The crape-man stood rooted to the spot dumb with astonishment.
Both men stood opposite one another on the landing, and both stared in
each other’s eyes, silent and motionless.
So passed a few moments, and suddenly, like a flash of lightning,
Velchaninoff became aware of the identity of his guest.
At the same moment the latter seemed to guess that Velchaninoff had
recognised him. Velchaninoff could see it in his eyes. In one instant the
visitor’s whole face was all ablaze with its very sweetest of smiles.
“Surely I have the pleasure of speaking to Aleksey Ivanovitch?” he asked,
in the most dulcet of voices, comically inappropriate to the circumstances
of the case.
“Surely you are Pavel Pavlovitch Trusotsky?” asked Velchaninoff, in
return, after a pause, and with an expression of much perplexity.
“I had the pleasure of your acquaintance ten years ago at T——, and, if I
may remind you of the fact, we were almost intimate friends.”
“Quite so—oh yes! but it is now three o’clock in the morning, and you have
been trying my lock for the last ten minutes.”
“Three o’clock!” cried the visitor, looking at his watch with an air of
melancholy surprise.
“Why, so it is! dear me—three o’clock! forgive me, Aleksey Ivanovitch! I
ought to have found it out before thinking of paying you a visit. I will
do myself the honour of calling to explain another day, and now I—.”
“Oh no;—no, no! If you are to explain at all let’s have it at once; this
moment!” interrupted Velchaninoff warmly. “Kindly step in here, into the
room! You must have meant to come in, you know; you didn’t come here at
night, like this, simply for the pleasure of trying my lock?”
He felt excited, and at the same time was conscious of a sort of timidity;
he could not collect his thoughts. He was ashamed of himself for it. There
was no danger, no mystery about the business, nothing but the silly figure
of Pavel Pavlovitch.
And yet he could not feel satisfied that there was nothing particular in
it; he felt afraid of something to come, he knew not what or when.
However, he made the man enter, seated him in a chair, and himself sat
down on the side of his bed, a yard or so off, and rested his elbows on
his knees while he quietly waited for the other to begin. He felt
irritated; he stared at his visitor and let his thoughts run. Strangely
enough, the other never opened his mouth; he seemed to be entirely
oblivious of the fact that it was his duty to speak. Nay, he was even
looking enquiringly at Velchaninoff as though quite expecting that the
latter would speak to _him_!
Perhaps he felt a little uncomfortable at first, somewhat as a mouse must
feel when he finds himself unexpectedly in the trap.
Velchaninoff very soon lost his patience.
“Well?” he cried, “you are not a fantasy or a dream or anything of that
kind, are you? You aren’t a corpse, are you? Come, my friend, this is not
a game or play. I want your explanation, please!”
The visitor fidgeted about a little, smiled, and began to speak
cautiously.
“So far as I can see,” he said, “the time of night of my visit is what
surprises you, and that I should have come as I did; in fact, when I
remember the past, and our intimacy, and all that, I am astonished myself;
but the fact is, I did not mean to come in at all, and if I did so it was
purely an accident.”
“An accident! Why, I saw you creeping across the road on tip-toes!”
“You saw me? Indeed! Come, then you know as much or more about the matter
than I do; but I see I am annoying you. This is how it was: I’ve been in
town three weeks or so on business. I am Pavel Pavlovitch Trusotsky, you
recognized me yourself, my business in town is to effect an exchange of
departments. I am trying for a situation in another place—one with a large
increase of salary; but all this is beside the point; the fact of the
matter is, I believe I have been delaying my business on purpose. I
believe if everything were settled at this moment I should still be
dawdling in this St. Petersburg of yours in my present condition of mind.
I go wandering about as though I had lost all interest in things, and were
rather glad of the fact, in my present condition of mind.”
“What condition of mind?” asked Velchaninoff, frowning.
The visitor raised his eyes to Velchaninoff’s, lifted his hat from the
ground beside him, and with great dignity pointed out the black crape
band.
“There, sir, in _that_ condition of mind!” he observed.
Velchaninoff stared stupidly at the crape, and thence at the man’s face.
Suddenly his face flushed up in a hot blush for a moment, and he was
violently agitated.
