBurmistrui: two classes of overseers, the former dealing with economical matters only, the latter having to do with the administrative department also.]
The change which had taken place in Ivan Petrovich, produced a strong impression on the mind of his son. He had already entered on his nineteenth year; and he had begun to think for himself, and to shake off the weight of the hand which had been pressing him down. Even before this he had remarked how different were his father's deeds from his words; the wide and liberal theories he professed from the hard and narrow despotism he practiced; but he had not expected so abrupt a transformation. In his old age the egotist revealed himself in his full nature. The young Lavretsky was just getting ready to go to Moscow, with a view to preparing himself for the university, when a new and unexpected misfortune fell on the head of Ivan Petrovich. In the course of a single day the old man became blind, hopelessly blind.
Distrusting the skill of Russian medical men, he did all he could to get permission to travel abroad. It was refused. Then, taking his son with him, he wandered about Russia for three whole years, trying one doctor after another, incessantly journeying from place to place, and, by his impatient fretfulness, driving his doctors, his son, and his servants to the verge of despair. Utterly used up[A], he returned to Lavriki a weeping and capricious infant. Days of bitterness ensued, in which all suffered at his hands. He was quiet only while he was feeding. Never had he eaten so much, nor so greedily. At all other moments he allowed neither himself nor any one else to be at peace. He prayed, grumbled at fate, found fault with himself, with his system, with politics, with all which he used to boast of, with all that he had ever set up as a model for his son. He would declare that he believed in nothing, and then he would betake himself again to prayer; he could not bear a single moment of solitude, and he compelled his servants constantly to sit near his bed day and night, and to entertain him with stories, which he was in the habit of interrupting by exclamations of, "You're all telling lies!" or, "What utter nonsense!"
[Footnote A: Literally, "a regular rag."]
Glafira Petrovna had the largest share in all the trouble he gave. He was absolutely unable to do without her; and until the very end she fulfilled all the invalid's caprices, though sometimes she was unable to reply immediately to what he said, for fear the tone of her voice should betray the anger which was almost choking her. So he creaked on for two years more, and at length one day in the beginning of the month of May, he died. He had been carried out to the balcony, and planed there in the sun. "Glasha! Glashka! broth, broth, you old idi—," lisped his stammering tongue; and then, without completing the last word, it became silent forever. Glafira, who had just snatched the cup of broth from the hands of the major-domo, stopped short, looked her brother in the face, very slowly crossed herself, and went silently away. And his son, who happened also to be on the spot, did not say a word either, but bent over the railing of the balcony, and gazed for a long time into the garden, all green and fragrant, all sparkling in the golden sunlight of spring. He was twenty-three years old; how sadly, how swiftly had those years passed by unmarked! Life opened out before him now.
After his father's burial, having confided to the never-changing Glafira Petrovna the administration of his household, and the supervision of his agents, the young Lavretsky set out for Moscow, whither a vague but powerful longing attracted him. He knew in what his education had been defective, and he was determined to supply its deficiencies as far as possible. In the course of the last five years he had read much, and he had see a good deal with his own eyes. Many ideas had passed through his mind, many a professor might have envied him some of his knowledge; yet, at the same time, he was entirely ignorant of much that had long been familiar to every school-boy. Lavretsky felt that he was not at his ease among his fellow-men; he had a secret inkling that he was an exceptional character. The Anglomaniac had played his son a cruel trick; his capricious education had borne its fruit. For many years he had implicitly obeyed his father; and when at last he had learned to value him aright, the effects of his father's teaching were already produced. Certain habits had become rooted in him. He did not know how to comport himself towards his fellow-men; at the age of twenty-three, with an eager longing after love in his bashful heart, he had not yet dared to look a woman in the face. With his clear and logical, but rather sluggish intellect, with his stubbornness, and his tendency towards inactivity and contemplation, he ought to have been flung at an early age into the whirl of life, instead of which he had been deliberately kept in seclusion. And now the magic circle was broken, but he remained standing on the same spot, cramped in mind and self-absorbed.
