The days passed quietly by. Every morning the sun climbed up through the blue air, and lighted up the Volga and its banks. At midday the snowy clouds crept up, often piled one on another until the blue sky was hidden, and the cooling rain fell on woods and fields; then once more the clouds stole away before the approach of the warm, pleasant evening.
Life at Malinovka passed just as peacefully. The naiveté of the surroundings had not yet lost its charm for Raisky. The sunshine insinuating itself everywhere, his aunt’s kind face, Marfinka’s friendliness, and the willing attention of the servants made up a pleasant, friendly environment. He even felt pleasure in the watchful guardianship that his aunt exercised over him; he smiled when she preached order to him, warned him of crime and temptation, reproached him for his gipsy tendencies and tried to lead him to a definite plan of life.
He liked Tiet Nikonich, and saw in his courtesy and his extreme good manners, his care for his health, and the universal esteem and affection in which he was held, a survival from the last century. When he felt very good tempered he found even Paulina Karpovna’s eccentricities amusing. She had induced him to lunch with her one day, when she assured him that she was not indifferent to him, and that he himself was on the eve of returning her sentiments!
The even, monotonous life lulled him like a cradle song. He wrote idly at his novel, strengthened a situation here, grouped a scene there, or accentuated a character. He watched his aunt, Leonti and his wife, and Marfinka, or looked at the villages and fields lying in an enchanted sleep along the banks of the Volga. In this ocean of silence he caught notes which he could interpret in terms of music, and determined, in his abundant leisure, to pursue the subject.
One day, after a lonely walk along the shore, he climbed the cliff, and passed Koslov’s house. Seeing that the windows were lighted, he was going up to the door, when suddenly he heard someone climb over the fence and jump down into the garden. Standing in the shadow of the fence, Raisky hesitated. He was afraid to sound the alarm until he knew whether it was a thief or an admirer of Juliana Andreevna’s, some Monsieur Charles or other. However, he decided to pursue the intruder, and promptly climbed the fence and followed him. The man stopped before a window and hammered on the pane.
“That is no thief, possibly Mark,” thought Raisky. He was right.
“Philosopher, open! Quick!” cried the intruder.
“Go round to the entrance,” said Leonti’s voice dully through the glass.
“To the entrance, to wake the dog! Open!”
“Wait!” said Leonti, and as he opened the window Mark swung himself into the room.
“Who is that behind you. Whom have you brought with you?” asked Leonti in terror.
“No one. Do you imagine there’s a ghost. Ah! there is someone scrambling up.”
“Boris, you? How did you happen to arrive together,” he exclaimed as Raisky sprang into the room.
Mark cast a hasty glance on Boris and turned to Leonti. “Give me another pair of trousers. Have you any wine in the house?
“What’s the matter, and where have you been?” asked Leonti suddenly, who had just noticed that Mark was covered up to the waist with wet and slime.
“Give me another pair of trousers quick,” said Mark impatiently. “What is the good of chattering?”
“I have no wine, because we drank it all at dinner, when Monsieur Charles was our guest.”
“Where do you keep your clothes?”
“My wife is asleep and I don’t know; you must ask Avdotya.”
“Fool! I will find them myself!”
He took a light, and went into the next room.
“You see what he is like,” sighed Leonti, addressing Raisky.
After about ten minutes, Mark returned with the trousers and Leonti questioned him as to how he had got wet through.
“I was crossing the Volga in a fishing-boat. The ass of a fisherman fell asleep, and brought us right up into the reeds by the island, and we had to get out among the reeds to extricate the boat.”
Without taking any heed of Raisky, he changed his trousers and sat down with his feet drawn up under him in the great armchair, so that his knees were on a level with his face, and he supported his bearded chin upon them.
Raisky observed him silently. Mark was twenty-seven, built as if his muscles were iron, and well proportioned; a thick mane of light brown hair framed his pale face with its high arched forehead, and fell in long locks on his neck. The full beard was paler in colour. His open, bold, irregular, rather thin face was illuminated every now and then by a smile—of which it was hard to read the meaning; one could not tell whether it spelt vexation, mockery or pleasure. His grey eyes could be bold and commanding, but for the most part wore a cold expression of contempt. Tied up in a knot as he was, he now sat motionless with staring eyes, stirring neither hand nor foot.
There was something restless and watchful in the motionless attitude, as in that of a dog apparently at rest, but ready to spring.
Suddenly his eyes gleamed, and he turned to Raisky. “You will have brought some good cigars from St. Petersburg,” he began without ceremony. “Give me one.”
Raisky offered his cigar case, and reminded Leonti that he had not introduced them.
“What need is there of introduction! You came in by the same way, and both know who the other is.”
“Words of wisdom from the scholar!” ejaculated Mark.
“That same Mark of whom I wrote to you, don’t you remember!” said Leonti.
“Wait, I will introduce myself,” cried Mark, springing from the easy chair. He posed ceremoniously, and bowed.
“I have the honour to present myself, Mark Volokov, under police surveillance, involuntary citizen of this town.”
He puffed away at his cigar, and again rolled himself up in a ball.
“What do you do with yourself here?” asked Raisky.
“I think, as you do.”
“You love art, are perhaps an artist?”
