[1]Simon Yakovlevitch Nadson (1862-86), a poet of considerable merit, who was popular in spite of his monotony and melancholy.
[1]Simon Yakovlevitch Nadson (1862-86), a poet of considerable merit, who was popular in spite of his monotony and melancholy.
[2]This word in Russian is "poloskatsya" and is a pun on "laskatsya," which is to caress.
[2]This word in Russian is "poloskatsya" and is a pun on "laskatsya," which is to caress.
[3]The original word is "chastushka," which is a town song put to the tune of an old folk-song. This is a recent development of town life in Russia.
[3]The original word is "chastushka," which is a town song put to the tune of an old folk-song. This is a recent development of town life in Russia.
[4]"Bossiak" is literally "bare-foot," a vagabond. The "bossiak" has become quite a marked type in Russia since Gorky took to writing of him. The bossiak is often referred to in a satiric way in modern Russian literature.
[4]"Bossiak" is literally "bare-foot," a vagabond. The "bossiak" has become quite a marked type in Russia since Gorky took to writing of him. The bossiak is often referred to in a satiric way in modern Russian literature.
Volodin went punctually to the Adamenkos to give his lessons. His hopes that the young woman would invite him to take coffee were not realised. Each time he came he was taken straight to the little shanty used for carpentry. Misha usually stood in his linen apron at the joiner's bench, having got ready what was necessary for the lesson. He did obediently but unwillingly all that Volodin told him to do. In order to work less, Misha tried to drag Volodin into conversation, but Volodin wished to work conscientiously and refused to comply.
"Mishenka," he would say, "you had better do your work for a couple of hours and then, if you like, we can have a talk. Then as much as you like, but now not a bit—business before everything."
Misha sighed lightly and went on with his work, but at the end of the lesson he had no desire to talk: he said he had no time and that he had much home work to do.
Sometimes Nadezhda came to the lesson to see how Misha was getting along. Misha noticed—and made use of the fact—that in her presence Volodin could much more easily be lured into conversation. When Nadezhda saw that Misha was not working she immediately said to him:
"Misha, don't be lazy!"
And when she left she said to Volodin:
"I'm sorry that I've interrupted. If you give him a little leeway he gets very lazy."
At the beginning Volodin was mortified by Nadezhda's behaviour; then he thought that she hesitated to ask him to take coffee in case there should be gossip. Then he thought that she need not have come to look on at the lessons at all and yet she came—was it because she liked to see him? So Volodin reasoned to his advantage from the fact that Nadezhda from the very first had eagerly agreed that he should give lessons and had not stopped to bargain. He was encouraged in these suppositions by Peredonov and Varvara.
"It is clear that she's in love with you," said Peredonov.
"And what better fiancé could she have?" added Varvara.
Volodin tried to look modest and felt pleased with his prospects.
Once Peredonov said to him:
"You're a fiancé and yet you wear that shabby tie!"
"I'm not her fiancé yet, Ardasha," said Volodin soberly, nevertheless trembling with pleasure. "But I can easily get a new tie."
"Buy yourself one with a pattern in it," advised Peredonov. "So that it will be clear that love is burning within you."
"Better get a red one," said Varvara, "and the fancier the better. And a tie-pin. You can buy a tie-pin cheaply and with a stone too—it will be quitechic."
Peredonov thought that possibly Volodin had not enough money. Or he might think of economising and buy a simple black one. And that would be fatal, thought Peredonov: Adamenko is a fashionable girl and if he should come to propose to her in any kind of a tie she might be offended and reject him. Peredonov said:
"Only don't buy a cheap one. Pavloushka, you've won from me enough money to pay for a tie. How much do I owe you? I think it's one rouble forty kopecks, isn't it?"
"You're quite right about the forty kopecks," said Volodin with a wry smile, "only it's not one rouble but two."
Peredonov knew himself that it was two roubles, but it was more pleasant to pay only one. He said:
"You're a liar! What two roubles?"
"Varvara Dmitrievna's my witness," said Volodin.
"You'd better pay, Ardalyon Borisitch," said Varvara, "since you lost—and I remember that it was two forty."
Peredonov thought that as Varvara was interceding for Volodin, that meant that she was going over to his side. He frowned, produced the money from his purse and said:
"All right, let it be two forty—it won't ruin me. You're a poor man, Pavloushka. Well, here it is."
Volodin took the money, counted it, then assumed an offended expression and bent down his thick forehead, stuck out his lower lip and said in a bleating, cracked voice:
"Ardalyon Borisitch, you happen to be in debt to me and therefore you've got to pay, and that I happen to be poor has nothing to do with the matter. I haven't yet come down to begging my bread off anyone, and as you know the only poor devil is the one that hasn't any bread to eat, and as I eat bread, and butter with it, that means I'm not poor."
