It is in Berlin, in the Hotel du Nord, nine years after the first
violent quarrel, the first passionate reconciliation with her husband,
that Natalie receives this letter.
She had left St. Petersburg a few days before, in order, as by
agreement, to meet Lensky, whom she has not seen since the beginning of
March, in the German capital. It had been a great disappointment for
her that she had not found Boris in Berlin, but he has accustomed her
to disappointments.
She reads the letter once more. It is a dear, good letter. Ah! Natalie
has received such dear, good, tender letters from all the large cities
in Europe and America--and knows----
Not that Boris is deceiving her when he writes to her in this tender
tone. No, every trace of falseness is strange to him, his attachment to
her, his anxiety about her, are sincere--but----
What use to grieve over it? These great geniuses are never different.
One must not judge them like other men! With this shallow commonplace,
with which she has so often put to sleep her inconsolable heart if it
sometimes wishes violently to rise up against its oppressive,
ignominious lot, she compels it to rest again to-day. It is easier now
than formerly; her poor heart has already accustomed itself to
grievances.
Nine years have passed since that time in the pretty, cosey Hermitage
when she--forgave him too easily, and thereby lost her power over him
forever. She has known it a long time. Late in that following autumn a
great symphony by him was given in the "Gewandhaus," in Leipzig. The
work was beautiful, the success moderate, Lensky's discouragement
exaggerated, quite morbid. A few months later he took up his wanderer's
staff anew, and left Petersburg, where he had returned with his family,
in order to distract himself by the most exaggerated virtuoso triumphs
from the humiliation which had befallen the composer. Oftener, ever
oftener, he had then left wife and children, and now, in his own house,
he had long been only an indulged, distinguished guest.
But in the time which he every year devoted to his wife, to his family,
he behaved in an exemplary fashion. He did everything that lay in his
power to make life bearable to Natalie--everything except to lay a
restraint upon himself; that he simply could not, and for that reason
he must leave home so often in order to vent his passion.
Natalie's nature was broken. An unexpressed, numbing, blunting
conviction that this was the natural course of things, and that nothing
of all this could be changed, had overpowered her. As to what might
take place while he was away from her, of that she did not permit
herself to think.
With his art matters had long gone downward, even more rapidly
than Natalie--who already after his return from America had been
startled by the exaggerations to which he had accustomed himself in his
playing--had deemed possible. At that time he had given the reins to
his temperament with assiduity in order to dazzle the public. Now--now,
he had long lost power over himself. And concerning his compositions! A
fearful pain contracted Natalie's heart if she thought how she had
formerly, in her tender enthusiasm, called him the last musical poet,
in opposition to the other great composers of modern times, whom at
that time she had described as--musical bunglers. She could no longer
remember the speech without blushing.
The bunglers had all grown above his head. One scarcely spoke of his
compositions now, and the worst of it was--Natalie herself no longer
cared to hear them.
Where was the sweet, sunny, charming element of his first little works?
Where the fiery earnestness, the penetrating, noble sound of pain in
his later works?
Sleepy monotony, noisy emptiness were now the characteristics of his
musical creations. Certainly, here and there appeared melodies of
wonderful beauty; but who had the patience to seek out the lovely oases
in this sterile musical wilderness?
Once, Natalie had hesitatingly made a remark to him about a new
composition. But he, who had formerly showed himself of such
unimpeachable gentleness toward her, had flown into a passion, and had
even for many days remained irritable. Since that time she said nothing
more, but let him have his way, as she let him have his way in
everything, only that she might not break the last thin thread which
still held them together.
* * * * *
She had read the letter a third time. "Business affairs detain him,"
she murmured to herself. "Business affairs! He writes from Leipzig; why
does he not ask me to come to him?" She shrugged her shoulders--what
good to think of it?
Suddenly her cheeks burned, her breath came short. She pours out a
glass of water, throws a couple of bits of ice from a porcelain bowl in
it, and drinks thirstily. "Such great geniuses are never different,"
she says to herself again. She begins to walk up and down in the room
uneasily. At last she goes to the window and looks out.
A great weariness lay over everything. The lindens slept, wrapped in
white dust; the stony heroes at their feet looked morose and weary, as
if they were satiated with letting themselves parch on their pedestals.
They throw pitch-black shadows over the sun-burned road. A black poodle
lies at the foot of one of the memorials, on its back, and does its
utmost to pull off the muzzle on its nose. The people are weary and
pale, and crowd into the shadow wherever they can. Everything flees the
sun. No one remembers another such hot, dry, oppressive summer. And
suddenly a strange longing for shade comes over Natalie; for some deep,
cool, shady place in which she can rest.
The hollow, oppressive feeling about her heart has become more
significant, has taken, at length, the form of a piercing physical
pain. She lays her hand on her breast; the physicians have told her
that she should spare herself, should guard against every vehement
sensation, because her heart is affected. Suddenly she breaks out in
convulsive sobbing. Spare herself! Is it worth the trouble to spare
one's self; to exert one's self for the preservation of this poor life;
is it worth the trouble to bend down again and again in the mire for
the poor little bit of happiness that is thrown to one as an alms?
Then the door opens; a charming little girl of about ten years,
large-eyed, gay, with wonderful curly hair hanging far down her back,
with very long black stockings and very short white dress, hops
in--Maschenka, who had been to walk with the maid. The first thing
which she discovers when she has scarcely greeted her mother and given
her a somewhat breathless and hurried account of the various
impressions she has formed on her walk, is Lensky's letter, which has
remained lying on the table. "Oh, from papa!" says she. "When is he
coming; to-morrow?" and her eyes shine.
"He is not coming; we are going to Trouville without him," replies
Natalie, wearily.
"Without him," repeats Maschenka; her sweet, large-eyed cherub's face
lengthens. "Oh!"--looking at Natalie attentively--"Did you cry over
that, mamma?"
Natalie says nothing, only turns her head away with a gesture of
displeasure.
