“Do you desire it, you?” “Yes. . . . I suppose so,” replied Litvinov hesitatingly. “I agree with your papa. . . . Indeed, why should you not go . . . to see the world, and show yourself,” he added with a short laugh.
“To show myself,” she repeated slowly. “Very well then, I will go. . . . Only remember, it is you yourself who desired it.”
“That’s to say, I - - “ Litvinov was beginning.
“You yourself have desired it,” she interposed. “And here is one condition more; you must promise me that you will not be at this ball.”
“But why?”
“I wish it to be so.”
Litvinov unclasped his hands. “I submit . . . but I confess I should so have enjoyed seeing you in all your grandeur, witnessing the sensation you are certain to make. . . . How proud should be of you!” he added with a sigh.
Irina laughed.
“All the grandeur will consist of a white frock, and as for the sensation. . . . Well, any way, I wish it.”
“Irina, darling, you seem to be angry?”
Irina laughed again.
“Oh, no! I am not angry. Only, Grisha . . . (She fastened her eyes on him, and he thought he had never before seen such an expression in them.) “Perhaps, it must be,” she added in an undertone.
“But, Irina, you love me, dear?”
“I love you,” she answered with almost solemn gravity, and she clasped his hand firmly like a man.
All the following days Irina was busily occupied over her dress and her coiffure; on the day before the ball she felt unwell, she could not sit still, and twice she burst into tears in solitude; before Litvinov she wore the same uniform smile. . . . She treated him however, with her old tenderness, but carelessly, and was constantly looking at herself in the glass. On the day of the ball she was silent and pale, but collected. At nine o’clock in the evening Litvinov came to look at her. When she came to meet him in a white tarlatan gown, with a spray of small blue flowers in her slightly raised hair, he almost uttered a cry; she seemed to him so lovely and stately beyond what was natural to her years. “Yes, she has grown up since this morning!” he thought, “and how she holds herself! That’s what race does!” Irina stood before him, her hands hanging loose, without smiles or affectation, and looked resolutely, almost boldly, not at him, but away into the distance straight before her.
“You are just like a princess in a story book,” said Litvinov at last. “You are like a warrior before the battle, before victory. . . . You did not allow me to go to this ball,” he went on, while she remained motionless as before, not because she was not listening to him, but because she was following another inner voice, “but you will not refuse to accept and take with you these flowers?”
He offered her a bunch of heliotrope. She looked quickly at Litvinov, stretched out her hand, and suddenly seizing the end of the spray which decorated her hair, she said:
“Do you wish it, Grisha? Only say the word, and I will tear off all this, and stop at home.”
Litvinov’s heart seemed fairly bursting. Irina’s hand had already snatched the spray. . .
“No, no, what for?” he interposed hurriedly, in a rush of generous and magnanimous feeling, “I am not an egoist. . . . Why should I restrict your freedom . . . when I know that your heart - - “
“Well, don’t come near me, you will crush my dress,” she said hastily.
Litvinov was disturbed.
“But you will take the nosegay?” he asked.
“Of course; it is very pretty, and I love that scent. Merci - - I shall keep it in memory - - “
“Of your first coming out,” observed Litvinov, “your first triumph.”
Irina looked over her shoulder at herself in the glass, scarcely bending her figure. “And do I really look so nice? You are not partial?”
Litvinov overflowed in enthusiastic praises. Irina was already not listening to him, and holding the flowers up to her face, she was again looking away into the distance with her strange, as it were, overshadowed, dilated eyes, and the ends of her delicate ribbons stirred by a faint current of air rose slightly behind her shoulders like wings. The prince made his appearance, his hair well becurled, in a white tie, and a shabby black evening coat, with the medal of nobility on a Vladimir ribbon in his buttonhole. After him came the princess in a china silk dress of antique cut, and with the anxious severity under which mothers try to conceal their agitation, set her daughter to rights behind, that is to say, quite needlessly shook out the folds of her gown. An antiquated hired coach with seats for four, drawn by two shaggy hacks, crawled up to the steps, its wheels grating over the frozen mounds of unswept snow, and a decrepit groom in a most unlikely - looking livery came running out of the passage, and with a sort of desperate courage announced that the carriage was ready. . . . After giving a blessing for the night to the children left at home, and enfolding themselves in their fur wraps, the prince and princess went out to the steps; Irina in a little cloak, too thin and too short - - how she hated the little cloak at that moment! - - followed them in silence. Litvinov escorted them outside, hoping for a last look from Irina, but she took her seat in the carriage without turning her head.
