His mother did not leave her room all day long; the old nurse kept sighing and speaking in whispers; his aunt had been on the point of taking her departure every day, and her trunks were continually being brought down to the hall and carried up again to her room. In the house, in the yard, and in the garden it was as still as though there were some one dead in the house. His aunt, the servants, and even the peasants, so it seemed to Pyotr Mihalitch, looked at him enigmatically and with perplexity, as though they wanted to say “Your sister has been seduced4; why are you doing nothing?” And he reproached himself for inactivity, though he did not know precisely5 what action he ought to have taken.
So passed six days. On the seventh—it was Sunday afternoon—a messenger on horseback brought a letter. The address was in a familiar feminine handwriting: “Her Excy. Anna Nikolaevna Ivashin.” Pyotr Mihalitch fancied that there was something defiant6, provocative7, in the handwriting and in the abbreviation “Excy.” And advanced ideas in women are obstinate8, ruthless, cruel.
“She’d rather die than make any concession9 to her unhappy mother, or beg her forgiveness,” thought Pyotr Mihalitch, as he went to his mother with the letter.
His mother was lying on her bed, dressed. Seeing her son, she rose impulsively10, and straightening her grey hair, which had fallen from under her cap, asked quickly:
“What is it? What is it?”
“This has come . . .” said her son, giving her the letter.
Zina’s name, and even the pronoun “she” was not uttered in the house. Zina was spoken of impersonally11: “this has come,” “Gone away,” and so on. . . . The mother recognised her daughter’s handwriting, and her face grew ugly and unpleasant, and her grey hair escaped again from her cap.
“No!” she said, with a motion of her hands, as though the letter scorched12 her fingers. “No, no, never! Nothing would induce me!”
The mother broke into hysterical13 sobs14 of grief and shame; she evidently longed to read the letter, but her pride prevented her. Pyotr Mihalitch realised that he ought to open the letter himself and read it aloud, but he was overcome by anger such as he had never felt before; he ran out into the yard and shouted to the messenger:
“Say there will be no answer! There will be no answer! Tell them that, you beast!”
And he tore up the letter; then tears came into his eyes, and feeling that he was cruel, miserable15, and to blame, he went out into the fields.
He was only twenty-seven, but he was already stout16. He dressed like an old man in loose, roomy clothes, and suffered from asthma17. He already seemed to be developing the characteristics of an elderly country bachelor. He never fell in love, never thought of marriage, and loved no one but his mother, his sister, his old nurse, and the gardener, Vassilitch. He was fond of good fare, of his nap after dinner, and of talking about politics and exalted18 subjects. He had in his day taken his degree at the university, but he now looked upon his studies as though in them he had discharged a duty incumbent19 upon young men between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five; at any rate, the ideas which now strayed every day through his mind had nothing in common with the university or the subjects he had studied there.
In the fields it was hot and still, as though rain were coming. It was steaming in the wood, and there was a heavy fragrant21 scent22 from the pines and rotting leaves. Pyotr Mihalitch stopped several times and wiped his wet brow. He looked at his winter corn and his spring oats, walked round the clover-field, and twice drove away a partridge with its chicks which had strayed in from the wood. And all the while he was thinking that this insufferable state of things could not go on for ever, and that he must end it one way or another. End it stupidly, madly, but he must end it.
“But how? What can I do?” he asked himself, and looked imploringly23 at the sky and at the trees, as though begging for their help.
But the sky and the trees were mute. His noble ideas were no help, and his common sense whispered that the agonising question could have no solution but a stupid one, and that to-day’s scene with the messenger was not the last one of its kind. It was terrible to think what was in store for him!
As he returned home the sun was setting. By now it seemed to him that the problem was incapable24 of solution. He could not accept the accomplished25 fact, and he could not refuse to accept it, and there was no intermediate course. When, taking off his hat and fanning himself with his handkerchief, he was walking along the road, and had only another mile and a half to go before he would reach home, he heard bells behind him. It was a very choice and successful combination of bells, which gave a clear crystal note. No one had such bells on his horses but the police captain, Medovsky, formerly26 an officer in the hussars, a man in broken-down health, who had been a great rake and spendthrift, and was a distant relation of Pyotr Mihalitch. He was like one of the family at the Ivashins’ and had a tender, fatherly affection for Zina, as well as a great admiration27 for her.
“I was coming to see you,” he said, overtaking Pyotr Mihalitch. “Get in; I’ll give you a lift.”
He was smiling and looked cheerful. Evidently he did not yet know that Zina had gone to live with Vlassitch; perhaps he had been told of it already, but did not believe it. Pyotr Mihalitch felt in a difficult position.
“You are very welcome,” he muttered, blushing till the tears came into his eyes, and not knowing how to lie or what to say. “I am delighted,” he went on, trying to smile, “but . . . Zina is away and mother is ill.”
“How annoying!” said the police captain, looking pensively28 at Pyotr Mihalitch. “And I was meaning to spend the evening with you. Where has Zinaida Mihalovna gone?”
“To the Sinitskys’, and I believe she meant to go from there to the monastery29. I don’t quite know.”
The police captain talked a little longer and then turned back. Pyotr Mihalitch walked home, and thought with horror what the police captain’s feelings would be when he learned the truth. And Pyotr Mihalitch imagined his feelings, and actually experiencing them himself, went into the house.
“Lord help us,” he thought, “Lord help us!”
At evening tea the only one at the table was his aunt. As usual, her face wore the expression that seemed to say that though she was a weak, defenceless woman, she would allow no one to insult her. Pyotr Mihalitch sat down at the other end of the table (he did not like his aunt) and began drinking tea in silence.