"He is coming after us?" asks Maschenka, embarrassed.
"He promises to," replies Natalie, with difficultly restrained
bitterness.
"Poor mamma!" and Maschenka tenderly kisses the tears away from her
mother's cheek. "You must not cry, it is not good for you. You know
papa cannot bear to see you cry."
It is quite inexplicable how nature has been able to bestow upon this
tender, childish, velvet-cheeked little being such a striking likeness
to the face stamped by time, weather, and life of the virtuoso. The
troubled, strangely deep look with which Maschenka regards her mother;
the tender and still defiant expression of her full lips; the manner of
drawing together her delicate brows, all that reminds one of her
father. But that in which her likeness to him is most strikingly
announced, is the bewitching heartiness of her manner, the flattering
insinuation of her caresses.
Natalie observes her with quite fixed attention, then draws her to her
and kisses her passionately on both eyes.
Meanwhile there is a knock at the door. It is a waiter, who brings a
telegram from Petersburg. Natalie starts, her thoughts fly to her son
whom she has left behind them. But no the telegram has nothing to do
with Kolia. It is really not from Petersburg, but has only sought her
there, and has been sent after her to Berlin. She reads:
Dresden, Hotel Bellevue, _August 4th_.
Can you not take the roundabout way through Dresden? We would be very
glad to see you.
Sergei.
Why should she not take the roundabout way through Dresden? Why should
she hasten to reach Trouville, the full, empty Trouville, where no one
will be glad to see her?
* * * * *
Shortly after his reconciliation with his sister, Sergei had left St.
Petersburg, in order to follow his brilliant but exacting diplomatic
wandering career from one important but remote post to another, and now
he had at length been recalled to Petersburg, to fill a high position
at home. Natalie cherished the conviction that he suspected nothing of
the slow crumbling together of her happiness. How should he! Before
him, more than before all the others, she had concealed her great
inconsolableness. In the long letter which, by agreement, she wrote him
every month, she had always forced herself to take as gay as possible a
tone, and even if she was accustomed, in the description of her
"domestic happiness" to dwell at especial length on the lovability and
happy dispositions of both of her children, she yet had never failed to
mention the goodness of their father and his unwearied consideration
for her. "How he would triumph if he knew!" she said to herself, on the
platform in Dresden, while she uneasily looked round for her brother,
whom she had informed by telegram of the hour of her arrival. "If he
knew anything of it!" she said to herself, and at the mere thought, it
seemed to her that she would flee to the end of the world, rather than
bear the cold scrutinizing glance of his eye. Then a very slender man
in blameless English clothes came up to her, looked at her a moment
uncertainly, put up his eye-glass--"Natalie! it is really you!" and
evidently truly pleased to see her again he draws her hand to his lips.
And now she is also glad to see him, is pleased to be with her brother,
as she has never yet been glad since her betrothal to Lensky. He has
changed very much since that time in Rome when he had vainly sought to
destroy Natalie's illusions; but, as with all really distinguished men,
growing old was becoming to him. If his bearing is still proud, it has
yet lost much of its harsh, nervous, immature arrogance of that time.
His fine features are still sharper, but his glance has become softer,
more benevolent.
"That is your little girl?" says he, bending down to Maschenka,
pleasantly. "May one ask a kiss of such a large young lady?"
The gay Maschenka, always bent upon the conquest of all hearts, hops up
to him with hearty readiness, and throws both her little arms round his
neck. "_Elle est charmante!_" whispers Sergei in a somewhat patronizing
tone to Natalie.
"We find her very like the Maria AEgyptica of Ribera--your favorite
picture in the Dresden Gallery. Do you not remember it?"
"Indeed!" The prince bends down a second time, wonderingly, to
Maschenka. Suddenly his face takes on a discontented expression. "She
chiefly resembles Lensky; I do not understand how that could escape
me!" says he, and his tone expresses decided displeasure.
"And still if he knew!" thinks Natalie.
"Kolia looks like you," says she, hastily.
"They have often written me that," says the prince. "Besides, they tell
me only good things of him; I shall be glad to see a great deal of him
in Petersburg. And now come, Natalie. I wished to have rooms in
Bellevue for you, but there were none to be had; not a mouse hole; all
engaged. We ourselves live at the extreme end of a corridor. So I have
taken a little apartment for you in the Hotel du Saxe. It is a plain
house, but the nearest one to us, and you will not be there much. Send
your maid ahead with the luggage. I hope you will now come direct to
our rooms with me, you and the little one; my wife awaits you at
dinner."
* * * * *
And now Natalie has been in Dresden since many hours. The joy of the
meeting with her brother has fled, a great depression benumbs her whole
being. What a home! Sergei's wife, born a Countess Brok, who is two
years older than he, and whom he has married on account of the
influential position of her father, suffers with rheumatism, on which
account she fears a little bit of too warm sunshine as well as a slight
draught. The meal is taken in the drawing-room of the married pair,
instead of down on the gay, sunny terrace, as Sergei had ordered. After
the princess has welcomed Natalie, and has said something in praise of
Maschenka's beautiful hair, her remarks consist in commanding her
companion, a very homely little Frenchwoman, by turns to open or close
a window.
After dinner the married couple quarrel over several immaterial
trifles, which momentarily interest no one; over the latest Russian
table of duties, and as to whether it is better to treat scarlet fever
with heat or with cold. Then Varvara Pavlovna busies herself in her
favorite occupation; that is to say, twisting paper flowers. Natalie
took part in this, but Maschenka, to whom they have confided an album
with views of Dresden for her entertainment, has uneasily crept about
the room, now reached after this and now that, has hopped around first
on the right, then on the left leg, until at last Natalie's maid
presents herself to ask her mistress if she has anything to command or
to be done, whereupon Natalie has commissioned her to take the little
one out for a walk, and then to take her to the Hotel du Saxe.
Then Sergei read something aloud from the newspaper; then tea was
brought.
