The Project Gutenberg eBook ofThe DevilThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: The DevilAuthor: graf Leo TolstoyTranslator: Aylmer MaudeRelease date: January 22, 2022 [eBook #67224]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024Language: EnglishOriginal publication: United Kingdom: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1926Credits: Laura Natal Rodrigues (Images generously made available by Hathi Trust Digital Library.)*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL ***
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
Title: The DevilAuthor: graf Leo TolstoyTranslator: Aylmer MaudeRelease date: January 22, 2022 [eBook #67224]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024Language: EnglishOriginal publication: United Kingdom: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1926Credits: Laura Natal Rodrigues (Images generously made available by Hathi Trust Digital Library.)
Title: The Devil
Author: graf Leo TolstoyTranslator: Aylmer Maude
Author: graf Leo Tolstoy
Translator: Aylmer Maude
Release date: January 22, 2022 [eBook #67224]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024
Language: English
Original publication: United Kingdom: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1926
Credits: Laura Natal Rodrigues (Images generously made available by Hathi Trust Digital Library.)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL ***
But I say unto you, that every one that looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.And if thy right eye causeth thee to stumble, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body be cast into hell.And if thy right hand causeth thee to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body go into hell.MATTHEW V. 28, 29, 30.
But I say unto you, that every one that looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.
And if thy right eye causeth thee to stumble, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body be cast into hell.
And if thy right hand causeth thee to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body go into hell.
MATTHEW V. 28, 29, 30.
Dómna, a cook in Tolstoy's house.Leo Tolstóy, the author.Yásnaya Polyána, his estate.
Anna Prókhorova, a peasant woman.Ánnushka, a servant.Desyatína, a land measure, about 2·7 acres.Dúmchin, an ex-Marshal of the Nobility.Eugene Ivánich Irténev (Jénya), a landed-proprietor.Fëdor Zakhárich Pryánishnikov, a gentleman.Iván (Ványa), a clerk.Kabúshka, a mare.Kalériya Vladímirovna Esípova, a lady.Koltóvski, an estate.Liza Ánnenskaya, Eugene's wife.Mary Pávlovna Irtényeva, Eugene's mother.Matvéy, a peasant.Misha, a man-servant.Nicholas Lysúkh, a servant.Nikoláy Semënich, a doctor.Parásha, a servant.Samókhin, a labourer.Semënovskoe, a village.Sídor Péchnikov, a peasant.Stepanída Péchnikova, Sídor's wife.Tánya, a girl.Varára Alexéevna Ánnenskaya, Liza's mother.Vasíli Nikoláich, a steward.Vásin, a peasant.Yálta, a town in the Crimea.Zémstvo, a Local Government institution.Zenóvi, a peasant.
ë is pronounced asyo.
PREFACECHAPTERIIIIIIIVVVIVIIVIIIIXXXIXIIXIIIXIVXVXVIXVIIXVIIIXIXXXXXIVARIATION OF THE CONCLUSION OFTHE DEVIL
Towards the end of 1880, when he was fifty-two, Tolstoy one day approached the young tutor who lived in his house at Yasnaya Polyana, and in great agitation asked him to do him a service. The tutor, seeing Tolstoy so moved, asked what he could possibly do for him. In an unready voice Tolstoy replied: "Save me, I am falling!" The tutor, in alarm, inquired what was the matter, to which Tolstoy replied: "I am overcome by sexual desire and feel a complete lack of power to retrain myself. I am in danger of yielding to the temptation. Help me!"
"I am a weak man myself," replied the tutor. "How can I help you?"
"You can, if only you won't refuse!"
"But what must I do to help you?"
"This! Come with me on my daily walks. We will go out together and talk, and the temptation will not occur to me."
They set out together, and Tolstoy told the tutor how during his daily walks he had encountered Domna, a young woman of twenty-two who had recently been engaged as the servants' cook. This Domna was a tall, healthy, attractive young woman with a fine figure and beautiful complexion, though not otherwise particularly handsome. At first for some days he had found it pleasant to watch her. Then he had followed her and whittled to her. After that he had walked and talked with her, and at last had arranged a rendezvous with her. The spot was in a distant alley on the estate; to reach it from the house one had to pass the windows of the children's schoolroom. When setting out past those windows next day to keep the appointment, he had gone through a terrible struggle between the temptation and his conscience. Just then his second son had called to him through the window, reminding him of a Greek lesson that had been fixed for that day, and this had detained Tolstoy. He woke as it were, and was glad to have been saved from keeping the appointment. But the temptation still tormented him. He tried the effect of prayer, but it did not free him. He suffered but felt powerless and as if he might yield at any moment. So as a last resource he resolved to try the effect of making a full confession to someone—giving all particulars of the strength of the temptation that oppressed him and of his own weakness. He wished to feel as thoroughly ashamed of himself as possible, and he had decided to ask the tutor to accompany him on his daily walk, which usually he took alone. He also arranged that Domna should be removed to another place.
