On parting with Tatyana, Litvinov had one thing in mind: to see Irina – and he set off for her hotel. But General Ratmirov was at home; that, at any rate was what the porter told him, and he had no wish to go in. Feeling himself in no state to dissemble, he made his way to the Konversationshaus. Litvinov’s inability to dissemble was experienced that day by both Voroshilov and Pishchalkin, whom he chanced to meet: to the one he blurted out that he was an empty vessel, to the other that he was catatonically boring. It was fortunate that Bindasov did not show up; there would probably have been a “grosser Scandal”.* Both young men were astounded; Voroshilov even wondered whether his honour as an officer demanded satisfaction, but, like Gogol’s Lieutenant Pirogov,* he calmed himself with sandwiches in a coffee house. Litvinov caught sight of Kapitolina Markovna in the distance as she ran busily from shop to shop in her multicoloured mantilla. Faced with this kind, comical, noble lady, he felt guilty. Then he remembered Potugin and the conversation of the previous day. But then he became aware of something intangible and unmistakable; if it had come from a falling shadow it would not have been more elusive, but he immediately sensed that it was Irina approaching. Indeed, she appeared a few yards away, arm in arm with another lady. Their eyes met at once. Irina probably noticed something unusual in Litvinov’s expression. She stopped in front of a shop which sold a wide variety of miniature wooden clocks from the Black Forest, called him to her with a movement of her head and, while showing him one of these clocks and inviting him to admire the pretty dial with a painted cuckoo at the top, said to him, not in a whisper, but in her normal voice, as though she were continuing a sentence she had already begun, in order to attract less attention from bystanders: “Come in an hour. I’ll be alone at home.”
At that point, however, the well-known ladies’ man Monsieur Verdier swooped on her and began to enthuse about the feuille morte* colour of her dress, her low-crowned Spanish hat, pulled down over her eyebrows… Litvinov disappeared in the crowd.
21
“Grigory,” Irina said to him two hours later, sitting beside him on a sofa with both hands on his shoulder. “What’s the matter with you? Tell me now, quickly, while we’re alone.”
“With me?” said Litvinov. “I’m happy – that’s what’s the matter with me.”
Irina looked down, smiled, and sighed.
“That’s not an answer to my question, my dear.”
Litvinov reflected on this.
“Well then, you should know, since you keep on demanding this.” (Irina opened her eyes wide and staggered back slightly.) “Today I told my fiancée everything.”
“What do you mean, everything? Did you name me?”
Litvinov wrung his hands.
“Irina, for Heaven’s sake, how could such a thought enter your head? To think that I…”
“All right. Forgive me, forgive me. What then did you say?”
“I told her I didn’t love her any more.”
“Did she ask why?”
“I did not hide from her the fact that I’d fallen in love with another woman and that we must part.”
“Well… and what of her? Did she agree?”
“Oh, Irina! What a girl she is! All self-sacrifice, all nobility!”
“I believe you, I believe you. But she had no other choice.”
“And she uttered not a single reproach, not a single bitter word to me, the man who had spoilt her whole life, who had deceived her, who had thrown her over mercilessly.”
Irina examined her nails.
“Tell me, Grigory, did she love you?”
“Yes, Irina, she loved me.”
Irina fell silent and smoothed down her dress.
“I confess,” she began, “I don’t altogether understand why you took it into your head to have things out with her.”
“What do you mean, ‘why’, Irina? Did you really want me to lie and dissemble to her, to that pure soul, or did you suppose—”
“I supposed nothing,” Irina interrupted. “I regret I have not given much thought to her. I can’t think about two people at once.”
“That is, you mean to say—”
“Well, and what next?” Irina interrupted a second time.
“I have no idea,” Litvinov replied. “I have to see her again. But she won’t stay.”
“Ah! Bon voyage.”
“No, she won’t stay. However, at the moment, I too am not thinking about her; I’m thinking about what you told me, about what you promised me.”
Irina gave him a quizzical look.
“You ungrateful man! Are you still not satisfied?”
