In the high plates of her dark ruff her face was in a blush, but she smiled a little, and with strangely flashing eyes looked directly into the face of her father.
"For," added she, "one would need to have mental rheumatism to believe that you loved only mamma all the time, and even that you loved her in general—mamma, of course, did not think that you did."
"Irene!" cried Darvid.
But she did not permit interruption.
"Allow me, I beg you, to say that I am not criticising. I am not in any sense. There is not a shade of criticism in what I say. I only state and expose facts and causes. That is all. This is requisite. Without this it would be impossible to understand mamma's request and mine which I will tell you quickly. And now I return to the question of the individual soul. That is a thing of capital importance. Offences, so-called, rise from so-called mean souls, or from noble ones. Of the first I know little, but if an offence comes from a noble soul it is to that soul a great and terrible torment—I have looked at such a torment, and while looking at it I have been brought to name the so-called love, and the so-called happiness, painted pots. Idyls! There may be idyls somewhere, but that which I saw—I assure you, father, did not encourage—did not encourage me to look at things from the idyllic angle."
Darvid rose with an impulsive movement.
"To the question, Irene, to the question! Say what the request is for which you have come. And from what does your mother suffer so greatly? It would be better were you to tell your wish at once, and without these introductions. Do reproaches of conscience trouble your mother? I have no time for psychological analysis, and should like to finish this conversation more quickly. Well, was it that besides conscience and other things like it—she did not find in her lover the man whom her sentiment imagined? I am ashamed to speak with you of this. Tell quickly what your wish is."
With a trembling hand he approached the end of his cigarette to the candle burning on the desk; his face now grown smaller, was contracted from the wrinkles which covered his forehead, and the countless quivers which passed across his face. Irene, very pale now, followed her father with her eyes; her lips were almost blue.
"Yes, father," answered she, "in mamma's soul that which we call conscience is greatly developed. Moreover, a feeling of shame in presence of us, and humiliation that everything which she has comes from you."
At this moment something rustled again, somewhere in a corner, but no one turned attention to it.
Darvid, who passed through the room a number of times, hastily, stopped again:
"Speak more quickly," said he, "I cannot understand what it is that your mother wishes. I left her in the position of a respected wife, of a mother, and mistress of a house. She is surrounded with luxury, she shines in society, and enjoys life."
Irene opened her arms with a movement indicating pity:
"This which you consider as the highest favor for mamma is just what she does not wish. She does not wish to enjoy the respect of society, which she does not deserve, as she thinks; nor to make use of the luxury which comes from you, and which is bound up with speechless contempt. Mamma desires to leave this house; in general, to abandon society-life, with all its luxury and brilliancy. I have known for a considerable time of this, and therefore had the plan of marrying soon and withdrawing from here with mamma."
Darvid put an end to his emotion; his daughter's words approached facts, and facts demanded cool blood.
"If you wish to speak of your intention to marry the baron, I must tell you—"
"You have no need to speak of that, father. I have abandoned that intention. I had it, but I have dropped it. Another plan entirely different has taken its place. You own a village in a remote province which came to you from your parents. I wish to ask you to give me that village, to endow me with it, but immediately. I suppose, I know, even, that it was your intention to give me a dowry ten times as valuable. Now, I am ready to renounce nine-tenths, orally, in writing, in every form and every manner indicated by you, but I beg you, as a favor, I beg you earnestly, for this one-tenth, and beg that I may receive it without delay."
She bent her whole form low, and her eyes, which she raised to her father, were filled with tears; these, however, she restrained immediately. Darvid answered after a moment of silence:
"Though I do not understand this whim of yours, I do not see in it anything impossible, or harmful. On the contrary, I shall be glad to do something which pleases you, and to-morrow, if you like, you shall be the owner of that wretched hole. But of what use can it be to you?"
Irene rose, went around the table, and, bending, pressed her father's hand to her lips; and then she returned to her former place:
"I thank you, father," said she; "you satisfy my most ardent desire. That 'wretched hole,' as you call it, is just the place that mamma desires. We shall go from here, and settle down there as quickly as possible."
"What?" cried Darvid, bending forward with astonishment, but soon he began to speak calmly:
"I come to the conclusion that when talking with my children I should not be astonished at anything. I must be ready for any surprise."
"That is natural, father, for we hardly know each other," interrupted Irene. "In reproaches of conscience," continued she, "and various other feelings of that sort, mamma goes to exaggeration, she goes so far as to desire penance, punishment, voluntarily accepted. If time and circumstances were favorable she would enter a cloister assuredly, and put on a hair shirt. That is an exaggeration, but what is to be done? Characters are various; hers is of that kind. But the desire which mamma has of withdrawing from the noise and show of the world, I understand perfectly; for, first of all—"
She made a gesture of contempt with her hand.
"All the honors, the glitter, the luxury, etc., are gates 'before which men with spades are standing;' this means that behind them we find dust, emptiness, nothing."
"Great God!" exclaimed Darvid.
"What do you say, father?" inquired she.
"Your age, the brilliant position in which you have lived since childhood—and this disenchantment."
"Just this brilliant position, father—just because of this brilliant position, perhaps. We are not talking of me, however—but because of this, which in me you call disenchantment, I am able to understand mamma's wish to leave society, all the more because, if I were in her position, all homage, show, luxury, amusements would for me be as impossible as they are for her. This depends on character. Moreover, mamma remembers that everything which she uses is yours, and the use of it attended by your contempt, and the evident impossibility of ever coming to any understanding is such a poison—so I beg you to give me Krynichna. I am your daughter, and, as it seems to me, you have no thought of disinheriting me, so if I own Krynichna, mamma will live with me and receive everything from me alone."
Her voice grew weaker, and her posture less constrained, in her whole form there was an expression of suffering. Everything which she said cost her, in spite of appearances to the contrary, much effort and suffering. Darvid was silent a while, then he said:
"It seems to me that I am Ali Baba, listening to the tales of Sheherazade. If I should agree to your plan what would you do there?"
"I do not know clearly as yet. This is mamma's idea; her wish; she will discover more and tell me. We will examine; we shall see. Into mamma's plans, besides quiet obscurity, and modesty of life, labor enters also."
She spoke in a low, wearied voice:
"An idyl!" laughed Darvid.
"An idyl, father; I used to laugh at all idyls without knowing that I had one in myself. It has saved me from many, and, perhaps, dreadful things. Yes, I have an idyl: I love mamma."
Then her thin lips, famous in society for their precocious, bitter irony, quivered as do those of children when preparing to cry.
Darvid turned to her quickly, and said with a prolonged hiss:
"Why?"
She raised sad eyes to him, and with a voice in which Malvina's sweet tones were heard, she answered:
"I am not sure that anyone could tell why he or she loves. Mamma has always been kind—but I do not know—she is very pleasant, and she and I have been together always—I do not know—it may be, besides, that often I have seen her so unhappy. You see, father, that I am sincere; I answer all your questions as far as I am able. Have regard to mamma's scruples, I beg, and my request; do not oppose our plans."
Darvid stood in the middle of the room, he raised his head, his eyes had the flash of steel.
"No," said he. "My daughter shall not wither away in a remote corner with my consent, because it pleases her mother to hide her—shame there."