“Your mother has had no dinner again to-day,” said his aunt. “You ought to do something about it, Petrusha. Starving oneself is no help in sorrow.”
It struck Pyotr Mihalitch as absurd that his aunt should meddle30 in other people’s business and should make her departure depend on Zina’s having gone away. He was tempted31 to say something rude to her, but restrained himself. And as he restrained himself he felt the time had come for action, and that he could not bear it any longer. Either he must act at once or fall on the ground, and scream and bang his head upon the floor. He pictured Vlassitch and Zina, both of them progressive and self-satisfied, kissing each other somewhere under a maple32 tree, and all the anger and bitterness that had been accumulating in him for the last seven days fastened upon Vlassitch.
“One has seduced and abducted my sister,” he thought, “another will come and murder my mother, a third will set fire to the house and sack the place. . . . And all this under the mask of friendship, lofty ideas, unhappiness!”
“No, it shall not be!” Pyotr Mihalitch cried suddenly, and he brought his fist down on the table.
He jumped up and ran out of the dining-room. In the stable the steward33’s horse was standing34 ready saddled. He got on it and galloped35 off to Vlassitch.
There was a perfect tempest within him. He felt a longing37 to do something extraordinary, startling, even if he had to repent38 of it all his life afterwards. Should he call Vlassitch a blackguard, slap him in the face, and then challenge him to a duel39? But Vlassitch was not one of those men who do fight duels40; being called a blackguard and slapped in the face would only make him more unhappy, and would make him shrink into himself more than ever. These unhappy, defenceless people are the most insufferable, the most tiresome41 creatures in the world. They can do anything with impunity42. When the luckless man responds to well-deserved reproach by looking at you with eyes full of deep and guilty feeling, and with a sickly smile bends his head submissively, even justice itself could not lift its hand against him.
“No matter. I’ll horsewhip him before her eyes and tell him what I think of him,” Pyotr Mihalitch decided43.
He was riding through his wood and waste land, and he imagined Zina would try to justify44 her conduct by talking about the rights of women and individual freedom, and about there being no difference between legal marriage and free union. Like a woman, she would argue about what she did not understand. And very likely at the end she would ask, “How do you come in? What right have you to interfere45?”
“No, I have no right,” muttered Pyotr Mihalitch. “But so much the better. . . . The harsher I am, the less right I have to interfere, the better.”
It was sultry. Clouds of gnats46 hung over the ground and in the waste places the peewits called plaintively47. Everything betokened48 rain, but he could not see a cloud in the sky. Pyotr Mihalitch crossed the boundary of his estate and galloped over a smooth, level field. He often went along this road and knew every bush, every hollow in it. What now in the far distance looked in the dusk like a dark cliff was a red church; he could picture it all down to the smallest detail, even the plaster on the gate and the calves49 that were always grazing in the church enclosure. Three-quarters of a mile to the right of the church there was a copse like a dark blur—it was Count Koltonovitch’s. And beyond the church Vlassitch’s estate began.
From behind the church and the count’s copse a huge black storm-cloud was rising, and there were ashes of white lightning.
“Here it is!” thought Pyotr Mihalitch. “Lord help us, Lord help us!”
The horse was soon tired after its quick gallop36, and Pyotr Mihalitch was tired too. The storm-cloud looked at him angrily and seemed to advise him to go home. He felt a little scared.
“I will prove to them they are wrong,” he tried to reassure50 himself. “They will say that it is free-love, individual freedom; but freedom means self-control and not subjection to passion. It’s not liberty but license51!”
He reached the count’s big pond; it looked dark blue and frowning under the cloud, and a smell of damp and slime rose from it. Near the dam, two willows52, one old and one young, drooped53 tenderly towards one another. Pyotr Mihalitch and Vlassitch had been walking near this very spot only a fortnight before, humming a students’ song:
“‘Youth is wasted, life is nought54, when the heart is cold and loveless.’”
A wretched song!
It was thundering as Pyotr Mihalitch rode through the copse, and the trees were bending and rustling55 in the wind. He had to make haste. It was only three-quarters of a mile through a meadow from the copse to Vlassitch’s house. Here there were old birch-trees on each side of the road. They had the same melancholy56 and unhappy air as their owner Vlassitch, and looked as tall and lanky57 as he. Big drops of rain pattered on the birches and on the grass; the wind had suddenly dropped, and there was a smell of wet earth and poplars. Before him he saw Vlassitch’s fence with a row of yellow acacias, which were tall and lanky too; where the fence was broken he could see the neglected orchard58.
Pyotr Mihalitch was not thinking now of the horsewhip or of a slap in the face, and did not know what he would do at Vlassitch’s. He felt nervous. He felt frightened on his own account and on his sister’s, and was terrified at the thought of seeing her. How would she behave with her brother? What would they both talk about? And had he not better go back before it was too late? As he made these reflections, he galloped up the avenue of lime-trees to the house, rode round the big clumps59 of lilacs, and suddenly saw Vlassitch.
Vlassitch, wearing a cotton shirt, and top-boots, bending forward, with no hat on in the rain, was coming from the corner of the house to the front door. He was followed by a workman with a hammer and a box of nails. They must have been mending a shutter60 which had been banging in the wind. Seeing Pyotr Mihalitch, Vlassitch stopped.
“It’s you!” he said, smiling. “That’s nice.”
“Yes, I’ve come, as you see,” said Pyotr Mihalitch, brushing the rain off himself with both hands.
“Well, that’s capital! I’m very glad,” said Vlassitch, but he did not hold out his hand: evidently he did not venture, but waited for Pyotr Mihalitch to hold out his. “It will do the oats good,” he said, looking at the sky.
“Yes.”
