The band, composed of the marshal's domestic serfs, were stationed in the
butler's pantry, which had been put in order on account of the ball, and,
having turned up the sleeves of their coats, had begun at the signal of
their leader to play the ancient polonaise "Aleksandr, Yelisaviéta;" and
under the soft, brilliant light of the wax candles, the couples began to
move in tripping measure through the great ballroom; a governor-general of
Catherine's time, with a star, taking out the gaunt wife of the marshal,
the marshal with the governor's wife, and so on through all the hierarchy
of the government in various combinations and variations,--when
Zavalshevsky in a blue coat with a huge collar, and epaulets on his
shoulders, and wearing stockings and pumps, and exhaling about him an odor
of jasmine with which he had plentifully drenched his mustaches, the
facings of his coat, and his handkerchief, entered with the handsome count,
who wore tight-fitting blue trousers and a red pelisse embroidered with
gold, and wearing on his breast the cross of Vladímir and a medal of 1812.
The count was of medium height, but had an extremely handsome figure. His
clear blue eyes of remarkable brilliancy, and dark hair which was rather
long and fell in thick ringlets, gave his beauty a peculiar character.
The count's presence at the ball was not unexpected. The handsome young
man who had seen him at the hotel had already spoken of him to the marshal.
The impressions made by this announcement were of various kinds, but on the
whole were not altogether pleasant.
"I suppose this young man will turn us into ridicule," was what the old
women and the men said to themselves.
"Suppose he should run off with me," was what the wives and young ladies
thought, with more or less apprehension.
As soon as the polonaise was finished, and the couples had made each other
low bows, once more the women formed little groups by themselves, and the
men by themselves. Zavalshevsky, proud and happy, led the count up to the
hostess.
The marshal's wife, conscious of a certain inward trepidation lest this
hussar should make her the cause of some scandal before everybody, said
proudly and scornfully, as she turned away, "Very glad to see you. I hope
that you will dance." And then she looked at the count mistrustfully with
an expression that seemed to say, "Now, if you insult any woman, then you
are a perfect scoundrel after this."
The count, however, quickly overcame this prejudice by his amiability, his
politeness, and his handsome jovial appearance; so that in five minutes the
expression on the face of the marshal's wife plainly declared to all who
stood around her, "I know how to manage all these men. He immediately
realized whom he was talking with. And now he will be charming to me all
the rest of the evening."
Moreover, just then the governor, who had known his father, came up to the
count, and very graciously drew him to one side, and entered into
conversation with him, which still more pleased the fashionable society of
the town, and raised the count in their estimation.
Then Zavalshevsky presented the count to his sister, a plump young widow,
who, ever since the count entered the room, had kept her big black eyes
fastened upon him.
The count asked the little widow for the waltz which at that moment the
musicians had struck up, and it was his artistic dancing that conquered the
last vestiges of the popular prejudice.
"Ah, he's a master at dancing!" said a stout lady, following the legs in
blue trousers which were flashing through the ballroom, and mentally
counting, "One, two, three; one, two, three,--he's a master."
"How gracefully he moves his feet! how gracefully!" said another guest, who
did not stand very high in the governmental society. "How does he manage to
not hit any one with his spurs? Wonderful, very skilful!"
The count, by his skill in dancing, eclipsed the three best dancers of the
city. These were, a governor's aide, a tall albino, who was famous for his
rapid dancing and because he held the lady pressed very close to his
breast; secondly, the cavalryman, who was famous for his graceful swaying
during the waltz, and for his frequent but light tapping with his heels;
and thirdly, a civilian of whom everybody said, that, though he was not
very strong-minded, yet he was an admirable dancer and the life of all
balls.
In point of fact, this civilian from the beginning to the end of a ball
invariably invited all the ladies in the order in which they sat, did not
cease for a moment to dance, and only occasionally paused to wipe his
weary but still radiant face with his cambric handkerchief, which would
become wet through.
The count had surpassed them all, and had danced with the three principal
ladies,--with the stout one, who was rich, handsome, and stupid; with the
middle-sized one, who was lean, and not particularly good-looking, but
handsomely dressed; and with the little one, who was not pretty, but very
witty.
He had danced also with others,--with all the pretty women, and there were
many pretty women there.
But the little widow, Zavalshevsky's sister, pleased the count more than
all the rest; with her he danced a quadrille and a schottische and a
mazurka.
At first, when they took their places for the quadrille, he overwhelmed her
with compliments, comparing her to Venus and Diana, and to a rosebush, and
to some other flower besides.
To all these amenities the little widow only bent her white neck, modestly
dropped her eyes, and, looking at her white muslin dress, changed her fan
from one hand to the other.
When, at last, she said, "This is too much, count; you are jesting," etc.,
her voice, which was rather guttural, betrayed such _naïve_ simplicity of
heart and amusing naturalness that the count, as he looked at her, actually
compared her, not to a flower or to a rosebush, but to some kind of a
pinkish-white wild-flower, exuberant and odorless, growing alone on a
virgin snow-drift in some far, far-distant land.
Such a strange impression was made upon the count by this union of
_naïveté_ and unconventionality together with fresh beauty, that several
times, in the pauses of the conversation, when he looked silently into her
eyes or contemplated the loveliness of her arms and neck, the desire came
over him with such vehemence to take her into his arms and kiss her again
and again, that he was really obliged to restrain himself.
The little widow was quite satisfied with the impression which she
perceived that she had made; but there was something in the count's
behavior that began to disquiet her, and fill her with apprehensions,
though the young hussar was not only flatteringly amiable, but even, to an
extravagant degree, deferential in his treatment of her.
