He rose to his feet, quickly locked the door, went back to her and took her hands in his. He was suffocating with joy and unable to speak. She smiled and looked him in the eyes. There was so much happiness in them… She felt embarrassed.
“Wait,” she said, disengaging her hands from his, “let me take my hat off.”
She untied the ribbons of her hat, threw it aside, slipped the mantilla from her shoulders, tidied her hair and sat down on the old sofa. Insarov did not stir, watching her as if entranced.
“Do sit down,” she said without looking up at him and pointing him to a place beside her.
Insarov sat down, not on the sofa but on the floor at her feet.
“Here, take my gloves off for me,” she said in an unsteady voice. She was beginning to feel afraid.
He began first to unbutton, then to take off one glove; he pulled it half off and avidly pressed his lips to the soft, slender white wrist beneath it.
Yelena shuddered and tried to fend him off with her other hand; he began to kiss her other hand. She drew it back; he threw back his head; she looked him in the face, bent forward – and their lips met…
A moment passed… She broke away, stood up, whispered: “No, no” and went quickly up to the writing table.
“I’m the landlady here, am I not? You mustn’t have any secrets from me,” she said, trying to appear nonchalant and standing with her back to him. “What a lot of papers! What are these letters?”
Insarov knitted his brow.
“These letters?” he said, getting up from the floor. “You can read them.”
Yelena turned them over in her hand.
“There’s so many of them, the writing’s so small and I’ve got to go soon… What do I care! They’re not from a rival of mine, are they?… And they’re not even in Russian,” she added, riffling through the thin sheets.
Insarov went up to her and put his hand on her waist. She turned to him suddenly, gave him a radiant smile and leant on his shoulder.
“These letters are from Bulgaria, Yelena. Friends writing to me and asking me to go there.”
“To go there? Now?”
“Yes… now. While there’s still time, while it’s possible to get through.”
Suddenly she threw both her arms round his neck.
“You’ll take me with you, won’t you?”
He clasped her to him.
“Oh, my darling girl, my heroine, well spoken! But would it not be a sin, would it not be sheer madness for me, alone and homeless as I am, to take you with me… And to where!”
She stopped his mouth.
“Shush, or I’ll get angry and never come and see you again. Isn’t everything decided, isn’t everything settled between us? Am I not your wife? Does a wife part from her husband?”
“Wives don’t go to war,” he said with a half-sorrowful smile.
“No, not when they can stay behind. But can I stay here?”
“Yelena, you’re an angel!… But just think: I may have to leave Moscow… in two weeks’ time. Already I can’t even think about university lectures or about finishing my work here.”
“What is this?” Yelena interrupted. “You must go so soon? Would you like me to stay with you now, this very minute, stay with you for ever and not go home. Would you like that? Would you like to set off at once?”
Insarov took her in his arms with redoubled fervour.
“Then let God punish me,” he cried, “if I’m doing a bad thing! From now on we are united for ever!”
“Shall I stay?” Yelena asked.
“No, my pure treasure. You will go home today, but be ready. The deed cannot be done at one go; we must think everything through carefully. We’ll need money, a passport…”
“I have money,” Yelena interrupted. “Eighty roubles.”
“Well, it’s not a lot,” said Insarov, “but all the same it will help.”
“And I can get a loan. I’ll ask Mama… No, I won’t ask her… But I can sell my watch… I’ve got earrings, a couple of bracelets… some lace.”
“It’s not a matter of money, Yelena. Your passport, what shall we do about that?”
“Yes, what shall we do? But do I definitely need a passport?”
“Definitely.”
Yelena gave a wry smile.
“I’ve got an idea! I’ve just remembered: when I was little, a maid ran away from us. She was caught and forgiven, and she lived with us for a long time… but all the same they dubbed her ‘Runaway Tanya’. I didn’t think then that I’d be like her, a runaway.”
“Yelena, the very idea!”
