Fathers and Children Part 24

'And since you don't quite understand me, I'll tell you this--to my mind, it's better to break stones on the highroad than to let a woman have the mastery of even the end of one's little finger. That's all ...' Bazarov was on the point of uttering his favourite word, 'romanticism,' but he checked himself, and said, 'rubbish. You don't believe me now, but I tell you; you and I have been in feminine society, and very nice we found it; but to throw up society like that is for all the world like a dip in cold water on a hot day. A man hasn't time to attend to such trifles; a man ought not to be tame, says an excellent Spanish proverb. Now, you, I suppose, my sage friend,' he added, turning to the peasant sitting on the box--'you've a wife?'

The peasant showed both the friends his dull blear-eyed face.

'A wife? Yes. Every man has a wife.'

'Do you beat her?'

'My wife? Everything happens sometimes. We don't beat her without good reason!'

'That's excellent. Well, and does she beat you?'

The peasant gave a tug at the reins. 'That's a strange thing to say, sir. You like your joke.'... He was obviously offended.

'You hear, Arkady Nikolaevitch! But we have taken a beating ... that's what comes of being educated people.'

Arkady gave a forced laugh, while Bazarov turned away, and did not open his mouth again the whole journey.

The twenty miles seemed to Arkady quite forty. But at last, on the slope of some rising ground, appeared the small hamlet where Bazarov's parents lived. Beside it, in a young birch copse, could be seen a small house with a thatched roof.

Two peasants stood with their hats on at the first hut, abusing each other. 'You're a great sow,' said one; 'and worse than a little sucking pig.'

'And your wife's a witch,' retorted the other.

'From their unconstrained behaviour,' Bazarov remarked to Arkady, 'and the playfulness of their retorts, you can guess that my father's peasants are not too much oppressed. Why, there he is himself coming out on the steps of his house. They must have heard the bells. It's he; it's he--I know his figure. Ay, ay! how grey he's grown though, poor chap!'

CHAPTER XX

Bazarov leaned out of the coach, while Arkady thrust his head out behind his companion's back, and caught sight on the steps of the little manor-house of a tall, thinnish man with dishevelled hair, and a thin hawk nose, dressed in an old military coat not b.u.t.toned up. He was standing, his legs wide apart, smoking a long pipe and s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his eyes to keep the sun out of them.

The horses stopped.

'Arrived at last,' said Bazarov's father, still going on smoking though the pipe was fairly dancing up and down between his fingers. 'Come, get out; get out; let me hug you.'

He began embracing his son ... 'Enyusha, Enyusha,' was heard a trembling woman's voice. The door was flung open, and in the doorway was seen a plump, short, little old woman in a white cap and a short striped jacket. She moaned, staggered, and would certainly have fallen, had not Bazarov supported her. Her plump little hands were instantly twined round his neck, her head was pressed to his breast, and there was a complete hush. The only sound heard was her broken sobs.

Old Bazarov breathed hard and screwed his eyes up more than ever.

'There, that's enough, that's enough, Arisha! give over,' he said, exchanging a glance with Arkady, who remained motionless in the coach, while the peasant on the box even turned his head away; 'that's not at all necessary, please give over.'

'Ah, Va.s.sily Ivanitch,' faltered the old woman, 'for what ages, my dear one, my darling, Enyusha,' ... and, not unclasping her hands, she drew her wrinkled face, wet with tears and working with tenderness, a little away from Bazarov, and gazed at him with blissful and comic-looking eyes, and again fell on his neck.

'Well, well, to be sure, that's all in the nature of things,' commented Va.s.sily Ivanitch, 'only we'd better come indoors. Here's a visitor come with Yevgeny. You must excuse it,' he added, turning to Arkady, and sc.r.a.ping with his foot; 'you understand, a woman's weakness; and well, a mother's heart ...'

His lips and eyebrows too were twitching, and his beard was quivering ... but he was obviously trying to control himself and appear almost indifferent.

'Let's come in, mother, really,' said Bazarov, and he led the enfeebled old woman into the house. Putting her into a comfortable armchair, he once more hurriedly embraced his father and introduced Arkady to him.

