Rudin Part 20

'What, aren't you well?' he asked, seating himself in a chair near the sofa.

Volintsev raised himself, and, leaning on his elbow gazed a long, long while into his friend's face, and then repeated to him his whole conversation with Rudin word for word. He had never before given Lezhnyov a hint of his sentiments towards Natalya, though he guessed they were no secret to him.

'Well, brother, you have surprised me!' Lezhnyov said, as soon as Volintsev had finished his story. 'I expected many strange things from him, but this is----Still I can see him in it.'

'Upon my honour!' cried Volintsev, in great excitement, 'it is simply insolence! Why, I almost threw him out of the window. Did he want to boast to me or was he afraid? What was the object of it? How could he make up his mind to come to a man----?'

Volintsev clasped his hands over his head and was speechless.

'No, brother, that's not it,' replied Lezhnyov tranquilly; 'you won't believe me, but he really did it from a good motive. Yes, indeed. It was generous, do you see, and candid, to be sure, and it would offer an opportunity of speechifying and giving vent to his fine talk, and, of course, that's what he wants, what he can't live without. Ah! his tongue is his enemy. Though it's a good servant to him too.'

'With what solemnity he came in and talked, you can't imagine!'

'Well, he can't do anything without that. He b.u.t.tons his great-coat as if he were fulfilling a sacred duty. I should like to put him on a desert island and look round a corner to see how he would behave there.

And he discourses on simplicity!'

'But tell me, my dear fellow,' asked Volintsev, 'what is it, philosophy or what?'

'How can I tell you? On one side it is philosophy, I daresay, and on the other something altogether different It is not right to put every folly down to philosophy.'

Volintsev looked at him.

'Wasn't he lying then, do you imagine?'

'No, my son, he wasn't lying. But, do you know, we've talked enough of this. Let's light our pipes and call Alexandra Pavlovna in here. It's easier to talk when she's with us and easier to be silent. She shall make us some tea.'

'Very well,' replied Volintsev. 'Sasha, come in,' he cried aloud.

Alexandra Pavlovna came in. He grasped her hand and pressed it warmly to his lips.

Rudin returned in a curious and mingled frame of mind. He was annoyed with himself, he reproached himself for his unpardonable precipitancy, his boyish impulsiveness. Some one has justly said: there is nothing more painful than the consciousness of having just done something stupid.

Rudin was devoured by regret.

'What evil genius drove me,' he muttered between his teeth, 'to call on that squire! What an idea it was! Only to expose myself to insolence!'

But in Darya Mihailovna's house something extraordinary had been happening. The lady herself did not appear the whole morning, and did not come in to dinner; she had a headache, declared Pandalevsky, the only person who had been admitted to her room. Natalya, too, Rudin scarcely got a glimpse of: she sat in her room with Mlle. Boncourt When she met him at the dinner-table she looked at him so mournfully that his heart sank. Her face was changed as though a load of sorrow had descended upon her since the day before. Rudin began to be oppressed by a vague presentiment of trouble. In order to distract his mind in some way he occupied himself with Ba.s.sistoff, had much conversation with him, and found him an ardent, eager lad, full of enthusiastic hopes and still untarnished faith. In the evening Darya Mihailovna appeared for a couple of hours in the drawing-room. She was polite to Rudin, but kept him somehow at a distance, and smiled and frowned, talking through her nose, and in hints more than ever. Everything about her had the air of the society lady of the court. She had seemed of late rather cooler to Rudin. 'What is the secret of it?' he thought, with a sidelong look at her haughtily-lifted head.

He had not long to wait for the solution of the enigma. As he was returning at twelve o'clock at night to his room, along a dark corridor, some one suddenly thrust a note into his hand. He looked round; a girl was hurrying away in the distance, Natalya's maid, he fancied. He went into his room, dismissed the servant, tore open the letter, and read the following lines in Natalya's handwriting:--

'Come to-morrow at seven o'clock in the morning, not later, to Avduhin pond, beyond the oak copse. Any other time will be impossible. It will be our last meeting, all will be over, unless... Come. We must make our decision.--P.S. If I don't come, it will mean we shall not see each other again; then I will let you know.'

Rudin turned the letter over in his hands, musing upon it, then laid it under his pillow, undressed, and lay down. For a long while he could not get to sleep, and then he slept very lightly, and it was not yet five o'clock when he woke up.

