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Title: Family Happiness
Author: Leo Tolstoy
Date: 1887
Language: en
Topics: marriage, fiction
Source: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44266

Leo Tolstoy

Family Happiness

CHAPTER I.

WE were in mourning for our mother, who had died the preceding autumn,

and we had spent all the winter alone in the country—Macha, Sonia and I.

Macha was an old family friend, who had been our governess and had

brought us all up, and my memories of her, like my love for her, went as

far back as my memories of myself.

Sonia was my younger sister.

The winter had dragged by, sad and sombre, in our old country-house of

Pokrovski. The weather had been cold, and so windy that the snow was

often piled high above our windows; the panes were almost always cloudy

with a coating of ice; and throughout the whole season we were shut in,

rarely finding it possible to go out of the house.

It was very seldom that any one came to see us, and our few visitors

brought neither joy nor cheerfulness to our house. They all had mournful

faces, spoke low, as if they were afraid of waking some one, were

careful not to laugh, sighed and often shed tears when they looked at

me, and above all at the sight of my poor Sonia in her little black

frock. Everything in the house still savored of death; the affliction,

the horror of the last agony yet reigned in the air. Mamma’s chamber was

shut up, and I felt a painful dread and yet an irresistible longing to

peep furtively into the chill, desolate place as I passed it every night

on my way to bed.

I was at this time seventeen years old, and the very year of her death

Mamma had intended to remove to the city, in order to introduce me into

society. The loss of my mother had been a great sorrow to me; but I must

confess that to this grief had been added another, that of seeing

myself—young, beautiful as I heard from every one that I was,—condemned

to vegetate during a second winter in the country, in a barren solitude.

Even before the end of this winter, the feeling of regret, of isolation,

and, to speak plainly, of ennui, had so gained upon me that I scarcely

ever left my own room, never opened my piano, and never even took a book

in my hand. If Macha urged me to occupy myself with something I would

reply: “I do not wish to, I cannot,” and far down in my soul a voice

kept asking: “What is the use? Why ‘do something’—no matter what—when

the best of my life is wearing away so in pure loss? Why?” And to this

“Why?” I had no answer except tears.

I was told that I was growing thin and losing my beauty, but this gave

me not the slightest concern. Why, and for whom, should I take interest

in it? It seemed to me that my entire life was to drift slowly away in

this desert, borne down by this hopeless suffering, from which, given up

to my own resources alone, I had no longer the strength, nor even the

wish, to set myself free.

Towards the end of the winter Macha became seriously uneasy about me,

and determined come what might to take me abroad. But for this, money

was essential, and as yet we knew little of our resources beyond the

fact that we were to succeed to our mother’s inheritance; however, we

were in daily expectation of a visit from our guardian, who was to

examine the condition of our affairs.

He came at last, late in March.

“Thank Heaven!” said Macha to me one day, when I was wandering like a

shadow from one corner to another, perfectly idle, without a thought in

my head or a wish in my heart: “Sergius Mikaïlovitch has sent word that

he will be here before dinner.—You must rouse yourself, my little

Katia,” she added; “what will he think of you? He loves you both so

much!”

Sergius Mikaïlovitch was our nearest neighbor, and though much his

junior had been the friend of our dead father. Besides the pleasant

change which his arrival might cause in our life, by making it possible

for us to leave the country, I had been too much accustomed, from my

childhood, to love and respect him, for Macha not to divine while urging

me to rouse myself, that still another change might be worked and that,

of all my acquaintances, he was the one before whom I would be most

unwilling to appear in an unfavorable light. Not only did I feel the old

attachment for Sergius Mikaïlovitch which was shared by every one in the

house, from Sonia, who was his god-daughter, down to the under-coachman,

but this attachment had derived a peculiar character from a few words

Mamma had once let fall before me. She had said that he was just the

husband that she would have wished for me. At the moment such an idea

had appeared to me very extraordinary and even somewhat disagreeable;

the hero of my imagination was totally different. My own hero was to be

slender, delicate, pale, and melancholy. Sergius Mikaïlovitch, on the

contrary, was no longer young, he was tall and large, full of vigor,

and, so far as I could judge, had an extremely pleasant temper;

nevertheless my mother’s remark had made a strong impression on my

imagination. This had happened six years before, when I was only eleven,

when he still said “thou” to me, played with me, and gave me the name of

La petite violette, yet ever since that day I had always felt some

secret misgivings whenever I had asked myself the question what I should

do if he should suddenly take a fancy to marry me?

A little before dinner, to which Macha had added a dish of spinach and a

sweet entre mets Sergius Mikaïlovitch arrived. I was looking out of the

window when his light sledge approached, and as he turned the corner of

the house I hastily drew back into the drawing-room, not wishing to let

him see that I had been watching for him the least in the world. But

upon hearing sounds in the ante-chamber, his strong voice, and Macha’s

footsteps, I lost patience and went myself to meet him. He was holding

Macha’s hand, and talking to her in a raised voice, smiling. When he

perceived me, he stopped and looked at me for some moments without

saluting me; it embarrassed me a good deal, and I felt myself blush.

“Ah! is it possible that this is you, Katia?” he said in his frank,

decided tone, disengaging his hand and approaching me.

“Can people change so! How you have grown! Yesterday a violet! To-day

the full rose!”

His large hand clasped mine, pressing it so cordially, so strongly, that

he almost hurt me. I had thought he might kiss me, and bent a little

towards him; but he only caught it a second time, and looked me straight

in the eyes with his bright, steady glance.

I had not seen him for six years. He was much changed, older, browner,

and his whiskers, which he had allowed to grow, were not particularly

becoming to him; but he had the same simple manners, the same open,

honest face, with its marked features, eyes sparkling with intelligence,

and smile as sweet as a child’s.

At the end of five minutes he was no longer on the footing of a mere

visitor, but on that of an intimate guest with us all, and even the

servants manifested their joy at his arrival, by the eager zeal with

which they served him.

He did not act at all like a neighbor who, coming to a house for the

first time after the mother’s death, thinks it necessary to bring with

him a solemn countenance; on the contrary, he was gay, talkative, and

did not say a single word about Mamma, so that I began to think this

indifference on the part of a man standing in such near relation to us

very strange, and rather unseemly. But I soon saw that it was far from

being indifference, and read in his intention a considerateness for

which I could not help being grateful.

In the evening Macha gave us tea in the drawing-room where it had been

usually served during Mamma’s lifetime. Sonia and I sat near her;

Gregory found one of Papa’s old pipes, and brought it to our guardian,

who began to pace up and down the room according to his old fashion.

“What terrible changes in this house, when one thinks of it!” said he,

stopping suddenly.

“Yes,” replied Macha with a sigh; and replacing the top of the samovar,

she looked up at Sergius Mikaïlovitch, almost ready to burst into tears.

“No doubt you remember your father?” he asked me.

“A little.”

“How fortunate it would be for you, now, to have him still!” he observed

slowly, with a thoughtful air, casting a vague glance into vacancy over

my head. And he added more slowly still:

“I loved your father very much....”

I thought I detected a new brightness in his eyes at this moment.

“And now God has taken away our mother also!” exclaimed Macha. Dropping

her napkin on the tea-tray, she pulled out her handkerchief and began to

cry.

“Yes, there have been terrible changes in this house!”

He turned away as he spoke.

Then, a moment after: “Katia Alexandrovna,” he said, in a louder voice,

“play me something!”

I liked the tone of frank, friendly authority with which he made this

request; I rose and went to him.

“Here, play me this,” said he, opening my Beethoven at the adagio of the

sonata, Quasi una fantasia. “Let us see how you play,” he continued,

taking his cup of tea to drink in a corner of the room.

I know not why, but I felt it would be impossible either to refuse or to

put forward a plea of playing badly; on the contrary, I submissively sat

down at the piano and began to play as well as I could, although I was

afraid of his criticism, knowing his excellent taste in music.

In the tone of this adagio there was a prevalent sentiment which by

association carried me away to the conversation before tea, and, guided

by this impression, I played tolerably well, it seemed. But he would not

let me play the scherzo.

“No, you will not play it well,” said he, coming to me, “stop with that

first movement,—which has not been bad! I see that you comprehend

music.”

This praise, certainly moderate enough, delighted me so that I felt my

color rise. It was something so new and agreeable to me to have the

friend, the equal of my father, speak to me alone, seriously, and no

longer as though he were talking to a child as he used to do.

He talked to me about my father, telling me how they suited each other,

and what a pleasant life they had led together while I was occupied

solely with my playthings and school-books; and what he said revealed my

father to me in a light quite new to me, for the first time I seemed to

know fully his simple goodness. My guardian questioned me as to what I

liked, what I read, what I intended doing, and gave me advice. I had no

longer beside me the gay talker, delighting in badinage, but a man

serious, frank, friendly, for whom I felt involuntary respect, while at

the same time I was conscious of being in perfect sympathy with him.

This consciousness was pleasing to me, nevertheless there was a certain

tension in conversing with him. Every word I uttered left me timid; I

wished so much to deserve in my own person the affection which at

present I only received because I was my father’s daughter!

After putting Sonia to bed, Macha rejoined us, and began to pour out to

Sergius Mikaïlovitch her lamentations on the score of my apathy, which

resulted she complained in my rarely having a single word to say.

“Then she has not told me the most important thing of all,” he answered,

smiling, and shaking his head at me with an air of reproach.

“What had I to tell?” I replied: “that I was bored?—but that will pass

away.” (And indeed it now seemed to me, not only that my ennui would

pass away, but that it was something already gone by, which could not

return.)

“It is not well not to know how to bear solitude:—is it possible that

you are truly a ‘grown young lady’?”

“I believe so!” I answered smiling.

“No, no, or at least a naughty young lady, who only lives to be admired,

and who, when she finds herself isolated, gives way, and no longer

enjoys anything; all for show, nothing for herself.”

“You have a lovely idea of me, it seems!” I answered, to say something.

“No,” he returned, after a moment’s silence; “it is not in vain that you

have that resemblance to your father; there is something in you!”

Again those kind, steadfast eyes exerted their charm over me, filling me

with strange emotion.

I noticed for the first time at this moment that the face which to a

casual glance seemed so gay, the expression, so peculiarly his own,

where at first one seemed to read only serenity, afterwards revealed

more and more clearly, a reserve of deep thought and a shade of sadness.

“You should not feel ennui,” he said, “you have music, which you are

able to understand, books, study; you have before you a whole life, for

which the present is the only moment to prepare yourself, so that

hereafter you may not have to repine. In a year it will be too late.”

He spoke to me like a father or an uncle, and I understood that he was

making an effort to come to my level. I was a little offended that he

should think me so much below him, and on the other hand, it was

gratifying to feel that he cared to make the effort for my sake.

The rest of the evening was devoted to a business conversation between

him and Macha.

“And now, good-night, my dear Katia,” said he, rising, approaching me,

and taking my hand.

“When shall we see each other again?” asked Macha.

“In the spring,” he replied, still holding my hand; “I am now going to

Danilovka” (our other estate); “I must look into matters there and make

some necessary arrangements, then I have to go to Moscow upon business

of my own, and later—or in the summer—we shall see each other again.”

“Why do you go for so long a time?” I asked, dejectedly; for I was

already hoping to see him every day, and it was with a sudden sinking of

my heart that I thought of again battling with my ennui. Probably my

eyes and voice let this be guessed.

“Come, occupy yourself more; drive away the blues!” he said in a voice

that seemed to me too placid and cold. “In the spring I will hold an

examination,” he added, dropping my hand without looking at me.

We accompanied him to the ante-chamber, where he hurriedly put on his

pelisse, and again his eyes seemed to avoid mine.

“He is taking very useless trouble!” I said to myself, “can it be

possible that he thinks he is giving me too great a pleasure by looking

at me!—An excellent man—Perfectly good.... But that is all.”

We remained awake a long time that night talking, not of him, but of the

employment of the ensuing summer, of where and how we should spend the

winter. Mighty question, yet why? To me it appeared perfectly simple and

evident that life was to consist in being happy, and in the future I

could imagine nothing but happiness, so suddenly had our sombre old

dwelling at Pokrovski filled itself with life and light.

CHAPTER II.

THE spring came. My former ennui had disappeared, and in exchange I felt

the dreamy vernal sadness, woven of unknown hopes and unslaked desires.

But my life was no longer the existence I had led during the early

winter; I occupied myself with Sonia, with music, with studies, and I

often went into the garden, to spend a long, long, time in wandering

alone through the shady walks, or in sitting motionless upon some quiet

bench. God knows what I was thinking, what I was wishing, what I was

hoping! Sometimes for whole nights, especially if it was moonlight, I

would remain kneeling at my window with my elbows on the sill; morning

would find me there; and sometimes, without Macha’s knowing it, I would

steal down into the garden again after I was in my simple night-dress,

and fly through the dew to the little pond; once I even went out into

the fields, and spent the rest of the night roaming alone about the

park.

Now it is difficult for me to recall, still less to comprehend, the

reveries which at this period filled my imagination. If I can succeed in

remembering them, I can hardly believe that these reveries were my own,

so strange were they, so outside of real life.

At the end of May, Sergius Mikaïlovitch, as he had promised, returned

from his journey.

The first time he came to see us was in the evening, when we were not

expecting him at all. We were sitting on the terrace, preparing to take

tea. The garden was in full verdure, and at Pokrovski nightingales had

their homes on all sides in the thick shrubbery. Here and there, large

clumps of lilacs raised their heads, enamelled with the white or pale

purple of their opening flowers. The leaves in the birch alleys seemed

transparent in the rays of the setting sun. The terrace lay in

refreshing shade, and the light evening dew was gathering upon the

grass. In the court-yard behind the garden were heard the sounds of

closing day, and the lowing of cows returning to their stable; poor

half-witted Nikone came along the path at the foot of the terrace with

his huge watering-pot, and soon the torrents of cool water traced in

darkening circles over the newly-dug earth of the dahlia beds. Beside us

on the terrace, the shining samovar hissed and sputtered on the white

cloth, flanked by cream, pancakes, and sweetmeats. Macha, with her plump

hands, was dipping the cups in hot water like a good housekeeper. As to

me, with an appetite sharpened by my late bath, I could not wait for

tea, but was eating a crust of bread soaked in fresh, rich cream. I had

on a linen blouse with loose sleeves, and my damp hair was bound in a

handkerchief.

Macha was the first to perceive him.

“Ah! Sergius Mikaïlovitch!” she cried; “we were just talking about you.”

I rose to run in and change my dress; but he met me as I reached the

door.

“Come, Katia, no ceremony in the country,” said he, smiling, and looking

at my head and my handkerchief, “you have no scruples before Gregory,—I

can be Gregory to you.”

But at the same time it darted into my mind that he was not looking at

me precisely as Gregory would have done, and this embarrassed me.

“I will be back directly,” I replied, drawing away from him.

“What is wrong about it?” he exclaimed, following me, “one might take

you for a little peasant girl!”

“How strangely he looked at me,” I thought, as I hastened up-stairs to

dress myself. “At last, thank Heaven, here he is, and we shall be

gayer!” And with a parting glance at the mirror I flew down again, not

even trying to conceal my eager delight, and reached the terrace, out of

breath. He was sitting near the table, talking to Macha about our

business matters. Noticing me, he gave me a smile, and went on talking.

Our affairs, he said, were in very satisfactory condition. We had

nothing to do but to finish our country summer, and then we could go,

either to St. Petersburg for Sonia’s education, or abroad.

“That would be very well, if you would come abroad with us,” said Macha,

“but by ourselves we should be like people lost in the woods.”

“Ah! would to Heaven I could go around the world with you,” was the

half-jesting, half-serious answer.

“Well and good,” said I, “let us go around the world then!”

He smiled and shook his head.

“And my mother? And my business? Come, we will let the tour of the world

alone, now, and you can tell me how you have passed your time. Can it be

possible that you have had the blues again?”

When I told him that I had been able, without him, to employ myself and

not to yield to ennui, and Macha had confirmed the good account, he

praised me, with the same words and looks of encouragement he would have

used to a child, and as if he had a perfect right to do so. It seemed to

me quite natural that I should tell him frankly and minutely everything

I had done that was right, and also, on the contrary, own to him, as if

in the confessional, whatever I had done that might deserve his censure.

The evening was so beautiful that, when the tea-tray was carried away,

we remained upon the terrace, and I found the conversation so

interesting that I only gradually became aware that all the sounds from

the house were ceasing around us. Upon all sides arose the penetrating

night perfume of flowers, the turf was drenched with heavy dew, the

nightingale in a lilac bush near us was executing his roulades, stopping

abruptly at the sound of our voices. The starry sky seemed to stoop

close above our heads.

What warned me that night had come, was the swift, heavy rush of a bat

beneath the awning of the terrace, and its blind, terrified circling

around my white dress. I fell back against the wall, and almost cried

out, but with another dull swoop it was off again and lost in the

blackness of the garden.

“How I love your Pokrovski,” said Sergius Mikaïlovitch, interrupting the

conversation.... “One could linger for a lifetime on this terrace!”

“Well,” said Macha, “linger!”

“Ah, yes! linger; but life—does not pause!”

“Why do you not marry?” continued Macha; “you would make an excellent

husband!”

“Why?” he repeated, smiling. “People long ago, ceased to count me a

marriageable man!”

“What!” replied Macha, “thirty-six years old, and already you pretend to

be tired of living?”

“Yes, certainly, and even so tired that I desire nothing but rest. To

marry, one must have something else to offer. There, ask Katia,” he

added, pointing me out with a nod “Girls of her age are the ones for

marriage. For us ... our rôle is to enjoy their happiness.”

There was a secret melancholy, a certain tension in the tone of his

voice, which did not escape me. He kept silence a moment; neither Macha

nor I said anything.

“Imagine now,” he resumed, turning towards the table again, “if all at

once, by some deplorable accident, I should marry a young girl of

seventeen, like Katia Alexandrovna! That is a very good example, and I

am pleased that it applies so well to the point ... there could not be a

better instance.”

I began to laugh, but I could not at all understand what pleased him so

much, nor to what it applied so well.

“Come, now, tell me the truth, ‘hand on heart,’” he went on, turning to

me with a bantering air, “would it not be a great misfortune for you, to

bind your life to a man already old, who has had his day, and wants

nothing except to stay just where he is, while you,—Heaven knows where

you would not want to run off to, as the fancy took you!”

I felt uncomfortable, and was silent, not knowing very well what to say

in reply.

“I am not making a proposal for your hand,” said he, laughing, “but,

now, tell us the truth are you dreaming of such a husband, as you wander

through your alleys in the evening, and would he not be a great

misfortune?”

“Not so great a misfortune ...” I began.

“And not so great a boon, either,” he finished for me.

“Yes ... but I may be mistaken....”

He interrupted me again.

“You see?... she is perfectly right.... I like her honesty, and am

delighted that we have had this conversation. I will add that—to me—it

would have been a supreme misfortune!”

“What an original you are! you have not changed in the least!” said

Macha, leaving the terrace to order supper to be served.

After her departure we were silent, and all was still around us. Then

the solitary nightingale recommenced, not his abrupt, undecided notes of

early evening, but his night song, slow and tranquil, whose thrilling

cadence filled the garden; and from far down the ravine came for the

first time a response from another nightingale. The one near us was mute

for a moment, listening, then burst out anew in a rapture of song,

louder and clearer than before. Their voices resounded, calm and

supreme, amid that world of night which is their own and which we

inhabit as aliens. The gardener went by, on his way to his bed in the

orange-house, we heard his heavy boots on the path as he went farther

and farther from us. Some one in the direction of the mountain blew two

shrill, quick notes on a whistle, then all was still once more. Scarcely

a leaf was heard to move; yet all at once the awning of the terrace

puffed out slowly, stirred by a breath of air, and a more penetrating

perfume stole up to us from below. The silence embarrassed me, but I did

not know what to say. I looked at him. His eyes, bright in the darkness,

were fixed upon me.