“And are you an artist?”
“Painter and musician,” broke in Leonti, “and now he is writing a novel. Take care, brother, he may put you in too.”
Raisky signed to him to be silent.
“Yes, I am an artist,” Mark went on, “but of a different kind. Your Aunt will have acquainted you with my works.”
“She won’t hear your name mentioned.”
“There you have it. But it was only a matter of a hundred apples or so that I plucked from over the fence.”
“The apples are mine; you may take as many as you like.”
“Many thanks. But why should I need your permission? I am accustomed to do everything in this life without permission. Therefore I will take the apples without your permission, they taste better.”
“I was curious to make your acquaintance. I hear so many tales about you.”
“What do they say?”
“Little that is good.”
“Probably they tell you I am a thief, a monster, the terror of the neighbourhood.”
“That’s about it.”
“But if this reputation precedes me, why should you seek my acquaintance. I have torn your books, as no doubt our friend there has informed you.”
“There he is to the point,” cried Leonti. “I am glad he began the subject himself. He is a good sort at the bottom. If one is ill, he waits on one like a nurse, runs to the chemist, and takes any amount of trouble. But the rascal wanders round and gives no one any peace.”
“Don’t chatter so,” interrupted Mark.
“For that matter,” said Raisky, “everybody does not abuse you. Tiet Nikonich Vatutin, for instance, goes out of his way to speak well of you.”
“Is it possible! The sugar marquis! I left him some souvenirs of my presence. More than once I have waked him in the night by opening his bedroom window. He is always fussing about his health, but in all the forty years since he came here no one remembers him to have been ill. I shall never return the money he lent me. What more provocation would he have? And yet he praises me.”
“So that is your department of art,” said Raisky gaily.
“What kind of an artist are you? It is your turn to tell me.”
“I love and adore beauty. I love art, draw, and make music, and just now I am trying to write a great work, a novel.”
“Yes, yes, I see. You are an artist of the kind we all are.”
“All?”
“With us Russians everybody is an artist. They use the chisel, paint, strum, write poetry, as you and your like do. Others drive in the mornings to the courts or the government offices, others sit before their stalls playing draughts, and still others stick on their estates—Art is everywhere.”
“Do you feel no desire to enter any of these categories.”
“I have tried, but don’t know how to. What brought you here?”
“I don’t know myself. It is all the same to me where I go. I had a letter summoning me here from my Aunt, and I came.”
Mark busied himself in his thoughts, and took no further interest in Raisky. Raisky on the other hand examined the extraordinary person before him attentively, studied the expression of his face, followed his movements, and tried to grasp the outline of a strong character. “Thank God,” he said to himself, “that I am not the only idle, aimless person here. In this man there is something similar; he wanders about, reconciles himself to his fate, and does nothing. I at least draw and try to write my novel, while he does nothing. Is he the victim of secret discord like myself? Is he always struggling between two fires? Imagination striving upward to the ideal lures him on on the one hand—man, nature and life in all its manifestations; on the other he is attracted by a cold, destructive analysis which allows nothing to live, and will forget nothing, an analysis that leads to eternal discontent and blighting cold. Is that his secret?” He glanced at Mark, who was already drowsing.
“Good-bye, Leonti,” he said, “it’s time I was going home.”
“What am I to do with him?”
“He can stay here all right.”
“Think of the books. It’s leaving the goat loose in the vegetable garden.”
“I might wheel him in the armchair into that dark little room, and lock him in,” thought Leonti, “but if he woke, he might pull the roof down.”
Mark helped him out of his dilemma by jumping to his feet.
“I am going with you,” he said to Raisky. “It is time for you to go to bed, philosopher,” he said to Leonti. “Don’t sit up at nights. You have already got a yellow patch in your face, and your eyes are hollow.”
He put out the light, stuffed on his cap, and leapt out of the window. Raisky followed his example, and they went down the garden once more, climbed the fence, and came out in the street.
“Listen,” said Mark. “I am hungry, and Leonti has nothing to give me. Can you help me to storm an inn?”
“As far as I am concerned. But the thing can be managed without the application of force.”
“It is late, and the inns are shut. No one will open willingly, especially when it is known that I am in the case; consequently we must enter by storm. We will call ‘Fire!’ and then they will open at once, and we can get in.”
“And be hurled out into the street again.”
“There you are wrong. It is possible that I might be refused entrance, but once in, I remain.”
“A siege, a row at night....”
“Ah, you are afraid of the police,” laughed Mark. “You are thinking of what the Governor would decide on in such a serious case, what Niel Andreevich would say, how the company would take it. Now good-bye, I will go and storm my entrance alone.”
“Wait, I have another, more delightful plan,” said Raisky. “My Aunt cannot, you say, bear to hear your name; only the other day she declared she would in no circumstances give you hospitality.”
“Well, what then?”
“Come home with me to supper, and stay the night with me.”
“That’s not a bad plan. Let us go.”
They walked in silence, almost feeling their way through the darkness. When they came to the fence of the Malinovka estate, which bounded the vegetable garden, Raisky proposed to climb it.
“It would be better,” said Mark, “to go by way of the orchard or from the precipice. Here we shall wake the house and must make a circuit in addition. I always go the other way.”