“Not Natalia Vasilievna, surely?”
“Yes, Natalia Vasilievna! Last March! Consumption, sir, and almost
suddenly—all over in two or three months—and here am I left as you see
me!”
So saying, Pavel Pavlovitch, with much show of feeling, bent his bald head
down and kept it bent for some ten seconds, while he held out his two
hands, in one of which was the hat with the band, in explanatory emotion.
This gesture, and the man’s whole air, seemed to brighten Velchaninoff up;
he smiled sarcastically for one instant, not more at present, for the news
of this lady’s death (he had known her so long ago, and had forgotten her
many a year since) had made a quite unexpected impression upon his mind.
“Is it possible!” he muttered, using the first words that came to his
lips, “and pray why did you not come here and tell me at once?”
“Thanks for your kind interest, I see and value it, in spite of——”
“In spite of what?”
“In spite of so many years of separation you at once sympathised with my
sorrow—and in fact with myself, and so fully too—that I feel naturally
grateful. That’s all I had to tell you, sir! Don’t suppose I doubt my
friends, you know; why, even here, in this place, I could put my finger on
several very sincere friends indeed (for instance, Stepan Michailovitch
Bagantoff); but remember, my dear Aleksey Ivanovitch—nine years have
passed since we were acquaintances—or friends, if you’ll allow me to say
so—and meanwhile you have never been to see us, never written.”
The guest sang all this out as though he were reading it from music, but
kept his eyes fixed on the ground the while, although, of course, he saw
what was going on above his eyelashes exceedingly well all the same.
Velchaninoff had found his head by this time.
With a strange sort of fascinated attention, which strengthened itself
every moment, he continued to gaze at and listen to Pavel Pavlovitch, and
of a sudden, when the latter stopped speaking, a flood of curious ideas
swept unexpectedly through his brain.
“But look here,” he cried, “how is it that I never recognized you all this
while?—we’ve met five times, at least, in the streets!”
“Quite so—I am perfectly aware of the circumstance. You chanced to meet me
two or three times, and——”
“No, no! _you_ met _me_, you know—not I you!” Velchaninoff suddenly burst
into a roar of laughter, and rose from his seat. Pavel Pavlovitch paused a
moment, looked keenly at Velchaninoff, and then continued:
“As to your not recognizing me, in the first place you might easily have
forgotten me by now; and besides, I have had small-pox since last we met,
and I daresay my face is a good deal marked.”
“Smallpox? why, how did you manage that?—he has had it, though, by Jove!”
cried Velchaninoff. “What a funny fellow you are—however, go on, don’t
stop.”
Velchaninoff’s spirits were rising higher and higher; he was beginning to
feel wonderfully light-hearted. That feeling of agitation which had lately
so disturbed him had given place to quite a different sentiment. He now
began to stride up and down the room, very quickly.
“I was going to say,” resumed Pavel Pavlovitch, “that though I have met
you several times, and though I quite intended to come and look you up,
when I was arranging my visit to Petersburg, still, I was in that
condition of mind, you know, and my wits have so suffered since last
March, that——”
“Wits since last March,—yes, go on: wait a minute—do you smoke?”
“Oh—you know, Natalia Vasilievna, never—”
“Quite so; but since March—eh?”
“Well—I might, a cigarette or so.”
“Here you are, then! Light up and go on,—go on! you interest me
wonderfully.”
Velchaninoff lit a cigar and sat down on his bed again. Pavel Pavlovitch
paused a moment.
“But what a state of agitation you seem to be in yourself!” said he, “are
you quite well?”
“Oh, curse my health!” cried Velchaninoff,—“you go on!”
The visitor observed his host’s agitation with satisfaction; he went on
with his share of the talking with more confidence.
