How on the instant that dear image led my imagination captive! I seemed
to see once more the meadow before our house, the tall lime-trees in the
garden, the clear pond where the ducks swain, the blue sky dappled with
white clouds, the sweet-smelling ricks of hay. How those memories - aye,
and many another quiet, beloved recollection - floated through my mind at
that time!
XXIII - AFTER THE MAZURKA
At supper the young man whom I have mentioned seated himself beside
me at the children's table, and treated me with an amount of attention
which would have flattered my self-esteem had I been able, after the
occurrence just related, to give a thought to anything beyond my failure
in the mazurka. However, the young man seemed determined to cheer me
up. He jested, called me "old boy," and finally (since none of the
elder folks were looking at us) began to help me to wine, first from one
bottle and then from another and to force me to drink it off quickly.
By the time (towards the end of supper) that a servant had poured me out
a quarter of a glass of champagne, and the young man had straightway bid
him fill it up and urged me to drink the beverage off at a draught, I
had begun to feel a grateful warmth diffusing itself through my body.
I also felt well-disposed towards my kind patron, and began to laugh
heartily at everything. Suddenly the music of the Grosvater dance struck
up, and every one rushed from the table. My friendship with the young
man had now outlived its day; so, whereas he joined a group of the older
folks, I approached Madame Valakhin hear what she and her daughter had
to say to one another.
"Just HALF-an-hour more?" Sonetchka was imploring her.
"Impossible, my dearest."
"Yet, only to please me - just this ONCE?" Sonetchka went on
persuasively.
"Well, what if I should be ill to-morrow through all this dissipation?"
rejoined her mother, and was incautious enough to smile.
"There! You DO consent, and we CAN stay after all!" exclaimed Sonetchka,
jumping for joy.
"What is to be done with such a girl?" said Madame. "Well, run away and
dance. See," she added on perceiving myself, "here is a cavalier ready
waiting for you."
Sonetchka gave me her hand, and we darted off to the salon, The wine,
added to Sonetchka's presence and gaiety, had at once made me forget
all about the unfortunate end of the mazurka. I kept executing the most
splendid feats with my legs - now imitating a horse as he throws out his
hoofs in the trot, now stamping like a sheep infuriated at a dog, and
all the while laughing regardless of appearances.
Sonetchka also laughed unceasingly, whether we were whirling round in
a circle or whether we stood still to watch an old lady whose painful
movements with her feet showed the difficulty she had in walking.
Finally Sonetchka nearly died of merriment when I jumped half-way to the
ceiling in proof of my skill.
As I passed a mirror in Grandmamma's boudoir and glanced at myself
I could see that my face was all in a perspiration and my hair
dishevelled - the top-knot, in particular, being more erect than ever.
Yet my general appearance looked so happy, healthy, and good-tempered
that I felt wholly pleased with myself.
"If I were always as I am now," I thought, "I might yet be able to
please people with my looks." Yet as soon as I glanced at my partner's
face again, and saw there not only the expression of happiness, health,
and good temper which had just pleased me in my own, but also a fresh
and enchanting beauty besides, I felt dissatisfied with myself again.
I understood how silly of me it was to hope to attract the attention
of such a wonderful being as Sonetchka. I could not hope for
reciprocity - could not even think of it, yet my heart was overflowing
with happiness. I could not imagine that the feeling of love which was
filling my soul so pleasantly could require any happiness still greater,
or wish for more than that that happiness should never cease. I felt
perfectly contented. My heart beat like that of a dove, with the blood
constantly flowing back to it, and I almost wept for joy.
As we passed through the hall and peered into a little dark store-room
beneath the staircase I thought: "What bliss it would be if I could pass
the rest of my life with her in that dark corner, and never let anybody
know that we were there!"
"It HAS been a delightful evening, hasn't it?" I asked her in a low,
tremulous voice. Then I quickened my steps - as much out of fear of what
I had said as out of fear of what I had meant to imply.
"Yes, VERY!" she answered, and turned her face to look at me with an
expression so kind that I ceased to be afraid. I went on:
"Particularly since supper. Yet if you could only know how I regret" (I
had nearly said) "how miserable I am at your going, and to think that
we shall see each other no more!"