“You—come—here—into the garden? What to do?”
“To get apples.”
“You have my permission, so long as Tatiana Markovna does not catch you.”
“I shan’t be caught so easily. Look, someone has just leaped over the fence, like us. Hi! Stop! Don’t try to hide. Who’s there? Halt! Raisky, come and help me!”
He ran forward a few paces, and seized someone.
Raisky hurried to the point from which voices were audible, remarking, “What cat’s eyes you have!” The man who was held fast by Mark’s strong arms twisted round to free himself, and in the end fell to the ground and made for the fence.
“Catch him, hold fast! There is another sneaking round in the vegetable garden,” cried Raisky.
Raisky saw dimly a figure about to spring down from the fence, and demanded who it was.
“Sir, let me go, do not ruin me!” whispered a woman’s voice.
“Is it you, Marina, what are you doing here?
“Gently, Sir. Don’t call me by name. Savili will hear, and will beat me.”
“Off with you! No, stop. I have found you at the right moment. Can you bring some supper to my room?”
“Anything, Sir. Only, for God’s sake, don’t betray me.”
“I won’t betray you. Tell me what there is in the kitchen.”
“The whole supper is there. As you did not come, no one ate anything. There is sturgeon in jelly, turkey, all on ice.”
“Bring it, and what about wine?”
“There is a bottle in the sideboard, and the fruit liqueurs are in Marfa Vassilievna’s room.”
“Be careful not to wake her.”
“She sleeps soundly. Let me go now, Sir, for my husband may hear us.”
“Run, but take care you don’t run into him.”
“He dare not do anything if he does meet me now. I shall tell him that you have given me orders....”
Meanwhile, Mark had dragged his man from hiding. “Savili Ilivich,” the unknown murmured, “don’t strike me.”
“I ought to know the voice,” said Raisky.
“Ah! You are not Savili Ilivich, thank God. I Sir, I am the gardener from over there.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I came on a real errand, Sir. Our clock has stopped, and I came here to wait for the church-clock to strike.”
“Devil take you,” cried Mark, and gave the man a push that sent him reeling.
The man sprang over the ditch, and vanished in the darkness.
Raisky, meantime, returned to the main entrance. He tried to open the door, not wishing to knock for fear of awaking his aunt. “Marina,” he called in a low voice, “Marina, open!”
The bolt was pushed back. Raisky pushed open the door with his foot. Before him stood—he recognised the voice—Savili, who flung himself upon him and held him.
“Wait, my little dove, I will make my reckoning with you, not with Marina.”
“Take your hands off, Savili, it is I.”
“Who, not the Master?” exclaimed Savili, loosening his prisoner. “You were so good as to call Marina? But,” after a pause, “have you not seen her.”
“I had already asked her to leave some supper for me and to open the door,” he said untruthfully, by way of protecting the unfaithful wife. “She had already heard that I am here. Now let my guest pass, shut the door, and go to bed.”
“Yes, Sir,” said Savili, and went slowly to his quarters, meeting Marina on the way.
“Why aren’t you in bed, you demon?” she cried, dashing past him. “You sneak around at night, you might be twisting the manes of the horses like a goblin, and put me to shame before the gentry.”
Marina sped past light-footed as a sylph, skilfully balancing dishes and plates in her hands, and vanished into the dark night. Savili’s answer was a threatening gesture with his whip.
Mark was indeed hungry, and as Raisky showed no hesitation either, the sturgeon soon disappeared, and when Marina came to clear away there was not much to take.
“Now we should like something sweet,” suggested Raisky.
“No sweets are left,” Marina assured them, “but I could get some preserves, of which Vassilissa has the keys.”
“Better still punch,” said Mark. “Have you any rum?”
“Probably,” she said, in answer to an inquiring glance from Raisky. “The cook was given a bottle this morning for a pudding. I will see.”
Marina returned with a bottle of rum, a lemon and sugar, and then left the room. The bowl was soon in flames, which lighted up the darkened room with their pale blue light. Mark stirred it with the spoon, while the sugar held between two spoons dripped slowly into the bowl. From time to time he tasted it.
“How long have you been in our town?” asked Raisky after a short silence.
“About two years.”
“You must assuredly be bored?”
“I try to amuse myself,” he said, pouring out a glass for himself and emptying it. “Drink,” he said, pushing a glass towards Raisky.
Raisky drank slowly, not from inclination, but out of politeness to his guest. “It must be essential for you to do something, and yet you appear to do nothing?”
“And what do you do?”
“I told you I am an artist.”
“Show me proof of your art.”
“At the moment I have nothing except a trifling thing, and even that is not complete.”
He rose from the divan and uncovered Marfinka’s portrait.
“H’m, it’s like her, and good,” declared Mark. He told himself that Raisky had talent. “And it would be excellent, but the head is too large in proportion and the shoulders a trifle broad.”
“He has a straight eye,” thought Raisky.
“I like best the lightly-observed background and accessories, from which the figure detaches itself light, gay, and transparent. You have found the secret of Marfinka’s figure. The tone suits her hair and her complexion.”
Raisky recognised that he had taste and comprehension, and wondered if he were really an artist in a disguise.