IX

The Avduhin pond, near which Natalya had fixed the place of meeting, had long ceased to be a pond. Thirty years before it had burst through its banks and it had been given up since then. Only by the smooth flat surface of the hollow, once covered with slimy mud, and the traces of the banks, could one guess that it had been a pond. A farm-house had stood near it. It had long ago pa.s.sed away. Two huge pine-trees preserved its memory; the wind was for ever droning and sullenly murmuring in their high gaunt green tops. There were mysterious tales among the people of a fearful crime supposed to have been committed under them; they used to tell, too, that not one of them would fall without bringing death to some one; that a third had once stood there, which had fallen in a storm and crushed a girl.

The whole place near the old pond was supposed to be haunted; it was a barren wilderness, dark and gloomy, even on a sunny day--it seemed darker and gloomier still from the old, old forest of dead and withered oak-trees which was near it. A few huge trees lifted their grey heads above the low undergrowth of bushes like weary giants. They were a sinister sight; it seemed as though wicked old men had met together bent on some evil design. A narrow path almost indistinguishable wandered beside it. No one went near the Avduhin pond without some urgent reason.

Natalya intentionally chose this solitary place. It was not more than half-a-mile from Darya Mihailovna's house.

The sun had already risen some time when Rudin reached the Avduhin pond, but it was not a bright morning. Thick clouds of the colour of milk covered the whole sky, and were driven flying before the whistling, shrieking wind. Rudin began to walk up and down along the bank, which was covered with clinging burdocks and blackened nettles. He was not easy in his mind. These interviews, these new emotions had a charm for him, but they also troubled him, especially after the note of the night before. He felt that the end was drawing near, and was in secret perplexity of spirit, though none would have imagined it, seeing with what concentrated determination he folded his arms across his chest and looked around him. Pigasov had once said truly of him, that he was like a Chinese idol, his head was constantly overbalancing him. But with the head alone, however strong it may be, it is hard for a man to know even what is pa.s.sing in himself.... Rudin, the clever, penetrating Rudin, was not capable of saying certainly whether he loved Natalya, whether he was suffering, and whether he would suffer at parting from her. Why then, since he had not the least disposition to play the Lovelace--one must do him that credit--had he turned the poor girl's head? Why was he awaiting her with a secret tremor? To this the only answer is that there are none so easily carried away as those who are without pa.s.sion.

He walked on the bank, while Natalya was hurrying to him straight across country through the wet gra.s.s.

'Natalya Alexyevna, you'll get your feet wet!' said her maid Masha, scarcely able to keep up with her.

Natalya did not hear and ran on without looking round.

'Ah, supposing they've seen us!' cried Masha; 'indeed it's surprising how we got out of the house... and ma'mselle may wake up... It's a mercy it's not far.... Ah, the gentleman's waiting already,' she added, suddenly catching sight of Rudin's majestic figure, standing out picturesquely on the bank; 'but what does he want to stand on that mound for--he ought to have kept in the hollow.'

Natalya stopped.

'Wait here, Masha, by the pines,' she said, and went on to the pond.

Rudin went up to her; he stopped short in amazement. He had never seen such an expression on her face before. Her brows were contracted, her lips set, her eyes looked sternly straight before her.

'Dmitri Nikolaitch,' she began, 'we have no time to lose. I have come for five minutes. I must tell you that my mother knows everything. Mr.

Pandalevsky saw us the day before yesterday, and he told her of our meeting. He was always mamma's spy. She called me in to her yesterday.'

'Good G.o.d!' cried Rudin, 'this is terrible.... What did your mother say?'

'She was not angry with me, she did not scold me, but she reproached me for my want of discretion.'

'That was all?'

'Yes, and she declared she would sooner see me dead than your wife!'

'Is it possible she said that?'

'Yes; and she said too that you yourself did not want to marry me at all, that you had only been flirting with me because you were bored, and that she had not expected this of you; but that she herself was to blame for having allowed me to see so much of you... that she relied on my good sense, that I had very much surprised her... and I don't remember now all she said to me.'

Natalya uttered all this in an even, almost expressionless voice.

'And you, Natalya Alexyevna, what did you answer?' asked Rudin.

'What did I answer?' repeated Natalya.... 'What do you intend to do now?'

'Good G.o.d, good G.o.d!' replied Rudin, 'it is cruel! So soon... such a sudden blow!... And is your mother in such indignation?'

'Yes, yes, she will not hear of you.'

'It is terrible! You mean there is no hope?