At his age it seemed a little ridiculous to put on the uniform of a student[A], but he did not fear ridicule. His Spartan education had at all events been so far useful, inasmuch as it had developed in him a contempt for the world's gossiping. So he donned a student's uniform without being disconcerted, enrolling himself in the faculty of physical and mathematical science. His robust figure, his ruddy face, his sprouting beard, his taciturn manner, produced a singular impression on his comrades. They never suspected that under the rough exterior of this man, who attended the lectures so regularly, driving up in a capacious rustic sledge, drawn by a couple of horses, something almost childlike was concealed. They thought him an eccentric sort of pedant, and they made no advances towards him, being able to do very well without him. And he, for his part, avoided them. During the first two years he passed at the university, he became intimate with no one except the student from whom she took lessons in Latin. This student, whose name was Mikhalevich, an enthusiast, and somewhat of a poet, grew warmly attached to Lavretsky, and quite accidentally became the cause of a serious change in his fortunes.
[Footnote A: The students at the Russian universities used to wear a uniform, but they no longer do so.]
One evening, when Lavretsky was at the theatre—he never missed a single representation, for Mochalof was then at the summit of his glory—he caught sight of a young girl in a box on the first tier. Never before had his heart beaten so fast, though at that time no woman ever passed before his stern eyes without sending its pulses flying. Leaning on the velvet border of the box, the girl sat very still. Youthful animation lighted up every feature of her beautiful face; artistic feeling shone in her lovely eyes, which looked out with a soft, attentive gaze from underneath delicately pencilled eyebrows, in the quick smile of her expressive lips, in the bearing of her head, her arms, her neck. As to her dress, it was exquisite. By her side sat a sallow, wrinkled woman of five-and-forty, wearing a low dress and a black cap, with an unmeaning smile on her vacant face, to which she strove to give an aspect of attention. In the background of the box appeared an elderly man in a roomy coat, and with a high cravat. His small eyes had an expression of stupid conceit, modified by a kind of cringing suspicion; his mustache and whiskers were dyed, he had an immense meaningless forehead, and flabby cheeks: his whole appearance was that of a retired general.
Lavretsky kept his eyes fixed on the girl who had made such an impression on him. Suddenly the door of the box opened, and Mikhalevich entered. The appearance of the man who was almost his only acquaintance in all Moscow—his appearance in the company of the very girl who had absorbed his whole attention, seemed to Lavretsky strange and significant. As he continued looking at the box, he remarked that all its occupants treated Mikhalevich like an old friend. Lavretsky lost all interest in what was going on upon the stage; even Mochalof, although he was that evening "in the vein," did not produce his wonted impression upon him. During one very pathetic passage, Lavretsky looked almost involuntarily at the object of his admiration. She was leaning forward, a red glow coloring her cheeks. Her eyes were bent upon the stage, but gradually, under the influence of his fixed look, they turned and rested on him. All night long those eyes haunted him. At last, the carefully constructed dam was broken through. He shivered and he burnt by turns, and the very next day he went to see Mikhalevich. From him he learned that the name of the girl he admired so much was Varvara Pavlovna Korobine, that the elderly people who were with her in the box were her father and her mother, and that Mikhalevich had become acquainted with them the year before, during the period of his stay as tutor in Count N.'s family, near Moscow. The enthusiast spoke of Varvara Pavlovna in the most eulogistic terms. "This girl, my brother," he exclaimed, in his peculiar, jerking kind of sing-song, "is an exceptional being, one endowed with genius, an artist in the true sense of the word, and besides all that, such an amiable creature." Perceiving from Lavretsky's questions how great an impression Varvara Pavlovna had made upon him, Mikhalevich, of his own accord, proposed to make him acquainted with her, adding that he was on the most familiar terms with them, that the general was not in the least haughty, and that the mother was as unintellectual as she well could be.
Lavretsky blushed, muttered something vague, and took himself off. For five whole days he fought against his timidity; on the sixth, the young Spartan donned an entirely new uniform, and placed himself at the disposal of Mikhalevich, who, as an intimate friend of the family, contented himself with setting his hair straight—and the two companions set off together to visit the Karobines.
Varvara Pavlovna's father, Pavel Petrovich Korobine, a retired major-general, had been on duty at St. Petersburg during almost the whole of his life. In his early years he had enjoyed the reputation of being an able dancer and driller; but as he was very poor he had to act as aide-de-camp to two or three generals of small renown in succession, one of whom gave him his daughter in marriage, together with a dowry of 25,000 roubles. Having made himself master of all the science of regulations and parades, even to their subtlest details, he "went on stretching the girth" until at last, after twenty years service, he became a general, and obtained a regiment. At that point he might have reposed, and have quietly consolidated his fortune. He had indeed counted upon doing so, but he managed his affairs rather imprudently. It seems he had discovered a new method of speculating with the public money. The method turned out an excellent one, but he must needs practise quite unreasonable economy,[A] so information was laid against him, and a more than disagreeable, a ruinous scandal ensued. Some how or other the general managed to get clear of the affair; but his career was stopped, and he was recommended to retire from active service. For about a couple of years he lingered on at St. Petersburg, in hopes that a snug civil appointment might fall to his lot; but no such appointment did fall to his lot. His daughter finished her education at the Institute; his expenses increased day by day. So he determined, with suppressed indignation, to go to Moscow for economy's sake; and there, in the Old Stable Street, he hired a little house with an escutcheon seven feet high on the roof, and began to live as retired generals do in Moscow on an income of 2,700 roubles a year[B].
