The large hall in a private house on Ostozhyónka Street was already half
filled with spectators when Arátoff and Kupfer arrived. Theatrical
representations were sometimes given in that hall, but on this occasion
neither stage-scenery nor curtain were visible. Those who had organised
the "morning" had confined themselves to erecting a platform at one end,
placing thereon a piano and a couple of music-racks, a few chairs, a
table with a carafe of water and a glass, and hanging a curtain of red
cloth over the door which led to the room set apart for the artists. In
the first row the Princess was already seated, clad in a bright green
gown; Arátoff placed himself at some distance from her, after barely
exchanging a bow with her. The audience was what is called motley; it
consisted chiefly of young men from various institutions of learning.
Kupfer, in his quality of a manager, with a white ribbon on the lapel of
his dress-coat, bustled and fussed about with all his might; the
Princess was visibly excited, kept looking about her, launching smiles
in all directions, and chatting with her neighbours ... there were only
men in her immediate vicinity.
The first to make his appearance on the platform was a flute-player of
consumptive aspect, who spat out ... that is to say, piped out a piece
which was consumptive like himself. Two persons shouted "Bravo!" Then a
fat gentleman in spectacles, very sedate and even grim of aspect,
recited in a bass voice a sketch by Shtchedrín;[57] the audience
applauded the sketch, not him.--Then the pianist, who was already known
to Arátoff, presented himself, and pounded out the same Liszt fantasia;
the pianist was favoured with a recall. He bowed, with his hand resting
on the back of a chair, and after each bow he tossed back his hair
exactly like Liszt! At last, after a decidedly long intermission, the
red cloth over the door at the rear of the platform moved, was drawn
widely apart, and Clara Mílitch made her appearance. The hall rang with
applause. With unsteady steps she approached the front of the platform,
came to a halt, and stood motionless, with her large, red, ungloved
hands crossed in front of her, making no curtsey, neither bending her
head nor smiling.
She was a girl of nineteen, tall, rather broad-shouldered, but well
built. Her face was swarthy, partly Hebrew, partly Gipsy in type; her
eyes were small and black beneath thick brows which almost met, her nose
was straight, slightly up-turned, her lips were thin with a beautiful
but sharp curve; she had a huge braid of black hair, which was heavy
even to the eye, a low, impassive, stony brow, tiny ears ... her whole
countenance was thoughtful, almost surly. A passionate, self-willed
nature,--not likely to be either kindly or even intelligent,--but
gifted, was manifested by everything about her.
For a while she did not raise her eyes, but suddenly gave a start and
sent her intent but not attentive glance, which seemed to be buried in
herself, along the rows of spectators.
"What tragic eyes!" remarked a certain grey-haired fop, who sat behind
Arátoff, with the face of a courtesan from Revel,--one of Moscow's
well-known first-nighters and rounders. The fop was stupid and intended
to utter a bit of nonsense ... but he had spoken the truth! Arátoff, who
had never taken his eyes from Clara since she had made her appearance,
only then recalled that he actually had seen her at the Princess's; and
had not only seen her, but had even noticed that she had several times
looked at him with particular intentness out of her dark, watchful eyes.
And on this occasion also ... or did he merely fancy that it was so?--on
catching sight of him in the first row, she seemed to be delighted,
seemed to blush--and again she gazed intently at him. Then, without
turning round, she retreated a couple of paces in the direction of the
piano, at which the accompanist, the long-haired foreigner, was already
seated. She was to execute Glinka's romance, "As soon as I recognised
thee...." She immediately began to sing, without altering the position
of her hands and without glancing at the notes. Her voice was soft and
resonant,--a contralto,--she pronounced her words distinctly and
forcibly, and sang monotonously, without shading but with strong
expression.
"The lass sings with conviction," remarked the same fop who sat behind
Arátoff,--and again he spoke the truth.
