" When it is savage, instinctive," put in Piotr Ivanitch, " it does not reflect, but reasonable feeling must reflect; if it does not, it is not love."
" What is it then ? "
" Oh, vileness, as you would call it."
"You—love!" said Alexandr, looking incredulously at his uncle, " ha ! ha! ha ! "
Piotr Ivanitch went on writing in silence.
" Who is it, uncle ? " asked Alexandr.
" Do you want to know ? "
" Yes."
" The lady I'm about to marry ? "
"You—to marry!" Alexandr could scarcely utter the words; he leaped up from his place and went up to his uncle.
" No closer, no closer, Alexandr, shut off the steam I " said Piotr Ivanitch, seeing his nephew's round eyes of astonishment and quickly collecting round him the various small objects on the table—b usts, figures, clocks, a nd inkstands.
] tr Shd you are so calm ! you write letters to Moscow, and talk of outside matters, go to your factory and still talk with such hellish coldness about love!"
" Hellish coldness—that's something new, they say it's hot in hell. But why are you looking at me so strangely ? "
" You get married !"
"What is there astonishing in that?" asked Piotr Ivanitch laying down his pen.
"What indeed? you get married and never a word to me!"
" Why I have just told you."
"You mentioned it because it happened to be apropos of something."
" I try as far as I can to do everything a propos."
" No, you should have communicated your happiness to me first; you know how I love you and how I should participate ... ."
" I dislike participation in everything and especially in marriage."
"Do you know, uncle?" said Alexandr with animation "it may be . . . • no, I cannot conceal it from you. I am not like that, I must tell all."
" Oh, Alexandr, I've no time to spare; if there's another rigmarole, won't it do to-morrow ? "
" I want only to tell you that perhaps .... I too am soon to be as happy "
" What ?" asked Piotr Ivanitch, pricking up his ears a little, "that's something curious."
"Ah! curious? then I will torment you: I won't tell you."
Piotr Ivanitch took up an envelope with an air of indifference, put his letter in it and began to seal it up. *J l " And I too am going to be married perhaps!" said ^Alexandr in his uncle's ear.
Piotr Ivanitch did not finish sealing the letter up but looked at him very seriously.
" Shut off your steam, Alexandr !" he said.
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A COMMON STORY 75
" You may joke, uncle, you may joke, I am speaking in earnest. I shall ask mamma's consent."
" You get married!"
" And why not ? "
"At your age?"
" I am twenty-three."
" It's high time indeed ! Why at your age no one marries except peasants, who want some one to do the work in their house."
" But if I am in love with a girl, and there is a possibility of marrying her, then, according to you, ought I not "
" I d on't advi se you at any time to marry a woman with w hom y ou are in Iove7
" what7uncle? fliafs a new idea; I never heard of it before."
" I should fancy there are things you haven't heard of."
" I always thought that there ought not to be marriage without love, r
^Marriage is one thing, love is another," said PiQtt
IvanitcnT ** n What are you marrying for then ? For your advantage ? "
" To my advantage, certainly, though not for my advantage. Even you will think of advantages when you marry, you will look out, will choose among women."
" Look out, choose!" cried Alexandr wonderingly.
"Yes, choose. For this rpflsnn^j^dnn^ fid vi se y ou. SL
marry when vou are M JWB.... Epve, you k^w^ js.fleeting^— th&t is a truth that has become a commonplace."
" It is the grossest lie and calumny."
