Smoke Part 18

A prolonged whistle sounded at last, a heavy momentarily increasing rumble was heard, and, slowly rolling round a bend in the line, the train came into sight. The crowd hurried to meet it, and Litvinov followed it, dragging his feet like a condemned man. Faces, ladies'

hats began to appear out of the carriages, at one window a white handkerchief gleamed.... Kapitolina Markovna was waving to him.... It was over; she had caught sight of Litvinov and he recognised her. The train stood still; Litvinov rushed to the carriage door, and opened it; Tatyana was standing near her aunt, smiling brightly and holding out her hand.

He helped them both to get out, uttered a few words of welcome, unfinished and confused, and at once bustled about, began taking their tickets, their travelling bags, and rugs, ran to find a porter, called a fly; other people were bustling around them. He was glad of their presence, their fuss, and loud talk. Tatyana moved a little aside, and, still smiling, waited calmly for his hurried arrangements to be concluded. Kapitolina Markovna, on the other hand, could not keep still; she could not believe that she was at last at Baden.

She suddenly cried, 'But the parasols? Tanya, where are our parasols?'

all unconscious that she was holding them fast under her arm; then she began taking a loud and prolonged farewell of another lady with whom she had made friends on the journey from Heidelberg to Baden. This lady was no other than our old friend Madame Suhantchikov. She had gone away to Heidelberg to do obeisance to Gubaryov, and was returning with 'instructions.' Kapitolina Markovna wore a rather peculiar striped mantle and a round travelling hat of a mushroom-shape, from under which her short white hair fell in disorder; short and thin, she was flushed with travelling and kept talking Russian in a shrill and penetrating voice.... She was an object of attention at once.

Litvinov at last put her and Tatyana into a fly, and placed himself opposite them. The horses started. Then followed questionings, renewed handshaking, interchanging of smiles and welcomes.... Litvinov breathed freely; the first moment had pa.s.sed off satisfactorily. Nothing in him, apparently, had struck or bewildered Tanya; she was smiling just as brightly and confidently, she was blushing as charmingly, and laughing as goodnaturedly. He brought himself at last to take a look at her; not a stealthy cursory glance, but a direct steady look at her, hitherto his own eyes had refused to obey him. His heart throbbed with involuntary emotion: the serene expression of that honest, candid face gave him a pang of bitter reproach. 'So you are here, poor girl,' he thought, 'you whom I have so longed for, so urged to come, with whom I had hoped to spend my life to the end, you have come, you believed in me ... while I ... while I.'... Litvinov's head sank; but Kapitolina Markovna gave him no time for musing; she was pelting him with questions.

'What is that building with columns? Where is it the gambling's done?

Who is that coming along? Tanya, Tanya, look, what crinolines! And who can that be? I suppose they are mostly French creatures from Paris here?

Mercy, what a hat! Can you get everything here just as in Paris? But, I expect, everything's awfully dear, eh? Ah, I've made the acquaintance of such a splendid, intellectual woman! You know her, Grigory Mihalitch; she told me she had met you at some Russian's, who's a wonderfully intellectual person too. She promised to come and see us. How she does abuse all these aristocrats--it's simply superb! What is that gentleman with grey moustaches? The Prussian king? Tanya, Tanya, look, that's the Prussian king. No? not the Prussian king, the Dutch amba.s.sador, did you say? I can't hear, the wheels rattle so. Ah, what exquisite trees!'

'Yes, exquisite, aunt,' Tanya a.s.sented, 'and how green everything is here, how bright and gay! Isn't it, Grigory Mihalitch?'

'Oh, very bright and gay' ... he answered through his teeth.

The carriage stopped at last before the hotel. Litvinov conducted the two travellers to the room taken for them, promised to come back within an hour, and went to his own room. Directly he entered it, he fell again under the spell which had been lulled for a while. Here, in that room, since the day before, Irina reigned supreme; everything was eloquent of her, the very air seemed to have kept secret traces of her visit....

Again Litvinov felt himself her slave. He drew out her handkerchief, hidden in his bosom, pressed it to his lips, and burning memories flowed in subtle poison through his veins. He realised that there was no turning back, no choosing now; the sorrowful emotion aroused in him by Tatyana melted away like snow in the fire, and remorse died down ...

died down so completely that his uneasiness even was soothed, and the possibility--present to his intellect--of hypocrisy no longer revolted him.... Love, Irina's love, that was now his truth, his bond, his conscience.... The sensible Litvinov did not even ponder how to get out of a position, the horror and hideousness of which he bore lightly, as if it did not concern him.