“What am I to go on about?” he asked. “Imagine me, Alexey Ivanovitch—a
broken man,—not simply broken, but gone at the root, as it were; a man
forced to change his whole manner of living, after twenty years of married
life, wandering about the dusty roads without an object,—mind lost—almost
oblivious of his own self,—and yet, as it were, taking some sort of
intoxicated delight in his loneliness! Isn’t it natural that if I should,
at such a moment of self-forgetfulness come across a friend—even a _dear_
friend, I might prefer to avoid him for that moment? and isn’t it equally
natural that at another moment I should long to see and speak with some
one who has been an eye-witness of, or a partaker, so to speak, in my
never-to-be-recalled past? and to rush—not only in the day, but at night,
if it so happens,—to rush to the embrace of such a man?—yes, even if one
has to wake him up at three in the morning to do it! I was wrong in my
time, not in my estimate of my friend, though, for at this moment I feel
the full rapture of success; my rash action has been successful: I have
found sympathy! As for the time of night, I confess I thought it was not
twelve yet! You see, one sups of grief, and it intoxicates one,—at least,
not grief, exactly, it’s more the condition of mind—the new state of
things that affects me.”
“Dear me, how oddly you express yourself!” said Velchaninoff, rising from
his seat once more, and becoming quite serious again.
“Oddly, do I? Perhaps.”
“Look here: are you joking?”
“Joking!” cried Pavel Pavlovitch, in shocked surprise; “_joking_—at the
very moment when I am telling you of——”
“Oh—be quiet about that! for goodness sake.”
Velchaninoff started off on his journey up and down the room again.
So matters stood for five minutes or so: the visitor seemed inclined to
rise from his chair, but Velchaninoff bade him sit still, and Pavel
Pavlovitch obediently flopped into his seat again.
“How changed you are!” said the host at last, stopping in front of the
other chair, as though suddenly struck with the idea; “fearfully changed!”
“Wonderful! you’re quite another man!”
“That’s hardly surprising! _nine_ years, sir!”
“No, no, no! years have nothing to do with it! it’s not in appearance you
are so changed: it’s something else!”
“Well, sir, the nine years might account for anything.”
“Perhaps it’s only since March, eh?”
“Ha-ha! you are playful, sir,” said Pavel Pavlovitch, laughing slyly.
“But, if I may ask it, wherein am I so changed?”
“Oh—why, you used to be such a staid, sober, correct Pavel Pavlovitch;
such a wise Pavel Pavlovitch; and now you’re a good-for-nothing sort of
Pavel Pavlovitch.”
Velchaninoff was in that state of irritation when the steadiest, gravest
people will sometimes say rather more than they mean.
“Good-for-nothing, am I? and _wise_ no longer, I suppose, eh?” chuckled
Pavel Pavlovitch, with disagreeable satisfaction.
“Wise, indeed! My dear sir, I’m afraid you are not sober,” replied
Velchaninoff; and added to himself, “I am pretty fairly insolent myself,
but I can’t compare with this little cad! And what on earth is the fellow
driving at?”
“Oh, my dear, good, my best of Alexey Ivanovitches,” said the visitor
suddenly, most excitedly, and twisting about on his chair, “and why
_should_ I be sober? We are not moving in the brilliant walks of
society—you and I—just now. We are but two dear old friends come together
in the full sincerity of perfect love, to recall and talk over that sweet
mutual tie of which the dear departed formed so treasured a link in our
friendship.”
So saying, the sensitive gentleman became so carried away by his feelings
that he bent his head down once more, to hide his emotion, and buried his
face in his hat.
Velchaninoff looked on with an uncomfortable feeling of disgust.
“I can’t help thinking the man is simply silly,” he thought; “and yet—no,
no—his face is so red he must be drunk. But drunk or not drunk, what does
the little wretch want with me? That’s the puzzle.”
“Do you remember—oh, _don’t_ you remember—our delightful little
evenings—dancing sometimes, or sometimes literary—at Simeon
Simeonovitch’s?” continued the visitor, gradually removing his hat from
before his face, and apparently growing more and more enthusiastic over
the memories of the past, “and our little readings—you and she and
myself—and our first meeting, when you came in to ask for information
about something connected with your business in the town, and commenced
shouting angrily at me; don’t you remember—when suddenly in came Natalia
Vasilievna, and within ten minutes you were our dear friend, and so
remained for exactly a year? Just like Turgenieff’s story ‘The
Provincialka!’ ”
Velchaninoff had continued his walk up and down the room during this
_tirade_, with his eyes on the ground, listening impatiently and with
disgust—but listening _hard_, all the same.