And he became mollified and at the same time blushed with joy to think that he had answered so cleverly, and twisted his lips into a smile.
At last Peredonov and Volodin decided to go and fix up the match. They arranged themselves very elaborately and they had a solemn and more than usually stupid look. Peredonov put on a white stock. Volodin a vivid red tie with green stripes. Peredonov argued thus:
"As I am to do the match-making, mine is a sober role. I must live up to it. So I must wear a white tie, and you, the lover, should show your flaming feelings."
With intense solemnity Peredonov and Volodin seated themselves in the Adamenkos' drawing-room. Peredonov sat on a sofa and Volodin in an arm-chair. Nadezhda looked at her visitors in astonishment. The visitors talked about the weather and various bits of news, with the look of people who had come upon a delicate affair and did not know how to approach it. At last Peredonov coughed, frowned and began:
"Nadezhda Vassilyevna, we've come on business."
"On business," said Volodin, making a significant face; and he protruded his lips.
"It's about him," said Peredonov, and pointed at Volodin with his forefinger.
"It's about me," echoed Volodin, and pointed his own forefinger at his breast.
Nadezhda smiled.
"Please go on," she said.
"I'm going to speak for him," said Peredonov. "He's bashful, he can't make up his mind to do it himself. He's a worthy, non-drinking, good man. He does not earn much, but that's nothing. Everyone needs a different thing—one needs money, another needs a man. Well, why don't you say something?" He turned to Volodin, "Say something!"
Volodin lowered his head and spoke in a trembling voice, like a bleating ram:
"It's true I don't earn high wages. But I shall always have my crumb of bread. It's true that I didn't go to a university, but I live as may God grant everyone to do. But I don't know anything against myself—and besides, let everyone judge for himself. But I, well, I'm satisfied with myself."
He spread out his arms, lowered his forehead as if he were about to butt and grew silent.
"And so, as you see," said Peredonov, "he's a young man. And he shouldn't live like this. He ought to marry. In any case the married man is always better off."
"And if his wife suits him, what can be better?" added Volodin.
"And you," continued Peredonov, "are a girl. You also ought to marry."
From behind the door there came a slight rustle, abrupt smothered sounds, as though someone were breathing or laughing with a closed mouth. Nadezhda looked sternly in the direction of the door and said coldly:
"You are too concerned about me," with an annoying emphasis on the word "too."
"You don't want a rich husband," said Peredonov, "you're rich yourself. You need someone to love you and gratify you in everything. And you know him, you could understand him. He's not indifferent to you and perhaps you're not indifferent to him either. So you see I have the merchant and you have the goods. That is, you are the goods yourself."
Nadezhda blushed and bit her lip to keep from laughing. The same sounds continued behind the door. Volodin bashfully lowered his eyes. It seemed to him that his affair was going well.
"What goods?" asked Nadezhda cautiously. "Pardon me, I don't understand."
"What do you mean, 'you don't understand'?" asked Peredonov incredulously. "Well, I'll tell you straight. Pavel Vassilyevitch has come to ask for your hand and heart. I ask on his behalf."
Behind the door something fell to the floor and rolled and snorted and panted. Nadezhda, growing red with suppressed laughter, looked at her visitors. Volodin's proposal seemed to her a ridiculous impertinence.
"Yes," said Volodin, "Nadezhda Vassilyevna, I've come to ask for your hand and heart."
He grew red and rose from his chair—his foot awkwardly rumpled the carpet—bowed and quickly sat down again. Then he got up again, put his hand on his heart and said as he looked tenderly at the girl:
"Nadezhda Vassilyevna, permit me to say a few words! As I have loved you for some time you surely will not say 'no' to me?"
He threw himself forward and let himself down on one knee before Nadezhda and kissed her hand.
"Nadezhda Vassilyevna, believe me! I swear to you!" he exclaimed, and lifted his hand high in the air and with a wild swing hit himself full on the chest so that the sound re-echoed through the room.
"What's the matter with you! Please get up," said Nadezhda in embarrassment. "Why are you doing this?"
Volodin rose and with an injured expression on his face returned to his seat. There he pressed both his hands on his chest and again exclaimed:
"Nadezhda Vassilyevna, do believe me! Until death, from all my soul."
"I'm sorry," said Nadezhda, "but I really can't. I must bring up my brother—even now he's crying behind the door."
"Bring up your brother," said Volodin, protruding an offended lip. "I fail to see why that should prevent it."
"No, in any case it concerns him," said Nadezhda, rising hurriedly. "He must be asked. Just wait."
