Virgin Soil Part 28

Not only Sipiagin, but even Kollomietzev felt, that in the factory Solomin was quite at home, was familiar with every little detail, was master there in fact. He laid his hand on a machine as a rider on his horse's neck; he poked a wheel with his finger and it either stood still or began whirling round; he took some paper pulp out of a vat and it instantly revealed all its defects.

Solomin said very little, took no notice of the Little Russian at all, and went out without saying anything. Sipiagin and Kollomietzev followed him.

Sipiagin was so upset that he did not let any one accompany him. He stamped and ground his teeth with rage.

"I can see by your face," he said turning to Solomin, "that you are not pleased with the place. Of course, I know that it's not in a very excellent condition and doesn't pay as yet. But please ... give me your candid opinion as to what you consider to be the princ.i.p.al failings and as to what one could do to improve matters."

"Paper-manufacturing is not in my line," Solomin began, "but I can tell you one thing. I doubt if the aristocracy is cut out for industrial enterprises."

"Do you consider it degrading for the aristocracy?" Kollomietzev asked.

Solomin smiled his habitual broad smile.

"Oh dear no! What is there degrading about it? And even if there were, I don't think the aristocracy would be overly particular."

"What do you mean?"

"I only meant," Solomin continued, calmly, "that the gentry are not used to that kind of business. A knowledge of commerce is needed for that; everything has to be put on a different footing, you want technical training for it. The gentry don't understand this. We see them starting woollen, cotton, and other factories all over the place, but they nearly always fall into the hands of the merchants in the end. It's a pity, because the merchants are even worse sweaters. But it can't be helped, I suppose."

"To listen to you one would think that all questions of finance were above our n.o.bility!" Kollomietzev exclaimed.

"Oh no! On the other hand the n.o.bility are masters at it. For getting concessions for railways, founding banks, exempting themselves from some tax, or anything like that, there is no one to beat them! They make huge fortunes. I hinted at that just now, but it seemed to offend you. I had regular industrial enterprises in my mind when I spoke; I say regular, because founding private public houses, petty little grocers' shops, or lending the peasants corn or money at a hundred or a hundred and fifty percent, as many of our landed gentry are now doing, I cannot consider as genuine financial enterprises."

Kollomietzev did not say anything. He belonged to that new species of money-lending landlord whom Markelov had mentioned in his last talk with Nejdanov, and was the more inhuman in his demands that he had no personal dealings with the peasants themselves. He never allowed them into his perfumed European study, and conducted all his business with them through his manager. He was boiling with rage while listening to Solomin's slow, impartial speech, but he held his peace; only the working of the muscles of his face betrayed what was pa.s.sing within him.

"But allow me, Va.s.sily Fedot.i.tch," Sipiagin began; "what you have just said may have been quite true in former days, when the n.o.bility had quite different privileges and were altogether in a different position; but now, after all the beneficial reforms in our present industrial age, why should not the n.o.bility turn their attention and bring their abilities into enterprises of this nature? Why shouldn't they be able to understand what is understood by a simple illiterate merchant? They are not suffering from lack of education and one might even claim, without any exaggeration, that they are, in a certain sense, the representatives of enlightenment and progress."

Boris Andraevitch spoke very well; his eloquence would have made a great stir in St. Petersburg, in his department, or maybe in higher quarters, but it produced no effect whatever on Solomin.

"The n.o.bility cannot manage these things," Solomin repeated.

"But why, I should like to know? Why?" Kollomietzev almost shouted.

"Because there is too much of the bureaucrat about them."

"Bureaucrat?" Kollomietzev laughed maliciously. "I don't think you quite realise what you're saying, Mr. Solomin."

Solomin continued smiling.

"What makes you think so, Mr. Kolomentzev?" (Kollomietzev shuddered at hearing his name thus mutilated.) "I a.s.sure you that I always realise what I am saying."

"Then please explain what you meant just now!"

"With pleasure. I think that every bureaucrat is an outsider and was always such. The n.o.bility have now become 'outsiders.'"

Kollomietzev laughed louder than ever.

"But, my dear sir, I really don't understand what you mean!"

"So much the worse for you. Perhaps you will if you try hard enough."

"Sir!

"Gentlemen, gentlemen," Sipiagin interposed hastily, trying to catch someone's eye, "please, please... Kallomeitzeff, je vous prie de vous calmer. I suppose dinner will soon be ready. Come along, gentlemen!"

