Kitabı oku: «The Diary of a Superfluous Man, and Other Stories», sayfa 7

"Stop behaving like a baby," – remarked Vasíly Ivánovitch, coldly. – "Remember, you have given me your word that the wedding shall take place to-morrow."

"No, that shall not be! Enough, Vasíly Ivánovitch, I say to you once more – for whom do you take me? You do me much honour; many thanks, sir. Excuse me, sir."

"As you like!" – retorted Vasíly. – "Get your sword."

"Why?"

"This is why."

Vasíly drew out his slender, flexible French sword, and bent it slightly against the floor.

"You mean … to fight … with me?.."

"Precisely so."

"But, Vasíly Ivánovitch, pray, enter into my position! How can I – judge for yourself – after what you have told me?.. I am an honest man, Vasíly Ivánovitch; I am a nobleman."

"You are a nobleman, you are an honest man, – then be so good as to fight with me."

"Vasíly Ivánovitch!"

"You appear to be a coward, Mr. Rogatchyóff?"

"I am not in the least a coward, Vasíly Ivánovitch. You have thought to frighten me, Vasíly Ivánovitch. 'Come, now,' you said to yourself, 'I 'll scare him, and he 'll turn cowardly; he will instantly consent to anything.'… No, Vasíly Ivánovitch, I 'm the same sort of nobleman as yourself, although I have not received my education in the capital, it is true; and you will not succeed in terrifying me, excuse me."

"Very good," – retorted Vasíly: – "where is your sword?"

"Eróshka!" – shouted Pável Afanásievitch.

A man entered.

"Get my sword – yonder – thou knowest where it is – in the garret … and be quick about it…"

Eróshka withdrew. Pável Afanásievitch suddenly turned extremely pale, hastily took off his dressing-gown, put on a kaftan of a reddish hue with large strass buttons … wound a neckcloth round his neck… Vasíly watched him, and examined the fingers of his right hand.

"So how is it to be? Are we to fight, Pável Afanásievitch?"

"If we must fight, we must," – returned Rogatchyóff, hastily buttoning his waistcoat.

"Hey, Pável Afanásievitch, heed my advice: marry … why shouldst thou not?.. But I, believe me …"

"No, Vasíly Ivánovitch," – Rogatchyóff interrupted him. "You will either kill me or maim me, I know; but I have no intention of losing my honour; if I must die, I will."

Eróshka entered and hurriedly handed Rogatchyóff a wretched little old sword, in a cracked, leather scabbard. At that time all nobles wore swords when they had powdered hair; but the nobles of the steppes only powdered their hair a couple of times a year. Eróshka retreated to the door, and fell to weeping. Pável Afanásievitch thrust him out of the room.

"But, Vasíly Ivánovitch," – he remarked, with some agitation, – "I cannot fight with you instantly: permit me to defer our duel until to-morrow; my father is not at home; and it would not be a bad thing to put my affairs in order, in case of a catastrophe."

"I see that you are beginning to quail again, my dear sir."

"No, no, Vasíly Ivánovitch; but judge for yourself…"

"Listen!"… shouted Lutchínoff: – "you are driving me out of patience… Either give me your word to marry immediately, or fight … or I will trounce you with a cudgel, like a coward, do you understand?"

"Let us go into the park," – replied Rogatchyóff between his teeth.

But suddenly the door opened, and the old nurse Efímovna, all dishevelled, forced her way into the room, fell on her knees before Rogatchyóff and clasped his feet…

"My dear little father!" – she wailed: – "my child … what is this thou art projecting? Do not ruin us miserable ones, dear little father! For he will kill thee, my dear little dove! But only give us the command, give us the command, and we 'll kill that insolent fellow with our caps… Pável Afanásievitch, my darling child, have the fear of God before thine eyes!"

A multitude of pale and agitated faces showed themselves in the doorway … the red beard of the Elder even made its appearance…

"Let me go, Efímovna, let me go!" – muttered Rogatchyóff.

"I will not let thee go, my own one, I will not let thee go. What art thou doing, dear little father, what art thou doing? And what will Afanásy Lúkitch say? Why, he will drive all of us out of the white world… And why do ye stand there? Seize the unbidden guest by the arms, and lead him forth from the house, that no trace of him may remain…"

"Rogatchyóff!" – shouted Vasíly Ivánovitch, menacingly.

"Thou hast gone crazy, Efímovna, thou art disgracing me,"… said Pável Afanásievitch. – "Go away, go, with God's blessing, and begone, all of you, do you hear? Do you hear?.."