After the danger was over Tolstoy seldom referred to the incident unless to those who spoke to him of their own sexual difficulties, but on one occasion he wrote a full account of it to a friend.
The incident resulted in his writing this story,The Devil—the hero of which yields to a temptation such as that Tolstoy had encountered. It was composed some ten years later, but was not published during Tolstoy's lifetime; nor did it appear in the English edition of his posthumous works issued by Nelson & Sons. It is now translated into English for the first time. Tolstoy had vividly imagined the consequences that might have resulted from yielding to the temptation, and used that mental experience for his story, employing fictitious characters placed in surroundings with which he was familiar and such as those amid which the incident had occurred.
The relations of the sexes in Russian society of his day resembled that in English society to-day more than in English society of that period—when, both in literature and in life, repression and suppression of passion was more common. When inKreutzer Sonataand inThe Devilhe expressed the views he held, Tolstoy was consciously opposing the current of life around him, and these works also run counter to the movement of our own society to-day. That however does not detract from the value of the work. The belief that ill-results follow from the indulgence of the sexual instincts is not an obsolete eccentricity but a belief held by many men in many ages, and it receives sufficient confirmation from experience to make it certain that it is a view which has to be reckoned with.
The ancient conception of a bitter strife between the flesh and the spirit and of woman as the devil's chief agent in achieving man's spiritual destruction, is alien to the modern outlook, and to-day it is often not understood how and why men ever held such beliefs; but both inThe Kreutzer Sonataand in this story Tolstoy makes us realize how easily and naturally men of a certain temperament may come to those convictions. Without adopting that view one is enabled to realize what others have felt, and to perceive how probable is a reaction from the unrestraint of to-day; as happened after the libertinage of the Restoration period.
I do not think there is any other important story of Tolstoy's that has not yet been translated. He left several trunks full of manuscripts, chiefly early drafts of works that had been published during his lifetime or commencements of stories he abandoned; but before his death he expressed the opinion that, except some passages in his Diaries, there was little or nothing worth publishing among those remains. He was indeed a great artist, and his mastery showed itself in knowing what to strike out, omit, and withhold. His published writings are voluminous, but among them there is little (except perhaps some of the later repetitions of his non-resistance doctrine) that we could willingly spare. But if the mass of documents which while he lived he had the good sense to suppress are now to be published, together with a large amount of didactic correspondence, it is likely to injure rather than to enhance his literary reputation. There is a disquieting rumour that this is to take place, in the form of an edition of his works extending to one hundred volumes. Not even that calamity will depose him from the place he securely holds as the greatest and most influential of Russian writers, but it will be an obstacle rather than a help to those who want to become acquainted with the works on which he wished his reputation to rest. The present story is an exception. It is so characteristic of him, and so closely connected with an event that influenced him, that it would be a pity for it not to be known, especially as it is one of the few posthumous works he left in a completed state; even in this case we do not know which of the two endings he wrote he would have adopted had he published it himself.
The foot-notes are by the translator.
AYLMER MAUDE
GREAT BADDOW, CHELMSFORD
September12, 1925.
A brilliant career lay before Eugene Irtenev. He had all that was necessary for this: an admirable education at home, high honours when he graduated in law at Petersburg University, connections in the highest society through his recently deceased father, and he had himself already begun service in one of the Ministries under the protection of the Minister. He also had a fortune; even a large one, though insecure. His father had lived abroad and in Petersburg, allowing his sons, Eugene, and Andrew, the elder who was in the Horse Guards, 6,000 rubles a year each, while he himself and his wife spent a great deal. He only used to visit his estate for a couple of months in summer and did not concern himself with its direction, entrusting it all to an unscrupulous manager who also failed to attend to it, but in whom he had complete confidence.
After the father's death, when the brothers began to divide the property, there were found to be so many debts that their lawyer even advised them to refuse the inheritance and retain only an estate left them by their grand-mother, which was valued at 100,000 rubles. But a neighbouring landed-proprietor who had done business with old Irtenev, that is to say, who had promissory notes from him and had come to Petersburg on that account, said that in spite of the debts they could straighten out affairs so as to retain a large fortune—it would only be necessary to sell the forest and some outlying land, retaining the rich Semënov estate with 4,000 desyatinas of black-earth, the sugar-factory, and 200 desyatinas of water-meadows—if one devoted oneself to the management and, settling on the estate, farmed it wisely and economically.
And so, having visited the estate in spring (his father had died in Lent), Eugene looked into everything, resolved to retire from the Civil Service, settle in the country with his mother, and undertake the management, with the object of preserving the main estate. He arranged with his brother, with whom he was very friendly, that he would pay him 4,000 rubles a year, or alternatively would pay him 80,000 in a lump sum, while Andrew, on his part, handed over to him his share of the inheritance.
So he arranged matters and, having settled down with his mother in the big house, ardently and yet cautiously began managing the estate.
It is generally supposed that Conservatives are usually old people, and those in favour of change are the young. That is not quite correct. The most usual Conservatives are young people: those who want to live but who do not think, and have not time to think, about how to live and who therefore take as a model for themselves a way of life that they have seen.
