"Yes, I have grown old. People do, but there is nothing terrible in
that when they have found what they sought for."
"Yes, when they have found it.... But what about now? Why do you say
that? Is it Alena?"
"Why ask? Although I am disillusioned, Kseniya, I go on chopping
firewood, heating the stove, living just to live. I read St. Francis
d'Assisi, think about him, and grieve that such a life as his may not
be lived again. I know he was absurd, but he had faith, And now
Alena--I love her, I shall love her for ever. I wish to feel God!"
Kseniya Ippolytovna looked at him curiously:
"Do you know what the baby-mice smelt like?"
"No, why do you ask?"
"They smelt like new-born babies--like human children! You have a
daughter, Natasha. That is everything."
The sun sank in an ocean of wine-coloured light, and a great red
wound remained amidst the drift of cold clouds over the western
horizon. The snow grew violet, and the room was filled with shadowy,
purplish twilight. Alena entered and the loud humming of the
telegraph wires came through the study's open door.
By nightfall battalions of fleeting clouds flecked the sky; the moon
danced and quivered in their midst--a silver-horned goddess, luminous
with the long-stored knowledge of the ages. The bitter snow-wind
crept, wound, and whirled along in spirals, loops, and ribbons,
lashing the fields, whining and wailing its age-old, dismal song over
the lone desolate spaces. The land was wretched, restless, and
forlorn; the sky was overcast with sombre, gaping caverns shot
through with lurid lines of fire.
* * * * * * *
At seven o'clock the Arkhipovs arrived.
Kseniya Ippolytovna had known them a long time: they had been
acquaintances even before Arkhipov's marriage. As he greeted her now,
he kissed her hand and began speaking about foreign countries--
principally Germany, which he knew and admired. They passed into the
study, where they argued and conversed: they had nothing much to talk
about really. Vera Lvovna was silent, as usual; and soon went to see
Natasha. Polunin also was quiet, walking about the room with his
hands behind his back.
Kseniya Ippolytovna jested in a wilful, merry, and coquettish fashion
with Arkhipov, who answered her in a polite, serious, and punctilious
manner. He was unable to carry on a light, witty conversation, and
was acutely conscious of his own awkwardness. From a mere trifle,
something Kseniya Ippolytovna said about fortune-telling at
Christmas, there arose an old-standing dispute between the two men on
Belief and Unbelief.
Arkhipov spoke with calmness and conviction, but Polunin grew angry,
confused, and agitated. Arkhipov declared that Faith was unnecessary
and injurious, like instinct and every other sentiment; that there
was only one thing immutable--Intellect. Only that was moral which
was intelligent.
Polunin retorted that the intellectual and the non-intellectual were
no standard of life, for was life intelligent? he asked. He contended
that without Faith there was only death; that the one thing immutable
in life was the tragedy of Faith and the Spirit.
"But do you know what Thought is, Polunin?"
"Yes, indeed I do!"
"Don't smile! Do you not know that Thought kills everything? Reflect,
think thrice over what you regard as sacred, and it will be as simple
as a glass of lemonade."
"But death?"
"Death is an exit into nothing. I have always that in reserve--when I
am heart-broken. For the present I am content to live and thrive."
When the dispute was over, Vera Lvovna said in a low voice, as calm
as ever:
"The only tragic thing in life is that there is nothing tragical,
while death is just death, when anyone dies physically. A little less
metaphysics!"
Kseniya Ippolytovna had been listening, alert and restless.
"But all the same," she answered Vera Lvovna animatedly, "Isn't the
absence of tragedy the true tragedy?"
"Yes, that alone."
"And love?"
"No, not love."
"But aren't you married?"
"I want my baby."
Kseniya Ippolytovna, who was lying on the sofa, rose up on her knees,
and stretching out her arms cried:
"Ah, a baby! Is that not instinct?"
"That is a law!"
The women began to argue. Then the dispute died down. Arkhipov
proposed a game of chance. They uncovered a green table, set lighted
candles at its corners and commenced to play leisurely and silently
as in winter. Arkhipov sat erect, resting his elbows at right angles
on the table.