They went into the house in silence. To the right of the hall was a door leading to another hall and then to the drawing-room, and on the left was a little room which in winter was used by the steward. Pyotr Mihalitch and Vlassitch went into this little room.
“Where were you caught in the rain?”
“Not far off, quite close to the house.”
Pyotr Mihalitch sat down on the bed. He was glad of the noise of the rain and the darkness of the room. It was better: it made it less dreadful, and there was no need to see his companion’s face. There was no anger in his heart now, nothing but fear and vexation with himself. He felt he had made a bad beginning, and that nothing would come of this visit.
Both were silent for some time and affected61 to be listening to the rain.
“Thank you, Petrusha,” Vlassitch began, clearing his throat. “I am very grateful to you for coming. It’s generous and noble of you. I understand it, and, believe me, I appreciate it. Believe me.”
He looked out of the window and went on, standing in the middle of the room:
“Everything happened so secretly, as though we were concealing63 it all from you. The feeling that you might be wounded and angry has been a blot64 on our happiness all these days. But let me justify myself. We kept it secret not because we did not trust you. To begin with, it all happened suddenly, by a kind of inspiration; there was no time to discuss it. Besides, it’s such a private, delicate matter, and it was awkward to bring a third person in, even some one as intimate as you. Above all, in all this we reckoned on your generosity65. You are a very noble and generous person. I am infinitely66 grateful to you. If you ever need my life, come and take it.”
Vlassitch talked in a quiet, hollow bass67, always on the same droning note; he was evidently agitated68. Pyotr Mihalitch felt it was his turn to speak, and that to listen and keep silent would really mean playing the part of a generous and noble simpleton, and that had not been his idea in coming. He got up quickly and said, breathlessly in an undertone:
“Listen, Grigory. You know I liked you and could have desired no better husband for my sister; but what has happened is awful! It’s terrible to think of it!”
“Why is it terrible?” asked Vlassitch, with a quiver in his voice. “It would be terrible if we had done wrong, but that isn’t so.”
“Listen, Grigory. You know I have no prejudices; but, excuse my frankness, to my mind you have both acted selfishly. Of course, I shan’t say so to my sister—it will distress3 her; but you ought to know: mother is miserable beyond all description.”
“Yes, that’s sad,” sighed Vlassitch. “We foresaw that, Petrusha, but what could we have done? Because one’s actions hurt other people, it doesn’t prove that they are wrong. What’s to be done! Every important step one takes is bound to distress somebody. If you went to fight for freedom, that would distress your mother, too. What’s to be done! Any one who puts the peace of his family before everything has to renounce69 the life of ideas completely.”
There was a vivid flash of lightning at the window, and the lightning seemed to change the course of Vlassitch’s thoughts. He sat down beside Pyotr Mihalitch and began saying what was utterly70 beside the point.
“I have such a reverence71 for your sister, Petrusha,” he said. “When I used to come and see you, I felt as though I were going to a holy shrine72, and I really did worship Zina. Now my reverence for her grows every day. For me she is something higher than a wife—yes, higher!” Vlassitch waved his hands. “She is my holy of holies. Since she is living with me, I enter my house as though it were a temple. She is an extraordinary, rare, most noble woman!”
“Well, he’s off now!” thought Pyotr Mihalitch; he disliked the word “woman.”
“Why shouldn’t you be married properly?” he asked. “How much does your wife want for a divorce?”
“Seventy-five thousand.”
“It’s rather a lot. But if we were to negotiate with her?”
“She won’t take a farthing less. She is an awful woman, brother,” sighed Vlassitch. “I’ve never talked to you about her before—it was unpleasant to think of her; but now that the subject has come up, I’ll tell you about her. I married her on the impulse of the moment—a fine, honourable73 impulse. An officer in command of a battalion74 of our regiment75—if you care to hear the details—had an affair with a girl of eighteen; that is, to put it plainly, he seduced her, lived with her for two months, and abandoned her. She was in an awful position, brother. She was ashamed to go home to her parents; besides, they wouldn’t have received her. Her lover had abandoned her; there was nothing left for her but to go to the barracks and sell herself. The other officers in the regiment were indignant. They were by no means saints themselves, but the baseness of it was so striking. Besides, no one in the regiment could endure the man. And to spite him, you understand, the indignant lieutenants76 and ensigns began getting up a subscription78 for the unfortunate girl. And when we subalterns met together and began to subscribe79 five or ten roubles each, I had a sudden inspiration. I felt it was an opportunity to do something fine. I hastened to the girl and warmly expressed my sympathy. And while I was on my way to her, and while I was talking to her, I loved her fervently80 as a woman insulted and injured. Yes. . . . Well, a week later I made her an offer. The colonel and my comrades thought my marriage out of keeping with the dignity of an officer. That roused me more than ever. I wrote a long letter, do you know, in which I proved that my action ought to be inscribed81 in the annals of the regiment in letters of gold, and so on. I sent the letter to my colonel and copies to my comrades. Well, I was excited, and, of course, I could not avoid being rude. I was asked to leave the regiment. I have a rough copy of it put away somewhere; I’ll give it to you to read sometime. It was written with great feeling. You will see what lofty and noble sentiments I was experiencing. I resigned my commission and came here with my wife. My father had left a few debts, I had no money, and from the first day my wife began making acquaintances, dressing82 herself smartly, and playing cards, and I was obliged to mortgage the estate. She led a bad life, you understand, and you are the only one of the neighbours who hasn’t been her lover. After two years I gave her all I had to set me free and she went off to town. Yes. . . . And now I pay her twelve hundred roubles a year. She is an awful woman! There is a fly, brother, which lays an egg in the back of a spider so that the spider can’t shake it off: the grub fastens upon the spider and drinks its heart’s blood. That was how this woman fastened upon me and sucks the blood of my heart. She hates and despises me for being so stupid; that is, for marrying a woman like her. My chivalry83 seems to her despicable. ‘A wise man cast me off,’ she says, ‘and a fool picked me up.’ To her thinking no one but a pitiful idiot could have behaved as I did. And that is insufferably bitter to me, brother. Altogether, I may say in parenthesis84, fate has been hard upon me, very hard.”