Thus it was with Eugene. Having settled in the village, his aim and ideal was to restore the form of life that had existed, not in his father's time—his father had been a bad manager—but in his grandfather's. And now in the house, the garden, in the estate-management—of course with changes suited to the times—he tried to resurrect the general spirit of his grandfather's life—everything on a large scale—good order, method, and everybody satisfied; but so to arrange things entailed much work. It was necessary to meet the demands of the creditors and the banks, and for that purpose to sell some land and arrange renewals of credit. It was also necessary to get money to carry on (partly by farming out land, and partly by hiring labour) the immense operations on the Semënov estate, with its 400 desyatinas of ploughland and its sugar-factory, and to deal with the garden so that it should not seem to be neglected or in decay.
There was much work to do, but Eugene had plenty of strength—physical and mental. He was twenty-six, of medium height, strongly built, with muscles developed by gymnastics. He was full-blooded and very red over his whole neck, with bright teeth and lips and hair soft and curly, though not thick. His only physical defect was shortsightedness, which he had himself developed by using spectacles, so that he could not now do without a pince-nez, which had already formed a line at the top of his nose-ridge.
Such he was physically. For his spiritual portrait it might be said that the better anyone knew him the better they liked him. His mother had always loved him more than she loved anyone else; and now, after her husband's death, she concentrated on him not only her whole affection but her whole life. Nor was it only his mother who so loved him. All his comrades at the high-school and the university not merely liked him very much, but respected him. He had this effect on all who met him. It was impossible not to believe what he said, impossible to suspect any deception or falseness in one who had such an open, honest face and, in particular, such eyes.
In general his personality helped him much in his affairs. A creditor who would have refused another, trusted him. The clerk, the village Elder, or a peasant, who would have played a dirty trick and cheated someone else, forgot to deceive under the pleasant impression of intercourse with this kindly, agreeable, and above all candid man.
It was the end of May. Eugene had somehow managed, in town, to get the vacant land freed from the mortgage, so as to sell it to a merchant, and had borrowed money from that same merchant to replenish his stock, that is to say, to procure horses, bulls, carts and, chiefly, to begin to build a necessary farm-house. The matter had been arranged. The timber was being carted, the carpenters were already at work, and manure for the estate was being brought on eighty carts. But everything still hung by a thread.
Amid these cares something came about which, though unimportant, tormented Eugene at the time. As a young man he had lived as all healthy young men live, that is, he had had relations with women of various kinds. He was not a libertine but, as he himself said, neither was he a monk. He only turned to this, however, in so far as was necessary for physical health and to have his mind free, as he used to say. This had begun when he was sixteen and had gone on satisfactorily. Satisfactorily in the sense that he did not give himself up to debauchery, was not once infatuated, and had never contracted a disease. At first he had a seamstress in Petersburg, then she got spoilt and he made other arrangements, and that side of his affairs was so well secured that it did not trouble him.
But now he was living in the country for the second month and did not at all know what he was to do. Compulsory self-restraint was beginning to have a bad effect on him.
Must he really go to town for that purpose? And where to? How? That was the only thing that disturbed Eugene Ivanich, but as he was convinced that the thing was necessary and that he needed it, it really became necessary, and he felt that he was not free and that involuntarily his eyes followed every young woman.
He did not approve of having relations with a married woman or a maid in his own village. He knew by report that both his father and grandfather had been quite different in this matter from other land-owners of that time. At home they had never had any entanglements with peasant-women, and he had decided that he would not do so either; but afterwards, feeling himself ever more and more under compulsion, and imagining with horror what might happen to him in the neighbouring country town, and reflecting on the fact that the days of serfdom were now over, he decided that it might be done on the spot. Only it must be done so that no one should know of it, and not for the sake of debauchery but merely for health's sake—as he said to himself. And when he had decided this he became still more restless. When talking to the village Elder, the peasants, or the carpenters, he involuntarily brought the conversation round to women, and when it turned to women, he kept it on that theme. He noticed the women more and more.
To settle the matter in his own mind was one thing, but to carry it out was another. To approach a woman himself was impossible. Which one? Where? It must be done through someone else, but to whom should he speak about it?
He happened to go into a watchman's hut in the forest to get a drink of water. The watchman had been his father's huntsman. Eugene Ivanich chatted with him, and the watchman began telling some strange tales of hunting sprees. It occurred to Eugene Ivanich that it would be convenient to arrange matters in this hut, or in the wood. Only he did not know how to manage it, and whether old Daniel would undertake the arrangement. "Perhaps he will be horrified at such a proposal; and I shall have disgraced myself, but perhaps he would agree to it quite simply." So he thought while listening to Daniel's stories. Daniel was telling how once when they had been stopping at the hut of the sexton's wife in an outlying field, he had brought a woman for Fëdor Zakharich Pryanishnikov.
"It will be all right," thought Eugene.
"Your father, may the kingdom of heaven be his, did not go in for nonsense of that kind."
"It won't do," thought Eugene. But to test the matter he said: "How was it you engaged on such bad things?"