“What’s wrong with it? Of course it’s better to travel with a passport, but if you can’t…”
“We’ll sort all this out later, later. Just wait,” said Insarov. “Just let me look round and have a think. We’ll talk things through properly together. I have money too.”
Yelena pushed back the hair which was falling onto his forehead.
“Oh, Dmitry! How happy we’ll be travelling together!”
“Yes,” said Insarov, “but when we get there—”
“What of that? Yelena interposed. “Won’t we also be happy to die together? But no, why die? We will live. We’re young. How old are you? Twenty-six?”
“Yes.”
“And I’m twenty. We’ve still got lots of time ahead of us. Oh, just think! You wanted to run away from me, didn’t you? Bulgarian that you are, you didn’t need Russian love! Let’s see you get rid of me now! But what would have happened to us if I’d not come to you that time!”
“Yelena, you know what compelled me to go away.”
“I do know: you’d fallen in love and were afraid. But did you really not suspect that you were loved too?”
“On my honour, Yelena, I swear I didn’t.”
Quickly, and unexpectedly, she kissed him.
“That’s why I love you. And now, goodbye.”
“You can’t stay longer?” asked Insarov.
“No, darling. Do you think it was easy to go out alone? The quarter of an hour was up a long time ago.” She put on her mantilla and hat. “Come to us tomorrow evening. No, the day after tomorrow. Things will be strained and tedious, but there’s nothing for it. At least we’ll see each other. Goodbye. Let me out.” He embraced her a final time. “Oh look out! You’ve broken my watch chain. Clumsy you! Well, never mind. So much the better. I’ll go to Kuznetsky Bridge* and hand it in for repair. If I’m asked, I’ll say I’ve been to Kuznetsky Bridge.” She took hold of the door handle. “By the way, I forgot to tell you: Monsieur Kurnatovsky will probably propose to me in the coming days. But this is what I’ll do to him.” She put her left thumb to the end of her nose and waggled her other fingers. “Goodbye. Till we meet again. I know the way now… And don’t you waste time.”
Yelena opened the door slightly, listened, turned to Insarov, nodded and slipped out of the room.
For a moment Insarov stood in front of the closed door and also listened. The door downstairs into the courtyard slammed shut. He went up to the sofa, sat down and put his hand over his eyes. Nothing like this had ever happened to him before. “How have I deserved love like this?” he thought. “Is it a dream?”
But the delicate scent of mignonette which Yelena had left in his dark, mean little room kept the memory of her visit alive. In addition to that, it seemed there lingered in the air the tones of her young voice, the sound of her light, youthful tread and the warmth and freshness of her virginal young body.
24
Insarov decided to wait for more positive news, but began to prepare to leave. The situation was very difficult. For himself no real obstacles lay ahead; all he had to do was to exercise his right to a passport – but what about Yelena? It was not possible for her to get a passport by lawful means. Marry her in secret and then approach h
er parents… “They will then let us go,” he thought. “But if not? We’ll leave anyway… But if they complain… if… no, it’s better to try to get a passport somehow.”
He decided to take advice (naturally, without naming anyone) from one of his friends, a voluntarily, or rather, forcibly retired public prosecutor, an old and experienced hand where clandestine matters were concerned. This esteemed gentleman lived some way away. It took a full hour for Insarov to get there in a decrepit cab and, to make matters worse, he did not find him at his house; on the way home he got soaked to the skin owing to a sudden downpour. The following morning, Insarov, despite a rather bad headache, again made his way to the house of the retired public prosecutor. The prosecutor heard him out attentively, all the while taking snuff from a snuffbox embellished with a picture of a big-breasted nymph and looking sideways at his guest with his cunning little eyes, which were also the colour of snuff. He heard him out and demanded “greater precision in the exposition of factual data”; however, noticing that Insarov was reluctant to go into detail (he had been very uneasy about coming to see him at all), he confined himself to advising him to furnish himself with pieniądze.* He then asked him to call again, adding in a Polish accent, as he took snuff over his open snuffbox: “When you have gained trust and lost mistrust.” “But a passport,” he went on, as if talking to himself, “is the work of human hands; for example, you are travelling: who knows you? Are you Marya Bredikhina or Karolina Fogelmeyer?” A sense of disgust stirred in Insarov, but he thanked the prosecutor and promised to drop in again in a few days.
