‘I like comfort in life,’ Sitnikov brought out, with dignity. ‘That does not prevent my being a Liberal.’
‘No, it does; it does prevent it!’ cried Evdoksya. She gave directions, however, to her maid, both as regards the lunch and the champagne.
‘What do you think about it?’ she added, turning to Bazarov. ‘I’m persuaded you share my opinion.’
‘Well, no,’ retorted Bazarov; ‘a piece of meat’s better than a piece of bread even from the chemical point of view.’
‘You are studying chemistry? That is my passion. I’ve even invented a new sort of composition myself.’
‘A composition? You?’
‘Yes. And do you know for what purpose? To make dolls’ heads so that they shouldn’t break. I’m practical, too, yon see. But everything’s not quite ready yet. I’ve still to read Liebig. By the way, have you read Kislyakov’s article on Female Labour, in the Moscow Gazette? Read it please. You’re interested in the woman question, I suppose? And in the schools too? What does your friend do? What is his name?’
Madame Kukshin shed her questions one after another with affected negligence, not waiting for an answer; spoilt children talk so to their nurses.
‘My name’s Arkady Nikolaitch Kirsanov,’ said Arkady, ‘and I’m doing nothing.’
Evdoksya giggled. ‘How charming! What, don’t you smoke? Victor, do you know, I’m very angry with you.’
‘What for?’
‘They tell me you’ve begun singing the praises of George Sand again. A retrograde woman, and nothing else! How can people compare her with Emerson! She hasn’t an idea on education, nor physiology, nor anything. She’d never, I’m persuaded, heard of embryology, and in these days — what can be done without that?’ (Evdoksya even threw up her hands.) ‘Ah, what a wonderful article Elisyevitch has written on that subject! He’s a gentleman of genius.’ (Evdoksya constantly made use of the word ‘gentleman’ instead of the word ‘man.’) ‘Bazarov, sit by me on the sofa. You don’t know, perhaps, I’m awfully afraid of you.’
‘Why so? Allow me to ask.’
‘You’re a dangerous gentleman; you’re such a critic. Good God! yes! why, how absurd, I’m talking like some country lady. I really am a country lady, though. I manage my property myself; and only fancy, my bailiff Erofay’s a wonderful type, quite like Cooper’s Pathfinder; something in him so spontaneous! I’ve come to settle here finally; it’s an intolerable town, isn’t it? But what’s one to do?’
‘The town’s like every town,’ Bazarov remarked coolly.
‘All its interests are so petty, that’s what’s so awful! I used to spend the winters in Moscow ... but now my lawful spouse, Monsieur Kukshin’s residing there. And besides, Moscow nowadays ... there, I don’t know — it’s not the same as it was. I’m thinking of going abroad; last year I was on the point of setting off.’
‘To Paris, I suppose?’ queried Bazarov.
‘To Paris and to Heidelberg.’
‘Why to Heidelberg?’
‘How can you ask? Why, Bunsen’s there!’
To this Bazarov could find no reply.
‘Pierre Sapozhnikov ... do you know him?’
‘No, I don’t.’
‘Not know Pierre Sapozhnikov ... he’s always at Lidia Hestatov’s.’
‘I don’t know her either.’
‘Well, it was he undertook to escort me. Thank God, I’m independent; I’ve no children.... What was that I said: thank God! It’s no matter though.’
Evdoksya rolled a cigarette up between her fingers, which were brown with tobacco stains, put it to her tongue, licked it up, and began smoking. The maid came in with a tray.
‘Ah, here’s lunch! Will you have an appetiser first? Victor, open the bottle; that’s in your line.’
‘Yes, it’s in my line,’ muttered Sitnikov, and again he gave vent to the same convulsive laugh.
‘Are there any pretty women here?’ inquired Bazarov, as he drank off a third glass.
‘Yes, there are,’ answered Evdoksya; ‘but they’re all such empty - headed creatures. Mon amie, Odintsova, for instance, is nice - looking. It’s a pity her reputation’s rather doubtful.... That wouldn’t matter, though, but she’s no independence in her views, no width, nothing ... of all that. The whole system of education wants changing. I’ve thought a great deal about it, our women are very badly educated.’