"But what is there bad in it? She was glad of it, and Fëdor Zakharich was satisfied, very satisfied. I got a ruble. Why, what was he to do? He too is a lively limb, apparently, and drinks wine."
"Yes, I may speak," thought Eugene, and at once proceeded to do so.
"And, do you know, Daniel, I don't know how to endure it,"—he felt himself going scarlet.
Daniel smiled.
"I am not a monk,—I have been accustomed to it."
He felt that what he was saying was stupid, but was glad to see that Daniel approved.
"Why of course, you should have told me long ago. It can all be arranged," said he: "Only tell me which one you want."
"Oh, it is really all the same to me. Of course not an ugly one, and she must be healthy."
"I understand!" said Daniel briefly. He reflected.
"Ah! There is a tasty morsel," he began. Again Eugene went red. "A tasty morsel. See here, she was married last autumn." Daniel whispered,—"and he hasn't been able to do anything. Think what that is worth to one who wants it!"
Eugene even frowned with shame.
"No, no," he said. "I don't want that at all. I want, on the contrary (what could the contrary be?), on the contrary I only want that she should be healthy and that there should be as little fuss as possible—a woman whose husband is away in the army, or something of that kind."
"I know. It's Stepanida I must bring you. Her husband is away in town, just the same as a soldier. And she is a fine woman, and clean. You will be satisfied. As it is I was saying to her the other day—you should go, but she . . ."
"Well then, when is it to be?"
"To-morrow if you like. I shall be going to get some tobacco and I will call in, and at the dinner-hour come here, or to the bath-house behind the kitchen garden. There will be nobody about. Besides after dinner everybody takes a nap."
"All right, then."
A terrible excitement seized Eugene as he rode home. "What will happen? What is a peasant woman like? Suppose it turns out that she is hideous, horrible. No, she is handsome," he told himself, remembering some he had been noticing. "But what shall I say? What shall I do?"
He was not himself all that day. Next day at noon he went to the forester's hut. Daniel stood at the door and silently and significantly nodded towards the wood. The blood rushed to Eugene's heart, he was conscious of it and went to the kitchen-garden. No one was there. He went to the bath-house—there was no one about, he looked in, came out, and suddenly heard the crackling of a breaking twig. He looked round—and she was standing in the thicket beyond the little ravine. He rushed there across the ravine. There were nettles in it which he had not noticed. They stung him and, losing the pince-nez from his nose, he ran up the slope on the farther side. In a white embroidered apron, in a red-brown skirt and a bright red kerchief, barefoot, fresh, firm, and handsome, she stood shyly smiling.
"There is a path leading round,—you should have gone round," she said. "I came long ago, ever so long."
He went up to her and, looking her over, touched her.
A quarter of an hour later they separated; he found his pince-nez, called in to see Daniel, and in reply to his question: "Are you satisfied, master?" gave him a ruble and went home.
He was satisfied. Only at first had he felt ashamed, then it had passed off. And it had all gone well. The best thing was that he now felt at ease, tranquil and vigorous. As for her, he had not even seen her thoroughly. He remembered that she was clean, fresh, not bad-looking, and simple, without any pretence. "Whose wife is she?" said he to himself. "Pechnikov's, Daniel said. What Pechnikov is that? There are two households of that name. Probably she is old Michael's daughter-in-law. Yes, that must be it. His son does live in Moscow. I'll ask Daniel about it some time."
From then onward that previously important drawback to country life—enforced self-restraint—was eliminated. Eugene's freedom of mind was no longer disturbed and he was able to attend freely to his affairs.
And the matter Eugene had undertaken was far from easy: it sometimes seemed to him that he would not be able to go through with it, and that it would end in his having to sell the estate after all, so that all his efforts would be wasted and it would turn out that he had failed, and been unable to accomplish what he had undertaken. That prospect disturbed him most of all. Before he had time to stop up one hole a new one would unexpectedly show itself.
All this time more and more debts of his father's, which he had not expected, came to light. It was evident that his father had latterly borrowed right and left. At the time of the settlement in May, Eugene had thought he at last knew everything, but suddenly, in the middle of the summer, he received a letter from which it appeared that there was still a debt of 12,000 rubles to the widow Esipova. There was no promissory note, but only an ordinary receipt, which his lawyer told him could be disputed. But it did not enter Eugene's head to refuse to pay a debt of his father's merely because the document could be challenged. He only wanted to know for certain whether there had been such a debt.
"Mamma! Who is Kaleriya Vladimirovna Esipova?" he asked his mother, when they met as usual for dinner.
"Esipova? She was brought up by your grandfather. Why?"
Eugene told his mother about the letter.
"I wonder she is not ashamed to ask for it. Your father gave her so much!"
"But do we owe her this?"
"Well now, how shall I say? It is not a debt. Papa, out of his unbounded kindness . . ."
"Yes, but did Papa consider it a debt?"
"I cannot say. I don't know. I only know it is hard enough for you without that."