“Do you know Marfinka?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“And Vera?”
“Vera too.”
“Where have you met my cousins? You do not come to the house.”
“At church.”
“At church? But they say you never look inside a church.”
“I don’t exactly remember where I have seen them, in the village, in the field.”
Raisky concluded his guest was a drunkard, as he drunk down glass after glass of punch. Mark guessed his thoughts.
“You think it extraordinary that I should drink. I do it out of sheer boredom, because I am idle and have no occupation. But don’t be afraid that I shall set the house on fire or murder anybody. To-day I am drinking more than usual because I am tired and cold. But I am not a drunkard.”
“It depends on ourselves whether we are idle or not.”
“When you climbed over Leonti’s fence, I thought you were a sensible individual, but now I see that you belong to the same kind of preaching person as Niel Andreevich....”
“Is it true that you fired on him?” asked Raisky curiously.
“What nonsense! I fired a shot among the pigeons to empty the barrel of my gun, as I was returning from hunting. He came up and shouted that I should stop, because it was sinful. If he had been content with protesting I should merely have called him a fool, and there it would have ended. But he began to stamp and to threaten, ‘I will have you put in prison, you ruffian, and will have you locked up where not even the raven will bring you a bone.’ I allowed him to run through the whole gamut of polite remarks, and listened calmly—and then I ‘took aim at him.’”
“And he?”
“Ducked, lost his stick and goloshes, finally squatted on the ground and whimpered for forgiveness. I shot into the air. That’s all.”
“A pretty distraction,” commented Raisky ironically.
“No distraction,” said Mark seriously. “There was more in it, a badly-needed lesson for the old boy.”
“And then what?”
“Nothing. He lied to the Governor, saying that I had aimed at him, but missed. If I had been a peaceful citizen of the town I should have been thrust into gaol without delay; but as I am an outlaw, the Governor inquired into the matter and advised Niel Andreevich to say nothing. So that no enquiry should be instituted from St. Petersburg; they fear that like fire.”
“When I spoke of idleness,” said Raisky, “I did not mean to read a moral. Yet when I see what your mind, your abilities and your education are....”
“What have you seen? That I can climb a hedge, shoot at a fool, eat and drink heavily?” he asked as he drained his glass.
Raisky watched him, and wondered uneasily how it would all end.
“We were speaking of the art you love so much,” said Mark.
“I have been snatched from Art as if from my mother’s breast,” sighed Raisky, “but I shall return and shall reach my goal.”
“No, you will not,” laughed Mark.
“Why not, don’t you believe in firm intentions?”
“How should I do otherwise, since they say the way to Hell is paved with them. No, you will do little more than you have accomplished already—that is very little. We, and many like us, simply rot and die. The only wonder is that you don’t drink. That is how our artists, half men, usually end their careers.”
Smiling he thrust a glass towards his host, but emptied it himself. Raisky concluded that he was cold, malicious and heartless. But the last remark had disturbed him. Was he really only half a man? Had he not a firm determination to reach the goal he had set before himself? He was only making fun of him.
“You see that I don’t drink away my talents,” he remarked.
“Yes, that is an improvement, a step forward. You haven’t succumbed to society, to perfumes, gloves and dancing. Drinking is a different thing. It goes to one man’s head, another is susceptible to passion. Tell me, do you easily take fire? Ah! I have touched the spot,” he went on as Raisky coloured. “That belongs to the artistic temperament, to which nothing is foreign—Nihil humanum, etc. One loves wine, another women, a third cards. The artists have usurped all these things for themselves. Now kindly explain what I am.”
“What you are. Why, an artist, without doubt, who on a first acquaintance will drink, storm public houses, shoot, borrow money—”
“And not repay it. Bravo! an admirable description. To justify your last remark and prove its truth beyond doubt, lend me a hundred roubles. I will never pay them back unless you and I should have exchanged our respective situations in life.”
“You say that in jest?”
“Not at all. The market gardener, with whom I live, feeds me. He has no money, nor have I.”
Raisky shrugged his shoulders, felt in his pockets, produced his pocket book and laid some notes on the table.
“You have counted wrong,” said Mark. “There are only eighty here.”
“I have no more money on me. My aunt keeps my money, and I will send you the balance to-morrow.”
“Don’t forget. This is enough for the moment and now I want to sleep.”
“My bed is at your disposal, and I will sleep on the divan. You are my guest.”
“I should be worse than a Tatar if I did that,” murmured Mark, already half asleep. “Lie down on your bed. Anything will do for me.”
In a few minutes he was sleeping the sleep of a tired, satisfied and drunken man worn out with cold and weariness. Raisky went to the window, raised the curtain, and looked out into the dark, starlit night. Now and then a flame hovered over the unemptied bowl, flared up and lighted up the room for a moment. There was a gentle tap on the door.
“Who is there?” he asked.
“I, Borushka. Open quickly. What are you doing there,” said the anxious voice of Tatiana Markovna.
Raisky opened the door, and saw his aunt before him, like a white-clad ghost.
“What is going on here. I saw a light through the window, and thought you were asleep. What is burning in the bowl.”
“Rum.”
“Do you drink punch at night?” she whispered, looking first at him, then at the bowl in amazement.