The hour had not yet pa.s.sed when a waiter came to Litvinov from the newly arrived ladies; they begged him to come to them in the public drawing-room. He followed the messenger, and found them already dressed and in their hats. They both expressed a desire to go out at once to see Baden, as the weather was so fine. Kapitolina Markovna especially seemed burning with impatience; she was quite cast down when she heard that the hour of the fashionable promenade before the Konversation Hall had not yet arrived. Litvinov gave her his arm, and the ceremony of sight-seeing began. Tatyana walked beside her aunt, looking about her with quiet interest; Kapitolina Markovna pursued her inquiries. The sight of the roulette, the dignified croupiers, whom--had she met them in any other place--she would certainly have taken for ministers, the quickly moving scoops, the heaps of gold and silver on the green cloth, the old women gambling, and the painted _cocottes_ reduced Kapitolina Markovna to a sort of speechless stupor; she altogether forgot that she ought to feel moral indignation, and could only gaze and gaze, giving a start of surprise at every new sight.... The whiz of the ivory ball into the bottom of the roulette thrilled her to the marrow of her bones, and it was only when she was again in the open air that, drawing a long breath, she recovered energy enough to denounce games of chance as an immoral invention of aristocracy. A fixed, unpleasant smile had made its appearance on Litvinov's lips; he had spoken abruptly and lazily, as though he were annoyed or bored.... But now he turned round towards Tatyana, and was thrown into secret confusion; she was looking attentively at him, with an expression as though she were asking herself what sort of an impression was being made on her. He made haste to nod his head to her, she responded with the same gesture, and again looked at him questioningly, with a sort of strained effort, as though he were standing much further off than he really was. Litvinov led his ladies away from the Konversation Hall, and pa.s.sing the 'Russian tree,' under which two Russian ladies were already sitting, he went towards Lichtenthaler Allee. He had hardly entered the avenue when he saw Irina in the distance.

She was walking towards him with her husband and Potugin. Litvinov turned white as a sheet; he did not slacken his pace, however, and when he was on a level with her, he made a bow without speaking. She too bowed to him, politely, but coldly, and taking in Tatyana in a rapid glance, she glided by.... Ratmirov lifted his hat high, Potugin muttered something.

'Who is that lady?' Tatyana asked suddenly. Till that instant she had hardly opened her lips.

'That lady?' repeated Litvinov, 'that lady? That is a Madame Ratmirov.'

'Is she Russian?'

'Yes.'

'Did you make her acquaintance here?'

'No; I have known her a long while.'

'How beautiful she is!'

'Did you notice her dress?' put in Kapitolina Markovna. 'Ten families might live for a whole year on the cost of her lace alone. Was that her husband with her?' she inquired turning to Litvinov.

'Yes.'

'He must be awfully rich, I suppose?'

'Really I don't know; I don't think so.'

'What is his rank?'

'He's a general.'

'What eyes she has!' said Tatyana, 'and what a strange expression in them: pensive and penetrating at the same time.... I have never seen such eyes.'

Litvinov made no answer; he fancied that he felt again Tatyana's questioning glance bent on his face, but he was wrong, she was looking at her own feet, at the sand of the path.

'Mercy on us! Who is that fright?' cried Kapitolina Markovna suddenly, pointing to a low jaunting-car in which a red-haired pug-nosed woman lay lolling impudently, in an extraordinarily gorgeous costume and lilac stockings.

'That fright! why, that's the celebrated Ma'mselle Cora.'

'Who?'

'Ma'mselle Cora ... a Parisian ... notoriety.'

'What? That pug? Why, but she's hideous!'

'It seems that's no hindrance.'

Kapitolina Markovna could only lift her hands in astonishment.

'Well, this Baden of yours!' she brought out at last. 'Can one sit down on a seat here? I'm rather tired.'

'Of course you can, Kapitolina Markovna.... That's what the seats are put here for.'

'Well, really, there's no knowing! But there in Paris, I'm told, there are seats, too, along the boulevards; but it's not proper to sit on them.'

Litvinov made no reply to Kapitolina Markovna; only at that moment he realised that two paces away was the very spot where he had had that explanation with Irina, which had decided everything. Then he recalled that he had noticed a small rosy spot on her cheek to-day....

Kapitolina Markovna sank down on to the seat, Tatyana sat down beside her. Litvinov remained on the path; between Tatyana and him--or was it only his fancy?--something seemed to have happened ... unconsciously and gradually.

'Ah, she's a wretch, a perfect wretch!' Kapitolina Markovna declared, shaking her head commiseratingly; 'why, with the price of _her_ get-up, you could keep not ten, but a hundred families. Did you see under her hat, on _her_ red hair, there were diamonds? Upon my word, diamonds in the day-time!'

'Her hair's not red,' remarked Litvinov; 'she dyes it red--that's the fashion now.'

Again Kapitolina Markovna could only lift her hands; she was positively dumbfounded.

'Well,' she said at last, 'where we were, in Dresden, things had not got to such a scandalous pitch yet. It's a little further from Paris, anyway, that's why. Don't you think that's it, Grigory Mihalitch, eh?'

'Don't I think so?' answered Litvinov. While he thought to himself, 'What on earth is she talking of?' 'I? Of course ... of course....'

But at this point the sound of slow footsteps was heard, and Potugin approached the seat.

'Good-morning, Grigory Mihalitch,' he began, smiling and nodding.

Litvinov grasped him by the hand at once.

'Good-morning, good-morning, Sozont Ivanitch. I fancy I pa.s.sed you just now with ... just now in the avenue?'

'Yes, it was me.'