A Nobleman's Nest Part 7

"Apparently, she likes him,--however, the Lord only knows. Another man's soul, thou knowest, is a dark forest, much more the soul of a young girl.

Now, there's Schurotchka's soul--try to dissect that! Why has she been hiding herself, and yet does not go away, ever since thou camest?"

Schurotchka snorted with suppressed laughter and ran out of the room, and Lavretzky rose from his seat.

"Yes,"--he said slowly:--"a maiden's soul is not to be divined."

He began to take leave.

"Well? Shall we see thee again soon?"--asked Marfa Timofeevna.

"That's as it may happen, aunty; it is not far off."

"Yes, but thou art going to Vasilievskoe. Thou wilt not live at Lavriki:--well, that is thy affair; only, go and salute the tomb of thy mother, and the tomb of thy grandmother too, by the bye. Thou hast acquired all sorts of learning yonder abroad, and who knows, perchance they will feel it in their graves that thou hast come to them. And don't forget, Fedya, to have a requiem service celebrated for Glafira Petrovna also; here's a silver ruble for thee. Take it, take it, I want to pay for having a requiem service for her. During her lifetime I did not like her, but there's no denying it, the woman had plenty of character. She was a clever creature; and she did not wrong thee, either.

And now go, with G.o.d's blessing, or thou wilt grow weary of me."

And Marfa Timofeevna embraced her nephew.

"And Liza shall not marry Panshin,--don't worry about that; that's not the sort of husband she deserves."

"Why, I am not worrying in the least," replied Lavretzky, and withdrew.

[7] Ivan the Terrible left a long record of his distinguished victims, for the repose of whose souls he ordered prayers to be said in perpetuity. "Book of Remembrance" contains the names of persons who are to be prayed for at the general requiem services, and so forth.

--Translator.

XVIII

Four hours later, he was driving homeward. His tarantas rolled swiftly along the soft country road. There had been a drought for a fortnight; a thin milky cloud was diffused through the air, and veiled the distant forests; it reeked with the odour of burning. A mult.i.tude of small, dark cloudlets, with indistinctly delineated edges, were creeping across the pale-blue sky; a fairly strong wind was whisking along in a dry, uninterrupted stream, without dispelling the sultriness. Leaning his head against a cushion, and folding his arms on his breast, Lavretzky gazed at the strips of ploughed land, in fan-shape, which flew past, at the willow-trees slowly flitting by, at the stupid crows and daws gazing with dull suspicion askance at the pa.s.sing equipage, at the long strips of turf between the cultivated sections, overgrown with artemisia, wormwood, and wild tansy; he gazed ... and that fresh, fertile nakedness and wildness of the steppe, that verdure, those long hillocks, the ravines with stubby oak bushes, the grey hamlets, the flexible birch-trees,--this whole Russian picture, which he had not seen for a long time, wafted into his soul sweet and, at the same time, painful sensations, weighed on his breast with a certain agreeable oppression. His thoughts slowly roved about; their outlines were as indistinct and confused as the outlines of those lofty cloudlets, which, also, seemed to be roving. He recalled his childhood, his mother; he remembered how she died, how they had carried him to her, and how she, pressing his head to her bosom, had begun to sing feebly over him, but had cast a glance at Glafira Petrovna--and had relapsed into silence. He recalled his father, at first alert, dissatisfied with every one, and with a brazen voice,--then blind, tearful, and with a dirty grey beard; he recalled how, one day, at table, after drinking an extra gla.s.s of wine, and spilling the sauce over his napkin, he had suddenly burst out laughing, and had begun, winking his sightless eyes and flushing crimson, to tell stories of his conquests; he recalled Varvara Pavlovna,--and involuntarily screwed up his eyes, as a man does from momentary inward pain, and shook his head. Then his thoughts came to a pause on Liza.

"Here," he thought, "is a new being, who is only just entering upon life.

A splendid young girl, what will become of her? She is comely. A pale, fresh face, such serious eyes and lips, and an honest and innocent gaze.

It is a pity that she seems to be somewhat enthusiastic. A splendid figure, and she walks so lightly, and her voice is soft. I greatly like to see her pause suddenly, listen attentively, without a smile, and then meditate, and toss back her hair. Really, it strikes me that Panshin is not worthy of her. But what is there wrong about him? She will traverse the road which all traverse. I had better take a nap." And Lavretzky closed his eyes.

He could not get to sleep, but plunged into the dreamy stupor of the road. Images of the past, as before, arose in leisurely fashion, floated through his soul, mingling and entangling themselves with other scenes.