It is nine o'clock. Natalie rises, says that she is tired, and that she
would like to retire early to-night. Sergei asks: "Do you wish to
drive? Shall I send for a carriage? It would really be a shame! The
evening is lovely; if you go on foot, I will accompany you."
They go on foot. "I do not know what fancy has seized me to loiter
about a little," she says in the passage, where Sergei has remained
standing to light a cigarette. "Would you have time?" she asks her
brother.
"Yes," replies he, "I am very willing to walk a little. Where do you
wish to go?"
"Anywhere, where it is quiet and pretty, and where one does not hear
this cafe chantant music." She points over the Elbe, where from out a
dazzlingly lighted enclosure, frivolous dance measures sound boldly and
obtrusively over the dreamy plash of the waves.
"Come in the fortress grounds," says Sergei, and gives her his arm. And
suddenly a kind of anxiety at being alone with him overcomes Natalie.
"Now he will question me," thinks she, and would like to tear her arm
away from him and--has not the courage to do it.
They are quite alone in the court-yard, the world-renowned court-yard
of the fortress, with its enclosure of strange, carved, exaggerated,
and charming irregular architecture; only the sentinel continually goes
along the same path, up and down, and above, on the flat terrace roofs
of the fortress, a couple of friends are walking. One hears them laugh,
jest; yes, even kiss, standing in the court below. They may be lovers,
or some couple on their wedding tour.
The lanterns burn red and sleepily in the transparent pale gray of the
summer half light, and the buttons of the sentinel shine dully; all
other light is extinguished in the world, but up in heaven the stars
slowly open their golden eyes. What is there down here to-day for them
to look at?
A thunder-storm threatens, but one does not see it as yet, but only
hears its hollow voice growling in the distance.
Slowly the brother and sister wander along the narrow way between the
old-fashioned, regularly laid-out flower-beds. The stony faces of
satyrs and fauns grin down upon them with triumphant cynicism. One can
still see their small eyes, slanting upward toward the temples,
distinctly in the dull, shadowless, clear twilight. The air is sultry
and close, and quite immoderately impregnated with the sad, penetrating
perfume of weary flowers which have been tormented by an over-hot
summer day.
"Do you remember the last time that we walked around here together?"
remarked Sergei, at length breaking the silence.
"Yes," says Natalie. "It was the year before our father's death. I was
not much older than Maschenka, and you had not completed your studies."
"Quite right, I did not yet feel myself obliged to be ambitious, in
order to help raise our family from its sunken condition," said Sergei
very bitterly. "Father had taken me with him during my vacation, in
order to cultivate my aesthetic taste. Only think, Natalie, at that time
I wrote a poem on the Sistine Madonna! I! that is very laughable, is it
not?"
"You--a poem," says Natalie, astonished, and still absently; the affair
has in reality little interest for her.
"Yes, I--a poem!" repeats Sergei. "I--now at that time I was an
idealist, however improbable that may seem to you! Now, now I am a
machine, who still sometimes dreams of having been a man!" He laughs
harshly and forcedly, and is suddenly silent. After a while he begins
again: "Just look at the roses, Natascha," and he points to the slender
bushes which are almost broken under their weight of dried blossoms.
"Have you ever seen such an Ash Wednesday? Early this morning they were
still fresh! It is a pitiless summer."
Natalie lowers her head. "Now it is coming," she thinks. "Now it is
coming." But no, not what she has expected, but something different,
comes.
"Did it ever occur to you," continues Sergei after a little while, "how
very much a tree struck by lightning resembles one killed by frost? In
the end it all tends in the same direction." He is silent. After a
while he says, looking her straight in the eyes: "Did you understand
me?"
"Yes, I understand," murmurs she, tonelessly.
"Hm! it was plain enough. You are dying of heat, I of cold!" says he,
and laughing slightly to himself, he adds: "Do you still remember how I
lectured you at that time in Rome?"
Instead of any answer, she pulls her hand away from his arm.
Compassionately her brother looks at her through the gray veil of the
now fast-descending twilight. "Poor Natascha!" he says. "You surely do
not believe that I will return to my wisdom of that time--no! I will
make you a great confession!" His voice sounds hissingly close to her
ear. She feels his breath unpleasantly hot on her cheeks. "There are
moments when I envy you!" he whispers. "Bah! that one must say of one's
self: it is over, one is old, one will die, without once having been
deeply shaken by a true shudder of delight,--_sans avoir connu le grand
frisson_--it is horrible! I know what you have to bear, Natalie, and
still--yes, there are moments when I envy you!"
"Who has then permitted himself to assert that I have anything to
bear?" Natalie bursts out.
"Who?" Sergei raises his eyebrows. "You surely do not fancy that it is
a secret?" says he. "Many wonder that you endure it; as it seems, he
exercises an incredible charm over all women!"
Her eyes and his meet in the sultry half darkness. "What have they told
you?" asks Natalie, with difficulty.
But then he replies with fearful emphasis: "You surely do not demand an
answer of me in earnest?"
She breathes heavily. "It is not true!" says she. "They have lied to
you!"
Thereupon he remains silent. The sultriness becomes ever more
oppressive. Heavy thunder-clouds creep slowly and threateningly over
the roof of the fortress and blot out the stars from the heavens.
Natalie has turned away from her brother, and with uneasy haste she
hurries to the gate of the yard; he comes after her. "I am sorry to
have wounded you," he says. "I had not that intention."
She answers nothing; silently she walks along near him. From time to
time he pulls her gently by the sleeve and says: "This is the way." The
stars are all extinguished, clouds cover the whole heaven, and close to
the ground sighs a heavy wind which cannot yet rise to a hurricane.
What is it in this depressing sound of nature which chases the blood
more rapidly through her veins?
At the door of the great, many-storied hotel, Natalie wishes to take
leave of her brother. "I will accompany you to your room," says Sergei.