Pyotr Mihalitch listened to Vlassitch and wondered in perplexity what it was in this man that had so charmed his sister. He was not young—he was forty-one—lean and lanky, narrow-chested, with a long nose, and grey hairs in his beard. He talked in a droning voice, had a sickly smile, and waved his hands awkwardly as he talked. He had neither health, nor pleasant, manly85 manners, nor savoir-faire, nor gaiety, and in all his exterior86 there was something colourless and indefinite. He dressed without taste, his surroundings were depressing, he did not care for poetry or painting because “they have no answer to give to the questions of the day” —that is, he did not understand them; music did not touch him. He was a poor farmer.
His estate was in a wretched condition and was mortgaged; he was paying twelve percent on the second mortgage and owed ten thousand on personal securities as well. When the time came to pay the interest on the mortgage or to send money to his wife, he asked every one to lend him money with as much agitation87 as though his house were on fire, and, at the same time losing his head, he would sell the whole of his winter store of fuel for five roubles and a stack of straw for three roubles, and then have his garden fence or old cucumber-frames chopped up to heat his stoves. His meadows were ruined by pigs, the peasants’ cattle strayed in the undergrowth in his woods, and every year the old trees were fewer and fewer: beehives and rusty88 pails lay about in his garden and kitchen-garden. He had neither talents nor abilities, nor even ordinary capacity for living like other people. In practical life he was a weak, na?ve man, easy to deceive and to cheat, and the peasants with good reason called him “simple.”
He was a Liberal, and in the district was regarded as a “Red,” but even his progressiveness was a bore. There was no originality89 nor moving power about his independent views: he was revolted, indignant, and delighted always on the same note; it was always spiritless and ineffective. Even in moments of strong enthusiasm he never raised his head or stood upright. But the most tiresome thing of all was that he managed to express even his best and finest ideas so that they seemed in him commonplace and out of date. It reminded one of something old one had read long ago, when slowly and with an air of profundity90 he would begin discoursing91 of his noble, lofty moments, of his best years; or when he went into raptures92 over the younger generation, which has always been, and still is, in advance of society; or abused Russians for donning their dressing-gowns at thirty and forgetting the principles of their alma mater. If you stayed the night with him, he would put Pissarev or Darwin on your bedroom table; if you said you had read it, he would go and bring Dobrolubov.
In the district this was called free-thinking, and many people looked upon this free-thinking as an innocent and harmless eccentricity93; it made him profoundly unhappy, however. It was for him the maggot of which he had just been speaking; it had fastened upon him and was sucking his life-blood. In his past there had been the strange marriage in the style of Dostoevsky; long letters and copies written in a bad, unintelligible94 hand-writing, but with great feeling, endless misunderstandings, explanations, disappointments, then debts, a second mortgage, the allowance to his wife, the monthly borrowing of money—and all this for no benefit to any one, either himself or others. And in the present, as in the past, he was still in a nervous flurry, on the lookout95 for heroic actions, and poking96 his nose into other people’s affairs; as before, at every favourable97 opportunity there were long letters and copies, wearisome, stereotyped98 conversations about the village community, or the revival99 of handicrafts or the establishment of cheese factories—conversations as like one another as though he had prepared them, not in his living brain, but by some mechanical process. And finally this scandal with Zina of which one could not see the end!
And meanwhile Zina was young—she was only twenty-two—good-looking, elegant, gay; she was fond of laughing, chatter100, argument, a passionate101 musician; she had good taste in dress, in furniture, in books, and in her own home she would not have put up with a room like this, smelling of boots and cheap vodka. She, too, had advanced ideas, but in her free-thinking one felt the overflow102 of energy, the vanity of a young, strong, spirited girl, passionately103 eager to be better and more original than others. . . . How had it happened that she had fallen in love with Vlassitch?
“He is a Quixote, an obstinate fanatic104, a maniac,” thought Pyotr Mihalitch, “and she is as soft, yielding, and weak in character as I am. . . . She and I give in easily, without resistance. She loves him; but, then, I, too, love him in spite of everything.”
Pyotr Mihalitch considered Vlassitch a good, straightforward105 man, but narrow and one-sided. In his perturbations and his sufferings, and in fact in his whole life, he saw no lofty aims, remote or immediate106; he saw nothing but boredom107 and incapacity for life. His self-sacrifice and all that Vlassitch himself called heroic actions or noble impulses seemed to him a useless waste of force, unnecessary blank shots which consumed a great deal of powder. And Vlassitch’s fanatical belief in the extraordinary loftiness and faultlessness of his own way of thinking struck him as na?ve and even morbid108; and the fact that Vlassitch all his life had contrived109 to mix the trivial with the exalted, that he had made a stupid marriage and looked upon it as an act of heroism110, and then had affairs with other women and regarded that as a triumph of some idea or other was simply incomprehensible.
Nevertheless, Pyotr Mihalitch was fond of Vlassitch; he was conscious of a sort of power in him, and for some reason he had never had the heart to contradict him.
Vlassitch sat down quite close to him for a talk in the dark, to the accompaniment of the rain, and he had cleared his throat as a prelude111 to beginning on something lengthy112, such as the history of his marriage. But it was intolerable for Pyotr Mihalitch to listen to him; he was tormented113 by the thought that he would see his sister directly.