“It is good to live in this world!” he murmured.

I know not why, but at the words I sighed.

“Well?” he questioned.

“Yes, it is good to live in this world!” I repeated.

Again the silence fell upon us, and again I felt ill at ease. I could

not get it out of my head that I had hurt him, by agreeing with him that

he was old; I would have liked to console him, but did not know how to

set about it.

“But good-bye!” he said, rising, “my mother expects me to supper. I have

hardly seen her to-day.”

“I would have liked to play you my new sonata.”

“Another time,” he replied coldly, at least so it seemed to me; then,

moving off a step, he said with a careless gesture: “Good-bye!”

I was more than ever convinced that I had given him pain, and this

distressed me. Macha and I went with him, as far as the porch, and stood

there awhile looking down the road where he had disappeared. When we no

longer caught the slightest echo from his horse’s feet, I began to walk

about the terrace and watch the garden, and I remained a long time

there, amid the heavy mist that deadened all the sounds of night, busy

seeing and hearing whatever my fancy chose to make me see and hear.

He came a second time, a third time, and the little embarrassment caused

by our strange conversation soon vanished, and never returned.

Throughout the whole summer he came to see us two or three times a week;

I was so accustomed to him that, when a longer time than usual passed

without his coming, it seemed to me painful to live alone; I was

secretly indignant with him, and thought he was behaving badly in thus

deserting me. He transformed himself for me, as it were, into a friendly

comrade; inducing the most sincere frankness on my part, giving me

advice and encouragement, scolding me sometimes, checking me when

necessary. But despite these efforts to remain always upon my level, I

was conscious that, besides all I knew of him, there existed within him

an entire world, to which I was a stranger, and he did not think it was

necessary to admit me; and this, more than anything else, tended to keep

up my feeling of deference, and at the same time to attract me towards

him. I knew from Macha and the neighbors that, besides his attentive

care of his old mother, with whom he lived, besides his agricultural

interests, and our guardianship, he had also on hand certain matters

affecting all the nobles, which caused him much trouble and annoyance;

but how he faced this complex situation, what were his thoughts, his

plans, his hopes, I could never discover from him. If I endeavored to

lead the conversation to his own affairs, a certain line appeared upon

his brow, which seemed to say: “Stop there, if you please; what is that

to you?” And he would immediately speak of something else. At first this

offended me, then I grew so accustomed to it that we never talked of

anything but what concerned me; which I finally came to think quite a

matter of course.

At first, too, I felt some displeasure, (while afterwards, on the

contrary, it had a kind of charm,) in seeing the perfect indifference, I

might almost say contempt, which he showed for my appearance. Never, by

word or look, did he give the least idea that he thought me pretty; far

from it, he frowned and began to laugh if any one remarked before him

that I was “not bad-looking.” He even took pleasure in criticizing the

defects in my face, and teasing me about them. The fashionable dresses,

the coiffures, with which Macha delighted to adorn me on our holidays,

only excited his raillery, which chagrined my good Macha not a little,

and at first disconcerted me. Macha, who had settled in her own mind

that I was pleasing to Sergius Mikaïlovitch, could not at all comprehend

why he did not prefer that a woman whom he admired should appear at her

best. But I soon discovered what was the matter. He wished to believe

that I was not coquettish. As soon as I understood this there no longer

remained a trace of coquetry in my dress, hair, or manner; it was

replaced—usual and shallow little trick—by another coquetry, the

assumption of simplicity, before I had attained the point of really

being artless. I saw that he loved me: whether as a child or woman I had

not hitherto asked myself: this love was dear to me, and feeling that he

considered me the best girl in the world, I could not help wishing that

the delusion might continue to blind him. And indeed I deceived him

almost involuntarily. But in deluding him, I was nevertheless growing

more what he thought me. I felt that it would be better and more worthy

of him to unveil to him the good points of my soul rather than those of

my person. My hair, my hands, my face, my carriage, whatever they might

be, whether good or bad,—it seemed to me he could appreciate at one

glance, and that he knew very well that, had I desired to deceive him, I

could add nothing at all to my exterior. My soul, on the contrary, he

did not know: because he loved it, because just at this time it was in

full process of growth and development, and finally because in such a

matter it was easy to deceive him, and that I was in fact deceiving him.

What relief I felt in his presence, when once I comprehended all this!

The causeless agitation, the need of movement, which in some way

oppressed me, completely disappeared. It seemed to me henceforth that

whether opposite or beside me, whether standing or sitting, whether I

wore my hair dressed high or low, he looked at me always with

satisfaction, that he now knew me entirely; and I imagined that he was

as well pleased with me, as I myself was. I verily believe that if,

contrary to his custom, he had suddenly said to me as others did that I

was pretty, I should even have been a little sorry. But, on the other

hand, what joy, what serenity, I felt in the depth of my soul, if, upon

the occasion of my expressing some thought or letting fall a few words,

he looked at me attentively and said in a moved tone which he strove to

render light and jesting:

“Yes, yes, there is something in you! You are a good girl, and I ought

to tell you so.”

And for what did I receive this recompense which filled my heart with

joy and pride? Perhaps because I had said that I sympathized with old

Gregory’s love for his little daughter, perhaps because I had been

affected to tears while reading a poem or a romance, perhaps for

preferring Mozart to Schuloff! I was amazed by this new intuition, which

enabled me to divine what was good and what one ought to like, though as

yet I had no positive knowledge of either. Most of my past habits and

tastes were displeasing to him, and a look or an imperceptible movement

of his eyebrows was enough to make me understand his disapproval of what

I was about to do; while a certain air of slightly disdainful pity,

which was peculiar to him, would at once make me believe that I no

longer liked what had formerly pleased me. If the thought of giving me

advice upon any subject, occurred to him, I knew beforehand what he was

going to say to me. He questioned me with a glance, and already this

glance had drawn from me the thought he wished to ascertain. All my

thoughts, all my feelings during that time, were not my own; they were

his, which suddenly became mine, penetrating and illuminating my life.

In a manner insensible to me, I began to see everything with other eyes,

Macha, my servants, Sonia, as well as myself and my own occupations. The

books which formerly I had read only in order to ward off ennui appeared

to me all at once one of the greatest charms of life, and for no reason

except that we talked, he and I, of books, that we read them together,

that he brought them to me. Hitherto I had considered my work with

Sonia, the lessons I gave her, as a painful obligation, only fulfilled

from a sense of duty; now that he sometimes came to assist at these

lessons one of my delights was to observe Sonia’s progress. To learn an

entire piece of music had always seemed impossible, and now, knowing

that he would listen and perhaps applaud it, I thought nothing of going

over the same passage forty times in succession, poor Macha would end by

stopping her ears with cotton wool, while I would not consider the

performance at all tiresome. The old sonatas spoke out under my fingers

in a very different and very superior voice. Even Macha, whom I had

always known and loved as myself, seemed totally changed. It was only

now that I understood that nothing had compelled her to be what she had

been to us, a mother, a friend, a slave to our whims and fancies. I

comprehended all the abnegation, all the devotion, of this loving

creature, I realized the greatness of my obligations to her, and loved

her so much the more. He had already taught me to regard our people, our

peasants, our droroviés,[1] our men and women servants, in a totally

different light. It is an odd fact, but at seventeen years of age, I was

living in the midst of them a far greater stranger to them than to

people I had never seen; not once had it crossed my mind that they were

beings capable like myself of love, desires, regrets. Our garden, our

woods, our fields, which I had known ever since I was born, suddenly

became quite new to me, and I began to admire their loveliness. There

was no error in the remark which he so often made, that, in life, there

was but one certain happiness: to live for others. This had appeared

strange to me, and I had not been able to understand it; but the

conviction, unknown even to my own mind, was penetrating little by

little into the depths of my heart. In short, he had opened before me a

new life, full of present delights, without having in any wise changed

or added to my old existence, save by developing each of my own

sensations. From my infancy everything around me had remained buried in

a sort of silence, only awaiting his presence to lift up a voice, speak

to my soul, and fill it with happiness.

Often, in the course of this summer, I would go up to my chamber, throw

myself upon my bed, and there, in place of the old anguish of the

spring, full of desires and hopes for the future, I would feel myself

wrapped in another emotion, that of present happiness. I could not

sleep, I would get up and go and sit on the side of Macha’s bed, and

tell her that I was perfectly happy,—which, as I look back upon it

to-day was perfectly needless; she could see it well enough for herself.

She would reply that neither had she anything more to wish for, that she

too was very happy, and would embrace me. I believed her, so entirely

natural and necessary did it seem to me for every one to be happy. But

Macha had her night’s rest to think of, so, pretending to be angry, she

would drive me away from her bed, and drop off to sleep; I, on the

contrary, would lie for a long time running over all my reasons for

being gladsome. Sometimes I would rise, and begin my prayers a second

time, praying in the fulness of my heart that I might thank God better

for all the happiness He had granted me. In my chamber all was peaceful;

there was no sound save the long-drawn regular breathing of the sleeping

Macha, and the ticking of the watch by her side; I would return to bed,

murmur a few words, cross myself, or kiss the little cross hanging at my

neck. The doors were locked, the shutters fast over the windows, the

buzzing of a fly struggling in a corner came to my ear. I could have

wished never to leave this room; desired that morning might never come

to dissipate the atmosphere impregnated with my soul, that enveloped me.

It seemed to me that my dreams, my thoughts, my prayers, were so many

animated essences which in this darkness lived with me, fluttered about

my pillow, hovered above my head. And every thought was his thought,

every feeling his feeling. I did not yet know what love was, I thought

that it might always be thus—that it might give itself and ask nothing

in return.

CHAPTER III.

ONE day, during the grain harvest, Macha, Sonia, and I, went into the

garden after dinner, to our favorite bench under the shade of the

linden-trees at the head of the ravine, whence we could see the fields

and the woods. For three days Sergius Mikaïlovitch had not been to see

us, and we looked for him all the more confidently to-day, as he had

promised our intendant to visit the harvest fields.

About two o’clock we saw him coming over the rising ground in the middle

of a rye field. Macha, giving me a smile, ordered a servant to bring out

some peaches and cherries, which he was very fond of, then stretched

herself upon the bench and was soon fast asleep. I broke off a little

linden bough, its leaves and bark fresh with young sap, and, while I

fanned Macha, went on with my reading, not without turning every instant

to watch the field-path by which he must come to us. Sonia had

established herself on a linden root, and was busy putting up a green

arbor for her dolls.

The day was very warm, without wind, it seemed as if we were in a

hot-house; the clouds, lying in a low circle upon the horizon, had

looked angry in the morning, and there had been a threat of storm,

which, as was always the case, had excited and agitated me. But since

mid-day the clouds had dispersed, the sun was free in a clear sky, the

thunder was only muttering at a single point, rolling slowly through the

depths of a heavy cloud which, seeming to unite earth and heaven,

blended with the dust of the fields, and was furrowed by pale zig-zags

of distant lightning. It was evident that for us at least there was no

more to be dreaded for that day. In the part of the road running behind

the garden there was continual sound and motion, now the slow, long

grind of a wagon loaded with sheaves, now the quick jolt of the empty

telégas[2] as they passed each other, or the rapid steps of the drivers,

whose white smocks we could see fluttering as they hurried along. The

thick dust neither blew away nor fell, it remained suspended above the

hedges, a hazy background for the clear green leaves of the garden

trees. Farther off, about the barn, resounded more voices, more grinding

wheels; and I could see the yellow sheaves, brought in the carts to the

enclosure, being tossed off into the air, and heaped up, until at length

I could distinguish the stacks, rising like oval sharp-roofed buildings,

and the silhouettes of the peasants swarming about them. Presently,

there were new telégas moving in the dusty fields, new piles of yellow

sheaves, and in the distance the wheels, the voices, the chanted songs.

The dust and heat invaded everything, except our little favorite nook of

the garden. Yet on all sides, in the dust and heat, the blaze of the

burning sun, the throng of laborers chattered, made merry, and kept in

continual movement. As for me, I looked at Macha, sleeping so sweetly on

our bench, her face shaded by her cambric handkerchief; the black juicy

cherries on the plate; our light, dazzlingly clean dresses, the carafe

of clear water, where the sun’s rays were playing in a little rainbow;

and I felt a sense of rare comfort. “What must I do?” thought I;

“perhaps it is wicked to be so happy? But can we diffuse our happiness

around us? How, and to whom, can we wholly consecrate

ourselves—ourselves and this very happiness?”

The sun had disappeared behind the tops of the old birch-trees bordering

the path, the dust had subsided; the distances of the landscape stood

out, clear and luminous, under the slanting rays; the clouds had

dispersed entirely, long ago; on the other side of the trees I could

see, near the barn, the pointed tops rise upon three new stacks of

grain, and the peasants descend from them; finally, for the last time

that day, the telégas passed rapidly, making the air resound with their

noisy jolts; the women were going homewards, singing, their rakes on

their shoulders, and their binding withes hanging at their girdles; and

still Sergius Mikaïlovitch did not come, although long ago I had seen

him at the foot of the mountain. Suddenly he appeared at the end of the

path, from a direction where I had not been looking for him at all, for

he had to skirt the ravine to reach it. Raising his hat he came towards

me, his face lighted up with sudden joy. At the sight of Macha, still

asleep, his eyes twinkled, he bit his lip, and began tip-toeing

elaborately. I saw at once that he was in one of those fits of causeless

gayety which I liked so much in him, and which, between ourselves, we

called “le transport sauvage.” At such times he was like a boy just let

out of school, his whole self from head to foot instinct with delight

and happiness.

“How do you do, little violet, how goes the day with you? Well?” said

he, in a low voice, coming near and pressing my hand.... “And with me?

oh, charmingly, also!” he replied to my similar question, “to-day I am

really not over thirteen years old; I would like to ride a

stick-horse,—I want to climb the trees!”

“Le transport sauvage!” I commented, looking into his laughing eyes, and

feeling this transport sauvage take possession of me also.

“Yes,” he murmured, at the same time raising his eyebrows with an

enquiring glance, and keeping back a smile. “But why are you so furious

with our poor Macha Karlovna?”

In fact I then became conscious that, while I was gazing up at him and

continuing to brandish my linden bough, I had whipped off Macha’s

handkerchief, and was sweeping her face with the leaves. I could not

help laughing.

“And she will say she has not been asleep,” I said, whispering, as if

afraid of waking her; but I did not do it altogether for that,—it was so

delightful to whisper when I spoke to him!

He moved his lips in almost dumb show, imitating me, and as if he, on

his side, was saying something that no one else must hear. Then, spying

the plate of cherries, he pretended to seize it and carry it off by

stealth, running away towards Sonia, and dropping on the grass under the

linden-tree in the midst of her accumulation of dolls. Sonia was about

to fly into a little rage, but he made peace with her by proposing a new

game, the point of which lay in seeing which of the two could devour the

most cherries.

“Shall I order some more?” I asked, “or shall we go gather them for

ourselves?”

He picked up the plate, piled Sonia’s dolls in it, and we all three

started for the cherry orchard. Sonia, shouting with laughter, trotted

after him, tugging at his coat to make him give her back her family. He

did so; and turning gravely to me:

“Come, how can you convince me that you are not a violet?” he said,

still speaking very low, though there was now no one for him to be

afraid of waking; “as soon as I came near you, after having been through

so much dust and heat and fatigue, I seemed to perceive the fragrance of

a violet, not, it is true, that violet with the powerful perfume, but

the little early one, you know, which steals out first, still modest, to

breathe at once the expiring snow and the springing grass....”

“But, tell me, is the harvest coming on well?” I put in hastily, to

cover the happy confusion his words caused me.

“Wonderfully! what excellent people these all are,—the more one knows

them, the more one loves them.”

“Oh, yes!—A little while ago, before you came, I sat watching their

work, and it really went to my conscience to see them toiling so

faithfully, while I was just idly taking my ease, and....”

“Do not play with these sentiments, Katia,” he interrupted, with a

serious manner, giving me at the same time a caressing glance, “there is

holy work there. May God guard you from posing in such matters!”

“But it was only to you that I said that!”

“I know it.—Well, and our cherries?”

The cherry orchard was locked, not a single gardener was to be found (he

had sent them all to the harvest fields). Sonia ran off to look for the

key; but, without waiting for her return, he climbed up at a corner by

catching hold of the meshes of the net, and jumped down inside the wall.

“Will you give me the plate?” he asked me, from within.

“No, I want to gather some, myself; I will go get the key, I doubt if

Sonia can find it.”

But at that moment a sudden fancy seized me, to find out what he was

doing there, how he looked, in short his demeanor when he supposed no

one could see him. Or rather, honestly, perhaps just then I did not feel

like losing sight of him for a single instant. So on my tip-toes,

through the nettles, I made a circuit around the little orchard and

gained the opposite side, where the enclosure was lower; there, stepping

up on an empty tub, I found the wall but breast-high, and leaned over. I

made a survey of everything within; looked at the crooked old trees, the

large serrated leaves, the black, vertical clusters of juicy fruit; and,

slipping my head under the net, I could observe Sergius Mikaïlovitch

through the twisted boughs of an old cherry-tree. He was certainly

confident that I had gone, and that no one could see him.

With bared head and closed eyes he was sitting on the mouldering trunk

of an old tree, absently rolling between his fingers a bit of

cherry-gum. All at once, he opened his eyes, and murmured something,

with a smile. The word and smile were so little in keeping with what I

knew of him that I was ashamed of having watched him. It really seemed

to me that the word was: Katia! “That cannot be!” I said to myself.

“Dear Katia!” he repeated lower, and still more tenderly. And this time

I heard the two words distinctly. My heart began to beat so fast, I was

so filled with joyful emotion, I even felt, as it were, such a kind of

shock, that I had to hold on to the wall with both hands, to keep myself

from falling, and so betraying myself. He heard my movement, and glanced

behind him, startled; then suddenly casting down his eyes he blushed,

reddening like a child. He made an effort to speak to me, but could not,

and this failure made his face grow deeper and deeper scarlet. Yet he

smiled as he looked at me. I smiled at him too. He looked all alive with

happiness; this was no longer, then,—oh, no, this was no longer an old

uncle lavishing cares and caresses upon me; I had there before my eyes a

man on my own level, loving me and fearing me; a man whom I myself

feared, and loved. We did not speak, we only looked at each other. But

suddenly he bent his brows darkly; smile and glow went out of his eyes

simultaneously, and his bearing became again cold and fatherly, as if we

had been doing something wrong, as if he had regained control of himself

and was counselling me to do the same.

“Get down from there, you will hurt yourself,” said he. “And arrange

your hair; you ought to see what you look like!”

“Why does he dissemble so? Why does he wish to wound me?” I thought,

indignantly. And at the moment came an irresistible desire to move him

again, and to try my power over him.

“No, I want to gather some cherries, myself,” I said; and grasping a

neighboring bough with my hands, I swung myself over the wall. He had no

time to catch me, I dropped to the ground in the middle of the little

space.

“What folly is this?” he exclaimed, flushing again, and endeavoring to

conceal his alarm under a semblance of anger. “You might injure

yourself! And how are you going to get out?”