“I am a sinner, Grandmother. Sometimes I drink.”
“And who is lying there asleep?” she asked in new terror as she gazed on the sleeping Mark.
“Gently, Grandmother, don’t wake him. It is Mark.”
“Mark! Shall I send for the police! What have you to do with him? You have been drinking punch at night with Mark? What has come over you, Boris Pavlovich?”
“I found him at Leonti’s, we were both hungry. So I brought him here and we had supper.”
“Why didn’t you call me. Who served you, and what did they bring you?”
“Marina did everything.”
“A cold meal. Ah, Borushka, you shame me.”
“We had plenty to eat.”
“Plenty, without a single hot dish, without dessert. I will send up some preserves.”
“No, no ... if you want anything, I can wake Mark and ask him.”
“Good heavens! I am in my night-jacket,” she whispered, and drew back to the door. “How he sleeps, all rolled up like a little dog. I am ashamed, Boris Pavlovich, as if we had no beds in the house. But put out the flames. No dessert!”
Raisky extinguished the blue flame and embraced the old lady. She made the sign of the Cross over him, looked round the room once more, and went out on tiptoe. Just as he was going to lie down again there was another tap on the door, he opened it immediately.
Marina entered, bearing a jar of preserves; then she brought a bed and two pillows. “The mistress sent them,” she said.
Raisky laughed heartily, and was almost moved to tears.
Early in the morning a slight noise wakened Raisky, and he sat up to see Mark disappear through the window. He does not like the straight way, he thought, and stepped to the window. Mark was going through the park, and vanished under the thick trees on the top of the precipice. As he had no inclination to go to bed again, he put on a light overcoat and went down into the park too, thinking to bring Mark back, but he was already far below on the bank of the Volga. Raisky remained standing at the top of the precipice. The sun had not yet risen, but his rays were already gilding the hill tops, the dew covered fields were glistening in the distance, and the cool morning wind breathed freshness. The air grew rapidly warmer, giving promise of a hot day. Raisky walked on in the park, and the rain began to fall. The birds sang, as they darted in all directions seeking their morning meal, and the bees and the humble-bees hummed over the flowers. A feeling of discomfort came over Raisky. He had a long day before him, with the impressions of yesterday and the day before still strong upon him. He looked down on the unchanging prospect of smiling nature, the woods and the melancholy Volga, and felt the caress of the same cooling breeze. He went forward over the courtyard, taking no notice of the greetings of the servants or the friendly advances of the dogs.
He intended to go back to his room to turn the tenseness of his mood to account as an artistic motive in his novel; but as he hurried past the old house, he noticed that the door was half open, and went in. Since his arrival he had only been here for a moment with Marfinka, and had glanced into Vera’s room. Now it occurred to him to make a closer inspection. Passing through his old bedroom and two or three other rooms, he came into the corner room, then with an expression of extreme astonishment in his face he stood still.
Leaning on the window-sill, so that her profile was turned towards him, stood a girl of two or three and twenty, looking with strained curiosity, as if she were following some one with her eyes, down to the bank of the Volga. He was startled by the white, almost pallid face under the dark hair, the velvet-black eyes with their long lashes. Her face, still looking anxiously into the distance, gradually assumed an indifferent expression. The girl glanced hastily over park and courtyard, then as she turned and caught sight of him, shrank back.
“Sister Vera!” he cried.
Her face cleared, and her eyes remained fixed on him with an expression of modest curiosity, as he approached to kiss her.
She drew back almost imperceptibly, turning her head a little so that his lips touched her cheek, not her mouth, and they sat down opposite the window.
Impatient to hear her voice he began: “How eagerly I have expected you, and you have stayed away so long.”
“Marina told me yesterday that you were here.”
Her voice, though not so clear as Marfinka’s, was still fresh and youthful.
“Grandmother wanted to send you word of my arrival, but I begged her not to tell you. When did you return? No one told me you were here.”
“Yesterday, after supper. Grandmother and my sister don’t know I am here yet. No one saw me but Marina.”
She threw some white garments that lay beside her into the next room, pushed aside a bundle and brought a table to the window. Then she sat down again, with a manner quite unconstrained, as if she were alone.
“I have prepared coffee,” she said. “Will you drink it with me. It will be a long time before it is ready at the other house. Marfinka gets up late.”
“I should like it very much,” he replied, following her with his eyes. Like a true artist he abandoned himself to the new and unexpected impression.
“You must have forgotten me, Vera,” he remarked after a pause, with an affectionate note in his voice.
“No,” she said, as he poured out the coffee, “I remember everything. How was it possible to forget you when Grandmother was for ever talking about you?”
He would have liked to ask her question after question, but they crowded into his brain in so disconnected a fashion that he did not know where to begin.
“I have already been in your room. Forgive the intrusion,” he said.
“There is nothing remarkable here,” she said hastily, looking around as if something not intended for strange eyes might be lying about.
“Nothing remarkable, quite right. What book is that?”
He put out his hand for the book under her hand; she rapidly drew it away and put it behind her on the shelf.
“You hide it as you used to hide the currants in your mouth. But show it me.”
“Do you read books that may not be seen?” he said, laughingly as she shook her head.