[Footnote A: In other words, he stole, but he neglected to bribe.]
[Footnote B: Nearly £400, the roubles being "silver" ones. The difference in value between "silver" and "paper" roubles exists no longer.]
Moscow is an hospitable city, and ready to welcome any one who appears there, especially if he is a retired general. Pavel Petrovich's form, which, though heavy, was not devoid of martial bearing, began to appear in the drawing-rooms frequented by the best society of Moscow. The back of his head, bald, with the exception of a few tufts of dyed hair, and the stained ribbon of the Order of St. Anne, which he wore over a stock of the color of a raven's wing, became familiar to all the young men of pale and wearied aspect, who were wont to saunter moodily around the card tables while a dance was going on.
Pavel Petrovich understood how to hold his own in society. He said little, but always, as of old, spoke through the nose—except, of course, when he was talking to people of superior rank. He played at cards prudently, and when he was at home he ate with moderation. At a party he seemed to be feeding for six. Of his wife scarcely anything more can be said than that her name was Calliope Carlovna—that a tear always stood in her left eye, on the strength of which Calliope Carlovna, who to be sure was of German extraction, considered herself a woman of feeling—that she always seemed frightened about something—that she looked as if she never had enough to eat—and that she always wore a tight velvet dress, a cap, and bracelets of thin, dull metal.
As to Varvara Pavlovna, the general's only daughter, she was but seventeen years old when she left the Institute in which she had been educated. While within its walls she was considered, if not the most beautiful, at all events the most intelligent of the pupils, and the best musician, and before leaving it she obtained the Cipher[A]. She was not yet nineteen when Lavretsky saw her for the first time.
[Footnote A: The initial letter of the name of the Empress, worn as a kind of decoration by the best pupils in the Imperial Institutes.]
The Spartan's legs trembled when Mikhalevich led him into the Korobines' not over-well furnished drawing-room, and introduced him to its occupants. But he overcame his timidity, and soon disappeared. In General Korobine that kindliness which is common to all Russians, was enhanced by the special affability which is peculiar to all persons whose fair fame has been a little soiled. As for the General's wife, she soon became as it were ignored by the whole party. But Varvara Pavlona was so calmly, so composedly gracious, that no one could be, even for a moment, in her presence without feeling himself at his ease. And at the same time from all her charming form, from her smiling eyes, from her faultlessly sloping shoulders, from the rose-tinged whiteness of her hands, from her elastic, but at the same time as it were, irresolute gait, from the very sound of her sweet and languorous voice—there breathed, like a delicate perfume, a subtle and incomprehensible charm—something which was at once tender and voluptuous and modest—something which it was difficult to express in words, which stirred the imagination and disturbed the mind, but disturbed it with sensations which were not akin to timidity.
Lavretsky introduced the subject of the theatre and the preceding night's performance; she immediately began to talk about Mochalof of her own accord, and did not confine herself to mere sighs and exclamations, but pronounced several criticisms on his acting, which were as remarkable for sound judgment as for womanly penetration. Mikhalevich mentioned music; she sat down to the piano without affectation, and played with precision several of Chopin's mazurkas, which were then only just coming into fashion. Dinner time came. Lavretsky would have gone away, but they made him stop, and the General treated him at table with excellent Lafitte, which the footman had been hurriedly sent out to buy at Depre's.
It was late in the evening before Lavretsky returned home; and then he sat for a longtime without undressing, covering his eyes with his hand, and yielding to the torpor of enchantment. It seemed to him that he had not till now understood what makes life worth having. All his resolutions and intentions, all the now valueless ideas of other days, had disappeared in a moment. His whole soul melted within him into one feeling, one desire; into the desire of happiness, of possession, of love, of the sweetness of a woman's love.