Silently, she lets him remain near her. With bowed head she goes up the
broad staircase to the first landing; then something wakes her from her
brooding thoughts--the rustling of a woman's dress. She looks up--there
goes a man up the stairs to the second story with a heavily veiled
woman on his arm. She sees him for one moment only; then the shadow of
his profile passes quickly over the wall; she turns away her head. It
is he--she has recognized him! Silently and with doubled haste she
follows her brother's guidance. "Your room is No. 53," says he, and
turns the door-knob of a room. The lamp is lighted, everything cosily
prepared for her reception. "I will disturb you no longer," says
Sergei. His manner has become very stiff, his voice is icy cold, and
before he leaves the room his glance seeks a last time the eyes of his
sister.
* * * * *
She is alone. Trembling in all her limbs, she has thrown herself down
on a sofa. The maid presents herself with the question whether her
mistress wishes to undress. Natalie signifies to her to go away, to
retire for the night to her room in an upper story. The maid goes,
happy to be released from her service, weary, sleepy. Natalie does not
think of sleeping. How should she think of it when she knows that here,
under the same roof, a few rooms distant from her-- It is horrible! It
seems to her that she is slowly suffocating in a close, oppressing
dread.
The lamp burns brightly. As a maid of good form, Lisa has already
unpacked those little objects which luxurious women always carry about
with them, even on the shortest journey, in order to make a hotel
residence cosey. On the table lies Natalie's portfolio; her travelling
writing utensils stand near by; and near the ink-case two photographs
in pretty little leather frames the pictures of her husband and of her
son. Shuddering, she turns away. She pushes the hair back from her
temples. "Sergei recognized him also!" murmurs she to herself. "It was
impossible not to recognize him," whispers she, "and Sergei believes
that I will still bear this also. And why should he not believe it?"
For years she has waded through the mire after a _fata morgana_, and
the world laughs, and points its fingers at her. What does she care
about the world, if she can only once shake off the feeling of
boundless degradation which drags her down to the ground? In a few days
he will come to her with loving glance, uneasily concerned about her,
with a thousand anxious, tender words, with open arms. And she--well,
she--she will rush into those arms, forgive and forget everything as
before. Ah!--she springs up.
A few moments later she stands near the bed of her little daughter. The
child looks very lovely in her white night-gown, richly trimmed with
lace and embroidery. One of her hands rests under her cheek, the other
is hidden under the pillow. Formerly Natalie has come every night to
the bed of the child in order to kiss and bless her, still asleep. But
to-night her tortured heart is capable of no tender emotion.
"Wake up!" she commands, in a harsh, strange voice. Maschenka starts
up, thereby involuntarily drawing her hand out from under the pillow,
and with the hand a little letter which she immediately tries to
conceal again from her mother. But Natalie tears it away from her.
"What have you to conceal from me?" she says to the little girl,
imperiously.
"I have only written to papa!" replies Maschenka excusingly, tearfully.
"I wrote him that you are sad, and that he must come very soon because
we will be so glad--that was all."
Natalie tears the poor little letter apart in the middle. "Dress
yourself!" she orders.
"Is there a fire?" asks Maschenka, frightened.
"No, but something has happened; we cannot stay in the hotel; do not
ask."
Sleepy, but obedient, as a good child who has the most complete
confidence in her mother, Maschenka sets about putting on the clothes
daintily arranged on a chair near her little bed. Natalie helps her as
well as her fingers, trembling with fever, will permit her, then
wrapping head and shoulders in a lace scarf, she takes the child by the
hand and hurries down the stairs.
"Is the princess going out?" asks the porter, who has not the heart to
give the sister of Prince Assanow another title. "The weather is very
threatening; shall I send for a carriage?"
Natalie takes no notice of him, pushes by him like a strange,
inexplicable apparition.
* * * * *
The stars are all extinguished, clouds cover the whole heaven, and
close to the ground sighs a weary wind.
What is it in this confused, depressing sound of nature which chases
the blood through her veins? In the midst of her excitement she hears
the chromatic succession of tones--her breath stops--it is that
inciting, musical poison, that now follows her with a longing
complaint, a strange, alluring call--Asbein.
The wind rises, screams louder and more shrill, its sultry breath rages
so powerfully against Natalie that she can scarcely proceed. One, two
great water-drops splash in her face, then more. Pointed hailstones
prick her between them; all drive her back--back.
Has not some one seized her by the dress? She looks round. No! she is
alone on the street with her child and the raging storm. Forward she
hastens, panting, breathless. The way to Bellevue is quite easy to
find--quite straight along the street. It grows darker and darker, the
rain falls in streams, the clothes hang ever heavier on her body, she
can scarcely lift her feet from the paving; it is as if all would drag
her down to the ground--all! Twice she loses her way, twice she
suddenly, as if attracted by an evil charm, stands before the Hotel du
Saxe.
Maschenka cries silently and bitterly to herself. There--this wall
ornamented with black lead, Natalie remembers, and here--the large mass
of formless shadow--is not that the Catholic church?
A flash of lightning rends the darkness--Natalie sees the immense
stairs of the Bruehl terrace, with its adornments of colossal gilded
statues; she sees the broad, black river flowing along, cool, alluring;
hastily she goes across the place, for one moment her eyes rest on the
stream--Maschenka pulls her by the arm with her tender little fingers,
and whispers: "I am afraid, mamma; I am afraid!"
Then Natalie turns away from the most alluring temptation that has ever
met her in life, and the water ripples behind her as if in anger that
they have torn away a sacrifice from it.
Now they have reached the Hotel Bellevue; the phlegmatic Hollander in
the porter's lodge looks after her in astonishment as she rushes past
him, stretches his powerful limbs, sticks his thumbs in the arm-holes
of his vest, closes his eyes, sleepily, and murmurs, "These Russian
women!"
She finds the number of her brother's sitting-room. Light still shines
through the keyhole. She bursts open the door. Varvara Pavlovna is
still busy making flowers. Sergei sits bent over a railroad courier,
the eternal samovar stands on its small table.
