Books: On the Eve
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Ivan Turgenev >> On the Eve
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'You are alive, you are mine,' she repeated, embracing and stroking
his head. He was almost swooning, breathless at such closeness,
such caresses, such bliss.
She sat down near him, holding him fast, and began to gaze at him with
that smiling, and caressing, and tender look, only to be seen shining
in the eyes of a loving woman.
Her face suddenly clouded over.
'How thin you have grown, my poor Dmitri,' she said, passing her hand
over his neck; 'what a beard you have.'
'And you have grown thin, my poor Elena,' he answered, catching her
fingers with his lips.
She shook her curls gaily.
'That's nothing. You shall see how soon we'll be strong again! The
storm has blown over, just as it blew over and passed away that day
when we met in the chapel. Now we are going to live.'
He answered her with a smile only.
'Ah, what a time we have had, Dmitri, what a cruel time! How can
people outlive those they love? I knew beforehand what Andrei
Petrovitch would say to me every day, I did really; my life seemed to
ebb and flow with yours. Welcome back, my Dmitri!'
He did not know what to say to her. He was longing to throw himself at
her feet.
'Another thing I observed,' she went on, pushing back his hair--'I
made so many observations all this time in my leisure--when any one is
very, very miserable, with what stupid attention he follows everything
that's going on about him! I really sometimes lost myself in gazing at
a fly, and all the while such chill and terror in my heart! But that's
all past, all past, isn't it? Everything's bright in the future, isn't
it?'
'You are for me in the future,' answered Insarov, 'so it is bright
for me.'
'And for me too! But do you remember, when I was here, not the last
time--no, not the last time,' she repeated with an involuntary
shudder, 'when we were talking, I spoke of death, I don't know why; I
never suspected then that it was keeping watch on us. But you are well
now, aren't you?'
'I'm much better, I'm nearly well.'
'You are well, you are not dead. Oh, how happy I am!'
A short silence followed.
'Elena?' said Insarov.
'Well, my dearest?'
'Tell me, did it never occur to you that this illness was sent us as a
punishment?'
Elena looked seriously at him.
'That idea did come into my head, Dmitri. But I thought: what am I to
be punished for? What duty have I transgressed, against whom have I
sinned? Perhaps my conscience is not like other people's, but it was
silent; or perhaps I am guilty towards you? I hinder you, I stop you.'
'You don't stop me, Elena; we will go together.'
'Yes, Dmitri, let us go together; I will follow you. . . . That is my
duty. I love you. ... I know no other duty.'
'O Elena!' said Insarov, 'what chains every word of yours fastens
on me!'
'Why talk of chains?' she interposed. 'We are free people, you and
I. Yes,' she went on, looking musingly on the floor, while with one
hand she still stroked his hair, 'I experienced much lately of which
I had never had any idea! If any one had told me beforehand that I, a
young lady, well brought up, should go out from home alone on all
sorts of made-up excuses, and to go where? to a young man's
lodgings--how indignant I should have been! And that has all come
about, and I feel no indignation whatever. Really!' she added, and
turned to Insarov.
He looked at her with such an expression of adoration, that she softly
dropped her hand from his hair over his eyes.
'Dmitri!' she began again, 'you don't know of course, I saw you
there in that dreadful bed, I saw you in the clutches of death,
unconscious.'
'You saw me?'
'Yes.'
He was silent for a little. 'And Bersenyev was here?'
She nodded.
Insarov bowed down before her. 'O Elena!' he whispered, 'I don't
dare to look at you.'
'Why? Andrei Petrovitch is so good. I was not ashamed before him. And
what have I to be ashamed of? I am ready to tell all the world that I
am yours. . . . And Andrei Petrovitch I trust like a brother.'
'He saved me!' cried Insarov. 'He is the noblest, kindest of men!'
'Yes . .. And do you know I owe everything to him? Do you know that
it was he who first told me that you loved me? And if I could tell
you everything. . . . Yes, he is a noble man.'