Shouts of "Bis!" "Bravo!" resounded all about, but she merely darted a
swift glance at Arátoff, who was neither shouting nor clapping,--he had
not been particularly pleased by her singing,--made a slight bow and
withdrew, without taking the arm of the hairy pianist which he had
crooked out like a cracknel. She was recalled ... but it was some time
before she made her appearance, advanced to the piano with the same
uncertain tread as before, and after whispering a couple of words to her
accompanist, who was obliged to get and place on the rack before him not
the music he had prepared but something else,--she began Tchaikóvsky's
romance: "No, only he who hath felt the thirst of meeting".... This
romance she sang in a different way from the first--in an undertone, as
though she were weary ... and only in the line before the last, "He will
understand how I have suffered,"--did a ringing, burning cry burst from
her. The last line, "And how I suffer...." she almost whispered, sadly
prolonging the final word. This romance produced a slighter impression
on the audience than Glinka's; but there was a great deal of
applause.... Kupfer, in particular, distinguished himself: he brought
his hands together in a peculiar manner, in the form of a cask, when he
clapped, thereby producing a remarkably sonorous noise. The Princess
gave him a large, dishevelled bouquet, which he was to present to the
songstress; but the latter did not appear to perceive Kupfer's bowed
figure, and his hand outstretched with the bouquet, and she turned and
withdrew, again without waiting for the pianist, who had sprung to his
feet with still greater alacrity than before to escort her, and who,
being thus left in the lurch, shook his hair as Liszt himself, in all
probability, never shook his!
During the whole time she was singing Arátoff had been scanning Clara's
face. It seemed to him that her eyes, athwart her contracted lashes,
were again turned on him. But he was particularly struck by the
impassiveness of that face, that forehead, those brows, and only when
she uttered her passionate cry did he notice a row of white, closely-set
teeth gleaming warmly from between her barely parted lips. Kupfer
stepped up to him.
"Well, brother, what dost thou think of her?" he asked, all beaming with
satisfaction.
"She has a fine voice," replied Arátoff, "but she does not know how to
sing yet, she has had no real school." (Why he said this and what he
meant by "school" the Lord only knows!)
Kupfer was surprised.--"She has no school," he repeated slowly....
"Well, now.... She can still study. But on the other hand, what soul!
But just wait until thou hast heard her recite Tatyána's letter."
He ran away from Arátoff, and the latter thought: "Soul! With that
impassive face!"--He thought that she bore herself and moved like a
hypnotised person, like a somnambulist.... And, at the same time, she
was indubitably.... Yes! she was indubitably staring at him.
Meanwhile the "morning" went on. The fat man in spectacles presented
himself again; despite his serious appearance he imagined that he was a
comic artist and read a scene from Gógol, this time without evoking a
single token of approbation. The flute-player flitted past once more;
again the pianist thundered; a young fellow of twenty, pomaded and
curled, but with traces of tears on his cheeks, sawed out some
variations on his fiddle. It might have appeared strange that in the
intervals between the recitations and the music the abrupt notes of a
French horn were wafted, now and then, from the artists' room; but this
instrument was not used, nevertheless. It afterward came out that the
amateur who had offered to perform on it had been seized with a panic at
the moment when he should have made his appearance before the audience.
So at last, Clara Mílitch appeared again.
She held in her hand a small volume of Púshkin; but during her reading
she never once glanced at it.... She was obviously frightened; the
little book shook slightly in her fingers. Arátoff also observed the
expression of dejection which _now_ overspread her stern features. The
first line: "I write to you ... what would you more?" she uttered with
extreme simplicity, almost ingenuously,--stretching both arms out in
front of her with an ingenuous, sincere, helpless gesture. Then she
began to hurry a little; but beginning with the line: "Another! Nay! to
none on earth could I have given e'er my heart!" she regained her
self-possession, and grew animated; and when she reached the words:
"All, all life hath been a pledge of faithful meeting thus with
thee,"--her hitherto rather dull voice rang out enthusiastically and
boldly, and her eyes riveted themselves on Arátoff with a boldness and
directness to match. She went on with the same enthusiasm, and only
toward the close did her voice again fall, and in it and in her face her
previous dejection was again depicted. She made a complete muddle, as
the saying is, of the last four lines,--the little volume of Púshkin
suddenly slipped from her hands, and she beat a hasty retreat.
The audience set to applauding and recalling her in desperate
fashion.... One theological student,--a Little Russian,--among others,
bellowed so loudly: "Muíluitch! Muíluitch!"[58] that his neighbour
politely and sympathetically begged him to "spare himself, as a future
proto-deacon!"[59] But Arátoff immediately rose and betook himself to
the entrance. Kupfer overtook him....