“Heavens! how lovely she is!” he thought. And he wondered how such beauty could have lost its way in such an outlandish place. He wanted to touch some answering chord in her heart, wanted her to reveal something of her feelings, but his efforts only produced a greater coldness.
“My library was in your hands?”
“Yes, but later Leonid Ivanovich took it over, and I was glad to be relieved of the charge.”
“But he must have left you a few books?”
“Oh no! I read what I liked, and then surrendered the books.”
“What did you like?”
She looked out of the window as she answered: “A great many. I have really forgotten.”
“Do you care for music?”
She looked at him inquiringly before she said, “Does that mean that I play myself, or like to hear music?”
“Both.”
“I don’t play, but I like to hear music, but what music is there here?”
“But what are your particular tastes?” Again she looked at him inquiringly. “Do you like housekeeping, or needlework. Do you do embroidery?”
“No, Marfinka likes and understands all those things.”
“But what do you like? A book only occupies you for a short time. You say that you don’t do any needlework, but you must like something, flowers perhaps.”
“Flowers, yes, in the garden, but not in the house where they have to be tended. I love this corner of God’s earth, the Volga, the precipice, the forest and the garden—these are the things I love,” she said, looking contentedly at the prospect from the window.
“What ties bind you to this little place?”
She gave no answer, but her eyes wandered lovingly over the trees and the rising ground, and finally rested on the dazzling mirror of water.
“It is a beautiful place,” admitted Raisky, “but the view, the river bank, the hills, the forest—all these things would became tedious if they were not inhabited by living creatures which share our feelings and exchange ideas with us.”
She was silent.
“Vera!” said Raisky after a pause.
“Ah!” she said, as if she had only just heard his remarks, “I don’t live alone; Grandmother, Marfinka....”
“As if you shared your sympathies and thoughts with them. But perhaps you have a congenial spirit here?”
Vera nodded her head.
“Who is that happy individual?” he stammered, urged on by envy, terror and jealousy.
“The pope’s wife with whom I have been stopping,” said Vera as she rose and shook the crumbs from her apron. “You must have heard of her.”
“The pope’s wife!” he repeated.
“When she is here with me we both admire the Volga, we are never tired of talking about it. Will you have some more coffee? May I have it cleared away?”
“The pope’s wife,” he repeated thoughtfully, without hearing her question, and the smile on her lips passed unobserved.
“Will you have some more coffee?”
“No. Do you care for Grandmother and Marfinka?”
“Whom else should I hold dear?”
“Well—me,” he retorted, jesting.
“You too,” she said, looking gaily at him, “if you deserve it.”
“How does one earn this good fortune?” he asked ironically.
“Love, they say, is blind, gives herself without any merit, is indeed blind,” she rejoined.
“Yet sometimes love comes consciously, by way of confidence, esteem and friendship. I should like to begin with the last, and end with the first. So what must one do, dear sister, to attract your attention.”
“Not to make such round eyes as you are doing now for instance, not to go into my room—without me, not to try to find out what my likes and dislikes are....”
“What pride! Tell me, Sister, forgive my bluntness: Do you pride yourself on this? I ask because Grandmother told me you were proud.”
“Grandmother must have her finger in everything. I am not proud. In what connection did she say I was?”
“Because I have made a gift of these houses and gardens to you and Marfinka. She said that you would not accept the gift. Is that true? Marfinka has accepted on the condition that you do not refuse. Grandmother hesitated, and has not come to a final decision, but waits, it seems, to see what you will say. And how shall you decide. Will a sister take a gift from a brother?”
“Yes, I accept ... but no, I can buy the estate. Sell it to me.... I have money, and will pay you 50,000 roubles for it.”
“I will not do it that way.”
She looked thoughtfully out on the Volga, the precipice, and the park.
“Very well. I agree to anything you please, so long as we remain here.”
“I will have the deed drawn up.”
“Yes, thank you!” she said, stretching out both hands to him.
He pressed her hands, and kissed Vera on the cheek. She returned the pressure of his hands and kissed the air.
“You seem really to love the place and this old house.”
“And you, do you mean to stay here long?”
“I don’t know. It depends on circumstances—on you.”
“On me?”
“Come over to the other house.”
“I will follow you. I must first put things straight here. I have not yet unpacked.”
The less Raisky appeared to notice Vera, the more friendly Vera was to him, although, in spite of her aunt’s wishes she neither kissed him nor addressed him as “thou.” But as soon as he looked at her overmuch or seemed to hang on her words, she became suspicious, careful and reserved. Her coming made a change in the quiet circle, putting everything in a different light. It might happen that she said nothing, and was hardly seen for a couple of days, yet Raisky was conscious every moment of her whereabouts and her doings. It was as if her voice penetrated to him through any wall, and as if her doings were reflected in any place where he was. In a few days he knew her habits, her tastes, her likings, all that love on her outer life. But the indwelling spirit, Vera herself, remained concealed in the shadows. In her conversation she betrayed no sign of her active imagination and she answered a jest with a gay smile, but Raisky rarely made her laugh outright. If he did her laughter broke off abruptly to give place to an indifferent silence. She had no regular employment. She read, but was never heard to speak of what she read; she did not play the piano, though she sometimes struck discords and listened to their effects.