Lavretzky, G.o.d knows why, began to think about Robert Peel ... about French history ... about how he would win a battle if he were a general; he thought he heard shots and shrieks.... His head sank to one side, he opened his eyes.... The same fields, the same views of the steppe; the polished shoes of the trace-horse flashed in turn through the billowing dust; the shirt of the postilion, yellow, with red gussets at the armpits, puffed out in the wind.... "A pretty way to return to my native land"--flashed through Lavretzky's head; and he shouted: "Faster!"

wrapped himself up in his cloak, and leaned back harder against his pillow. The tarantas gave a jolt: Lavretzky sat upright, and opened his eyes wide. Before him, on a hillock, a tiny hamlet lay outspread; a little to the right, a small, ancient manor-house was to be seen, with closed shutters and a crooked porch; all over the s.p.a.cious yard, from the very gates, grew nettles, green and thick as hemp; there, also, stood a small oaken store-house, still sound. This was Vasilievskoe.

The postilion turned up to the gate, and brought the horses to a standstill; Lavretzky's footman rose on the box, and, as though preparing to spring down, shouted: "Hey!" A hoa.r.s.e, dull barking rang out, but not even the dog showed himself; the lackey again prepared to leap down, and again shouted: "Hey!" The decrepit barking was renewed, and, a moment later, a man ran out into the yard, no one could tell whence,--a man in a nankeen kaftan, with a head as white as snow; shielding his eyes with his hand, he stared at the tarantas, suddenly slapped himself on both thighs, at first danced about a little on one spot, then ran to open the gate. The tarantas drove into the yard, the wheels rustling against the nettles, and halted in front of the porch.

The white-headed man, very nimble, to all appearances, was already standing, with his feet planted very wide apart and very crooked, on the last step; and having unb.u.t.toned the ap.r.o.n, convulsively held up the leather and aided the master to descend to the earth, and then kissed his hand.

"Good-day, good-day, brother,"--said Lavretzky,--"I think thy name is Anton? Thou art still alive?"

The old man bowed in silence, and ran to fetch the keys. While he was gone, the postilion sat motionless, bending sideways and gazing at the locked door; but Lavretzky's lackey remained standing as he had sprung down, in a picturesque pose, with one hand resting on the box. The old man brought the keys, and quite unnecessarily writhing like a serpent, raising his elbows on high, he unlocked the door, stepped aside, and again bowed to his girdle.

"Here I am at home, here I have got back,"--said Lavretzky to himself, as he entered the tiny anteroom, while the shutters were opened, one after the other, with a bang and a squeak, and the daylight penetrated into the deserted rooms.

XIX

The tiny house where Lavretzky had arrived, and where, two years previously, Glafira Petrovna had breathed her last, had been built in the previous century, out of st.u.r.dy pine lumber; in appearance it was decrepit, but was capable of standing another fifty years or more.

Lavretzky made the round of all the rooms, and, to the great discomfiture of the aged, languid flies, with white dust on their backs, who were sitting motionless under the lintels of the doors, he ordered all the windows to be opened; no one had opened them since the death of Glafira Petrovna. Everything in the house remained as it had been: the small, spindle-legged couches in the drawing-room, covered with glossy grey material, worn through and flattened down, vividly recalled the days of Katherine II; in the drawing-room, also, stood the mistress's favourite chair, with a tall, straight back, against which, even in her old age, she had not leaned. On the princ.i.p.al wall hung an ancient portrait of Feodor's great-grandfather, Andrei Lavretzky; the dark, sallow face was barely discernible against the warped and blackened background; the small, vicious eyes gazed surlily from beneath pendent, swollen lids; the black hair, devoid of powder, rose in a brush over the heavy, deeply-seamed brow. On the corner of the portrait hung a wreath of dusty immortelles. "Glafira Petrovna herself was pleased to weave it,"