He ran to get orgeat for her, picked up her handkerchief, snatched a chair
from the hands of a scrofulous young proprietor, who was also anxious to
pay her attention, and who was not quick enough. But perceiving that these
assiduities, which were fashionable at that period, had little effect in
making the lady well-disposed, he began to amuse her by telling her
ridiculous anecdotes: he assured her that he was ready at a moment's notice
to stand on his head, or to crow like a cock, or to jump out of the window,
or to fling himself into a hole in the ice.
This procedure was a brilliant success: the little widow became very gay;
she rippled with laughter, displaying her marvellous white teeth, and
became entirely satisfied with her cavalier. The count each moment grew
more and more enchanted with her, so that at the end of the quadrille he
was really in love with her.
After the quadrille, when she was approached by her former admirer, a young
man of eighteen, the son of a very rich proprietor, the same scrofulous
young man from whom Turbin had snatched away the chair, she received him
with perfect coolness, and not one-tenth part of the constraint was
noticeable in her which she felt when she was with the count.
"You are very kind," she said, all the time gazing at Turbin's back, and
unconsciously reckoning how many yards[64] of gold-lace were used for his
whole jacket. "You are very kind; you promised to come to take me for a
walk, and to bring me some comfits."
[Footnote 64: _arshins._]
"Well, I did come, Anna Fedorovna, but you weren't at home, and I left the
very best comfits for you," said the young man, in a voice that was very
thin, considering his height.
"You always are provided with excuses; I don't need your comfits. Please do
not think"....
"I begin to see, Anna Fedorovna, how you have changed toward me, and I know
why. But it is not right," he added, but without finishing his remark,
evidently owing to some powerful interior emotion, which caused his lips to
tremble strangely.
Anna Fedorovna did not heed him, and continued to follow Turbin with her
eyes. The marshal, at whose house the ball was given,--a big, stout old
man, who had lost his teeth,--came up to the count, and, taking him by the
arm, invited him into his library to smoke and drink if he so desired.
As soon as Turbin disappeared, Anna Fedorovna felt that there was
absolutely nothing for her to do in the ballroom, and slipping her hand
through the arm of a dried-up old maid, who was a friend of hers, went with
her into the dressing-room.
"Well, what do you think of him? Is he nice?" asked the old maid.
"Only it's terrible--the way he follows you up!" said Anna Fedorovna, going
to the mirror, and contemplating herself in it.
Her face was aglow, her eyes were full of mischief, her color was
heightened; then suddenly imitating one of the ballet-dancers whom she had
seen during election time, she pirouetted round on one toe, and, laughing
her guttural but sweet laugh, she leaped up in the air, crossing her knees.
"What a man he is! he even asked me for a _souvenir_," she confided to her
friend. "But he will ne-e-ver get one," she said, singing the last words,
and lifting one finger in the lilac-colored glove that reached to her
elbow.
In the library where Turbin was conducted by the marshal, stood various
kinds of vodka, liqueurs, edibles,[65] and champagne. In a cloud of
tobacco-smoke the nobility were sitting, or walking up and down, talking
about the elections.
[Footnote 65: _zakuski._]
"When the whole of the high nobility of our district has honored him with
an election," exclaimed the newly elected isprávnik who was already
tolerably tipsy, "he certainly ought not to fail in his duties toward
society in general."
The conversation was interrupted by the count's coming. All were presented
to him, and the isprávnik especially pressed his hand long between both of
his, and asked him several times to go with him after the ball to the new
tavern, where he would treat the gentlemen of the nobility, and where they
would hear the gypsies sing.
The count accepted his invitation, and drank with him several glasses of
champagne.
"Why aren't you dancing, gentlemen?" he asked, as he was about to leave the
library.
"We aren't dancers," replied the isprávnik, laughing. "We prefer the wine,
count; and besides, all these young ladies have grown up under my eyes,
count. But still, I do sometimes take part in a schottische, count. I can
do it, count."
"Come on then for a while," said Turbin. "Let us have some sport before we
go to the gypsies."
"What say you, gentlemen? Let us come! Let us delight our host!"
And the three gentlemen who, since the beginning of the ball, had been
drinking in the library and had very red faces, began to draw on their
gloves, some of black kid, another of knit silk, and were just going with
the count to the ballroom, when they were detained by the scrofulous young
man, who, pale as a sheet, and scarcely able to refrain from tears, came
straight up to Turbin.
"You have an idea, because you are a count, you can run into people as if
you were at a fair," said he, with difficulty drawing his breath; "hence it
isn't fitting"--
Once more the stream of his speech was interrupted by the involuntary
trembling of his lips.
"What?" cried Turbin, frowning suddenly, "what?... You're a baby," he
cried, seizing him by the arm, and squeezing it so that the blood rushed to
the young man's head, not so much from vexation as from fright. "What is
it? Do you want to fight? If so, I am at your service."
Turbin had scarcely let go of his arm, which he had squeezed so powerfully,
when two nobles seized the young man by the sleeve, and carried him off
through a back door.
"What! have you lost your wits? You've surely been drinking too much. We
shall have to tell your papa. What's the matter with you?" they asked.
"No, I haven't been drinking; but he ran into me, and did not apologize.
He's a hog, that's what he is," whined the young man, now actually in
tears.
Nevertheless they paid no attention to him, but carried him off home.
"Never mind, count," said the isprávnik and Zavalshevsky assuringly. "He's
a mere child. They still whip him: he's only sixteen years old. It's hard
to tell what is to be done with him. What fly stung him? And his father is
such an honorable man! He's our candidate."
"Well, the Devil take him if he refuses"....
And the count returned to the ballroom, and, as gayly as before, danced the
schottische with the pretty little widow, and laughed heartily when he saw
the antics of the gentlemen who had come with him out of the library. There
was a general burst of merriment all through the ballroom when the
isprávnik tripped, and measured his length on the floor in the midst of the
dancers.