That evening he went to the Stakhovs’ house. Anna Vasilyevna greeted him cordially, reproached him for having forgotten them completely and, thinking he looked pale, asked after his health. Nikolai Artemyevich did not say a word to him, merely looking at him with contemplative curiosity and nonchalance; Shubin behaved coldly towards him, but Yelena amazed him. She was waiting for him; she had put on the same dress which she had worn on the day of that first meeting in the shrine, but greeted him so calmly and was so affectionate and carefree that, to look at her, no one would have thought that the fate of this girl was already decided and that it was only the secret awareness of requited love which lent animation to her features and lightness and charm to all her movements. She poured out tea in place of Zoya, joked and chattered; she knew that Shubin would be watching her, that Insarov was incapable of masking his feelings and feigning indifference, and so was forearmed. She was not mistaken: Shubin did not take his eyes off her and Insarov was very silent and sullen throughout the whole evening. Yelena felt so happy that she wanted to tease him.
“Well then,” she said suddenly, “how’s your plan going?”
Insarov became flustered.
“What plan?” he said.
“Have you forgotten?” she replied, laughing in his face: only he could understand the significance of this merry laughter. “Your Bulgarian anthology for Russians.”
“Quelle bourde!” muttered Nikolai Artemyevich through his teeth.
Zoya sat down at the piano. Almost imperceptibly, Yelena shrugged her shoulders and indicated the door to Insarov, as if urging him to go home. Then she touched the table with her finger twice, with an interval. He understood from this that she was fixing a meeting with him in two days’ time; she gave a quick smile when she saw that he understood. Insarov stood up and began to take his leave; he felt unwell. Kurnatovsky appeared. Nikolai Artemyevich leapt to his feet, raised his right hand above his head and lowered it gently onto the palm of the chief secretary. Insarov stayed a few minutes longer, so as to have a look at his rival. Yelena gave him a sly and stealthy nod of the head and, her father not considering it necessary to introduce him to the newcomer, Insarov left, exchanging glances with Yelena for a final time. Shubin gave matters some thought, then began to argue with Kurnatovsky over a legal question about which he knew nothing.
Insarov did not sleep all night and in the morning felt poorly; however, he set about putting his papers in order and writing letters, but his head was heavy and somehow muddled. By dinner time he had developed a fever and could not eat anything; by evening the fever had rapidly worsened. All his limbs ached and he had an agonizing headache. Insarov lay down on the same sofa on which Yelena had recently sat; he thought: “It serves me right for traipsing off to that old scoundrel,” and tried to sleep… But the illness had already taken hold. His veins began to throb with terrifying violence, his blood caught fire, his thoughts wheeled like birds. He lost consciousness. He lay as if crushed, flat on his back; suddenly he fancied he saw someone laughing and whispering above him. He opened his eyes with difficulty; the light from the guttering candle pierced them like a knife… What was this? Before him stood the old prosecutor wearing a termolama* dressing gown, tied with a foulard, just as Insarov had seen him the day before… “Karolina Fogelmeyer,” muttered the toothless mouth. Insarov looked, but the old man widened, swelled and grew. Already he was no longer a man, but a tree… Insarov had to climb the steep branches. He clung on then fell, hitting his chest on a sharp stone, and Karolina Fogelmeyer was squatting there like a street trader hawking her wares: “Pies, pies, pies.” But there was blood flowing and sabres gleaming unbearably… Yelena! And everything vanished in crimson chaos.
25
“Someone – goodness knows who – has come to see you. Some sort of locksmith,” Bersenev’s servant told him the following evening, a man distinguished by his stern demeanour towards his master and a sceptical turn of mind. “He wants to see you.”