Insarov looked steadily at Elena. 'He is in love with you, isn't he?'
Elena dropped her eyes. 'He did love me,' she said in an undertone.
Insarov pressed her hand warmly. 'Oh you Russians,' he said, 'you have
hearts of pure gold! And he, he has been waiting on me, he has not
slept at night. And you, you, my angel. . . . No reproaches, no
hesitations . . . and all this for me, for me----'
'Yes, yes, all for you, because they love you, Ah, Dmitri! How strange
it is! I think I have talked to you of it before, but it doesn't
matter, I like to repeat it, and you will like to hear it. When I saw
you the first time----'
'Why are there tears in your eyes?' Insarov interrupted her.
'Tears? Are there?' She wiped her eyes with her handkerchief. 'Oh,
what a silly boy! He doesn't know yet that people weep from
happiness. I wanted to tell you: when I saw you the first time, I saw
nothing special in you, really. I remember, Shubin struck me much more
at first, though I never loved him, and as for Andrei Petrovitch--oh,
there was a moment when I thought: isn't this he? And with you there
was nothing of that sort; but afterwards--afterwards--you took my
heart by storm!'
'Have pity on me,' began Insarov. He tried to get up, but dropped down
on to the sofa again at once.
'What's the matter with you?' inquired Elena anxiously.
'Nothing. ... I am still rather weak. I am not strong enough yet for
such happiness.'
'Then sit quietly. Don't dare to move, don't get excited,' she added,
threatening him with her finger. 'And why have you left off your
dressing-gown? It's too soon to begin to be a dandy! Sit down and I
will tell you stories. Listen and be quiet. To talk much is bad for
you after your illness.'
She began to talk to him about Shubin, about Kurnatovsky, and what she
had been doing for the last fortnight, of how war seemed, judging from
the newspapers, inevitable, and so directly he was perfectly well
again, he must, without losing a minute, make arrangements for them to
start. All this she told him sitting beside him, leaning on his
shoulder. . . .
He listened to her, listened, turning pale and red. Sometimes he tried
to stop her; suddenly he drew himself up.
'Elena,' he said to her in a strange, hard voice 'leave me, go away.'
'What?' she replied in bewilderment 'You feel ill?' she added
quickly.
'No . . . I'm all right . . . but, please, leave me now.'
'I don't understand you. You drive me away? . . What are you doing?'
she said suddenly; he had bent over from the sofa almost to the
ground, and was pressing her feet to his lips. 'Don't do that,
Dmitri. . . . Dmitri----'
He got up.
'Then leave me! You see, Elena, when I was taken ill, I did not lose
consciousness at first; I knew I was on the edge of the abyss;
even in the fever, in delirium I knew, I felt vaguely that it was
death coming to me, I took leave of life, of you, of everything; I
gave up hope. . . . And this return to life so suddenly; this light
after the darkness, you--you--near me, with me--your voice, your
breath. . . . It's more than I can stand! I feel I love you
passionately, I hear you call yourself mine, I cannot answer for
myself. . . You must go!'
'Dmitri,' whispered Elena, and she nestled her head on his shoulder.
Only now she understood him.
'Elena,' he went on, 'I love you, you know that; I am ready to give
my life for you. . . . Why have you come to me now, when I am weak,
when I can't control myself, when all my blood's on fire . . . you are
mine, you say . . . you love me------'
'Dmitri,' she repeated; she flushed all over, and pressed still
closer to him.
'Elena, have pity on me; go away, I feel as if I should die. ... I
can't stand these violent emotions . . . my whole soul yearns for you
. . . think, death was almost parting us . . and now you are here, you
are in my arms . . . Elena----'
She was trembling all over. 'Take me, then,' she whispered scarcely
above her breath.
XXIX
Nikolai Artemyevitch was walking up and down in his study with a scowl
on his face. Shubin was sitting at the window with his legs crossed,
tranquilly smoking a cigar.
