Litvinov walked up and down his room in the hotel, his head bowed in
thought. He had now to pass from theory to practice, to devise ways and
means for flight, for moving to unknown countries.... But, strange to
say, he was not pondering so much upon ways and means as upon whether
actually, beyond doubt, the decision had been reached on which he had so
obstinately insisted? Had the ultimate, irrevocable word been uttered?
But Irina to be sure had said to him at parting, ‘Act, act, and when
every thing is ready, only let me know.’ That was final! Away with all
doubts.... He must proceed to action. And Litvinov proceeded--in the
meantime--to calculation. Money first of all. Litvinov had, he found, in
ready money one thousand three hundred and twenty-eight guldens, in
French money, two thousand eight hundred and fifty-five francs; the sum
was trifling, but it was enough for the first necessities, and then he
must at once write to his father to send him all he could; he would
have to sell the forest part of the land. But on what pretext?... Well,
a pretext would be found. Irina had spoken, it’s true, of her _bijoux_,
but that must not be taken into his reckoning; that, who knows, might
come in for a rainy day. He had besides a good Geneva watch, for which
he might get ... well, say, four hundred francs. Litvinov went to a
banker’s, and with much circumlocution introduced the question whether
it was possible, in case of need, to borrow money; but bankers at Baden
are wary old foxes, and in response to such circumlocutions they
promptly assume a drooping and blighted air, for all the world like a
wild flower whose stalk has been severed by the scythe; some indeed
laugh outright in your face, as though appreciating an innocent joke on
your part. Litvinov, to his shame, even tried his luck at roulette,
even, oh ignominy! put a thaler on the number thirty, corresponding with
his own age. He did this with a view to augmenting and rounding off his
capital; and if he did not augment it, he certainly did round off his
capital by losing the odd twenty-eight guldens. There was a second
question, also not an unimportant one; that was the passport. But for a
woman a passport is not quite so obligatory, and there are countries
where it is not required at all, Belgium, for instance, and England;
besides, one might even get some other passport, not Russian. Litvinov
pondered very seriously on all this; his decision was firm, absolutely
unwavering, and yet all the time against his will, overriding his will,
something not serious, almost humorous came in, filtered through his
musings, as though the very enterprise were a comic business, and no one
ever did elope with any one in reality, but only in plays and novels,
and perhaps somewhere in the provinces, in some of those remote
districts, where, according to the statements of travellers, people are
literally sick continually from _ennui_. At that point Litvinov recalled
how an acquaintance of his, a retired cornet, Batsov, had eloped with a
merchant’s daughter in a staging sledge with bells and three horses,
having as a preliminary measure made the parents drunk, and adopted the
same precaution as well with the bride, and how, as it afterwards turned
out, he was outwitted and within an ace of a thrashing into the bargain.
Litvinov felt exceedingly irritated with himself for such inappropriate
reminiscences, and then with the recollection of Tatyana, her sudden
departure, all that grief and suffering and shame, he felt only too
acutely that the affair he was arranging was deadly earnest, and how
right he had been when he had told Irina that his honour even left no
other course open.... And again at the mere name something of flame
turned with sweet ache about his heart and died away again.
The tramp of horses’ hoofs sounded behind him.... He moved aside....
Irina overtook him on horseback; beside her rode the stout general. She
recognised Litvinov, nodded to him, and lashing her horse with a
sidestroke of her whip, she put him into a gallop, and suddenly dashed
away at headlong speed. Her dark veil fluttered in the wind....
‘_Pas si vite! Nom de Dieu! pas si vite!_’ cried the general, and he too
galloped after her.