"But why SHOULDN'T we?" she asked, looking gravely at the corner of
her pocket-handkerchief, and gliding her fingers over a latticed screen
which we were passing. "Every Tuesday and Friday I go with Mamma to the
Iverskoi Prospect. I suppose you go for walks too sometimes?"
"Well, certainly I shall ask to go for one next Tuesday, and, if they
won't take me I shall go by myself - even without my hat, if necessary. I
know the way all right."
"Do you know what I have just thought of?" she went on. "You know, I
call some of the boys who come to see us THOU. Shall you and I call each
other THOU too? Wilt THOU?" she added, bending her head towards me and
looking me straight in the eyes.
At this moment a more lively section of the Grosvater dance began.
"Give me your hand," I said, under the impression that the music and din
would drown my exact words, but she smilingly replied, "THY hand, not
YOUR hand." Yet the dance was over before I had succeeded in saying
THOU, even though I kept conning over phrases in which the pronoun could
be employed - and employed more than once. All that I wanted was the
courage to say it.
"Wilt THOU?" and "THY hand" sounded continually in my ears, and caused
in me a kind of intoxication I could hear and see nothing but Sonetchka.
I watched her mother take her curls, lay them flat behind her ears (thus
disclosing portions of her forehead and temples which I had not yet
seen), and wrap her up so completely in the green shawl that nothing was
left visible but the tip of her nose. Indeed, I could see that, if her
little rosy fingers had not made a small, opening near her mouth, she
would have been unable to breathe. Finally I saw her leave her mother's
arm for an instant on the staircase, and turn and nod to us quickly
before she disappeared through the doorway.
Woloda, the Iwins, the young Prince Etienne, and myself were all of us
in love with Sonetchka and all of us standing on the staircase to follow
her with our eyes. To whom in particular she had nodded I do not know,
but at the moment I firmly believed it to be myself. In taking leave
of the Iwins, I spoke quite unconcernedly, and even coldly, to Seriosha
before I finally shook hands with him. Though he tried to appear
absolutely indifferent, I think that he understood that from that day
forth he had lost both my affection and his power over me, as well as
that he regretted it.
XXIV - IN BED
"How could I have managed to be so long and so passionately devoted to
Seriosha?" I asked myself as I lay in bed that night. "He never either
understood, appreciated, or deserved my love. But Sonetchka! What a
darling SHE is! 'Wilt THOU?' - 'THY hand'!"
I crept closer to the pillows, imagined to myself her lovely face,
covered my head over with the bedclothes, tucked the counterpane in on
all sides, and, thus snugly covered, lay quiet and enjoying the warmth
until I became wholly absorbed in pleasant fancies and reminiscences.
If I stared fixedly at the inside of the sheet above me I found that I
could see her as clearly as I had done an hour ago could talk to her in
my thoughts, and, though it was a conversation of irrational tenor, I
derived the greatest delight from it, seeing that "THOU" and "THINE" and
"for THEE" and "to THEE" occurred in it incessantly. These fancies were
so vivid that I could not sleep for the sweetness of my emotion, and
felt as though I must communicate my superabundant happiness to some
one.
"The darling!" I said, half-aloud, as I turned over; then, "Woloda, are
you asleep?"
"No," he replied in a sleepy voice. "What's the matter?"
"I am in love, Woloda - terribly in love with Sonetchka"
"Well? Anything else?" he replied, stretching himself.
"Oh, but you cannot imagine what I feel just now, as I lay covered over
with the counterpane, I could see her and talk to her so clearly that
it was marvellous! And, do you know, while I was lying thinking about
her - I don't know why it was, but all at once I felt so sad that I could
have cried."
Woloda made a movement of some sort.
"One thing only I wish for," I continued; "and that is that I could
always be with her and always be seeing her. Just that. You are in love
too, I believe. Confess that you are."
It was strange, but somehow I wanted every one to be in love with
Sonetchka, and every one to tell me that they were so.
"So that's how it is with you? " said Woloda, turning round to me.
"Well, I can understand it."
"I can see that you cannot sleep," I remarked, observing by his bright
eyes that he was anything but drowsy. "Well, cover yourself over SO"
(and I pulled the bedclothes over him), "and then let us talk about her.