‘There’s no doing anything with them,’ put in Sitnikov; ‘one ought to despise them, and I do despise them fully and completely!’ (The possibility of feeling and expressing contempt was the most agreeable sensation to Sitnikov; he used to attack women in especial, never suspecting that it was to be his fate a few months later to be cringing before his wife merely because she had been born a princess Durdoleosov.) ‘Not a single one of them would be capable of understanding our conversation; not a single one deserves to be spoken of by serious men like us!’
‘But there’s not the least need for them to understand our conversation,’ observed Bazarov.
‘Whom do you mean?’ put in Evdoksya.
‘Pretty women.’
‘What? Do you adopt Proudhon’s ideas, then?’
Bazarov drew himself up haughtily. ‘I don’t adopt any one’s ideas; I have my own.’
‘Damn all authorities!’ shouted Sitnikov, delighted to have a chance of expressing himself boldly before the man he slavishly admired.
‘But even Macaulay,’ Madame Kukshin was beginning ...
‘Damn Macaulay,’ thundered Sitnikov. ‘Are you going to stand up for the silly hussies?’
‘For silly hussies, no, but for the rights of women, which I have sworn to defend to the last drop of my blood.’
‘Damn!’ — but here Sitnikov stopped. ‘But I don’t deny them,’ he said.
‘No, I see you’re a Slavophil.’
‘No, I’m not a Slavophil, though, of course ...’
‘No, no, no! You are a Slavophil. You’re an advocate of patriarchal despotism. You want to have the whip in your hand!’
‘A whip’s an excellent thing,’ remarked Bazarov; ‘but we’ve got to the last drop.’
‘Of what?’ interrupted Evdoksya.
‘Of champagne, most honoured Avdotya Nikitishna, of champagne — not of your blood.’
‘I can never listen calmly when women are attacked,’ pursued Evdoksya. ‘It’s awful, awful. Instead of attacking them, you’d better read Michelet’s book, De l’amour. That’s exquisite! Gentlemen, let us talk of love,’ added Evdoksya, letting her arm fall languidly on the rumpled sofa cushion.
A sudden silence followed. ‘No, why should we talk of love,’ said Bazarov; ‘but you mentioned just now a Madame Odintsov ... That was what you called her, I think? Who is that lady?’
‘She’s charming, charming!’ piped Sitnikov. ‘I will introduce you. Clever, rich, a widow. It’s a pity, she’s not yet advanced enough; she ought to see more of our Evdoksya. I drink to your health, Evdoxie! Let us clink glasses! Et toc, et toc, et tin - tin - tin! Et toc, et toc, et tin - tin - tin!!!’
‘Victor, you’re a wretch.’
The lunch dragged on a long while. The first bottle of champagne was followed by another, a third, and even a fourth.... Evdoksya chattered without pause; Sitnikov seconded her. They had much discussion upon the question whether marriage was a prejudice or a crime, and whether men were born equal or not, and precisely what individuality consists in. Things came at last to Evdoksya, flushed from the wine she had drunk, tapping with her flat finger - tips on the keys of a discordant piano, and beginning to sing in a hoarse voice, first gipsy songs, and then Seymour Schiff’s song, ‘Granada lies slumbering’; while Sitnikov tied a scarf round his head, and represented the dying lover at the words —
‘And thy lips to mine
In burning kiss entwine.’
Arkady could not stand it at last. ‘Gentlemen, it’s getting something like Bedlam,’ he remarked aloud. Bazarov, who had at rare intervals put in an ironical word i
n the conversation — he paid more attention to the champagne — gave a loud yawn, got up, and, without taking leave of their hostess, he walked off with Arkady. Sitnikov jumped up and followed them.
‘Well, what do you think of her?’ he inquired, skipping obsequiously from right to left of them. ‘I told you, you see, a remarkable personality! If we only had more women like that! She is, in her own way, an expression of the highest morality.’
‘And is that establishment of your governor’s an expression of the highest morality too?’ observed Bazarov, pointing to a ginshop which they were passing at that instant.
Sitnikov again went off into a shrill laugh. He was greatly ashamed of his origin, and did not know whether to feel flattered or offended at Bazarov’s unexpected familiarity.
