IX

The worst of it was that Orlov had thoughtlessly let Polya, too, into

the secret of his deception, telling her to bring his shirts to

Sergievsky Street. After that, she looked at Zinaida Fyodorovna with a

malignant joy and hatred I could not understand, and was never tired of

snorting with delight to herself in her own room and in the hall.

"She's outstayed her welcome; it's time she took herself off!" she would

say with zest. "She ought to realise that herself...."

She already divined by instinct that Zinaida Fyodorovna would not be

with us much longer, and, not to let the chance slip, carried off

everything she set her eyes on--smelling-bottles, tortoise-shell

hairpins, handkerchiefs, shoes! On the day after New Year's Day, Zinaida

Fyodorovna summoned me to her room and told me in a low voice that she

missed her black dress. And then she walked through all the rooms, with

a pale, frightened, and indignant face, talking to herself:

"It's too much! It's beyond everything. Why, it's unheard-of insolence!"

At dinner she tried to help herself to soup, but could not--her hands

were trembling. Her lips were trembling, too. She looked helplessly at

the soup and at the little pies, waiting for the trembling to pass off,

and suddenly she could not resist looking at Polya.

"You can go, Polya," she said. "Stepan is enough by himself."

"I'll stay; I don't mind," answered Polya.

"There's no need for you to stay. You go away altogether," Zinaida

Fyodorovna went on, getting up in great agitation. "You may look out for

another place. You can go at once."

"I can't go away without the master's orders. He engaged me. It must be

as he orders."

"You can take orders from me, too! I am mistress here!" said Zinaida

Fyodorovna, and she flushed crimson.

"You may be the mistress, but only the master can dismiss me. It was he

engaged me."

"You dare not stay here another minute!" cried Zinaida Fyodorovna, and

she struck the plate with her knife. "You are a thief! Do you hear?"

Zinaida Fyodorovna flung her dinner-napkin on the table, and with a

pitiful, suffering face, went quickly out of the room. Loudly sobbing

and wailing something indistinct, Polya, too, went away. The soup and

the grouse got cold. And for some reason all the restaurant dainties on

the table struck me as poor, thievish, like Polya. Two pies on a plate

had a particularly miserable and guilty air. "We shall be taken back to

the restaurant to-day," they seemed to be saying, "and to-morrow we

shall be put on the table again for some official or celebrated singer."

"She is a fine lady, indeed," I heard uttered in Polya's room. "I could

have been a lady like that long ago, but I have some self-respect! We'll

see which of us will be the first to go!"

Zinaida Fyodorovna rang the bell. She was sitting in her room, in the

corner, looking as though she had been put in the corner as a

punishment.

"No telegram has come?" she asked.

"No, madam."

"Ask the porter; perhaps there is a telegram. And don't leave the

house," she called after me. "I am afraid to be left alone."

After that I had to run down almost every hour to ask the porter whether

a telegram had come. I must own it was a dreadful time! To avoid seeing

Polya, Zinaida Fyodorovna dined and had tea in her own room; it was here

that she slept, too, on a short sofa like a half-moon, and she made her

own bed. For the first days I took the telegrams; but, getting no

answer, she lost her faith in me and began telegraphing herself. Looking

at her, I, too, began impatiently hoping for a telegram. I hoped he

would contrive some deception, would make arrangements, for instance,

that a telegram should be sent to her from some station. If he were too

much engrossed with cards or had been attracted by some other woman, I

thought that both Gruzin and Kukushkin would remind him of us. But our

expectations were vain. Five times a day I would go in to Zinaida

Fyodorovna, intending to tell her the truth. But her eyes looked piteous

as a fawn's, her shoulders seemed to droop, her lips were moving, and I

went away again without saying a word. Pity and sympathy seemed to rob

me of all manliness. Polya, as cheerful and well satisfied with herself

as though nothing had happened, was tidying the master's study and the

bedroom, rummaging in the cupboards, and making the crockery jingle, and

when she passed Zinaida Fyodorovna's door, she hummed something and

coughed. She was pleased that her mistress was hiding from her. In the

evening she would go out somewhere, and rang at two or three o'clock in

the morning, and I had to open the door to her and listen to remarks

about my cough. Immediately afterwards I would hear another ring; I

would run to the room next to the study, and Zinaida Fyodorovna, putting

her head out of the door, would ask, "Who was it rung?" while she looked

at my hands to see whether I had a telegram.

When at last on Saturday the bell rang below and she heard the familiar

voice on the stairs, she was so delighted that she broke into sobs. She

rushed to meet him, embraced him, kissed him on the breast and sleeves,

said something one could not understand. The hall porter brought up the

portmanteaus; Polya's cheerful voice was heard. It was as though some

one had come home for the holidays.

"Why didn't you wire?" asked Zinaida Fyodorovna, breathless with joy.

"Why was it? I have been in misery; I don't know how I've lived through

it.... Oh, my God!"

"It was very simple! I returned with the senator to Moscow the very

first day, and didn't get your telegrams," said Orlov. "After dinner, my

love, I'll give you a full account of my doings, but now I must sleep

and sleep.... I am worn out with the journey."