Raisky noticed that their aunt was liberal with observation and warnings for Marfinka; but she said nothing to Vera, no doubt in the hope that the good seed sown would bear fruit.
Vera had moments when she was seized with a feverish desire for activity; and then she would help in the house, and in the most varying tasks with surprising skill. This thirst for occupation came on her especially when she read reproach in her aunt’s eyes. If she complained that her guests were too much for her, Vera would not bring herself to assist immediately, but presently she would appear in the company with a bright face, her eyes gleaming with gaiety, and astonished her aunt by the grace and wit with which she entertained the visitors. This mood would last a whole evening, sometimes a whole day, before she again relapsed into shyness and reserve, so that no one could read her mind and heart.
That was all that Raisky could observe for the time, and it was all the others saw either. The less ground he had to go on however, the more active his imagination was in seeking to divine her secret.
She came over every day for a short time, exchanged greetings with her aunt and her sister, and returned to the other house, and no one knew how she passed her time there. Tatiana Markovna grumbled a little to herself, complained that her niece was moody, and shy, but did not insist.
For Raisky the whole place, the park, the estate with the two houses, the huts, the peasants, the whole life of the place had lost its gay colours. But for Vera he would long since have left it. It was in this melancholy mood that he lay smoking a cigar on the sofa in Tatiana Markovna’s room. His aunt who was never happy unless she was doing something, was looking through some accounts brought her by Savili; before her lay on pieces of paper samples of hay and rye. Marfinka was working at a piece of lace. Vera, as usual, was not there.
Vassilissa announced visitors; the young master; from Kolchino.
“Nikolai Andreevich Vikentev, please enter.”
Marfinka coloured, smoothed her hair, gave a tug to her fichu, and cast a glance in the mirror. Raisky shook his finger at her, making her colour more deeply.
“The person who stayed one night here,” said Vassilissa to Raisky, “is also asking for you.”
“Markushka?” asked Tatiana Markovna in a horrified tone.
“Yes,” said Vassilissa.
Raisky hurried out.
“How glad he is, how he rushes to meet him. Don’t forget to ask him for the money. Is he hungry? I will send food directly,” cried his aunt after him.
There stepped, or rather sprang into the room a fresh-looking, well-built young man of middle height of about twenty-three years of age. He had chestnut hair, a rosy face, grey-blue keen eyes, and a smile which displayed a row of strong teeth. He laid on a chair with his hat a bunch of cornflowers and a packet carefully done up in a handkerchief.
“Good-day, Tatiana Markovna; Good-day, Marfa Vassilievna,” he cried. He kissed the old lady’s hand, and would have raised Marfinka’s to his lips, but she pulled it away, though he found time to snatch a hasty kiss from it.
“You haven’t been to see us for three weeks,” said Tatiana Markovna, reproachfully.
“I could not come. The Governor would not let me off. Orders were given to settle up all the business in the office,” said Vikentev, so hurriedly that he nearly swallowed some of the words.
“That is absurd; don’t listen to him, Granny,” interrupted Marfinka. “He hasn’t any business, as he himself said.”
“I swear I am up to my neck in work. We are now expecting a new chief clerk, and I swear by God we have to sit up into the night.”
“It is not the custom to appeal to God over such trifles. It is a sin,” said Tatiana Markovna severely.
“What do you mean? Is it a trifle when Marfa Vassilievna will not believe me, and I, by God—”
“Again?”
“Is it true, Tatiana Markovna, that you have a visitor? Has Boris Pavlovich arrived? Was it he I met in the corridor? I have come on purpose—”
“You see, Granny, he has come to see my cousin. Otherwise he would have stayed away longer, wouldn’t he?”
“As soon as I could tear myself away, I came here. Yesterday I was at Kolchino for a minute, with Mama—”
“Is she well?”
“Thanks for the kind thought. She sends her kind regards and begs you not to forget her nameday.”
“Many thanks. I only don’t know whether I can come myself. I am old, and fear the crossing of the Volga.”
“Without you, Granny, Vera and I will not go. We, too, are afraid of crossing the Volga.”
“Be ashamed of yourself, Marfa Vassilievna. What are you afraid of? I will fetch you myself with our boat. Our rowers are singers.”
“Under no circumstances will I cross with you. You never sit quiet in the boat for a minute. What have you got alive in that handkerchief? See, Granny, I am sure it’s a snake.”
“I have brought you a carp, Tatiana Markovna, which I have caught myself. And these are for you, Marfa Vassilievna. I picked the cornflowers here in the rye.”
“You promised not to pick any without me. Now you have not put in an appearance for more than two weeks. The cornflowers are all withered, and what can I do with them?”
“Come with me, and we’ll pick some fresh ones.”
“Wait,” called Tatiana Markovna. “You can never sit quiet, you have hardly had time to show your nose, the perspiration still stands on your forehead, and you are aching to be off. First you must have breakfast. And you, Marfinka, find out if that person, Markushka, will have anything. But don’t go yourself, send Egorka.”
Marfinka seized the carp’s head with two fingers, but when he began to wave his tail hither and thither, she uttered a loud cry, hastily dropped him on the floor, and fled down the corridor.