Eugene saw that Mary Pavlovna did not know what to say, and was as it were sounding him.
"I see from what you say, that it must be paid," said the son. "I will go to see her to-morrow and have a chat, and see if it cannot be deferred."
"Ah, how sorry I am for you, but, you know, that will be best. Tell her she must wait," said Mary Pavlovna, evidently tranquillized and proud of her son's decision.
Eugene's position was particularly hard because his mother, who was living with him, did not at all realize his position. She had been so accustomed all her life long to live extravagantly that she could not even imagine to herself the position her son was in, that is to say, that to-day or to-morrow matters might shape themselves so that they would have nothing left, and he would have to sell everything, and live and support his mother on what salary he could earn, which at the very most would be 2,000 rubles. She did not understand that they could only save themselves from that position by cutting down expense in everything, and so she could not understand why Eugene was so careful about trifles, in expenditure on gardeners, coachmen, servants—even on food. Also, like most widows, she nourished feelings of devotion to the memory of her departed spouse quite different from those she had felt for him while he lived, and she did not admit the thought that what the departed had done, or had arranged, could be wrong or could be altered.
Eugene by great efforts managed to keep up the garden and the conservatory with two gardeners, and the stables with two coachmen. And Mary Pavlovna naïvely thought that she was sacrificing herself for her son and doing all a mother could do, by not complaining of the food which the old man-cook prepared, of the fact that the paths in the park were not all swept clean, and that instead of footmen they had only a boy.
So, too, concerning this new debt, in which Eugene saw an almost crushing blow to all his undertakings, Mary Pavlovna only saw an incident displaying Eugene's noble nature.
Mary Pavlovna moreover did not feel much anxiety about Eugene's position, because she was confident that he would make a brilliant marriage which would put everything right. And he could make a very brilliant marriage: she knew a dozen families who would be glad to give their daughters to him. And she wished to arrange the matter as soon as possible.
Eugene himself dreamt of marriage, but not in the same way as his mother. The idea of using marriage as a means of putting his affairs in order was repulsive to him. He wished to marry honourably, for love. He observed the girls whom he met and those he knew, and compared himself with them, but no decision had yet been taken. Meanwhile contrary to his expectations his relations with Stepanida continued, and even acquired the character of a settled affair. Eugene was so far from debauchery, it was so hard for him secretly to do this thing which he felt to be bad, that he could not arrange these meetings himself, and even after the first one hoped not to see Stepanida again; but it turned out that after some time the same restlessness (due, he believed, to that cause) again overcame him. And his restlessness this time was no longer impersonal, but suggested just those same bright, black eyes, and that deep voice, saying, "ever so long," that same scent of something fresh and strong, and that same full bread lifting the bib of her apron, and all this in that hazel and maple thicket, bathed in bright sunlight.
Though he felt ashamed, he again approached Daniel. And again a rendezvous was fixed for midday, in the wood. This time Eugene looked her over more carefully, and everything about her seemed attractive. He tried talking to her, and asked about her husband. He really was Michael's son, and lived as a coachman in Moscow.
"Well, then, how is it you . . ." Eugene wanted to ask how it was she was untrue to him.
"What about 'how is it'?" asked she. Evidently she was clever and quick-witted.
"Well, how is it you come to me?"
"There now," said she merrily. "I bet he goes on the spree there. Why shouldn't I?"
Evidently she was putting on an air of sauciness and assurance. And this seemed charming to Eugene. But all the same he did not himself fix a rendezvous with her. Even when she proposed that they should meet without the aid of Daniel, to whom she seemed not very well-disposed, Eugene did not consent. He hoped that this meeting would be the last. He liked her. He thought such intercourse was necessary for him and that there was nothing bad about it, but in the depth of his soul there was a stricter judge, who did not approve of it and hoped that this would be the last time, or if he did not hope that, at any rate did not wish to participate in arrangements to repeat it another time.
So the whole summer passed, during which they met a dozen times and always by Daniel's help. It happened once that she could not be there because her husband had come home, and Daniel proposed another woman, but Eugene refused with disgust. Then the husband went away, and the meetings continued as before, at first through Daniel, but afterwards he simply fixed the time and she came with another woman, Prokhorova—as it would not do for a peasant-woman to go about alone.
Once at the very time fixed for the rendezvous a family came to call on Mary Pavlovna, with the very girl she wished Eugene to marry, and it was impossible for Eugene to get away. As soon as he could do so, he went out as though to the thrashing-floor, and round by the path to their meeting-place in the wood. She was not there, but at the accustomed spot everything within reach of one's hand had been broken—the black alder, the hazel-twigs, and even a young maple the thickness of a stake. She had waited, had become excited and angry, and had skittishly left him a remembrance. He waited, waited, and went to Daniel to ask him to call her for to-morrow. She came, and was just as usual.
So the summer passed. The meetings were always arranged in the wood, and only once, when it grew towards autumn, in the shed that stood in her back-yard.