'Leave off tramping from corner to corner, please,' he observed,
knocking the ash off his cigar. 'I keep expecting you to speak;
there's a rick in my neck from watching you. Besides, there's
something artificial, melodramatic in your striding.'
'You can never do anything but joke,' responded Nikolai Artemyevitch.
'You won't enter into my position, you refuse to realise that I am
used to that woman, that I am attached to her in fact, that her
absence is bound to distress me. Here it's October, winter is upon us.
. . . What can she be doing in Revel?'
'She must be knitting stockings--for herself; for herself--not for
you.'
'You may laugh, you may laugh; but I tell you I know no woman like
her. Such honesty; such disinterestedness.'
'Has she cashed that bill yet?' inquired Shubin.
'Such disinterestedness,' repeated Nikolai Artemyevitch; 'it's
astonishing. They tell me there are a million other women in the
world, but I say, show me the million; show me the million, I say;
_ces femmes, qu'on me les montre_! And she doesn't write--that's
what's killing me!'
'You're eloquent as Pythagoras,' remarked Shubin; 'but do you know
what I would advise you?'
'What?'
'When Augustina Christianovna comes back--you take my meaning?'
'Yes, yes; well, what?'
'When you see her again--you follow the line of my thought?'
'Yes, yes, to be sure.'
'Try beating her; see what that would do.'
Nikolai Artemyevitch turned away exasperated.
'I thought he was really going to give me some practical advice. But
what can one expect from him! An artist, a man of no principles----'
'No principles! By the way, I'm told your favourite Mr. Kurnatovsky,
the man of principle, cleaned you out of a hundred roubles last night.
That was hardly delicate, you must own now.'
'What of it? We were playing high. Of course, I might expect--but
they understand so little how to appreciate him in this house----'
'That he thought: get what I can!' put in Shubin: 'whether he's
to be my father-in-law or not, is still on the knees of the gods, but
a hundred roubles is worth something to a man who doesn't take
bribes.'
'Father-in-law! How the devil am I his father-in-law? _Vous revez, mon
cher_. Of course, any other girl would be delighted with such a suitor.
Only consider: a man of spirit and intellect, who has gained a
position in the world, served in two provinces----'
'Led the governor in one of them by the nose,' remarked Shubin.
'Very likely. To be sure, that's how it should be. Practical, a
business man----'
'And a capital hand at cards,' Shubin remarked again.
'To be sure, and a capital hand at cards. But Elena Nikolaevna. ... Is
there any understanding her? I should be glad to know if there is any
one who would undertake to make out what it is she wants. One day
she's cheerful, another she's dull; all of a sudden she's so thin
there's no looking at her, and then suddenly she's well again, and all
without any apparent reason----'
A disagreeable-looking man-servant came in with a cup of coffee, cream
and sugar on a tray.
'The father is pleased with a suitor,' pursued Nikolai Artemyevitch,
breaking off a lump of sugar; 'but what is that to the daughter!
That was all very well in the old patriarchal days, but now we have
changed all that. _Nous avons change tout ca_. Nowadays a young girl
talks to any one she thinks fit, reads what she thinks fit; she goes
about Moscow alone without a groom or a maid, just as in Paris; and
all that is permitted. The other day I asked, "Where is Elena
Nikolaevna?" I'm told she has gone out. Where? No one knows. Is
that--the proper thing?'
'Take your coffee, and let the man go,' said Shubin. 'You say
yourself that one ought not _devant les domestiques_' he added in an
undertone.
The servant gave Shubin a dubious look, while Nikolai Artemyevitch
took the cup of coffee, added some cream, and seized some ten lumps of
sugar.
'I was just going to say when the servant came in,' he began, 'that I
count for nothing in this house. That's the long and short of the
matter. For nowadays every one judges from appearances; one man's an
empty-headed fool, but gives himself airs of importance, and he's
respected; while another, very likely, has talents which might--which
might gain him great distinction, but through modesty----'
'Aren't you a born statesman?' asked Shubin in a jeering voice.