From that day he began to visit the Korobines frequently. After six months had passed, he proposed to Varvara Pavlovna, and his offer was accepted. Long, long before, even if it was not the night before Lavretsky's first visit, the General had asked Mikhalevich how many serfs[A] his friend had. Even Varvara Pavlona, who had preserved her wonted composure and equanimity during the whole period of her young admirer's courtship, and even at the very moment of his declaration—even Varvara Pavlovna knew perfectly well that her betrothed was rich. And Calliope Carlovna thought to herself, "Meine Tochter macht eine schöne Partie[B]"—and bought herself a new cap.
[Footnote A: Literally, "souls,"i.e., male peasants.]
[Footnote B: My daughter is going to make a capital match.]
And so his offer was accepted, but under certain conditions. In the first place, Lavretsky must immediately leave the university. Who could think of marrying a student? And what an extraordinary idea, a landed proprietor, a rich man, at twenty-six years of age, to be taking lessons like a schoolboy! In the second place, Varvara Pavlovna was to take upon herself the trouble of ordering and buying her trousseau. She even chose the presents the bridegroom was to give. She had very good taste, and a great deal of common sense, and she possessed a great liking for comfort, and no small skill in getting herself that comfort. Lavretsky was particularly struck by this talent when, immediately after the wedding, he and his wife set off for Lavriki, travelling in a convenient carriage which she had chosen herself. How carefully all their surroundings had been meditated over by Varvara Pavlovna! what prescience she had shown in providing them! What charming travelling contrivances made their appearance in the various convenient corners! what delicious toilet boxes! what excellent coffee machines! and how gracefully did Varvara Pavlovna herself make the coffee in the morning! But it must be confessed that Lavretsky was little fitted for critical observation just then. He revelled in his happiness, he was intoxicated by his good fortune, he abandoned himself to it like a child—he was, indeed, as innocent as a child, this young Hercules. Not in vain did a charmed influence attach itself to the whole presence of his young wife; not in vain did she promise to the imagination a secret treasure of unknown delights. She was even better than her promise.
When she arrived at Lavriki, which was in the very hottest part of the summer, the house seemed to her sombre and in bad order, the servants antiquated and ridiculous; but she did not think it necessary to say a word about this to her husband. If she had intended to settle at Lavriki, she would have altered every thing there, beginning of course with the house; but the idea of staying in that out-of-the-way corner never, even for an instant, came into her mind. She merely lodged in it, as she would have done in a tent, putting up with all its discomforts in the sweetest manner, and laughing at them pleasantly.
When Marfa Timofeevna came to see her old pupil, she produced a favorable impression on Varvara Pavlovna. But Varvara was not at all to the old lady's liking. Nor did the young mistress of the house get on comfortably with Glafira Petrovna. She herself would have been content to leave Glafira in peace, but the general was anxious to get his hand into the management of his son-in-law's affairs. To see after the property of so near a relative, he said, was an occupation that even a general might adopt without disgrace. It is possible that Pavel Petrovich would not have disdained to occupy himself with the affairs of even an utter stranger.
Varvara Pavlovna carried out her plan of attack very skillfully. Although never putting herself forward, but being to all appearance thoroughly immersed in the bliss of the honeymoon, in the quiet life of the country, in music, and in books, she little by little worked upon Glafira, until that lady, one morning, burst into Lavretsky's study like a maniac, flung her bunch of keys on the table, and announced that she could no longer look after the affairs of the household, and that she did not wish to remain on the estate. As Lavretsky had been fitly prepared for the scene, he immediately gave his consent to her departure. This Glafira Petrovna had not expected. "Good," she said, and her brow grew dark. "I see that I am not wanted here. I know that I am expelled hence, driven away from the family nest. But, nephew, remember my words—nowhere will you be able to build you a nest; your lot will be to wander about without ceasing. There is my parting legacy to you." That same day she went off to her own little property: a week later General Korobine arrived, and, with a pleasantly subdued air, took the whole management of the estate into his own hands.
In September Varvara Pavlovna carried off her husband to St. Petersburg. There the young couple spent two winters—migrating in the summer to Tsarskoe Selo. They lived in handsome, bright, admirably-furnished apartments; they made numerous acquaintances in the upper and even the highest circles of society; they went out a great deal and received frequently, giving very charming musical parties and dances. Varvara Pavlovna attracted visitors as a light does moths.