He was much more perturbed than when he first caught sight of me; but

now this agitation no longer gladdened me, on the contrary it made me

afraid. I was attacked by it in my turn; I blushed, moved away, no

longer knowing what to say to him, and began to pick cherries very fast,

without having anything to put them in. I reproached myself, I repented,

I was frightened, it seemed to me that by this step I had ruined myself

forever in his eyes. We both remained speechless, and the silence

weighed heavily upon both. Sonia, running back with the key, freed us

from our embarrassing situation. However, we still persistently avoided

speaking to each other, both preferring to address little Sonia instead.

When we were again with Macha, (who vowed she had not been asleep, and

had heard everything that had gone on,) my calmness returned, while he,

on his side, made another effort to resume his tone of paternal

kindness. But the effort was not successful, and did not deceive me at

all. A certain conversation that had taken place two days before still

lived in my memory.

Macha had announced her opinion that a man loves more easily than a

woman, and also more easily expresses his love. She added:

“A man can say that he loves, and a woman cannot.”

“Now it seems to me that a man neither ought nor can say that he loves,”

was his reply.

I asked him why.

“Because it would always be a lie. What is this discovery that a man

loves? As if he had only to pronounce the word, and there must

immediately spring from it something extraordinary, some phenomenon or

other, exploding all at once! It seems to me that those people who say

to you solemnly: ‘I love you,’ either deceive themselves, or, which is

worse, deceive others.”

“Then you think a woman is to know that she is loved, without being

told?” asked Macha.

“That I do not know; every man has his own fashion of speech. But such

feelings make themselves understood. When I read a novel, I always try

to imagine the embarrassed air of Lieutenant Crelski or Alfred, as he

declares: ‘Eléonore, I love thee!’ which speech he fancies is going to

produce something astounding, all of a sudden,—while in reality it

causes nothing at all, neither in her nor in him: features, look,

everything, remain precisely the same!”

He spoke jestingly, but I thought I detected an undertone of serious

meaning, which might have some reference to me; and Macha never allowed

even playful aspersions upon her heroes of romance.

“Always paradoxes!” she exclaimed. “Come now, be honest, have you

yourself never said to a woman that you loved her?”

“Never have I said so, never have I bowed a knee,” he replied laughing,

“and never will I!”

“Yes, he need not tell me that he loves me!” I thought, now vividly

recalling this conversation. “He does love me, and I know it. And all

his efforts to seem indifferent cannot take away this conviction!”

During the whole evening he said very little to me, but in every word,

in every look and motion, I felt love, and no longer had any doubts. The

only thing that vexed and troubled me was that he should still judge it

necessary to conceal this feeling, and to feign coldness, when already

all was so clear, and we might have been so easily and so frankly happy

almost beyond the verge of possibility. Then, too, I was tormenting

myself as though I had committed a crime, for having jumped down into

the cherry orchard to join him, and it seemed as if he must have ceased

to esteem me, and must feel resentment against me.

After tea, I went to the piano, and he followed.

“Play something, Katia, I have not heard you for a long time,” he said,

joining me in the drawing-room. “I wished ... Sergius Mikaïlovitch!” And

suddenly I looked right into his eyes. “You are not angry with me?”

“Why should I be?”

“Because I did not obey you this afternoon,” said I, blushing.

He understood me, shook his head, and smiled. And this smile said that

perhaps he would willingly have scolded me a little, but had no longer

the strength to do so.

“That is done with, then, isn’t it? And we are good friends again?” I

asked, seating myself at the piano.

“I think so, indeed!”

The large, lofty apartment was lighted, only by the two candles upon the

piano, and the greater portion of it was in semi-darkness; through the

open windows we beheld the luminous stillness of the summer night. The

most perfect calm reigned, only broken at intervals by Macha’s footfall

in the adjoining room, which was not yet lighted, or by an occasional

restless snort or stamp from our visitor’s horse, which was tied under

one of the casements. Sergius Mikaïlovitch was seated behind me, so that

I could not see him, but in the imperfect darkness of the room, in the

soft notes that filled it, in the very depths of my being, I seemed to

feel his presence. Every look, every movement, though I could not

distinguish them, seemed to enter and echo in my heart. I was playing

Mozart’s Caprice-sonata, which he had brought me, and which I had

learned before him and for him. I was not thinking at all of what I

played, but I found that I was playing well and thought he was pleased.

I shared his enjoyment, and without seeing him, I knew that from his

place his eyes were fixed on me. By a quite involuntary movement, while

my fingers continued to run over the keys, unconscious of what they were

doing, I turned and looked at him; his head stood out in dark relief

against the luminous background of the night. He was sitting with his

brow resting on his hand, watching me attentively with sparkling eyes.

As mine met them, I smiled, and stopped playing. He smiled also, and

made a motion with his head towards my notes, as if reproaching me and

begging me to keep on. Just then the moon, midway in her course, soared

in full splendor from a light cloud, pouring into the room waves of

silvery radiance which overcame the feeble gleam of our wax candles, and

swept in a sea of glory over the inlaid floor. Macha said that what I

had done was like nothing at all, that I had stopped at the very

loveliest part, and that, besides, I had played miserably; he, on the

contrary, insisted that I had never succeeded better than this evening,

and began pacing about restlessly, from the dim drawing-room into the

hall, from the hall back again into the drawing-room, and every time he

passed he looked at me and smiled. I smiled too though without any

reason; I wanted to laugh, so happy was I at what had taken place that

day, at that moment even. While the door hid him from me for an instant

I pounced upon Macha and began to kiss her in my pet place on her soft

throat under her chin, but when he reappeared I was perfectly grave,

although it was hard work to keep from laughing.

“What has happened to her, to-day?” Macha said.

He made no answer, but began to tease and make laughing conjectures. He

knew well enough what had happened to me!

“Just see what a night!” he said presently, from the door of the

drawing-room, opening on the garden balcony.

We went and stood by him, and indeed I never remember such a night. The

full moon shone down upon us from above the house with a glory I have

never seen in her since; the long shadows of the roof, of the slender

columns and tent-shaped awning of the terrace stretched out in oblique

foreshortening, over the gravel walk and part of the large oval of turf.

The rest lay in brilliant light, glistening with dew-drops turned by the

moon’s rays to liquid silver. A wide path, bordered with flowers, was

diagonally cut into at one edge by the shadows of tall dahlias and their

supporting stakes, and then ran on, an unbroken band of white light and

gleaming pebbles until it was lost in the mist of distance. The glass

roof of the orangery sparkled through the trees, and a soft vapor

stealing up the sides of the ravine grew denser every moment. The tufts

of lilac, now partially faded, were pierced through and through by the

light; every slender foot-stalk was visible, and the tiny flowers,

freshened by the dew, could easily be distinguished from each other. In

the paths light and shadow were so blended that one would no longer have

said there were trees and paths, but transparent edifices shaken with

soft vibrations. On the right of the house all was obscure, indistinct,

almost a horror of darkness. But out of it sprang, more resplendent from

the black environment, the fantastic head of a poplar which, by some

strange freak, ended abruptly close above the house in an aureole of

clear light, instead of rising to lose itself in the distant depths of

dark blue sky.

“Let us go to walk,” said I.

Macha consented, but added that I must put on my galoshes.

“It is not necessary,” I said; “Sergius Mikaïlovitch will give me his

arm.”

As if that could keep me from getting my feet wet! But at that moment,

to each of us three, such absurdity was admissible, and caused no

astonishment. He had never given me his arm, and now I took it of my own

accord, and he did not seem surprised. We all three descended to the

terrace. The whole universe, the sky, the garden, the air we breathed,

no longer appeared to me what I had always known.

As I looked ahead of me in the path we were pursuing, I began to fancy

that one could not go beyond, that there the possible world ended, and

that all there would abide forever in its present loveliness.

However, as we went on, this enchanted wall, this barrier built of pure

beauty, receded before us and yielded us passage, and I found myself in

the midst of familiar objects, garden, trees, paths, dry leaves. These

were certainly real paths that we were pursuing, where we crossed

alternate spaces of light and spheres of darkness, where the dry leaves

rustled beneath our feet, and the dewy sprays softly touched my cheek as

we passed. It was really he, who walked by my side with slow, steady

steps and with distant formality, allowed my arm to rest upon his own.

It was the real moon, high in the heavens, whose light came down to us

through the motionless branches.

Once I looked at him. There was only a single linden in the part of the

path we were then following, and I could see his face clearly. He was so

handsome; he looked so happy....

He was saying: “Are you not afraid?” But the words I heard, were: “I

love thee, dear child! I love thee! I love thee!” His look said it, and

his arm said it; the light, the shadow, the air, and all things repeated

it.

We went through the whole garden, Macha walked near us, taking short

steps, and panting a little, she was so tired. She said it was time to

go in, and I was so sorry for the poor creature. “Why does not she feel

like us?” I thought. “Why is not everybody always young and happy? How

full this night is of youth and happiness,—and we too!”

We returned to the house, but it was a long time before Sergius

Mikaïlovitch went away. Macha forgot to remind us that it was late; we

talked of all sorts of things, perhaps trivial enough, sitting side by

side without the least suspicion that it was three o’clock in the

morning. The cocks had crowed for the third time, before he went. He

took leave of us as usual, not saying anything particular. But I could

not doubt that from this day he was mine, and I could no longer lose

him. Now that I recognized that I loved him, I told Macha all. She was

delighted and touched, but the poor woman got no sleep that night; and

as for me, after walking a long, long time up and down the terrace, I

went to the garden again, seeking to recall every word, every incident,

as I wandered through the paths where we had so lately passed together.

I did not go to bed, that night, and, for the first time in my life, I

saw the sun rise and knew what the dawn of day is. Never again have I

seen such a night and such a morning. But I still kept asking myself why

he did not tell me frankly that he loved me. “Why,” thought I, “does he

invent such or such difficulties, why does he consider himself old, when

everything is so simple and so beautiful? Why lose thus a precious time

which perhaps will never return? Let him say that he loves, let him say

it in words, let him take my hand in his, bend down his head and say: “I

love.” Let his face flush, and his eyes fall before me, and then I will

tell him all. Or, rather, I will tell him nothing, I will only hold him

fast in my arms and let my tears flow. But if I am mistaken?—if he does

not love me?” This thought suddenly crossed my mind.

I was terrified by my own feeling. Heaven knows where it might have led

me; already the memory of his confusion and my own when I suddenly

dropped down into the cherry orchard beside him, weighed upon me,

oppressed my heart. The tears filled my eyes, and I began to pray. Then

a thought, a strange thought, came to me, which brought me a great

quietness, and rekindled my hope. This was, the resolution to commence

my devotions, and to choose my birthday as my betrothal day.

How and why? How could it come to pass? That I knew nothing about,—but

from this moment I believed that it would be so. In the meantime, broad

day had come, and every one was rising as I returned to my chamber.

CHAPTER IV.

IT was the Carême de l’Assomption,[3] and consequently no one was

surprised at my commencing a season of devotion.

During this whole week Sergius Mikaïlovitch did not once come to see us,

and far from being surprised, alarmed, or angry with him, I was content,

and did not expect him before my birthday. Throughout this week I rose

very early every day, and while the horses were being harnessed I walked

in the garden, alone, meditating upon the past, and thinking what I must

do in order that the evening should find me satisfied with my day, and

proud of having committed no faults.

When the horses were ready, I entered the droschky, accompanied by Macha

or a maid-servant, and drove about three versts to church. In entering

the church, I never failed to remember that we pray there for all those

“who enter this place in the fear of God,” and I strove to rise to the

level of this thought, above all when my feet first touched the two

grass-grown steps of the porch. At this hour there were not usually in

the church more than ten or a dozen persons, peasants and droroviés,

preparing to make their devotions; I returned their salutations with

marked humility, and went myself, (which I regarded as an act of

superior merit,) to the drawer where the wax tapers were kept, received

a few from the hand of the old soldier who performed the office of

staroste,[4] and placed them before the images. Through the door of the

sanctuary I could see the altar-cloth Mamma had embroidered, and above

the iconstase[5] two angels spangled with stars, which I had considered

magnificent when I was a little girl; and a dove surrounded by a gilded

aureole which, at that same period, often used to absorb my attention.

Behind the choir I caught a glimpse of the embossed fonts near which I

had so often held the children of our droroviés, and where I myself had

received baptism. The old priest appeared, wearing a chasuble cut from

cloth which had been the pall of my father’s coffin, and he intoned the

service in the same voice which, as far back as I could remember, had

chanted the offices of the Church at our house, at Sonia’s baptism, at

my father’s funeral service, at my mother’s burial. In the choir I heard

the familiar cracked voice of the precentor; I saw, as I had always seen

her, a certain old woman, almost bent double, who came to every service,

leaned her back against the wall, and, holding her faded handkerchief in

her tightly clasped hands, gazed with eyes full of tears at one of the

images in the choir, mumbling I knew not what prayers with her toothless

mouth. And all these objects, all these beings,—it was not mere

curiosity or reminiscence which brought them so near to me; all seemed

in my eyes great and holy, all were full of profound meaning.

I lent an attentive ear to every word of the prayers I heard read, I

endeavored to bring my feelings into accord with them, and if I did not

comprehend them, I mentally besought God to enlighten me, or substituted

a petition of my own for that which I had not understood. When the

penitential prayers were read, I recalled my past, and this past of my

innocent childhood appeared to me so black in comparison with the state

of serenity in which my soul was, at this time, that I wept over myself,

terrified; yet I felt that all was forgiven me, and that even if I had

had many more faults to reproach myself with, repentance would only have

been all the sweeter to me.

At the conclusion of the service, at the moment when the priest

pronounced the words: “May the blessing of the Lord our God be upon

you,” I seemed to feel within me, instantaneously communicated to all my

being, a sense of even, as it were, physical comfort, as if a current of

light and warmth had suddenly poured into my very heart.

When the service was over, if the priest approached me to ask if he

should come to our house to celebrate vespers, and what hour would suit

me, I thanked him with emotion for his offer, but told him that I would

come myself to the church either on foot or in the carriage.

“So you will yourself take that trouble?” he asked.

I could not answer, for fear of sinning from pride. Unless Macha was

with me, I sent the carriage home from the church, and returned on foot,

alone, saluting humbly all whom I met, seeking occasion to assist them,

to advise them, to sacrifice myself for them in some way; helping to

lift a load or carry a child, or stepping aside into the mud to yield a

passage.

One evening I heard our intendant, in making his report to Macha, say

that a peasant, Simon, had come to beg for some wood to make a coffin

for his daughter, and for a silver rouble to pay for the mortuary

service, and that his request had been complied with.

“Are they so poor?” I enquired.

“Very poor, my lady; they live without salt,”[6] replied the intendant.

I was distressed, yet, at the same time, in a manner rejoiced to hear

this. Making Macha believe that I was going for a walk, I ran upstairs,

took all my money (it was very little, but it was all I had,) and,

having made the sign of the cross, hurried off, across the terrace and

garden, to Simon’s cottage in the village. It was at the end of the

little cluster of houses, and, unseen by anyone, I approached the

window, laid the money upon the sill and tapped gently. The door opened,

some one came out of the cottage and called to me; but I, cold and

trembling with fear like a criminal, ran away home. Macha asked where I

had been, what was the matter with me? But I did not even understand

what she was saying, and made no reply.

Everything at this moment appeared to me so small, and of so little

consequence! I shut myself up in my chamber, and walked up and down

there alone, for a long time, not feeling disposed to do anything, to

think anything, and incapable of analyzing my own sensations. I imagined

the delight of the whole family, and what they would all say about the

person who had placed the money upon their window, and I began to regret

that I had not given it to them myself. I wondered what Sergius

Mikaïlovitch would have said, if he had known what I had done, and I was

delighted to think that he never would know it. And I was so seized with

joy, so filled with a sense of the imperfection in myself and in all,

yet so inclined to view with gentleness all these others, as well as

myself, that the thought of death offered itself to me as a vision of

bliss. I smiled, I prayed, I wept, and at this instant I suddenly loved

every creature in the world, and I loved myself with a strange ardor.

Searching my prayer-book, I read many passages from the Gospel, and all

that I read in this volume became more and more intelligible; the story

of that divine life, appeared to me more touching and simple, while the

depth of feeling and of thought revealed to me, in this reading, became

more terrible and impenetrable. And how clear and easy everything

seemed, when, on laying aside the book, I looked at my life and

meditated upon it. It seemed impossible not to live aright, and very

simple to love every one and to be loved by every one. Besides, every

one was good and gentle to me, even Sonia, whom I continued to teach,

and who had become totally different, who really made an effort to

understand, and to satisfy me, and give me no annoyance. What I was

trying to be to others, others were to me.

Passing then to my enemies, from whom I must obtain forgiveness before

the great day, I could not think of any except one young lady in the

neighborhood, whom I had laughed at before some company, about a year

before, and who had ceased to visit at our house. I wrote a letter to

her, acknowledging my fault, and begging her pardon. She responded by

fully granting it, and asking mine in return. I shed tears of pleasure

while reading these frank lines, which seemed to me full of deep and

touching sentiment. My maid wept when I asked her pardon also. Why were

they all so good to me? How had I deserved so much affection? I asked

myself. Involuntarily I began to think about Sergius Mikaïlovitch. I

could not help it, and besides I did not consider it a light or

frivolous diversion. True I was not thinking about him at all as I had

done on that night when, for the first time, I found out that I loved

him; I was thinking of him just as of myself, linking him, in spite of

myself, with every plan and idea of my future. The dominating influence

which his presence had exercised over me, faded away completely in my

imagination. I felt myself to-day his equal, and, from the summit of the

ideal edifice whence I was looking down, I had full comprehension of

him. Whatever in him had previously appeared strange to me was now

intelligible. To-day, for the first time, I could appreciate the thought

he had expressed to me, that happiness consists in living for others,

and to-day I felt in perfect unison with him. It appeared to me that we

two were to enjoy a calm and illimitable happiness. No thought entered

my mind of journeys to foreign lands, guests at home, excitement, stir,

and gayety; it was to be a peaceful existence, a home life in the

country, perpetual abnegation of one’s own will, perpetual love for each

other, perpetual and absolute thankfulness to a loving and helpful

Providence.

I concluded my devotions, as I had purposed, upon the anniversary of my

birth. My heart was so overflowing with happiness, that day, when I

returned from church, that there resulted all kinds of dread of life,

fear of every feeling, terrors of whatever might disturb this happiness.

But we had scarcely descended from the droschky to the steps before the

house, when I heard the well-known sound of his cabriolet upon the

bridge, and in a moment Sergius Mikaïlovitch was with us. He offered me

his congratulations, and we went into the drawing-room together. Never

since I had known him, had I found myself so calm, so independent in his

presence, as upon this morning. I felt that I bore within myself an

entire new world, which he did not comprehend and which was superior to

him. I did not feel the least agitation in his society. He may, however,

have understood what was passing within me, for his gentleness to me was

peculiarly delicate, almost, as it were, a religious deference. I was

going towards the piano, but he locked it and put the key in his pocket,

saying:

“Do not spoil the state of mind I see you are in; there is sounding, at

this moment, in the depths of your soul, a music which no harmony of

this earth can approach!”

I was grateful to him for this thought, yet, at the same time, it was a

little displeasing to me that he should thus understand, too easily, and

too clearly, what was to remain secret from all, in the kingdom of my

soul.

After dinner he said that he had come to bring me his congratulations

and to say farewell, as he was going to Moscow on the following day. He

was looking at Macha when he said this, but he gave me a quick

side-glance as if he was afraid of noticing some emotion upon my

countenance. But I showed neither surprise nor agitation, and did not

even ask if his absence would be long. I knew that he said so, but I

knew that he was not going. How? I cannot, now, explain it in the least;

but on this memorable day it appeared to me that I knew all that had

been, and all that would be. I was in a mood akin to one of those happy

dreams, where one has a kind of luminous vision of both the future and

the past.