'Give over playing the fool!' Nikolai Artemyevitch cried with heat.
'You forget yourself! Here you have another proof that I count for
nothing in this house, nothing!'
'Anna Vassilyevna ill-uses you . . . poor fellow!' said Shubin,
stretching. 'Ah, Nikolai Artemyevitch, we're a pair of sinners! You
had much better be getting a little present ready for Anna
Vassilyevna, It's her birthday in a day or two, and you know how she
appreciates the least attention on your part.'
'Yes, yes,' answered Nikolai Artemyevitch hastily. 'I'm much obliged
to you for reminding me. Of course, of course; to be sure. I have a
little thing, a dressing-case, I bought it the other day at
Rosenstrauch's; but I don't know really if it will do.'
'I suppose you bought it for her, the lady at Revel?'
'Why, certainly.--I had some idea.'
'Well, in that case, it will be sure to do.' Shubin got up from his
seat.
'Are we going out this evening, Pavel Yakovlitch, eh?' Nikolai
Artemyevitch asked with an amicable leer.
'Why yes, you are going to your club.'
'After the club ... after the club.'
Shubin stretched himself again.
'No, Nikolai Artemyevitch, I want to work to-morrow. Another time.'
And he walked off.
Nikolai Artemyevitch scowled, walked twice up and down the room, took
a velvet box with the dressing-case out of the bureau and looked at it
a long while, rubbing it with a silk handkerchief. Then he sat down
before a looking-glass and began carefully arranging his thick black
hair, turning his head to right and to left with a dignified
countenance, his tongue pressed into his cheek, never taking his eyes
off his parting. Some one coughed behind his back; he looked round
and saw the manservant who had brought him in his coffee.
'What do you want?' he asked him.
'Nikolai Artemyevitch,' said the man with a certain solemnity, 'you
are our master?'
'I know that; what next!'
'Nikolai Artemyevitch, graciously do not be angry with me; but I,
having been in your honour's service from a boy, am bound in dutiful
devotion to bring you----'
'Well what is it?'
The man shifted uneasily as he stood.
'You condescended to say, your honour,' he began, 'that your honour
did not know where Elena Nikolaevna was pleased to go. I have
information about that.'
'What lies are you telling, idiot?'
'That's as your honour likes, but T saw our young lady three days ago,
as she was pleased to go into a house!'
'Where? what? what house?'
'In a house, near Povarsky. Not far from here. I even asked the
doorkeeper who were the people living there.'
Nikolai Artemyevitch stamped with his feet.
'Silence, scoundrel! How dare you? ... Elena Nikolaevna, in the
goodness of her heart, goes to visit the poor and you ... Be off, fool!'
The terrified servant was rushing to the door.
'Stop!' cried Nikolai Artemyevitch. 'What did the doorkeeper say to
you?'
'Oh no--nothing--he said nothing--He told me--a stu--student----'
'Silence, scoundrel! Listen, you dirty beast; if you ever breathe a
word in your dreams even----'
'Mercy on us----'
'Silence! if you blab--if any one--if I find out--you shall find no
hiding-place even underground! Do you hear? You can go!'
The man vanished.
'Good Heavens, merciful powers! what does it mean?' thought Nikolai
Artemyevitch when he was left alone. 'What did that idiot tell me?
Eh? I shall have to find out, though, what house it is, and who lives
there. I must go myself. Has it come to this! . . . _Un laquais!
Quelle humiliation!_'
And repeating aloud: '_Un laquais!_' Nikolai Artemyevitch shut the
dressing-case up in the bureau, and went up to Anna Vassilyevna. He
found her in bed with her face tied up. But the sight of her
sufferings only irritated him, and he very soon reduced her to tears.