Vasíly Ivánovitch walked swiftly to the open window, drew out a small silver whistle, and whistled lightly… Boursier answered close at hand. Lutchínoff immediately turned to Pável Afanásievitch.

"How is this comedy to end?"

"Vasíly Ivánovitch, I will come to you to-morrow – what am I to do with this crazy woman?.."

"Eh! I see that it is useless to talk long with you," – said Vasíly, and swiftly raised his cane…

Pável Afanásievitch dashed forward, thrust aside Efímovna, seized his sword, and rushed through the other door into the park.

Vasíly darted after him. They both ran to a wooden arbour artfully painted in the Chinese manner, locked themselves in, and bared their swords. Rogatchyóff had once upon a time taken lessons in fencing; but he barely knew how to parry properly. The blades crossed. Vasíly was, evidently, playing with Rogatchyóff's sword. Pável Afanásievitch sighed, turned pale, and gazed with consternation into Lutchínoff's face. In the meanwhile, cries resounded in the park; a throng of people rushed to the arbour. Suddenly Rogatchyóff heard a heart-rending, senile roar … he recognised his father's voice. Afanásy Lúkitch, hatless, and with dishevelled locks, was running in front of all, waving his arms despairingly…

With a powerful and unexpected turn of his blade, Vasíly knocked the sword from Pável Afanásievitch's hand.

"Marry, brother," – he said to him. – "Stop being a fool!"

"I will not marry!" – whispered Rogatchyóff, closed his eyes, and trembled all over.

Afanásy Lúkitch began to pound on the door of the arbour.

"Thou wilt not?" – shouted Vasíly.

Rogatchyóff shook his head in the negative.

"Well, then, the devil take thee!"

Poor Pável Afanásievitch fell dead: Lutchínoff's sword had pierced his heart… The door burst open, old Rogatchyóff rushed into the arbour, but Vasíly had already managed to spring out of the window…

Two hours later, he entered Olga Ivánovna's room… She darted to meet him in affright… He silently bowed to her, drew out his sword, and pierced Pável Afanásievitch's portrait at the place of the heart. Olga shrieked, and fell senseless on the floor… Vasíly directed his steps to Anna Pávlovna. He found her in the room of the holy pictures.

"Mamma," – he said, – "we are avenged."

The poor old woman shuddered and went on praying.

A week later, Vasíly took his departure for Petersburg, – and two years afterward he returned to the country, crippled with paralysis, and speechless. He no longer found either Anna Pávlovna or Olga Ivánovna alive, and soon died himself in the arms of Yúditch, who fed him like a baby, and was the only person who could understand his incoherent babble.

THREE MEETINGS
(1851)

[Pg 148]

[Pg 149]

I

 
Passa que' colli e vieni allegramente;
Non ti curar di tanta compania —
Vieni pensando a me segretamente —
Ch'io t'accompagna per tutta la via.²⁰
 

During the whole course of the summer, I had gone a-hunting nowhere so frequently as to the large village of Glínnoe, situated twenty versts from my hamlet. In the environs of this village there are, in all probability, the very best haunts of game in all our county. After having tramped through all the adjacent bush-plots and fields, I invariably, toward the end of the day, turned aside into the neighbouring marsh, almost the only one in the countryside, and thence returned to my cordial host, the Elder of Glínnoe, with whom I always stopped. It is not more than two versts from the marsh to Glínnoe; the entire road runs through a valley, and only midway of the distance is one compelled to cross a small hillock. On the crest of this hillock lies a homestead, consisting of one uninhabited little manor-house and a garden. It almost always happened that I passed it at the very acme of the sunset glow, and I remember, that on every such occasion, this house, with its hermetically-sealed windows, appeared to me like a blind old man who had come forth to warm himself in the sunlight. He is sitting, dear man, close to the highway; the splendour of the sunlight has long since been superseded for him by eternal gloom; but he feels it, at least, on his upturned and outstretched face, on his flushed cheeks. It seemed as though no one had lived in the house itself for a long time; but in a tiny detached wing, in the courtyard, lodged a decrepit man who had received his freedom, tall, stooping, and grey-haired, with expressive and impassive features. He was always sitting on a bench in front of the wing's solitary little window, gazing with sad pensiveness into the distance, and when he caught sight of me, he rose a little way and saluted, with that deliberate gravity which distinguishes old house-serfs who have belonged not to the generation of our fathers, but to our grandfathers. I sometimes entered into conversation with him, but he was not loquacious; all I learned from him was that the farm on which he dwelt belonged to the granddaughter of his old master, a widow, who had a younger sister; that both of them lived in towns, and beyond the sea, and never showed themselves at home; that he was anxious to finish his life as speedily as possible, because "you eat and eat bread so that you get melancholy: so long do you eat." This old man's name was Lukyánitch.