“No, Irina, I’m not satisfied. You made me happy, but I’m not satisfied, and you understand me…”
“That is, I…”
“Yes, you understand me. Remember your words. Remember what you wrote to me. I cannot share you with another. No, I cannot agree to the pitiful role of secret lover. I’ve thrown not only my life, but the life of another, at your feet. I’ve renounced everything, I’ve reduced everything to dust, without regret and without any possibility of going back, and yet I believe, I am firmly convinced, that you will both keep your promise and link your fate with mine for ever…”
“Do you want me to elope with you? I’m ready.” (Litvinov pressed his lips to her hands in ecstasy.) “I’m ready. I am not going back on my word. But have you thought through all the difficulties? Have you prepared all the means?”
“Me? I haven’t had time yet to think through or prepare anything, but just say the word, allow me to act, and in less than a month—”
“A month! We’re leaving for Italy in two weeks.”
“Two weeks is sufficient for me. Oh, Irina! You seem to be receiving my proposal coldly. Perhaps it seems fanciful to you, but I’m not a child, I’m not accustomed to consoling myself with fancies. I know what a fearful step this is. I know what responsibility I am taking on. But I see no other way out. Finally, think how I must sever all links with the past in order not to be thought of as a despicable liar in the eyes of the girl whom I have sacrificed for you.”
Irina straightened and her eyes flashed.
“Forgive me, Grigory Mikhailovich. If I take the decision, if I run away, then I do so with a man who will do it for me, just for me, and not to avoid lowering himself in the eyes of a phlegmatic young woman with watered-down milk, du lait coupé, in her veins instead of blood. And I tell you I confess it’s the first time I’ve had occasion to hear that the man to whom my heart is inclined deserves sympathy, is playing a pitiful role: the role of a man who does not himself know what is going on in his soul.”
Litvinov, in his turn, straightened.
“Irina,” he began.
But she suddenly pressed both palms to her brow and, throwing herself on his bosom with a convulsive burst, embraced him with unfeminine force.
“Forgive me, forgive me,” she said in a trembling voice. “Forgive me, Grigory, you can see how depraved I am, how loathsome, jealous, vicious I am! You can see how I need your help, your indulgence! Yes, save me, tear me out of this abyss, while I am still not yet ruined. Yes, let us run away, run away from these people, from this world, into some beautiful, distant, free land! Perhaps your Irina will finally become more worthy of the sacrifices you make for her. Don’t be angry with me, my dear. Forgive me and know that I will do everything you command, will go everywhere you take me.”
Litvinov’s heart leapt. Irina pressed her young, supple body against him more strongly than before. He bent down to her dishevelled, fragrant hair and, drunk with gratitude and delight, scarcely dared to caress it, barely touching it with his lips.
“Irina, Irina,” he kept repeating, “my angel.”
Suddenly she raised her head and listened.
“Those are my husband’s footsteps… He’s gone into his room,” she whispered, moving away has
tily and sitting in an armchair. Litvinov made to leave. “Where are you going?” she went on in the same whisper. “Stay here. He suspects you as it is. Or are you afraid of him?” She did not take her eyes off the door. “Yes, it’s him. He’ll come in presently. Tell me something; talk to me.” Litvinov could not immediately compose himself and remained silent. “Are you not going to the theatre tomorrow?” she said loudly. “They’re doing Le Verre d’eau; it’s an old-fashioned play* and Plessy* hams it up horribly. We are in a kind of fever,” she added, lowering her voice. “We can’t go on like this. We must think this over carefully. I must warn you that he has all my money; mais j’ai mes bijoux.* Let’s go to Spain. Would you like that?” She again raised her voice. “Why is it that all actresses get fat? Even Madeleine Brohan.* Say something. Don’t sit there in silence like that. My head is spinning. But you mustn’t doubt me… I’ll let you know when to come tomorrow. Only you shouldn’t have told that young lady. Ah, mais c’est charmant,”* she exclaimed suddenly and, laughing nervously, shredded the frill on her handkerchief.