He had intended going immediately after dinner, but Macha had left the

table, to take her siesta, and he was obliged to wait until she awoke in

order to take leave of her.

The sun was shining full into the drawing-room, and we went out upon the

terrace. We were scarcely seated, when I entered upon the conversation

which was to decide the fate of my love. I began to speak, neither

sooner nor later, but at the first moment that found us face to face

alone, when nothing else had been said, when nothing had stolen into the

tone and general character of the conversation which might hinder or

embarrass what I wished to say. I cannot myself comprehend whence came

the calmness, the resolution, the precision of my words. One would have

said that it was not I who was talking, and that something—I know not

what—independent of my own volition, was making me speak. He was seated

opposite to me, and, having drawn down to him a branch of lilac, began

to pluck off its leaves. When I opened my lips, he let go the little

branch, and covered his face with his hand. This might be the attitude

of a man who was perfectly calm, or that of a man yielding to great

agitation.

“Why are you going away?” I began, in a resolute tone; then stopped, and

looked him straight in the eyes.

He did not reply at once.

“Business!” he articulated, looking down on the ground.

I saw that it was difficult for him to dissemble in answering a question

I put so frankly.

“Listen,” said I, “you know what this day is to me. In many ways it is a

great day. If I question you, it is not only to show my interest in you

(you know I am used to you, and fond of you), I question you because I

must know. Why are you going away?”

“It is excessively difficult to tell you the truth, to tell you why I am

going away. During this week I have thought a great deal of you and of

myself, and I have decided that it is necessary for me to go. You

understand ... why? And if you love me, do not question me!”

He passed his hand across his brow, and, covering his eyes again with

the same hand, he added:

“This is painful to me.... But you understand, Katia!”

My heart began to beat hard in my breast.

“I cannot understand,” said I, “I cannot do it; but you, speak to me, in

the name of God, in the name of this day, speak to me, I can hear

everything calmly.”

He changed his attitude, looked at me, and caught the branch of lilac

again.

“Well,” he resumed, after a moment’s silence, in a voice which vainly

struggled to appear firm, “though it may be absurd, and almost

impossible to translate into words, and though it will cost me much, I

will try to explain to you;”—and as he uttered the words there were

lines on his brow, as if he was suffering physical pain.

“Go on,” I said.

“You must suppose there is a gentleman,—A. we will call him,—old, weary

of existence; and a lady,—Madame B. we will say,—young, happy, and as

yet knowing neither the world nor life. In consequence of family

relations A. loved B. like a daughter, with no fear of coming to love

her differently.”

He was silent, and I did not interrupt him.

“But,” he suddenly pursued, in a brief, resolute voice, without looking

at me, “he had forgotten that B. was young, that for her life was still

but a game, that it might easily happen that he might love her, and that

B. might amuse herself with him. He deceived himself, and one fine day

he found that another feeling, weighty to bear as remorse, had stolen

into his soul, and he was startled. He dreaded to see their old friendly

relations thus compromised, and he decided to go away before these had

time to change their nature.”

As he spoke, he again with seeming carelessness passed his hand across

his eyes, and covered them.

“And why did he fear to love differently?” I said, presently, in a

steady voice, controlling my emotion; but no doubt this seemed to him

mere playful banter, for he answered with the air of a deeply wounded

man:

“You are young; I am no longer so. Playing may please you, for me more

is necessary. Only, do not play with me, for I assure you it will do me

no good,—and you might find it weigh on your conscience! That is what A.

said,” he added,—“but all this is nonsense; you understand, now, why I

am going; let us say no more about it, I beg you....”

“Yes, yes, let us speak of it!” said I, and tears made my voice tremble.

“Did she love him or not?”

He did not reply.

“And if he did not love her,” I continued, “why did he play with her as

if she were a child?”

“Yes, yes, A. had been culpable,” he replied interrupting me; “but all

that is over, and they have parted from each other ... good friends!”

“But this is frightful! And is there no other end?” I exclaimed,

terrified at what I was saying.

“Yes, there is one.” And he uncovered his agitated face, and looked at

me steadily. “There are even two other ends, quite different. But, for

the love of God, do not interrupt me, and listen to me quietly. Some

say,” he went on, rising, and giving a forced, sad smile, “some say that

A. went mad, that he loved B. with an insane love, and that he told her

so.... But that she only laughed at him. For her the matter had been but

a jest, a trifle; for him,—the one thing in his life!”

I shivered, and would have broken in, to tell him that he should not

dare to speak for me; but he stopped me, and, laying his hand upon mine:

“Wait!” he said, in a shaking voice: “others say that she was sorry for

him, that she fancied—poor little girl, knowing nothing of the

world—that she might actually love him, and that she consented to be his

wife. And he—madman—he believed,—believed that all his life was

beginning again; but she herself became conscious that she was deceiving

him and that he was deceiving her.... Let us talk no more about it!” he

concluded, indeed evidently incapable of farther speech, and he silently

sat down again opposite me.

He had said, “Let us talk no more about it,” but it was manifest that

with all the strength of his soul he was waiting for a word from me.

Indeed I tried to speak, and could not; something stopped my breath. I

looked at him, he was pale, and his lower lip was trembling. I was very

sorry for him. I made another effort, and suddenly succeeding in

breaking the silence which paralyzed me. I said, in a slow, concentrated

voice, fearing every moment it would fail me:

“There is a third end to the story” (I stopped, but he remained silent),

“and this other end is that he did not love her, that he hurt her, hurt

her cruelly, that he believed he was right to do it, that he ... that he

went away, and that, moreover, moreover, he was proud of it. It is not

on my side, but on yours, that the trifling has been, from the first day

I loved you; I loved you,” I repeated, and at the word “loved” my voice

involuntarily changed from its tone of slow concentration to a kind of

wild cry which appalled myself.

He was standing up before me, very pale, his lip trembled more and more,

and I saw two heavy tears making their way down his cheeks.

“This is dreadful!”—I could barely get out the words, choked with anger

and unshed tears.—“And why?...” I jumped up hastily, to run away.

But he sprang towards me. In a moment his head was upon my knees, my

trembling hands were pressed again and again to his lips, and I felt hot

drops falling upon them.

“My God, if I had known!” he was murmuring.

“Why? why?” I repeated mechanically, my soul in the grasp of that

transport which seizes, possesses, and flies forever, that rapture which

returns no more.

Five minutes afterwards, Sonia went dashing upstairs to Macha, and all

over the house, crying out that Katia was going to marry Sergius

Mikaïlovitch.

CHAPTER V.

THERE was no reason to delay our marriage, and neither he nor I desired

to do so. It is true that Macha longed to go to Moscow to order my

trousseau, and Sergius’ mother considered it incumbent upon him before

marrying to buy a new carriage and more furniture and have the whole

house renovated, but we both insisted that this could all be done quite

as well afterwards, and that we would be married at the end of the

fortnight succeeding my birthday, without trousseau, parade, guests,

groomsmen, supper, champagne, or any of the traditional attributes of a

wedding. He told me that his mother was unwilling to have the great

event take place without the music, the avalanche of trunks, the

refurnished house, which, at a cost of thirty thousand roubles, had

accompanied her own marriage; and how, without his knowledge, she had

ransacked for treasures all the chests in the lumber rooms, and held

sober consultations with Mariouchka, the housekeeper, on the subject of

certain new carpets and curtains, quite indispensable to our happiness.

On our side, Macha was similarly employed, with my maid Kouzminicha. She

could not be laughed out of this; being firmly persuaded that when

Sergius and I ought to have been discussing our future arrangements, we

wasted our time in soft speeches (as was perhaps natural in our

position); while of course, in fact, the very substance of our future

happiness was dependent upon the cut and embroidery of my dresses, and

the straight hems on our table-cloths and napkins. Between Pokrovski and

Nikolski, every day and several times a day, mysterious communications

were exchanged as to the progressing preparations; and though apparently

Macha and the bridegroom’s mother were upon the tenderest terms, one

felt sure of the constant passage of shafts of keen and hostile

diplomacy between the two powers.

Tatiana Semenovna, his mother, with whom I now became more fully

acquainted, was a woman of the old school, starched and stiff, and a

severe mistress. Sergius loved her, not only from duty as a son, but

also with the sentiment of a man who saw in her the best, the most

intelligent, the tenderest, and the most amiable woman in the world.

Tatiana had always been cordial and kind to us, particularly to me, and

she was delighted that her son should marry; but as soon as I became

betrothed to him it appeared to me that she wished to make me feel that

he might have made a better match, and that I ought never to forget the

fact. I perfectly understood her, and was entirely of her opinion.

During these last two weeks, Sergius and I saw each other every day; he

always dined with us and remained until midnight; but, though he often

told me—and I knew he was telling the truth—that he could not now live

without me, yet he never spent the whole day with me, and even, after a

fashion, continued to attend to his business matters. Our outward

relations, up to the very time of our marriage, were exactly what they

had been; we still said “you” to each other, he did not even kiss my

hand, and not only did he not seek, but he actually avoided occasions of

finding himself alone with me, as if he feared giving himself up too

much to the great and dangerous love he bore in his heart.

All these days the weather was bad, and we spent most of them in the

drawing-room; our conversations being held in the corner between the

piano and the window.

“Do you know that there is one thing I have been wishing to say to you

for a long time?” he said, late one evening, when we were alone in our

corner. “I have been thinking of it, all the time you have been at the

piano.”

“Tell me nothing, I know all,” I replied.

“Well then, we will say no more about it.”

“Oh, yes, indeed, tell me; what is it?” I asked.

“It is this. You remember me telling you that story about A. and B.?”

“As if I could help remembering that foolish story! How lucky that it

has ended so....”

“A little more, and I would have destroyed my happiness with my own

hand; you saved me; but the thing is, that I was not truthful with you,

then; it has been on my conscience, and now I wish to tell you all.”

“Ah, please do not!”

“Do not be afraid,” he said, smiling, “it is only that I must justify

myself. When I began to talk to you, I wished to debate the question.”

“Why debate?” said I, “that is never necessary.”

He looked at me in silence, then went on.

“In regard to the end of that story,—what I said to you, then, was not

nonsense; clearly there was something to fear, and I was right to fear

it. To receive everything from you, and give you so little! You are yet

a child, yet an unexpanded flower, you love for the first time, while

I....”

“Oh, yes, tell me the truth!” I exclaimed. But all at once I was afraid

of his answer. “No, do not tell me!” I added.

“Whether I have loved before? is that it?” he said, instantly divining

my thought. “It is easy to tell you that. No, I have not loved. Never

has such a feeling.... So, do you not see how imperative it was for me

to reflect, before telling you that I loved you? What am I giving you?

Love, it is true....”

“Is that so little?” I asked, looking into his face.

“Yes, that is little, my darling, little for you. You have beauty and

youth. Often, at night, I cannot sleep for happiness; I am incessantly

thinking how we are going to live together. I have already lived much,

yet it seems to me that I have but just now come to the knowledge of

what makes happiness. A sweet, tranquil life, in our retired corner,

with the possibility of doing good to those to whom it is so easy to do

it, and who, nevertheless, are so little used to it; then work,—work,

whence, you know, some profit always springs; recreation, also, nature,

books, music, the affection of some congenial friend; there is my

happiness, a happiness higher than I ever dreamed of. And beyond all

that, a loved one like you, perhaps a family; in one word, all that a

man can desire in this world!”

“Yes,” said I.

“For me, whose youth is done, yes; but for you ...” he continued. “You

have not yet lived; perhaps you might have wished to pursue your

happiness in some other path, and in some other path perhaps you might

have found it. At present it seems to you that what I speak of is indeed

happiness, because you love me....”

“No, I have never desired nor liked any but this sweet home life. And

you have just said precisely what I think, myself.”

He smiled.

“It seems so to you, my darling. But that is little for you. You have

beauty and youth,” he repeated, thoughtfully.

I was beginning to feel provoked at seeing that he would not believe me,

and that in a certain way he was reproaching me with my beauty and my

youth.

“Come now, why do you love me?” I asked, rather hotly: “for my youth or

for myself?”

“I do not know, but I do love,” he replied, fixing upon me an observant

look, full of alluring sweetness.

I made no response, but involuntarily met his eyes. All at once, a

strange thing happened to me. I ceased to see what was around me, his

face itself disappeared from before me, and I could distinguish nothing

but the fire of the eyes exactly opposite mine; then it seemed to me

that these eyes themselves were piercing into me, then all became

confused, I could no longer see anything at all, and I was obliged to

half close my eyelids to free myself from the mingled sensation of joy

and terror produced by this look.

Towards evening of the day previous to that appointed for our marriage,

the weather cleared. After the heavy continuous rains of the summer we

had the first brilliant autumnal sunset. The sky was pure, rigid, and

pale. I went to sleep, happy in the thought that the next day would be

bright, for our wedding. I woke in the morning with the sun upon me, and

with the thought that here already was the day ... as if it astonished

and frightened me. I went to the garden. The sun had just risen, and was

shining through the linden-trees, whose yellow leaves were floating down

and strewing the paths. There was not one cloud to be seen in the cold

serene sky.

“Is it possible that it is to-day?” I asked myself, not venturing to

believe in my own happiness. “Is it possible that to-morrow I shall not

wake here, that I shall open my eyes in that house of Nikolski, with its

columns, in a place now all strange to me! Is it possible that

henceforward I shall not be expecting him, shall not be going to meet

him, shall not talk about him any more in the evenings, with Macha?

Shall I no longer sit at the piano in our drawing-room at Pokrovski,

with him beside me? Shall I no longer see him go away, and tremble with

fear for him because the night is dark?” But I remembered that he had

told me, the night before, that it was his last visit; and, besides,

Macha had made me try on my wedding-dress. So that, by moments, I would

believe, and then doubt again. Was it really true that this very day I

was to begin to live with a mother-in-law, without Nadine, without old

Gregory, without Macha? That at night I would not embrace my old nurse,

and hear her say, making the sign of the cross, as she always did;

“Good-night, my young lady?” That I would no longer hear Sonia’s

lessons, or play with her, or rap on the partition wall in the morning

and hear her gay laugh? Was it possible that it was really to-day that I

was to become, in a measure, an alien to myself, and that a new life,

realizing my hopes and my wishes, was opening before me? And was it

possible that this new life, just beginning, was to be for ever? I

waited impatiently for Sergius, so hard it was for me to remain alone

with these thoughts. He came early, and it was only when he was actually

there that I was sure that to-day I was really going to be his wife, and

no longer felt frightened at the thought.

Before dinner we went to church, to hear the service for the dead, in

commemoration of my father.

“Oh, if he were still in this world!” thought I, as I was returning

home, leaning silently on the arm of the man who had been his dearest

friend. While the prayers were being read, kneeling with my brow pressed

upon the cold flag-stones of the chapel floor, my father had been so

vividly brought before my mind, that I could not help believing that he

comprehended me and blessed my choice, and I imagined that, at the

moment, his soul was hovering above us, and that his benediction rested

upon me. These remembrances, these hopes, my happiness and my regrets,

blended within me into a feeling at once solemn and sweet, which seemed,

as it were, to be set in a frame of clear quiet air, stillness, bare

fields, pale heavens whose brilliant but enfeebled rays vainly strove to

bring the color to my cheek. I persuaded myself that my companion was

understanding and sharing my feelings. He walked with slow steps, in

silence, and his face, which I glanced into from time to time, bore the

impress of that intense state of the soul, which is neither sadness nor

joy, and which perfectly harmonized with surrounding nature and with my

heart.

All at once, he turned towards me, and I saw that he had something to

say to me. What if he were not going to speak of what was in my

thoughts? But without even naming him he spoke of my father, and added:

“One day he happened to say to me, laughingly, ‘You will marry my little

Katia!’”

“How glad he would have been, to-day,” I responded, pressing closer to

the arm on which I leaned.

“Yes, you were then but a child,” he went on, looking deep into my eyes;

“I kissed those eyes and loved them simply because they were so like

his, and I was far from thinking that one day they would be so dear to

me in themselves.”

We were still walking slowly along the field-path, scarcely traceable

among the trodden and scattered stubble, and heard no sound save our own

footsteps and voices. The sun poured down floods of light that gave no

warmth. When we spoke, our voices seemed to resound and hang suspended

above our heads in the motionless atmosphere. We might have thought we

two were alone upon the earth, alone beneath that blue vault vibrating

with cold scintillations from the sun.

When we arrived at the house, we found his mother already there, with

the few guests whom we had felt obliged to invite, and I was not again

alone with him until we had left the church and were in the carriage on

our way to Nikolski.

The church had been almost empty. At one glance I had seen his mother,

standing near the choir; Macha, with her wet cheeks and lilac

cap-ribbons; and two or three droroviés, who were gazing at me with

curious eyes. I heard the prayers, I repeated them, but they had no

meaning for me. I could not pray, myself, I only kept looking stupidly

at the images, the wax tapers, the cross embroidered on the chasuble the

priest had on, the iconostase, the church windows, but did not seem able

to understand anything at all; I only felt that something very

extraordinary was being done to me. When the priest turned towards us

with the cross, when he gave us his congratulations, and said that he

had baptized me and that now God had permitted him also to marry me;

when Macha and Sergius’ mother embraced us, when I heard Gregory’s voice

calling the carriage, I was astonished and frightened at the thought

that all was finished, though no marvellous change, corresponding with

the sacrament which had just been performed over me, had taken place in

my soul. We kissed each other, and this kiss appeared to me so odd, so

out of keeping with ourselves, that I could not help thinking: “It is

only that?” We went out upon the parvise, the noise of the wheels echoed

loudly within the arch of the church; I felt the fresh air upon my face,

and was conscious that, Sergius with his hat under his arm, had assisted

me into the carriage. Through the window I saw that the moon was shining

in her place in the frosty sky. He took his seat beside me, and shut the

door. Something, at this moment, seemed to strike through my heart, as

if the assurance with which he did this had given me a wound. The wheels

glanced against a stone, then began to revolve upon the smooth road, and

we were gone. Drawn back into a corner of the carriage, I watched the

fields flooded with light, and the flying road. Nevertheless, without

looking at him, I was feeling that there he was, beside me. “Here, then,

is all that this first moment from which I have expected so much, brings

me?” I thought, and all at once I had a sense of humiliation and offence

at finding myself seated thus alone with him and so close to him. I

turned towards him, intending to say something, no matter what. But no

word would come from my lips; one would have said that no trace of my

former tenderness lingered within my heart, but that it was entirely

replaced by this impression of alarm and offence.

“Up to this moment, I still dared not believe that this might be!” he

softly responded to my glance. “And I ... I am afraid ... I know not

why!”

“Afraid of me, Katia?” he said, taking my hand, and bending his head

over it.

My hand rested within his, lifeless; my heart stopped beating.

“Yes,” I murmured.

But, at the same moment, my heart suddenly began to beat again, my hand

trembled and clasped his, warmth returned to me; my eyes, in the dim

light, sought his eyes, and I felt, all at once, that I was no longer

afraid of him; that this terror had been but a new love, yet more tender

and strong than the old. I knew that I was wholly his, and that I was

happy to be wholly in his power.

CHAPTER VI.

THE days, the weeks, two entire months of lonely country life slipped

away, imperceptibly, it appeared to us; but the sensations, the

emotions, and the happiness of these two months would have sufficed to

fill a whole life. My dreams, and his, concerning the mode of organizing

our joint existence were not realized exactly as we had anticipated.