"Father," answered Irene, "I must explain that your resistance will only give a more permanent, and, for you, a more disagreeable, form to our withdrawal."
She rose, and again on her face, surrounded by the high ruff, was an expression of resolve and energy. A moment before she was full of emotion and pain, now with the need of defence she found energy.
"Do you suppose, father, that you can understand what happened, forgive, to use the general phrase, and restore your esteem and friendship to mamma?"
With a form as rigid as iron, and with an evil smile on his lips,Darvid answered immediately:
"No. I am very sorry that I cannot play a comedy of noble-mindedness, for this is perhaps a popular comedy. But that of which you speak is forever and altogether impossible."
Irene moved her head affirmatively.
"Then mamma and I must withdraw; if not to Krynichna to some remote place abroad—I know four European languages well, I know how to paint, and I know a few other things. Mamma possesses a real genius in several rare accomplishments, and you remember well her beautiful music. We will give lessons, and do something else—I know not what—we shall find means of existence. But I beg you, father, to believe that in no case shall we remain in this house."
With pale, almost with blue lips, she laughed and added:
"Either as inhabitants of Krynichna, or making our own living in some distant place—which do you prefer, father? In the last instance it depends on you. One of these two things we shall do most certainly; that is, properly speaking, I shall do it; I, who am mamma's only defence. I became of age some months ago. I have finished my twenty-first year, and—no one can hinder me from acting in this way."
Whoever had seen her at that moment would have believed, perforce, that no man and no thing would have power to hinder her in carrying out her resolve. Omitting differences of age and sex, she seemed the living portrait of her father. The same cold self-confidence as in him; the same clear penetrating glance as of steel; the same enigmatical smile on impressionable and also cold lips. As if involuntarily, and lowering her voice, she said in addition:
"It is our duty to put a radical stop to the family idyl out of regard also to Cara. She is innocent yet—she knows nothing—she loves all, and not only loves but worships. Life has not touched her, even with the tip of one of its angel feathers. Just imagine what would happen if, into that little volcano of lofty feeling, a spark of this knowledge were to fall. And this may happen any moment. If we do not change the condition of affairs it will happen."
She was silent, and Darvid was silent also. It might seem that he recognized only Irene's last argument as worthy of attention. The two voices had grown silent, one after the other; then, somewhere in the corner of the room, was heard a rustle, not so low as before, far stronger, a low knocking rather than a rustle, and almost at the same time a servant in the open door of the antechamber called:
"The horses are ready."
Irene, who had turned her face toward the rustle, or knocking, thought some of the countless papers in the room had dropped from the furniture, or that some book had fallen. Darvid, who also had heard the knocking, or rustle, forgot it while looking at his watch.
"I shall be late," said he. "You have told me things over which I must meditate. I cannot deny that they possess considerable importance. Hence, I delay, and shall beg you soon to continue this conversation. Good-night, and perhaps till to-morrow."
"Let it be only till to-morrow. I beg you, father. Tomorrow."
Miss Mary was sitting in her pupil's bedroom, a beautiful nest which wealth had formed as a symbol of the springtime of life. From the top of the walls to the bottom, cretonne, interchanged with muslin, formed succeeding folds on which the freshest flowers of spring seemed to have been scattered. The walls, the windows, the furniture were covered with a shower of forget-me-nots and rosebuds, strewn on grounds of yellow as pale as if sunlight had penetrated them slightly. Groups of green plants at the windows looked like little groves made ready for the songs of nightingales; artistic playthings, porcelain figures, suggested a child amused with dolls yet; but a multitude of large books in gilt bindings suggested the active and methodical development of a young mind, which surely had dreams of Paradise on that lace and satin bed which covered a bedstead inlaid with mother-of-pearl. On all the furniture: small arm-chairs, tables, screens, which reminded one of butterfly-wings, mother-of-pearl rainbow-tints passed into milk-white. Spring tones, joyous motives, light and graceful forms, filled the room of that little daughter of a millionnaire with an atmosphere of childish innocence and tenderness; it was lighted, from floor to ceiling, and from wall to wall, with a cheering light, poured from the rosy tulip-shaped shade of a grand lamp.
In that rosy lamp-light Miss Mary seemed full of care. Under her smooth hair her forehead was smooth and calm, but in her thoughtful eyes, and in the way that her head rested on her hand, anxiety was evident. Conscientiously devoted to the duties undertaken by her, she retained the warmth and purity which permeated the house of an Anglican pastor; chance had committed to her care, in a strange atmosphere, a rare spirit, one of those which come to the world in the form of a flame. Even three years earlier, Cara had seemed to her, at first glance, one of those souls for whom life is love, worship, trust, and—nothing more. No ambitions or imaginings beyond those. All her thoughts and wishes issued from her heart and went back to it. Her innate sensitiveness was inexplicable in its source, just as genius is in other persons. Sensitiveness in her demanded the accomplishment of her wishes as imperiously as, in organisms of another sort, hunger claims satisfaction for the body. She was by nature a flame and a bird. The riddle of her existence was involved in two words: to blaze and to fly. Besides, she had impulse and caprice; she loved to twitter, and to laugh quietly in a corner. From the thoughtfulness into which she dropped oftener and oftener, she woke up as a gladsome and petted child; that room was filled with her quick speech, her thin voice, her gestures, almost theatrical, her laughing, her humming, and at times all the drawing-rooms were filled with them.
This day she woke up full of twittering, and before dressing threw her bare arms around Miss Mary, looking into her eyes, declaiming verses, telling childish dreams.
"Why are you so delighted?" inquired Miss Mary. "Is it at the coming ball?"
Cara pouted her scarlet lips contemptuously, and answered:
"The ball! What do I care? I do not want the ball! Mamma and Ira do not want it either, so I will go to-day and beg father to defer it. But I am delighted this morning! The sun is so pleasant! Do you see how the rays quiver; how they slip among the leaves, like little snakes, or spring, like golden butterflies?"
With outstretched finger she showed the play of sunrays among the clumps of green at the windows; herself in white muslin which covered her slender neck and childish breast, and with naked arms, she might remind one of a butterfly escaping from the chrysalis of childhood.
In the evening (of that day) Cara circled about the room; her mouth filled with historical names, and lines of poetry, with which she had been occupied all day. Finally, she caught Puffie in her arms, and, courtesying so low before Miss Mary that she touched the floor, announced that she was going to her father. From time immemorial she had not talked with him a moment. Sometimes he was going out, or had not the time. But to-day she would watch him, she would wait till all his business was finished, all his guests gone; she would seize her father and bring him to her mother's study. Miss Mary would go there; perhaps Maryan would be there too.
Her idyllic heart, like a bird in a grove, was eternally dreaming of quiet retreats, of confidential talks, of the attachment of hearts and the pressure of hands. Her picture of the Anglican rectory taken from Miss Mary's narrative, and situated in a grove of old oaks, smiled at her like a bit of Paradise. "But mamma's study is so quiet, and full of fragrant flowers—"
An hour had passed since she had skipped away with Puffie in her arms, and with the reflection of a bit of Paradise in her eyes. Miss Mary felt alarmed. For some time she had felt continual alarm. She observed carefully the change taking place in Cara's disposition, and discovered in it causes for anxiety. But she could do nothing. While she was friendly to the family to which fate had brought her, and while she experienced from it kindness mingled with respect, it was to her a stranger. She observed everything, and said nothing. She strove, more and more, to be inseparable from Cara, and to turn her attention toward things of remote interest. That was a splendid mansion, but terrors were roaming around in its drawing-rooms, among plushes, mirrors, damasks, satins, and gold.