One day, for some reason or other, I tarried long in the fields; a very fair amount of game had presented itself, and the day had turned out fine for hunting – from early morning it had been still and grey, as though thoroughly permeated with evening. I wandered far a-field, and it was not only already completely dark, but the moon had risen and night had long been standing in the sky, as the expression runs, when I reached the familiar farm. I had to pass along the garden… All around lay such tranquillity…

I crossed the broad road, cautiously made my way through the dusty nettles, and leaned against the low, wattled hedge.²¹ Motionless before me lay the small garden all illuminated and, as it were, soothed to stillness by the silvery rays of the moon, – all fragrant and humid; laid out in ancient fashion, it consisted of a single oblong grass-plot. Straight paths came together exactly in the centre, in a circular flower-bed, thickly overgrown with asters; tall lindens surrounded it in an even border. In one spot only was this border, a couple of fathoms in length, broken, and through the gap a part of the low-roofed house was visible, with two windows lighted, to my amazement. Young apple-trees reared themselves here and there over the meadow; athwart their slender branches the nocturnal sky gleamed softly blue, and the dreamy light of the moon streamed down; in front of each apple-tree, on the whitening grass, lay its faint, mottled shadow. On one side of the garden the lindens were confusedly green, inundated with motionless, palely-brilliant light; on the other, they stood all black and opaque; a strange, repressed rustling arose at times in their dense foliage; they seemed to be calling to the paths which vanished under them, as though luring them beneath their dim canopy. The whole sky was studded with stars; mysteriously did their soft blue scintillations stream down from on high; they seemed to be gazing with quiet intentness at the distant earth. Small, thin clouds now and then sailed across the moon, momentarily converting its tranquil gleam into an obscure but luminous mist… Everything was dreaming. The air, all warm, all perfumed, did not even vibrate; it only shivered now and then, as water shivers when disturbed by a falling branch… One was conscious of a certain thirst, a certain swooning in it… I bent over the fence: a wild scarlet poppy reared its erect little stalk before me from the matted grass; a large, round drop of night dew glittered with a dark gleam in the heart of the open blossom. Everything was dreaming; everything was taking its ease luxuriously round about; everything seemed to be gazing upward, stretching itself out, motionless, expectant… What was it that that warm, not yet sleeping night, was waiting for?

It was waiting for a sound; that sensitive stillness was waiting for a living voice – but everything maintained silence. The nightingales had long since ceased their song … and the sudden booming of a beetle as it flew past, the light smacking of a tiny fish in the fish-pond behind the lindens at the end of the garden, the sleepy whistle of a startled bird, a distant cry in the fields, – so far away that the ear could not distinguish whether it was a man, or a wild animal, or a bird which had uttered it, – a short, brisk trampling of hoofs on the road: all these faint sounds, these rustlings, only rendered the stillness more profound… My heart yearned within me, with an indefinite feeling, akin not precisely to expectation, nor yet to a memory of happiness. I dared not stir; I was standing motionless before this motionless garden steeped in moonlight and in dew, and, without myself knowing why, was staring importunately at those two windows, which shone dimly red in the soft half-darkness, when suddenly a chord rang out of the house, – rang out and rolled forth in a flood… The irritatingly-resonant air thundered back an echo… I gave an involuntary start.

The chord was followed by the sound of a woman's voice… I began to listen eagerly – and … can I express my amazement?.. two years previously, in Italy, at Sorrento, I had heard that selfsame song, that selfsame voice… Yes, yes…

 
"Vieni pensando a me segretamente …"
 

It was they; I had recognised them; those were the sounds… This is the way it had happened. I was returning home from a long stroll on the seashore. I was walking swiftly along the street; night had long since descended, – a magnificent night, southern, not calm and sadly-pensive as with us, no! but all radiant, sumptuous, and very beautiful, like a happy woman in her bloom; the moon shone with incredible brilliancy; great, radiant stars fairly throbbed in the dark-blue sky; the black shadows were sharply defined against the ground illuminated to yellowness. On both sides of the street stretched the stone walls of gardens; orange-trees reared above them their crooked branches; the golden globes of heavy fruit, hidden amidst the interlacing leaves, were now barely visible, now glowed brightly, as they ostentatiously displayed themselves in the moonlight. On many trees the blossoms shone tenderly white; the air was all impregnated with fragrance languishingly powerful, penetrating, and almost heavy, although inexpressibly sweet.