announced Anton. In the bedchamber rose a narrow bed, under a tester of ancient, striped material, of very excellent quality; a mountain of faded pillows, and a thin quilted coverlet, lay on the bed, and by the head of the bed hung an image of the Presentation in the Temple of the All-Holy Birthgiver of G.o.d, the very same image to which the old spinster, as she lay dying alone and forgotten by every one, had pressed for the last time, her lips which were already growing cold. The toilet-table, of inlaid wood with bra.s.s tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs and a crooked mirror with tarnished gilding, stood by the window. Alongside the bedroom was the room for the holy pictures, a tiny chamber, with bare walls and a heavy shrine of images in the corner; on the floor lay a small, threadbare rug, spotted with wax; Glafira Petrovna had been wont to make her prostrations upon it. Anton went off with Lavretzky's lackey to open the stable and carriage-house; in his stead, there presented herself an old woman, almost of the same age as he, with a kerchief bound round her head, down to her very brows; her head trembled, and her eyes gazed dully, but expressed zeal, and a long-established habit of serving with a.s.siduity, and, at the same time, a certain respectful commiseration. She kissed Lavretzky's hand, and paused at the door, in antic.i.p.ation of orders. He positively was unable to recall her name; he could not even remember whether he had ever seen her. It turned out that her name was Apraxyeya; forty years before, that same Glafira Petrovna had banished her from the manor-house service, and had ordered her to attend to the fowls; however, she said little,--as though she had outlived her mind,--and only looked on cringingly. In addition to these two old people, and three potbellied brats in long shirts, Anton's great-grandchildren, there dwelt in the service-rooms of the manor a one-armed little old peasant, who was exempt from compulsory service; he made a drumming noise like a woodc.o.c.k when he spoke, and was not capable of doing anything. Not much more useful than he was the decrepit dog, who had welcomed Lavretzky's home-coming with his bark: it had already been fastened up for ten years with a heavy chain, bought by order of Glafira Petrovna, and was barely in a condition to move and drag its burden. After inspecting the house, Lavretzky went out into the park, and was satisfied with it. It was all overgrown with tall gra.s.s, burdock, and gooseberry and raspberry bushes; but there was much shade in it: there were many old linden-trees, which surprised the beholder by their huge size and the strange arrangement of their branches; they had been too closely planted, and at some time or other--a hundred years before--had been pollarded. The park ended in a small, clear pond, with a rim of tall, reddish reeds. The traces of human life fade away very quickly: Glafira Petrovna's farm had not succeeded in running wild, but it already seemed plunged in that tranquil dream wherewith everything on earth doth dream, where the restless infection of people does not exist. Feodor Ivanitch also strolled through the village; the women stared at him from the thresholds of their cottages, each with her cheek propped on one hand; the peasant men saluted him from afar; the children ran away; the dogs barked indifferently. At last he felt hungry, but he did not expect his servants and cook until toward evening; the cart with provisions from Lavriki had not yet arrived,--he was compelled to appeal to Anton. Anton immediately arranged matters: he caught an old hen, cut its throat, and plucked it; Apraxyeya rubbed and scrubbed it for a long time, and washed it, like linen, before she placed it in the stew-pan; when, at last, it was cooked, Anton put on the table-cloth and set the table, placed in front of the plate a blackened salt-cellar of plated ware on three feet, and a small faceted carafe with a round gla.s.s stopper and a narrow neck; then he announced to Lavretzky, in a chanting voice, that the meal was ready,--and took up his post behind his chair, having wound a napkin around his right fist, and disseminating some strong, ancient odour, which resembled the odour of cypress wood. Lavretzky tasted the soup, and came upon the hen; its skin was all covered with big pimples, a thick tendon ran down each leg, its flesh had a flavour of charcoal and lye. When he had finished his dinner, Lavretzky said that he would like some tea, if.... "This very moment, sir, I will serve it, sir,"--interrupted the old man,--and he kept his promise. A pinch of tea was hunted up, wrapped in a sc.r.a.p of red paper, a small but very mettlesome and noisy samovar was searched out, also sugar, in very tiny bits, that seemed to have been melted around the edges. Lavretzky drank his tea out of a large cup; he remembered that cup in his childhood: playing-cards were depicted on it, only visitors drank out of it,--and he now drank out of it, like a visitor. Toward evening, his servants arrived; Lavretzky did not wish to sleep in his aunt's bed; he gave orders that a bed should be made up for him in the dining-room. Extinguishing the candle, he stared about him for a long time, and meditated on cheerless thoughts; he experienced the sensation familiar to every man who chances to pa.s.s the night, for the first time, in a place which has long been uninhabited; it seemed to him that the darkness which surrounded him on all sides could not accustom itself to the new inhabitant, that the very walls of the house were waxing indignant. At last he sighed, drew the coverlet up over him, and fell asleep. Anton remained afoot longer than the rest; for a long time he whispered with Apraxyeya, groaned in a low tone, and crossed himself a couple of times. Neither of them expected that the master would settle down among them at Vasilievskoe, when, near at hand, he owned such a magnificent estate, with a capitally-organised manor-house; they did not even suspect that it was precisely that manor-house which was repugnant to Lavretzky: it evoked in him oppressive memories. After having whispered his fill, Anton took his staff, and beat upon the board at the store-house which had long been hanging silent,[8] and immediately lay down for a nap in the yard, without covering up his grey head with anything. The May night was tranquil and caressing--and the old man slumbered sweetly.