"Good gracious, whither art thou going?" he yelled:--"I'll introduce
thee to Clara if thou wishest--shall I?"
"No, thanks," hastily replied Arátoff, and set off homeward almost at a
run.
V
Strange emotions, which were not clear even to himself, agitated him. In
reality, Clara's recitation had not altogether pleased him either ...
altogether he could not tell precisely why. It had troubled him, that
recitation, it had seemed to him harsh, unmelodious.... Somehow it
seemed to have broken something within him, to have exerted some sort of
violence. And those importunate, persistent, almost insolent
glances--what had caused them? What did they signify?
Arátoff's modesty did permit him even a momentary thought that he might
have pleased that strange young girl, that he might have inspired her
with a sentiment akin to love, to passion!... And he had imagined to
himself quite otherwise that as yet unknown woman, that young girl, to
whom he would surrender himself wholly, and who would love him, become
his bride, his wife.... He rarely dreamed of this: he was chaste both in
body and soul;--but the pure image which rose up in his imagination at
such times was evoked under another form,--the form of his dead mother,
whom he barely remembered, though he cherished her portrait like a
sacred treasure. That portrait had been painted in water-colours, in a
rather inartistic manner, by a friendly neighbour, but the likeness was
striking, as every one averred. The woman, the young girl, whom as yet
he did not so much as venture to expect, must possess just such a tender
profile, just such kind, bright eyes, just such silky hair, just such a
smile, just such a clear understanding....
But this was a black-visaged, swarthy creature, with coarse hair, and a
moustache on her lip; she must certainly be bad-tempered, giddy.... "A
gipsy" (Arátoff could not devise a worse expression)--what was she to
him?
And in the meantime, Arátoff was unable to banish from his mind that
black-visaged gipsy, whose singing and recitation and even whose
personal appearance were disagreeable to him. He was perplexed, he was
angry with himself. Not long before this he had read Walter Scott's
romance "Saint Ronan's Well" (there was a complete edition of Walter
Scott's works in the library of his father, who revered the English
romance-writer as a serious, almost a learned author). The heroine of
that romance is named Clara Mowbray. A poet of the '40's, Krásoff, wrote
a poem about her, which wound up with the words:
"Unhappy Clara! foolish Clara!
Unhappy Clara Mowbray!"
Arátoff was acquainted with this poem also.... And now these words kept
incessantly recurring to his memory.... "Unhappy Clara! foolish
Clara!..." (That was why he had been so surprised when Kupfer mentioned
Clara Mílitch to him.) Even Platósha noticed, not precisely a change in
Yákoff's frame of mind--as a matter of fact, no change had taken
place--but something wrong about his looks, in his remarks. She
cautiously interrogated him about the literary morning at which he had
been present;--she whispered, sighed, scrutinised him from in front,
scrutinised him from the side, from behind--and suddenly, slapping her
hands on her thighs, she exclaimed:
"Well, Yáshal--I see what the trouble is!"
"What dost thou mean?" queried Arátoff in his turn.
"Thou hast certainly met at that morning some one of those
tail-draggers" (that was what Platonída Ivánovna called all ladies who
wore fashionable gowns).... "She has a comely face--and she puts on airs
like _this_,--and twists her face like _this_" (Platósha depicted all
this in her face), "and she makes her eyes go round like this...." (she
mimicked this also, describing huge circles in the air with her
forefinger).... "And it made an impression on thee, because thou art not
used to it.... But that does not signify anything, Yásha ... it does not
signify anything! Drink a cup of herb-tea when thou goest to bed, and
that will be the end of it!... Lord, help!"
Platósha ceased speaking and took herself off.... She probably had never
made such a long and animated speech before since she was born ... but
Arátoff thought:
"I do believe my aunt is right.... It is all because I am not used to
such things...." (He really had attracted the attention of the female
sex to himself for the first time ... at any rate, he had never noticed
it before.) "I must not indulge myself."
So he set to work at his books, and drank some linden-flower tea when he
went to bed, and even slept well all that night, and had no dreams. On
the following morning he busied himself with his photography, as though
nothing had happened....
But toward evening his spiritual serenity was again disturbed.