Isn't she splendid? If she were to say to me, 'Nicolinka, jump out of
the window,' or 'jump into the fire,' I should say, 'Yes, I will do it
at once and rejoice in doing it.' Oh, how glorious she is!"
I went on picturing her again and again to my imagination, and, to enjoy
the vision the better, turned over on my side and buried my head in the
pillows, murmuring, "Oh, I want to cry, Woloda."
"What a fool you are!" he said with a slight laugh. Then, after a
moment's silence he added: "I am not like you. I think I would rather
sit and talk with her."
"Ah! Then you ARE in love with her!" I interrupted.
"And then," went on Woloda, smiling tenderly, "kiss her fingers and eyes
and lips and nose and feet - kiss all of her."
"How absurd!" I exclaimed from beneath the pillows.
"Ah, you don't understand things," said Woloda with contempt.
"I DO understand. It's you who don't understand things, and you talk
rubbish, too," I replied, half-crying.
"Well, there is nothing to cry about," he concluded. "She is only a
girl."
XXV - THE LETTER
ON the 16th of April, nearly six months after the day just described,
Papa entered our schoolroom and told us that that night we must start
with him for our country house. I felt a pang at my heart when I heard
the news, and my thoughts at once turned to Mamma, The cause of our
unexpected departure was the following letter:
"PETROVSKOE, 12th April.
"Only this moment (i.e. at ten o'clock in the evening) have I received
your dear letter of the 3rd of April, but as usual, I answer it at once.
Fedor brought it yesterday from town, but, as it was late, he did not
give it to Mimi till this morning, and Mimi (since I was unwell) kept
it from me all day. I have been a little feverish. In fact, to tell the
truth, this is the fourth day that I have been in bed.
"Yet do not be uneasy. I feel almost myself again now, and if Ivan
Vassilitch should allow me, I think of getting up to-morrow.
"On Friday last I took the girls for a drive, and, close to the little
bridge by the turning on to the high road (the place which always makes
me nervous), the horses and carriage stuck fast in the mud. Well, the
day being fine, I thought that we would walk a little up the road until
the carriage should be extricated, but no sooner had we reached the
chapel than I felt obliged to sit down, I was so tired, and in this way
half-an-hour passed while help was being sent for to get the carriage
dug out. I felt cold, for I had only thin boots on, and they had been
wet through. After luncheon too, I had alternate cold and hot fits, yet
still continued to follow our ordinary routine.
"When tea was over I sat down to the piano to play a duct with
Lubotshka, (you would be astonished to hear what progress she has
made!), but imagine my surprise when I found that I could not count the
beats! Several times I began to do so, yet always felt confused in
my head, and kept hearing strange noises in my ears. I would begin
'One-two-three - ' and then suddenly go on '-eight-fifteen,' and so on,
as though I were talking nonsense and could not help it. At last Mimi
came to my assistance and forced me to retire to bed. That was how my
illness began, and it was all through my own fault. The next day I had
a good deal of fever, and our good Ivan Vassilitch came. He has not left
us since, but promises soon to restore me to the world.
"What a wonderful old man he is! While I was feverish and delirious he
sat the whole night by my bedside without once closing his eyes; and at
this moment (since he knows I am busy writing) he is with the girls in
the divannaia, and I can hear him telling them German stories, and them
laughing as they listen to him.
"'La Belle Flamande,' as you call her, is now spending her second week
here as my guest (her mother having gone to pay a visit somewhere), and
she is most attentive and attached to me, She even tells me her secret
affairs. Under different circumstances her beautiful face, good temper,
and youth might have made a most excellent girl of her, but in the
society in which according to her own account, she moves she will be
wasted. The idea has more than once occurred to me that, had I not had
so many children of my own, it would have been a deed of mercy to have
adopted her.
"Lubotshka had meant to write to you herself, but she has torn up three
sheets of paper, saying: 'I know what a quizzer Papa always is. If he
were to find a single fault in my letter he would show it to everybody.'
Katenka is as charming as usual, and Mimi, too, is good, but tiresome.
