The following day I only had a passing glimpse of Zinaïda: she was
driving somewhere with the old princess in a cab. But I saw Lushin,
who, however, barely vouchsafed me a greeting, and Malevsky. The young
count grinned, and began affably talking to me. Of all those who
visited at the lodge, he alone had succeeded in forcing his way into
our house, and had favourably impressed my mother. My father did not
take to him, and treated him with a civility almost insulting.
“Ah, _monsieur le page_,” began Malevsky, “delighted to meet you. What
is your lovely queen doing?”
His fresh handsome face was so detestable to me at that moment, and he
looked at me with such contemptuous amusement that I did not answer him
at all.
“Are you still angry?” he went on. “You’ve no reason to be. It wasn’t I
who called you a page, you know, and pages attend queens especially.
But allow me to remark that you perform your duties very badly.”
“How so?”
“Pages ought to be inseparable from their mistresses; pages ought to
know everything they do, they ought, indeed, to watch over them,” he
added, lowering his voice, “day and night.”
“What do you mean?”
“What do I mean? I express myself pretty clearly, I fancy. Day and
night. By day it’s not so much matter; it’s light, and people are about
in the daytime; but by night, then look out for misfortune. I advise
you not to sleep at nights and to watch, watch with all your energies.
You remember, in the garden, by night, at the fountain, that’s where
there’s need to look out. You will thank me.”
Malevsky laughed and turned his back on me. He, most likely, attached
no great importance to what he had said to me, he had a reputation for
mystifying, and was noted for his power of taking people in at
masquerades, which was greatly augmented by the almost unconscious
falsity in which his whole nature was steeped…. He only wanted to tease
me; but every word he uttered was a poison that ran through my veins.
The blood rushed to my head. “Ah! so that’s it!” I said to myself;
“good! So there was reason for me to feel drawn into the garden! That
shan’t be so!” I cried aloud, and struck myself on the chest with my
fist, though precisely what should not be so I could not have said.
“Whether Malevsky himself goes into the garden,” I thought (he was
bragging, perhaps; he has insolence enough for that), “or some one else
(the fence of our garden was very low, and there was no difficulty in
getting over it), anyway, if any one falls into my hands, it will be
the worse for him! I don’t advise any one to meet me! I will prove to
all the world and to her, the traitress (I actually used the word
“traitress”) that I can be revenged!”
I returned to my own room, took out of the writing-table an English
knife I had recently bought, felt its sharp edge, and knitting my brows
with an air of cold and concentrated determination, thrust it into my
pocket, as though doing such deeds was nothing out of the way for me,
and not the first time. My heart heaved angrily, and felt heavy as a
stone. All day long I kept a scowling brow and lips tightly compressed,
and was continually walking up and down, clutching, with my hand in my
pocket, the knife, which was warm from my grasp, while I prepared
myself beforehand for something terrible. These new unknown sensations
so occupied and even delighted me, that I hardly thought of Zinaïda
herself. I was continually haunted by Aleko, the young gipsy—“Where art
thou going, young handsome man? Lie there,” and then, “thou art all
besprent with blood…. Oh, what hast thou done?… Naught!” With what a
cruel smile I repeated that “Naught!” My father was not at home; but my
mother, who had for some time past been in an almost continual state of
dumb exasperation, noticed my gloomy and heroic aspect, and said to me
at supper, “Why are you sulking like a mouse in a meal-tub?” I merely
smiled condescendingly in reply, and thought, “If only they knew!” It
struck eleven; I went to my room, but did not undress; I waited for
midnight; at last it struck. “The time has come!” I muttered between my
teeth; and buttoning myself up to the throat, and even pulling my
sleeves up, I went into the garden.
I had already fixed on the spot from which to keep watch. At the end of
the garden, at the point where the fence, separating our domain from
the Zasyekins,’ joined the common wall, grew a pine-tree, standing
alone. Standing under its low thick branches, I could see well, as far
as the darkness of the night permitted, what took place around. Close
by, ran a winding path which had always seemed mysterious to me; it
coiled like a snake under the fence, which at that point bore traces of
having been climbed over, and led to a round arbour formed of thick
acacias. I made my way to the pine-tree, leaned my back against its
trunk, and began my watch.
The night was as still as the night before, but there were fewer clouds
in the sky, and the outlines of bushes, even of tall flowers, could be
more distinctly seen. The first moments of expectation were oppressive,
almost terrible. I had made up my mind to everything. I only debated
how to act; whether to thunder, “Where goest thou? Stand! show
thyself—or death!” or simply to strike…. Every sound, every whisper and
rustle, seemed to me portentous and extraordinary…. I prepared myself….
I bent forward…. But half-an-hour passed, an hour passed; my blood had
grown quieter, colder; the consciousness that I was doing all this for
nothing, that I was even a little absurd, that Malevsky had been making
fun of me, began to steal over me. I left my ambush, and walked all
about the garden. As if to taunt me, there was not the smallest sound
to be heard anywhere; everything was at rest. Even our dog was asleep,
curled up into a ball at the gate. I climbed up into the ruins of the
greenhouse, saw the open country far away before me, recalled my
meeting with Zinaïda, and fell to dreaming….
I started…. I fancied I heard the creak of a door opening, then the
faint crack of a broken twig. In two bounds I got down from the ruin,
and stood still, all aghast. Rapid, light, but cautious footsteps
sounded distinctly in the garden. They were approaching me. “Here he is
… here he is, at last!” flashed through my heart. With spasmodic haste,
I pulled the knife out of my pocket; with spasmodic haste, I opened it.
Flashes of red were whirling before my eyes; my hair stood up on my
head in my fear and fury…. The steps were coming straight towards me; I
bent—I craned forward to meet him…. A man came into view…. My God! it
was my father! I recognised him at once, though he was all muffled up
in a dark cloak, and his hat was pulled down over his face. On tip-toe
he walked by. He did not notice me, though nothing concealed me; but I
was so huddled up and shrunk together that I fancy I was almost on the
level of the ground. The jealous Othello, ready for murder, was
suddenly transformed into a school-boy…. I was so taken aback by my
father’s unexpected appearance that for the first moment I did not
notice where he had come from or in what direction he disappeared. I
only drew myself up, and thought, “Why is it my father is walking about
in the garden at night?” when everything was still again. In my horror
I had dropped my knife in the grass, but I did not even attempt to look
for it; I was very much ashamed of myself. I was completely sobered at
once. On my way to the house, however, I went up to my seat under the
elder-tree, and looked up at Zinaïda’s window. The small
slightly-convex panes of the window shone dimly blue in the faint light
thrown on them by the night sky. All at once—their colour began to
change…. Behind them—I saw this, saw it distinctly—softly and
cautiously a white blind was let down, let down right to the
window-frame, and so stayed.
“What is that for?” I said aloud almost involuntarily when I found
myself once more in my room. “A dream, a chance, or …” The suppositions
which suddenly rushed into my head were so new and strange that I did
not dare to entertain them.