It did not enter Eugene's head that these relations of his had any importance for him. About her he did not even think. He gave her money and nothing more. At first he did not know and did not think that the affair was known and she was envied throughout the village, or that her relations took money from her and encouraged her, and that her conception of any sin in the matter had been quite obliterated by the influence of the money and her family's approval. It seemed to her that if people envied her, then what she was doing was good.
"It is simply necessary for one's health," thought Eugene. "I grant it is not right, and though no one says anything, everybody, or many people, know of it. The woman who comes with her knows. And once she knows, she is sure to have told others. But what's to be done? I am acting badly," thought Eugene, "but what's one to do? Anyhow it is not for long."
What chiefly disturbed Eugene was the thought of the husband. At first, for some reason, it seemed to him that the husband must be a poor sort, and this, as it were, partly justified his conduct. But he saw the husband and was struck: he was a fine fellow and smartly dressed, in no way a worse man, but surely better, than himself. At their next meeting he told her he had seen her husband and had been surprised to see that he was such a fine fellow.
"There's not such another in the village," said she proudly.
This surprised Eugene. The thought of the husband tormented him still more after that. He happened to be at Daniel's one day and Daniel, having begun chatting, plainly said to him:
"And Michael, the other day, asked me: 'Is it true that the master is living with my wife?' I said I did not know. Anyway, I said, better with the master than with a peasant."
"Well, and what did he say?"
"He said,—'Wait a bit. I'll get to know, and I'll give it her all the same.'"
"Yes, if the husband returned to live here, I would give her up," thought Eugene.
But the husband lived in town and for the present their intercourse continued.
"When necessary, I will break it off, and there will be nothing left of it," thought he.
And this seemed to him certain, especially as during the whole summer many different things occupied him very fully: the erection of the new farm-house, and the harvest, and building, and above all meeting the debts and selling the waste land. All these were affairs that completely absorbed him and on which he spent his thoughts when he lay down and when he rose. All that was, real life. His intercourse—he did not even call it connection—with Stepanida was something quite unnoticed. It is true that when the wish to see her arose, it came with such strength that he could think of nothing else. But this did not last long. A meeting was arranged, and he again forgot her for a week or even for a month.
In autumn Eugene often rode to town, and there became friendly with the Annenskis. They had a daughter who had just finished the Institute.[1]And then, to Mary Pavlovna's great grief, it happened that Eugene, as she expressed it, "cheapened himself,"—by falling in love with Liza Annenskaya and proposing to her.
From that time the relations with Stepanida ceased.
[1]The Institute was a boarding-school for the daughters of the nobility and gentry, in which great attention was paid to the manners and accomplishments of the pupils.
[1]The Institute was a boarding-school for the daughters of the nobility and gentry, in which great attention was paid to the manners and accomplishments of the pupils.
It is impossible to explain why Eugene chose Liza Annenskaya, as it is never possible to explain why a man chooses this and not that woman. There were many reasons—positive and negative. One reason was that she was not a very rich heiress such as his mother sought for him, another that she was naïve and to be pitied in her relations with her mother, then there was the fact that she was not a beauty who attracted general attention to herself, but yet was not bad looking. The chief reason was that his acquaintance with her began at the time when Eugene was ripe for marriage. He fell in love because he knew that he would marry.
Liza Annenskaya was at first merely pleasing to Eugene, but when he decided to make her his wife, his feelings for her became much stronger. He felt that he was in love.
Liza was tall, slender, and long. Everything about her was long; her face, and her nose—not prominently but downwards—and her fingers, and her feet. The colour of her face was very delicate, yellowish white and delicately pink; her hair was long, light brown, soft, curly, and she had beautiful, clear, mild, confiding eyes. Those eyes especially struck Eugene. And when he thought of Liza he always saw those clear, mild, confiding eyes.
Such was she physically; spiritually he knew nothing of her, but only saw those eyes. And those eyes seemed to tell him all he needed to know. The meaning of those eyes was this:
While still in the Institute, when she was fifteen, Liza used continually to fall in love with all attractive men and was animated and happy only when she was in love. After leaving the Institute she continued to fall in love, in just the same way, with all the young men she met, and of course fell in love with Eugene as soon as she made his acquaintance. It was this being in love which gave her eyes that particular expression which so captivated Eugene. Already that winter she had been, at one and the same time, in love with two young men, and blushed and became excited not only when they entered the room but whenever their names were mentioned. But afterwards, when her mother hinted to her that Irtenev seemed to have serious intentions, her love for him increased so that she became almost indifferent to the two previous attractions, and when Irtenev began to come to their balls and parties, and danced with her more than with others and evidently only wished to know whether she loved him, her love for him became painful. She dreamed of him in her sleep and seemed to see him when she was awake in a dark room, and everyone else vanished from her mind. But when he proposed and they were formally engaged, and when they had kissed one another and were a betrothed couple, then she had no thoughts but of him, no desire but to be with him, to love him, and to be loved by him. She was also proud of him and felt emotional about him and herself and her love, and quite melted and felt faint from love of him.
The more he got to know her the more he loved her. He had not at all expected to find such love, and it strengthened his own feeling still more.