“May I come in?” asked Ratmirov from the next room.
“Yes, yes.”
The door opened and the General appeared on the threshold. He frowned at the sight of Litvinov, but bowed to him – that is, he inclined the upper half of his body.
“I didn’t know you had a guest,” he said. “Je vous demande pardon de mon indiscrétion.* Does Baden still amuse you, Monsieur… Litvinov?”
Ratmirov always hesitated over Litvinov’s name, as if he forgot it each time and did not immediately recall it. With this, together with his exaggeratedly high raising of his hat, he thought to wound Litvinov.
“I’m not bored here, Monsieur le Général.”
“Really? I’m really sick of Baden. We’re soon leaving here, aren’t we, Irina Pavlovna? Assez de Bade comme ça.* However, you’ll be pleased to know I won five hundred francs today.”
Irina extended her hand in coquettish fashion.
“Where are they? Please, it’s pin money.”
“I won them, I won them. But you’re already going, Monsieur… Litvinov.”
“Yes, sir, I’m going, as you are so good to observe.”
Ratmirov again inclined his body.
“Until our next pleasant meeting.”
“Goodbye, Grigory Mikhailovich,” said Irina. “But I will keep my promise.”
“What promise, may I enquire?” asked her husband.
Irina smiled.
“No, it was just something between ourselves. C’est à propos du voyage… où il vous plaira.* You know the work by Stahl?”*
“Ah, yes, I know. Very nice drawings.”
Ratmirov seemed to be on good terms with his wife: he was using the familiar form of address.
22
“It really is better not to think,” Litvinov kept repeating as he strode down the street, conscious that inner turmoil was again brewing within him. “The matter is settled. She will keep her promise and it remains for me to take all necessary measures… But she seems to be in doubt.” He shook his head. His own intentions were presented to him in a strange light: they had something artificial and improbable about them. It’s impossible to carry on with the same thoughts: they shift gradually, like the lenses of a kaleidoscope. You look, and already there are different images before your eyes. A feeling of profound lassitude took hold of Litvinov. If only he could rest for just an hour. But Tanya? He shuddered and, without reasoning further, wandered submissively home. His only thought was that today he was being thrown like a ball from one woman to another. All the same, he had to get this over with. He returned to his hotel and, equally submissively, almost insensibly, without delay or hesitation, set off to see Tatyana.
Kapitolina Markovna met him. From his first glance at her it was already clear that she knew everything; the eyes of the poor spinster were swollen with tears and her reddened face, fringed with tangled white locks, expressed the fear and anguish of disgust, grief and limitless astonishment. She was about to rush to Litvinov, but then stopped and, biting her trembling lips, looked at him as if she wanted to beseech him, to kill him and to persuade herself that this was a dream, madness, an impossibility.
“You’ve come, you’ve come,” she said.
The door to the next room instantly burst open, and Tatyana came in with light tread, pale to the point of transparency, but calm.
She quietly put one arm round her aunt and sat down beside her.
“You sit down too, Grigory Mikhailovich,” she said to Litvinov, who was standing by the door like a lost soul. “I’m very glad to see you once again. I’ve informed Auntie of your decision, of our joint decision, and she fully endorses and approves it. Without mutual love there can be no happiness; mutual respect is not sufficient.” (At the word “respect” Litvinov involuntarily lowered his eyes.) “It’s better to part sooner than repent later. Is that not so, Auntie?”
“Yes, of course,” Kapitolina Markovna began. “Of course, Tanya. The man who is unable to appreciate you, who has decided—”
“Auntie, Auntie,” Tatyana interrupted, “remember what you promised me. You yourself always said: ‘The truth, Tanya, the truth before everything, and freedom.’ Well, the truth isn’t always pleasant, nor is freedom. If they were, what would be the merit in choosing them?”
She kissed Kapitolina Markovna’s white hair tenderly and, turning to Litvinov, went on: “Auntie and I have decided to leave Baden. I think that will be better for all of us.”