“Yes, you’ve had bad luck,” he said gently; “but, excuse me, we’ve been wandering from the point. That’s not what we are talking about.”
“Yes, yes, quite so. Well, let us come back to the point,” said Vlassitch, and he stood up. “I tell you, Petrusha, our conscience is clear. We are not married, but there is no need for me to prove to you that our marriage is perfectly114 legitimate115. You are as free in your ideas as I am, and, happily, there can be no disagreement between us on that point. As for our future, that ought not to alarm you. I’ll work in the sweat of my brow, I’ll work day and night— in fact, I will strain every nerve to make Zina happy. Her life will be a splendid one! You may ask, am I able to do it. I am, brother! When a man devotes every minute to one thought, it’s not difficult for him to attain116 his object. But let us go to Zina; it will be a joy to her to see you.”
Pyotr Mihalitch’s heart began to beat. He got up and followed Vlassitch into the hall, and from there into the drawing-room. There was nothing in the huge gloomy room but a piano and a long row of old chairs ornamented117 with bronze, on which no one ever sat. There was a candle alight on the piano. From the drawing-room they went in silence into the dining-room. This room, too, was large and comfortless; in the middle of the room there was a round table with two leaves with six thick legs, and only one candle. A clock in a large mahogany case like an ikon stand pointed118 to half-past two.
Vlassitch opened the door into the next room and said:
“Zina, here is Petrusha come to see us!”
At once there was the sound of hurried footsteps and Zina came into the dining-room. She was tall, plump, and very pale, and, just as when he had seen her for the last time at home, she was wearing a black skirt and a red blouse, with a large buckle119 on her belt. She flung one arm round her brother and kissed him on the temple.
“What a storm!” she said. “Grigory went off somewhere and I was left quite alone in the house.”
She was not embarrassed, and looked at her brother as frankly120 and candidly121 as at home; looking at her, Pyotr Mihalitch, too, lost his embarrassment122.
“But you are not afraid of storms,” he said, sitting down at the table.
“No,” she said, “but here the rooms are so big, the house is so old, and when there is thunder it all rattles123 like a cupboard full of crockery. It’s a charming house altogether,” she went on, sitting down opposite her brother. “There’s some pleasant memory in every room. In my room, only fancy, Grigory’s grandfather shot himself.”
“In August we shall have the money to do up the lodge124 in the garden,” said Vlassitch.
“For some reason when it thunders I think of that grandfather,” Zina went on. “And in this dining-room somebody was flogged to death.”
“That’s an actual fact,” said Vlassitch, and he looked with wide-open eyes at Pyotr Mihalitch. “Sometime in the forties this place was let to a Frenchman called Olivier. The portrait of his daughter is lying in an attic125 now—a very pretty girl. This Olivier, so my father told me, despised Russians for their ignorance and treated them with cruel derision. Thus, for instance, he insisted on the priest walking without his hat for half a mile round his house, and on the church bells being rung when the Olivier family drove through the village. The serfs and altogether the humble126 of this world, of course, he treated with even less ceremony. Once there came along this road one of the simple-hearted sons of wandering Russia, somewhat after the style of Gogol’s divinity student, Homa Brut. He asked for a night’s lodging127, pleased the bailiffs, and was given a job at the office of the estate. There are many variations of the story. Some say the divinity student stirred up the peasants, others that Olivier’ s daughter fell in love with him. I don’t know which is true, only one fine evening Olivier called him in here and cross-examined him, then ordered him to be beaten. Do you know, he sat here at this table drinking claret while the stable-boys beat the man. He must have tried to wring128 something out of him. Towards morning the divinity student died of the torture and his body was hidden. They say it was thrown into Koltovitch’s pond. There was an inquiry129, but the Frenchman paid some thousands to some one in authority and went away to Alsace. His lease was up just then, and so the matter ended.”
“What scoundrels!” said Zina, shuddering130.
“My father remembered Olivier and his daughter well. He used to say she was remarkably131 beautiful and eccentric. I imagine the divinity student had done both—stirred up the peasants and won the daughter’s heart. Perhaps he wasn’t a divinity student at all, but some one travelling incognito132.”
Zina grew thoughtful; the story of the divinity student and the beautiful French girl had evidently carried her imagination far away. It seemed to Pyotr Mihalitch that she had not changed in the least during the last week, except that she was a little paler. She looked calm and just as usual, as though she had come with her brother to visit Vlassitch. But Pyotr Mihalitch felt that some change had taken place in himself. Before, when she was living at home, he could have spoken to her about anything, and now he did not feel equal to asking her the simple question, “How do you like being here?” The question seemed awkward and unnecessary. Probably the same change had taken place in her. She was in no haste to turn the conversation to her mother, to her home, to her relations with Vlassitch; she did not defend herself, she did not say that free unions are better than marriages in the church; she was not agitated, and calmly brooded over the story of Olivier. . . . And why had they suddenly begun talking of Olivier?
“You are both of you wet with the rain,” said Zina, and she smiled joyfully133; she was touched by this point of resemblance between her brother and Vlassitch.
And Pyotr Mihalitch felt all the bitterness and horror of his position. He thought of his deserted134 home, the closed piano, and Zina’s bright little room into which no one went now; he thought there were no prints of little feet on the garden-paths, and that before tea no one went off, laughing gaily135, to bathe. What he had clung to more and more from his childhood upwards136, what he had loved thinking about when he used to sit in the stuffy137 class-room or the lecture theatre—brightness, purity, and joy, everything that filled the house with life and light, had gone never to return, had vanished, and was mixed up with a coarse, clumsy story of some battalion officer, a chivalrous138 lieutenant77, a depraved woman and a grandfather who had shot himself. . . . And to begin to talk about his mother or to think that the past could ever return would mean not understanding what was clear.