Towards spring he went to his estate at Semënovskoe to have a look at it and to give directions about the management, and especially about the house which was being done up for his wedding.
Mary Pavlovna was dissatisfied with her son's choice, not only because the match was not as brilliant as it might have been, but also because she did not like Varvara Alexeevna, his future mother-in-law. Whether she was good-natured or not she did not know and could not decide, but that she was not well-bred, notcomme il faut, "not a lady" as Mary Pavlovna said to herself,—she saw from their first acquaintance, and this distressed her; distressed her because she was accustomed to value breeding and knew that Eugene was sensitive to it, and she foresaw that he would suffer much annoyance on this account. But she liked the girl. Liked her chiefly because Eugene did. One could not help loving her. And Mary Pavlovna was quite sincerely ready to do so.
Eugene found his mother contented and in good spirits. She was getting everything straight in the house and preparing to go away herself as soon as he brought his young wife. Eugene persuaded her to stay for the time being, and the future remained undecided.
In the evening after tea Mary Pavlovna played patience as usual. Eugene sat by, helping her. This was the hour of their most intimate talks. Having finished one game of patience and while preparing to begin another, Mary Pavlovna looked up at Eugene and, with a little hesitation, began thus:
"I wanted to tell you, Jenya,—of course I do not know, but in general I wanted to suggest to you that before your wedding it is absolutely necessary to have finished with all your bachelor affairs, so that nothing may disturb either you or your wife. God forbid that it should. You understand me?"
And indeed Eugene at once understood that Mary Pavlovna was hinting at his relations with Stepanida which had ended in the previous autumn; and that she attributed much more importance to those relations than they deserved, as single women always do. Eugene blushed, and not from shame so much as from vexation that good-natured Mary Pavlovna was bothering—out of affection no doubt—but still was bothering about matters that were not her business and that she did not and could not understand. He answered that he had nothing that needed concealment, and that he had always conducted himself so that there should be nothing to hinder his marrying.
"Well, dear, that is excellent. Only, Jenya, don't be vexed with me," said Mary Pavlovna, in confusion.
But Eugene saw that she had not finished and had not said what she wanted to. So it appeared when a little later she began to tell him of how, in his absence, she had been asked to stand godmother at . . . the Pechnikovs.
Eugene flushed now, not with vexation or shame, but with some strange consciousness of the importance of what was about to be told him—an involuntary consciousness quite at variance with his conclusions. And what he expected happened. Mary Pavlovna, as if merely by way of conversation, mentioned that this year only boys were being born,—evidently a sign of a coming war. Both at the Vasins and the Pechnikovs the young wife had a first child—at each house a boy. Mary Pavlovna wanted to say this casually, but she herself felt ashamed when she saw the colour mount to her son's face and saw him nervously removing, tapping, and replacing his pince-nez and hurriedly lighting a cigarette. She became silent. He too was silent and could not think how to break that silence. So they both understood that they had understood one another.
"Yes, the chief thing is that there should be justice and no favouritism in the village,—as under your grandfather."
"Mamma,"—said Eugene suddenly,—"I know why you are saying this. You have no need to be disturbed. My future family-life is so sacred to me that I should not infringe it in any case. And as to what occurred in my bachelor days, that is quite ended. I never formed any union and no one has any claims on me."
"Well, I am glad," said his mother. "I know how noble your feelings are."
Eugene accepted his mother's words as a tribute due to him, and did not reply.
Next day he drove to town thinking of his fiancée and of anything in the world except of Stepanida. But, as if purposely to remind him, on approaching the church he met people walking and driving back from it. He met old Matvey with Simon, some lads and girls, and then two women, one elderly, the other smartly dressed with a bright red kerchief, who seemed familiar. The woman was walking lightly, boldly, carrying a child in her arms. He came up to them, the elder woman bowed, stopping in the old-fashioned way, but the young woman with the child only bent her head, and from under the kerchief gleamed familiar, merry, smiling eyes.
Yes, this was she, but all was over and it was no use looking at her: "and the child may be mine," flashed through his mind. No, what nonsense! There was her husband, she used to see him. He did not even consider the matter further, so settled in his mind was it that it had been necessary for his health,—he had paid her money and there was no more to be said; there was, there had been, and there could be, no question of any union between them. It was not that he stifled the voice of conscience, no—his conscience simply said nothing to him. And he thought no more about her after the conversation with his mother and after this meeting. Nor did he meet her again.
Eugene was married in town the week after Easter, and left at once with his young wife for his country estate. The house had been arranged as usual for a young couple. Mary Pavlovna wished to leave, but Eugene and still more strongly Liza begged her to remain, and she only moved into a detached wing of the house.
And so a new life began for Eugene.
The first year of his marriage was a hard one for Eugene. It was hard because affairs he had managed to put off during the time of his courtship now, after his marriage, all came upon him at once.