"What has happened, Natalie, for God's sake?" says Varvara, as she
discovers Natalie's figure, dripping with water, her pale, staring
face, her burning eyes, and the little girl by her side. "What has
happened?"
The brother does not ask.
"I come to seek shelter with you," murmurs Natalie, breaking down, as
she sinks upon a sofa; then turning to Sergei, she with difficulty
gasps out: "You understand--I could not stay there--it--it is all
over!"
* * * * *
Yes, it was all over--all. The bond between him and her was broken. He
was beside himself when he discovered what had taken place, begged for
a meeting, wrote her the tenderest letters. She left his letters
unanswered.
Then a wild defiance overcame him. It angered him that she had placed
herself under her brother's protection--that brother, who from the
beginning had wished to sow discord between him and her. He also could
not be persuaded that the prince had not alone been the cause of the
separation.
The circumstance that Natalie travelled in advance with her
sister-in-law to Baden-Baden, while Assanow remained in Dresden to
arrange with Lensky, strengthened him in his conviction.
It did not come to a legal separation. Lensky was not the man to use
compulsion with a woman; if she did not wish to stay with him, he let
her go voluntarily. That she wished to keep the child with her was
understood of itself; he could see the child from time to time, for a
couple of weeks, on neutral ground. Nikolas, as one could not interrupt
him in his studies, quite naturally remained with his father in St.
Petersburg.
"All that is understood of itself; why lose words over it?" thought
Lensky to himself, while he quite passively consented to all the
propositions of the diplomat.
For what reason did the unendurable man remain sitting there and
tormenting him?
Quite everything was wound up between them--it was afternoon, and the
brothers-in-law sat opposite each other at a long table strewn with
papers, in a large, gloomy room, with dark green damask hangings, in
the Hotel du Saxe. A pause had occurred.
"What does he still wish?" thought Lensky, and drummed unrestrainedly
on the top of the table, while at the same time he gave a significant
glance toward the door.
Assanow coughed a couple of times; at last he began: "In conclusion, I
must touch upon a delicate point--the question of money. My sister
formally rejects all assistance on your part, Boris Nikolaivitch, and
wishes strictly to limit herself to live on her own income!"
Then Lensky flew into a rage: "And you have declared yourself agreed to
that?" he cried, to his brother-in-law.
"I should have considered it undignified in my sister if she had wished
to act otherwise!" replied Assanow.
Lensky clutched his temples with a gesture which was peculiar to him.
"Ah! leave me in peace with your pasteboard dignity," said he,
impatiently. "I cannot endure the word--a parade expression which means
nothing--live on her own income--my poor luxurious Natalie--but that is
madness, simply not possible! You are indeed her brother, but still you
do not know her. Such a tender, guarded hothouse plant as she is! Why,
she would die if she did not have what she needed."
"With the best will, I would not be able to persuade her to take
anything from you," replied Sergei, earnestly.
"Not?" Lensky struck his clenched fist on the table. "Listen, Sergei
Alexandrovitch, you are not only pitiless, you are also stupid. If she
will not take anything from me, deceive her a little, tell her that the
rents of her estate have increased, that you have sold building land
for her, or what do I know! With women that is so easy, especially with
her, poor soul!--who has never understood the difference in appearance
between ten rubles and a thousand--but force the money upon her, she
must have it! And hear me! if you do not so care for it that she takes
it, then I will make a scandal for you, and insist upon a legal
exposition!"
For a moment Assanow was silent, then he said: "Good, I will arrange
it!" with that he rose and offered Lensky his hand.
But Lensky refused it. "Let that go! Between you and me there is no
friendship. After the 'service' which you have rendered me such
grimaces are repulsive."
"You are mistaken if you believe I would have persuaded Natalie to the
separation," assured the Prince. "Naturally, however, as a
conscientious man, I could not dissuade her therefrom."
"Conscientious! Certainly, hangmen are always conscientious--that one
knows," murmured Lensky, and stamped his foot on the ground. "Well, you
will see what you have done! Meanwhile--go. I will not longer bear
it--go!"
* * * * *
When Assanow hereupon wrote Natalie in Baden that the affair was
arranged with Lensky, and the separation declared he added, at the same
time: "I feel myself obliged to say to you, that Lensky in this whole
affair has acted not only honorably, but really nobly."
To his wife wrote Sergei at the same time: "I do not understand the
man!--_figurez-vous_ that I myself for a moment, was _sous le charme_.
What a depth of nobility is in this prodigy! His is an enormous
nature!"
* * * * *
As long as the separation was still impending, as long as the
conferences still lasted, a kind of restless life fevered in Natalie;
she forced her being, naturally inclined to tender reliance and
dependence, to an independent strength of will, of which no one had
thought her capable.
But when the last word was spoken, the separation at length validly
arranged, she fell into a condition of brooding sadness from which
nothing more could rouse her.
For still three years she lived after the separation; three years, in
which every hour endlessly dragged itself along, and which flowed
together in the recollection into a single endless, cold, dull day; a
day in that northern zone where the sun, with far-extending, weak,
weary beams, tardily remains the whole twenty-four hours long, standing
on the horizon, and grudges the night its refreshing darkness and the
day its light.
Her torment reached an exquisite culmination when Maschenka, who
idolized her father, and who, in her childish innocence, had no idea of
the state of affairs, in the beginning incessantly and anxiously asked
her mother little questions referring to the separation. Natalie gave
her no answer, frowned and turned away her head. And sometimes
Maschenka then became ungovernable and angry. Her little warm, loving
heart could not understand why they had taken away her idol.