Pyotr Mihalitch’s eyes filled with tears and his hand began to tremble as it lay on the table. Zina guessed what he was thinking about, and her eyes, too, glistened139 and looked red.
“Grigory, come here,” she said to Vlassitch.
They walked away to the window and began talking of something in a whisper. From the way that Vlassitch stooped down to her and the way she looked at him, Pyotr Mihalitch realised again that everything was irreparably over, and that it was no use to talk of anything. Zina went out of the room.
“Well, brother!” Vlassitch began, after a brief silence, rubbing his hands and smiling. “I called our life happiness just now, but that was, so to speak, poetical140 license. In reality, there has not been a sense of happiness so far. Zina has been thinking all the time of you, of her mother, and has been worrying; looking at her, I, too, felt worried. Hers is a bold, free nature, but, you know, it’s difficult when you’re not used to it, and she is young, too. The servants call her ‘Miss’; it seems a trifle, but it upsets her. There it is, brother.”
Zina brought in a plateful of strawberries. She was followed by a little maidservant, looking crushed and humble, who set a jug141 of milk on the table and made a very low bow: she had something about her that was in keeping with the old furniture, something petrified142 and dreary143.
The sound of the rain had ceased. Pyotr Mihalitch ate strawberries while Vlassitch and Zina looked at him in silence. The moment of the inevitable144 but useless conversation was approaching, and all three felt the burden of it. Pyotr Mihalitch’s eyes filled with tears again; he pushed away his plate and said that he must be going home, or it would be getting late, and perhaps it would rain again. The time had come when common decency145 required Zina to speak of those at home and of her new life.
“How are things at home?” she asked rapidly, and her pale face quivered. “How is mother?”
“You know mother . . .” said Pyotr Mihalitch, not looking at her.
“Petrusha, you’ve thought a great deal about what has happened,” she said, taking hold of her brother’s sleeve, and he knew how hard it was for her to speak. “You’ve thought a great deal: tell me, can we reckon on mother’s accepting Grigory . . . and the whole position, one day?”
She stood close to her brother, face to face with him, and he was astonished that she was so beautiful, and that he seemed not to have noticed it before. And it seemed to him utterly absurd that his sister, so like his mother, pampered146, elegant, should be living with Vlassitch and in Vlassitch’s house, with the petrified servant, and the table with six legs—in the house where a man had been flogged to death, and that she was not going home with him, but was staying here to sleep.
“You know mother,” he said, not answering her question. “I think you ought to have . . . to do something, to ask her forgiveness or something. . . .”
“But to ask her forgiveness would mean pretending we had done wrong. I’m ready to tell a lie to comfort mother, but it won’t lead anywhere. I know mother. Well, what will be, must be!” said Zina, growing more cheerful now that the most unpleasant had been said. “We’ll wait for five years, ten years, and be patient, and then God’s will be done.”
She took her brother’s arm, and when she walked through the dark hall she squeezed close to him. They went out on the steps. Pyotr Mihalitch said good-bye, got on his horse, and set off at a walk; Zina and Vlassitch walked a little way with him. It was still and warm, with a delicious smell of hay; stars were twinkling brightly between the clouds. Vlassitch’s old garden, which had seen so many gloomy stories in its time, lay slumbering147 in the darkness, and for some reason it was mournful riding through it.
“Zina and I to-day after dinner spent some really exalted moments,” said Vlassitch. “I read aloud to her an excellent article on the question of emigration. You must read it, brother! You really must. It’s remarkable148 for its lofty tone. I could not resist writing a letter to the editor to be forwarded to the author. I wrote only a single line: ‘I thank you and warmly press your noble hand.’”
Pyotr Mihalitch was tempted to say, “Don’t meddle in what does not concern you,” but he held his tongue.
Vlassitch walked by his right stirrup and Zina by the left; both seemed to have forgotten that they had to go home. It was damp, and they had almost reached Koltovitch’s copse. Pyotr Mihalitch felt that they were expecting something from him, though they hardly knew what it was, and he felt unbearably149 sorry for them. Now as they walked by the horse with submissive faces, lost in thought, he had a deep conviction that they were unhappy, and could not be happy, and their love seemed to him a melancholy, irreparable mistake. Pity and the sense that he could do nothing to help them reduced him to that state of spiritual softening150 when he was ready to make any sacrifice to get rid of the painful feeling of sympathy.
“I’ll come over sometimes for a night,” he said.
But it sounded as though he were making a concession, and did not satisfy him. When they stopped near Koltovitch’s copse to say good-bye, he bent20 down to Zina, touched her shoulder, and said:
“You are right, Zina! You have done well.” To avoid saying more and bursting into tears, he lashed151 his horse and galloped into the wood. As he rode into the darkness, he looked round and saw Vlassitch and Zina walking home along the road—he taking long strides, while she walked with a hurried, jerky step beside him—talking eagerly about something.
“I am an old woman!” thought Pyotr Mihalitch. “I went to solve the question and I have only made it more complicated—there it is!”
He was heavy at heart. When he got out of the copse he rode at a walk and then stopped his horse near the pond. He wanted to sit and think without moving. The moon was rising and was reflected in a streak152 of red on the other side of the pond. There were low rumbles153 of thunder in the distance. Pyotr Mihalitch looked steadily154 at the water and imagined his sister’s despair, her martyr-like pallor, the tearless eyes with which she would conceal62 her humiliation155 from others. He imagined her with child, imagined the death of their mother, her funeral, Zina’s horror. . . . The proud, superstitious156 old woman would be sure to die of grief. Terrible pictures of the future rose before him on the background of smooth, dark water, and among pale feminine figures he saw himself, a weak, cowardly man with a guilty face.