"Now let me speak of more serious matters. You write to me that your
affairs are not going well this winter, and that you wish to break into
the revenues of Chabarovska. It seems to me strange that you should
think it necessary to ask my consent. Surely what belongs to me belongs
no less to you? You are so kind-hearted, dear, that, for fear of
worrying me, you conceal the real state of things, but I can guess that
you have lost a great deal at cards, as also that you are afraid of my
being angry at that. Yet, so long as you can tide over this crisis, I
shall not think much of it, and you need not be uneasy, I have grown
accustomed to no longer relying, so far as the children are concerned,
upon your gains at play, nor yet - excuse me for saying so - upon your
income. Therefore your losses cause me as little anxiety as your gains
give me pleasure. What I really grieve over is your unhappy passion
itself for gambling - a passion which bereaves me of part of your tender
affection and obliges me to tell you such bitter truths as (God knows
with what pain) I am now telling you. I never cease to beseech Him that
He may preserve us, not from poverty (for what is poverty?), but from
the terrible juncture which would arise should the interests of the
children, which I am called upon to protect, ever come into collision
with our own. Hitherto God has listened to my prayers. You have never
yet overstepped the limit beyond which we should be obliged either
to sacrifice property which would no longer belong to us, but to the
children, or - It is terrible to think of, but the dreadful misfortune
at which I hint is forever hanging over our heads. Yes, it is the heavy
cross which God has given us both to carry.
"Also, you write about the children, and come back to our old point
of difference by asking my consent to your placing them at a
boarding-school. You know my objection to that kind of education. I
do not know, dear, whether you will accede to my request, but I
nevertheless beseech you, by your love for me, to give me your promise
that never so long as I am alive, nor yet after my death (if God should
see fit to separate us), shall such a thing be done.
"Also you write that our affairs render it indispensable for you to
visit St. Petersburg. The Lord go with you! Go and return as, soon as
possible. Without you we shall all of us be lonely.
"Spring is coming in beautifully. We keep the door on to the terrace
always open now, while the path to the orangery is dry and the
peach-trees are in full blossom. Only here and there is there a little
snow remaining, The swallows are arriving, and to-day Lubotshka brought
me the first flowers. The doctor says that in about three days' time I
shall be well again and able to take the open air and to enjoy the April
sun. Now, au revoir, my dearest one. Do not be alarmed, I beg of you,
either on account of my illness or on account of your losses at play.
End the crisis as soon as possible, and then return here with the
children for the summer. I am making wonderful plans for our passing of
it, and I only need your presence to realise them."
The rest of the letter was written in French, as well as in a strange,
uncertain hand, on another piece of paper. I transcribe it word for
word:
"Do not believe what I have just written to you about my illness. It is
more serious than any one knows. I alone know that I shall never leave
my bed again. Do not, therefore, delay a minute in coming here with the
children. Perhaps it may yet be permitted me to embrace and bless them.
It is my last wish that it should be so. I know what a terrible blow
this will be to you, but you would have had to hear it sooner or
later - if not from me, at least from others. Let us try to, bear the
Calamity with fortitude, and place our trust in the mercy of God. Let
us submit ourselves to His will. Do not think that what I am writing is
some delusion of my sick imagination. On the contrary, I am perfectly
clear at this moment, and absolutely calm. Nor must you comfort yourself
with the false hope that these are the unreal, confused feelings of a
despondent spirit, for I feel indeed, I know, since God has deigned to
reveal it to me - that I have now but a very short time to live. Will my
love for you and the children cease with my life? I know that that can
never be. At this moment I am too full of that love to be capable of
believing that such a feeling (which constitutes a part of my very
existence) can ever, perish. My soul can never lack its love for you;
and I know that that love will exist for ever, since such a feeling
could never have been awakened if it were not to be eternal. I shall no
longer be with you, yet I firmly believe that my love will cleave to
you always, and from that thought I glean such comfort that I await the
approach of death calmly and without fear. Yes, I am calm, and God knows
that I have ever looked, and do look now, upon death as no mere than the
passage to a better life. Yet why do tears blind my eyes? Why should the
children lose a mother's love? Why must you, my husband, experience such
a heavy and unlooked-for blow? Why must I die when your love was making
life so inexpressibly happy for me?
"But His holy will be done!
"The tears prevent my writing more. It may be that I shall never see you
again. I thank you, my darling beyond all price, for all the felicity
with which you have surrounded me in this life. Soon I shall appear
before God Himself to pray that He may reward you. Farewell, my dearest!