Once, Lensky asked for his daughter for two weeks. Maschenka, with her
English governess, was sent to Nice to her grandmother, where Lensky
daily visited her. When, loaded with presents, her heart full of sweet,
tender recollections, she came back again to Cannes, where Natalie had
meanwhile awaited her, with fearful obstinacy she insisted in relating
to Natalie endless things about the goodness and lovability of the
father, and especially how impressively and anxiously he had inquired
after mamma. Her full, deep little voice trembled resentfully thereby,
and an angry reproach darkened her large, clear child's eyes.
For a while Natalie was quite calm, then, without having replied a word
to the child, she stood up and left the room.
Maschenka observed with astonishment how she tottered and hit against
the furniture like a blind person. Thereupon the child remained as if
rooted to the ground, with thoughtfully wrinkled brow, her little hands
glued to her sides, standing, staring down at the carpet as if she
there sought the solution to the great, sad riddle which so occupied
her. Then with a short motion as if shaking off something, which she
had caught from her father, like so much else, she threw her little
head back and hurried after her mother.
Natalie had retired to her bedroom. Maschenka found her deathly pale,
with helpless, stiff bearing, and hands folded straight before her,
sitting in an easy chair; her weary glance, directed in front of her,
expressed inconsolable despair.
"Little mother, forgive me, oh, forgive me!" begged the child,
embracing her mother with her soft, warm arms. "Sometimes it seems to
me as if you love him as much as I, only you do not wish to. But why do
you cover your soul with a veil; why? Oh, why did you separate yourself
from him? He was not very much with us without that, but still it was
so lovely to expect him and to rejoice over him from one time to
another!" And Maschenka burst out in violent weeping.
Natalie remained silent, but she raised the child on her knee and
kissed her, ah, how tenderly! Every tear she kissed away from the round
little cheeks. And Maschenka never repeated her question.
Once, in the night--Maschenka's little room was next to her mother's
bedroom--the child awoke; from the adjoining room sounded soft,
whimpering, difficultly restrained sobs.
* * * * *
She wandered from Venice to Florence, from Florence to Nice, from Nice
to Pau--all the European cities of refuge for uprooted existences she
sought out. Nowhere could Natalie find rest. Sometimes she tried to
distract herself. She never visited large entertainments, but she
associated with her old friends if she met them in their different
exiles, gradually slid back into the old, aristocratic atmosphere in
which she had been brought up; but, strange! she no longer felt at home
therein, and in her inconsolable misery a feeling of insensible _ennui_
mingled itself.
His name never crossed her lips. Did she ever think of him? Day and
night. The more she tried to accustom herself to other people the more
she thought of him. How empty, how shallow, how insignificant were all
the others in comparison to him; how cold, how hard!
Her health went rapidly downward. A short, nervous cough tormented her,
her hands were now ice-cold, now hot with fever. Associated with that
was something else strangely tormenting: she almost incessantly had the
feeling that her heart was torn away from its natural place; she felt
in her breast something like an uneasy fluttering, like the beating of
the wings of a deathly weary, sinking bird.
She slept badly and was afraid of sleep, for always the whole spring of
her love, with its entrancing charm and perfume of flowers, arose in
her dreams again. Again vibrated through her soul the swelling musical,
alluring call--Asbein. Little trifles, which in her waking condition
she no longer remembered, came to her mind, and when she awoke she
burned with fever and hid her face, gasping, in her pillows. She
consumed herself in longing; a longing of which she was ashamed as of a
sin, and which she fought as a sin.
* * * * *
Gradually she became wearier and more calm. His picture began to
obliterate itself from her memory.
* * * * *
It was in Geneva, in a music shop. Natalie, who had gone out to attend
to a few trifles, entered and desired the Chopin Etudes, which she had
promised to bring the extremely musical Maschenka. While a clerk looked
for the music, she observed an elderly man--she divined the piano
teacher in him--talking about a photograph which he held in his hand,
to the woman who managed the business.
She glanced fleetingly at the photograph--she shuddered.
"So that is he; that is the way he looks now! _C'est qu'il a
terriblement change_," said the piano teacher.
"_Que voulez-vous_, with the existence which he leads?" replied the
woman. "If one burns the candle of life at both ends!"
"But he should stop it, a married man, as he is," said the music
teacher.
"My goodness; his marriage is so--so--he has been separated, who knows
how long, already." The woman shrugged her shoulders.
"Ah! Who, then, is his wife?"
"Some great lady who has made enough out of him, and to whom he has
become inconvenient," replied the old woman.
"So--h'm! that explains much," said the musician, and laying down the
photograph, he added: "_enfin c'est un homme fini_." With that he
seized the roll of music which had been prepared for him and left the
shop. Natalie bought the photograph, without having the courage to look
at it before strangers. Arrived at home, she unwrapped the portrait.
For the first time since that evening when she ran out of the Hotel du
Saxe she looked at a picture of him. She was frightened at the fearful
physical deterioration designated in his features. Around the mouth and
under the eyes hateful lines were drawn; but from the eyes still spoke
the deep, seeking glance as formerly, and on the lips lay an expression
of inconsolable goodness. "A great lady who has made enough out of him,
and to whom he has become inconvenient," Natalie repeated to herself
again and again. That truly was false from beginning to end. Still, a
great uneasiness overcame her. The reproofs which she believed she had
expiated once for all by the easy, tender confession that she had set
aside her beloved husband on account of her scruples, now rose sharply
and reprovingly before her.
A nervous condition, which culminated in a long-enduring cramp of the
heart, befell her; the cramp was followed by an hour-long swoon which
could not be lifted.
When she could again leave her bed, a great change had taken place in
her. She no longer evaded the recollection of Lensky; the old love was
dead, but a new love had risen from the ruins of the old, a new
enlightened love, which was nothing more than a warm, compassionate
pardon.
* * * * *
With the restlessness of those mortally ill, who in vain seek relief,
she was again driven to leave Geneva, where at first she had intended
to pass the whole winter. She longed for Rome.
The physicians laid no difficulties in the way. In the end, a dying
person has the right to seek out the place where she will lay down her
weary head for the last time.