From the gates of the mansion, the rumble of a carriage went forth, grew faint in the street, and was lost in the distance. The master of the mansion was in that carriage which sank in the uproar of the city, to return, barely, at daybreak. A quarter of an hour passed, Cara did not return. Maybe she went to her mother? Another quarter of an hour. Miss Mary rose up, took a small candlestick in her hand with a candle, which she lighted to use in her wandering through the series of drawing-rooms. But among the soft folds of cretonne and muslin the lofty door, ornamented with gilded arabesques and borders, opened slowly, and Cara walked into the chamber holding Puffie at her bosom. Her face was so bent that the lower part of it was hidden in the silky coat of the little animal. Miss Mary, sitting down again, inquired:
"Where were you, Cara, after your father went away? With mamma?"
In answer, a few steps from the door, the sound of a fall was heard. That was Puff, he had dropped from her arms to the floor. She had let him slip down along her dress. Cara had never treated her favorite with such indifference, or so carelessly. Leaning forward, Miss Mary fixed her eyes on the young girl. Oh, my God! What has happened? Who can tell, but something has happened, that is certain. Cara's cheeks, recalling usually the leaves of a full rose, were as white as the soft muslin covering her chamber, and her lips, always scarlet, formed a barely visible line, pale and narrow. Tall, slender, and erect, without the slightest movement of hand or head, with dry eyes looking somewhere into remoteness, she passed through the room, and with automatic movement dropped into a low chair near Miss Mary, who touched her hand and felt the cold of ice in it.
"What is the matter, my dear? Are you ill?"
Instead of giving an answer Cara rose and went to the cluster of green plants at the window. With her shoulders turned toward Miss Mary, she seemed to be looking at the plants; but, after a few minutes, she turned, and making some steps stopped, with her eyes fixed on the floor.
"Cara, come to me!" cried Miss Mary.
She went, and sat down at her side. The English girl looked at her sharply, and asked in a low voice:
"Have you met anything disagreeable? Or anyone? Or has anyone—"
She did not finish, for the delicate, pale face turned from her with quick movement, and said very hurriedly:
"No! no! no!"
Then the slender form of the girl slipped slowly from the chair to the carpet, and her head rested heavily on the knees of her governess. But barely had the soft hand of the English girl touched her hair, when Cara rose and went to the other side of the room, where the light screen, struck by her skirt, tottered and fell with a clatter. Without noticing the noise Cara turned now toward the lamp, and with a face which was growing ever paler she sat down opposite Miss Mary and opened one of the books lying on the table. Her brows were raised, this brought many wrinkles to her forehead; for a time it seemed as though she were reading, then she closed the book with a sudden gesture, stood up again, and went toward the door leading to the drawing-rooms.
"Are you going to your mamma?"
She made no answer, but sat on a low stool near the door. Puff went up, and, putting his forepaws on her knees, licked her hand. But that hand, usually so fondling, pushed the little dog far away with a sudden movement. Miss Mary rose, and was going to the stool, but she had hardly reached the middle of the room when Cara rose again and went to meet her. The English girl seized both her hands.
"My dear," began the governess, "you frighten me. What has happened? What is your trouble? You should have confidence in me—I am your friend, and a friend of your family—perhaps, I can explain, or help you in some way. Has anything happened? Has there been an accident? What is it that troubles you?"
The dry, dark eyes of the girl, looking, as it were, from some distant depth, met the kindly glance of her friend, and this whisper came from her lips:
"Nothing! Nothing!"
Then going some steps, she stopped at the table with the lamp on it, and again opened one of the books there. Miss Mary followed, put her arm around Cara, and wished to draw her near, but she, with an alarmed and supple movement, slipped from her embrace, put the book down, and turning, started to go somewhere. Miss Mary faced toward the door, and said:
"I will go for your mother."
But that instant she was frightened; for Cara, recovering her voice at once, screamed:
"No!"
Her eyes grew wild, and she began to tremble.
There was no doubt: In the row of empty drawing-rooms which stretched beyond that door, ornamented with arabesques and gilded borders, the girl had seen some horror. But what the horror was, and whence it had crept forth, Miss Mary did not know. She sat down, and pale with fear, placed her helpless hands upon her knees. What could she do in presence of those blue lips, which were as silent as if shut by some seal, either sacred or infernal? What could she do? Cara's father was not at home, and to call her mother, when the very mention of that mother brought a cry of terror from the girl's breast, would have been a useless cruelty. Her brother? Her elder sister? Miss Mary's hand moved in a manner indicating doubt. It was necessary to wait, to leave her some time to herself. She might grow calm, overcome her fear, speak.
Left to herself Cara went to the bed, knelt by it, and buried her face in the coverlet; but a few minutes later she wound her lithe form like the twist of a serpent, and turned her face toward the ceiling. She remained in this posture rather long, only changing, from time to time, the position of her head, which rested on the coverlet.
Miss Mary remembered people seized with violent pains, who, in the fruitless hope of allaying them, changed positions and postures continually. She remembered, also, the faintness and weariness which cover the faces of people with pallor and an expression of unbearable disgust. A certain disgust, repulsive and unendurable, must be working in that slender breast, from which a low moan came when she turned her head from side to side.
"Are you ill, dearest Cara; are you in pain?"
Prom the bed, in a scarcely audible whisper, came:
"No."
She rose, went to Miss Mary, sat on the carpet, put her head on the English girl's knee, with her face toward the ceiling. She threw her hands back on her dishevelled hair, and then let them drop without control, so that they fell on the carpet as if lifeless. Her dry, inflamed eyes continued to look at the ceiling. Miss Mary, bent, and making her words as low and fondling as human words could be, inquired again:
"Has anything happened? Has anything hurt you?"
Changing the position of her head, and shaking it, as if she wished to shake something off, she whispered:
"Nothing."
And rising, she went again to the end of the room. Her hair, not long, but thick, like a bundle of silken flax, lay motionless on her narrow shoulders; her pendent hands seemed like two rose-buds falling from a bush. She stood again for a moment before the clump of green plants, then went around it and hid beyond the thickest palms at the window. Outside the window was the darkness of a winter evening, relieved somewhat by snow which covered the broad garden. The darkness was spotted by red lamps, which illuminated the street beyond the garden. Some months before, Cara had opened a window overlooking that same garden; she did this in the middle of the night to look at the first snow and at the frost in the moonlight. Snow was lying there now, at the close of winter, surely the last snow.