“It never struck me to think of ’The Provincialka’ in connection with the
matter,” he interrupted. “And look here, why do you talk in that sneaking,
whining sort of voice? You never used to do that. Your whole manner is
unlike yourself.”
“Quite so, quite so. I used to be more silent, I know. I used to love to
listen while others talked. You remember how well the dear departed
talked—the wit and grace of her conversation. As to The Provincialka, I
remember she and I used often to compare your friendship for us to certain
episodes in that piece, and especially to the doings of one Stupendief. It
really was remarkably like that character and his doings.”
“What Stupendief do you mean, confound it all?” cried Velchaninoff,
stamping his foot with rage. The name seemed to have evoked certain most
irritating thoughts in his mind.
“Why, Stupendief, don’t you know, the ‘husband’ in ‘Provincialka,’ ”
whined Pavel Pavlovitch, in the very sweetest of tones; “but that belongs
to another set of fond memories—after you departed, in fact, when Mr.
Bagantoff had honoured us with his friendship, just as you had done before
him, only that his lasted five whole years.”
“Bagantoff? What Bagantoff? Do you mean that same Bagantoff who was
serving down in your town? Why, he also——”
“Yes, yes! quite so. He also, he also!” cried the enthusiastic Pavel
Pavlovitch, seizing upon Velchaninoff’s accidental slip. “Of course! So
that there you are—there’s the whole company. Bagantoff played the
‘count,’ the dear departed was the ‘Provincialka,’ and I was the
‘husband,’ only that the part was taken away from me, for incapacity, I
suppose!”
“Yes; fancy _you_ a Stupendief. You’re a—you’re first a Pavel Pavlovitch
Trusotsky!” said Velchaninoff, contemptuously, and very unceremoniously.
“But look here! Bagantoff is in town; I know he is, for I have seen him.
Why don’t you go to see _him_ as well as myself?”
“My dear sir, I’ve been there every day for the last three weeks. He won’t
receive me; he’s ill, and can’t receive! And, do you know, I have found
out that he really is very ill! Fancy my feelings—a five-year’s friend!
Oh, my dear Alexey Ivanovitch! you don’t know what my feelings are in my
present condition of mind. I assure you, at one moment I long for the
earth to open and swallow me up, and the next I feel that I _must_ find
one of those old friends, eyewitnesses of the past, as it were, if only to
weep on his bosom, only to weep, sir—give you my word.”
“Well, that’s about enough for to-night; don’t you think so?” said
Velchaninoff, cuttingly.
“Oh, too—too much!” cried the other, rising. “It must be four o’clock; and
here am I agitating your feelings in the most selfish way.”
“Now, look here; I shall call upon you myself, and I hope that you will
then——but, tell me honestly, are you drunk to-night?”
“Drunk! not the least in the world!”
“Did you drink nothing before you came here, or earlier?”
“Do you know, my dear Alexey Ivanovitch, you are quite in a high fever!”
“Good-night. I shall call to-morrow.”
“And I have noticed it all the evening, really quite delirious!” continued
Pavel Pavlovitch, licking his lips, as it were, with satisfaction as he
pursued this theme. “I am really quite ashamed that I should have allowed
myself to be so awkward as to agitate you. Well, well; I’m going! Now you
must lie down at once and go to sleep.”
“You haven’t told me where you live,” shouted Velchaninoff after him as he
left the room.
“Oh, didn’t I? Pokrofsky Hotel.”
Pavel Pavlovitch was out on the stairs now.
“Stop!” cried Velchaninoff, once more. “You are not ‘running away,’ are
you?”
“How do you mean, ‘running away?’ ” asked Pavel Pavlovitch, turning round
at the third step, and grinning back at him, with his eyes staring very
wide open.
Instead of replying, Velchaninoff banged the door fiercely, locked and
bolted it, and went fuming back into his room. Arrived there, he spat on
the ground, as though to get rid of the taste of something loathsome.
He then stood motionless for at least five minutes, in the centre of the
room; after which he threw himself upon his bed, and fell asleep in an
instant.
The forgotten candle burned itself out in its socket.