CHAPTER XIV
A few days later the ball at the Governor’s took place. Matvy Ilyitch was the real ‘hero of the occasion.’ The marshal of nobility declared to all and each that he had come simply out of respect for him; while the Governor, even at the ball, even while he remained perfectly motionless, was still ‘making arrangements.’ The affability of Matvy Ilyitch’s demeanour could only be equalled by its dignity. He was gracious to all, to some with a shade of disgust, to others with a shade of respect; he was all bows and smiles ‘en vrai chevalier français’ before the ladies, and was continually giving vent to a hearty, sonorous, unshared laugh, such as befits a high official. He slapped Arkady on the back, and called him loudly ‘nephew’; vouchsafed Bazarov — who was attired in a rather old evening coat — a sidelong glance in passing — absent but condescending — and an indistinct but affable grunt, in which nothing could be distinguished but ‘I ...’ and ‘very much’; gave Sitnikov a finger and a smile, though with his head already averted; even to Madame Kukshin, who made her appearance at the ball with dirty gloves, no crinoline, and a bird of Paradise in her hair, he said ‘enchanté.’. There were crowds of people, and no lack of dancing men; the civilians were for the most part standing close along the walls, but the officers danced assiduously, especially one of them who had spent six weeks in Paris, where he had mastered various daring interjections of the kind of — ’zut,’ ‘Ah, fichtr - re,’ ‘pst, pst, mon bibi,’ and such. He pronounced them to perfection with genuine Parisian chic, and at the same time he said ‘si j’aurais’ for ‘si j’avais,’ ‘absolument’ in the sense of ‘absolutely,’ expressed himself, in fact, in that Great Russo - French jargon which the French ridicule so when they have no reason for assuring us that we speak French like angels, ‘comme des anges.’
Arkady, as we are aware, danced badly, while Bazarov did not dance at all; they both took up their position in a corner; Sitnikov joined himself on to them, with an expression of contemptuous scorn on his face, and giving vent to spiteful comments, he looked insolently about him, and seemed to be really enjoying himself. Suddenly his face changed, and turning to Arkady, he said, with some show of embarrassment it seemed, ‘Odintsova is here!’
Arkady looked round, and saw a tall woman in a black dress standing at the door of the room. He was struck by the dignity of her carriage. Her bare arms lay gracefully beside her slender waist; gracefully some light sprays of fuchsia drooped from her shining hair on to her sloping shoulders; her clear eyes looked out from under a rather overhanging white brow, with a tranquil and intelligent expression — tranquil it was precisely, not pensive — and on her lips was a scarcely perceptible smile. There was a kind of gracious and gentle force about her face.
‘Do you know her?’ Arkady asked Sitnikov.
‘Intimately. Would you like me to introduce you?’
‘Please ... after this quadrille.’
Bazarov’s attention, too, was directed to Madame Odintsov.
‘That’s a striking figure,’ he remarked. ‘Not like the other females.’
After waiting till the end of the quadrille, Sitnikov led Arkady up to Madame Odintsov; but he hardly seemed to be intimately acquainted with her; he was embarrassed in his sentences, while she looked at him in some surprise. But her face assumed an expression of pleasure when she heard Arkady’s surname. She asked him whether he was not the son of Nikolai Petrovitch.
‘Yes.’
‘I have seen your father twice, and have heard a great deal about him,’ she went on; ‘I am glad to make your acquaintance.’
At that instant some adjutant flew up to her and begged for a quadrille. She consented.
‘Do you dance then?’ asked Arkady respectfully.
‘Yes, I dance. Why do you suppose I don’t dance? Do you think I am too old?’
‘Really, how could I possibly.... But in that case, let me ask you for a mazurka.’
Madame Odintsov smiled graciously. ‘Certainly,’ she said, and she looked at Arkady not exactly with an air of superiority, but as married sisters look at very young brothers. Madame Odintsov was a little older than Arkady — she was twenty - nine — but in her presence he felt himself a schoolboy, a little student, so that the difference in age between them seemed of more consequence. Matvy Ilyitch approached her with a majestic air and ingratiating speeches. Arkady moved away, but he still watched her; he could not take his eyes off her even during the quadrille. She talked with equal ease to her partner and to the grand official, softly turned her head and eyes, and twice laughed softly. Her nose — like almost all Russian noses — was a little thick; and her complexion was not perfectly clear; Arkady made up his mind, for all that, that he had never before met such an attractive woman. He could not get the sound of her voice out of his ears; the very folds of her dress seemed to hang upon her differently from all the rest — more gracefully and amply — and her movements were distinguished by a peculiar smoothness and naturalness.