Much time passed. Miss Mary rose, and went to the narrow space between the clump of plants and the window. Cara was standing there at the very window, looking into the darkness, or at the red spots made by lanterns, placed here and there in it. The governess saw that a change had taken place in her. She was not pale as before; on the contrary, a lively flush had come out on her face. Her features were less rigid; instead of the nauseous disgust and dull pain, an expression of deep thought had covered them. As happened often when Cara was thinking deeply, the point of her finger was in her mouth. Miss Mary felt relieved. "Cara is no longer pale," thought she; "she has stopped over something; she stands long in one place; she is recovering her balance; soon she will be pacified completely, and will tell what has happened."
"Do you not wish me to read to you?"
Cara shook her head, and said in a low voice:
"I want to sleep."
"To sleep! so early? But you are tired, of course. Very well, dear. Lie down and rest. I will call Ludvika to open the bed. Or no—I will do it myself. No one need make a noise here that would prevent us from talking."
With great goodness and kindly grace, while arranging the bed with a rustle of silk, and the waves of lace going through her fingers, Miss Mary told vivaciously of many things which were near and confidential, things always affecting Cara, and though no answer came to her from beyond the green plants, her voice, which sounded agreeably, scattered the gloom and silence of the chamber.
Half an hour later the door to the drawing-room was opened partly, and the voice of Irene said some words in English. Miss Mary went to the door on tip-toe.
"Cara is sleeping already," whispered she; "we ought not to wake her; she is a little unwell."
The door was closed slowly and in silence; some minutes later the maid brought a tray in with tea and many dishes.
Soon after Malvina entered the room. She approached her daughter's bed quietly, and anxious.
"What is the matter?" whispered she. "Why did she go to bed so early?"
Miss Mary gave some pacifying answer. That was caution. She felt always in that house, and on that day more than ever, the need of caution in making observations. Both looked at the girl, who, as they thought, was sleeping soundly; she breathed slowly and evenly, with a deep flush on her cheeks.
Malvina bent down and impressed a long kiss on the forehead of her sleeping daughter. Then Miss Mary noted something of which she was not sure: when her mother's lips rested on Cara's forehead a quiver ran through the girl's body, from head to foot. But Miss Mary was not sure whether Cara really trembled, or it only seemed so to her. After Malvina's departure she remained at the bedside, with eyes fixed on the delicate face, which was growing more inflamed with an ever-increasing flush. A number of dark spots came out on her purple lips, which were parched and half open, her small pearl-like teeth gleamed behind them.
"She is sick, but has fallen asleep!" thought Miss Mary. "Perhaps that horror, which I thought seized the child in the empty drawing-rooms, was an invention of her mind? Surely it was nothing more; she is simply ill; perhaps, not very ill, since she fell asleep so quickly."
The small night-lamp shone in Cara's room like a blue spark. In the adjoining room, beyond the open door, far into the night, rustled book-leaves turned by the English governess. Miss Mary watched long, and stood often in the open door, between her room and Cara's, inclining forward, looking from a distance at the bed from which the regular, unbroken sound of breathing came to her. She is asleep. She moved a number of times and groaned, then again she was silent. Puff lay at her feet, like a bundle of ash-colored silk, and snored slightly. The street beyond the garden grew more and more silent till it was silent altogether. At the windows light began to whiten the shades and to draw aside the black curtain of darkness which was on the furniture. The wearied Miss Mary, in a long dressing-gown, ready to spring from her bed any moment, slept for a short time and then woke with a feeling of great fear. She was roused by a sharp cold by a breath of frosty air coming in through the open door. She sprang up and ran, with a cry, to Cara's chamber. There, on the threshold she saw beyond the spreading palm leaves the great window half open, and a slender, white figure sitting there in the gray dawn. When had she done that? How long had she sat there with her shoulders resting on the window-frame, with her naked feet hanging in the air, with her breast and arms stripped even of muslin? No one was ever to know.
Miss Mary, while carrying the girl to bed with that strength which only terror can give one, felt in her embrace, limbs as stiff as those of a frozen corpse; but her breast rose and fell with her breathing which was heavy and audible; her cheeks and forehead were burning. In half a minute the window was closed; Miss Mary, with all the strength of long and supple arms, strove to warm the breast and shoulders, which were as cold as ice, and the skin on them stiffened.
"Oh, child! you unkind! most dear! poor child! Why have you done this? Is it possible to do such things? Did you know what you were doing? Was that an unfortunate accident, or did you do it purposely? Tell, was it done purposely? Tell me! tell!"
Cara for the first time looked straight into Miss Mary's face; she bent her head with a lively movement; her eyes shot forth triumph; a smile encircled her parched lips. In the glitter of her eyes, in the smile, in the curve of her neck, for the twinkle of an eye, shone forth once again the wilful, capricious Cara. Next moment her teeth began to chatter and her whole body trembled in a feverish chill, so that the silk of the bed rustled loudly. With that rustling was joined a dry, unbroken cough, which shook the fragile and ice-cold breast, the skin of which was rough, and had a tanned and withered look. Miss Mary sprang from her knees. On her lips were the words:
"Her parents! A doctor!"
The rumbling of a carriage was heard far away on the street, it drew nearer and nearer, rolled in through the gate of the house, and was silent. Miss Mary, all in white, her hair hanging over her shoulders, hastened to Darvid's study, through drawing-rooms in which, from behind black veils which the pale dawn was removing, emerged glass, metal, pictures, mirrors, plush, silk, polished surfaces, gildings, mosaics, marbles, porcelain, in the dull gleam of their colors.
The dawn was in Darvid's study also; but the servant was lighting the hanging-lamp over the round table. Darvid, very pale, with a nervous movement, tore rather than drew the gloves from his hands.
"Then did she return from me? Where did she come from? You say that she was with me, and returned—in that condition? But she was not here yesterday; I did not see her; she was not here—"
"She was," answered Miss Mary; "she said that she was going to you; she did not return for more than an hour."
"She might have been with her mother?"
"No; I asked her sister about that. She was not with her mother; she was here."
Darvid was astonished; he thought a while, and called suddenly:
"Ah!"
There was something tragic in the gesture with which he indicated the thick case full of books, forming with the two walls a little triangular space; then in the manner in which he intertwined his fingers:
"She was there! And—she heard! Ah!"
He stood for a moment as if rooted to the floor; he bit his lip; there were quivers on his cheeks and wrinkles on his forehead; then he approached Miss Mary, and asked in such a low voice that she barely heard him:
"Did she do this purposely—purposely? Purposely?"
"With clasped hands she said in a very low voice:
"I cannot hide—maybe something will depend on this—she did it purposely."
Then that man, usually calm and regular in all his movements, rushed to the door of the antechamber with the spring of a tiger.
"Carriage!" cried he.
"When the most famous doctor in the city came out of the sick girl's chamber that day for the second time, Darvid met him in the blue drawing-room, alone. He was as usual self-possessed, and with a pleasing smile in the presence of that man with a great name.
"Is the disease defined?" asked he.
It was defined, and very serious. Inflammation had seized the greater part of the lungs, and was working fiercely on an organism weakened by a previous attack. Besides, some kind of complication had supervened, something coming from the brain, from the nerves, something psychic.
Darvid mentioned a consultation.
"We may summon from abroad—from Paris, from Vienna; we have telegraphs and railroads at our service—as to expense—" concluded he with indifference "—as to expense, I shall not spare it. My whole fortune is at the disposal of—"
He fixed in the eyes of the doctor a look in which was the desire for a silent understanding.
