CHAPTER XX
Vera came that night to supper with a gloomy face. She eagerly drank aglass of milk, but offered no remark to anyone.
"Why are you so unhappy, Veroshka?" asked her aunt. "Don't you feelwell."
"I was afraid to ask," interposed Tiet Nikonich politely. "I could nothelp noticing, Vera Vassilievna, that you have been altered for sometime; you seem to have grown thinner and paler. The change becomes yourlooks, but the symptoms ought not to be overlooked, as they mightindicate the approach of illness."
"I have a little tooth-ache, but it will soon pass," answered Veraunwillingly.
Tatiana Markovna looked away sadly enough, but said nothing, whileRaisky tapped his plate absently with a fork, but ate nothing, andmaintained a gloomy silence. Only Marfinka and Vikentev took every dishthat was offered them, and chattered without intermission.
Vera soon took her leave, followed by Raisky. She went into the park,and stood at the top of the cliff looking down into the dark wood belowher; then she wrapped herself in her mantilla, and sat down on the bench.Silently she acceded to Raisky's request to be allowed to sit downbeside her.
"You are in trouble, and are suffering, Vera."
"I have tooth-ache."
"It is your heart that aches, Vera. Share your trouble with me."
"I make no complaint."
"You have an unhappy love affair, with whom?"
She did not answer. She knew that her hopes were still not dead, madthough they might be. What if she went away for a week or two to breathe,to conjure up her strength.
"Cousin," she said at last, "to-morrow at daybreak I am going across theVolga, and may stay away longer than usual. I have not said good-bye toGrandmother. Please say it for me."
"I will go away too."
"Wait, Cousin, until I am a little calmer. Perhaps then I can confide inyou, and we can part like brother and sister, but now it is impossible.Still, in case you do go away, let us say good-bye now. Forgive me mystrange ways, and let me give you a sister's kiss."
She kissed him on the forehead and walked quickly away, but she had onlytaken a few steps before she paused to say: "Thank you for all you havedone for me. I have not the strength to tell you how grateful I am foryour friendship, and above all for this place. Farewell, and forgiveme."
"Vera," he cried in painful haste. "Let me stay as long as you are hereor are in the neighbourhood. Even if we don't see one another, I yetknow where you are. I will wait till you are calmer, till you fulfilyour promise, and confide in me, as you have said you would. You won'tbe far away, and we can at least write to one another. Give me at leastthis consolation, for God's sake," he murmured passionately. "Leave meat least that Paradise which is next door to Hell."
She looked at him with a distraught air, and bent her head in assent.But she saw the glow of delight which swept over his agitated face, andwondered sorrowfully why _he_ did not speak like that.
"I will put off my journey till the day after tomorrow. Good-night!" shesaid, and gave him her hand to kiss before they separated.
Early next day Vera gave Marina a note with instructions to deliver itand to wait for the answer. After the receipt of the answer she grewmore cheerful and went out for a walk along the riverside. That eveningshe told her aunt that she was going on a visit to Natalie Ivanovna, andtook leave of them all, promising Raisky not to forget him.
The next day a fisherman from the Volga brought him a letter from Vera,in which she called him "dear cousin," and seemed to look forward to ahappier future. Into the friendly tone of the letter he contrived toread tender feeling, and he forgot, in his delight, his doubts, hisanxiety, the blue letters, and the precipice. He wrote and dispatchedimmediately a brief, affectionate reply.
Vera's letter aroused in him the artist sense, and drove him to set outhis chaotic emotions in defined form. He sought to crystallise histhoughts and affections; his very passion took artistic shape, andassumed in the clear light Vera's charming features.
"What are you scribbling day and night?" inquired Tatiana Markovna. "Isit a play or another novel?"
"I write and write, Granny, and don't know myself how it will end."
"It doesn't matter what the child does so long as he is amused," sheremarked, not altogether missing the character of Raisky's occupation."But why do you write at night, when I am so afraid of fire, and youmight fall asleep over your drama. You will make yourself ill, and youoften look as yellow as an over-ripe gherkin as it is."
He looked in the glass, and was struck with his own appearance. Yellowpatches were visible on the nose and temples, and there were greythreads in his thick, black hair.
"If I were fair," he grumbled, "I should not age so quickly. Don'tbother about me, Granny, but leave me my freedom. I can't sleep."