To escape from debts was impossible. An outlying part of the estate was sold and the most pressing obligations met, but others remained, and he had no money. The estate yielded a good revenue, but he had had to send payments to his brother, and to spend on his own marriage, so that there was no ready money and the factory could not carry on and would have to be closed down. The only way of escape was to use his wife's money. Liza, having realized her husband's position, insisted on this herself. Eugene agreed, but only on condition that he should give her a mortgage on half his estate; and this he did. Of course it was not for the sake of his wife, who felt offended at it, but to appease his mother-in-law.
These affairs, with various fluctuations of success and failure, helped to poison Eugene's life that first year. Another thing was his wife's ill-health. That same first year, seven months after their marriage, in autumn, a misfortune befell Liza. She drove out to meet her husband who was returning from town; the quiet horse became rather playful, and she was frightened and jumped out. Her jump was comparatively fortunate—she might have been caught by the wheel—but she was pregnant, and that same night the pains began and she had a miscarriage from which she was long in recovering. The loss of the expected child and his wife's illness, together with the disorder in his affairs, and above all the presence of his mother-in-law, who arrived as soon as Liza fell ill—all this together made the year still harder for Eugene.
But notwithstanding these difficult circumstances, towards the end of the first year Eugene felt very well. First of all his cherished hope of restoring his fallen fortune and renewing his grandfather's way of life in a new form, was approaching accomplishment, though slowly and with difficulty. There was no longer any question of having to sell the whole estate to meet the debts. The chief estate, though transferred to his wife's name, was saved, and if only the beet crop succeeded and the price kept up, by next year his position of want and stress might be replaced by one of complete prosperity. That was one thing.
Another was that however much he had expected from his wife, he had never expected to find in her what he actually found. It was not what he had expected, but it was much better. Emotion, raptures of love—though he tried to produce them—did not take place or were very slight, but something quite different appeared, namely, that he was not merely more cheerful and happier but that it became easier to live. He did not know why this should be so, but it was.
It happened because immediately after the marriage she decided that Eugene Irtenev was superior to, wiser, purer, and nobler than, anyone else in the world, and therefore it was right for everyone to serve him and do what would please him; but as it was impossible to make everyone do this, she to the limit of her strength must do it herself. So she did; and therefore all her strength of mind was directed towards learning and guessing what he liked, and then doing just that, whatever it was and however difficult it might be.
She had the gift which furnishes the chief delight of intercourse with a loving woman; thanks to her love of her husband she penetrated into his soul. She knew—better it seemed to him than he himself—his every state, and every shade of his feeling, and she behaved correspondingly, and therefore never hurt his feelings, but always lessened his distresses and strengthened his joys. And she understood not only his feelings but also his joys. Things quite foreign to her—concerning the farming, the factory, or the appraisement of others, she immediately understood so that she could not merely converse with him, but could often, as he himself said, be a useful and irreplaceable counsellor. She regarded affairs and people, and everything in the world, only through his eyes. She loved her mother, but having seen that Eugene disliked his mother-in-law's interference in their life she immediately took her husband's side, and did so with such decision that he had to restrain her.
Besides all this she had very much taste, tact, and above all, peacefulness. All that she did, she did unnoticed; only the results of what she did were observable, namely, that always and in everything there was cleanliness, order, and elegance. Liza had at once understood in what her husband's ideal of life consisted, and she tried to attain, and in the arrangement and order of the house did attain, what he wanted. Children, it is true, were lacking, but there was hope of this also. In winter she went to Petersburg to see a specialist, and he assured them that she was quite well and could have children.
And this desire was accomplished. By the end of the year she was again pregnant.
The one thing that threatened, not to say poisoned, their happiness was her jealousy; a jealousy she restrained and did not exhibit, but from which she often suffered. Not only might Eugene not love anyone—because there was not a woman on earth worthy of him (as to whether she herself was worthy or not, she never asked herself),—but not a single woman might, therefore, dare to love him.
They lived thus: he rose, as he always had done, early, and went to see to the farm or the factory, where work was going on, or sometimes to the fields. Towards ten o'clock he would come back to his coffee: they had it on the verandah, Mary Pavlovna, an uncle who lived with them, and Liza. After a conversation which was often very animated while they drank their coffee, they dispersed till dinner-time. At two o'clock they dined and then went for a walk, or a drive. In the evening when he returned from his office they drank their evening tea, and sometimes he read aloud while she worked, or when there were guests they had music or talked. When he went away on business he wrote to his wife, and received letters from her, every day. Sometimes she accompanied him, and then they were particularly merry. On his name-day and on hers guests assembled, and it was pleasant to him to see how well she managed to arrange things so that it was pleasant for everybody. He saw, and heard also, that they all admired her, the young, agreeable hostess, and he loved her still more for this.
All went excellently. She bore her pregnancy easily, and though they were afraid, they both began making plans as to how they would bring the child up. The system of education and the arrangements were all decided by Eugene, and her only wish was obediently to carry out his desires. Eugene on his part read up medical works, and intended to bring the child up according to all the precepts of science. She, of course, agreed to everything and made preparations, making warm and also cool "envelopes,"[2]and preparing a cradle. Thus the second year of their marriage arrived, and the second spring.