“When are you thinking of leaving?” said Litvinov dully. He remembered that Irina had recently said the same to him.
Kapitolina Markovna made to come forward, but Tatyana restrained her, laying her head affectionately on her shoulder.
“Soon. Probably very soon.”
“Allow me to ask where you intend to go,” said Litvinov in the same voice.
“First to Dresden, then to Russia probably.”
“Why do you want to know that now, Grigory Mikhailovich?” exclaimed Kapitolina Markovna.
“Auntie, Auntie,” Tatyana again interposed.
A short silence ensued.
“Tatyana Petrovna,” Litvinov began, “you realize what an agonizingly heavy and sorrowful feeling I must be experiencing at this moment.”
Tatyana stood up.
“Grigory Mikhailovich,” she said, “let us not speak of that. Please, I ask you, if not for your sake, then for mine. It wasn’t yesterday we met, and I can well imagine what you must be feeling now. But why talk, why pour salt…” (She halted; it was clear she wanted to wait for her agitation to pass, to choke back the tears which were already welling up; in this she succeeded.) “Why pour salt in a wound we cannot heal? Let us leave it to time. But now I have a request, Grigory Mikhailovich. I’m going to give you a letter – would you be so kind as to take it to the post office yourself? It’s rather important, and Auntie and I haven’t got the time now. I would be very grateful. Wait a second; I won’t be long.”
On the threshold Tatyana looked round anxiously at Kapitolina Markovna, but she was sitting very solemnly and primly, her furrowed brow and tightly compressed lips forming such a stern expression that Tatyana merely nodded to her and went out.
But scarcely had the door closed behind her than all expression of solemnity and sternness instantly vanished from her face. She stood up, ran up to Litvinov on tiptoes and, all hunched up and trying to look him in the eye, began to speak in a tremulous whisper.
“Dear Lord above,” she said in a tremulous whisper. “Grigory Mikhailovich, what’s going on? Is it a dream, or what? You are renouncing Tatyana. You have fallen out of love with her. You are going back on your word. You are doing this, Grigory Mikhailovich, you in whom our trust was rock-solid! You? You? You? You, my dear Grigory…” Kapitolina Markovna stopped. “You will kill her, you know, Grigory Mikhailovic
h,” she went on, without waiting for an answer, and the tears rolled down her cheeks in little droplets. “Pay no heed to the brave face she’s putting on now. You know what she’s like. She never complains, never pities herself, so others should take pity on her! She tells me now: ‘Auntie, we must preserve our dignity.’ What’s the use of dignity when I foresee death, nothing but death?” Tatyana clattered a chair in the adjoining room. “Yes, I foresee death,” the old lady resumed, even more quietly. “What could have happened? Was it long ago that you were writing her the most tender letters? Have you been bewitched or something? And finally, can an honourable man behave like this? As you know, I’m a woman without prejudices, esprit fort,* and I brought up Tatyana in the same way. She too has a free spirit.”
“Auntie,” came Tatyana’s voice from the adjoining room.
“But a word of honour is a duty, Grigory Mikhailovich, especially for people with your, with our standards! If we do not acknowledge our duty, what else remains for us? It cannot be broken like this, on a personal whim, with no consideration for its effect on others. It’s shameless. Yes, it’s a crime. What sort of freedom is that?”
“Auntie, come here please” was again heard.
“In a moment, my dear, in a moment.” Kapitolina Markovna seized Litvinov by the hand. “I see that you are angry, Grigory Mikhailovich.” (“Me? Angry?” he wanted to say, but remained tongue-tied.) “Goodness knows, I don’t want to anger you. On the contrary, I want to beseech you: think again, while there’s time. Don’t destroy her. Don’t destroy your own happiness. She will still believe you, Grigory, she will believe you. Nothing is lost yet. She loves you as no one else will ever love you! Get out of this hateful Baden-Baden. Let’s leave together. Come out from under this spell, but above all, spare her, spare her.”
Smoke (Alma Classics) Page 17