"This is no hyperbole, or figure of rhetoric. I am ready to summon half medical Europe, and spend half my fortune."
There was a quiver on his temples, around his mouth, and near his eyes, but he smiled. The doctor smiled also.
"My dear sir," said he, "the case is not so peculiar as to need presentation before the judgment of Europe. But being in Europe—yes. I will serve you at once with the names of my foreign colleagues. But as to colossal money sacrifices, I must say that they will not help. Death, my dear sir, is such a giantess, that if she is to come, mountains of gold will not stop her. I will not say that she must come surely in this case. But if she is to come, half your fortune—that is, golden mountains—yes, golden mountains will be no hindrance to her. She will spring over them and—come."
After the doctor had gone, Darvid remained alone for a while, and, with his eyes fixed on the floor, he thought:
"A giantess! Golden mountains will not stop her! True, but science is also a giantess. And, besides, is human, and every human thing travels in golden chariots. But to set one giantess against the other, gold and energy are needed."
For some time the great study was seething with activity, in sending letters and telegrams. Darvid was heard commanding and giving directions in a voice always low, but emphatic. He was decisive, cool, and active, as he always was when going to a contest. In the course of a few minutes arriving carriages halted, one after another, before the gate of the mansion. Out of them issued men full of importance, with famous names, very learned, specialists, old and young, strong in theory and practice. Some of these men it was almost impossible to see, for they were reposing in wealth and on laurels, but they had been snatched from their rest by the rumble of the golden chariot which came for them. There were many of these men. The blue room grew black from their garments as from a cloud. Darvid pressed their hands a little more firmly than he was wont to do; perhaps his side-whiskers dropped a little less symmetrically than usual, along cheeks somewhat paler than usual, but there was no other change in the man. And when the cloud of dark garments flowed from the blue room to the chamber of his daughter, a spark of triumph glittered in his eye. Let one giantess fight with the other; we shall see which one wins. The power of science was one of the very few articles of Darvid's faith. That power had to be great, since it was indispensable in the conquest of wealth. He had tried that power more than once in his mighty struggles for wealth; he would try it now, also. This was only the beginning of the battle. Diseases last a series of days, sometimes weeks, but to-morrow, after to-morrow, Europe will begin to ride hither on the golden chariot. Giantess against giantess! We shall see their force.
Inflammation extending with great rapidity in the weak breast of the girl, besides a complication of the brain, not considerable, but giving much cause for concern—the normal condition of the mind shaken—that was the case. A long consultation was carried on in an undertone; some medicines were prescribed, and some advice given, in the domain of hygiene. Among the carriages which left the gate of the mansion, two were empty. The two dignitaries of science, who had remained in his house, Darvid conducted to his study for black coffee, excellent liquors, and cigars of uncommon quality. They had to remain some hours, then they would be relieved by others. They opposed this wish at first, for it was in opposition to their customs, to obligations assumed elsewhere; but Darvid, with his eyes looking very kindly into theirs, uttered a magic word. It was a figure unheard of—almost fabulous. They hesitated still; resisted; then they came to an understanding as to the how-and-when—and remained. Darvid's forehead smoothed for the moment, all wrinkles vanished from it. His child (in his mind he added), "my little one," during one hour of the day or night would not be without the good giantess, who would do battle against the wicked one.
In the city, people said that Darvid, in anxiety for his daughter would commit some mad folly; but those who had seen him shrugged their shoulders. Not at all! There was not a man on earth who could preserve better, in such straits, cool blood, self-confidence, fluent speech, affability perfect, though cold. Only at times, from the quiver which ran over his face, from the temporary stare of his eyes, and the slight carelessness in dressing his hair, was it possible to divine in him a man playing for great stakes. Really, in the battle which he had begun and was fighting, the question was not of Cara alone—it was of her above all, but not of her alone. At the bottom of his being he felt himself a player, then, as he had been countless times before in cases wholly different; a player aided by energy, money, and universal reason, which was his own and that bought by money. The stakes in this play were not only the life of his child, but the one faith which he had—his faith in the all-mightiness, and all-effectiveness of energy, sound sense, and money.
At one time and another, either with the doctors, or without them, Darvid entered Cara's chamber; where, in obedience to medical advice, they had not darkened the great windows through which light was pouring in its golden torrents. This light penetrated the yellowish folds of cretonne at the walls, lent apparent life to forget-me-nots and rose-buds scattered over them, played among the palm leaves, lay on the flowery carpet, struck out golden sparks on the gilding of toys and books, played with rainbow gleams on surfaces inlaid with mother-of-pearl. In this gleaming light, near the mirror, which was surrounded by porcelain flowers, amid flasks gilded and enamelled, a rosy Cupid was drawing a bow with a golden arrow, a marble cat lay at the feet of a statuette, which held a dove rat its bosom; on a small desk of lapis-lazuli as blue as the sky, a bronze statuette personifying the Dew was inclining gracefully an amphora above an open book, skeins of various colored silks were hanging at little looms. Amid all these tones of spring, joyous themes, light and graceful forms, the sunlight went to Cara's bed, and, from the white cambric on which she was lying, increased the paleness of her yellow hair. On the pillow with lace it was difficult at first to distinguish where the sunrays ended and the maiden's hair began. But, amid the yellow of the rays and the hair, her oval, delicate face in its bright flush seemed a scarlet flower. Her lips, blooming with a bloody purple, her eyes, flashing with a dry fire, were silent. But her breast labored with hoarse, hurried breathing, and a cough shook her body, the slender, fragile form of which was indicated beneath the blue silk coverlet, like a fine piece of sculpture.
When Darvid entered the chamber a dark-robed woman drew back from the bed of the suffering Cara, without the least rustle, and stood at some distance with a pained, pallid face under smoothly dressed hair of the same hue exactly as that which, in dishevelled abundance, lay mingled with pale sunrays on the pillow of the sick girl.
"How is it with you, little one?" asked Darvid. "Perhaps you feel somewhat better? Perhaps you would like something?"
For its only answer the face, which was like a scarlet flower, turned toward the wall, covered with forget-me-nots and rose-buds.
"Why not answer, Cara? Perhaps you would like something? Only say, only whisper. Say into my ear. I would bring you anything, get it, buy it. Perhaps you would like something? Have something, something to look at. You can have anything—anything, only say what it is—whisper in my ear."
But in vain he bent low, brought his ear to her lips almost, no sound came from them, no whisper, only her face turned away still more and her breath became hoarser and heavier.
How many times did he go there and put to her the question: "Would you like something? Will you tell what?" He thought that the young girl, though sick, must remember some wish, some desire which, if granted, might give her relief and some comfort. He had power to gratify every wish, even the wildest, but had not the power of drawing from her lips even one word, and that the briefest.