It was evident that he had not slept all night; he had probably been

playing cards and drinking freely. Zinaida Fyodorovna put him to bed,

and we all walked about on tiptoe all that day. The dinner went off

quite satisfactorily, but when they went into the study and had coffee

the explanation began. Zinaida Fyodorovna began talking of something

rapidly in a low voice; she spoke in French, and her words flowed like a

stream. Then I heard a loud sigh from Orlov, and his voice.

"My God!" he said in French. "Have you really nothing fresher to tell me

than this everlasting tale of your servant's misdeeds?"

"But, my dear, she robbed me and said insulting things to me."

"But why is it she doesn't rob me or say insulting things to me? Why is

it I never notice the maids nor the porters nor the footmen? My dear,

you are simply capricious and refuse to know your own mind.... I really

begin to suspect that you must be in a certain condition. When I offered

to let her go, you insisted on her remaining, and now you want me to

turn her away. I can be obstinate, too, in such cases. You want her to

go, but I want her to remain. That's the only way to cure you of your

nerves."

"Oh, very well, very well," said Zinaida Fyodorovna in alarm. "Let us

say no more about that.... Let us put it off till to-morrow.... Now tell

me about Moscow.... What is going on in Moscow?"

X

After lunch next day--it was the seventh of January, St. John the

Baptist's Day--Orlov put on his black dress coat and his decoration to

go to visit his father and congratulate him on his name day. He had to

go at two o'clock, and it was only half-past one when he had finished

dressing. What was he to do for that half-hour? He walked about the

drawing-room, declaiming some congratulatory verses which he had recited

as a child to his father and mother.

Zinaida Fyodorovna, who was just going out to a dressmaker's or to the

shops, was sitting, listening to him with a smile. I don't know how

their conversation began, but when I took Orlov his gloves, he was

standing before her with a capricious, beseeching face, saying:

"For God's sake, in the name of everything that's holy, don't talk of

things that everybody knows! What an unfortunate gift our intellectual

thoughtful ladies have for talking with enthusiasm and an air of

profundity of things that every schoolboy is sick to death of! Ah, if

only you would exclude from our conjugal programme all these serious

questions! How grateful I should be to you!"

"We women may not dare, it seems, to have views of our own."

"I give you full liberty to be as liberal as you like, and quote from

any authors you choose, but make me one concession: don't hold forth in

my presence on either of two subjects: the corruption of the upper

classes and the evils of the marriage system. Do understand me, at last.

The upper class is always abused in contrast with the world of

tradesmen, priests, workmen and peasants, Sidors and Nikitas of all

sorts. I detest both classes, but if I had honestly to choose between

the two, I should without hesitation, prefer the upper class, and there

would be no falsity or affectation about it, since all my tastes are in

that direction. Our world is trivial and empty, but at any rate we speak

French decently, read something, and don't punch each other in the ribs

even in our most violent quarrels, while the Sidors and the Nikitas and

their worships in trade talk about 'being quite agreeable,' 'in a

jiffy,' 'blast your eyes,' and display the utmost license of pothouse

manners and the most degrading superstition."

"The peasant and the tradesman feed you."

"Yes, but what of it? That's not only to my discredit, but to theirs

too. They feed me and take off their caps to me, so it seems they have

not the intelligence and honesty to do otherwise. I don't blame or

praise any one: I only mean that the upper class and the lower are as

bad as one another. My feelings and my intelligence are opposed to both,

but my tastes lie more in the direction of the former. Well, now for the

evils of marriage," Orlov went on, glancing at his watch. "It's high

time for you to understand that there are no evils in the system itself;

what is the matter is that you don't know yourselves what you want from

marriage. What is it you want? In legal and illegal cohabitation, in

every sort of union and cohabitation, good or bad, the underlying

reality is the same. You ladies live for that underlying reality alone:

for you it's everything; your existence would have no meaning for you

without it. You want nothing but that, and you get it; but since you've

taken to reading novels you are ashamed of it: you rush from pillar to

post, you recklessly change your men, and to justify this turmoil you

have begun talking of the evils of marriage. So long as you can't and

won't renounce what underlies it all, your chief foe, your devil--so

long as you serve that slavishly, what use is there in discussing the

matter seriously? Everything you may say to me will be falsity and

affectation. I shall not believe you."

I went to find out from the hall porter whether the sledge was at the

door, and when I came back I found it had become a quarrel. As sailors

say, a squall had blown up.

"I see you want to shock me by your cynicism today," said Zinaida

Fyodorovna, walking about the drawing-room in great emotion. "It revolts

me to listen to you. I am pure before God and man, and have nothing to

repent of. I left my husband and came to you, and am proud of it. I

swear, on my honour, I am proud of it!"

"Well, that's all right, then!"

"If you are a decent, honest man, you, too, ought to be proud of what I

did. It raises you and me above thousands of people who would like to do

as we have done, but do not venture through cowardice or petty prudence.