She quickly ran from the drawing-room, rustling with her bright yellow dress, caught Misha by the shoulder behind the door and ran with him to his room; as she stood there by the door panting with running and suppressed laughter, she said in a breathless voice:
"It's quite useless to ask you not to listen behind doors. Must I really be very stern with you?"
Misha, catching her by the waist, with his head against her, laughed and shook with his efforts to suppress his laughter. She pushed Misha into his room, sat down on a chair near the door and began to laugh.
"Did you hear what he's thinking of, your Pavel Vassilyevitch?" she said. "Come with me into the drawing-room and don't you dare to laugh. I will ask you in their presence and don't you dare say 'yes.' Do you understand?"
"Oo-hoo," blurted out Misha, and stuck a corner of his handkerchief in his mouth to stop his laughing, but with little success.
"Cover your face with your handkerchief when you want to laugh," his sister advised him, and led him by his shoulder into the drawing-room.
There she placed him in an arm-chair and sat down on a chair at his side. Volodin looked offended and lowered his head like a little ram.
"You see," she said, pointing at her brother, "I've barely dried his tears, poor boy! I have to be a mother to him, and he has a sudden idea that I'm going to leave him."
Misha covered his face with his handkerchief. His whole body shook. In order to hide his laughter he uttered a protracted moan:
"Oo-oo-oo."
Nadezhda embraced him, pinched his hand secretly and said:
"Well, stop crying, my dear, stop crying."
Misha for a moment unexpectedly felt touched and tears came into his eyes. He lowered his handkerchief and looked angrily at his sister.
"The youngster might suddenly get into a fit," thought Peredonov, "and begin to bite; human spit, they say, is poisonous."
He moved closer to Volodin, so that in case of danger he could hide behind him. Nadezhda said to her brother:
"Pavel Vassilyevitch asks for my hand."
"Hand and heart," corrected Peredonov.
"And heart," added Volodin modestly but with dignity.
Misha covered his face with his handkerchief and choking with suppressed laughter said:
"No, don't marry him. What would become of me?"
Volodin, hurt but agitated, said in a trembling voice:
"I'm surprised, Nadezhda Vassilyevna, that you are asking your brother, who is besides quite a child. Even if he were a grown-up young man you might speak for yourself. But at your asking him now, Nadezhda Vassilyevna, I am not only surprised but shocked."
"To ask little boys seems ridiculous to me," said Peredonov gravely.
"Whom have I to ask? It's all the same to my aunt, and as I'm responsible for his upbringing how can I marry you. Perhaps you would treat him harshly. Isn't it so, Mishka, that you're afraid of his harshness?"
"No, Nadya," said Misha, looking out with one eye from behind his handkerchief. "I'm not afraid of his harshness. Why should I? But I am afraid that Pavel Vassilyevitch would spoil me and not allow you to put me in the corner."
"Believe me, Nadezhda Vassilyevna," said Volodin, pressing his hands to his heart, "I won't spoil Mishenka. I always think: 'Why should a boy be spoiled?' He's well fed, well dressed, well shod, as for spoiling—no! I too can put him into the corner and not spoil him at all. I can do even more. As you're a girl, that is, a young lady, it's a little inconvenient to you, but I could easily birch him."
"He's not only going to put me into a corner," said Misha whimpering, having again covered his face with his handkerchief, "but he'll even birch me! No, that doesn't suit me. No, Nadya, don't you dare to marry him."
"Well, do you hear? I decidedly can't," said Nadezhda.
"It seems very strange to me, Nadezhda Vassilyevna, that you're acting in this way," said Volodin. "I come to you with all my affections and one might even say with fiery feelings, and you give your brother as an excuse. If you now give your brother as an excuse, another might give her sister, a third her nephew, or perhaps some other relative, and so no one would marry—so that the whole human race would come to an end."
"Don't worry about that, Pavel Vassilyevitch," said Nadezhda, "the world is not threatened yet by such a possibility. I don't want to marry without Misha's consent, and he, as you have heard, is not willing. Besides, as it's clear that you have promised to beat him straight away, you might also beat me."
"Please, Nadezhda Vassilyevna, surely you don't think that I would permit myself such a disgraceful action," exclaimed Volodin desperately.
Nadezhda smiled.
"And I myself have no desire to marry," she said.
"Perhaps you think of entering a nunnery?" asked Volodin in an offended voice.
"More likely you'll join the Tolstoyan sect," corrected Peredonov, "and manure the fields."
"Why should I go anywhere?" asked Nadezhda coldly, as she rose from her seat. "I'm perfectly well off here."
Volodin rose also, protruded his lips in a hurt way and said:
"Since Mishenka feels this way towards me and you are on his side, then I suppose I'd better stop the lessons, for how can I go to the lessons if Mishenka behaves towards me in this way?"