Some days passed. In front of the mansion the carriages of doctors were arriving and departing continually, meeting on the way a multitude of equipages from which men came out and entered the study of the master of the mansion, or only came to the entrance to inscribe their names in a book furnished by the Swiss in livery. Once, when coming home, Darvid met on the stairway two men who spoke a foreign language. He was eloquent, triumphant. These were allies from abroad, coming to strengthen the local forces, which joined them in full array for a consultation. Again a cloud of black garments moved from the blue room to the chamber which was full of spring colors, of childhood's playthings, of mother-of-pearl rainbow gleams. One more mountain of gold and of intellect set up as a bulwark of defence near the bed of the sick girl. When the cloud of black garments and serious faces had vanished, the mother drew near:
"These gentlemen have wearied you. That is nothing. Because they have come you will be well. Those are very wise men. The two who have just come are Germans; throughout the whole world they are famous. They will cure you to a certainty. But now you may swallow a little of those excellent sweets which those gentlemen let us give you. Or a drop of wine. Perhaps a spoonful, one little spoonful of bouillon?"
Cara's only answer was to turn on her yellowish bed to the wall sprinkled with spring flowers, her face in scarlet flushes. Malvina, bending low, kissed the little hand, the heat of which burnt her lips, and which trembled under those lips, like a leaf in a blast of wind.
"Why not answer me, Cara? One word! only one short, little word! Shall I give a drop of wine? Those gentlemen ordered it—will you have it now? Whisper!"
But in vain did she put her ear almost down to Cara's lips, not a sound, not a whisper, she only turned her face away farther, while her breath grew in hoarseness.
Maryan came in with a great bouquet of flowers in his hand.
"What, are we sick, little one!" began he. "Well, that is nothing wonderful! King Solomon said that for everyone there must be a time for sickness and a time for dancing. You will be sick a little while, and then you will dance. But now I have brought flowers to cheer you. Flowers without odor, for sick girls might get headache from fragrant ones. These have no fragrance, but they are very beautiful. You will look most poetic when I scatter them on the bed before you. They will gladden your sight after looking at those dreary pedants who are like a flock of wise ravens. Father has brought in the wisest ravens from all the world for you; I have gathered throughout this whole city the most beautiful flowers. Mein Lieichen, was willst du mehr?"
While laughing he scattered on the blue coverlet, and on the slender form of the maiden indicated under it, the most beautiful flowers which the best conservatories could yield to him; she only looked at her brother with great burning eyes, and when he went away she began, with a slow and monotonous movement to throw them from the bed. She did not look at these flowers, but the slender, dry, rosy hand of the girl worked and worked on, pushing from the bed the rich twigs and beautiful flowers, which fell, one after another, with a dull rustle on the carpet. She wanted nothing. But in the night, when Malvina and Miss Mary thought that she was sleeping, a whisper was heard in the deep stillness calling:
"Puffie! Puffie!"
Miss Mary raised the little dog from a neighboring chair and gave him to her. Cara took him in her burning hands, but soon she pushed him away with the same kind of slow gesture with which she had thrown down the flowers, turned her face toward the wall, and then whispered:
"No."
Next morning the faces of the "wise ravens" were very gloomy. Those who flew in from the neighborhood, and those who came from a distance took on more and more that mysterious solemnity which reminds one of death-bells.
But Darvid waited yet; he did not lay down his arms; he did not lose faith in the power of the good giantess. He waited for a new reinforcement. This was the greatest medical name in all Europe, that of a man who had the fame almost of one who worked miracles. Here again was a mountain of gold, and of intellect piled up, the highest mountain among all of them. In the blue drawing-room a suppressed, many-tongued murmur was heard. Servants bore about food and drink. Darvid gave cigars to his worthy guests, the most worthy of all, he who had just arrived; listened with close attention to the explanation of his colleagues touching the case before which he was to find himself. At last, calm, and perfectly correct, with a pleasant smile on his lips, a smile almost of triumph, Darvid indicated with a gesture full of welcome the door of his daughter's chamber. The most famous of the famous entered first, and stopped some steps from the threshold; behind him stopped the others. On the parched lips of the sick girl appeared ruby-like drops of blood; her eyes were opened very widely; to her forehead, which was damp from perspiration, some slender locks of pale, yellow hair adhered. Throughout the room sounded in an audible, hoarse whisper:
"Ira! Ira!"
Irene approached quickly, and, bending over, removed, delicately, with a thin handkerchief, the liquid rubies from the lips of her sister.
"What do you want, little one; what do you wish?"
Cara fixed on her sister eyes in which something uncommon had begun to take place, for the dark pupils became larger every moment, and larger, more prominent, they seemed to grow and to swell, as if concentrating into one point all power of vision, until a glassy film began to come down over them, and at the same time her lips, sprinkled with blood, moved a number of times wishing to pronounce something and not being able. At last, fixing on her sister from behind the glassy film the sight of her swollen pupils, Cara, as if in sign that she understood, shook her head, and with a whisper which was heard through the room with a note of alarm and complaint, she said:
"Pain-ted pots!"
Then in her breast a great orchestra began to play: hoarse, discordant, wheezing, and her head, grown suddenly heavy, fell into the pillow deeply. Prom the assembly of men standing there at the door, the most famous, the small sprightly, iron-gray Frenchman, with a face greatly thoughtful, advanced a few steps, stood at the bedside, and after some minutes, with his hands resting on the laboring bosom, cast into the deep silence which possessed the room these words:
"The agony!"
As if in answer to that word, at the very door, behind the cloud of black garments, was heard a loud hand-clap. That was Darvid, who, with a movement most unexpected for him, had in this manner wrung his hands, intertwining them with a strength which almost broke his fingers, and then raised them above his head.
So the giantess had sprung over all the mountains—and had come!
From street to street, and from one alley of the public garden to another, passed Arthur Kranitski, with the step and the mien of a person who is strolling through a city without great desire or object. In his shining hat and well-fitting fur coat, on the costly collar of which traces of wear were observable, the man seemed notably older and poorer in some sort than he had been during a past which was still recent. In his erect form and springy step one might discover that disagreeable effort with which people guard themselves when they fear lest observers may penetrate their sad secret in some way. But despite every effort Kranitski's secret was manifest sometimes in his stooping shoulders, drooping head, pendant cheeks, and dimmed glances. All this was the more evident since Pan Arthur was advancing in the full gleam of the sun which flooded with light the sidewalks of the streets and the alleys of the great public garden. The end of the winter had been exceptionally mild and serene, the snow had almost melted away, and only, here and there, mingled its dull white with the azure of the sky and the golden hue of the atmospheres. While passing multitudes of people, Kranitski raised his hand to his hat frequently, and at times, with a smile which was winning, nay, almost seductive, he made movements as if to approach, or even spring forward to those whom he greeted; but they, with a courteous though prompt inclination, moved past the man swiftly. These persons were stylish young gentlemen conversing with one another vivaciously, or young ladies hastening to some point. They returned bow after bow, but none took note of Kranitski's desire to draw near, or, at least, none had the wish to observe it. Each man or woman had some person at his side or hers with whom to converse, and was going, or even hastening, to some place. How recent and intimate had been his acquaintance with those persons!—lie had known them from early childhood. He knew everything touching them: the names and life-histories of their parents, the nicknames given them in jest or in tenderness, names given at an age when they were barely lisping. He knew every chamber, almost every corner of the houses in which they had been reared. He had raised many of them in his strong arms from the floor—he who at that time was the praised, the beloved, the sought for. He who had amused and entertained them, was he, indeed, to imagine a day when they would pass him at a distance and indifferently? How could he? He with rosy glasses on his eyes, those eyes famed at that period for beauty, had been given to tenderness and attachments; he had considered the feelings and relations of men as eternal. But from various causes a multitude of his relations with people had ended already—and now they were ending to the last one. He had the vivid sensation of hanging in a vacuum, and felt a growing need to grasp after something or someone lest he might tumble into a place which he knew not, but which he felt must be abyss-like. At the beginning of his walk he thought that in that bright hour of the day when throngs of gayly-dressed people were covering the sidewalks, and the middle of the street was filled with passing carriages, some person would stop him, would invite him, would attend him somewhere, or take him to some place. What was he to do now? Whither was he to go? Baron Emil, whose mediaeval mansion had been in recent days almost his one refuge from weariness and lonely tedium, had gone to his estate to make trips in various directions and search in village cottages and under their roofs for remnants of art which were genuine or suitable. He was to return soon; but, meanwhile, Kranitski could not sit in the broad chair before Tristan, who was giving obeisance on the wall of the chamber to Isolde, nor sit at the table where, besides gastronomic tidbits, he found conversation to which he was accustomed, nor in presence of the Triumph of Death sweeping through the air on bat wings, or experience the tone of beyond-the-worldness. With the departure of the baron he lost the only ground on which he met Maryan—that dear child. The very thought now of Maryan, from whom after so many years of life in common he was separated, brought tears to Kranitski's eyelids.
