IV

Masha was just approaching the drawing-room door when the arrival of

Kister and Lutchkov was announced. She promptly returned to her own

room, and went up to the looking-glass.... Her heart was throbbing

violently. A girl came to summon her to the drawing-room. Masha drank a

little water, stopped twice on the stairs, and at last went down. Mr.

Perekatov was not at home. Nenila Makarievna was sitting on the sofa;

Lutchkov was sitting in an easy-chair, wearing his uniform, with his hat

on his knees; Kister was near him. They both got up on Masha's

entrance--Kister with his usual friendly smile, Lutchkov with a solemn

and constrained air. She bowed to them in confusion, and went up to her

mother. The first ten minutes passed off favourably. Masha recovered

herself, and gradually began to watch Lutchkov. To the questions

addressed to him by the lady of the house, he answered briefly, but

uneasily; he was shy, like all egoistic people. Nenila Makarievna

suggested a stroll in the garden to her guests, but did not herself go

beyond the balcony. She did not consider it essential never to lose

sight of her daughter, and to be constantly hobbling after her with a

fat reticule in her hands, after the fashion of many mothers in the

steppes. The stroll lasted rather a long while. Masha talked more with

Kister, but did not dare to look either at him or at Lutchkov. Avdey

Ivanovitch did not address a remark to her; Kister's voice showed

agitation. He laughed and chattered a little over-much.... They reached

the stream. A couple of yards or so from the bank there was a

water-lily, which seemed to rest on the smooth surface of the water,

encircled by its broad, round leaves.

'What a beautiful flower!' observed Masha.

She had hardly uttered these words when Lutchkov pulled out his sword,

clutched with one hand at the frail twigs of a willow, and, bending his

whole body over the water, cut off the head of the flower. 'It's deep

here, take care!' Masha cried in terror. Lutchkov with the tip of his

sword brought the flower to the bank, at her very feet. She bent down,

picked up the flower, and gazed with tender, delighted amazement at

Avdey. 'Bravo!' cried Kister. 'And I can't swim...' Lutchkov observed

abruptly. Masha did not like that remark. 'What made him say that?' she

wondered.

Lutchkov and Kister remained at Mr. Perekatov's till the evening.

Something new and unknown was passing in Masha's soul; a dreamy

perplexity was reflected more than once in her face. She moved somehow

more slowly, she did not flush on meeting her mother's eyes--on the

contrary, she seemed to seek them, as though she would question her.

During the whole evening, Lutchkov paid her a sort of awkward attention;

but even this awkwardness gratified her innocent vanity. When they had

both taken leave, with a promise to come again in a few days, she

quietly went off to her own room, and for a long while, as it were, in

bewilderment she looked about her. Nenila Makarievna came to her, kissed

and embraced her as usual. Masha opened her lips, tried to say

something--and did not utter a word. She wanted to confess---she did not

know what. Her soul was gently wandering in dreams. On the little table

by her bedside the flower Lutchkov had picked lay in water in a clean

glass. Masha, already in bed, sat up cautiously, leaned on her elbow,

and her maiden lips softly touched the fresh white petals....

'Well,' Kister questioned his friend next day, 'do you like the

Perekatovs? Was I right? eh? Tell me.'

Lutchkov did not answer.

'No, do tell me, do tell me!'

'Really, I don't know.'

'Nonsense, come now!'

'That... what's her name... Mashenka's all right; not bad-looking.'

'There, you see...' said Kister--and he said no more.

Five days later Lutchkov of his own accord suggested that they should

call on the Perekatovs.

Alone he would not have gone to see them; in Fyodor Fedoritch's absence

he would have had to keep up a conversation, and that he could not do,

and as far as possible avoided.

On the second visit of the two friends, Masha was much more at her ease.

She was by now secretly glad that she had not disturbed her mamma by an

uninvited avowal. Before dinner, Avdey had offered to try a young horse,

not yet broken in, and, in spite of its frantic rearing, he mastered it

completely. In the evening he thawed, and fell into joking and

laughing--and though he soon pulled himself up, yet he had succeeded in

making a momentary unpleasant impression on Masha. She could not yet be

sure herself what the feeling exactly was that Lutchkov excited in her,

but everything she did not like in him she set down to the influence of

misfortune, of loneliness.