“Call him in,” said Bersenev.
The “locksmith” came in. Bersenev recognized him as the tailor who was Insarov’s landlord.
“What do you want?” Bersenev asked him.
“I came to see Your Honour,” the tailor began, slowly shuffling from foot to foot and at times waving a right hand and clutching his cuff in its last three fingers. “Our tenant, what’s-his-name, is very ill.”
“Insarov?”
“That’s it – our tenant. Him anyway. Yesterday morning he was still on his feet; in the evening he just asked for a drink. My wife took him some water, but during the night he started raving. We could hear it through the partition wall. This morning he couldn’t talk, just lay there flat out. God alone knows how feverish he was. I thought that what’s-his-name was going to die any minute; I thought, I’ll have to let the police know, because he’s on his own, but my wife said: “Go to that other tenant of ours – the one what’s-his-name rented a room from. Maybe he’ll tell you what to do, or come himself.’ That’s why I came to see Your Honour, because we can’t, that is…”
Bersenev seized his cap, thrust a rouble into the tailor’s hand and hurried round with him to Insarov’s lodging.
He found him lying unconscious and fully dressed on the sofa. His face was terribly altered. Bersenev immediately ordered the tailor and his wife to undress him and transfer him to the bed, while he rushed off and fetched a doctor. The doctor prescribed leeches, mustard plasters and calomel to be applied together, and ordered him to be bled.
“Is he dangerously ill?” asked Bersenev.
“Yes, very,” replied the doctor. “Severe inflammation of the lungs; pneumonia is developing very rapidly and the brain may be affected, but the patient is young. His very strength is directed against him at present. You were late sending for me; however we’ll do everything that science requires of us.”
The doctor himself was still young and believed in science.
Bersenev stayed there the night. The tailor and his wife turned out to be kind and responsive as soon as someone was found who could tell them what to do. The doctor’s assistant appeared and the ordeal by medicine began.
Towards morning, Insarov came round for a few minutes, recognized Bersenev and asked: “Am I ill then?” He looked round him with the uncomprehending and listless perplexity of the seriously ill and again lost consciousness. Ber
senev went home, got changed, picked up some books and returned to Insarov’s lodgings. He had decided to move in with him, at least initially. He put screens round his bed and made a place for himself round the sofa. The day passed slowly and cheerlessly. Bersenev only absented himself in order to eat. Evening fell. He lit a shaded candle and began to read. It was quiet all around. From the landlord’s room behind the partition wall came suppressed whispers, yawns and sighs… Someone sneezed there, provoking whispered reproaches; from behind the screens could be heard uneven heavy breathing, punctuated by brief moans and anguished tossing of the head on the pillow. Bersenev was visited by strange thoughts. He found himself in the room of a man whose life hung by a thread, a man whom he knew Yelena loved. He remembered the night when Shubin caught him up and announced that she loved him, Bersenev! But now… “What am I to do now?” he wondered. “Tell Yelena about his illness? Wait? This news is sadder than the news I once brought her: strange how Fate always makes me the go-between!” He decided that it was best to wait. His eye fell on the table, covered with piles of papers… “Will he fulfil his plans?” he thought. “Will it all come to nothing?” And he began to feel sorry for the young life ebbing away, and vowed he would save it…
It was a bad night. The sick man raved a great deal. Several times Bersenev rose from his sofa, approached the bed on tiptoe and listened sorrowfully to Insarov’s incoherent babbling. Just once did Insarov say with sudden clarity: “I don’t want you to, I don’t want you to. Yelena, you mustn’t…” Bersenev shuddered and looked at Insarov: his face, at once pain-racked and deathly pale, was immobile and his arms lay inert… “I don’t want you to,” he repeated, scarcely audibly.
The doctor came in the morning and prescribed new medicaments.
On the Eve (Alma Classics) Page 13