But, nevertheless, the reality was not below our dreams. This was not

the life of strict industry, full of duties, abnegation, and sacrifices,

which I had pictured to myself when I became his betrothed; on the

contrary, it was the absorbing and egotistical sentiment of love, joys

without reason and without end, oblivion of everything in the world. He

would, it is true, sometimes retire to his study and occupy himself with

something demanding attention; sometimes he went to the city on

business, or overlooked his agricultural matters; but I could see how

hard it was for him to tear himself away from me. Indeed, he himself

said that whenever I was not present, things appeared to him so devoid

of interest that the wonder was that he could attend to them at all. It

was precisely the same on my side. I read, I busied myself with my

music, with Mamma, with the schools; but I only did so because all these

employments were in some way connected with him, and met with his

approbation, and the instant the thought of him ceased to be in some

manner, direct or indirect, associated with anything whatever that I was

doing, I would stop doing it. To me, he was the only person in the

universe, the handsomest, noblest human being in the wide world; of

course, therefore, I could live for nothing but him, could strive for

nothing but to remain in his eyes what he considered me. For he honestly

considered me the first and highest of women, gifted with every

excellence and charm; and my one aim was to be in reality for him this

highest and most complete of all existing creatures.

Ours was one of those old country homes, where generation after

generation of ancestors had lived, loved each other, and peacefully

passed away. The very walls seemed to breathe out happy household

memories, and no sooner had I set my foot upon the threshold, than these

all appeared to become memories of my own. The arrangement and order of

the dwelling were old-fashioned, carefully kept so by Tatiania

Semenovna. No one could have said that anything was handsome or elegant,

but everything, from the attendance to the furniture and the food, was

proper, solid, regular, and seemed to inspire respect. In the

drawing-room, tables, chairs, and divans were symmetrically ranged, the

walls were hidden by family portraits, and the floor was covered with

ancient rugs and immense landscapes in linen. In the small parlor there

was an old grand piano, two chiffoniers of different shapes, a divan,

and one or two tables decorated with wrought copper. My private room,

adorned by Tatiana Semenovna, was honored with all the finest pieces of

furniture, irrespective of varying styles and dates, and, among the

rest, with an old mirror with doors, which at first I hardly dared to

raise my eyes to, but which afterwards became like a dear old friend to

me. Tatiana’s voice was never heard, but the household went on with the

regularity of a well-wound clock, although there were many more servants

than were necessary. But all these servants, wearing their soft heelless

slippers (for Tatiana Semenovna insisted that creaking soles and

pounding heels were, of all things in the world, the most disagreeable),

all these servants appeared proud of their condition, trembling before

the old lady, showing to my husband and me a protecting good-will, and

seeming to take special satisfaction in the discharge of their

respective duties. Every Saturday, regularly, the floors were scoured,

and the carpets shaken; on the first day of every month, a Te Deum was

chanted, and holy water sprinkled; while upon every recurring fête-day

of Tatiana Semenovna and her son, and now also upon mine (which took

place this autumn, for the first time), a feast was given to all the

neighborhood. And all this was performed precisely as in the oldest

times that Tatiana Semenovna could remember.

My husband interfered in nothing concerning the management of the house,

confining himself to the control of the estate, and the affairs of the

peasants, which fully occupied him.

He rose very early, even during the winter, so that he was always gone

when I woke. He generally returned for tea, which we took alone

together; and at these times, having finished the troubles and

annoyances of his agricultural matters, he would often fall into that

particularly joyous light-hearted state of mind, which we used to call

le transport sauvage. Often, when I asked him to tell me what he had

been doing all the morning, he would relate such perfectly absurd

adventures, that we would almost die of laughing; sometimes when I

demanded a sober account, he would give it to me, making an effort to

restrain even a smile. As for me, I watched his eyes, or the motion of

his lips, and did not understand a word he said, being entirely taken up

with the pleasure of looking at him and hearing his voice.

“Come, now, what was I saying?” he would ask; “repeat it to me!”

But I never could repeat any of it.

Tatiana Semenovna never made her appearance until dinner time, taking

her tea alone, and only sending an ambassador to wish us good-morning. I

always found it hard not to burst out laughing, when the maid entered,

took her stand before us with her hands crossed one upon the other, and,

in her measured tones informed us that Tatiana Semenovna desired to know

whether we had slept well, and whether we liked the little cakes we had

for tea. Until dinner time we seldom remained together. I played, or

read, alone; he wrote, or sometimes went out again; but at four o’clock

we went down to the drawing-room for dinner. Mamma came out of her

chamber, and then the poor gentle-folk and pilgrims who happened to be

lodging in the house, usually two or three in number made their

appearance. Regularly every day my husband, following the ancient

custom, offered his arm to his mother, to conduct her to the

dining-room, and she requested him to take me upon his other arm. Mamma

presided at dinner, and the conversation was of a serious, thoughtful

turn, not altogether without a shade of solemnity. The simple every-day

talk between my husband and myself was the only agreeable diversion in

the grave aspect of these table sessions. After dinner, Mamma took her

seat in a large arm-chair in the salon, and cut open the leaves of any

newly-arrived books; we read aloud, or went to the piano in the small

drawing-room. We read a great deal together during those two months, but

music continued to be our supreme enjoyment, for every day it seemed to

strike some new chord in our hearts, whose vibrations revealed us to

each other more and more wholly. When I was playing his favorite airs he

retired to a divan at some distance, where I could scarcely see him, and

with a kind of modesty of sentiment tried to conceal from me the emotion

my music produced; but, often, when he least expected it, I rose from

the piano and ran to him, to try to surprise upon his countenance the

traces of this deep feeling and to catch the almost supernatural light

in the humid eyes which he vainly strove to conceal from me. I presided

over our late tea in the large drawing-room, again all the family were

gathered round the table, and for a long time this formal assembling

near the samovar, as in a tribunal, with the distribution of the cups

and glasses, discomposed me very much. It always seemed to me that I was

not yet worthy of these honors, that I was too young, too giddy, to turn

the faucet of that stately samovar, set the cups on Nikita’s tray and

say: “For Peter Ivanovitch; for Maria Minichna,” and ask: “Is it sweet

enough?” And afterwards give out the lumps of sugar for the white-haired

nurse and the other old servants. “Perfect, perfect,” my husband would

often tell me; “quite a grown-up person!” and then I would feel more

intimidated than ever.

After tea Mamma played patience, or she and Maria Minichna had a game of

cards together; then she embraced us both and gave us her blessing, and

we withdrew to our own apartment. There, however, our evening

tête-à-tête was usually prolonged until midnight, for these were our

pleasantest hours in the twenty-four. He told me about his past life, we

made plans, occasionally we philosophized, all the time talking in a low

tone lest we might be overheard. We lived, he and I, almost upon the

footing of strangers in this huge old house, where everything seemed to

be weighed upon by the severe spirit of ancient times and of Tatiana

Semenovna. Not only she herself, but also the servants, all these old

men and women, the furniture, the pictures, all inspired me with respect

and a kind of fear, and at the same time with the consciousness that my

husband and I were not exactly in our own place there and that our

conduct must be extremely circumspect. As well as I remember, now, this

severe order and the prodigious number of idle, inquisitive men and

women about our house were very hard to bear: but even this sense of

oppression only served to vivify our mutual love. Not only I, but he

also, made an effort not to let it be seen that anything in our home was

displeasing to us. Sometimes this calmness, this indulgence, this

seeming indifference to everything, irritated me, and I could not help

looking upon such conduct as weakness, and telling him so.

“Ah, dear Katia,” he replied, once, when I was expressing my annoyance,

“how can a man show that anything, no matter what, is displeasing to

him, when he is as happy as I am? It is a great deal easier to yield,

than to make them yield, I have long been convinced of that,—and,

moreover, of the fact there is no situation where one cannot be happy.

Everything goes so well with us! I do not even know, any longer, how to

get angry; for me, just now, there is nothing at all that is bad, there

are only things that are either dull or droll. But, above all, ‘let well

enough alone.’ You may hardly believe me, but whenever I hear a ring at

the door-bell, whenever I receive a letter, actually whenever I wake in

the morning, a fear takes hold of me, fear of the obligations of life,

fear that something may be going to change; for nothing could be better

than this present moment!”

I believed him, but I could not understand him. I was happy, but it

seemed to me that all was as it ought to be, and could not be otherwise;

that it was the same with every one else, and that somewhere there were

other joys still, not greater ones, but quite different.

Thus two months passed by, bringing us to the cold, stormy winter, and

although he was with me, I began to feel somewhat alone; I began to feel

that life was doing nothing but repeating itself, as it were; that it

offered nothing new either for me or for him; that, on the contrary, we

seemed to be forever treading over and over again in our own footsteps.

He was more frequently occupied with business matters away from me, than

he had been at first, and once more I had the old feeling that far down

in his soul lay a world, hidden and reserved, to which he would not

admit me. His unalterable serenity irritated me. I loved him no less

than formerly, was no less happy in his love; but my love remained

stationary and did not seem to grow any more, and besides this love a

new sentiment, full of anxiety, came creeping into my heart. Continuing

to love seemed to me so small a thing after that great transport of

first loving him; I felt as if my sentiments ought to include agitation,

danger, sacrifice of myself. There were in me exuberant forces finding

no employment in our tranquil existence, fits of depression which I

sought to conceal from him as something wicked, fits of impetuous

tenderness and gaiety which only alarmed him. He still had his old habit

of watching me and studying my moods, and one day he came to me with a

proposal to move to the city for a time; but I begged him not to go, not

to alter anything whatever in our mode of life, not to touch our

happiness. And, really and truly, I was happy; but I was tormenting

myself because this happiness brought me no labor, no sacrifice, while,

I felt all the powers of sacrifice and labor dying away within me. I

loved him, I knew that I was entirely his; but I wished every one to see

our love, wished that some one would try to prevent my loving him,—and

then to love him all the same! My mind, and even my sentiments, found

their field of action, but yet there was something—the sense of youth,

with its need of movement—which had no sufficient satisfaction in our

placid life. Why did he tell me that we could go to the city whenever

the fancy seized me to do so? If he had not said this, perhaps I might

have understood that the feeling which oppressed me was a pernicious

chimera, a fault of which I was guilty.... But the thought kept coming

into my head that simply by going to the city, I could escape from my

ennui; but then, on the other hand, this would be withdrawing him from a

life that he loved; I was ashamed to do this, but it cost me something

not to do it.

Time went on, the snow piled higher and higher against the walls of the

house, and we were always alone, still alone, always with each other,

while away yonder,—I knew not where, but yonder somewhere,—in stir and

motion, in splendor and excitement, was the crowd, feeling, suffering,

rejoicing, amusing itself, without one thought of us and our vanished

existence. Worst of all to me was the consciousness that day by day the

chain of habit was binding and pressing our life closer into its narrow

mould, that our love itself would enter into bondage and become subject

to the monotonous and dispassionate law of time. To be cheerful in the

morning, respectful at dinner, affectionate in the evening! “To do

good!” I said to myself, it is all very well and admirable to do good,

and to live a worthy life, as he says; but we have yet time enough for

that; there are other things for which, to-day, I feel powers within me.

This is not what I wanted; what I wanted was combat, struggle; was to

feel that love is our guide in life, not that life guides our love. I

could have wished to draw near to the abyss with him, to say to him:

“One more step, and I dash myself down, one more movement and I perish;”

he, while paling on the brink of this abyss, he would have seized me

with his powerful hand, held me there suspended above the gulf, my heart

faint with fear,—and then he might have borne me whithersoever he would!

This mood of my soul began to tell upon my health, my nerves began to be

out of order. One morning I felt even more upset than usual, and Sergius

returned home in rather a bad temper, which was an extremely rare

occurrence with him; I noticed it at once, and asked him what was the

matter, but he would not tell me, only remarking that it was not worth

while. As I afterwards learned, the ispravnik,[7] from ill-will to my

husband, had summoned several peasants, made some illegal exaction of

them, and had even uttered menaces against him. My husband had not yet

been able to look into the matter and, moreover, as it was but a piece

of absurd impertinence he had not cared to tell me of it; but I imagined

that his not telling me was because he considered me a child, and that

in his eyes I was incapable of understanding what interested him. I

turned from him in silence, without saying a word; he went into his

study, gravely, and shut his door after him. When I could no longer hear

him, I sat down on a divan, almost crying. “Why,” said I to myself,

“does he persist in humiliating me by his solemn calmness, by being

always in the right? Am I not in the right also, when I am wearied, when

everywhere I feel emptiness, when I long to live, to move, not to stay

forever in one place and feel time walk over me? I wish to go onward,

each day, each hour; I wish for something new, while he,—he wants to

stand still in one spot, and keep me standing there with him! And yet

how easy it would be for him to satisfy me! He need not take me to the

city, it would only be necessary for him to be a little like me, for him

to stop trying to constrain and crush himself with his own hands, for

him to live naturally. That is what he is always advising me, and it is

he who is not natural, that is all.”

I felt my tears getting the mastery of me, and my irritation against him

increasing. I was afraid of this irritation, and I went to find him. He

was sitting in his study, writing. Hearing my steps, he turned for an

instant, looked at me with a calm and indifferent air, and continued

writing; this look did not please me, and instead of going up to him, I

stopped near the table where he was writing and, opening a book, began

to run my eyes over the page. He turned then, a second time, and looked

at me again:

“Katia, you are not as bright as usual!”

I only responded by a cold glance, meant to convey: “And why? And why so

much amiability?” He shook his head at me, and smiled timidly and

tenderly; but, for the first time, my smile would not answer his.

“What was the matter with you this morning?” I asked, “why would you

tell me nothing?”

“It was a trifle! a slight worry,” he replied. “I can tell you all about

it, now. Two peasants had been summoned to the city....”

But I would not let him finish.

“Why did you not tell me when I asked you?”

“I might have said something foolish, I was angry then.”

“That was just the time to tell me.”

“And why so?”

“What you think, then, is that I never can help you in anything?”

“What I think?” said he, throwing down his pen. “I think that without

you I could not live. In all things, in all, not only are you a help to

me, but it is by you that everything is done. You are literally to me

‘well-fallen,’” he went on smiling. “It is in you alone that I live; it

seems to me nothing is good but because you are there, because you

must....”

“Yes, I know it, I am a nice little child who has to be petted and kept

quiet,” said I, in such a tone that he looked at me in amazement. “But I

do not want this quieting; I have had enough of it!”

“Come, let me tell you about this morning’s trouble,” he said hastily,

as if he was afraid to give me time to say more: “let us see what you

think of it!”

“I do not wish to hear it now,” I replied.

I really did want to hear it, but it was more agreeable to me, at this

moment, to disturb his tranquillity.

“I do not wish to play with the things of life; I wish to live,” I

added; “like you.”

His face, which always so clearly and so readily reflected every

impression, wore a look of suffering and intense attention.

“I wish to live with you in perfect equality....”

But I could not finish, such profound pain was on his face. He was

silent an instant.

“And in what do you not live with me on a footing of equality?” he said:

“it is I, not you, that is concerned in this affair of the ispravnik and

some drunken peasants.”

“Yes, but it is not only this case,” said I.

“For the love of God, do understand me, my darling,” he continued; “I

know how painful a thing care is for us all; I have lived, and I know

it. I love you, therefore I would spare you every care. My life is

centred in my love for you; so do not prevent my living!”

“You are always right,” said I, without looking at him.

I could not bear to see him once more serene and tranquil, while I was

so full of anger and a feeling somewhat resembling repentance.

“Katia! What is the matter with you?” said he. “The question is not in

the least which of us two is in the right, what we were talking about is

something entirely different! What have you against me? Do not tell me

at once; reflect, and then tell me all that is in your thoughts. You are

displeased with me, you have, no doubt, a reason, but explain to me in

what I am to blame.”

But how could I tell him all that I had in the bottom of my heart? The

thought that he had seen through me at once, that again I found myself

as a child before him, that I could do nothing that he did not

comprehend and foresee, excited me more than ever.

“I have nothing against you,” said I, “but I am tired, and I do not like

ennui. You say that this must be so, and, of course, once more you are

right!”

As I spoke, I looked in his face. My object was attained; his serenity

had disappeared; alarm and pain were stamped upon his face.

“Katia!” he began, in a low, agitated voice, “this is no jesting we are

engaged in, at this moment. Our fate is being decided. I ask you to say

nothing, only to hear me. Why are you torturing me thus?”

But I broke in.

“Say no more, you are right,” said I, coldly, as if it were not I, but

some evil spirit speaking with my lips.

“If you knew what you are doing!” he exclaimed in a trembling voice.

I began to cry, and I felt my heart somewhat relieved. He was sitting

near me, silent. I was sorry for him, ashamed of myself, troubled by

what I had done. I did not look at him. I felt sure that he was looking

at me, and that his eyes were perplexed or severe. I turned; his eyes

were indeed fixed upon me, but they were kind and gentle and seemed

entreating forgiveness. I took his hand, and said:

“Pardon me! I do not know, myself, what I said.”

“Yes, but I know what you said, and I know that you spoke the truth.”

“What truth?” I asked.

“That we must go to St. Petersburg. This is no longer the place for us.”

“As you wish.”

He took me in his arms and kissed me.

“You forgive me?” he said, “I have been to blame concerning you....”

In the evening I was at the piano a long time playing for him, while he

walked up and down the room, repeating something in a low tone to

himself. This was a habit with him, and I often asked him what he was

murmuring thus, and he, still thoughtful, would repeat it again to me;

generally it was poetry, sometimes some really absurd thing, but even

the very absurdity would show me what frame of mind he was in.

“What are you murmuring there, now?” I asked after a time.

He stood still, thought a little, then, smiling, repeated the two lines

from Lermontoff:

“And he, the madman, invoked the tempest,

As if, in the tempest, peace might reign!”

“Yes, he is more than a man; he sees everything!” thought I; “how can I

help loving him!”

I left the piano, took hold of his hand, and began to walk up and down

with him, measuring my steps by his.

“Well!” he said, looking down at me with a smile.

“Well!” I echoed; and our two hearts seemed to spring to each other once

more.

At the end of a fortnight, before the fêtes, we were in St. Petersburg.

CHAPTER VII.

OUR removal to St. Petersburg, a week in Moscow, visits to his relatives

and to my own, settling ourselves in our new apartment, the journey, the

new city, the new faces, all seemed to me like a dream. All was so

novel, so changeful, so gay, all was so brightened for me by his

presence, by his love, that the placid country life appeared to me

something very far off, a sort of unreal thing. To my great surprise,

instead of the arrogant pride, the coldness, I had expected to

encounter, I was welcomed by all (not only by our relatives, but by

strangers,) with such cordiality that it seemed as if they had no

thought of anything but me, and as if one and all had been longing for

my arrival to complete their own happiness. Contrary to my

anticipations, in the circles of society, even in those which seemed to

me most select, I discovered many friends and connections of my husband

whom he had never mentioned to me, and it often struck me as strange and

disagreeable to hear him utter severe strictures upon some of these

persons who seemed to me so good. I could not understand why he treated

them so coldly, or why he tried to avoid some acquaintances whose

intimacy I thought rather flattering. I thought that the more one knew

of nice people, the better it was, and all these were nice people.

“Let us see how we shall arrange things,” he had said to me before we

left the country: “here, we are little Croesuses, and there we shall be

far from rich; so we cannot remain in the city longer than Easter, and

we cannot go much into society, or we shall find ourselves embarrassed;

and I would not like you....”