"Why not?" asked Nadezhda. "That's quite another affair."
Peredonov thought he ought to make yet another effort to prevail upon the young woman: perhaps she would consent.
He said to her gloomily:
"You'd better think it over well, Nadezhda Vassilyevna—why should you do it post-haste? He's a good man. He's my friend."
"No," said Nadezhda. "What is there to think about? I thank Pavel Vassilyevitch very much for the honour, but I really can't."
Peredonov looked angrily at Volodin and rose. He thought that Volodin was a fool, he couldn't make the young woman fall in love with him.
Volodin stood beside his chair with lowered head. He asked reproachfully:
"So that means it's all over, Nadezhda Vassilyevna? Ah! If so," said he waving his hand, "then may God be good to you, Nadezhda Vassilyevna. It means that is my miserable fate. Ah! A youth loved a maiden and she did not love him. God sees all! Ah, well, I'll grieve and that's all."
"You're rejecting a good man and you don't know what sort you may get," persisted Peredonov.
"Ah!" exclaimed Volodin once more and turned to the door.
But suddenly he decided to be magnanimous and returned to shake hands with the young woman and even with the juvenile offender Misha.
In the street Peredonov grumbled angrily. All the way Volodin complained bleatingly in an offended voice.
"Why did you give up your lessons?" growled Peredonov. "You must be a rich man!"
"Ardalyon Borisitch, I only said that if this is so I ought to give them up, and she said to me that I needn't give them up, and as I replied nothing then it follows that she begged me to continue. And now it all depends upon me—if I like, I'll refuse; if I like, I'll continue them."
"Why should you refuse?" said Peredonov. "Keep on going as if nothing had happened."
"Let him at least get something out of this—he'll have less cause for envy," thought Peredonov.
Peredonov felt terribly depressed. Volodin was not yet settled. "If I don't keep a look-out on him he may begin plotting with Varvara. Besides, it's possible that Adamenko will have a grudge against me for trying to marry her to Volodin. She has relatives in Peterburg; she might write to them and hurt my chances."
The weather was unpleasant. The sky was cloudy; the crows flew about cawing. They cawed above Peredonov's head, as if they taunted him and foreboded new and worse disappointments. Peredonov wrapped his scarf round his neck and thought that in such weather it was easy to catch cold.
"What sort of flowers are those, Pavloushka?" he asked as he pointed out to Volodin some small yellow flowers by a garden fence.
"That'sliutiki,[1]Ardasha," said Volodin sadly. Peredonov recalled that many such flowers grew in his own garden, and what a terrible name they had! Perhaps they were poisonous. One day Varvara would take a handful of them and boil them instead of tea, and would poison him—then when the inspector's certificate arrived, she would poison him and make Volodin take his place. Perhaps they had already agreed upon it. It was not for nothing that he knew the name of this flower. In the meantime Volodin was saying:
"Let God be her judge! Why did she humiliate me? She's waiting for an aristocrat and it doesn't occur to her that there are all sorts of aristocrats—she might be miserable with one of them; but a simple, good man might make her happy. And now I'll go to church and put a candle for her health and pray: May God give her a drunken husband, who will beat her, who will squander her money and leave her penniless in the world. Then she will remember me, but it will be too late. She will dry her tears with her hand and say, 'What a fool I was to reject Pavel Vassilyevitch. There's no one to direct me now. He was a good man!'"
Touched by his own words, a few tears came into Volodin's eyes and he wiped them from his sheepish, bulging eyes with his hands.
"You'd better break some of her windows one night," advised Peredonov.
"Well, God be with her," said Volodin sadly. "I might be caught. No, and what a miserable little boy that is! O Lord, what have I done to him that he should think of harming me? Haven't I tried hard for him, and look what mischief he's done me! What do you think of such an infant; what will become of him? Tell me."
"Yes," said Peredonov savagely, "you couldn't even manage the little boy. Oh, you lover!"
"Well, what of that?" said Volodin. "Of course I'm a lover. I'll find another. She needn't think that I'll grieve for her."
"Oh, you lover," Peredonov continued to taunt him. "And he put a new tie on! How can a chap like you expect to be a gentleman? Lover!"
"Well, I'm the lover and you're the match-maker, Ardasha," argued Volodin. "You yourself aroused hopes in me and couldn't fulfil them. Oh, you matchmaker!"
And they began zealously to taunt one another and to argue as if they were discussing some important business matter.
Nadezhda escorted her visitors to the door and returned to the drawing-room. Misha was lying on the sofa laughing. His sister pulled him off the sofa by his shoulders and said:
"But you have forgotten that you oughtn't to listen behind doors."