'Heartily glad to make your acquaintance,' said Va.s.sily Ivanovitch, 'but you mustn't expect great things; everything here in my house is done in a plain way, on a military footing. Arina Vlasyevna, calm yourself, pray; what weakness! The gentleman our guest will think ill of you.'

'My dear sir,' said the old lady through her tears, 'your name and your father's I haven't the honour of knowing....'

'Arkady Nikolaitch,' put in Va.s.sily Ivanitch solemnly, in a low voice.

'You must excuse a silly old woman like me.' The old woman blew her nose, and bending her head to right and to left, carefully wiped one eye after the other. 'You must excuse me. You see, I thought I should die, that I should not live to see my da .. arling.'

'Well, here we have lived to see him, madam,' put in Va.s.sily Ivanovitch. 'Tanyushka,' he turned to a bare-legged little girl of thirteen in a bright red cotton dress, who was timidly peeping in at the door, 'bring your mistress a gla.s.s of water--on a tray, do you hear?--and you, gentlemen,' he added, with a kind of old-fashioned playfulness, 'let me ask you into the study of a retired old veteran.'

'Just once more let me embrace you, Enyusha,' moaned Arina Vlasyevna.

Bazarov bent down to her. 'Why, what a handsome fellow you have grown!'

'Well, I don't know about being handsome,' remarked Va.s.sily Ivanovitch, 'but he's a man, as the saying is, _ommfay_. And now I hope, Arina Vlasyevna, that having satisfied your maternal heart, you will turn your thoughts to satisfying the appet.i.tes of our dear guests, because, as you're aware, even nightingales can't be fed on fairy tales.'

The old lady got up from her chair. 'This minute, Va.s.sily Ivanovitch, the table shall be laid. I will run myself to the kitchen and order the samovar to be brought in; everything shall be ready, everything. Why, I have not seen him, not given him food or drink these three years; is that nothing?'

'There, mind, good mother, bustle about; don't put us to shame; while you, gentlemen, I beg you to follow me. Here's Timofeitch come to pay his respects to you, Yevgeny. He, too, I daresay, is delighted, the old dog. Eh, aren't you delighted, old dog? Be so good as to follow me.'

And Va.s.sily Ivanovitch went bustling forward, sc.r.a.ping and flapping with his slippers trodden down at heel.

His whole house consisted of six tiny rooms. One of them--the one to which he led our friends--was called the study. A thick-legged table, littered over with papers black with the acc.u.mulation of ancient dust as though they had been smoked, occupied all the s.p.a.ce between the two windows; on the walls hung Turkish firearms, whips, a sabre, two maps, some anatomical diagrams, a portrait of Hoffland, a monogram woven in hair in a blackened frame, and a diploma under gla.s.s; a leather sofa, torn and worn into hollows in parts, was placed between two huge cupboards of birch-wood; on the shelves books, boxes, stuffed birds, jars, and phials were huddled together in confusion; in one corner stood a broken galvanic battery.

'I warned you, my dear Arkady Nikolaitch,' began Va.s.sily Ivanitch, 'that we live, so to say, bivouacking....'

'There, stop that, what are you apologising for?' Bazarov interrupted.

'Kirsanov knows very well we're not Croesuses, and that you have no butler. Where are we going to put him, that's the question?'

'To be sure, Yevgeny; I have a capital room there in the little lodge; he will be very comfortable there.'

'Have you had a lodge put up then?'

'Why, where the bath-house is,' put in Timofeitch.

'That is next to the bathroom,' Va.s.sily Ivanitch added hurriedly. 'It's summer now ... I will run over there at once, and make arrangements; and you, Timofeitch, meanwhile bring in their things. You, Yevgeny, I shall of course offer my study. _Suum cuique_.'

'There you have him! A comical old chap, and very good-natured,'

remarked Bazarov, directly Va.s.sily Ivanitch had gone. 'Just such a queer fish as yours, only in another way. He chatters too much.'

'And your mother seems an awfully nice woman,' observed Arkady.

'Yes, there's no humbug about her. You'll see what a dinner she'll give us.'

'They didn't expect you to-day, sir; they've not brought any beef?'

observed Timofeitch, who was just dragging in Bazarov's box.

'We shall get on very well without beef. It's no use crying for the moon. Poverty, they say, is no vice.'