About midnight he walked under the windows of the Hall of Nobility. Countless lights of huge candelabra shone with brilliant radiance through the red curtains; and the whole square, blocked with carriages, was ringing with the insolent, festive, seductive strains of a waltz of Strauss.
The next day at one o’clock, Litvinov betook himself to the Osinins’. He found no one at home but the prince, who informed him at once that Irina had a headache, that she was in bed, and would not get up till the evening, that such an indisposition was, however, little to be wondered at after a first ball.
“C’est très naturel, vous savez, dans les jeunes filles,” he added in French, somewhat to Litvinov’s surprise; the latter observed at the same instant that the prince was not in his dressing - gown as usual, but was wearing a coat. “And besides,” continued Osinin, “she may well be a little upset after the events of yesterday!”
“Events?” muttered Litvinov.
“Yes, yes, events, events, de vrais événements. You cannot imagine, Grigory Mihalovitch, quel succès elle a eu! The whole court noticed her! Prince Alexander Fedorovitch said that her place was not here, and that she reminded him of Countess Devonshirse. You know . . . that . . . celebrated. . . . And old Blazenkrampf declared in the hearing of all, that Irina was la reine du bal, and desired to be introduced to her; he was introduced to me, too, that’s to say, he told me that he remembered me as a hussar, and asked me where I was holding office now. Most entertaining man that Count, and such an adorateur du beau sexe! But that’s not all; my princess . . . they gave her no peace either: Natalya Nikitishna herself conversed with: her . . . what more could we have? Irina danced avec tous les meilleurs cavaliers; they kept bringing them up to me. . . . I positively lost count of them. Would you believe it, they were all flocking about us in crowds; in the mazurka they did nothing but seek her out. One foreign diplomatist, hearing she was a Moscow girl, said to the Tsar: ‘Sire,’ he said, ‘décidément c’est Moscou qui est le centre de votre empire!’ and another diplomatist added: ‘C’est une vraie revolution, Sire - - révélation or révolution . . .’ something of that sort. Yes, yes, it was. I tell you it was something extraordinary.” “Well, and Irina Pavlovna herself?” inquired Litvinov, whose hands and feet had grown cold hearing the prince’s speech, “did she enjoy herself, did she seem pleased?”
“Of course she enjoyed herself; how could she fail to be pleased? But, as you know, she’s not to be seen through at a glance! Every one was saying to me yesterday: it is really surprising! jamais on ne dirait que mademoiselle votre fille est à son premier bal. Count Reisenbach, among the rest . . . you know him most likely.”
“No, I don’t know him at all, and have never heard of him.”
“My wife’s cousin.”
“I don’t know him.”
“A rich man, a chamberlain, living in Petersburg, in the swim of things; in Livonia every one is in his hands. Hitherto he has neglected us . . . but there, I don’t bear him ill - will for that. J’ai l’humeur facile, comme vous savez. Well, that’s the kind of man he is. He sat near Irina, conversed with her for a quarter of an hour, not more, and said afterwards to my princess: ‘Ma cousine,’ he says, ‘votre fille est une perle; c’est une perfection, every one is congratulating me on such a niece. . . .’ And afterwards I look around - - and he had gone up to a . . . a very great personage, and was talking, and kept looking at Irina . . . and the person age was looking at her too. . . .”
“And so Irina Pavlovna will not appear all day?” Litvinov asked again.
“Quite so; her head aches very badly. She told me to greet you from her, and thank you for your flowers, qu’on a trouvé charmant. She needs rest. . . . The princess has gone out on a round of visits . . . and I myself . . . you see. . . .”
The prince cleared his throat, and began to fidget as though he were at a loss what to add further. Litvinov took his hat, and saying he did not want to disturb him, and would call again later to inquire after her health, he went away. A few steps from the Osinins’ house he saw an elegant carriage for two persons standing before the police sentry - box. A groom in livery, equally elegant, was bending negligently from the box, and inquiring of the Finnish police - sergeant whereabouts Prince Pavel Vassilyevitch Osinin lived. Litvinov glanced at the carriage; in it sat a middle - aged man of bloated complexion, with a wrinkled and haughty face, a Greek nose, and an evil mouth, muffled in a sable wrap, by all outward signs a very great man indeed.