She lifted her hands and made as if to cross her little fingers at an angle, a sign for him to go into the corner, but suddenly burst out laughing, and the little fingers did not come together. Misha threw himself towards her. They embraced and laughed for a long time.
"All the same," she said, "you ought to go in the corner for listening."
"You ought to let me off," said Misha. "I saved you from that bridegroom, so you ought to be grateful."
"Who saved whom? You heard how they were talking of giving you a birching. Now go into the corner."
"Well, I'd better kneel here," said Misha.
He lowered himself on to his knees at his sister's feet and laid his head in her lap. She caressed him and tickled him. Misha laughed, scrabbling with his knees on the floor. Suddenly his sister pushed him from her and sat down on the sofa. Misha remained alone. He stayed awhile on his knees, and looked questioningly at his sister. She seated herself more comfortably and picked up a book as if to read, but watched her brother over it.
"Well, I'm tired now," he said plaintively.
"I'm not keeping you there, you put yourself there," answered Nadezhda, smiling over her book.
"Well, I've been punished, let me go, please," entreated Misha.
"Did I put you on your knees?" said Nadezhda in a voice of assumed indifference. "Why do you bother me?"
"I'll not get up until you've forgiven me."
Nadezhda burst out laughing, put the book aside, and taking hold of Misha's shoulders, pulled him to her. He gave a squeal and threw himself into her arms exclaiming:
"Pavloushka's bride!"
[1]Liutiki,a sort of buttercup. The word "liuti" means "cruel, ferocious, violent," which gives the point of Peredonov's reflection.
[1]Liutiki,a sort of buttercup. The word "liuti" means "cruel, ferocious, violent," which gives the point of Peredonov's reflection.
The dark-eyed boy occupied all Liudmilla's thoughts. She often talked about him with her own family and with acquaintances, sometimes unseasonably. Almost every night she saw him in a dream, sometimes quiet and ordinary but often in a wild and fantastic guise. Her accounts of these dreams became so habitual with her that her sisters began to ask her every morning how she had dreamed of Sasha. She spent all her leisure thinking about him.
On Sunday Liudmilla prevailed on her sisters to ask Kokovkina in after Mass and to keep her a while. She wanted to find Sasha alone. She herself did not go to church. She instructed her sisters: "Tell her that I overslept myself."
Her sisters laughed at her plot but agreed to help her. They lived very amicably together. Besides this suited them admirably—Liudmilla would occupy herself with a boy and that would leave them the more eligible young men. And they did as they promised—they invited Kokovkina to come in after Mass.
In the meantime Liudmilla got ready to go. She dressed herself very gaily and handsomely and scented herself with soft syringa perfume, and she put a new bottle of scent and a small sprinkler into her white bead-trimmed hand-bag, and stood just behind the blind in the drawing-room so that she could see whether Kokovkina was coming. She had thought of taking the scent before this—to scent the schoolboy so that he would not smell of his detestable Latin, ink and boyishness. Liudmilla loved perfumes, ordered them from Peterburg and consumed a great deal of them. She loved aromatic flowers. Her room was always full of some sweet scent—with flowers, with perfumes, with pines, and in the spring with birch-twigs.
But here were the sisters, and Kokovkina with them. Liudmilla ran through the kitchen, across the vegetable garden, by the little gate, along a lane in order not to meet Kokovkina. She smiled happily, walked quickly towards Kokovkina's house and playfully swung her hand-bag and white parasol. The warm autumn day gladdened her and it seemed as if she were bringing with her and spreading around her her own spirit of gaiety.
At Kokovkina's the maid told her that her mistress was not at home. Liudmilla laughed noisily and joked with the red-cheeked girl who opened the door.
"But perhaps you're fooling me," she said; "perhaps your mistress is hiding from me."
"He-he! Why should she hide?" replied the maid with a laugh. "But you can come in if you don't believe me."
Liudmilla looked into the drawing-room and shouted playfully:
"Is there a live person in the place? Ah, a student!"
Sasha looked out from his room and was delighted to see Liudmilla, and seeing his joyous eyes Liudmilla became even gayer. She asked:
"And where's Olga Vassilyevna?"
"She's not at home," replied Sasha, "that is, she hasn't come back yet. She must have gone somewhere after church. Here I'm back and she's not here yet."
Liudmilla pretended to be astonished. She swung her parasol and said as if in annoyance:
"How can it be? Everyone else is back from church. She's always at home, and then I come and she's out. Is it because you make such a noise, young man, that the old woman can't sit at home?"
Sasha smiled quietly. He was delighted to hear Liudmilla's voice, Liudmilla's cheerful laughter. He was wondering at the moment how he could best offer to escort her—so that he would be with her even a few more minutes, to look at her and to listen to her.