XXX
Meanwhile the storm gathering in the East was breaking. Turkey had
declared war on Russia; the time fixed for the evacuation of the
Principalities had already expired, the day of the disaster of Sinope
was not far off. The last letters received by Insarov summoned him
urgently to his country. His health was not yet restored; he coughed,
suffered from weakness and slight attacks of fever, but he was
scarcely ever at home. His heart was fired, he no longer thought of
his illness. He was for ever rushing about Moscow, having secret
interviews with various persons, writing for whole nights,
disappearing for whole days; he had informed his landlord that he was
going away shortly, and had presented him already with his scanty
furniture. Elena too on her side was getting ready for departure. One
wet evening she was sitting in her room, and listening with
involuntary depression to the sighing of the wind, while she hemmed
handkerchiefs. Her maid came in and told her that her father was in
her mother's room and sent for her there. 'Your mamma is crying,' she
whispered after the retreating Elena, 'and your papa is angry.'
Elena gave a slight shrug and went into Anna Vassflyevna's room.
Nikolai Artemyevitch's kind-hearted spouse was half lying on a
reclining chair, sniffing a handkerchief steeped in _eau de Cologne_;
he himself was standing at the hearth, every button buttoned up, in a
high, hard cravat, with a stiffly starched collar; his deportment had
a vague suggestion of some parliamentary orator. With an orator's wave
of the arm he motioned his daughter to a chair, and when she, not
understanding his gesture, looked inquiringly at him, he brought out
with dignity, without turning his head: 'I beg you to be seated.'
Nikolai Artemyevitch always used the formal plural in addressing his
wife, but only on extraordinary occasions in addressing his daughter.
Elena sat down.
Anna Vassilyevna blew her nose tearfully. Nikolai Artemyevitch thrust
his fingers between his coat-buttons.
'I sent for you, Elena Nikolaevna,' he began after a protracted
silence, 'in order to have an explanation with you, or rather in order
to ask you for an explanation. I am displeased with you--or no--that
is too little to say: your behaviour is a pain and an outrage to
me--to me and to your mother--your mother whom you see here.'
Nikolai Artemyevitch was giving vent only to the few bass notes in his
voice. Elena gazed in silence at him, then at Anna Vassilyevna and
turned pale.
'There was a time,' Nikolai Artemyevitch resumed, 'when daughters did
not allow themselves to look down on their parents--when the parental
authority forced the disobedient to tremble. That time has passed,
unhappily: so at least many persons imagine; but let me tell you,
there are still laws which do not permit--do not permit--in fact
there are still laws. I beg you to mark that: there are still
laws----'
'But, papa,' Elena was beginning.
'I beg you not to interrupt me. Let us turn in thought to the past. I
and Anna Vassilyevna have performed our duty. I and Anna Vassilyevna
have spared nothing in your education: neither care nor expense. What
you have gained from our care--is a different question; but I had the
right to expect--I and Anna Vassilyevna had the right to expect that
you would at least hold sacred the principles of morality which we
have--_que nous avons inculques_, which we have instilled into you, our
only daughter. We had the right to expect that no new "ideas" could
touch that, so to speak, holy shrine. And what do we find? I am not
now speaking of frivolities characteristic of your sex, and age, but
who could have anticipated that you could so far forget yourself----'
'Papa,' said Elena, 'I know what you are going to say------'
'No, you don't know what I am going to say!' cried Nikolai
Artemyevitch in a falsetto shriek, suddenly losing the majesty of his
oratorical pose, the smooth dignity of his speech, and his bass notes.
'You don't know, vile hussy!'
'For mercy's sake, _Nicolas_,' murmured Anna Vassilyevna, '_vous me
faites mourir_?'
'Don't tell me _que je vous fais mourir_, Anna Vassilyevna! You can't
conceive what you will hear directly! Prepare yourself for the worst,
I warn you!'
Anna Vassilyevna seemed stupefied.
'No,' resumed Nikolai Artemyevitch, turning to Elena, 'you don't know
what I am going to say!'
'I am to blame towards you----' she began.
'Ah, at last!'
'I am to blame towards you,' pursued Elena, 'for not having long ago
confessed----'
'But do you know,' Nikolai Artemyevitch interrupted, 'that I can crush
you with one word?'