* * * * *
In Rome, it seemed at first as if she would be better again. At the end
of March, Nikolas came to visit her. He was now a young man, tall,
slender, with great dreamy eyes in an aristocratically cut face, and
with pretty, still somewhat embarrassed manners.
Already he had twice come to foreign countries to visit his mother, but
never had she been so glad to see him.
As the day was beautiful, and she felt better than usual, she proposed
a drive. "To the Via Giulia," she ordered the coachman. "I will show
you the Palazzo Morsini, in which we lived when your father was
betrothed to me," she said to her children. Mascha looked at her mother
in astonishment; it was the first time in quite three years that she
had mentioned her father before her.
So they drove in the Via Giulia, on a bright March afternoon they drove
there. But Natalie in vain sought the Palazzo Morsini; she did not find
it. A pile of rubbish stood in its place, surrounded by a board fence.
Disappointed almost to tears, with that childish, foolish
disappointment such as only those mortally ill know, she turned away.
On the way, it occurred to her to order the coachman to stop at the
Trevi fountain. She quite started with delight when she saw the
irregular collection of statues again. "Here I met your father for the
first time in Rome; it is just twenty years ago," said she, and rested
a strange, brilliant, dreamy glance on the old wall. The sculpturing
was still blacker and more weather-worn than twenty years before, but
the silver cascade rushed down more arrogantly than ever in the gray
stone basin, and the sky, which arched over the time-blackened walls,
was as blue as formerly. "Ah, how much beauty, nobility, and
immortality there still is in the world, together with the bad that
passes away," murmured Natalie, softly; then passing her hand over her
eyes, and as if speaking to herself, she added: "It is thus with great
men, and therefore I think, considerately overlooking their earthly
failings, one should rejoice over that which is immortal in them!"
Maschenka had not quite understood the words, but Nikolas sought by a
glance the eyes of his mother, and raised her hand to his lips.
It was evening of the same day, in Natalie's pretty apartment on the
Piazza di Spagna, opposite the church of Trinita dei Monti, and the
sick woman, relieved of her constricting and heavy street-clothes, lay,
in a white, lace-trimmed wrapper, on a lounge. Mother and son were
alone. He had read her a couple of verses from Musset, which she
particularly loved--_les souvenirs_--but it had become dark during the
reading; he laid the book away. For a while they were both quiet,
silently happy in each other's presence, as very nearly related people
when they are together after a long separation; but then Nikolas laid
his hand on that of his mother and said, softly: "Little mother--do you
know that it was really papa who sent me to you?"
The hand of the mother trembles, and softly draws itself out from under
the son's. Nikolas is silent. But what was that? After a while his
mother's hand voluntarily stole back into his, and the young man
continued: "Yes, papa sent me here, so that I might accurately report
to him how you are. You really cannot imagine how he always asks after
you, worries about you."
The hand of the poor woman trembles in that of her son, like an aspen
leaf. After a pause, quite as if he had waited so that his words might
sink warmly and deeply into her heart, he continues: "Father
commissioned me to bring before you a request from him--namely, whether
you would not permit him to visit you?"
Again Natalie drew her hand away from her son, but more hastily than
the first time. Her breath comes quickly and pantingly, for a few
moments she remains silent, then she says slowly, wearily: "No! it must
not be; tell him all love and kindness from me, and that I think only
with emotion of the great consideration which he always shows me, but
it must not be--it is better so!"
After she had made this decision, which had a sad and intimidating
effect upon the inexperienced boy, she remained for the rest of the
evening taciturn and with that, out of temper and irritable, as one had
never formerly seen her.
In the night she had one of her fearful attacks; the doctor must be
sent for. When the horrible oppression of breath and shuddering had
subsided, as usual, she fell into a condition of pale, cold numbness,
which resembled a deep swoon.
Nikolas, who had watched by the sick one, accompanied the physician
without. He begged him, in the name of his father, to tell him the
truth about the condition of the sufferer. The physician told him that
her condition was very serious, and a recovery absolutely out of the
question. It might last a few weeks still, perhaps only a few days.
When Nikolas, with difficulty restraining his tears, came up to his
mother's bed, she lay exactly in the same position as when he left the
room; still, something about her had changed. Her eyes were closed, but
around her beautiful mouth trembled a smile whose happy loveliness he
never forgot.
After a while she looked up and said in a quite weak voice: "Perhaps
only a few days"--she had heard the doctor's speech. After a pause, she
added: "Write your father--write--he must hurry--only a few more days!"
Nikolas telegraphed to St. Petersburg.
* * * * *
The consciousness of her near death had given her back her lack of
embarrassment toward Lensky. She insisted that he should stay in her
house, that they should prepare a room for him.
One day she was well enough to overlook the preparations herself. But
the improvement did not last. Quite every night came on an attack,
shorter and weaker, but still very painful; in between she slept, and
always had the same dream. It seemed to her as if she could fly, but
only about two feet from the ground; if she wished to rise higher, she
awoke. Of the young happiness of her love, she dreamed never more.
* * * * *
Lensky had telegraphed back that he would set out immediately. They
counted the days and nights which must elapse before his arrival--Kolia
and she; they consulted railroad time-tables together--so long to
Eydtkuhnen--so long to Berlin--so long to Vienna--so long to Rome. They
were twelve hours apart in their reckoning. Natalie expected Lensky
already on the morning of the fifth day, Nikolas not until the evening.
On the fourth day she was so well that she wished to undertake a walk.
"I would so like to see the spring once more," said she.
Nikolas begged her to save herself until his father had come, in order
not to aggravate her heart by excitement--that great, rich heart
through which she lived, and of which she was now dying. "We will bring
the spring in to you," said he tenderly.
They brought flowers, whatever kind they could buy, and placed them in
the pretty, pleasant boudoir in which she lay, stretched out on her
couch bed. The broad sunbeams slid like a golden veil over the
magnolias, violets, and roses.
