At last the earth was cloaked in darkness, the torches hung like
gleaming balls of fire, the pattering of the rain echoed dismally,
and above it, drowning all other sounds, was the dreary roar of the
factory.
He sauntered through the straight-cut avenues of the park towards his
club, but near the school turned aside and went in to see Nina. They
had known each other from childhood, attending the same school, Nina
his faithful comrade and devoted slave--and ever since he had
remained for her the one and only man, for she was of those who love
but once. Since then she had been flung about Russia, striven to
retain her honour, vainly tilting against the windmills of poverty
and temptation--had failed, been broken, and now had crept back that
she might live near him.
He walked through the school's dark corridors and knocked.
"Come in."
Alone, in a grey dress, plain-featured, her cheek red where it had
rested against the palm of her hand, she sat beside a little table in
the bare, simple room, a book on her lap. With a pang, Agrenev noted
her sunken eyes. But at sight of him they brightened instantly, and
she rose from her seat, putting the book aside.
"You darling? Welcome! Is it raining?"
"Greeting! Nina. I have just come in for a moment."
"Take off your coat," she urged. "You will have some tea?" Her eyes
and outstretched hands both said: "Thank you, thank you." "How are
you doing?" she asked him anxiously.
"I am bored. I can do nothing. I am utterly bored."
She placed the tea-urn on the table in her tiny kitchen, laid some
pots of jam by her copy-book, seated him in the solitary armchair,
and bustled round, all smiles, her cheeks flushing--the spot where
she had rested her hand all the long evening still showing red,--all-
loving, all-surrendering, yet undesired.
"You musn't wait on me like this, Nina," Agrenev protested;"... Sit
down and let us talk."
Their hands touched caressingly, and she sat down beside him.
"What is it, my dear?" She stroked his hand and its touch warmed her!
"What is it?"
At times indignation overcame her at the thought of life; she wrung
her hands, spoke with hatred, and her eyes darkened in anger. At
times she fell on her knees in tears and supplication; but with
Alexander Alexandrovitch she was always tender, with the tenderness
of unrequited love.
"What is it, darling?"
"I am bored, Nina. She ... Anna ... does not love me; she does not
leave me, nor deceive me, but neither does she love me. I know you
love ..."
At home four walls ... Coldness ... The miner, Bitska, making jokes
all day in the rain ... the fuse to be lighted in the quarry, the
slow igniting to be watched. Thirty years had been lived ... five-
tenths of his life ... a half ... ten-twentieths. It was like a blank
cartridge ... no kindness ... a life without feeling ... all blank ...
The lamp seemed to go out and something warm lay over his eyes. The
palm of a hand. Nina's words were calm at first; then they grew
frantic.
"Leave her, leave her, darling! Come to me, to me who wants you! What
if she doesn't love you? I do, I love you ..."
He was silent.
"You say nothing? I will give you all; you shall have everything!
Come to me, to me who will give to you so gladly! She is as dead; she
needs nothing! Do you hear? You have me ... I will take all the
suffering on myself ..."
* * * * * * *
The lamp streamed forth clearly again. A little grey clod of humanity
fell on to the maiden's narrow bed.
It was so intensely dark that the blackness seemed to close in on one
like a great wall, and it was difficult to see two paces ahead. Close
to the barracks some men were bawling to the music of a mouth-organ.
Under cover of the gloom someone whistled between his fingers,
babbling insolence and nonsense. The torches glowed through the
tangled network of branches and leaves like globes of fire.
Agrenev walked along, carrying a lantern, by the light of which he
mechanically picked his steps; close to his heels, Nina hurried
through the darkness and puddles. On every side there was the
rustling of pines, hundreds of them, their immense stems towering
upwards into obscurity. Although invisible, their presence could be
felt. The place was wild and dreary, odours of earth, moss, and pine-
sap mingled together in an overpowering perfume; it was the heart of
a vast primeval forest. Agrenev murmured as if to himself:
"No, Nina, I do not love you. I want nothing from you.... Anna ...
her father ordered her to marry me.... Ancient blood.... Anna told me
she would never love.... Asya is growing up under her influence.... I
love my little daughter ... yet she is strange too ... she looks at
me with vacant eyes ... my daughter! I stole her mother out of a
void! I go home and lie down alone ... or I go to Anna and she
receives me with compressed lips. I do not want a daughter from you,
Nina ... Why should I? To-morrow will ... be the same as yesterday."
By the door of his house in the engineer's quarters, he remembered
Nina, and all at once became solicitous:
"You will catch cold, my dear. It will be terrible for you getting
back ..."
He stood before her a moment silently; then stretched out his hand:
"Well, the best of luck, my dear!"
A band of youths strolled by. One of them flashed a lantern-light on
the doorway.
"Aha! Sky-larking with the engineers! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
They began chattering among themselves and sang in chorus a ribald
doggerel:
"Once upon a time a wench
Appeared before a judge's bench.."