Elena raised her eyes to look at him.
'Yes, madam, with one word! It's useless to look at me!' (He
crossed his arms on his breast.) 'Allow me to ask you, do you know a
certain house near Povarsky? Have you visited that house?' (He
stamped.) 'Answer me, worthless girl, and don't try to hide the truth.
People, people, servants, _madam, de vils laquais_ have seen you, as
you went in there, to your----'
Elena was crimson, her eyes were blazing.
'I have no need to hide anything,' she declared. 'Yes, I have visited
that house.'
'Exactly! Do you hear, do you hear, Anna Vassilyevna? And you know,
I presume, who lives there?'
'Yes, I know; my husband.'
Nikolai Artemyevitch's eyes were starting out of his head.
'Your----'
'My husband,' repeated Elena; 'I am married to Dmitri Nikanorovitch
Insarov.'
'You?--married?'--was all Anna Vassilyevna could articulate.
'Yes, mamma. . . . Forgive me. A fortnight ago, we were secretly
married.'
Anna Vassilyevna fell back in her chair; Nikolai Artemyevitch stepped
two paces back.
'Married! To that vagrant, that Montenegrin! the daughter of Nikolai
Stahov of the higher nobility married to a vagrant, a nobody, without
her parents' sanction! And you imagine I shall let the matter rest,
that I shall not make a complaint, that I will allow you--that
you--that----To the nunnery with you, and he shall go to prison, to
hard labour! Anna Vassilyevna, inform her at once that you will cut
off her inheritance!'
'Nikolai Artemyevitch, for God's sake,' moaned Anna Vassilyevna.
'And when and how was this done? Who married you? where? how? Good
God! what will all our friends think, what will the world say! And
you, shameless hypocrite, could go on living under your parents' roof
after such an act! Had you no fear of--the wrath of heaven?'
'Papa' said Elena (she was trembling from head to foot but her voice
was steady), 'you are at liberty to do with me as you please, but you
need not accuse me of shamelessness, and hypocrisy. I did not want--to
give you pain before, but I should have had to tell you all myself in
a few days, because we are going away--my husband and I--from here
next week.'
'Going away? Where to?'
'To his own country, to Bulgaria.'
'To the Turks!' cried Anna Vassilyevna and fell into a swoon.
Elena ran to her mother.
'Away!' clamoured Nikolai Artemyevitch, seizing his daughter by the
arm, 'away, unworthy girl!'
But at that instant the door of the room opened, and a pale face with
glittering eyes appeared: it was the face of Shubin.
'Nikolai Artemyevitch!' he shouted at the top of his voice, 'Augustina
Christianovna is here and is asking for you!'
Nikolai Artemyevitch turned round infuriated, threatening Shubin with
his fist; he stood still a minute and rapidly went out of the room.
Elena fell at her mother's feet and embraced her knees.
Uvar Ivanovitch was lying on his bed. A shirt without a collar,
fastened with a heavy stud enfolded his thick neck and fell in full
flowing folds over the almost feminine contours of his chest, leaving
visible a large cypress-wood cross and an amulet. His ample limbs were
covered with the lightest bedclothes. On the little table by the
bedside a candle was burning dimly beside a jug of kvas, and on the
bed at Uvar ivanovitch's feet was sitting Shubin in a dejected pose.
'Yes,' he was saying meditatively, 'she is married and getting ready
to go away. Your nephew was bawling and shouting for the benefit of
the whole house; he had shut himself up for greater privacy in his
wife's bedroom, but not merely the maids and the footmen, the coachman
even could hear it all! Now he's just tearing and raving round; he
all but gave me a thrashing, he's bringing a father's curse on the
scene now, as cross as a bear with a sore head; but that's of no
importance. Anna Vassilyevna's crushed, but she's much more
brokenhearted at her daughter leaving her than at her marriage.'
Uvar Ivanovitch flourished his fingers.
'A mother,' he commented, 'to be sure.'
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