“Why go into society?” I had answered; “we will only visit our

relatives, go to the theatre and opera, and to hear any good music, and

even before Easter we can be at home again in the country.”

But scarcely were we in St. Petersburg than all these fine plans were

forgotten. I had been suddenly thrown into a world so new, so happy, so

many delights had surrounded me, so many objects of heretofore unknown

interest were offered to me, that all in a moment, as it were, and

without being conscious of it, I disavowed all my past, I upset all the

plans formerly arranged. Until now there had been nothing but play; as

to life itself, it had not yet begun; but here it was now, the real, the

true,—and what will it be in the future? thought I. The anxieties, the

fits of depression, which came upon me in the country, disappeared

suddenly as if by enchantment. My love for my husband became calmer,

and, on the other hand, it never occurred to me, in this new life, to

think that he was loving me less than formerly. Indeed, it was not

possible for me to doubt this love; each thought was instantly

understood by him, each sentiment shared, each wish gratified. His

unalterable serenity had vanished, here, or perhaps it had only ceased

to cause me any irritation. I even felt that besides his old love for me

he seemed now to find some new charm in me. Often, after a visit, after

I had made some new acquaintance, or after an evening at home, when,

with secret misgiving lest I should commit some blunder, I had been

performing the duties of hostess, he would say to me:

“Well, my little girl! bravo! well done, indeed!”

This would fill me with delight.

A short time after our arrival he wrote to his mother, and, as he handed

me the letter to let me add a few words, he said I must not read what he

had written; I laughingly persisted in seeing it, and read:

“You would not recognize Katia, I hardly recognize her myself. Where

could she have acquired this lovely and graceful ease of manner, this

affability, this fascination, this sweet, unconscious tact? And still

always so simple, so gentle, so full of kindness. Every one is delighted

with her; and as for me, I am never tired of admiring her, and, if that

were possible, would be more in love with her than ever.”

“This, then, is what I am?” I thought. And it gave me so much pleasure

and gratification that I felt as if I loved him more than ever. My

success with all our acquaintances was a thing absolutely unexpected by

me. On all sides I was told: here, that I had particularly pleased my

uncle, there, that an aunt was raving over me; by this one, that there

was not a woman in all St. Petersburg like me; by that one, that if I

chose there would not be a woman in society so sought after as myself.

There was one cousin of my husband especially, Princess D., a lady of

high rank and fashion, no longer young, who announced that she had

fallen in love with me at first sight, and who did more than any one

else to turn my head with flattering attentions. When, for the first

time, this cousin proposed to me to go to a ball, and broached the

subject to my husband, he turned towards me with an almost imperceptible

smile, and mischievous glance, and asked if I wanted to go. I nodded,

and felt my face flush.

“One would say, a little culprit, confessing a wish,” he said, laughing

good-humoredly.

“You told me we must not go into company, and that you would not like

it,” I responded, smiling also, and giving him an entreating glance.

“If you wish it very much, we will go.”

“Indeed, I would rather....”

“Do you wish it, wish it very much?” he repeated.

I made no answer.

“The greatest harm is not in the world, society, itself,” he went on;

“it is unsatisfied worldly aspirations that are so evil, so unhealthful.

Certainly we must go,—and we will go,” he concluded, unhesitatingly.

“To tell you the truth,” I replied, “there is nothing in the world I

long for so much as to go to this ball!”

We went to it, and my delight was far beyond all my anticipations. At

this ball, even more than before, it seemed to me that I was the centre

around which everything was revolving; that it was for me alone that

this splendid room was in a blaze of light, that the music was sounding,

that the gay throng was gathering in ecstasy before me. All, from the

hair-dresser and my maid to the dancers, and even the stately old

gentlemen who slowly walked about through the rooms, watching the

younger people, seemed to me to be either implying or telling me in

downright speech that they were wild about me. The impression which I

produced at this ball, and which my cousin proudly confided to me, was

summed up in the general verdict that I was not the least in the world

like other women, and that there was about me some peculiar quality

which recalled the simplicity and charm of the country. This success

flattered me so much that I frankly owned to my husband how I longed to

go to at least two or three of the balls to be given in the course of

the winter, “in order,” I said, despite a sharp little whisper from my

conscience, “that I may be satiated, once for all!”

My husband willingly consented to this, and at first accompanied me,

with evident pride and pleasure in my success, apparently forgetting or

disavowing what he had formerly decided on principle.

But after awhile I could see that he was bored, and growing tired of the

life we were leading. However, this was not yet clear enough to my eyes

for me to understand the full significance of the grave, watchful look

he sometimes directed towards me, even if I noticed the look at all. I

was so intoxicated by this love which I seemed so suddenly to have

aroused in all these strangers, by this perfume of elegance, pleasure,

and novelty, which I here breathed for the first time; by the apparent

removal of what had hitherto, as it were, held me down, namely, the

moral weight of my husband; it was so sweet to me, not only to walk

through this new world on a level with him, but to find the place given

me there even higher than his, and yet to love him with all the more

strength and independence than before; that I could not understand that

he looked on with displeasure at my utter delight in this worldly

existence.

I felt a new thrill of pride and deep satisfaction, when upon entering a

ball-room, all eyes would turn towards me; and when he, as if disdaining

to parade before the multitude his rights of proprietorship, would

quietly and at once leave my side and go off to be lost in the mass of

black coats.

“Only wait!” I often thought, as my eyes sought him out at the end of

the room, and rested on his face, dimly seen from the distance between

us, but sometimes with a very weary look upon it; “wait! when we are at

home again you shall see and know for whom I have been glad to be so

beautiful and so brilliant, you shall know whom I love far, far above

all around me this evening.” It seemed to me, very sincerely, that my

delight in my successes was only for his sake, and also because they

enabled me to sacrifice even themselves for him. “One thing alone,” I

thought, “might be a danger to me in this life in the world: that is,

that one of the men I meet here might conceive a passion for me, and my

husband might grow jealous of him; but he had such confidence in me, he

appeared to be so calm and indifferent, and all these young men seemed

in my eyes so empty in comparison with him, that this peril, the only

one, as I thought, with which social life could threaten me, had no

terrors at all. Still, the attentions I received from so many persons in

society gave me such pleasure, such a sense of satisfied self-love that

I rather felt as if there was some merit in my very love for my husband,

while at the same time it seemed to impress upon my relation to him

greater ease and freedom.

“I noticed how very animated your manner was, while you were talking to

N. N.,” I said to him, one evening, upon our return from a ball; and I

shook my finger at him as I named a well-known lady of St. Petersburg

with whom he had spent part of the evening. I only meant to tease him a

little, for he was silent, and had a wearied look.

“Ah, why say such a thing? And for you to say it, Katia!” he exclaimed,

frowning, and pressing his lips together as if in physical pain. “That

is not like you,—not becoming your position, or mine. Leave such

speeches to others; bad jests of that kind might entirely do away with

our good understanding,—and I still hope that this good understanding

may return.”

I felt confused, and was silent.

“Will it return, Katia? What do you think?” he asked.

“It is not changed,—it will never change,” I said, and then I firmly

believed my assertion.

“May God grant it!” he exclaimed, “but it is time we were going back to

the country.”

This was the only occasion upon which he spoke to me in this way, and

the rest of the time it seemed to me that everything was going on as

delightfully for him as for me,—and as for me, oh! I was so

light-hearted, so joyous! If occasionally I happened to notice that he

was wearied, I would console myself by reflecting how long, for his

sake, I had been wearied in the country; if our relations seemed to be

undergoing some little alteration, I thought how speedily they would

resume their old charm when we should find ourselves again alone, in the

summer, at our own Nikolski.

Thus the winter sped away without my realizing it; and Easter came, and,

despite all our resolutions we were still in St. Petersburg.

The Sunday following, however, we were really ready to go, everything

was packed, my husband had made his final purchases of flowers, gifts,

things of all kinds which were needed for the country, and was in one of

his happiest, most affectionate moods. Shortly before we were to start,

we had an unexpected visit from our cousin, who came to beg us to

postpone our departure one week, so that we might attend a reception

given by Countess R. on Saturday. She reminded me that I had already

received several invitations from Countess R., which had been declined,

and told me that Prince M., then in St. Petersburg, had, at the last

ball, expressed a desire to make my acquaintance, that it was with this

object in view that he purposed attending this reception, and that he

was saying everywhere that I was the loveliest woman in Russia. The

whole city would be there,—in one word, I must go! It would be nothing

without me.

My husband was at the other end of the room, talking to some one.

“So you will certainly come, Katia?” said my cousin.

“We meant to leave for the country, day after to-morrow,” I replied,

doubtfully, as I glanced at my husband. Our eyes met, and he turned away

abruptly.

“I will persuade him to stay,” said my cousin, “and on Saturday we will

turn all heads,—won’t we?”

“Our plans would be disarranged, all our packing is done,” I objected

feebly, beginning to waver.

“Perhaps she had better go to-day, at once, to pay her respects to the

prince!” observed my husband from his end of the room, with some

irritation, and in a dictatorial tone I had never heard from him before.

“Why, he is getting jealous; I see it for the first time!” exclaimed our

cousin, ironically. “It is not for the prince alone, Sergius

Mikaïlovitch, but for all of us, that I want her. That is why Countess

R. is so urgent.”

“It depends upon herself,” returned my husband, coldly, as he left the

room.

I had seen that he was much more agitated than usual; this troubled me,

and I would not give a decided answer to my cousin. As soon as she was

gone, I went to look for my husband. He was thoughtfully walking up and

down his chamber, and neither saw nor heard me, as I stole softly in on

tiptoe.

“He is picturing to himself his dear Nikolski,” thought I, watching him,

“he is thinking about his morning coffee in that light drawing-room, his

fields, his peasants, his evenings at home, and his secret little night

suppers! Yes,” I decided, in my own mind, “I would give all the balls in

the world, and the flatteries of every prince in the universe, to have

again his bright joyousness and his loving caresses!”

I was about telling him that I was not going to the reception, that I no

longer cared to go, when he suddenly glanced behind him. At the sight of

me, his brow darkened, and the dreamy gentleness of his countenance

changed entirely. The well-known look came to his face, the look of

penetrating wisdom and patronizing calmness. He would not let me see in

him simple human nature: he must remain for me the demi-god upon his

pedestal!

“What is it, my love?” he enquired, turning towards me with quiet

carelessness.

I did not answer. I resented his hiding himself from me, his not

allowing me to see him as I best loved him.

“So you wish to go to this reception, on Saturday?” he continued.

“I did wish to go,” I replied, “but it did not suit you. And then, too,

the packing is done,” I added.

Never had he looked at me so coldly, never spoken so coldly.

“I shall not leave before Tuesday, and I will order the packing to be

undone,” he said; “we will not go until you choose. Do me the favor to

go to this entertainment. I shall not leave the city.”

As was his habit when excited, he went on walking about the room with

quick, irregular steps, and did not look at me.

“Most decidedly, I do not understand you,” I said, putting myself in his

way, and following him with my eyes. “Why do you speak to me in such a

singular manner? I am quite ready to sacrifice this pleasure to you, and

you, with sarcasm you have never before shown, you require that I shall

go!”

“Come! come! You sacrifice yourself” (he laid strong emphasis on the

word), “and I, I sacrifice myself also! Combat of generosity! There, I

hope, is what may be called ‘family happiness’!”

This was the first time I had ever heard from his lips words so hard and

satirical. His satire did not touch, and his hardness did not frighten

me, but they became contagious. Was it really he, always so opposed to

any debating between us, always so simple and straightforward, who was

speaking to me thus? And why? Just because I had offered to sacrifice

myself to his pleasure, which was really the supreme thing in my eyes;

just because, at this moment, with the thought, came the comprehension

of how much I loved him. Our characters were reversed; it was he who had

lost all frankness and simplicity, and I who had found them.

“You are so changed,” said I, sighing. “Of what am I guilty in your

eyes? It is not this reception, but some old sin, which you are casting

up against me in your heart. Why not use more sincerity? You were not

afraid of it with me, once. Speak out,—what have you against me?”

“No matter what he may say,” I thought, quickly running over the events

of the season in my mind, “there is not one thing that he has a right to

reproach me with, this whole winter.”

I went and stood in the middle of the room, so that he would be obliged

to pass near me, and I looked at him. I said to myself: “He will come

close to me, he will put his arms around me and kiss me, and that will

be the end of it all;” this thought darted into my head, and it even

cost me something to let it end so, without my proving to him that he

was in the wrong. But he stood still at the end of the room, and,

looking in my face:

“You still do not understand me?” he said.

“No.”

“Yet ... how can I tell you?... I am appalled, for the first time, I am

appalled at what I see—what I cannot but see.” He stopped, evidently

frightened at the rough tone of his voice.

“What do you mean?” I demanded, indignant tears filling my eyes.

“I am appalled that, knowing the prince’s comments on your beauty, you

should, after that, be so ready and willing to run after him, forgetting

your husband, yourself, your own dignity as a woman,—and then for you

not to understand what your husband has to feel in your stead, since you

yourself have not this sense of your own dignity!—far from it, you come

and declare to your husband that you will sacrifice yourself, which is

equivalent to saying, ‘To please His Highness would be my greatest

happiness, but I will sacrifice it.’”

The more he said, the more the sound of his own voice excited him, and

the harder, more cutting and violent, became his voice. I had never

seen, and had never expected to see him thus; the blood surged to my

heart; I was frightened, but yet, at the same time, a sense of unmerited

disgrace and offended self-love aroused me, and I keenly longed to take

some vengeance on him.

“I have long expected this outbreak,” said I, “speak, speak!”

“I do not know what you may have expected,” he went on, “but I might

have anticipated still worse things, from seeing you day by day steeped

in this slime, this idleness, this luxury, this senseless society; and I

did anticipate.... I did anticipate this that to-day covers me with

shame, and sinks me in misery such as I have never experienced; shame

for myself, when your dear friend, prying and fumbling about in my heart

with her unclean fingers, spoke of my jealousy,—and jealousy of whom? Of

a man whom neither you nor I have ever seen! And you, as if purposely,

you will not understand me, you ‘will sacrifice’ to me,—whom? Great

God!... Shame on your degradation! Sacrifice!” he repeated once more.

“Ah, this then is what is meant by the husband’s authority,” I thought.

“To insult and humiliate his wife, who is not guilty of the very least

thing in the world! Here then are ‘marital rights;’—but I, for one, will

never submit to them!”

“Well, I sacrifice nothing to you, then,” I returned, feeling my

nostrils dilate, and my face grow bloodless. “I will go to the reception

on Saturday. I most certainly will go!”

“And God give you pleasure in it! Only—all is ended between us!” he

exclaimed, in an uncontrollable transport of rage. “At least you shall

not make a martyr of me any longer. I was a fool who....”

But his lips trembled, and he made a visible effort not to finish what

he had begun to say.

At this moment I was afraid of him and I hated him. I longed to say a

great many more things to him, and to avenge myself for all his insults;

but if I had so much as opened my lips, my tears could no longer have

been restrained, and I would have felt my dignity compromised before

him. I left the room, without a word. But scarcely was I beyond the

sound of his footsteps when I was suddenly seized with terror at the

thought of what we had done. It seemed to me horrible that, perhaps for

life, this bond, which constituted all my happiness, was destroyed, and

my impulse was to return at once. But would his passion have subsided

sufficiently for him to comprehend me, if, without a word, I should hold

out my hand to him, and look into his eyes? Would he comprehend my

generosity? Suppose he should regard my sincere sorrow as dissimulation?

Or should consider my voluntary right-doing as repentance, and receive

me on that score? Or grant me pardon, with proud tranquillity? And why,

when I have loved him so much, oh, why should he have insulted me so?

I did not go back to him, but into my own room, where I sat for a long

time, crying, recalling with terror every word of our conversation,

mentally substituting other words for those we had used, adding

different and better ones, then reminding myself again, with a mingled

sense of fright and outraged feeling, of all that had taken place. When

I came down to tea, in the evening, and in the presence of C., who was

making us a visit, met my husband again, I was aware that from this day

forward there must be an open gulf between us. C. asked me when we were

going to leave the city. I could not answer her.

“On Tuesday,” replied my husband, “we are staying for Countess R’s

reception. You are going, no doubt?” he continued, turning to me.

I was frightened at the sound of his voice, although it seemed quite as

usual, and glanced at my husband. His eyes were fixed on me, with a hard

ironical look, his tone was measured, cold.

“Yes,” I replied.

Later, when we were alone, he approached me, and holding out his hand:

“Forget, I entreat you, what I said to you.”

I took his hand, a faint smile came to my trembling lips, and the tears

started to my eyes; but he quickly drew it away and, as if fearing a

sentimental scene, went and sat down in an arm-chair at some distance

from me. “Is it possible that he still believes himself right?” thought

I; and I had on my lips a cordial explanation, and a request not to go

to the reception.

“I must write to mamma that we have postponed our departure,” said he,

“or she will be uneasy.”

“And when do you intend to leave?” I asked.

“On the Tuesday after the reception.”

“I hope this is not on my account,” said I, looking into his eyes, but

they only looked back into mine without telling me anything, as if they

were held far from me by some secret force. All at once, his face

appeared to me old and disagreeable.

We went to the reception, and seemingly our relations were again cordial

and affectionate, but in reality they were quite unlike what they had

been in the past.

At the reception I was sitting in the midst of a circle of ladies, when

the prince approached me, so that I was obliged to stand up and speak to

him. As I did so, my eyes involuntarily sought my husband; I saw him

look at me, from the other end of the room, and then turn away. Such a

rush of shame and sorrow came over me, that I felt almost ill, and I

knew that my face and neck grew scarlet under the eyes of the prince.

But I had to stand and listen to what he was saying to me, all the while

feeling him scrutinize me keenly from head to foot. Our conversation was

not long, there was not room near me for him to sit down, and he could

not help seeing how ill at ease I was with him. We talked of the last

ball, where I was to spend the summer, etc. Upon leaving me he expressed

a wish to make my husband’s acquaintance, and in a little while I saw

them meet, at the other end of the room, and begin to talk with each

other. The prince must have made some remark concerning me, for I saw

him smile and glance in my direction.

My husband’s face flushed darkly, he bowed, and was the first to

conclude the interview. I felt my color rise, also, for I was mortified

to think what opinion the prince must have formed of me, and more

especially of Sergius. It seemed to me that every one must have observed

my embarrassment while I was talking with the prince, and also his very

singular manner; “God knows,” said I to myself, “what interpretation may

be put upon it; could any one happen to know of my wrangle with my

husband?” My cousin took me home, and on the way we were talking about

him. I could not resist telling her all that had passed between us in

regard to this unfortunate reception. She soothed me by assurances that

it was only one of those frequent quarrels, which signify nothing at all

and leave no result behind them; and in explaining my husband’s

character from her point of view, she spoke of him as extremely reserved

and proud. I agreed with her, and it seemed to me that, after this, I

comprehended his character more clearly and much more calmly.

But afterwards, when we were again alone together, this judgment of mine

with regard to him appeared to me a real crime, which weighed upon my

conscience, and I felt that the gulf between us was widening more and

more.

From this day on, our life and our mutual relations suffered a complete

change. Being alone together was no longer a delight to us. There were

subjects to be avoided, and it was easier for us to talk to each other

in the presence of a third person. If in the course of conversation any

allusion chanced to be made, either to life in the country, or to balls,

dazzling wild-fire seemed to dance before our eyes and make us afraid to

look at each other; I knew that his embarrassment was as great as my

own; we both realized how far asunder we were thrust by that dividing

gulf, and dreaded drawing nearer. I was persuaded that he was passionate

and proud, and that I must be very careful not to run against his weak

points. And, on his part, he was convinced that I could not exist

outside of the life of the world, that a home in the country did not

suit me at all, and that he must resign himself to this unhappy

predilection. Therefore we both shunned any direct conversation upon

such subjects, and each erroneously judged the other. We had long ceased

to be respectively, in each other’s eyes, the most perfect beings in

this world; on the contrary, we were beginning to compare each other

with those around us, and to measure with secret appreciation our own

characters.