IX
LITVINOV did not keep his promise of returning; later; he reflected that it would he better to defer his visit till the following day. When he went into the too familiar drawing - room at about twelve o’clock, he found there the two youngest princesses, Viktorinka and Kleopatrinka. He greeted them, and then inquired, “Was Irina Pavlovna better, and could he see her?”
“Irinotchka has gone away with mammy,” replied Viktorinka; she lisped a little, but was more forward than her sister.
“How . . . gone away?” repeated Litvinov, an there was a sort of still shudder in the very bottom of his heart. “Does she not, does she not look after you about this time, and give you your lessons?”
“Irinotchka will not give us any lessons any more now,” answered Viktorinka. “Not any more now,” Kleopatrinka repeated after her.
“Is your papa at home?” asked Litvinov.
“Papa is not at home,” continued Viktorinka, “and Irinotchka is not well; all night long she was crying and crying. . . .”
“Crying?”
“Yes, crying . . . Yegorovna told me, and her eyes are so red, they are quite in - inflamed. . . .” Litvinov walked twice up and down the room shuddering as though with cold, and went back to his lodging. He experienced a sensation like that which gains possession of a man when he looks down from a high tower; everything failed within him, and his head was swimming slowly with a sense of nausea. Dull stupefaction, and thoughts scurrying like mice, vague terror, and the numbness of expectation, and curiosity - - strange, almost malignant - - and the weight of crushed tears in his heavy laden breast, on his lips the forced empty smile, and a meaningless prayer - - addressed to no one. . . . Oh, how bitter it all was, and how hideously degrading! “Irina does not want to see me,” was the thought that was incessantly revolving in his brain; “so much is clear; but why is it? What can have happened at that ill - fated ball? And how is such a change possible all at once? So suddenly. . . .” People always see death coming suddenly, but they can never get accustomed to its suddenness, they feel it senseless. “She sends no message for me, does not want to explain herself to me. . . .” “Grigory Mihalitch,” called a strained voice positively in his ear.
Litvinov started, and saw before him his servant with a note in his hand. He recognized Irina’s writing. . . . Before he had broken the seal, he had a foreknowledge of woe, and bent his head on his breast and hunched his shoulders, as though shrinking from the blow.
He plucked up courage at last, and tore open the envelope all at once. On a small sheet of notepaper were the following lines: “Forgive me, Grigory Mihalitch. All is over between us; I am going away to Petersburg. I am dreadfully unhappy, but the thing is done. It seems my fate . . . but no, I do not want to justify myself. My presentiments have been realized. Forgive me, forget me; I am not worthy of you. - - Irina. Be magnanimous: do not try to see me.”
Litvinov read these five lines, and slowly dropped on to the sofa,, as though some one had dealt him a blow on the breast. He dropped the note, picked it up, read it again, whispered “to Petersburg,” and dropped it again; that was all. There even came upon him a sense of peace; he even, with his hands thrown behind him, smoothed the pillow under his head. “Men wounded to death don’t fling themselves about,” he thought, “as it has come, so it has gone. All this is natural enough: I always expected it. . . .” (He was lying to himself; he had never expected anything like it.) “Crying? . . . Was she crying? . . . What was she crying for? Why, she did not love me. But all that is easily understood and in accordance with her character. She - - she is not worthy of me. . . . That’s it!” (He laughed bitterly.) “She did not know her self what power was latent in her, - - weIl, convinced of it in her effect at the ball, was it likely she would stay with an insignificant student? - - all that’s easily understood.”
But then he remembered her tender words, her smile, and those eyes, those never to be forgotten eyes, which he would never see again, which used to shine and melt at simply meeting his eyes; he recalled one swift, timorous, burning kiss - - and suddenly he fell to sobbing, sobbing convulsively, furiously, vindictively; turned over on his face, and choking and stifling with frenzied satisfaction as though thirsting to tear him self to pieces with all around him, he turned his hot face in the sofa pillow, and bit it in his teeth.