But you are not a decent man. You are afraid of freedom, and you mock

the promptings of genuine feeling, from fear that some ignoramus may

suspect you of being sincere. You are afraid to show me to your friends;

there's no greater infliction for you than to go about with me in the

street.... Isn't that true? Why haven't you introduced me to your father

or your cousin all this time? Why is it? No, I am sick of it at last,"

cried Zinaida Fyodorovna, stamping. "I demand what is mine by right. You

must present me to your father."

"If you want to know him, go and present yourself. He receives visitors

every morning from ten till half-past."

"How base you are!" said Zinaida Fyodorovna, wringing her hands in

despair. "Even if you are not sincere, and are not saying what you

think, I might hate you for your cruelty. Oh, how base you are!"

"We keep going round and round and never reach the real point. The real

point is that you made a mistake, and you won't acknowledge it aloud.

You imagined that I was a hero, and that I had some extraordinary ideas

and ideals, and it has turned out that I am a most ordinary official, a

cardplayer, and have no partiality for ideas of any sort. I am a worthy

representative of the rotten world from which you have run away because

you were revolted with its triviality and emptiness. Recognise it and be

just: don't be indignant with me, but with yourself, as it is your

mistake, and not mine."

"Yes, I admit I was mistaken."

"Well, that's all right, then. We've reached that point at last, thank

God. Now hear something more, if you please: I can't rise to your

level--I am too depraved; you can't descend to my level, either, for you

are too exalted. So there is only one thing left to do...."

"What?" Zinaida Fyodorovna asked quickly, holding her breath and turning

suddenly as white as a sheet of paper.

"To call logic to our aid...."

"Georgy, why are you torturing me?" Zinaida Fyodorovna said suddenly in

Russian in a breaking voice. "What is it for? Think of my misery...."

Orlov, afraid of tears, went quickly into his study, and I don't know

why--whether it was that he wished to cause her extra pain, or whether

he remembered it was usually done in such cases--he locked the door

after him. She cried out and ran after him with a rustle of her skirt.

"What does this mean?" she cried, knocking at his door. "What ... what

does this mean?" she repeated in a shrill voice breaking with

indignation. "Ah, so this is what you do! Then let me tell you I hate

you, I despise you! Everything is over between us now."

I heard hysterical weeping mingled with laughter. Something small in the

drawing-room fell off the table and was broken. Orlov went out into the

hall by another door, and, looking round him nervously, he hurriedly put

on his great-coat and went out.

Half an hour passed, an hour, and she was still weeping. I remembered

that she had no father or mother, no relations, and here she was living

between a man who hated her and Polya, who robbed her--and how desolate

her life seemed to me! I do not know why, but I went into the

drawing-room to her. Weak and helpless, looking with her lovely hair

like an embodiment of tenderness and grace, she was in anguish, as

though she were ill; she was lying on a couch, hiding her face, and

quivering all over.

"Madam, shouldn't I fetch a doctor?" I asked gently.

"No, there's no need ... it's nothing," she said, and she looked at me

with her tear-stained eyes. "I have a little headache.... Thank you."

I went out, and in the evening she was writing letter after letter, and

sent me out first to Pekarsky, then to Gruzin, then to Kukushkin, and

finally anywhere I chose, if only I could find Orlov and give him the

letter. Every time I came back with the letter she scolded me, entreated

me, thrust money into my hand--as though she were in a fever. And all

the night she did not sleep, but sat in the drawing-room, talking to

herself.

Orlov returned to dinner next day, and they were reconciled.

The first Thursday afterwards Orlov complained to his friends of the

intolerable life he led; he smoked a great deal, and said with

irritation:

"It is no life at all; it's the rack. Tears, wailing, intellectual

conversations, begging for forgiveness, again tears and wailing; and the

long and the short of it is that I have no flat of my own now. I am

wretched, and I make her wretched. Surely I haven't to live another

month or two like this? How can I? But yet I may have to."

"Why don't you speak, then?" said Pekarsky.

"I've tried, but I can't. One can boldly tell the truth, whatever it may

be, to an independent, rational man; but in this case one has to do with

a creature who has no will, no strength of character, and no logic. I

cannot endure tears; they disarm me. When she cries, I am ready to swear

eternal love and cry myself."

Pekarsky did not understand; he scratched his broad forehead in

perplexity and said:

"You really had better take another flat for her. It's so simple!"

"She wants me, not the flat. But what's the good of talking?" sighed

Orlov. "I only hear endless conversations, but no way out of my

position. It certainly is a case of 'being guilty without guilt.' I

don't claim to be a mushroom, but it seems I've got to go into the

basket. The last thing I've ever set out to be is a hero. I never could

endure Turgenev's novels; and now, all of a sudden, as though to spite

me, I've heroism forced upon me. I assure her on my honour that I'm not

a hero at all, I adduce irrefutable proofs of the same, but she doesn't

believe me. Why doesn't she believe me? I suppose I really must have

something of the appearance of a hero."

"You go off on a tour of inspection in the provinces," said Kukushkin,

laughing.

"Yes, that's the only thing left for me."

A week after this conversation Orlov announced that he was again ordered

to attend the senator, and the same evening he went off with his

portmanteaus to Pekarsky.