CHAPTER VIII.

I HAD been very unwell before we left St. Petersburg, and instead of

going home we moved into a villa at a short distance from the city,

where my husband left me while he went to see his mother. I was then

quite well enough to accompany him, but he urged me not to do so,

alleging as his reason my state of health. I quite understood that he

was not really afraid of my health, but he was possessed by the idea

that it would not be good for us to be in the country; I did not insist

very strenuously, and remained where I was. Without him I felt myself

truly in the midst of emptiness and isolation; but when he returned I

perceived that his presence no longer added to my life what it had been

wont to add. Those former relations, when any thought, any sensation,

not communicated to him, oppressed me like a crime; when all his

actions, all his words, appeared to me models of perfection; when, from

sheer joy, we would laugh at nothing, looking at each other; those

relations had so insensibly changed into something quite different, that

we ourselves hardly admitted the transformation. But the fact was that

each of us had now separate occupations and interests, which we no

longer sought to share. We had even ceased to be at all troubled at thus

living in entirely distinct worlds, and entirely as strangers to each

other. We had become habituated to this thought, and at the end of a

year there was no longer the mutual embarrassment when our eyes chanced

to meet. His boyishness, his outbursts of light-hearted gaiety when with

me, were gone; gone, too, was that indulgent indifference, against which

I had so often risen in rebellion; nor had the penetrating look

survived, which, in other days, had at once disturbed and delighted me;

there were no more of the prayers, no more of the hours of exaltation

which we had so loved to share, and indeed we saw each other only very

rarely; he was constantly out, and I no longer dreaded remaining alone,

no longer complained of it; I was perpetually engrossed, on my side,

with the obligations of society, and never felt any need of him

whatever.

Scenes and altercations between us were quite unheard-of. I endeavored

to satisfy him, he carried out all my wishes, any one would have said

that we still loved each other.

When we were alone together, which was of rare occurrence, I felt

neither joy, agitation, nor embarrassment, in his presence, any more

than if I had been alone. I knew well that here was no new-comer, no

stranger, but on the contrary, a very excellent man, in short my

husband, whom I knew just as well as I knew myself. I was persuaded that

I could tell beforehand all that he would do, all that he would think,

precisely what view he would take of any matter, and if he did or

thought otherwise I only considered that he made a mistake; I never

expected anything at all from him. In one word, it was my husband, that

was all. It seemed to me that things were so, and had to be so; that no

other relations between us could exist, or indeed ever had existed. When

he went away, especially at first, I still felt terribly lonely, and

while he was absent I felt the full value of his support; when he came

home, I would even throw myself in his arms with joy; but scarcely had

two hours elapsed ere I had forgotten this joy, and would find that I

had nothing to say to him. In these brief moments, when calm, temperate

tenderness seemed to revive between us, it seemed to me that there never

had been anything but this; that this alone was what had once so

powerfully stirred my heart, and I thought I read in his eyes the same

impression. I felt that to this tenderness there was a limit, which he

did not wish to pass, and neither did I. Sometimes this caused me a

little regret, but I had no time to think about it seriously, and I

tried to put it out of my mind, by giving myself up to a variety of

amusements of which I did not even render a clear account to myself, but

which perpetually offered themselves to me. The life in the world,

which, at first, had bewildered me with its splendor and the

gratification it afforded to my self-love, had soon established entire

dominion over my inclinations, and become at once a habit and a bondage,

occupying in my soul that place which I had fancied would be the home of

sentiment. Therefore I avoided being alone, dreading lest it might force

me to look into and realize my condition. My whole time, from the

earliest hour in the morning till the latest at night, was appropriated

to something; even if I did not go out, there was no time that I left

free. I found in this life neither pleasure, nor weariness, and it

seemed to me it had always been thus.

In this manner three years passed away, and our relations with each

other remained the same, benumbed, congealed, motionless, as if no

alteration could come to them, either for better or worse. During the

course of these three years there were two important events in the

family, but neither brought any change to my own life. These events were

the birth of my first child, and the death of Tatiana Semenovna. At

first the maternal sentiment took possession of me with such power, so

great and unexpected a rapture seized upon me, that I imagined a new

existence was beginning; but at the end of two months, when I commenced

to go into society once more, this sentiment, which had been gradually

subsiding, had become nothing more than the habitual and cold

performance of a duty. My husband, on the contrary, from the day of this

son’s birth, had become his old self, gentle, calm, and home-loving,

recalling for his child, all his former tenderness and gaiety. Often

when I went in my ball-dress into the child’s nursery, to give him the

evening benediction before starting and found my husband there, I would

catch a glance of reproach, or a severe and watchful look fixed upon me,

and I would all at once feel ashamed. I was myself terrified at my

indifference towards my own child, and I asked myself: “Can I be so much

worse than other women?—But what is to be done?” I questioned. “Of

course I love my son, but, for all that, I cannot sit down beside him

for whole days at a time, that would bore me to death; and as for making

a pretence, nothing in the world would induce me to do such a thing!”

The death of my husband’s mother was a great grief to him; it was very

painful to him, he said, to live after her at Nikolski, but though I

also regretted her and really sympathized with his sorrow, it would have

been at that time more agreeable, more restful to me, to return and make

our residence there. We had passed the greater part of these three years

in the city; once only had I been at Nikolski, for a visit of two

months; and during the third year we had been abroad.

We passed this summer at the baths.

I was then twenty-one years of age. We were, I thought, prosperous; from

my home life I expected no more than it had already given me; all the

people whom I knew, it seemed to me, loved me; my health was excellent,

I knew that I was pretty, my toilettes were the freshest at the baths,

the weather was superb, an indefinable atmosphere of beauty and elegance

surrounded me, and everything appeared to me in the highest degree

delightful and joyous. Yet I was not, as light-hearted as I had been in

the old days at Nikolski, when I had felt that my happiness was within

myself, when I was happy because I deserved to be so, when my happiness

was great but might be greater still. Now all was different;

nevertheless the summer was charming. I had nothing to desire, nothing

to hope, nothing to fear; my life, as it seemed to me, was at its full,

and my conscience, it also seemed to me, was entirely clear.

Among the men most conspicuous at the baths during this season, there

was not one whom, for any reason whatever, I preferred above the others,

not even old Prince K. our ambassador, who paid me distinguished

attention. One was too young, another was too old, this one was an

Englishman with light curly hair, that one, a bearded Frenchman; I was

perfectly indifferent to all, but, at the same time, all were

indispensable to me. Insignificant as they might be, they yet belonged

to, and formed a part of, this life of elegance surrounding me, this

atmosphere in which I breathed. However, there was one among them, an

Italian, Marquis D. who, by the bold fashion in which he showed the

admiration he felt for me, had attracted my attention more than the

others. He allowed no occasion to escape him of meeting me, dancing with

me, appearing on horseback beside me, accompanying me to the casino, and

he was constantly telling me how beautiful I was. From my window I

sometimes saw him wandering around our house, and more than once the

annoying persistence of the glances shot towards me from his flashing

eyes had made me blush and turn away.

He was young, handsome, elegant; and one remarkable thing about him was

his extraordinary resemblance to my husband, especially in his smile and

something about the upper part of the face, though he was the handsomer

man of the two. I was struck by the likeness, in spite of decided

differences in some particulars, in the mouth for instance, the look,

the longer shape of the chin; and instead of the charm given to my

husband’s face by his expression of kindness and ideal calmness, there

was in the other something gross and almost bestial. After a while I

could not help seeing that he was passionately in love with me; I

sometimes found myself thinking of him with lofty pity. I undertook to

tranquillize him, and bring him down to terms of cordial confidence and

friendship, but he repelled these attempts with trenchant disdain, and,

to my great discomfiture, continued to show indications of a passion,

silent, indeed, as yet, but momentarily threatening to break forth.

Although I would not acknowledge it to myself, I was afraid of this man,

and seemed, against my own will, as it were, forced to think of him. My

husband had made his acquaintance, and was even more intimate with him

than with most of our circle, with whom he confined himself to being

simply the husband of his wife, and to whom his bearing was haughty and

cold.

Towards the end of the season I had a slight illness, which confined me

to the house for two weeks. The first time I went out, after my

recovery, was to listen to the music in the evening, and I was at once

told of the arrival of Lady C. a noted beauty, who had been expected for

some time. A circle of friends quickly gathered around me, eagerly

welcoming me once more among them, but a yet larger circle was forming

about the new belle, and everybody near me was telling me about her and

her beauty. She was pointed out to me; a beautiful and bewitching woman,

truly, but with an expression of confidence and self-sufficiency which

impressed me unpleasantly, and I said so. That evening, everything that

usually seemed so bright and delightful was tiresome to me. The

following day Lady C. organized an expedition to the castle, which I

declined. Hardly any one remained behind with me, and the aspect of

affairs was decidedly changed to my eyes. All, men and things, seemed

stupid and dull; I felt like crying, and resolved to complete my cure as

soon as possible and go home to Russia. At the bottom of my heart lurked

bad, malevolent feelings, but I would not confess it to myself. I said

that I was not well, making that a pretext for giving up society. I very

seldom went out, and then only in the morning, alone, to drink the

waters, or for a quiet walk or drive about the environs with L. M., one

of my Russian acquaintances. My husband was absent at this time, having

gone, some days before, to Heidelberg, to wait there until the end of my

prescribed stay should allow our return to Russia, and he came to see me

only now and then.

One day Lady C. had carried off most of the company on some party of

pleasure, and after dinner L. M. and I made a little excursion to the

castle by ourselves. While our carriage was slowly following the winding

road between the double rows of chestnuts, centuries old, between whose

gray trunks we saw in the distance the exquisite environs of Baden,

lying in the purple light of the setting sun, we unconsciously fell into

a serious strain of conversation, which had never before been the case

with us. L. M., whom I had known so long, now for the first time

appeared to me as a lovely intelligent woman, with whom one could

discuss any topic whatever, and whose society was full of charm and

interest. We talked about family duties and pleasures, children, the

vacuous life led in such places as we were now in, our desire to return

to Russia, to the country, and we both fell into a grave, gentle mood,

which was still upon us when we reached the castle. Within its broken

walls all was in deep shadow, cool and still, the summits of the towers

were yet in the sunlight, and the least sound of voice or footstep

re-echoed among the arches. Through the doorway we saw the beautiful

stretch of country surrounding Baden,—beautiful, yet to our Russian

eyes, cold and stern.

We sat down to rest, silently watching the sinking sun. Presently we

heard voices, they grew more distinct, and I thought I caught my own

name. I listened involuntarily, and heard a few words. I recognized the

voices; they were those of the Marquis D. and of a Frenchman, his

friend, whom I also knew. They were talking about me and Lady C. The

Frenchman was comparing one with the other, and analyzing our beauty. He

said nothing objectionable, yet I felt the blood rush to my heart as he

spoke. He entered into detail as to what he found attractive in both

Lady C. and myself. As for me, I was already a mother, while Lady C. was

but nineteen years of age; my hair was more beautiful, but Lady C.’s was

more gracefully arranged; Lady C. was more the high born dame “while

yours,” he said, alluding to me, “is one of the little princesses so

often sent us by Russia.” He concluded by saying that it was very

discreet in me not to attempt to contest the field with Lady C., for, if

I did, I most assuredly would find Baden my burial-place.

This cut me to the quick.

“Unless she chose to console herself with you!” added the Frenchman with

a gay, cruel laugh.

“If she goes, I shall follow,” was the coarse reply of the voice with

the Italian accent.

“Happy mortal! he can still love!” commented the other, mockingly.

“Love!” the Italian was silent a moment, then went on. “I cannot help

loving! Without love there is no life. To make of one’s life a

romance,—that is the only good. And my romances never break off in the

middle; this one, like the others, I will carry out to the end.”

“Good luck, my friend!” said the Frenchman.

I heard no more for the speakers seemed to turn the angle of the wall,

and their steps receded on the other side. They descended the broken

stairs, and in a few moments emerged from a side-door near us, showing

much surprise at the sight of us. I felt my cheeks flame when Marquis D.

approached me, and was confused and frightened at his offering me his

arm upon our leaving the castle. I could not refuse it, and following L.

M. who led the way with his friend, we went down towards the carriage. I

was indignant at what the Frenchman had said of me, though I could not

help secretly admitting that he had done nothing but put into language

what I myself had already felt, but the words of the marquis had

confounded and revolted me by their grossness. I was tortured by the

thought of having heard them, and at the same time I had suddenly lost

all fear of him. I was disgusted at feeling him so near me; without

looking at him, without answering him, trying, though I still had his

arm, to keep so far from him that I could not hear his whispers, I

walked on quickly, close behind L. M. and the Frenchman. The marquis was

talking about the lovely view, the unexpected delight of meeting me, and

I know not what besides, but I did not listen to him. The whole time I

was thinking about my husband, my son, Russia; divided feelings of shame

and pity took hold of me, and I was possessed by a desire to hurry home,

to shut myself up in my solitary room in the Hôtel de Bade, where I

might be free to reflect upon all that seemed so suddenly to have risen

up within my soul. But L. M. was walking rather slowly, the carriage was

still some distance away, and it seemed to me that my escort was

obstinately slackening our pace, as if he meant to be left alone with

me. “That shall not be!” I said to myself, quickening my steps. But he

undisguisedly kept me back, holding my arm with a close pressure; at

this moment L. M. turned a corner of the road, and we were left alone. I

was seized with alarm.

“Excuse me,” said I coldly, drawing my arm out of his, but the lace

caught on one of his buttons. He stooped towards me to disengage it, and

his ungloved fingers rested on my arm. A new sensation—not fright,

certainly not pleasure—sent a chill shiver through me. I looked up at

him, meaning my glance to express all the cold contempt I felt for him;

but instead of this, he seemed to read in it only agitation and alarm.

His ardent, humid eyes were fixed passionately upon me, his hands

grasped my wrists, his half-open lips were murmuring to me, telling me

that he loved me, that I was everything to him, his hold upon me growing

stronger and closer with every word. I felt fire in my veins, my vision

was obscured, I trembled from head to foot, and the words I tried to

utter died away in my throat. Suddenly I felt a kiss upon my cheek; I

shivered, and looked into his face again, powerless to speak or stir,

expecting and wishing I knew not what.

It was only an instant. But this instant was terrible! In it I saw him

as he was, I analyzed his face at a glance: low brow, straight correct

nose with swelling nostrils, fine beard and mustache waxed and pointed,

cheeks carefully shaven, brown neck. I hated him, I feared him, he was a

stranger to me; nevertheless, at this moment, how powerfully the emotion

and passion of this detestable man, this stranger, was re-echoing within

me!

“I love you!” was the murmur of the voice so like my husband’s. My

husband and my child,—hurriedly my mind flashed to them, as beings

dearly loved, once existent, now gone, lost, done with. But suddenly

from around the turn of the road I heard L. M.’s voice calling me. I

recovered myself, snatched away my hands without looking at him, and

almost flew to rejoin her. Not until we were in the caléche did I glance

back at him. He took off his hat, and said something to me—I know not

what—smiling. He little knew what inexpressible torture he made me

endure at that moment.

Life appeared so miserable, the future so desperate, the past so sombre!

L. M. talked to me, but I did not understand one word she was saying. It

seemed as though she was only talking to me from compassion, and to hide

the contempt she felt. I thought I read this contempt, this insulting

compassion in every word, every glance. That kiss was burning into my

cheek with cutting shame, and to think of my husband and child was

insupportable to me. Once alone in my chamber, I hoped to be able to

meditate upon my situation, but I found it was frightful to remain

alone. I could not drink the tea that was brought me, and without

knowing why, hurriedly I decided to take the evening train for

Heidelberg, to rejoin my husband. When I was seated with my maid in the

empty compartment, when the train was at last in motion, and I breathed

the fresh air rushing in through the empty windows, I began to be myself

again, and to think with some degree of clearness over my past and my

future. All my married life, from the day of our departure for St.

Petersburg, lay before me in a new light, that of awakened and accusing

conscience.

For the first time, I vividly recalled the commencement of my life in

the country, my plans; for the first time, the thought came to my mind:

how happy he was then! And I suddenly felt guilty towards him. “But

then, why not check me, why dissimulate before me, why avoid all

explanation, why insult me?” I asked myself. “Why not use the power of

his love? But perhaps he no longer loved me?”—Yet, whether he was to

blame or not, here was this on my cheek, this kiss which I still felt.

The nearer I came to Heidelberg, and the more clearly my husband’s image

presented itself, the more terrible became the imminent meeting with

him. “I will tell him all, all; my eyes will be blinded with tears of

repentance,” thought I, “and he will forgive me.” But I did not myself

know what was this “all” that I was going to tell him, nor was I

absolutely sure that he would forgive me. In fact, when I entered his

room and saw his face, so tranquil despite its surprise, I felt no

longer able to tell him anything, to confess anything, to entreat his

forgiveness for anything. An unspeakable sorrow and deep repentance were

weighing me down.

“What were you thinking of?” he said: “I intended joining you at Baden

to-morrow.” But a second glance at me seemed to startle him. “Is

anything wrong? What is the matter with you?” he exclaimed.

“Nothing,” I replied, keeping back my tears. “I have come away ... I am

not going back ... Let us go—to-morrow if we can—home to Russia!”

He was silent for some time, watching me narrowly.

“Come, tell me what has occurred,” he said, at length.

I felt my face grow scarlet, and my eyes sank. His were glittering with

an indefinable foreboding, and hot anger. I dreaded the thoughts which

might be assailing him, and, with a power of dissimulation of which I

could not have believed myself capable, I made haste to answer:

“Nothing has occurred,—but I was overwhelmed by weariness and dejection;

I was alone, I began to think of you, and of our life. How long I have

been to blame towards you! After this, you may take me with you wherever

you wish! Yes, I have long been to blame,” I repeated, and my tears

began to fall fast. “Let us go back to the country,” I cried, “and

forever!”

“Ah! my love, spare me these sentimental scenes,” said he, coldly; “for

you to go to the country will be all very well, just now, for we are

running a little short of money; but as for its being ‘forever,’ that is

but a notion: I know you could not stay there long! Come, drink a cup of

tea,—that is the best thing to do,” he concluded, rising to call a

servant.

I could not help imagining what his thoughts of me doubtless were, and I

felt indignant at the frightful ideas which I attributed to him as I met

the look of shame and vigilant suspicion which he bent upon me. No, he

will not, and he cannot comprehend me!... I told him that I was going to

see the child, and left him. I longed to be alone, and free to weep,

weep, weep....

CHAPTER IX.

OUR house at Nikolski, so long cold and deserted, came to life again;

but the thing which did not come to life was our old existence. Mamma

was there no longer, and henceforth we were alone, we two alone with

each other. But not only was solitude no longer to us what it had once

been, but we found it a burden and constraint. The winter passed all the

more drearily for me from my being out of health, and it was not until

some time after the birth of my second son that I recovered my strength.

My relations with my husband continued cold and friendly, as at St.