"You too ask me for freedom, like Vera. It is as if I held you both inchains," she added with an anxious sigh. "Go on writing, Borushka, butnot at night. I cannot sleep in peace, for when I look at your windowthe light is always burning."
"I will answer for it, Grandmother, that there shall be no fire, and ifI myself were to be burnt...."
"Touch wood! Do not tempt fate. Remember the saying that 'my tongue ismy enemy.'"
Suddenly Raisky sprang from the divan and ran to the window.
"There is a peasant bringing a letter from Vera," he cried, as hehurried out of the room.
"One might think it was his father in person," said Tatiana Markovna toherself. "How many candles he burns with his novels and plays, as manyas four in a night!"
Again Raisky received a few lines from Vera. She wrote that she waslonging to see him again, and that she wanted to ask for his services.She added the following postscript:--
"Dear Friend and Cousin, you taught me to love and to suffer, and pouredthe strength of your love into my soul. This it is that gives me courageto ask you to do a good deed. There is here an unhappy man who has beendriven from his home and lies under the suspicion of the Government. Hehas no place to lay his head, and everyone, either from indifference orfear, avoids him. But you are kind and generous, and cannot beindifferent; still less will you hesitate to do a deed of pure charity.The wretched man has not a kopek, has no clothes, and autumn is comingon.
"If your heart tells you, as I don't doubt it will, what to do, addressthe wife of the acolyte, Sekleteia Burdalakov, but arrange it so thatneither Grandmother, nor anyone at home, knows anything of it. A sum ofthree hundred roubles will be sufficient, I think, to provide for himfor a whole year, perhaps two hundred and fifty would suffice. Will youput in a cloak and a warm vest (in my firm belief in your kind heart andyour love to me, I enclose the measures taken by the village tailor) toprotect him from the cold.
"I don't like to ask you for a rug for him; that would be to make anunfair use of kindness. In the winter the poor exile will probably leavethe place, and will bless you, and to some degree me as well. I wouldnot have troubled you, but you know that my Grandmother has all my money,which is therefore inaccessible."
"What on earth is the meaning of this postscript?" cried Raisky. "Thewhole note is certainly not from her hand; she could not have writtenlike this."
He threw himself on the divan in a fit of nervous laughter. He was inTatiana Markovna's sitting-room, with Vikentev and Marfinka. At firstthe lovers laughed, but stopped when they saw the violent character ofhis mirth. Tatiana Markovna, who came in at this moment, offered himsome drops of cordial in a teaspoon.
"No, Grandmother," he cried, still laughing violently. "Don't give medrops, but three hundred roubles."
"What do you want the money for?" said Tatiana Markovna hesitating. "Isit for Markushka again. You had much better ask him to return the eightyroubles he has had."
He entered into the spirit of the bargain, and eventually had to contenthimself with two hundred and fifty roubles, which he dispatched next dayto the address given. He also ordered the cloak and vest, and bought awarm rug, to be sent in a few days.
"I thank you heartily, a
nd with tears, dear Cousin," ran the letter hereceived in return for his gifts. "I cannot express in writing thegratitude I feel. Heaven, not I, will reward you. How delighted the poorexile was with your gift. He laughed for joy, and is wearing the newthings. He immediately paid his landlord his three months' arrears ofrent, and a month in advance. He only allowed himself to spend threeroubles in cigars, which he has not smoked for a long time, and smokingis his only passion."
Although the apocryphal nature of this remarkable missive was quiteclear to Raisky, he did not hesitate to add a box of cigars to his giftfor the "poor exile." It was enough for him that Vera's name wasattached to this pressing request. He observed the course of his ownpassion as a physician does disease. As he watched the clouds drivenbefore the wind, or looked at the green carpet of the earth, now takingon sad autumnal hues, he realised that Nature was marching on her waythrough never ending change, with not a moment's stagnation. He alonebrooded idly with no prize in view. He asked himself anxiously what hisduty was, and begged that Reason would shed some light on his way, givehim boldness to leap over the funeral pyre of his hopes. Reason told himto seek safety in flight.
He drove into the town to buy some necessities for the journey, andthere met the Governor who reproached him with having hidden himself forso long. Raisky excused himself on the ground of ill-health, and spokeof his approaching departure.
"Where are you going?"