I walked on, and, I must confess, – having already become accustomed to all these wonders, – I was thinking only of how I might most speedily reach my inn, when suddenly, from a small pavilion, built upon the very wall of a garden along which I was passing, a woman's voice rang out. It was singing some song with which I was unfamiliar, and in its sounds there was something so winning, it seemed so permeated with the passion and joyous expectation expressed by the words of the song, that I instantly and involuntarily halted, and raised my head. There were two windows in the pavilion; but in both the Venetian blinds were lowered, and through their narrow chinks a dull light barely made its way.

After having repeated "vieni, vieni!" twice, the voice became silent; the faint sound of strings was audible, as though of a guitar which had fallen on the rug; a gown rustled, the floor creaked softly. The streaks of light in one window disappeared… Some one had approached from within and leaned against it. I advanced a couple of paces. Suddenly the blind clattered and flew open; a graceful woman, all in white, swiftly thrust her lovely head from the window, and stretching out her arms toward me, said: "Sei tu?"

I was disconcerted, I did not know what to say; but at that same moment the Unknown threw herself backward with a faint shriek, the blind slammed to, and the light in the pavilion grew still more dim, as though it had been carried out into another room. I remained motionless, and for a long time could not recover myself. The face of the woman who had so suddenly presented itself before me was strikingly beautiful. It had flashed too rapidly before my eyes to permit of my immediately recalling each individual feature; but the general impression was indescribably powerful and profound… I felt then and there that I should never forget that countenance. The moon fell straight on the wall of the pavilion, on the window whence she had shown herself to me, and, great heavens! how magnificently had her great, dark eyes shone in its radiance! In what a heavy flood had her half-loosened black hair fallen upon her uplifted, rounded shoulders! How much bashful tenderness there had been in the soft inclination of her form, how much affection in her voice, when she had called to me – in that hurried, but resonant whisper!

After standing for quite a long time on one spot, I at last stepped a little aside, into the shadow of the opposite wall, and began to stare thence at the pavilion with a sort of stupid surprise and anticipation. I listened … listened with strained attention… It seemed to me now that I heard some one's quiet breathing behind the darkened window, now a rustle and quiet laughter. At last, steps resounded in the distance … they came nearer; a man of almost identical stature with myself made his appearance at the end of the street, briskly strode up to a gate directly beneath the pavilion, which I had not previously noticed, knocked twice with its iron ring, without looking about him, waited a little, knocked again, and began to sing in an undertone: "Ecco ridente."… The gate opened … he slipped noiselessly through it. I started, shook my head, threw my hands apart, and pulling my hat morosely down on my brows, went off home in displeasure. On the following day I vainly paced up and down that street for two hours in the very hottest part of the day, past the pavilion, and that same evening went away from Sorrento without even having visited Tasso's house.

The reader can now picture to himself the amazement which suddenly took possession of me, when I heard that same voice, that same song, in the steppes, in one of the most remote parts of Russia… Now, as then, it was night; now, as then, the voice suddenly rang out from a lighted, unfamiliar room; now, as then, I was alone. My heart began to beat violently within me. "Is not this a dream?" I thought. And lo! again the final "vieni!" rang out… Can it be that the window will open? Can it be that the woman will show herself in it? – The window opened. In the window, a woman showed herself. I instantly recognised her, although a distance of fifty paces lay between us, although a light cloud obscured the moon. It was she, my Unknown of Sorrento.

But she did not stretch forth her bare arms as before: she folded them quietly, and leaning them on the window-sill, began to gaze silently and immovably at some point in the garden. Yes, it was she; those were her never-to-be-forgotten features, her eyes, the like of which I had never beheld. Now, also, an ample white gown enfolded her limbs. She seemed somewhat plumper than in Sorrento. Everything about exhaled an atmosphere of the confidence and repose of love, the triumph of beauty, of calm happiness. For a long time she did not stir, then she cast a glance backward into the room and, suddenly straightening herself up, exclaimed thrice, in a loud and ringing voice: "Addio!" The beautiful sounds were wafted far, far away, and for a long time they quivered, growing fainter and dying out beneath the lindens of the garden and in the fields behind me, and everywhere. Everything around me was filled for several minutes with the voice of this woman, everything rang in response to her, – rang with her. She shut the window, and a few moments later the light in the house vanished.