But Liudmilla did not think of going. She looked at Sasha with a shy smile and said:
"Well, why don't you ask me to sit down, you polite young man? Don't you see that I'm tired! Let me rest for a moment."
And she entered the drawing-room laughing and caressing Sasha with her quick, tender eyes. Sasha grew red with confusion but was glad that she would remain longer with him.
"If you like I'll scent you," said Liudmilla gaily. "Would you like it?"
"What a person you are!" said Sasha. "You suddenly want to suffocate[1]me! Why are you so cruel?"
Liudmilla burst out laughing and threw herself back in her chair.
"You stupid! You don't understand. I don't mean to suffocate with the hands, but with scents."
Sasha said:
"Ah! Scents! I don't mind that."
Liudmilla took the sprinkler from her hand-bag and turned before Sasha's eyes the pretty little glass vessel, dark red with gold ornaments, with its rubber ball and bronze mouthpiece, and said:
"Do you see, I bought a new sprinkler and I forgot to take it out of my bag at home."
Then she took out a large scent-bottle with a varicoloured label—Guerlain's Roa-Rosa.
Sasha said:
"What a deep hand-bag you've got!"
Liudmilla answered:
"Well, you needn't expect anything else. I haven't brought you any ginger-bread."
"Ginger-bread!" repeated Sasha in amusement.
He looked on with curiosity as Liudmilla uncorked the scent-bottle. He asked:
"And how will you pour it out from that without a funnel?"
"I expect you to get me a funnel," said Liudmilla.
"But I haven't one," said Sasha.
"Do as you like, but you must get me a funnel," persisted Liudmilla, laughing.
"I would get one from Milanya, only it's used for paraffin," said Sasha.
Liudmilla again burst into gay laughter.
"Oh, you dull young man, get me a piece of paper, if you can spare it—and there's your funnel."
"That's true," exclaimed Sasha joyously, "it's easy to make one from paper. I'll get it at once."
Sasha ran into his room.
"Shall I take it from an exercise-book?" he shouted from his room.
Liudmilla replied:
"You can tear it out from a book—a Latin grammar if you like. I don't mind."
"No, I'd better take it from the exercise-book," said Sasha laughingly.
He found a clean exercise-book, tore out the middle page and was about to run back to the drawing-room when he saw Liudmilla at the door.
"May I come in, master of the house?" she asked playfully.
"Please, I shall be very glad!" exclaimed Sasha.
Liudmilla seated herself at his table and twisted a funnel from a piece of paper. With a preoccupied expression, she began to pour the scent from the bottle into the sprinkler. The paper funnel, at the bottom and the side, where the trickle of scent ran, became wet and dark. The aromatic liquid accumulated in the funnel and dripped into the sprinkler below. There was a warm, sweet aroma of rose mixed with a poignant odour of spirit. Liudmilla poured half of the scent from the bottle into the sprinkler and said:
"That'll be enough."
And she began to screw the top on the scent-sprinkler. Then she rolled up the piece of wet paper and rubbed it between the palms of her hands.
"Smell!" she said to Sasha and put her palm to his face.
Sasha bent over, closed his eyes, and inhaled. Liudmilla laughed, lightly touched his lips with her palm and held her hand to his mouth. Sasha blushed and kissed her warm, scented hand with a gentle contact of his trembling lips. Liudmilla sighed; a tender expression crossed her attractive face, and then changed to her habitual expression of careless gaiety. She said:
"Now, just keep still while I sprinkle you."
And she pressed the rubber bulb. The aromatic spray-dust spurted out, spreading into minute drops upon Sasha's blouse. Sasha laughed as he turned obediently when Liudmilla pushed him.
"It smells nice, eh?" she asked.
"Very nice," replied Sasha. "What sort of scent is it?"
"What a baby you are!" said Liudmilla in a teasing voice. "Look on the bottle and you'll see."
Sasha looked at the label and said:
"It smells of oil of roses."
"Oil!" she said reproachfully, and struck Sasha lightly on the shoulder.
Sasha laughed, gave a slight scream and thrust out his tongue, curving it in the shape of a tube. Liudmilla rose, and began to turn over Sasha's school books.
"May I look?" she asked.
"Of course," said Sasha.
"Where are your ones and your noughts? Show me."
"I haven't yet had any such thing," said Sasha with an injured look.
"No, you're fibbing," asserted Liudmilla. "I'm sure you get noughts. You must have hidden them."
Sasha smiled.
"I'm sure you're bored with Latin and Greek," said Liudmilla.
"No," answered Sasha, but it was evident that the mere conversation about school-books would bring upon him their habitual tediousness. "It is a little boring to learn mechanically," he admitted. "But I have a good memory. I only like solving problems—that I like."