"It is all one to me," returned Raisky gloomily. "Here I am so boredthat I must seek some distraction. I intend going to St. Petersburg,then to my estate in the government of R---- and then perhaps abroad."
"I don't wonder that you are bored with staying in the same spot, sinceyou avoid society, and must need distraction. Will you make anexpedition with me? I am starting on a tour of the district to-morrow,why not come with me? You will see much that is beautiful, and, being apoet, you will collect new impressions. We will travel for a hundredversts by river. Don't forget your sketch-book."
Raisky shook the Governor's proffered hand, and accepted. The Governorshowed him his well-equipped travelling carriage, declared that hiskitchen would travel with him, and cards should not be forgotten, andpromised himself a gayer journey than would have been possible in thesole society of a busy secretary.
Raisky felt a relief in the firm determination he now made to conquerhis passion, and decided not to return from this journey, but to havehis effects sent after him. While he was away he wrote in this sense toVera, telling her that his life in Malinovka had been like an evil dreamfull of suffering, and that if he ever saw the place again it would beat some distant date.
A day or two later he received a short answer from Vera dated fromMalinovka. Marfinka's birthday fell during the next week, and when thefestival was over she was to go on a long visit to her futuremother-in-law. If Raisky did not make some sacrifice and return,a sacrifice to her grandmother and herself, Tatiana Markovna wouldbe terribly lonely.
Next evening he had a letter from Vera acquiescing in his intention ofleaving Malinovka without seeing her again, and saying that immediatelyafter the dispatch of this letter she would go over to her friend on theother side of the Volga, but she hoped that he would go to say good-byeto Tatiana Markovna and the rest of the household, as his departurewithout any farewell must necessarily cause surprise in the town, andwould hurt Tatiana Markovna's feelings.
This answer relieved him enormously. On the afternoon of the next day,when he alighted from the carriage in the outskirts of the town and badehis travelling host good-bye, he was in good enough spirits as he pickedup his bag and made his way to the house.
Marfinka and Vikentev were the first to meet him, the dogs leaped towelcome him, the servants hurried up, and the whole household showedsuch genuine pleasure at his return that he was moved almost to tears.He looked anxiously round to see if Vera was there, but one and anotherhastened to tell him that Vera had gone away. He ought to have been gladto hear this news, but he heard it with a spasm of pain. When he enteredhis aunt's room she sent Pashutka out and locked the door.
"How anxiously I have been expecting you!" she said. "I wanted to send amessenger for you."
"What is the matter?" he exclaimed, pale with terror in fear of bad newsof Vera.
"Your friend Leonti Ivanovich is ill."
"Poor fellow! What is wrong? Is it dangerous? I will go to him at once."
"I will have the horses put in. In the meantime I may as well tell youwhat is known all over the town. I have kept it secret from Marfinkaonly, and Vera already knows it. His wife has left him, and he hasfallen ill. Yesterday and the day before the Koslovs' cook came to fetchyou."
"Where has she gone?"
"Away with the Frenchman, Charles, who was suddenly called to St.Petersburg. She pretended she was going to stay with her relations inMoscow and said that Monsieur Charles would accompany her so far. Sheextracted from Koslov a pass giving her permission to live alone, and isnow with Charles in St. Petersburg."
"Her relations with Charles," replied Raisky, "were no secret to anybodyexcept her husband. Everyone will laugh at him, but he will understandnothing, and his wife will return."
"You have not heard the end. On her way she wrote to her husband tellinghim to forget her, not to expect her return, because she could no longerendure living with him."
"The fool! Just as if she had not made scandal enough. Poor Leonti! Iwill go to him, how sorry I am for him."
"Yes, Borushka, I am sorry for him too, and should like to have gone tosee him. He has the simple honesty of a child. God has given himlearning, but no common sense, and he is buried in his books. I wonderwho is looking after him now. If you find he is not being properly caredfor, bring him here. The old house is empty, and we can establish himthere for the time being. I will have two rooms got ready for him."
"What a woman you are, Grandmother. While I am thinking, you haveacted."
When he reached Koslov's house he found the shutters of the grey housewere closed, and he had to knock repeatedly before he was admitted. Hepassed through the ante-room into the dining-room and stood uncertainbefore the study door, hesitating whether he should knock or go straightin. Suddenly the door opened, and there stood before him, dressed in awoman's dressing-gown and slippers, Mark Volokov, unbrushed, sleepy,pale, thin and sinister.