"Well, there is no convincing you now, you will see for yourself in time, but now only mark my words; love is fleeting^ I repeat, and then the woman who has perhaps seemed to you the ideal of perfection shows herself to be very imperfect, and there's no help for it then. Love screens the absence of qualities needed in a wife. But when in choosing you consider in cool blood whether such or such a woman has the qualities which you would like to see in your wife, you get the greatest advantage. And if you find such a woman she is certain to continue to please you, because she answers to what you wanted. And so closer ties spring up between her and you, which afterwards go to make you "
i " Love one another ? " said Alexandr. ^ "Yes, and suit one another. Marrying f or money —that i s lowj but to marry witho ut any advantage—tfiafTs' stupid T . . but it is not suiTaBTeTor^ybii** to* iri fiVTSt"£tt now.'' ~ "When should I marry? When I am growing old? Why should I follow such foolish precedents ? " " You reckon my marriage one ? Thanks!" " I did not mean any reflection on you, uncle, I mean it generally. You hear of a wedding; you go to see it and what do you see? a lovely tender creature who has only been awaiting the magic touch of love to break into a splendid flower, and suddenly they tear her away from her dolls, her nurse, her childish games and dances, and it's well if it's only from all that; but often they don't look into her heart, which very likely is no longer her own. They dress her up in gauze, in blonde, they deck her in flowers, and in spite of her tears, her paleness, they drag her like a victim to the altar and set her beside—whom ? Beside an elderly man, generally unattractive, who has already squandered the strength of his youth. He either casts on her the glances of a passion which is an outrage, or coldly scans her from head to foot and thinks to himself apparently, ' You're pretty, yes, on my word with your head full of nonsense; love and roses—I will soon put an end to such folly, it's all silliness! with me you must give up sighing and dreaming and conduct yourself more properly;' or worse still, he is reflecting on her fortune. At the very youngest he is thirty years old. He often has a bald head, though I daresay he has a decoration or star on his breast. And ' this is the man' they tell her to whom are consecrated all the treasures of your youth, for him the first throbbing of your heart, the first avowal, his are your looks and words and maiden caresses, his is your whole life. And all round are standing in the crowd those who are her equals in youth and beauty, who ought to have been in the bridegroom's place. They gaze eagerly at the poor victim and seem to be saying: ' Ah, when we have exhausted our freshness and health, when we are bald, we too will get married and then we too shall carry of! such a splendid rose:} It's awful!"
[igh-flown, not good, Alexandr! " said Piotr Ivanitch ; " have you been writing now for two years on manures, and
potato-starch, and other serious subjects and you still talk in this high-flown way. For goodness' sake, don't give way to ecstasy."
"But, uncle, is not the poet's thought conceived in ecstasy ? "
"I don't know how it's conceived, but I know that it comes forth finished from the brain, that is when it has been worked up by meditation: it is only then that it is good. Well, but in your opinion," began Piotr Ivanitch after a pause: "to whom would you give these lovely creatures ? "
" To those whom they love, who have not yet lost the bloom of youth and beauty, whom one can see to be still full of life, in whose eyes the fire has not yet died away, who would have brought her the gift of a heart full of love for her, able to understand and to share her emotions when nature claims." ....
" I dare say! you mean to such fine fellows as you. If we were living ' in meads and forests thick'—and such a fellow as you had a wife—much he would get by it! for the first year he would be out of his senses, and then he would either take to hanging about behind the scenes of the theatre, or would give his wife a rival in her lady's maid, because nature's claims of which you talk, demand change, novelty—a pretty state of things ! And then his wife too, noticing her husband's pranks, would
suddenly take a fancy to spurs, parades and masquerades, and would pay him out in his own coin .... and without money, it is worse still; he comes begging, ' I have nothing to eat'!"
Piotr Ivanitch made a pitiful face.
" * I am a married man,' he says," continued he. "' I have already three children, help me, I cannot keep them, I am a poor man ' .... a poor man ! what degradation! no, I hope you will not fall into either of these categories."
"I shall fall into the category of happy husbands, uncle, and Nadinka of happy wives. I don't want to be married, as the majority of people marry; they all have the same tale : ' My youth is over, I am tired of solitude, so I must marry !' I am not like that! "
" You are talking nonsense, my dear boy."