As soon as I recovered myself – and this was not very soon, I must admit – I immediately directed my course along the garden of the manor, approached the closed gate, and peered through the wattled fence. Nothing out of the ordinary was visible in the courtyard; in one corner, under a shed, stood a calash. Its front half, all bespattered with dried mud, shone out sharply white in the moonlight. The shutters of the house were closed, as before.

I have forgotten to say, that for about a week previous to that day, I had not visited Glínnoe. For more than half an hour I paced to and fro in perplexity in front of the fence, so that, at last, I attracted the attention of the old watch-dog, which, nevertheless, did not begin to bark at me, but merely looked at me from under the gate in a remarkably ironical manner, with his purblind little eyes puckered up. I understood his hint, and beat a retreat. But before I had managed to traverse half a verst, I suddenly heard the sound of a horse's hoofs behind me… In a few minutes a rider, mounted on a black horse, dashed past me at a swift trot, and swiftly turning toward me his face, where I could descry nothing save an aquiline nose and a very handsome moustache under his military cap, which was pulled well down on his brow, turned into the right-hand road, and immediately vanished behind the forest.

"So that is he," I thought to myself, and my heart stirred within me in a strange sort of way. It seemed to me that I recognised him; his figure really did suggest the figure of the man whom I had seen enter the garden-gate in Sorrento. Half an hour later I was in Glínnoe at my host's, had roused him, and had immediately begun to interrogate him as to the persons who had arrived at the neighbouring farm. He replied with an effort that the ladies had arrived.

"But what ladies?"

"Why, everybody knows what ladies," he replied very languidly.

"Russians?"

"What else should they be? – Russians, of course."

"Not foreigners?"

"Hey?"

"Have they been here long?"

"Not long, of course."

"And have they come to stay long?"

"That I don't know."

"Are they wealthy?"

"And that, too, we don't know. Perhaps they are wealthy."

"Did not a gentleman come with them?"

"A gentleman?"

"Yes, a gentleman."

The Elder sighed.

"O, okh, O Lord!" – he ejaculated with a yawn… "N-n-o, there was no … gentleman, I think there was no gentleman. I don't know!" – he suddenly added.

"And what sort of other neighbours are living here?"

"What sort? everybody knows what sort, – all sorts."

"All sorts? – And what are their names?"

"Whose – the lady proprietors'? or the neighbours'?"

"The lady proprietors'."

Again the Elder yawned.

"What are their names?" – he muttered. – "Why, God knows what their names are! The elder, I think, is named Anna Feódorovna, and the other … No, I don't know that one's name."

"Well, what 's their surname, at least?"

"Their surname?"

"Yes, their surname, their family name."

"Their family name… Yes. Why, as God is my witness, I don't know."

"Are they young?"

"Well, no. They are not."

"How old are they, then?"

"Why, the youngest must be over forty."

"Thou art inventing the whole of this."

The Elder was silent for a while.

"Well, you must know best. But I don't know."

"Well, thou art wound up to say one thing!" – I exclaimed with vexation.

Knowing, by experience, that there is no possibility of extracting anything lucid from a Russian man when once he undertakes to answer in that way (and, moreover, my host had only just thrown himself down to sleep, and swayed forward slightly before every answer, opening his eyes widely with child-like surprise, and with difficulty ungluing his lips, smeared with the honey of the first, sweet slumber), – I gave up in despair, and declining supper, went into the barn.