"The evil one has brought you at last," he grumbled half in surprise andhalf in vexation. "Where have you been all this time? I have hardlyslept for two nights. His pupils are about in the day time, but at nighthe is alone."
"What is the matter with him?"
"Has no one told you. That she-goat has gone. I was pleased to hear it,and came at once to congratulate him, but I found him with not a drop ofblood in his face, with dazed eyes, and unable to recognise anyone. Hejust escaped brain fever. Instead of weeping for joy, the man has nearlydied of sorrow. I fetched the doctor, but Koslov sent him away, andwalked up and down the room like one demented. Now he is sleeping, so wewill not disturb him. I will go, and you must stay, and see that he doesnot do himself some injury in a fit of melancholy. He listens to no one,and I have been tempted to smack him." Mark spit with vexation. "Youcan't depend on his idiot of a cook. Yesterday the woman gave him sometooth powder instead of his proper powder. I am going to dismiss herto-morrow."
Raisky watched him in amazement, and offered his hand.
"What favour is this?" said Mark bitterly, and without taking theproffered hand.
"I thank you for having stood by my old friend."
Mark seized Raisky's hand and shook it.
"I have been looking for some means of serving you for a long time."
"Why, Volokov, are you for ever executing quick changes like a clown ina circus?"
"What the devil have I to do with your gratitude? I am not here for that,but on Koslov's account."
"God be with you and your manners, Mark Ivanovich!" replied Raisky. "Inany case, you have done a good deed."
"More praise. You can be as sentimental as you
like for all I care...."
"I will take Leonti home with me," resumed Raisky. "He will beabsolutely at home there, and if his troubles do not blow over he willhave his own quiet corner all his life."
"Bravo! that is deeds, not words. Koslov would wither without a home andwithout care. It is an excellent idea you have taken into your head."
"It comes not from me, but from a woman, and not from her head, but fromher heart. My Aunt...."
"The old lady has a sound heart. I must go and breakfast with her oneday. It is a pity she has amassed so many foolish ideas. Now I am going.Look after Koslov, if not personally, through some one else. The daybefore yesterday his head had to be cooled all day, and at night cabbageleaves should be laid on it. I was a little disturbed, because in hisdazed state he got the cabbage and began to eat it. Good-bye! I haveneither slept nor eaten, though Avdotya has treated me to a horriblebrew of coffee...."
"Allow me to send the coachman home to fetch some supper," said Raisky.
"I would rather eat at home."
"Perhaps you have no money," said Raisky nervously drawing out hispocket book.
"I have money," said Mark enigmatically, hardly able to restrain acallous laugh, "I am going to the bath-house before I have my supper, asI haven't been able to undress here. I have changed my quarters, and nowlive with a clerical personage."
"You look ill, thin, and your eyes...."
Mark's face grew more evil and sinister than before.
"You too look worse," he said. "If you look in the glass you will seeyellow patches and hollow eyes."
"I have many causes of anxiety."
"So have I. Good-bye," said Mark, and was gone.
Raisky went into the study and walked up to the bed on tiptoe.
"Who is there?" asked Leonti feebly.
When Leonti recognised Raisky he pushed his feet out of bed, and sat up.
"Is he gone?" he asked weakly. "I pretended to be asleep. You have notbeen for so long, and I have been expecting you all the time. The faceof an old comrade is the only one that I can bear to see."
"I have been away, and heard when I returned of your illness."
"It is gossip. There is a conspiracy to say I am ill, which is allfoolish talk. Mark, who even fetched a doctor, has been hanging abouthere as if he were afraid I should do myself an injury," said Leonti andpaced up and down the room.
"You are weak, and walk with difficulty," said Raisky. "It would bebetter for you to lie down."
"I am weak, that is true," admitted Leonti.
He bent over the chair-back to Raisky, embraced him, and laid his faceagainst his hair. Raisky felt hot tears on his forehead and cheeks.
"It is weakness," sobbed Leonti. "But I am not ill, and have not brainfever. They talk, but don't understand. And I understood nothing either,but now that I see you, I cannot keep back my tears. Don't abuse me likeMark, or laugh at me, as they all do, my colleagues and my sympatheticvisitors. I can discern malicious laughter on all their faces."