Remember that, if I am no longer here, my love will none the less NEVER
AND NOWHERE fail you. Farewell, Woloda - farewell, my pet! Farewell, my
Benjamin, my little Nicolinka! Surely they will never forget me?"
With this letter had come also a French note from Mimi, in which the
latter said:
"The sad circumstances of which she has written to you are but too
surely confirmed by the words of the doctor. Yesterday evening she
ordered the letter to be posted at once, but, thinking at she did so in
delirium, I waited until this morning, with the intention of sealing and
sending it then. Hardly had I done so when Natalia Nicolaevna asked
me what I had done with the letter and told me to burn it if not yet
despatched. She is forever speaking of it, and saying that it will kill
you. Do not delay your departure for an instant if you wish to see the
angel before she leaves us. Pray excuse this scribble, but I have not
slept now for three nights. You know how much I love her."
Later I heard from Natalia Savishna (who passed the whole of the night
of the 11th April at Mamma's bedside) that, after writing the first part
of the letter, Mamma laid it down upon the table beside her and went to
sleep for a while.
"I confess," said Natalia Savishna, "that I too fell asleep in the
arm-chair, and let my knitting slip from my hands. Suddenly, towards one
o'clock in the morning, I heard her saying something; whereupon I opened
my eyes and looked at her. My darling was sitting up in bed, with her
hands clasped together and streams of tears gushing from her eyes.
"'It is all over now,' she said, and hid her face in her hands.
"I sprang to my feet, and asked what the matter was.
"'Ah, Natalia Savishna, if you could only know what I have just
seen!' she said; yet, for all my asking, she would say no more,
beyond commanding me to hand her the letter. To that letter she added
something, and then said that it must be sent off directly. From that
moment she grew, rapidly worse."
XXVI - WHAT AWAITED US AT THE COUNTRY-HOUSE
On the 18th of April we descended from the carriage at the front door
of the house at Petrovskoe. All the way from Moscow Papa had been
preoccupied, and when Woloda had asked him "whether Mamma was ill" he
had looked at him sadly and nodded an affirmative. Nevertheless he had
grown more composed during the journey, and it was only when we were
actually approaching the house that his face again began to grow
anxious, until, as he leaped from the carriage and asked Foka (who
had run breathlessly to meet us), "How is Natalia Nicolaevna now?" his
voice, was trembling, and his eyes had filled with tears. The good, old
Foka looked at us, and then lowered his gaze again. Finally he said as
he opened the hall-door and turned his head aside: "It is the sixth day
since she has not left her bed."
Milka (who, as we afterwards learned, had never ceased to whine from the
day when Mamma was taken ill) came leaping, joyfully to meet Papa, and
barking a welcome as she licked his hands, but Papa put her aside, and
went first to the drawing-room, and then into the divannaia, from which
a door led into the bedroom. The nearer he approached the latter, the
more, did his movements express the agitation that he felt. Entering the
divannaia he crossed it on tiptoe, seeming to hold his breath. Even then
he had to stop and make the sign of the cross before he could summon up
courage to turn the handle. At the same moment Mimi, with dishevelled
hair and eyes red with weeping came hastily out of the corridor.
"Ah, Peter Alexandritch!" she said in a whisper and with a marked
expression of despair. Then, observing that Papa was trying to open the
door, she whispered again:
"Not here. This door is locked. Go round to the door on the other side."
Oh, how terribly all this wrought upon my imagination, racked as it was
by grief and terrible forebodings!
So we went round to the other side. In the corridor we met the gardener,
Akim, who had been wont to amuse us with his grimaces, but at this
moment I could see nothing comical in him. Indeed, the sight of his
thoughtless, indifferent face struck me more painfully than anything
else. In the maidservants' hall, through which we had to pass, two maids
were sitting at their work, but rose to salute us with an expression so
mournful that I felt completely overwhelmed.
Passing also through Mimi's room, Papa opened the door of the bedroom,
and we entered. The two windows on the right were curtained over, and
close to them was seated, Natalia Savishna, spectacles on nose and
engaged in darning stockings. She did not approach us to kiss me as she
had been used to do, but just rose and looked at us, her tears beginning
to flow afresh. Somehow it frightened me to see every one, on beholding
us, begin to cry, although they had been calm enough before.