I could not get to sleep for a long time. "Who is she?" – I kept incessantly asking myself: – "a Russian? If a Russian, why does she speak in Italian?.. The Elder declares that she is not young… But he 's lying… And who is that happy man?.. Positively, I can comprehend nothing… But what a strange adventure! Is it possible that thus, twice in succession … But I will infallibly find out who she is, and why she has come hither."… Agitated by such disordered, fragmentary thoughts as these, I fell asleep late, and saw strange visions… Now it seems to me that I am wandering in some desert, in the very blaze of noonday – and suddenly, I behold in front of me, a huge spot of shadow running over the red-hot yellow sand… I raise my head – 't is she, my beauty, whisking through the air, all white, with long white wings, and beckoning me to her. I dart after her; but she floats on lightly and swiftly, and I cannot rise from the ground, and stretch out eager hands in vain… "Addio!" she says to me, as she flies away. – "Why hast thou not wings?.. Addio!"… And lo, from all sides, "Addio!" resounds. Every grain of sand shouts and squeaks at me: "Addio!"… then rings out in an intolerable, piercing trill… I brush it aside, as I would a gnat, I seek her with my eyes … and already she has become a cloud, and is floating upward softly toward the sun; the sun quivers, rocks, laughs, stretches out to meet her long golden threads, and now those threads have enmeshed her, and she melts into them, but I shout at the top of my lungs, like a madman: "That is not the sun, that is not the sun, that is an Italian spider. Who gave it a passport for Russia? I 'll show him up for what he is: I saw him stealing oranges from other people's gardens."… Then it seems to me that I am walking along a narrow mountain path… I hurry onward: I must get somewhere or other as quickly as possible, some unheard-of happiness is awaiting me. Suddenly a vast cliff rears itself up in front of me. I seek a passage; I go to the right, I go to the left – there is no passage! And now behind the cliff a voice suddenly rings out: "Passa, passa quei colli."… It is calling me, that voice; it repeats its mournful summons. I fling myself about in anguish, I seek even the smallest cleft… Alas! the cliff is perpendicular, there is granite everywhere… "Passa quei colli," wails the voice again. My heart aches, and I hurl my breast against the smooth stone; I scratch it with my nails, in my frenzy… A dark passage suddenly opens before me… Swooning with joy, I dash forward… "Nonsense!" some one cries to me: – "thou shalt not pass through.".. I look: Lukyánitch is standing in front of me and threatening, and brandishing his arms… I hastily fumble in my pockets: I want to bribe him; but there is nothing in my pockets…

"Lukyánitch," – I say to him, – "let me pass; I will reward thee afterward."

"You are mistaken, signor," Lukyánitch replies to me, and his face assumes a strange expression: – "I am not a house-serf; recognise in me Don Quixote de La Mancha, the famous wandering knight; all my life long I have been seeking my Dulcinea – and I have not been able to find her, and I will not tolerate it, that you shall find yours."

"Passa quei colli"… rings out again the almost sobbing voice.

"Stand aside, signor!" – I shout wrathfully, and am on the point of precipitating myself forward … but the knight's long spear wounds me in the very heart… I fall dead… I lie on my back… I cannot move … and lo, I see that she is coming with a lamp in her hand, and elevating it with a fine gesture above her head, she peers about her in the gloom, and creeping cautiously up, bends over me…

"So this is he, that jester!" she says with a disdainful laugh. – "This is he who wanted to know who I am!" and the hot oil from her lamp drips straight upon my wounded heart…

"Psyche!" – I exclaim with an effort, and awake.

All night long I slept badly and was afoot before daybreak. Hastily dressing and arming myself, I wended my way straight to the manor. My impatience was so great that the dawn had only just begun to flush the sky when I reached the familiar gate. Round me the larks were singing, the daws were cawing on the birches; but in the house everything was still buried in death-like matutinal slumber. Even the dog was snoring behind the fence. With the anguish of expectation, exasperated almost to the point of wrath, I paced to and fro on the dewy grass, and kept casting incessant glances at the low-roofed and ill-favoured little house which contained within its walls that mysterious being…

Suddenly the wicket-gate creaked faintly, opened, and Lukyánitch made his appearance on the threshold, in some sort of striped kazák coat. His bristling, long-drawn face seemed to me more surly than ever. Gazing at me not without surprise, he was on the point of shutting the wicket again.

"My good fellow, my good fellow!" – I cried hastily.

"What do you want at such an early hour?" – he returned slowly and dully.

"Tell me, please, they say that your mistress has arrived?"

Lukyánitch made no reply for a while.

"She has arrived…"

"Alone?"

"With her sister."

"Were there not guests with you last night?"

"No."

And he drew the wicket toward him.

"Stay, stay, my dear fellow… Do me a favour…"

Lukyánitch coughed and shivered with cold.

"But what is it you want?"

"Tell me, please, how old is your mistress?"

Lukyánitch darted a suspicious glance at me.

"How old is the mistress? I don't know. She must be over forty."

"Over forty! And how old is her sister?"

"Why, she 's in the neighbourhood of forty."

"You don't say so! And is she good-looking?"

"Who, the sister?"

"Yes, the sister."

Lukyánitch grinned.

"I don't know; that 's as a person fancies. In my opinion, she is n't comely."

"How so?"

"Because – she 's very ill-favoured. A bit puny."

"You don't say so! And has no one except them come hither?"

"No one. Who should come?"