V

The friends began to pay frequent visits to the Perekatovs'. Kister's

position became more and more painful. He did not regret his action...

no, but he desired at least to cut short the time of his trial. His

devotion to Masha increased daily; she too felt warmly towards him; but

to be nothing more than a go-between, a confidant, a friend even--it's a

dreary, thankless business! Coldly idealistic people talk a great deal

about the sacredness of suffering, the bliss of suffering... but to

Kister's warm and simple heart his sufferings were not a source of any

bliss whatever. At last, one day, when Lutchkov, ready dressed, came to

fetch him, and the carriage was waiting at the steps, Fyodor Fedoritch,

to the astonishment of his friend, announced point-blank that he should

stay at home. Lutchkov entreated him, was vexed and angry... Kister

pleaded a headache. Lutchkov set off alone.

The bully had changed in many ways of late. He left his comrades in

peace, did not annoy the novices, and though his spirit had not

'blossomed out,' as Kister had foretold, yet he certainly had toned down

a little. He could not have been called 'disillusioned' before--he had

seen and experienced almost nothing--and so it is not surprising that

Masha engrossed his thoughts. His heart was not touched though; only his

spleen was satisfied. Masha's feelings for him were of a strange kind.

She almost never looked him straight in the face; she could not talk to

him.... When they happened to be left alone together, Masha felt

horribly awkward. She took him for an exceptional man, and felt overawed

by him and agitated in his presence, fancied she did not understand him,

and was unworthy of his confidence; miserably, drearily--but

continually--she thought of him. Kister's society, on the contrary,

soothed her and put her in a good humour, though it neither overjoyed

nor excited her. With him she could chatter away for hours together,

leaning on his arm, as though he were her brother, looking

affectionately into his face, and laughing with his laughter--and she

rarely thought of him. In Lutchkov there was something enigmatic for the

young girl; she felt that his soul was 'dark as a forest,' and strained

every effort to penetrate into that mysterious gloom.... So children

stare a long while into a deep well, till at last they make out at the

very bottom the still, black water.

On Lutchkov's coming into the drawing-room alone, Masha was at first

scared... but then she felt delighted. She had more than once fancied

that there existed some sort of misunderstanding between Lutchkov and

her, that he had not hitherto had a chance of revealing himself.

Lutchkov mentioned the cause of Kister's absence; the parents expressed

their regret, but Masha looked incredulously at Avdey, and felt faint

with expectation. After dinner they were left alone; Masha did not know

what to say, she sat down to the piano; her fingers flitted hurriedly

and tremblingly over the keys; she was continually stopping and waiting

for the first word... Lutchkov did not understand nor care for music.

Masha began talking to him about Rossini (Rossini was at that time just

coming into fashion) and about Mozart.... Avdey Ivanovitch responded:

'Quite so,' 'by no means,' 'beautiful,' 'indeed,' and that was all.

Masha played some brilliant variations on one of Rossini's airs.

Lutchkov listened and listened... and when at last she turned to him,

his face expressed such unfeigned boredom, that Masha jumped up at once

and closed the piano. She went up to the window, and for a long while

stared into the garden; Lutchkov did not stir from his seat, and still

remained silent. Impatience began to take the place of timidity in

Masha's soul. 'What is it?' she wondered, 'won't you... or can't you?'

It was Lutchkov's turn to feel shy. He was conscious again of his

miserable, overwhelming diffidence; already he was raging!... 'It was

the devil's own notion to have anything to do with the wretched girl,'

he muttered to himself.... And all the while how easy it was to touch

Masha's heart at that instant! Whatever had been said by such an

extraordinary though eccentric man, as she imagined Lutchkov, she would

have understood everything, have excused anything, have believed

anything.... But this burdensome, stupid silence! Tears of vexation were

standing in her eyes. 'If he doesn't want to be open, if I am really not

worthy of his confidence, why does he go on coming to see us? Or perhaps

it is that I don't set the right way to work to make him reveal

himself?'... And she turned swiftly round, and glanced so inquiringly,

so searchingly at him, that he could not fail to understand her glance,

and could not keep silence any longer....

'Marya Sergievna,' he pronounced falteringly; 'I... I've... I ought to

tell you something....'