Petersburg; but here in the country there was not a floor, not a wall,

not a piece of furniture, which did not remind me of what he had been to

me, and what I had lost. There stood between us, as it were, an offence

not forgiven; one would have said that he wished to punish me for

something, and that he was pretending to himself to be unconscious of

it. How could I ask forgiveness without knowing for what fault? He only

punished me by no longer entirely giving himself up to me, by no longer

surrendering to me his whole soul; but to no one, and under no

circumstances, was his soul surrendered, any more than if he had none.

It sometimes came into my head that he was only making a pretence of

being what he now was, in order to torment me, and that his feelings

were in reality what they had formerly been, and I tried to provoke him

into letting this be seen; but he invariably eluded all frank

explanation; one would have said that he suspected me of dissimulation,

and dreaded all manifestations of tenderness as attempts to ridicule

him. His looks and his air seemed to say: “I know all, there is nothing

to tell me; all that you would confide to me, I already know; I know

that you talk in one manner and act in another.” At first I was hurt by

his apparent fear of being frank with me, but I soon accustomed myself

to the thought that in him this was not so much lack of frankness, as

lack of necessity for frankness.

And on my side, my tongue was no longer capable of telling him

impulsively, as in the old days, that I loved him, of asking him to read

the prayers with me, of calling him to listen to my music when I was

going to play; there seemed to be certain rules of formality tacitly

decreed between us. We lived our own lives; he, with his various

interests and occupations, in which I no longer claimed nor desired a

share; I, with my idle hours, about which he no longer seemed to trouble

himself. As for the children, they were still too young to be in any way

a bond between us.

Spring came. Macha and Sonia returned to the country for the summer; and

as Nikolski was undergoing repairs, we went with them to Pokrovski. The

same old home, the terrace, the out-of-door tea-table, the piano in the

half-lighted room, my own old chamber with its white curtains, and the

girlish dreams which seemed to have been left behind there, forgotten.

In this chamber were two beds; over one, which had been my own, I now

bent nightly to bless my sturdy Kokocha,[8] in the midst of his bedtime

frolics; in the other lay little Vasica,[9] his baby-face rosy with

sleep, under the soft white blankets. After giving the benediction, I

often lingered a long time in this peaceful chamber, and from every

corner of its walls, from every fold of its curtains, came stealing

around me forgotten visions of my youth; childish songs, gay choruses,

floated again to my ears. And what were they now,—these visions? Were

they sounding still, anywhere,—these glad and sweet old songs? All that

I had hardly dared to hope had come true. My vague and confused dreams

had become reality, and it was now my life, so hard, so heavy, so

stripped of joy. And yet here around me were not all things as before?

Was it not the same garden that I saw beneath my window, the same

terrace, the same paths and benches? Far off there, across the ravine,

the songs of the nightingales still seemed to rise out of the ripples of

the little pond, the lilacs bloomed as they used to do, the moon still

stood in white glory over the corner of the house, yet for me all was so

changed, so changed! Macha and I had our old quiet talks, sitting

together as of old in the salon, and we still talked of him. But Macha’s

brow was grave, her face was wan, her eyes no longer shone with

contentment and hope, but were full of sad sympathy, and almost

expressed compassion. We no longer went into ecstasies over him, as in

the past; we judged him, now; we no longer marvelled at our great

happiness and wondered how it came to be ours, we no longer had the

impulse to tell all the world what we felt; we whispered in each other’s

ear like conspirators; for the hundredth time we asked each other why

all was so sad, so changed. As for him, he was still the same, except

that the line between his brows was deeper, and his temples were more

silvery, and his eyes, watchful, deep, continually turned away from me,

were darkened by a shadow. I, too, was still the same, but I no longer

felt either love or desire to love. No more wish to work, no more

satisfaction with myself. And how far off, how impossible, now appeared

my old religious fervor, my old love for him, my old fulness of life! I

could not, now, even comprehend what in those days was so luminous and

so true: the happiness of living for others. Why for others? when I no

longer wished to live for myself....

I had entirely given up my music during our residence in St. Petersburg,

but now my old piano and my old pieces brought back the love for it.

One day when I was not feeling well, I stayed at home, alone, while

Macha and Sonia went with my husband to see the improvements at

Nikolski. The tea-table was set, I went down-stairs, and, while waiting

for them, seated myself at the piano. I opened the sonata Quasi una

fantasia, and began to play. No living creature was to be seen or heard,

the windows were open upon the garden; the familiar notes, so sad and

penetrating, resounded through the room. I concluded the first part, and

unconsciously, simply from old habit, I looked across to the corner

where he used to sit and listen to me. But he was no longer there, a

long-unmoved chair occupied his old place; from the side of the open

window a projecting branch of lilac stood out against the burning west,

the evening air stole quietly in. I leaned my elbows on the piano,

covered my face with both hands, and fell into a fit of musing. I

remained there a long time, mournfully recalling the old days,

irrevocably gone, and timidly looking at the days to come. But

hereafter, it seemed to me, there could be nothing, I could hope

nothing, desire nothing. “Is it possible that I have outlived all that!”

thought I, raising my head with horror, and in order to forget and to

cease thinking, I began to play again, and still the same old andante.

“My God!” I said, “pardon me if I am guilty, or give back to my soul

what made its beauty ... or teach me what I ought to do,—how I ought to

live!”

The sound of wheels echoed on the turf and before the door, then I heard

on the terrace steady steps, well-known to me, then all was quiet. But

it was no longer the old feeling which stirred in me at these familiar

footsteps. They came up behind me when I had finished the sonata, and a

hand was laid upon my shoulder.

“A happy thought, to play the old sonata!” he said.

I made no answer.

“Have not you had tea?”

I shook my head, without turning towards him, for I did not want him to

see the traces of agitation on my face.

“They will be here presently; the horses were a little unruly, and they

are coming home on foot, by the road,” he continued.

“We will wait for them,” I said, going out on the terrace, in the hope

that he would follow, but he inquired for the children, and went up to

see them. Once more, his presence, the sound of his voice, so kind, so

honest, dissuaded me from believing that all was lost for me. “What more

is there to desire?” I thought: “he is good and true, he is an excellent

husband, an excellent father, and I do not myself know what is

missing,—what I want.”

I went out on the balcony, and sat down under the awning of the terrace,

on the same bench where I was sitting upon the day of our decisive

explanation long ago. The sun was nearly down, dusk was gathering; a

shade of spring softened the pure sky, where one tiny spark was already

gleaming. The light wind had died away, not a leaf or blade of grass

stirred; the perfume of the lilacs and cherry-trees, so powerful that

one might have thought all the air itself was in bloom, came in puffs

over garden and terrace, now faint and now full, making one feel an

impulse to close the eyes, to shut out all sight and sound, to banish

every sensation save that of inhaling this exquisite fragrance. The

dahlias and rose-bushes, yet leafless, stood in still lines in the

newly-dug black mould of their beds, lifting their heads above their

white props. From afar came the intermittent notes of the nightingales,

or the rush of their restless flight from place to place.

It was in vain that I strove to calm myself, I seemed to be waiting and

wishing for something.

Sergius came from up-stairs, and sat down beside me.

“I believe it is going to rain,” he said, “they will get wet.”

“Yes,” I replied; and we were both silent.

In the meantime, the cloud, without any wind, had crept slowly and

stealthily above our heads; nature was yet more perfectly tranquil,

sweet, and still: suddenly one drop fell, and, so to speak, rebounded,

upon the linen of the awning, another rolled, a growing ball of dust,

along the path; then, with a sound like deadened hail, came the heavy

dash of rain, gathering force every moment. At once, as if by concert,

frogs and nightingales were silent; but the light plash of the fountain

was still heard beneath the beating of the rain, and far off in the

distance some little bird, no doubt safe and dry under a sheltering

bough, chirped in monotonous rhythm his two recurring notes. Sergius

rose to go into the house.

“Where are you going?” said I, stopping him. “It is so delightful here!”

“I must send an umbrella and some overshoes.”

“It is not necessary, this will be over directly.”

He assented, and we remained standing together by the balustrade of the

balcony. I put my hand on the wet slippery rail, and leaned forward into

the rain, the cool drops falling lightly on my hair and neck. The cloud,

brightening and thinning, scattered in shining spray above us, the

regular beat of the shower was succeeded by the sound of heavy drops

falling more and more rarely from the sky or from the trees. The frogs

resumed their croaking, the nightingales shook their wings and began

again to respond to each other from behind the glistening shrubs, now on

one side, now on another. All was serene again before us.

“How good it is to live!” he said, leaning over the balustrade and

passing his hand over my wet hair.

This simple caress acted on me like a reproach, and I longed to let my

tears flow.

“What more can a man need?” continued he. “I am at this moment so

content, that I feel nothing wanting, and I am completely happy!”

(“You did not speak so to me when to hear it would have made my

happiness,” I thought. “However great yours was, then, you used to say

that you wished for more of it, still more. And now you are calm and

content, when my soul is full of inexpressible repentance and

unsatisfied tears!”)

“To me, too, life is good,” said I, “and it is precisely because it is

so good to me, that I am sad. I feel so detached, so incomplete; I am

always wanting some other thing, and yet everything here is so good, so

tranquil! Can it be possible that for you no sorrow ever seems mingled

with your pleasure in life?—as if, for instance, you were feeling regret

for something in the past?”

He drew away the hand resting on my head, and was silent for a moment.

“Yes, that has been the case with me, formerly, particularly in the

spring,” he said, as if searching his memory. “Yes, I also have spent

whole nights in longings and fears,—and what beautiful nights they

were!... But then all was before me, and now all is behind; now I am

content with what is, and that to me is perfection,” he concluded, with

such easy frankness of manner, that, painful as it was to hear, I was

convinced that it was the truth.

“Then you desire nothing more?” I questioned.

“Nothing impossible,” he replied, divining my thought. “How wet you have

made your head,” he went on, caressing me like a child, and passing his

hand again over my hair; “you are jealous of the leaves and grass which

the rain was falling on; you would like to be the grass and the leaves

and the rain; while I—I enjoy simply seeing them, as I do seeing

whatever is good, young, happy.”

“And you regret nothing in the past?” I persisted, with the dull weight

on my heart growing heavier and heavier.

He seemed to muse for a moment, keeping silent. I saw that he wished to

answer honestly.

“No!” he said, at length, briefly.

“That is not true! that is not true!” I cried, turning and facing him,

with my eyes fixed upon his. “You do not regret the past?”

“No!” he repeated. “I bless it, but I do not regret it.”

“And you would not wish to go back to it?”

He turned away, looking out over the garden.

“I no more wish that than I would wish to have wings. It cannot be.”

“And you would not re-make this past? And you reproach neither yourself,

nor me?”

“Never! all has been for the best.”

“Listen!” said I, seizing his hand to force him to turn towards me.

“Listen! Why did you never tell me what you wished from me, that I might

have lived exactly as you desired? Why did you give me a liberty which I

knew not how to use? why did you cease to teach me? If you had wished

it, if you had cared to guide me differently, nothing, nothing would

have happened,” I went on, in a voice which more and more energetically

expressed anger and reproach, with none of the former love.

“What is it that would not have happened?” said he with surprise,

turning towards me. “There has been nothing. All is well, very well,” he

repeated smiling.

“Can it be possible,” I thought, that he does not understand me? “or,

worse still, that he will not understand me?” and my tears began to

fall.

“This would have happened,—that, not having made me guilty towards you,

you would not have punished me by your indifference, your contempt,” I

broke out. “What would not have happened is seeing myself, with no fault

on my own part, suddenly robbed by you of all that was dear to me.”

“What are you saying, my darling?” he exclaimed, as if he had not

understood my words.

“No, let me finish! You have robbed me of your confidence, your love,

even of your esteem, and this because I ceased to believe that you still

loved me after what had taken place! No,” I went on, checking him again

as he was about to interrupt me, “for once I must speak out all that has

been torturing me so long! Was I to blame because I did not know life,

and because you left me to find it out for myself?... And am I to blame

that now,—when at last I comprehend, of myself, what is necessary in

life; now, when for more than a year I have been making a struggle to

return to you,—you constantly repulse me, constantly pretend not to know

what I want? and things are so arranged that there is never anything for

you to reproach yourself with, while I am left to be miserable and

guilty? Yes, you would cast me back again into that life which must make

wretchedness for me and for you!”

“And how am I doing that?” he asked, with sincere surprise and alarm.

“Did not you tell me yesterday,—yes, you tell me so perpetually,—that

the life here does not suit me, and that we must go to St. Petersburg

again for the winter? Instead of supporting me,” I continued, “you avoid

all frankness with me, any talk that is sweet, and real. And then if I

fall, you will reproach me with it, or you will make light of it!”

“Stop, stop,” he said severely and coldly; “what you are saying is not

right. It only shows that you are badly disposed towards me, that you do

not....”

“That I do not love you! say it! say it, then!” I exclaimed, blind with

my tears. I sat down on the bench, and covered my face with my

handkerchief.

“That is the way he understands me!” I thought, trying to control my

choking sobs. “It is all over with our old love!” said the voice in my

heart. He did not come near me, and made no attempt to console me. He

was wounded by what I had said. His voice was calm and dry, as he began:

“I do not know what you have to reproach me with, except that I do not

love you as I used to do!”

“As you used to love me!...” I murmured under my handkerchief, drenching

it with bitter tears.

“And for that, time and ourselves are equally guilty. For each period

there is one suitable phase of love....”

He was silent.

“And shall I tell you the whole truth, since you desire frankness? Just

as, during that first year of our acquaintance, I spent night after

night without sleep, thinking of you and building up my own love, until

it grew to fill all my heart, so in St. Petersburg and while we were

abroad I spent fearful nights in striving to break down and destroy this

love which was my torment. I could not destroy it, but I did at least

destroy the element which had tormented me; I became tranquil, and yet I

continued to love you,—but it was with another love.”

“And you call that love, when it was nothing but a punishment!” I

replied. “Why did you let me live in the world, if it appeared to you so

pernicious that because of it you would cease to love me?”

“It was not the world, my dear, that was the guilty one.”

“Why did you not use your power? Why did you not strangle me? Murder me?

That would have been better for me to-day than to have lost all that

made my happiness,—it would have been better for me, and at least there

would not have been the shame!”

I began to sob again, and I covered my face.

Just at that moment Macha and Sonia, wet and merry, ran up on the

terrace, laughing and talking; but at the sight of us their voices were

hushed, and they hurried into the house.

We remained where we were, for a long time, silent; after they were

gone, I sobbed on until my tears were exhausted and I felt somewhat

calmer. I looked at him. He was sitting with his head resting on his

hand, and appeared to wish to say something to me in response to my

glance, but he only gave a heavy sigh and put his head down again.

I went to him and drew his hand away. He turned then, and looked at me

thoughtfully.

“Yes,” he said, as if pursuing his own thoughts, “for all of us, and

particularly for you women, it is necessary that we should ourselves

lift to our own lips the cup of the vanities of life, before we can

taste life itself; no one believes the experience of others. You had

not, at that time, dipped very deep into the science of those entrancing

and seducing vanities. Therefore I allowed you to plunge for a moment; I

had no right to forbid it, simply because my own hour for it was long

since over.”

“Why did you let me live among these vanities, if you loved me?”

“Because you would not—nay, more, you could not—have believed me about

them; it was necessary for you to learn for yourself; and you have

learned.”

“You reasoned a great deal,” said I. “That was because you loved me so

little.”

We were silent again.

“What you have just said to me is hard, but it is the truth,” he

resumed, after a while, rising abruptly, and beginning to walk about the

terrace; “yes, it is the truth! I have been to blame,” he went on,

stopping before me.... “Either I ought not to have let myself love you

at all, or I ought to have loved you more simply—yes!”

“Sergius, let us forget everything,” said I, timidly.

“No, what is gone never comes again, there can be no turning back ...”

his voice softened as he spoke.

“It has already come again,” said I, laying my hand on his shoulder.

He took the hand in his, and pressed it.

“No, I was not telling the truth, when I pretended not to regret the

past; no, I do regret your past love; I bitterly mourn over it,—this

love, which can no longer exist. Who is to blame? I do not know. Love

there may even yet be, but not the same; its place is still there, but

darkened and desolated; it is without savor and without strength; the

remembrance has not vanished, nor the gratitude, but....”

“Do not speak so,” I interrupted. “Let it come to life again, let it be

what it was.... Might that be?” I asked, looking into his face. His eyes

were serene, quiet, and met mine without their old deep look.

Even as I asked the question I felt the answer, felt that my wish was no

longer possible to realize. He smiled; it seemed to me an old man’s

smile, gentle and full of peace.

“How young you still are, and how old I am already!” he said. “Why

delude ourselves?” he added, still with the same smile.

I remained near him, silent, and feeling my soul grow more and more

tranquil.

“Do not let us try to repeat life,” he went on, “nor to lie to

ourselves. But it is something, to have no longer, God willing, either

disquiet or distress. We have nothing to seek for. We have already

found, already shared, happiness enough. All we have to do now is to

open the way,—you see to whom....” he said, pointing out little Vania,

in his nurse’s arms, at the terrace door. “That is necessary, dear

love,” he concluded, bending over me and dropping a kiss on my hair.

It was no longer a lover, it was an old friend who gave the caress.

The perfumed freshness of night was rising, sweeter and stronger, from

the garden; the few sounds audible were solemn and far off, and soon

gave way to deep tranquillity; one by one the stars shone out. I looked

at him, and all at once I became conscious of infinite relief in my

soul; it was as if a moral nerve, whose sensitiveness had caused me keen

suffering had suddenly been removed. Quietly and clearly I comprehended

that the dominant sentiment of this phase of my existence was

irrevocably gone, as was the phase itself, and that not only was its

return impossible, but that it would be to me full of unendurable pain.

There had been enough of this time; and had it indeed been so good,—this

time, which to me had seemed to enclose such joys? And already it had

lasted so long, so long!

“But tea is waiting,” he said, gently; and we went together to the

drawing-room.

At the door I met Macha, and the nurse with Vania. I took the child in

my arms, wrapped up the little bare feet, and, holding it close to my

heart, barely touched its lips with a light kiss. Almost asleep as it

was, it moved its little arms, stretched out the crumpled fingers, and

opened its bewildered eyes, as if trying to find or remember something;

all at once its eyes fell on me, a look of intelligence sparkled in

them, and the pink pursed-up lips lengthened in a baby smile. “You are

mine, mine!” thought I, with a delicious thrill running through me, and

as I strained it to my heart I was half afraid of hurting it with my

eager embrace. Over and over I kissed its cold little feet, its breast,

its arms, and head with the scant covering of down. My husband came up

to us, quickly drew the wrapping over the baby’s face, then, drawing it

away again:

“Ivan Sergevitch!” he said with finger under the little chin.

But I, in my turn, covered up Ivan Sergevitch. No one should look at him

so long, except myself. I glanced at my husband, his eyes laughed as

they rested on mine, and it was long since I had met his with such happy

joy.

This day ended my romance with my husband. The old love remained, and

the dear remembrance of what could never come back to me; but a new love

for my children and my children’s father, began another life and another

way of happiness, up to this hour unending ... for at last I know that

in home, and in the pure joys of home will be found—real happiness!

THE END.

[1] Peasants attached to the household, and not to the soil.

[2] Russian cart, consisting of a flat frame-work of bark, between four

wheels.

[3] This expression, peculiar to Russia, corresponds to what in Catholic

countries is called: Making a preparatory retreat.

[4] In the Greek Church the staroste acts as church-warden, collector of

alms, etc.

[5] Screen, upon which are the images.

[6] Strong Russian phrase, to express great poverty.

[7] Justice of the peace, of the district.

[8] Diminutive of Nicolas.

[9] Yvan.