"Come to me to-morrow after lunch," said Liudmilla.
"Thank you, I will," said Sasha blushing.
He felt very happy that Liudmilla had invited him. Liudmilla asked:
"Do you know where I live? Will you come there?"
"Yes, I know. I'll come there," said Sasha happily.
"Now, be sure to come," repeated Liudmilla sternly. "I'll wait for you, do you hear!"
"But suppose I should have a lot of lessons?" asked Sasha, more from scruple than from any idea that he would not come because of his lessons.
"That's all nonsense. You must come," insisted Liudmilla. "They won't give you a nought."
"But why?" asked Sasha laughingly.
"Because you've got to come. Come, for I've something to tell you and something to show you," said Liudmilla dancing about and humming a song, and lifting her skirt as she did so, and playfully sticking out her pink little fingers.
"Come to me, sweet one, sober one, golden one," she sang.
Sasha began to laugh.
"You'd better tell me to-day," he entreated.
"I mustn't to-day. And how can I tell you to-day? You won't come to-morrow if I do. You'll say there's nothing to come for."
"Very well, I'll come without fail, if they'll let me."
"Of course they'll let you. No one's holding you on a chain."
When she said good-bye, Liudmilla kissed Sasha's forehead, and put her hand to his lips—he had to kiss it. And Sasha was happy to kiss again her white, gentle hand—and a little shy. And why not? But Liudmilla, as she left, smiled archly and tenderly. And she looked back several times.
"How charming she is," thought Sasha. He was left alone.
"How soon she left," he thought. "She suddenly went and it's hard to realise that she's gone. She might have stayed a little longer." And he felt ashamed that he had not offered to escort her. "It wouldn't have been a bad idea to walk along with her," he thought. "Shall I run after her? Has she gone far, I wonder. Perhaps if I run fast I might overtake her."
"But perhaps she would laugh," he continued to himself. "And besides she might not like it."
And so he could not make up his mind to go after her. He suddenly felt depressed and uneasy. The gentle tremor from the contact of her hand still remained on his lips, and on his forehead her kiss still burned.
"How gently she kisses," Sasha mused. "Like a sweet sister."
Sasha's cheeks burned. He felt deliciously ashamed. Vague reveries stirred within him.
"If she were only my sister," thought Sasha tenderly, "then I might go to her and kiss her and say an affectionate word. Then I might call her 'Liudmillotchka dearest,' or I might call her by some special pet-name: 'Booba' or 'Strekoza.' And she would respond. Now that would be a joy.
"But instead," thought Sasha sadly, "she's a stranger. Lovely, but a stranger. She came and she went. And it's likely she's not even thinking about me. And she's left behind her a sweet scent of rose and lilac, and the feeling of two gentle kisses—and a vague movement in the soul giving birth to a sweet vision as the waves gave birth to Aphrodite."
Soon Kokovkina returned.
"Phew! how strong it smells here," she said.
Sasha blushed.
"Liudmillotchka was here," he said. "And she didn't find you at home, so she sat a while and sprinkled me with scent and left."
"What tenderness!" said the old woman in astonishment, "and Liudmillotchka too!"
Sasha laughed confusedly and ran into his own room. As for Kokovkina, she thought that the Routilov sisters were very gay and affectionate girls—and that they could captivate both the young and the old with their affectionate ways.
On the next day, from the morning onward, Sasha felt happy because he had been invited to the Routilovs. At home he waited impatiently for lunch. After lunch, blushing with embarrassment, he asked permission of Kokovkina to go to the Routilovs till seven o'clock. Kokovkina was astonished but let him go. Sasha ran off gaily. He had carefully combed his hair and put pomade on it. He felt happy and slightly nervous, as one is before something important and pleasant. It pleased him to think that he would come and kiss Liudmilla's hand and that she would kiss his forehead—and then when he left the same kisses would be exchanged. He thought with delight of Liudmilla's white gentle hand.
All the three sisters met Sasha in the hall. They liked to sit by the window and look out on the street and that was why they saw him from a distance. Gay, well-dressed, chattering, they surrounded him with a noisy, impetuous gaiety—and he at once felt at ease with them and quite happy.
"Here he is, the mysterious young person!" exclaimed Liudmilla.
Sasha kissed her hand and he did it gracefully and with great pleasure to himself. At the same time he kissed Darya's hand and Valeria's—it was impossible to pass them by—and found this also very agreeable. All the more, since all three of them kissed his cheek. Darya kissed him loudly and indifferently, as though he were a board; Valeria kissed him gently, lowering her eyes with a sidelong glance, smiled slightly and barely brushed him with her light lips—touching his cheek with the faint colour of an apple—while Liudmilla gave him a gay, strong kiss.