Alas! the gentleman whom Litvinov had seen the day before in the carriage was no other than the cousin of the Princess Osinin, the rich chamberlain, Count Reisenbach. Noticing the sensation produced by Irina on certain personages of the highest rank, and instantaneously reflecting what advantages might mit etwas Accuratesse be derived from the fact, the count made his plan at once like a man of energy and a skillful courtier. He decided to act swiftly, in Napoleonic style. “I will take that original girl into my house,” was what he meditated, “in Petersburg; I will make her my heiress, devil take me, of my whole property even; as I have no children. She is my niece, and my countess is dull all alone. . . . It’s always more agreeable to have a pretty face in one’s drawing - room. . . . Yes, yes; . . . that’s it; es ist eine Idee, es ist eine Idee!” He would have to dazzle, bewilder, and impress the parents. “They’ve not enough to eat” - - the count pursued his reflection when he was in the carriage and on his way to Dogs’ Place - - “so, I warrant they won’t be obstinate. They’re not such over - sentimental folks either. I might give them a sum of money down into the bargain. And she? She will consent. Honey is sweet - - she had a taste of it last night. It’s a whim on my part, granted; let them profit by it, . . . the fools. I shall say to them one thing and another . . . and you must decide - - otherwise I shall adopt another - - an orphan - - which would be still more suitable. Yes or no - - twenty - four hours I fix for the term - - und damit Punctum.”
And with these very words on his lips, the count presented himself before the prince, whom he had forewarned of his visit the evening before at the ball. On the result of this visit it seems hardly worth while to enlarge further. The count was not mistaken in his prognostications: the prince and princess were in fact not obstinate, and accepted the sum of money; and Irina did in fact consent before the allotted term had expired. It was not easy for her to break off her relations with Litvinov; she loved him; and after sending him her note, she almost kept her bed, weeping continually, and grew th
in and wan. But for all that, a month later the princess carried her off to Petersburg, and established her at the count’s; committing her to the care of the countess, a very kind - hearted woman, but with the brain of a hen, and something of a hen’s exterior.
Litvinov threw up the university, and went home to his father in the country. Little by little his wound healed. At first he had no news of Irina, and indeed he avoided all conversation that touched on Petersburg and Petersburg society. Later on, by degrees, rumors - - not evil exactly, but curious - - began to circulate about her; gossip began to be busy about her. The name of the young Princess Osinin, encircled in splendor, impressed with quite a special stamp, began to be more and more frequently mentioned even in provincial circles. It was pronounced with curiosity, respect, and envy, as men at one time used to mention the name of the Countess Vorotinsky. At last the news came of her marriage. But Litvinov hardly paid attention to these last tidings; he was already betrothed to Tatyana.
Now, the reader can no doubt easily understand exactly what it was Litvinov recalled when he cried, “Can it be she?” and therefore we will return to Baden and take up again the broken thread of our story.
X
LITVINOV fell asleep very late, and did not sleep long; the sun had only just risen when he got out of bed. The summits of dark mountains visible from his windows stood out in misty purple against the clear sky. “How cool it must be there under the trees!” he thought; and he dressed in haste, and looked with indifference at the bouquet which had opened more luxuriantly after the night; he took a stick and set off towards the “Old Castle” on the famous “Cliffs.” Invigorating and soothing was the caressing contact of the fresh morning about him. He drew long breaths, and stepped out boldly; the vigorous health of youth was throbbing in every vein; the very earth seemed springy under his light feet. With every step he grew more light - hearted, more happy; he walked in the dewy shade in the thick sand of the little paths, beside the fir - trees that were fringed with the vivid green of the spring shoots at the end of every twig. “How jolly it is!” he kept repeating to himself. Suddenly he heard the sound of familiar voices; he looked ahead and saw Voroshilov and Bambaev coming to meet him. The sight of them jarred upon him; he rushed away like a school - boy avoiding his teacher, and hid him self behind a bush. . . . “My Creator!” he prayed, “mercifully remove my countrymen!” He felt that he would not have grudged any money at the moment if only they did not see him. . . . And they actually did not see him: the Creator was merciful to him. Voroshilov, in his self - confident military voice, was holding forth to Bambaev on the various phases of Gothic architecture, and Bambaev only grunted approvingly; it was obvious that Voroshilov had been dinning his phrases into him a long while, and the good - natured enthusiast was beginning to be bored. Compressing his lips and craning his neck, Litvinov listened a long while to their retreating footsteps; for a long time the accents of instructive discourse - - now guttural, now nasal - - reached his ears; at last, all was still again. Litvinov breathed freely, came out of his ambush, and walked on.
Works of Ivan Turgenev (Illustrated) Page 82