On the left stood the bed behind a screen, while in the great arm-chair
the doctor lay asleep. Beside the bed a young, fair-haired and
remarkably beautiful girl in a white morning wrapper was applying ice to
Mamma's head, but Mamma herself I could not see. This girl was "La
Belle Flamande" of whom Mamma had written, and who afterwards played so
important a part in our family life. As we entered she disengaged one
of her hands, straightened the pleats of her dress on her bosom, and
whispered, "She is insensible." Though I was in an agony of grief, I
observed at that moment every little detail.
It was almost dark in the room, and very hot, while the air was heavy
with the mingled, scent of mint, eau-de-cologne, camomile, and Hoffman's
pastilles. The latter ingredient caught my attention so strongly that
even now I can never hear of it, or even think of it, without my memory
carrying me back to that dark, close room, and all the details of that
dreadful time.
Mamma's eyes were wide open, but they could not see us. Never shall I
forget the terrible expression in them - the expression of agonies of
suffering!
Then we were taken away.
When, later, I was able to ask Natalia Savishna about Mamma's last
moments she told me the following:
"After you were taken out of the room, my beloved one struggled for a
long time, as though some one were trying to strangle her. Then at last
she laid her head back upon the pillow, and slept softly, peacefully,
like an angel from Heaven. I went away for a moment to see about her
medicine, and just as I entered the room again my darling was throwing
the bedclothes from off her and calling for your Papa. He stooped over
her, but strength failed her to say what she wanted to. All she could
do was to open her lips and gasp, 'My God, my God! The children, the
children!' I would have run to fetch you, but Ivan Vassilitch stopped
me, saying that it would only excite her - it were best not to do so.
Then suddenly she stretched her arms out and dropped them again. What
she meant by that gesture the good God alone knows, but I think that in
it she was blessing you - you the children whom she could not see. God
did not grant her to see her little ones before her death. Then she
raised herself up - did my love, my darling - yes, just so with her hands,
and exclaimed in a voice which I cannot bear to remember, 'Mother of
God, never forsake them!'"
"Then the pain mounted to her heart, and from her eyes it as, plain that
she suffered terribly, my poor one! She sank back upon the pillows, tore
the bedclothes with her teeth, and wept - wept - "
"Yes and what then?" I asked but Natalia Savishna could say no more. She
turned away and cried bitterly.
Mamma had expired in terrible agonies.
XXVII - GRIEF
LATE the following evening I thought I would like to look at her once
more; so, conquering an involuntary sense of fear, I gently opened the
door of the salon and entered on tiptoe.
In the middle of the room, on a table, lay the coffin, with wax candles
burning all round it on tall silver candelabra. In the further corner
sat the chanter, reading the Psalms in a low, monotonous voice. I
stopped at the door and tried to look, but my eyes were so weak with
crying, and my nerves so terribly on edge, that I could distinguish
nothing. Every object seemed to mingle together in a strange blur - the
candles, the brocade, the velvet, the great candelabra, the pink satin
cushion trimmed with lace, the chaplet of flowers, the ribboned cap, and
something of a transparent, wax-like colour. I mounted a chair to see
her face, yet where it should have been I could see only that wax-like,
transparent something. I could not believe it to be her face. Yet, as
I stood grazing at it, I at last recognised the well-known, beloved
features. I shuddered with horror to realise that it WAS she. Why were
those eyes so sunken? What had laid that dreadful paleness upon her
cheeks, and stamped the black spot beneath the transparent skin on one
of them? Why was the expression of the whole face so cold and severe?
Why were the lips so white, and their outline so beautiful, so majestic,
so expressive of an unnatural calm that, as I looked at them, a chill
shudder ran through my hair and down my back?
Somehow, as I gazed, an irrepressible, incomprehensible power seemed
to compel me to keep my eyes fixed upon that lifeless face. I could not
turn away, and my imagination began to picture before me scenes of her
active life and happiness. I forgot that the corpse lying before me
now - the THING at which I was gazing unconsciously as at an object which
had nothing in common with my dreams - was SHE. I fancied I could
see her - now here, now there, alive, happy, and smiling. Then some
well-known feature in the face at which I was gazing would suddenly
arrest my attention, and in a flash I would recall the terrible reality
and shudder-though still unable to turn my eyes away.