" How do you know ? "
"Because you are just like other people, and I have
known other people a long while. Come, tell me, why will you get married ? "
" Why ? Nadinka—my wife !" ejaculated Alexandr, covering His face with his hands.
" Well, you see—you don't know yourself."
" Oh the spirit swoons at the very thought. You don't know how I love her, uncle! I love her as no one ever loved before; with all the strength of my soul—all is hers."
" Really, Alexandr, I would rather have you ranting at me or even if it must be embracing me than repeating that very ridiculous phrase ! How it rolls off your tongue ! ' as no one ever loved before !'"
Piotr Ivanitch shrugged his shoulders.
" Why, do you mean that this cannot be ? "
" Indeed,- when I reflect on your love, I really think it is possible ; impossible for any love to be more foolish !" i " But she says that we must wait a vea^ t hat we are yo ung, J /and oughijo test ourselves—for a whole yeaf—^ndthen^—" year! a h! you should have told me that before !" interposed Piotr Ivanitch; "did she make that condition? What a sensible girl she is. How old is she ? n
u Eighteen."
"And you are twenty-three; well, my friend, she has twenty-three times as much sense as you. I see she understands the whole business: s he will amuse her self wit h you , flirt a little and have a good time ? and then—these little Tiuumes have "an intuition in such things! ffiell, s o""yog J w qjPt b e married then. I thought you wanteaTo Ilx n up* directly* and^gecfeHyT At your age such follies are so quickly done that one hasn't time to interfere; but in a year's a different thing; by that time she w ill jilt yo u."
She—jilt, flirt; little HTI53J7"tnc[eecn"she, JNadinka! for shame, uncle! Whom have you lived with all your life, whom have you had to do with, whom have you loved, that you have such black suspicions ? "
" I have lived with men, I have loved a woman."
" She deceive me! That angel, that very embodiment of sincerity, a woman, whom it seems as if God had for the
first time created in all the purity and brightness "
^ " Still she is a woman, and is certain to deceive you."
1 ' Will you tell me next that / shall j ilt her ? "
" In time—yes, you will too."
" I! of people you don't know you can conclude what you like; but me —isn't it a sin in you to suspect me of such vileness ? What do you imagine me to be ? "
" A man."
" All are not alike. You must know that I, not in jest, but in all sincerity have given her a promise to love her all my life; I am ready to confirm it upon oath."
" I kaow, I know! No decent man doubts the sincerity of the vows he makes to a woman, but afterwards he changes and grows cooler, and does not himself know how. It does not happen intentionally, and there is no vileness in it, no one is to blame; nature does not allow of eternal love. And those who believe in eternal and unchanging love do just the same as those who don't believe in it, only they don't notice it and are unwilling to recognise it; we are above that, they say, we are not men, but angels—all folly!"
" But how is it there are lovers, married people, who love one another for ever and live all their lives together ? "
" For ever ! if a man's love last a fortnight, he is called fickle, but if for two or three years—at once you say it is for ever! Only consider what love is made up of and then you will see for yourself that it is not for ever! The ardour, the fire and fever-heat of that emotion prevent its being continuous. Lovers, married people, live together all their lives —no doubt! but do they love each other all their lives ? are they always in the bondage of their first love? are they seeking one another every minute, constantly gazing at each other, and can they never see enough of one another ? In the end what becomes of the little observances, the constant attention, the thirst to be together, the tears, the transport, all the passionate glances ? The coldness and awkwardness of husbands has passed into a proverb. 'Their love has turned into friendship!' every one says very seriously ; well then ! it's no longer love! Friendship ! And what is this friendship? A husband and wife are bound together by general interests, circumstances, then common fortunes, and so they live together; if it is not so, then they separate, make new ties—some more quickly than others; then we talk of fickleness ! But if they go on living together they come to live by habit, which let me whisper in your ear is
stronger than any kind of love; it is well called second nature ; except for it men would continue all their lives to suffer from separation from or the death of the beloved object, but you see they are consoled in time. Still the everlasting repetition—For ever, for ever!—they shout it without thinking."