[8] It is the duty of the night-watchman to beat upon the board at regular intervals, to show that he is vigilant.--Translator.

XX

The next morning Lavretzky rose quite early, had a talk with the overseer, visited the threshing-floor, ordered the chain to be removed from the watch-dog, who only barked a little, but did not even move away from his kennel;--and on his return home, sank into a sort of peaceful torpor, from which he did not emerge all day. "I have sunk down to the very bottom of the river now," he said to himself more than once. He sat by the window, made no movement, and seemed to be listening to the current of tranquil life which surrounded him, to the infrequent noises of the country solitudes. Yonder, somewhere beyond the nettles, some one began to sing, in the shrillest of voices; a gnat seemed to be chiming in with the voice. Now it ceased, but the gnat still squeaked on; athwart the energetic, insistently-plaintive buzzing of the flies resounded the booming of a fat b.u.mble-bee, which kept b.u.mping its head against the ceiling; a c.o.c.k on the road began to crow, hoa.r.s.ely prolonging the last note; a peasant cart rumbled past; the gate toward the village creaked.

"Well?" suddenly quavered a woman's voice.--"Okh, thou my dear little sweetheart," said Anton to a little girl of two years, whom he was dandling in his arms. "Fetch some kvas," repeats the same female voice,--and all at once a deathlike silence ensues; nothing makes any noise, nothing stirs; the breeze does not flutter a leaf; the swallows dart along near the ground, one after the other, without a cry, and sadness descends upon the soul from their silent flight.--"Here I am, sunk down to the bottom of the river," Lavretzky says to himself again.--"And life is at all times tranquil, leisurely here," he thinks:--"whoever enters its circle must become submissive: here there is nothing to agitate one's self about, nothing to disturb; here success awaits only him who lays out his path without haste, as the husbandman lays the furrow with his plough." And what strength there is all around, what health there is in this inactive calm! Yonder now, under the window, a st.u.r.dy burdock is making its way out from among the thick gra.s.s; above it, the lovage is stretching forth its succulent stalk, the Virgin's-tears[9] toss still higher their rosy tendrils; and yonder, further away, in the fields, the rye is gleaming, and the oats are beginning to shoot up their stalks, and every leaf on every tree, every blade of gra.s.s on its stalk, spreads itself out to its fullest extent. "My best years have been spent on the love of a woman," Lavretzky pursued his meditations:--"may the irksomeness here sober me, may it soothe me, prepare me so that I may understand how to do my work without haste"; and again he began to lend an ear to the silence, expecting nothing,--and, at the same time, as it were incessantly expecting something: the silence enfolds him on all sides, the sun glides quietly across the calm blue sky, a cloud floats gently in its wake; it seems as though they know whither and why they are floating. At that same moment, in other spots on earth, life was seething, bustling, roaring; here the same life was flowing on inaudibly, like water amid marsh-gra.s.s; and until the very evening, Lavretzky could not tear himself from the contemplation of that life fleeting, flowing onward; grief for the past melted in his soul like snows of springtime,--and, strange to say!--never had the feeling of his native land been so deep and strong within him.

[9] This plant bears round seed-pods of mottled-grey, which are often used to make very pretty rosaries.--Translator.

XXI

In the course of a fortnight, Feodor Ivanitch brought Glafira Petrovna's little house into order; cleaned up the yard, the garden; comfortable furniture was brought to him from Lavriki, wine, books, newspapers from the town; horses made their appearance in the stables; in a word, Feodor Ivanitch provided himself with everything that was necessary and began to live--not exactly like a country squire, nor yet exactly like a recluse. His days pa.s.sed monotonously, but he was not bored, although he saw no one; he occupied himself diligently and attentively with the farming operations, he rode about the neighbourhood on horseback, he read. He read but little, however: it was more agreeable for him to listen to the tales of old Anton. As a rule, Lavretzky would seat himself with a pipe of tobacco and a cup of cold tea near the window; Anton would stand near the door, with his hands clasped behind him, and begin his leisurely stories of olden times,--of those fabulous times--when the oats and barley were sold not by measures but by huge sacks, at two or three kopeks the sack; when in all directions, even close to the town, stretched impenetrable forests, untouched steppes.