A hundred paces off on the right bank of the pond, something dark was standing motionless: was it a man or a tall post? Pyotr Mihalitch thought of the divinity student who had been killed and thrown into the pond.
“Olivier behaved inhumanly157, but one way or another he did settle the question, while I have settled nothing and have only made it worse,” he thought, gazing at the dark figure that looked like a ghost. “He said and did what he thought right while I say and do what I don’t think right; and I don’t know really what I do think. . . .”
He rode up to the dark figure: it was an old rotten post, the relic158 of some shed.
From Koltovitch’s copse and garden there came a strong fragrant scent of lilies of the valley and honey-laden flowers. Pyotr Mihalitch rode along the bank of the pond and looked mournfully into the water. And thinking about his life, he came to the conclusion he had never said or acted upon what he really thought, and other people had repaid him in the same way. And so the whole of life seemed to him as dark as this water in which the night sky was reflected and water-weeds grew in a tangle159. And it seemed to him that nothing could ever set it right.
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1
abducted
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| 劫持，诱拐( abduct的过去式和过去分词 )； 使（肢体等）外展 | |
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distressing
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| a.使人痛苦的 | |
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distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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seduced
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| 诱奸( seduce的过去式和过去分词 )； 勾引； 诱使堕落； 使入迷 | |
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precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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defiant
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| adj.无礼的，挑战的 | |
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provocative
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| adj.挑衅的，煽动的，刺激的，挑逗的 | |
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obstinate
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| adj.顽固的，倔强的，不易屈服的，较难治愈的 | |
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concession
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| n.让步，妥协；特许(权) | |
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impulsively
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| adv.冲动地 | |
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impersonally
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| ad.非人称地 | |
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12
scorched
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| 烧焦，烤焦( scorch的过去式和过去分词 )； 使（植物）枯萎，把…晒枯； 高速行驶； 枯焦 | |
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13
hysterical
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| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
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14
sobs
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| 啜泣（声），呜咽（声）( sob的名词复数 ) | |
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15
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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17
asthma
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| n.气喘病，哮喘病 | |
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18
exalted
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| adj.(地位等)高的，崇高的；尊贵的，高尚的 | |
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19
incumbent
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| adj.成为责任的，有义务的；现任的，在职的 | |
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20
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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21
fragrant
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| adj.芬香的，馥郁的，愉快的 | |
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scent
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| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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23
imploringly
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| adv. 恳求地, 哀求地 | |
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24
incapable
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| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
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25
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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26
formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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pensively
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| adv.沉思地，焦虑地 | |
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29
monastery
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| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
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30
meddle
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| v.干预，干涉，插手 | |
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31
tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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32
maple
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| n.槭树，枫树，槭木 | |
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33
steward
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| n.乘务员，服务员；看管人；膳食管理员 | |
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34
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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35
galloped
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| （使马）飞奔，奔驰( gallop的过去式和过去分词 )； 快速做[说]某事 | |
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36
gallop
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| v./n.(马或骑马等)飞奔；飞速发展 | |
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37
longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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38
repent
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| v.悔悟，悔改，忏悔，后悔 | |
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39
duel
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| n./v.决斗；(双方的)斗争 | |
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40
duels
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| n.两男子的决斗( duel的名词复数 )；竞争，斗争 | |
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41
tiresome
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| adj.令人疲劳的，令人厌倦的 | |
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42
impunity
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| n.(惩罚、损失、伤害等的)免除 | |
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43
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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44
justify
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| vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护 | |
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45
interfere
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| v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰 | |
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46
gnats
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| n.叮人小虫( gnat的名词复数 ) | |
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47
plaintively
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| adv.悲哀地，哀怨地 | |
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48
betokened
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| v.预示，表示( betoken的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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49
calves
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| n.(calf的复数)笨拙的男子，腓；腿肚子( calf的名词复数 )；牛犊；腓；小腿肚v.生小牛( calve的第三人称单数 )；（冰川）崩解；生（小牛等），产（犊）；使（冰川）崩解 | |
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50
reassure
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| v.使放心，使消除疑虑 | |
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51
license
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| n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许 | |
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52
willows
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| n.柳树( willow的名词复数 )；柳木 | |
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53
drooped
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| 弯曲或下垂，发蔫( droop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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54
nought
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| n.／adj.无，零 | |
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55
rustling
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| n. 瑟瑟声，沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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56
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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57
lanky
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| adj.瘦长的 | |
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58
orchard
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| n.果园，果园里的全部果树，(美俚)棒球场 | |
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59
clumps
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| n.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的名词复数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的第三人称单数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
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60
shutter
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| n.百叶窗；(照相机)快门；关闭装置 | |
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61
affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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62
conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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63
concealing
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，遮住( conceal的现在分词 ) | |
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64
blot
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| vt.弄脏（用吸墨纸）吸干；n.污点，污渍 | |
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65
generosity
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| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
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66
infinitely
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| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
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67
bass
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| n.男低音(歌手)；低音乐器；低音大提琴 | |
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68
agitated
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| adj.被鼓动的，不安的 | |
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69
renounce
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| v.放弃；拒绝承认，宣布与…断绝关系 | |
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70
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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71
reverence
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| n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬 | |
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72
shrine
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| n.圣地，神龛，庙；v.将...置于神龛内，把...奉为神圣 | |
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73
honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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74
battalion
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| n.营；部队；大队(的人) | |
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75
regiment
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| n.团，多数，管理；v.组织，编成团，统制 | |
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76
lieutenants
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| n.陆军中尉( lieutenant的名词复数 )；副职官员；空军；仅低于…官阶的官员 | |