"I respect and understand your tears and your sorrow," said Raisky,stifling his own tears.
"You are my kind old comrade. Even at school you never laughed at me,and do you know why I weep?"
Leonti took a letter from his desk and handed it to Raisky. It was theletter from Juliana Andreevna of which Tatiana Markovna had spoken.Raisky glanced through it.
"Destroy it," he said. "You will have no peace while it is in yourpossession."
"Destroy it!" said Leonti, seizing the letter, and replacing it in thedesk. "How is it possible to think of such a thing, when these are theonly lines she has written me, and these are all that I have as asouvenir?"
"Leonti! Think of all this as a malady, a terrible misfortune, and don'tsuccumb to it. You are not an old man, and have a long life before you."
"My life is over, unless she returns to me," he whispered.
"What! You could, you would take her back!"
"You, too, Boris, fail to understand me!" cried Leonti in despair, as hethrust his hands into his hair and strode up and down. "People keep onsaying I am ill, they offer sympathy, bring a doctor, sit all night bymy bedside, and yet don't guess why I suffer so wildly, don't even guessat the only remedy there is for me. She is not here," he whisperedwildly, seizing Raisky by the shoulders and shaking him violently. "Sheis not here, and that is what constitutes my illness. Besides, I am notill, I am dead. Take me to her, and I shall rise again. And you askwhether I will take her back again! You, a novelist, don't understandsimple things like that!"
"I did not know that you loved her like that," said Raisky tenderly."You used to laugh and say that you had got so used to her that you werebecoming faithless to your Greeks and Romans."
"I chattered, I boasted," laughed Leonti bitterly, "and was withoutunderstanding. But for this I never should have understood. I thought Iloved the ancients, while my whole love was given to the living woman.Yes, Boris, I loved books and my gymnasium, the ancients and the moderns,my scholars, and you, Boris; I loved the street, this hedge, the servicetree there, only through my love for her. Now, nothing of all thismatters. I knew that as I lay on the floor reading her letter. And youask whether I would receive her. God in Heaven! If she came, how sheshould be cherished!" he concluded, his tears flowing once more.
"Leonti, I come to you with a request from Tatiana Markovna, who asksyou," he went on, though Leonti walked ceaselessly up and down, dragginghis slippers and appeared not to listen, "to come over to us. Here youwill die of misery."
"Thank you," said Leonti, shaking his head. "She is a saint. But how cana desolate man carry his sorrow into a strange house?"
"Not a strange house, Leonti, we are brothers, and our relation iscloser than the ties of blood."
Leonti lay down on the bed, and took Raisky's hand.
"Pardon my egoism," he said. "Later, later, I will come of my own accord,will ask permission to look after your library, if no hope is left me."
"Have you any hope?"
"What! Do you think there is no hope?"
Raisky, who did not wish to deprive his friend of the last straw, nor tostir useless hope in him, hesitated, before he answered after a pause:"I don't know what to say to you exactly, Leonti. I know so little ofyour wife that I cannot judge her character."
"You know her," said Leonti in a dull voice. "It was you who directed myattention to the Frenchman, but then I did not understand you, becausenothing of the kind had entered my head. But if he leaves her," he said,with a gleam of hope in his eyes, "she will perhaps remember me."
"Perhaps," said Raisky. "To-morrow I will come to fetch you. Good-byefor the present. To-night I will either come myself or send someone whowill stay with you."
Leonti did not hear, and did not even see Raisky go.
When he reached home, Raisky gave his aunt an account of Leonti'scondition, telling her that there was no danger, but that no sympathywould help matters. Yakob was sent to look after the sick man andTatiana Markovna did not forget to send an abundant supper, with tea,rum, wine and all sorts of other things.
"What are these things for, Grandmother?" asked Raisky. "He doesn't eatanything."
"But the other one, if he returns?"
"What other one?"
"Who but Markushka? He will want something to eat. You found him withour invalid."
"I will go to Mark, Granny, and tell him what you say."
"For goodness' sake don't do that, Borushka. Mark will laugh at me."
"No, he will be grateful and respectful, for he understands you. He isnot like Niel Andreevich."
"I don't want his gratitude and respect. Let him eat, and be satisfied,and God be with him. He is a ruined man. Has he remembered the eightyroubles?"