"And now," wailed the old man, who was already over eighty years of age:--"they have felled and ploughed up everything until there is no place to drive through." Anton, also, related many things concerning his mistress Glafira Petrovna: how sagacious and economical she had been; how a certain gentleman, a youthful neighbour, had attempted to gain her good-will, had taken to calling frequently,--and how she had been pleased, for his benefit, even to don her cap with rose-purple ribbons, and her yellow gown of tru-tru levantine; but how, later on, having flown into a rage with her neighbour, on account of the unseemly question: "What might your capital amount to, madam?" she had given orders that he should not be admitted, and how she had then commanded, that everything, down to the very smallest sc.r.a.p, should be given to Feodor Ivanitch after her death. And, in fact, Lavretzky found all his aunt's effects intact, not excepting the festival cap, with the rose-purple ribbons, and the gown of yellow tru-tru levantine. The ancient papers and curious doc.u.ments, which Lavretzky had counted upon, proved not to exist, with the exception of one tattered little old book, in which his grandfather, Piotr Andreitch, had jotted down, now--"Celebration in the city of Saint Petersburg of the peace concluded with the Turkish Empire by his Ill.u.s.triousness Prince Alexander Alexandrovitch Prozorovsky"; now a recipe for a decoction for the chest, with the comment: "This instruction was given to Generaless Praskovya Feodorovna Saltykoff, by Feodor Avksentievitch, Archpriest of the Church of the Life-giving Trinity"; again, some item of political news, like the following: "In the '_Moscow News_,' it is announced that Premier-Major Mikhail Petrovitch Koltcheff has died. Was not he the son of Piotr Vasilievitch Koltcheff?" Lavretzky also found several ancient calendars and dream-books, and the mystical works of Mr. Ambodik; many memories were awakened in him by the long-forgotten but familiar "Symbols and Emblems."

In Glafira Petrovna's toilet-table Lavretzky found a small packet, tied with black ribbon, and sealed with black wax, thrust into the remotest recesses of the drawer. In the packet, face to face, lay a pastel portrait of his father in his youth, with soft curls tumbling over his brow, with long, languid eyes, and mouth half opened,--and the almost effaced portrait of a pale woman in a white gown, with a white rose in her hand,--his mother. Glafira Petrovna had never permitted her own portrait to be made.--"Dear little father Feodor Ivanitch,"--Anton was wont to say to Lavretzky:--"although I did not then have my residence in the manor-house of the masters, yet I remember your great-grandfather, Andrei Afanasievitch,--that I do; I was eighteen years of age when he died. Once I met him in the garden,--my very hamstrings shook; but he did nothing, only inquired my name,--and sent me to his chamber for a pocket-handkerchief. He was a real gentleman, there's no gainsaying that,--and he recognised no superior over him. For I must inform you, that your great-grandfather had a wonderful amulet,--a monk from Mount Athos gave him that amulet. And that monk said to him: 'I give thee this for thine affability, Boyarin; wear it--and fear not fate.' Well, and of course, dear little father, you know, what sort of times those were; what the master took a notion to do, that he did. Once in a while, some one, even one of the gentry, would take it into his head to thwart him; but no sooner did he look at him, than he would say: 'You're sailing in shoal water'--that was his favourite expression. And he lived, your great-grandfather of blessed memory, in a tiny wooden mansion; but what property he left behind him, what silver, and all sorts of supplies,--all the cellars were filled to the brim! He was a master. That little carafe, which you were pleased to praise,--belonged to him: he drank vodka from it. And then your grandfather, Piotr Ivanitch, built himself a stone mansion; but he acquired no property; with him everything went at sixes and sevens; and he lived worse than his papa, and got no pleasure for himself,--but wasted all the money, and there was none to pay for requiems for his soul; he left not even a silver spoon behind him, so it was lucky that Glafira Petrovna brought things into order."

"And is it true,"--Lavretzky interrupted him,--"that she was called an ill-tempered old hag?"

"Why, surely, some did call her that!"--returned Anton, in displeasure.

"WELL, little father,"--the old man one day summoned the courage to ask;--"and how about our young mistress; where is she pleased to have her residence?"

"I have separated from my wife,"--said Lavretzky, with an effort:--"please do not inquire about her."

"I obey, sir,"--replied the old man, sadly.