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77
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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78
subscription
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| n.预订，预订费，亲笔签名，调配法，下标（处方） | |
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79
subscribe
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| vi.(to)订阅，订购；同意；vt.捐助，赞助 | |
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80
fervently
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| adv.热烈地，热情地，强烈地 | |
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81
inscribed
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| v.写，刻( inscribe的过去式和过去分词 )；内接 | |
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82
dressing
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| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
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83
chivalry
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| n.骑士气概，侠义；（男人）对女人彬彬有礼，献殷勤 | |
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84
parenthesis
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| n.圆括号，插入语，插曲，间歇，停歇 | |
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85
manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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86
exterior
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| adj.外部的，外在的；表面的 | |
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87
agitation
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| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
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88
rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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89
originality
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| n.创造力，独创性；新颖 | |
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90
profundity
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| n.渊博；深奥，深刻 | |
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91
discoursing
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| 演说（discourse的现在分词形式） | |
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92
raptures
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| 极度欢喜( rapture的名词复数 ) | |
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93
eccentricity
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| n.古怪，反常，怪癖 | |
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94
unintelligible
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| adj.无法了解的，难解的，莫明其妙的 | |
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95
lookout
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| n.注意，前途，瞭望台 | |
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96
poking
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| n. 刺，戳，袋 vt. 拨开，刺，戳 vi. 戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
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97
favourable
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| adj.赞成的，称赞的，有利的，良好的，顺利的 | |
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stereotyped
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| adj.(指形象、思想、人物等)模式化的 | |
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99
revival
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| n.复兴，复苏，（精力、活力等的）重振 | |
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100
chatter
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| vi.／n.喋喋不休；短促尖叫；(牙齿)打战 | |
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101
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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102
overflow
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| v.(使)外溢，(使)溢出；溢出，流出，漫出 | |
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103
passionately
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| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
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104
fanatic
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| n.狂热者，入迷者；adj.狂热入迷的 | |
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105
straightforward
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| adj.正直的，坦率的；易懂的，简单的 | |
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106
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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107
boredom
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| n.厌烦，厌倦，乏味，无聊 | |
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108
morbid
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| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
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109
contrived
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| adj.不自然的，做作的；虚构的 | |
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110
heroism
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| n.大无畏精神，英勇 | |
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111
prelude
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| n.序言，前兆，序曲 | |
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112
lengthy
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| adj.漫长的，冗长的 | |
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113
tormented
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| 饱受折磨的 | |
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114
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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115
legitimate
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| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
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116
attain
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| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
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117
ornamented
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| adj.花式字体的v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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118
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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119
buckle
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| n.扣子，带扣；v.把...扣住，由于压力而弯曲 | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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candidly
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| adv.坦率地，直率而诚恳地 | |
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122
embarrassment
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| n.尴尬；使人为难的人(事物)；障碍；窘迫 | |
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123
rattles
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| （使）发出格格的响声， （使）作嘎嘎声( rattle的第三人称单数 )； 喋喋不休地说话； 迅速而嘎嘎作响地移动，堕下或走动； 使紧张，使恐惧 | |
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124
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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125
attic
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| n.顶楼，屋顶室 | |
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126
humble
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| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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127
lodging
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| n.寄宿，住所；(大学生的)校外宿舍 | |
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128
wring
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| n.扭绞；v.拧，绞出，扭 | |
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129
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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130
shuddering
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| v.战栗( shudder的现在分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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131
remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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132
incognito
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| adv.匿名地；n.隐姓埋名；adj.化装的，用假名的，隐匿姓名身份的 | |
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133
joyfully
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| adv. 喜悦地, 高兴地 | |
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134
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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135
gaily
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| adv.欢乐地，高兴地 | |
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136
upwards
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| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
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137
stuffy
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| adj.不透气的，闷热的 | |
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138
chivalrous
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| adj.武士精神的；对女人彬彬有礼的 | |
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139
glistened
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| v.湿物闪耀，闪亮( glisten的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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140
poetical
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| adj.似诗人的；诗一般的；韵文的；富有诗意的 | |
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141
jug
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| n.(有柄，小口，可盛水等的)大壶，罐，盂 | |
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142
petrified
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| adj.惊呆的；目瞪口呆的v.使吓呆，使惊呆；变僵硬；使石化(petrify的过去式和过去分词) | |
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143
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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144
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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145
decency
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| n.体面，得体，合宜，正派，庄重 | |
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146
pampered
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| adj.饮食过量的，饮食奢侈的v.纵容，宠，娇养( pamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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147
slumbering
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| 微睡，睡眠（slumber的现在分词形式） | |
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148
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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149
unbearably
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| adv.不能忍受地，无法容忍地；慌 | |
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150
softening
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| 变软，软化 | |
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151
lashed
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| adj.具睫毛的v.鞭打( lash的过去式和过去分词 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
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152
streak
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| n.条理，斑纹，倾向，少许，痕迹；v.加条纹，变成条纹，奔驰，快速移动 | |
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153
rumbles
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| 隆隆声，辘辘声( rumble的名词复数 ) | |
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154
steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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155
humiliation
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| n.羞辱 | |
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156
superstitious
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| adj.迷信的 | |
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157
inhumanly
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| adv.无人情味地，残忍地 | |
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158
relic
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| n.神圣的遗物，遗迹，纪念物 | |
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159
tangle
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| n.纠缠；缠结；混乱；v.(使)缠绕；变乱 | |
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