The wind whistled outside, the blizzard increased in violence, and
from some far distance came the dismal, melancholy creaking and
grinding of iron. Alena came in, and sat quietly beside her husband,
her hands folded in her lap. They were killing time.
"The last time, I sat down to play a game of chance amidst the fjords
in a little valley hotel; a dreadful storm raged the whole while,"
Kseniya Ippolytovna remarked pensively. "Yes, there are big and
little tragedies in life!"
The wind shrieked mournfully; snow lashed at the windows. Kseniya
stayed on until a late hour, and Alena invited her to remain
overnight; but she refused and left.
Polunin accompanied her. The snow-wind blew violently, whistling and
cutting at them viciously. The moon seemed to be leaping among the
clouds; around them the green, snowy twilight hung like a thick
curtain. The horses jogged along slowly. Darkness lay over the land.
Polunin returned alone over a tractless road-way; the gale blew in
his face; the snow blinded him. He stabled his horses; then found
Alena waiting up for him in the kitchen, her expression was composed
but sad. Polunin took her in his arms and kissed her.
"Do not be anxious or afraid; I love only you, no one else. I know
why you are unhappy."
Alena looked up at him in loving gratitude, and shyly smiled.
"You do not understand that it is possible to love one only. Other
men are not able to do that," Polunin told her tenderly.
The hurricane raged over the house, but within reigned peace. Polunin
went into his study and sat down at his desk; Natasha began to cry;
he rose, took a candle, and brought her to Alena, who nursed her. The
infant looked so small, fragile, and red that Polunin's heart
overflowed with tenderness towards her. One solitary, flickering
candle illumined the room.
There was a call on the telephone at daybreak. Polunin was already
up. The day slowly broke in shades of blue; there was a murky, bluish
light inside the rooms and outside the windows, the panes of which
were coated with snow. The storm had subsided.
"Have I aroused you? Were you still in bed?" called Kseniya.
"No, I was already up."
"On the watch?"
"Yes."
"I have only just arrived home. The storm whirled madly round us in
the fields, and the roads were invisible, frozen under snow ... I
drove on thinking, and thinking--of the snow, you, myself, Arkhipov,
Paris ... oh, Paris...! You are not angry with me for ringing you up,
are you, my ascetic?... I was thinking of our conversation."
"What were you thinking?"
"This.... We were speaking together, you see.... Forgive me, but you
could not speak like that to Alena. She would not understand ... how
could she?"
"One need not speak a word, yet understand everything. There is
something that unites--without the aid of speech--not only Alena and
me, but the world and me. That is a law of God."
"So it is," murmured Kseniya. "Forgive me ... poor old Alena."
"I love her, and she has given me a daughter...."
"Yes, that is true. And we ... we love, but are childless... We rise
in the morning feeling dull and depressed from our revels of
overnight, while you were wisely sleeping." Kseniya Ippolytovna's
voice rose higher. "'We are the heisha-girls of lantern-light,' you
remember Annensky? At night we sit in restaurants, drinking wine and
listening to garish music. We love--but are childless.... And you?
You live a sober, righteous and sensible life, seeking the truth....
Isn't that so?' Truth!" Her cry was malignant and full of derision.
"That is unjust, Kseniya," answered Polunin in a low voice, hanging
his head.
"No, wait," continued the mocking voice at the other end of the line;
"here is something more from Annensky: 'We are the heisha-girls of
lantern-light!'... 'And what seemed to them music brought them
torment'; and again: 'But Cypris has nothing more sacred than the
words _I love_, unuttered by us' ..."
"That is unjust, Kseniya."
"Unjust!" She laughed stridently; then suddenly was silent. She began
to speak in a sad, scarcely audible whisper: "But Cypris has nothing
more sacred than the words _I love_, unuttered by us.... I love ...
love.... Oh, darling, at that time, in that June, I looked upon you
as a mere lad. But now I seem small and little myself, and you a big
man, who defends me. How miserable I was alone in the fields last
night! But that is expiation.... You are the only one who has loved
me devotedly. Thank you, but I have no faith now."
The dawn was grey, lingering, cold; the East grew red.