"He's my visitor," she announced, as she took Sasha by the shoulders and led him to her room.
Darya was rather annoyed at this.
"Ah, so he's yours. Well, you can go on kissing him!" she exclaimed. "You've found a treasure. As if anyone would want to take him away from you."
Valeria said nothing but only smiled—it was not interesting, after all, to talk with a mere boy! What could he understand?
Liudmilla's room was spacious, cheerful and very light, because of two large windows giving on to the garden; these were curtained with light, yellow tulle. There was a perfume in the room. Everything was neat and bright. The chairs and the arm-chairs were covered with a golden yellow chintz, marked with a white almost indistinguishable pattern. Various bottles of scents and scented waters, and small jars, boxes and fans and several Russian and French books lay about the room.
"I saw you in a dream last night," Liudmilla began with a laugh. "You were swimming in the river and I was sitting on the bridge and I caught you with a fishing-rod."
"And I suppose you put me in a little jar?" asked Sasha jokingly.
"Why in a little jar?"
"Where, then?"
"Where? Why, I simply pulled you by the ears and threw you back in the water." And Liudmilla laughed for a long time.
"You're a strange girl," said Sasha. "But what is it you were going to tell me to-day?"
But Liudmilla went on laughing and did not reply.
"I see you've fooled me," said he. "And you also promised to show me something," he said reproachfully.
"I'll show you! Would you like something to eat?" asked Liudmilla.
"I've had lunch," said Sasha. "But you are a deceiver."
"As if I needed to deceive you! But what a strong smell of pomade?" Liudmilla suddenly exclaimed.
Sasha blushed.
"I can't stand pomade," said Liudmilla with annoyance. "You're smeared up like a young lady!"
She ran her hand down his hair and struck his cheek with her grease-smeared palm.
"Please don't you dare to use pomade," she said.
Sasha felt flustered.
"Very well, I won't do it," he said. "How severe you are! But you scent yourself with perfumes!"
"Scents are one thing, but pomade is another, you stupid. A fine comparison!" exclaimed Liudmilla. "I never pomade myself. Why should one glue one's hair down! It's different with scents. Now, let me scent you. Would you like it? Let us say lilac. Would you like it?"
"Yes, I would like it," said Sasha.
It was pleasant to think that he would take that scent home again and astonish Kokovkina.
"Who would like it?" asked Liudmilla, taking the bottle and looking archly at Sasha.
"I'd like it," repeated Sasha.
"You like it—so you bark do you?"[2]she teased him.
Sasha and Liudmilla both laughed.
"So you're not afraid that I'll suffocate you?" asked Liudmilla. "Do you remember how you were afraid yesterday?"
"I wasn't afraid at all," replied Sasha hotly.
Liudmilla, smiling and still teasing the boy, began to sprinkle him with lilac scent. Sasha thanked her and once more kissed her hand.
"And please you must get your hair cut," said Liudmilla sternly. "What's the use of wearing long locks? You only frighten the horses."
"All right, I'll have my hair cut," agreed Sasha. "You're terribly severe! My hair is very short. Not more than half an inch. The inspector never grumbled at me for it."
"I like young people with short hair," said Liudmilla impressively, and threatened him with her finger. "But I'm not an inspector, I've got to be obeyed!"
From that time on Liudmilla made it a habit to go frequently to Kokovkina—to see Sasha. She tried, especially at the beginning, to go when Kokovkina was not at home. Sometimes she even tried little tricks to lure the old woman out of the house. Darya once said to her:
"Ah, what a coward you are! You're afraid of an old woman. You'd better go when she's at home and take him out for a walk."
Liudmilla followed this advice and began to call at odd times. If she found Kokovkina at home she would sit with her for a while and then take Sasha out for a walk, in which case she always kept him for a short time only.
Liudmilla and Sasha became friends with a gentle yet not tranquil friendship. Without noticing it herself Liudmilla had awakened in Sasha premature though as yet vague inclinations and desires. Sasha often kissed Liudmilla's hands and her thin, supple wrists, covered with a soft elastic skin; through her thin yellow sleeve showed her frail, sinuous, blue veins. And above were her long slender arms which could be kissed to the very elbows when the sleeves were pushed back.
Sasha sometimes concealed from Kokovkina the fact that Liudmilla had been to the house. He didn't lie about it, but he kept silent. It was impossible for him to lie—as the maid-servant could easily have contradicted him. And to remain silent about Liudmilla's visits was also difficult for Sasha: Liudmilla's laughter echoed in his ears. He wanted to talk about her. But to talk about her was somehow awkward.
Sasha quickly made friends with the other sisters also. He would kiss their hands and soon even began to call the girls "Dashenka," "Liudmillotchka" and "Valerotchka."