Arkady felt some timidity in his heart when at the first sounds of the mazurka he began to sit it out beside his partner; he had prepared to enter into a conversation with her, but he only passed his hand through his hair, and could not find a single word to say. But his timidity and agitation did not last long; Madame Odintsov’s tranquillity gained upon him too; before a quarter of an hour had passed he was telling her freely about his father, his uncle, his life in Petersburg and in the country. Madame Odintsov listened to him with courteous sympathy, slightly opening and closing her fan; his talk was broken off when partners came for her; Sitnikov, among others, twice asked her. She came back, sat down again, took up her fan, and her bosom did not even heave more rapidly, while Arkady fell to chattering again, filled through and through by the happiness of being near her, talking to her, looking at her eyes, her lovely brow, all her sweet, dignified, clever face. She said little, but her words showed a knowledge of life; from some of her observations Arkady gathered that this young woman had already felt and thought much....
‘Who is that you were standing with?’ she asked him, ‘when Mr. Sitnikov brought you to me?’
‘Did you notice him?’ Arkady asked in his turn. ‘He has a splendid face, hasn’t he? That’s Bazarov, my friend.’
Arkady fell to discussing ‘his friend.’ He spoke of him in such detail, and with such enthusiasm, that Madame Odintsov turned towards him and looked attentively at him. Meanwhile, the mazurka was drawing to a close. Arkady felt sorry to part from his partner; he had spent nearly an hour so happily with her! He had, it is true, during the whole time continually felt as though she were condescending to him, as though he ought to be grateful to her ... but young hearts are not weighed down by that feeling.
The music stopped. ‘Merci,’ said Madame Odintsov, getting up. ‘You promised to come and see me; bring your friend with you. I shall be very curious to see the man who has the courage to believe in nothing.’
The Governor came up to Madame Odintsov, announced that supper was ready, and, with a careworn face, offered her his arm. As she went away, she turned to give a last smile and bow to Arkady. He bowed low, looked after her (how graceful her figure seemed to him, draped in the greyish lustre of the black silk!), and thinking, ‘Th
is minute she has forgotten my existence,’ was conscious of an exquisite humility in his soul.
‘Well?’ Bazarov questioned him, directly he had gone back to him in the corner. ‘Did you have a good time? A gentleman has just been talking to me about that lady; he said, “She’s — oh, fie! fie!” but I fancy the fellow was a fool. What do you think, what is she? — oh, fie! fie!’
‘I don’t quite understand that definition,’ answered Arkady.
‘Oh, my! What innocence!’
‘In that case, I don’t understand the gentleman you quote. Madame Odintsov is very sweet, no doubt, but she behaves so coldly and severely, that....’
‘Still waters ... you know!’ put in Bazarov. ‘That’s just what gives it piquancy. You like ices, I expect?’
‘Perhaps,’ muttered Arkady. ‘I can’t give an opinion about that. She wishes to make your acquaintance, and has asked me to bring you to see her.’
‘I can imagine how you’ve described me! But you did very well. Take me. Whatever she may be — whether she’s simply a provincial lioness, or “advanced” after Kukshina’s fashion — any way she’s got a pair of shoulders such as I’ve not set eyes on for a long while.’
Arkady was wounded by Bazarov’s cynicism, but — as often happens — he reproached his friend not precisely for what he did not like in him ...
‘Why are you unwilling to allow freethinking in women?’ he said in a low voice.
‘Because, my boy, as far as my observations go, the only freethinkers among women are frights.’
The conversation was cut short at this point. Both the young men went away immediately after supper. They were pursued by a nervously malicious, but somewhat faint - hearted laugh from Madame Kukshin; her vanity had been deeply wounded by neither of them having paid any attention to her. She stayed later than any one at the ball, and at four o’clock in the morning she was dancing a polka - mazurka with Sitnikov in the Parisian style. This edifying spectacle was the final event of the Governor’s ball.
A Sportsman's Sketches: Works of Ivan Turgenev 1 Page 61