'Speak,' Masha responded rapidly.

Lutchkov looked round him irresolutely.

'I can't now...'

'Why not?'

'I should like to speak to you... alone....'

'Why, we are alone now.'

'Yes... but... here in the house....'

Masha was at her wits' end.... 'If I refuse,' she thought, 'it's all

over.'... Curiosity was the ruin of Eve....

'I agree,' she said at last.

'When then? Where?'

Masha's breathing came quickly and unevenly.

'To-morrow... in the evening. You know the copse above the Long

Meadow?'...

'Behind the mill?'

Masha nodded.

'What time?'

'Wait...'

She could not bring out another word; her voice broke... she turned pale

and went quickly out of the room.

A quarter of an hour later, Mr. Perekatov, with his characteristic

politeness, conducted Lutchkov to the hall, pressed his hand feelingly,

and begged him 'not to forget them'; then, having let out his guest, he

observed with dignity to the footman that it would be as well for him to

shave, and without awaiting a reply, returned with a careworn air to his

own room, with the same careworn air sat down on the sofa, and

guilelessly dropped asleep on the spot.

'You're a little pale to-day,' Nenila Makarievna said to her daughter,

on the evening of the same day. 'Are you quite well?'

'Yes, mamma.'

Nenila Makarievna set straight the kerchief on the girl's neck.

'You are very pale; look at me,' she went on, with that motherly

solicitude in which there is none the less audible a note of parental

authority: 'there, now, your eyes look heavy too. You're not well,

Masha.'

'My head does ache a little,' said Masha, to find some way of escape.

'There, I knew it.' Nenila Makarievna put some scent on Masha's

forehead. 'You're not feverish, though.'

Masha stooped down, and picked a thread off the floor.

Nenila Makarievna's arms lay softly round Masha's slender waist.

'It seems to me you have something you want to tell me,' she said

caressingly, not loosing her hands.

Masha shuddered inwardly.

'I? Oh, no, mamma.'

Masha's momentary confusion did not escape her mother's attention.

'Oh, yes, you do.... Think a little.'

But Masha had had time to regain her self-possession, and instead of

answering, she kissed her mother's hand with a laugh.

'And so you've nothing to tell me?'

'No, really, nothing.'

'I believe you,' responded Nenila Makarievna, after a short silence. 'I

know you keep nothing secret from me.... That's true, isn't it?'

'Of course, mamma.'

Masha could not help blushing a little, though.

'You do quite rightly. It would be wrong of you to keep anything from

me.... You know how I love you, Masha.'

'Oh yes, mamma.'

And Masha hugged her.

'There, there, that's enough.' (Nenila Makarievna walked about the

room.) 'Oh tell me,' she went on in the voice of one who feels that the

question asked is of no special importance; 'what were you talking about

with Avdey Ivanovitch to-day?'

'With Avdey Ivanovitch?' Masha repeated serenely. 'Oh, all sorts of

things....'

'Do you like him?'

'Oh yes, I like him.'

'Do you remember how anxious you were to get to know him, how excited

you were?'

Masha turned away and laughed.

'What a strange person he is!' Nenila Makarievna observed

good-humouredly.

Masha felt an inclination to defend Lutchkov, but she held her tongue.

'Yes, of course,' she said rather carelessly; 'he is a queer fish, but

still he's a nice man!'

'Oh, yes!... Why didn't Fyodor Fedoritch come?'

'He was unwell, I suppose. Ah! by the way, Fyodor Fedoritch wanted to

make me a present of a puppy.... Will you let me?'

'What? Accept his present?'

'Yes.'

'Of course.'

'Oh, thank you!' said Masha, 'thank you, thank you!'

Nenila Makarievna got as far as the door and suddenly turned back again.

'Do you remember your promise, Masha?'

'What promise?'

'You were going to tell me when you fall in love.'

'I remember.'

'Well... hasn't the time come yet?' (Masha laughed musically.) 'Look

into my eyes.'

Masha looked brightly and boldly at her mother.

'It can't be!' thought Nenila Makarievna, and she felt reassured. 'As if

she could deceive me!... How could I think of such a thing!... She's

still a perfect baby....'

She went away....

'But this is really wicked,' thought Masha.