"Valentina Mihailovna!" Kollomietzev cried out five minutes later, rushing into her boudoir. "I really don't know what your husband is doing! He has brought us one nihilist and now he's bringing us another!

Only this one is much worse!"

"But why?"

"He is advocating the most awful things, and what do you think? He has been talking to your husband for a whole hour, and not once, not once, did he address him as Your Excellency! Le vagabond!"

XXIV

JUST before dinner Sipiagin called his wife into the library. He wanted to have a talk with her alone. He seemed worried. He told her that the factory was really in a bad way, that Solomin struck him as a capable man, although a little stiff, and thought it was necessary to continue being aux pet.i.ts soins with him.

"How I should like to get hold of him!" he repeated once or twice.

Sipiagin was very much annoyed at Kollomietzev's being there. "Devil take the man! He sees nihilists everywhere and is always wanting to suppress them! Let him do it at his own house I He simply can't hold his tongue!"

Valentina Mihailovna said that she would be delighted to be aux pet.i.ts soins with the new visitor, but it seemed to her that he had no need of these pet.i.ts soins and took no notice of them; not rudely in any way, but he was quite indifferent; very remarkable in a man du commun.

"Never mind.... Be nice to him just the same!" Sipiagin begged of her.

Valentina Mihailovna promised to do what he wanted and fulfilled her promise conscientiously. She began by having a tete-a-tete with Kollomietzev. What she said to him remains a secret, but he came to the table with the air of a man who had made up his mind to be discreet and submissive at all costs. This "resignation" gave his whole bearing a slight touch of melancholy; and what dignity... oh, what dignity there was in every one of his movements! Valentina Mihailovna introduced Solomin to everybody (he looked more attentively at Mariana than at any of the others), and made him sit beside her on her right at table.

Kollomietzev sat on her left, and as he unfolded his serviette screwed up his face and smiled, as much as to say, "Well, now let us begin our little comedy!" Sipiagin sat on the opposite side and watched him with some anxiety. By a new arrangement of Madame Sipiagina, Nejdanov was not put next to Mariana as usual, but between Anna Zaharovna and Sipiagin.

Mariana found her card (as the dinner was a stately one) on her serviette between Kollomietzev and Kolia. The dinner was excellently served; there was even a "menu"--a painted card lay before each person.

Directly soup was finished, Sipiagin again brought the conversation round to his factory, and from there went on to Russian manufacture in general. Solomin, as usual, replied very briefly. As soon as he began speaking, Mariana fixed her eyes upon him. Kollomietzev, who was sitting beside her, turned to her with various compliments (he had been asked not to start a dispute), but she did not listen to him; and indeed he p.r.o.nounced all his pleasantries in a half-hearted manner, merely to satisfy his own conscience. He realised that there was something between himself and this young girl that could not be crossed.

As for Nejdanov, something even worse had come to pa.s.s between him and the master of the house. For Sipiagin, Nejdanov had become simply a piece of furniture, or an empty s.p.a.ce that he quite ignored. These new relations had taken place so quickly and unmistakably that when Nejdanov p.r.o.nounced a few words in answer to a remark of Anna Zaharovna's, Sipiagin looked round in amazement, as if wondering where the sound came from.

Sipiagin evidently possessed some of the characteristics for which certain of the great Russian bureaucrats are celebrated for.

After the fish, Valentina Mihailovna, who had been lavishing all her charms on Solomin, said to her husband in English that she noticed their visitor did not drink wine and might perhaps like some beer. Sipiagin called aloud for ale, while Solomin calmly turned towards Valentina Mihailovna, saying, "You may not be aware, madame, that I spent over two years in England and can understand and speak English. I only mentioned it in case you should wish to say anything private before me." Valentina Mihailovna laughed and a.s.sured him that this precaution was altogether unnecessary, since he would hear nothing but good of himself; inwardly she thought Solomin's action rather strange, but delicate in its own way.

At this point Kollomietzev could no longer contain himself. "And so you've been in England," he began, "and no doubt studied the manners and customs there. Do you think them worth imitating?"

"Some yes, others no."

"Brief but not clear," Kollomietzev remarked, trying not to notice the signs Sipiagin was making to him. "You were speaking of the n.o.bility this morning... No doubt you've had the opportunity of studying the English landed gentry, as they call them there."

"No, I had no such opportunity. I moved in quite a different sphere. But I formed my own ideas about these gentlemen."

"Well, do you think that such a landed gentry is impossible among us? Or that we ought not to want it in any case?"