Then again the dreams would replace reality - then again the reality put
to flight the dreams. At last the consciousness of both left me, and for
a while I became insensible.
How long I remained in that condition I do not know, nor yet how it
occurred. I only know that for a time I lost all sense of existence, and
experienced a kind of vague blissfulness which though grand and sweet,
was also sad. It may be that, as it ascended to a better world, her
beautiful soul had looked down with longing at the world in which she
had left us - that it had seen my sorrow, and, pitying me, had returned
to earth on the wings of love to console and bless me with a heavenly
smile of compassion.
The door creaked as the chanter entered who was to relieve his
predecessor. The noise awakened me, and my first thought was that,
seeing me standing on the chair in a posture which had nothing touching
in its aspect, he might take me for an unfeeling boy who had climbed
on to the chair out of mere curiosity: wherefore I hastened to make the
sign of the cross, to bend down my head, and to burst out crying. As I
recall now my impressions of that episode I find that it was only during
my moments of self-forgetfulness that my grief was wholehearted. True,
both before and after the funeral I never ceased to cry and to look
miserable, yet I feel conscience-stricken when I recall that grief
of mine, seeing that always present in it there was an element of
conceit - of a desire to show that I was more grieved than any one else,
of an interest which I took in observing the effect, produced upon
others by my tears, and of an idle curiosity leading me to remark
Mimi's bonnet and the faces of all present. The mere circumstance that
I despised myself for not feeling grief to the exclusion of everything
else, and that I endeavoured to conceal the fact, shows that my sadness
was insincere and unnatural. I took a delight in feeling that I was
unhappy, and in trying to feel more so. Consequently this egotistic
consciousness completely annulled any element of sincerity in my woe.
That night I slept calmly and soundly (as is usual after any great
emotion), and awoke with my tears dried and my nerves restored. At ten
o'clock we were summoned to attend the pre-funeral requiem.
The room was full of weeping servants and peasants who had come to bid
farewell to their late mistress. During the service I myself wept
a great deal, made frequent signs of the cross, and performed many
genuflections, but I did not pray with, my soul, and felt, if anything,
almost indifferent, My thoughts were chiefly centred upon the new coat
which I was wearing (a garment which was tight and uncomfortable) and
upon how to avoid soiling my trousers at the knees. Also I took the most
minute notice of all present.
Papa stood at the head of the coffin. He was as white as snow, and
only with difficulty restrained his tears. His tall figure in its black
frockcoat, his pale, expressive face, the graceful, assured manner in
which, as usual, he made the sign of the cross or bowed until he touched
the floor with his hand [A custom of the Greek funeral rite.] or took
the candle from the priest or went to the coffin - all were exceedingly
effective; yet for some reason or another I felt a grudge against him
for that very ability to appear effective at such a moment. Mimi stood
leaning against the wall as though scarcely able to support herself. Her
dress was all awry and covered with feathers, and her cap cocked to one
side, while her eyes were red with weeping, her legs trembling under
her, and she sobbed incessantly in a heartrending manner as ever and
again she buried her face in her handkerchief or her hands. I imagine
that she did this to check her continual sobbing without being seen by
the spectators. I remember, too, her telling Papa, the evening before,
that Mamma's death had come upon her as a blow from which she could
never hope to recover; that with Mamma she had lost everything; but that
"the angel," as she called my mother, had not forgotten her when at the
point of death, since she had declared her wish to render her (Mimi's)
and Katenka's fortunes secure for ever. Mimi had shed bitter tears
while relating this, and very likely her sorrow, if not wholly pure and
disinterested, was in the main sincere. Lubotshka, in black garments
and suffused with tears, stood with her head bowed upon her breast. She
rarely looked at the coffin, yet whenever she did so her face expressed
a sort of childish fear. Katenka stood near her mother, and, despite
her lengthened face, looked as lovely as ever. Woloda's frank nature
was frank also in grief. He stood looking grave and as though he were
staring at some object with fixed eyes. Then suddenly his lips would
begin to quiver, and he would hastily make the sign of the cross, and
bend his head again.