He took a seat on a bench of the garden, and wishing to light a cigarette drew the golden case from his pocket. He did not light the cigarette, however; for there, beyond the low paling near which he was sitting, passed a splendid carriage drawn by two horses and bearing servants in livery. In that carriage sat a man of thirty years, at sight of whom Kranitski pushed forward as if to rush after him, as if to fly like the wind to him. This young man was the son of Count Alfred, of him whom Kranitski had nursed with endless devotion during illness under the sky of Italy. In those days the young man was a child, and remembered little of the hours in which Kranitski had occupied in his family the place of the best of friends, and somewhat that of the most faithful of servants. Afterward he forgot those hours completely, and put away by degrees "that excellent Kranitski," who was growing old; and though this Kranitski, on a time, had rendered some sort of service to the young man's father, he had been rewarded richly by resorting to the house for years, and, very likely, by loans of money given frequently and with no thought of payment. Very wealthy and a frequent traveller, Count Arthur's son had too many affairs on his head, and too many in it to cherish any desire of stuffing it further with old-fashioned trumpery. Kranitski soon observed this frame of mind in the young son of his former friend and protector, and he had long considered that house as lost and its master as a stranger. This did not sadden him at first over much, for he had a port, which he entered with, full sail at all times. But now the passing sight of that young man struck his heart with something which cut and burned at the same instant. Services are forgotten, ties are broken, the past is rejected; oh, the ingratitude of mankind! And still with what delight would he have ridden through the streets of the city on such a spring day in that carriage with rubber ties, bearing the persons within it on yielding cushions, with the soft movement of a cradle. With a still greater feeling of delight would he have conversed while going with someone who possessed the same habits, tastes, and relations which he had; with what vivid satisfaction would he halt before one of the best restaurants of that city to have an exquisite lunch, between walls decorated with taste, and amid sounds of joyfulness. But all those things which on a time were as cheap as good-morning, are now as remote and unattainable as the blue sky above him.
In his closely drawn coat, and bent over so much that his shoulders took the form of a half-circle; in his hat, from beneath which black hair was visible and a row of furrows above his dark brows, he gazed at the street which stretched along outside the paling, and in his fingers, covered with Danish gloves, he twirled the golden toy from habit. The hat shone like satin above his head, and on tire cigarette-ease, which he twirled in his fingers, the sun-gleams were crossing one another.
The street beyond that paling lay before a square which was rather extensive; this square seemed dominated by two lofty buildings, before the ornamented fronts of which there was a great movement of people. Through the broad doors of these buildings a throng of men went in and came out, equipages stopped before them; on the steps which led up to them halted, advanced, decreased, and again increased a crowd of figures clad in black, noisy, gesticulating, occupied passionately in some work. No wonder! These were the bank and the exchange, which stood with opposing fronts, and, with their multitude of windows, seemed to gaze eye to eye at each other. Kranitski looked neither at these piles nor the throng of men circulating about them. He had never had anything in common with activity in those buildings. But all at once he bent forward a second time and fixed his eyes on a carriage which passed the paling, or rather he fixed them on the man sitting in it.
It was Aloysius Darvid who, on that sunny day, was in an open carriage drawn by a pair of large, costly horses, which, in light harness without mounting, stepped slowly, with grace and importance. On the box sat a coachman and footman, in high hats and immense fur collars; in the carriage, finished in sapphire damask, a man of not large stature, slender, with pale face, ruddy side-whiskers, and with the glitter of a golden spark in the glasses which covered his eyes. Slowly, with dignity, the carriage with muffled sound of rubber-bound wheels halted before the bank entrance. The footman sprang from the box, stood at the door, and taking a card from his master's hand hurried into the building. Five minutes had not passed when out came two serious persons who approached the carriage hastily, and began to converse with the man sitting in it. Surely officials, even dignitaries of the bank, whom he had summoned by two words outlined on the card. To go to them, to ascend the high steps, he had not time perhaps, so they ran down those steps to him. They did not walk down, they ran, and now, with the most courteous smiles in the world and with raising of hats above their important heads, these men seemed to counsel with him about something, to indicate some point, to promise. While he, ever unchanged, perfectly polite though cold, with a shade of sarcasm on his lean face, rather listened than spoke, and with a golden spark in his glasses, against a background of bright sapphire damask, had the seeming of a demi-god.
In five minutes' time the conversation was over. Darvid inclined with befitting profoundness; the officers bowed much lower their hats above their heads. With the muffled sound of rubber tires, with the slow and important gait of the splendid horses, that carriage moved on, described a large circle and stopped at the long and broad steps leading up to the edifice opposite. Here the footman opened the carriage door; Darvid alighted and began to ascend the steps where a dense throng of men, dressed in black, opened before him as a wave opens to an oncoming vessel. That must be no common craft; for, along the wave of men, quivers passed as they pass through one living organism at the touch of an electric current. The opening throng formed eddies, whispered, was silent; a number of hands were raised toward heads, and hats or caps hung in the air; a multitude of faces were turned toward that one face, and fixed their eyes on it. These movements had in them an expression of timid curiosity, an expression which seemed almost humble. The most confident stepped forth from the throng with bared heads, and with steps which were either too slow or too hurried, but never such steps as they made habitually. These men approached the newly arrived and spoke to him of something; they were doubtless inquiring, taking counsel, perhaps petitioning; for all those acts were expressed in their movements, and on their faces. Thus was formed something like that retinue of the elite who surround a demi-god, and between the two walls of people, along the splendid steps of the stairway they went up with him higher and higher to the entrance of the temple, and vanished there with him. The heads of the common crowd were covered with hats and caps now, but many eyes, unable to gaze on Phaeton himself, turned to his chariot, and were fixed for a long time yet on its sapphire-colored damask, which was warmed by the sunrays, and on those two splendid animals which, standing there in trained fixedness, seemed like bronze steeds of the sun before the gates of that money mart.