Such a distracting life did not greatly please Fedor Ivanich. His wife wanted him to enter the service; but, partly in deference to his father's memory, partly in accordance with his own ideas, he would not do so, though he remained in St. Petersburg to please his wife. However, he soon found out that no one objected to his isolating himself, that it was not without an object that his study had been made the quietest and the most comfortable in the whole city, that his attentive wife was ever ready to encourage him in isolating himself; and from that time all went well. He again began to occupy himself with his as yet, as he thought, unfinished education. He entered upon anew course of reading; he even began the study of English. It was curious to see his powerful, broad-shouldered figure constantly bending over his writing-table, his full, ruddy, bearded face, half-hidden by the leaves of a dictionary or a copy-book. His mornings were always spent over his work; later in the day he sat down to an excellent dinner—for Varvara Pavlovna always managed her household affairs admirably; and in the evening he entered an enchanted, perfumed, brilliant world, all peopled by young and joyous beings, the central point of their world being that extremely attentive manager of the household, his wife.
She made him happy with a son; but the poor child did not live long. It died in the spring; and in the summer, in accordance with the advice of the doctors, Lavretsky and his wife went the round of the foreign watering-places. Distraction was absolutely necessary for her after such a misfortune; and, besides, her health demanded a warmer climate. That summer and autumn they spent in Germany and Switzerland; and in the winter, as might be expected, they went to Paris.
In Paris Varvara Pavlovna bloomed like a rose; and there, just as quickly and as skilfully as she had done in St. Petersburg, she learnt how to build herself a snug little nest. She procured a very pretty set of apartments in one of the quiet but fashionable streets, she made her husband such a dressing-gown as he had never worn before; she secured an elegant lady's maid, an excellent cook, and an energetic footman; and she provided herself with an exquisite carriage, and a charming cabinet piano. Before a week was over she could already cross a street, put on a shawl, open a parasol, and wear gloves, as well as the most pure-blooded of Parisian women.
She soon made acquaintances also. At first only Russians used to come to her house; then Frenchmen began to show themselves—amiable bachelors, of polished manners, exquisite in demeanor, and bearing high-sounding names. They all talked a great deal and very fast, they bowed gracefully, their eyes twinkled pleasantly. All of them possessed teeth which gleamed white between rosy lips; and how beautifully they smiled! Each of them brought his friends; and before longLa belle Madame de Lavretskibecame well known from theChausée d' Antinto theRue de Lille. At that time—it was in 1836—the race offeuilletonistsand journalists, which now swarms everywhere, numerous as the ants one sees when a hole is made in an ant-hill, had not yet succeeded in multiplying in numbers. Still, there used to appear in Varvara Pavlovna's drawing-room a certain M. Jules, a gentleman who bore a very bad character, whose appearance was unprepossessing, and whose manner was at once insolent and cringing—like that of all duellists and people who have been horsewhipped. Varvara disliked this M. Jules very much; but she received him because he wrote in several newspapers, and used to be constantly mentioning her, calling her sometimes Madame de L … tski, sometimes Madame de * * *,cette grande dame Russe si distinguée, qui demeure rue de P——, and describing to the whole world, that is to say to some few hundreds of subscribers, who had nothing whatever to do with Madame de L … tski, how loveable and charming was that lady,une vraie française par l'esprit,—the French have no higher praise than this,—what an extraordinary musician she was, and how wonderfully she waltzed. (Varvara Pavlovna did really waltz so as to allure all hearts to the skirt of her light, floating robe.) In fact, he spread her fame abroad throughout the world; and this we know, whatever people may say, is pleasant.
Mademoiselle Mars had by that time quitted the stage, and Mademoiselle Rachel had not yet appeared there; but for all that Varvara Pavlovna none the less assiduously attended the theatres. She went into raptures about Italian music, and laughed over the ruins of Odry, yawned in a becoming manner at the legitimate drama, and cried at the sight of Madame Dorval's acting in some ultra-melodramatic piece. Above all, Liszt played at her house twice, and was so gracious, so unaffected! It was charming!
Amid such pleasurable sensations passed the winter, at the end of which Varvara Pavlovna was even presented at Court. As for Fedor Ivanovich, he was not exactly bored, but life began to weigh heavily on his shoulders at times—heavily because of its very emptiness. He read the papers, he listened to the lectures at theSorbonneand theCollege de France, he followed the debates in the Chambers, he occupied himself in translating a famous scientific work on irrigation. "I am not wasting my time," he thought; "all this is of use; but next winter I really must return to Russia, and betake myself to active business." It would be hard to say if he had any clear idea of what were the special characteristics of that business, and only Heaven could tell whether he was likely to succeed in getting back to Russia in the winter. In the meanwhile he was intending to go with his wife to Baden. But an unexpected occurrence upset all his plans.