Vikentev hurried after, and a few moments later Tatiana Markovna heard a gay waltz in progress and a vigorous stampede, as if someone were rolling down the steps. Soon the two of them tore across the courtyard to the garden, Marfinka leading, and from the garden came the sound of chattering, singing and laughter. Tatiana Markovna shook her head as she looked through the window. Cocks, hens and ducks fled in panic, the dogs dashed barking at Marfinka’s heels, the servants put their heads out of the windows of their quarters, in the garden the tall plants swayed hither and hither, the flower beds were broken by the print of flying feet, two or three vases were overturned, and every bird sought refuge in the depths of the trees.
A quarter of an hour later, the two culprits sat with Tatiana Markovna as politely as if nothing had happened. They looked gaily about the room and at one another, as Vikentev wiped the perspiration from his face and Marfinka fanned her burning face with her handkerchief.
“You are a nice pair,” remarked Tatiana Markovna.
“He is always like that,” complained Marfinka, “he chased me. Tell him to sit quiet.”
“It wasn’t my fault, Tatiana Markovna. Marfa Vassilievna told me to go into the garden, and she herself ran on in front.”
“He is a man. But it does not become you, who are a girl, to do these things.”
“You see what I have to endure through you,” said Marfinka.
“Never mind, Marfa Vassilievna. Granny is only scolding a little, as she is privileged to do.”
“What do you say, Sir?” said Tatiana Markovna, catching his words. “Come here, and since your Mama is not here, I will box your ears for you.”
“But, Tatiana Markovna, you threaten these things and never do them,” he said, springing up to the old lady and bowing his head submissively.
“Do box his ears well, Granny, so that his ears will be red for a month.”
“How did you come to be made of quicksilver?” said Tatiana Markovna, affectionately. “Your late father was serious, never talked at random, and even disaccustomed your mother from laughter!”
“Ah, Marfa Vassilievna,” broke in Vikentev. “I have brought you some music and a new novel.”
“Where are they?”
“I left them in the boat. That’s the fault of the carp. I will go and fetch them now.”
In a moment he was out of the door, and Marfinka would have followed if her aunt had not detained her.
“What I wanted to say to you is——” she began.
She hesitated a little, as if she could not make up her mind to speak. Marfinka came up to her, and the old lady smoothed her disordered hair.
“What then, Granny?”
“You are a good child, and obey every word of your grandmother’s. You are not like Veroshka....”
“Don’t find fault with Veroshka, Granny!”
“No, you always defend her. She does indeed respect me, but she retains her own opinion and does not believe me. Her view is that I am old, while you two girls are young, know everything, and read everything. If only she were right. But everything is not written in books,” she added with a sigh.
“What do you want to say to me?” asked Marfinka curiously.
“That a grown girl must be a little more cautious. You are so wild, and run about like a child.”
“I am not always running about. I work, sew embroider, pour out tea, attend to the household. Why do you scold me, Grandmother,” she asked with tears in her eyes. “If you tell me I must not sing, I won’t do it.”
“God grant that you may always be as happy as a bird. Sing, play——”
“Then, why scold me?”
“I don’t scold you; I only ask you to keep within bounds. You used to run about with Nikolai Andreevich—”
Marfinka reddened and retired to her corner.
“That is no harm,” continued Tatiana Markovna. “There is nothing against Nikolai Andreevich, but he is just as wild as you are. You are my dearest child, and you will remember what is due to your dignity.”
Marfinka blushed crimson.
“Don’t blush, darling. I know that you will do nothing wrong, but for other people’s sake you must be careful. Why do you look so angry. Come and let me kiss you.”
“Nikolai Andreevich will be here in a moment, and I don’t know how to face him.”
Before Tatiana Markovna could answer Vikentev burst in, covered with dust and perspiration, carrying music and a book which he laid on the table by Marfinka.
“Give me your hand, Marfa Vassilievna,” he cried, wiping his forehead. “How I did run, with the dogs after me!”
Marfinka hid her hand, bowed, and returned with dignity:
“Je vous remercie, monsieur Vikentev, vous êtes bien amiable.”
He stared first at Marfinka, then at her aunt, and asked whether she would try over a song with him.
“I will try it by myself, or in company with Grandmother.”
“Let us go into the park, and I will read you the new novel,” he then said, picking up the book.
“How could I do such a thing?” asked Marfinka, looking demurely at her aunt. “Do you think I am a child?”
“What is the meaning of this, Tatiana Markovna,” stammered Vikentev in amazement. “Marfa Vassilievna is unendurable.” He looked at both of them, walked into the middle of the room, assumed a sugary smile, bowed slightly, put his hat under his arm, and struggling in vain to drag his gloves on his moist hands began: “Mille pardons, mademoiselle, de vous avoir dérangée. Sacrebleu, ca n’entre pas. Oh mille pardons, mademoiselle.”
“Do stop, you foolish boy!”
Marfinka bit her lips, but could not help laughing.
“Just look at him, Granny! How can anybody keep serious when he mimics Monsieur Charles so nicely?”
“Stop, children,” cried Tatiana Markovna, her frown relaxing into smiles. “Go, and God be with you. Do whatever you like.”