Kranitski, sitting on the garden bench, had grown rigid in the posture described above—his mouth awry, his eyes gleaming. So this is what has happened! In a few weeks after the death of the hapless Cara he is active and triumphant; he hurls his lariat on the golden calf and captures new millions. A demi-god! A Titan! The king of markets! He sweeps forward in seven-league boots over roads, at the crossing-points of which are Americans with milliards, they are millionnaires no longer, but masters of milliards. He is the man who, as Baron Emil said, knows how to will.
Still, how small he seemed and devoid of desire at the hour when he stood near the corpse of his daughter, joined with the silent smoke of the censer, which rose like light mist in the air. How petty he appeared at that juncture, crushed, as it were, by some giant hand—not a demi-god in any sense, or a Titan, but rather an insect, pushing into some narrow cranny to hide from a bird of prey. Kranitski had seen Darvid then, for, on hearing of the misfortune, no power on earth or in hell could have stopped him from running, from flying to the house where it had happened.
That misfortune had pierced his heart. And straightaway he felt, also, those inward and other pains which for some time had attacked him without pity and more frequently; but, in spite of his pains, he ran on without a thought that he had been forbidden that house, or a thought of what might meet him within it. He entered, and by well-known ways went directly to the chambers of the lady. Happen what might, he must see, in such a terrible moment, that woman, that saint, that mild and noble being. She was surrounded by many; there was a throng of people about her, but he did not see who they were, nor did he think what they might say of him. Before his eyes was a mist which veiled all things in front of him, save the face of that woman so dreadfully changed and grown old recently; that woman who no longer had the bright aureole of pale, golden hair above her forehead, but on that forehead and across the whole width of it was the dark furrow of a deep wrinkle. Without seeing, or greeting a person, he walked up to her directly, and, dropping on his knees, pressed to his lips the hem of her mourning garment. He did this without the trace of a plan, without forethought; he did it through an impulse which threw him at the feet of the woman. That action came from his heart, and from his heart only. For never was anyone like her, he thought. Many a time he had had fortune with women. In life he had been loved, and had loved in various fashions, but as he had loved her, never had he loved woman.
He did not remember; he was unconscious of what happened after that; but it seemed that Irene seized in her arms the loudly weeping lady; that Maryan was there also, and many other persons, who, going in and passing out with silent tread and low words, produced a sound something like the rustle of leaves when they are falling. In some corner of the chamber he sat down, or stood up, he cannot tell which, he only remembers that he was surrounded by the odor of alder-blossoms which filled the chamber, till, finally, he felt that it was late, that he had to go out just as had others. He could not be with that beloved being in her suffering; of all pains that was the most unendurable. But life contains sometimes such cruelties. Life at times is atrocious! He went once again to look at the "little one," he saw her, and with her the demi-god, in such a position that he thought: Here, too, is a man who is ended! At this point of meditation Kranitski rested his elbow on the arm of the bench, shaded his eyes with his palm, and placed before his imagination that wonderful sight which seemed a fable, a dream to him.
What luxury, what originality of thought and taste! What a mountain of gold was poured out there! The plan and the taste were seemingly Maryan's. The grand drawing-room had been turned into a grotto, which, from floor to ceiling, was covered with soft folds of white crape and muslin, meeting above in a gigantic rosette resembling the mystic four-leafed roses painted on Gothic church-windows, save that this one at which the wavy drapery met and hid walls and ceiling was as white and soft as if formed by the fantastic play of cloud substance. But everything in that chamber, the walls, the arch, the rosette, seemed made up of clouds and of snow, on which had fallen an immense rain of white flowers, white only. In garlands, woven together, or cast about without order by the movement of hands, they clung to the walls and the vault, covered the floor, were scattered over everything, were visible everywhere, and seemed to have fallen out of every place. Aside from them and among them, there was nothing but abundance of light; stars, bunches, columns were formed of lights, burning in branch-holders and candlesticks. It is unknown where they were invented, so uncommon were these holders and candlesticks, so fantastic. They were so peculiar in style that it would seem as if they had been brought from the dream-world of an excited fancy to the world of existence. There was no color, no tinsel, no emblem of death, nothing in that sea of snowy whiteness save an avalanche of snow-covered flowers and the dazzling gleam of burning tapers, with the odor of lilies-of-the-valley, roses, alder-blossoms, hyacinths, to which was added incense of some kind, as peculiar as was everything in that chamber. This incense, burning it was unknown in what place, sent hither and thither through the air, from time to time, small grayish cloudlets of smoke amid the gleam of the lights and tinged by the gold of them. In that chamber were virginity, with an atmosphere of mysticism, inventiveness unwilling to recognize the impossible—a chapter of magic, a strophe of a poem, and in it, as a central point for all else, was the slender form of Cara on a lofty place, fallen asleep calmly, arrayed as in a bridal robe, with her delicate face, which, in the pale, golden hair, with a shade of whiteness barely discernible, emerged from the flood of snowy crape and flowers. In that flood of snowy white, in that gleaming brilliance of the tapers, in that richness of intoxicating odors, in that atmosphere of haze moving from the burning censer, Cara was sleeping calmly, with the smooth arches of her dark brows below the Grecian outline of her forehead; on her closed lips was a smile which was almost gladsome.
It must have been late at night when Kranitski rose from his knees and found himself alone in that chamber. Outside the words and prayers of watchers were heard murmuring beyond the doors and the walls, but there the sleep of death seemed to reign alone. After a while, however, something rustled near one of the walls. Kranitski looked around and saw a man who seemed at first to be an undefined patch on the snowy background. After a few seconds he recognized Darvid's features in ruddy side-whiskers, but he strained his eyes rather long inquiring whether he was not mistaken. Neither sorrow nor despair, commonly roused by death in the living, but something still greater and beyond that was depicted in the look and the posture of Darvid. His eyes, usually so clear, so positive, so like glittering steel, had in them now an abyss of thought at the bottom of which terror was secreted, while the form of the man seemed shrunk and crushed down. Neither irony, nor energy, nor bold certainty of self was in it now. He looked smaller than usual, and in the manner of bending his head forward there was something of the vanquished. The soft folds at which he stood surrounded him in such a way that he seemed flattened and recalled definitely, like an insect in flight which was trying to push through a narrow crack to escape before something immense which was swooping down suddenly. He turned his eyes toward Kranitski, recognized the man, and casting an indifferent glance at him, gazed again in another direction at the enormous something. He had no feeling of hatred, or contempt, or offence. Kranitski on his part had none of those feelings either. He thought that various tales and dramas represent mortal enemies who, in moments like that, reach their hands to one another and are reconciled. Pathos is not truthful! It has no sufficient reason. What are men's quarrels or agreements in presence of—this? He looked a little longer at the maiden sleeping under the shower of white blossoms, and whispered: "Death! yes, yes! death! eternal sleep!" then, with drooping head, he went forth from that grotto, which was snow-white and gleaming with lights. He was so broken that he dragged himself out of it rather than walked.