Such of those present as were strangers I found intolerable. In fact,
the phrases of condolence with which they addressed Papa (such, for
instance, as that "she is better off now" "she was too good for this
world," and so on) awakened in me something like fury. What right had
they to weep over or to talk about her? Some of them, in referring to
ourselves, called us "orphans" - just as though it were not a matter of
common knowledge that children who have lost their mother are known as
orphans! Probably (I thought) they liked to be the first to give us that
name, just as some people find pleasure in being the first to address a
newly-married girl as "Madame."
In a far corner of the room, and almost hidden by the open door, of the
dining-room, stood a grey old woman with bent knees. With hands clasped
together and eyes lifted to heaven, she prayed only - not wept. Her soul
was in the presence of God, and she was asking Him soon to reunite her
to her whom she had loved beyond all beings on this earth, and whom she
steadfastly believed that she would very soon meet again.
"There stands one who SINCERELY loved her," I thought to myself, and
felt ashamed.
The requiem was over. They uncovered the face of the deceased, and all
present except ourselves went to the coffin to give her the kiss of
farewell.
One of the last to take leave of her departed mistress was a peasant
woman who was holding by the hand a pretty little girl of five whom she
had brought with her, God knows for what reason. Just at a moment when
I chanced to drop my wet handkerchief and was stooping to pick it up
again, a loud, piercing scream startled me, and filled me with such
terror that, were I to live a hundred years more, I should never forget
it. Even now the recollection always sends a cold shudder through my
frame. I raised my head. Standing on the chair near the coffin was the
peasant woman, while struggling and fighting in her arms was the
little girl, and it was this same poor child who had screamed with such
dreadful, desperate frenzy as, straining her terrified face away, she
still, continued to gaze with dilated eyes at the face of the corpse.
I too screamed in a voice perhaps more dreadful still, and ran headlong
from the room.
Only now did I understand the source of the strong, oppressive smell
which, mingling with the scent of the incense, filled the chamber, while
the thought that the face which, but a few days ago, had been full of
freshness and beauty - the face which I loved more than anything else in
all the world - was now capable of inspiring horror at length revealed to
me, as though for the first time, the terrible truth, and filled my soul
with despair.
XXVIII - SAD RECOLLECTIONS
Mamma was no longer with us, but our life went on as usual. We went
to bed and got up at the same times and in the same rooms; breakfast,
luncheon, and supper continued to be at their usual hours; everything
remained standing in its accustomed place; nothing in the house or in
our mode of life was altered: only, she was not there.
Yet it seemed to me as though such a misfortune ought to have changed
everything. Our old mode of life appeared like an insult to her memory.
It recalled too vividly her presence.
The day before the funeral I felt as though I should like to rest a
little after luncheon, and accordingly went to Natalia Savishna's room
with the intention of installing myself comfortably under the warm, soft
down of the quilt on her bed. When I entered I found Natalia herself
lying on the bed and apparently asleep, but, on hearing my footsteps,
she raised herself up, removed the handkerchief which had been
protecting her face from the flies, and, adjusting her cap, sat forward
on the edge of the bed. Since it frequently happened that I came to lie
down in her room, she guessed my errand at once, and said:
"So you have come to rest here a little, have you? Lie down, then, my
dearest."
"Oh, but what is the matter with you, Natalia Savishna?" I exclaimed
as I forced her back again. "I did not come for that. No, you are tired
yourself, so you LIE down."
"I am quite rested now, darling," she said (though I knew that it was
many a night since she had closed her eyes). "Yes, I am indeed, and have
no wish to sleep again," she added with a deep sigh.
I felt as though I wanted to speak to her of our misfortune, since I
knew her sincerity and love, and thought that it would be a consolation
to me to weep with her.
"Natalia Savishna," I said after a pause, as I seated myself upon the
bed, "who would ever have thought of this?"
The old woman looked at me with astonishment, for she did not quite
understand my question.
"Yes, who would ever have thought of it?" I repeated.
"Ah, my darling," she said with a glance of tender compassion, "it is
not only 'Who would ever have thought of it?' but 'Who, even now, would
ever believe it?' I am old, and my bones should long ago have gone to
rest rather than that I should have lived to see the old master, your