" How is it, un cle^ th at jgfijxe not afraid on your ovn account? If follows that your wife too—forgive me—will deCtilVti J6i ? ^ -
*I don't think so/'
" What vanity 1 * ~ " It isn't vanity, but prudence."
" Prudence again !"
" Well, foresight if you like."
" But if she falls in love with some one else ? "
" One must not let it come to that; but even if she were so misguided, with a little skill one might cool down her feelings."
" Is it possible ? is it in your power? "
" Very much so."
" All deceived husbands would have done so," said Alex-andr, " if there were any means."
" Not all husbands are alike, my dear boy : some are very indifferent to their wives; they don't pay attention to what is going on around them and they don't care to notice it; others would be ready to from vanity, but are poor creatures; they don't know how to set to work."
" How will you set to work ? "
"That's my secret; one could not instil it into you; you are in delirium."
Piotr Ivanitch was silent, and went on writing.
" But what a life!" began Alexandr; " not to forget yourself, but always to be thinking—thinking—no, I feel this is not so! I want to live without your cold analysis, not thinking whether trouble and danger are awaiting me hereafter or not, it's all the same ! Why should I think of it beforehand and poison "
"Why! I have often told you why, but he always comes back to his same point. Because when you foresee danger, obstacles, trouble, then you can more easily oppose them or endure them; you will not go out of your mind; you won't die; and when pleasure comes, you won't
be dancing about and smashing busts—is it clear ? One tells him—here this is the beginning, look at it, and judge by it of the end; but he covers his eyes and turns away his head just as though it were some bogy, and goes on living like a child. You would say—live day by day, as men lived sitting at their cottage doors, reckon your life by dinners, dances, love, and unchanging friendship. Always wanting the golden age! I have told you already that with your ideas it's well to stay in the country with your good lady and half-a-dozen children, but here one must work at a business ; this means that you must incessantly be thinking and remembering what you did yesterday, what you are doing to-day, so as to know what you must do to-morrow— that is to say, you must live with never-flagging control of yourself and your occupations. It is only in this way we
can attain to anything practical; an
d so But what's
the good of arguing with you—you are delirious for the present? Ah! it's just on the hour. Not a word more, Alexandr; go away, I will not listen; dine with me tomorrow; there will be some few people."
" Friends of yours ? "
« Y es —KonerT, Smirnoff, Fedoroff—you know them, and some few besides."
"Koneff, Smirnoff, Fedoroff! But these are the very people you have to do with in business."
" Why, yes; these are all indispensable people."
"So these are your friends? Certainly I have never observed that you received any one with special warmth."
" I have told you before that I consider as friends those whom I associate with oftenest, from whom I gain either profit or pleasure. I dare say ! Would you have me feed them for nothing ? "
"But I thought before your marriage you would take leave of your true friends, whom you love from your heart, with whom you would talk for the last time of your gay youth over the wine-cup, and whom, perhaps, you would press warmly to your heart on your separation."
" There, five of your words contain nothing that exists, or at least ought to exist, in life. With what transports your aunt would have thrown herself on your neck ! Of course there are ' true friends' wherever there is simply friendship and a * wine cup' whenever one is drinking out of bottles
F
and glasses, and embraces on separation when there is no separation at all. Oh, Alexandr!"
" Don't you feel regret at being separated, or at least seeing less of these friends ? " said Alexandr.
" No ! I never was so intimate with any one as to regret them, and I advise you to follow my example."
"So you will be here to-morrow?"
" To-morrow, uncle, I "
" What ? "
" I am invited to a country-house."
" The Lubetzkys, I suppose."
"Yes!"
" Ah! well, as you like. Don't forget your work, Alexandr; I shall tell the editor how you are spending your time."
" Oh, uncle, how can you! I will finish my abstract from the German economists without fail."
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