Dreamily the dying woman let her eyes wander over the fragrant
splendor. "How lovely the spring is!" murmured she, and then she added:
"How can one fear to die, when the resurrection is so beautiful!" The
windows stood wide open; it was afternoon; from without one heard the
rattling of carriages which rolled along in the heart of the city.
It sounded like the rolling of a stream which forced its way to the
sea.
* * * * *
The night came. Nikolas sat near his mother's bed and watched. She
slept uneasily. Frequently she started and listened, then she looked at
her watch--it could not yet be! Once Maschenka came in, with little
bare feet peeping out from under her long night-dress, and face quite
swollen with weeping. On tip-toes she crept up to the dying woman's
bed. Since a couple of days Natalie had no longer permitted her to
sleep in the adjoining little room, from fear that the child might be
awakened by her painful attacks. Maschenka had dreamed that her mother
was worse; she wished to see her mother. Natalie opened her eyes just
as she entered.
Then the child ran up to her, kneeled down near her, and sobbing hid
her little face in the covers. Natalie stroked her little head with
weary, weak hand, and asked her to be brave, and lie down and sleep;
that would give her the greatest joy.
Then Maschenka stood up, and went with hesitating steps as far as the
door; then she turned round, and hurried back to her mother. Natalie
made the sign of the cross on her forehead, then kissed her once more,
and held her to her thin breast. It should be the last time--the child
went.
Natalie looked after her tenderly, sadly.
Toward morning Nikolas fell asleep in the arm-chair in which he watched
by his mother's bed. All at once he felt that some one pulled him by
both sleeves. He started up; his mother sat half upright in the bed.
"Wake up, your father is coming!" she called quickly and breathlessly.
"But, little mother, it is quite impossible--not before evening can he
be here."
With a short, imperious motion she admonished him to silence. Now he
heard quite plainly--softly, then louder--the rolling of a single
carriage through the deathly-quiet, sleeping city. It came nearer
stopped before the house.
"Go to meet him, Kolia; I do not wish him to think we did not expect
him."
Kolia went, did, like a machine, whatever was required of him. Natalie
sat up, listened--listened. If she had been mistaken--no. Heavy steps
came up the stairs. Steps of two men--not of one--and this voice!
rough, deep, going to the heart. She did not understand a word; but it
was his voice.
A quite numbing embarrassment and shyness overcame her. She drew the
lace cuffs of her night-dress over her thin arms, she arranged her
hair; she felt as shy as before a stranger. What should she say to him?
She would be quite calm--calm and friendly. Then the door opened--he
entered, dusty, with tumbled, badly arranged gray hair, with fearful
furrows in his face, aged ten years since she last had seen him.
What should she say to him?
He did not wait for that; he only gave one look at her pale face, then
he hurried up to her and took her in his arms.
Behind the church of Trinita dei Monti there was already a golden
light, and the whole room was filled with brilliancy and light.
"Oh, my angel! how could you so repulse me!" are the first words which
he speaks.
She says nothing, only lies on his breast, silently, unresistingly.
Through her veins creeps for the last time the feeling of pleasant,
animating warmth which has always overcome her in his nearness. She
tries to rouse herself, to consider; she had certainly wished to tell
him something for farewell. But what was it--what----
Ah, truly!
"Boris," she breathes out softly, "do you know--at that time in your
study--in Petersburg--do you still remember how you once said to me I
should show you the way to the stars?"
"Yes, my little dove, yes."
"I was not fitted for my task," whispers she, sadly; "forgive!"
For one moment he remains speechless with emotion; then he presses his
lips to her mouth, on her poor emaciated hands, on her hair.
"Forgive--I you! O my heart!" murmurs he. "How could you draw me up
when I had broken your wings! But now all is well; we will seek our old
happiness hand in hand. You shall become well, shall live!"
"Live," whispers she, quite reproachfully; "live," and shakes her head.
He looks at her with a long, tender glance, and is frightened.
Her face is still angel beautiful, but there is nothing left of her
lovely form. It pains him to see the sharp, harsh lines which outline
her limbs under the covering. That is no longer a living woman who
stretches out her arms to him, it is only an angel who wishes to bless
him. It is quite clear between them, and also the last shyness, which
still held her back from him, has vanished.
"Yes, it is over," whispers she; "only a few more days--how
many is that?--three days--five days--oh, perhaps it will last
longer--physicians are so often mistaken. We will drive out once more
together to see the spring--out there where the almond trees bloom
between the ruins--by St. Steven, do you still know?--and until I feel
it coming--the last, the end--then you will hold me by the hand, will
you not? like a child that fears the dark, you will lead me quite
tenderly up to the threshold of eternity--is it not true? No one can be
so tender and loving as you. But do not be sad--not now; to-day I feel
well, quite well. Ah!----"
What is that? She clutches at her heart--there it is again, the strange
fluttering feeling in her heart. Her face changes, her breath fails.
"The doctor, Kolia!" calls Boris beside himself.
Kolia hurries away; at the door his mother calls him back once more.
"Not without a farewell, my brave boy," she says, and kisses him. "God
bless you!"
Then he rushes away down the stairs, to fetch the doctor--there is
haste.
No, there is no more haste--the attack is short--only a couple of
strange shudders--then the invalid grows calm in Lensky's arms.
"How wonderfully the trees bloom--" murmurs the dying one. "It grows
dark--give me your hand--do not grieve--my poor Genius----"
Suddenly her eyes take on a peculiarly longing expression. A last time
the Asbein tones glide through her soul, but no longer an inciting,
alluring call--but as something elevating, holy. She hears the tones
quite high and distinct, as if they vibrated down to her from Heaven,
resounding strangely in a sublime, calm harmony that is no longer the
devil's succession of tones, that is the music of the spheres.
"Boris," she murmurs, and raising her hand, points upward, "listen ..."
The hand sinks slowly, slowly--when, a little later, the physician
enters she is dead. A wonderful smile lies on her countenance, the
smile of one set free.