No More Learning

”




CHAPTER VI. 30th May.

ABOUT seven o’clock in the evening, I was walking on the boulevard.
Grushnitski perceived me a long way off, and came up to me. A sort of
ridiculous rapture was shining in his eyes. He pressed my hand warmly,
and said in a tragic voice:

“I thank you, Pechorin. . . You understand me? ”

“No; but in any case it is not worth gratitude,” I answered, not having,
in fact, any good deed upon my conscience.

“What? But yesterday! Have you forgotten? . . . Mary has told me
everything”. . .

“Why! Have you everything in common so soon as this? Even gratitude? ”. . .

“Listen,” said Grushnitski very earnestly; “pray do not make fun of
my love, if you wish to remain my friend. . . You see, I love her to the
point of madness. . . and I think--I hope--she loves me too. . . I have a
request to make of you. You will be at their house this evening; promise
me to observe everything. I know you are experienced in these matters,
you know women better than I. . . Women! Women! Who can understand them?
Their smiles contradict their glances, their words promise and allure,
but the tone of their voice repels. . . At one time they grasp and divine
in a moment our most secret thoughts, at another they cannot understand
the clearest hints. . . Take Princess Mary, now: yesterday her eyes, as
they rested upon me, were blazing with passion; to-day they are dull and
cold”. . .

“That is possibly the result of the waters,” I replied.

“You see the bad side of everything. . . materialist,” he added
contemptuously. “However, let us talk of other matters. ”

And, satisfied with his bad pun, he cheered up.

At nine o’clock we went to Princess Ligovski’s together.

Passing by Vera’s windows, I saw her looking out. We threw a fleeting
glance at each other. She entered the Ligovskis’ drawing-room soon after
us. Princess Ligovski presented me to her, as a relation of her own. Tea
was served. The guests were numerous, and the conversation was general.
I endeavoured to please the Princess, jested, and made her laugh
heartily a few times. Princess Mary, also, was more than once on the
point of bursting out laughing, but she restrained herself in order not
to depart from the role she had assumed. She finds languor becoming to
her, and perhaps she is not mistaken. Grushnitski appears to be very
glad that she is not infected by my gaiety.

After tea we all went into the drawingroom.

“Are you satisfied with my obedience, Vera? ” I said as I was passing
her.

She threw me a glance full of love and gratitude. I have grown
accustomed to such glances; but at one time they constituted my
felicity. The Princess seated her daughter at the pianoforte, and all
the company begged her to sing. I kept silence, and, taking advantage
of the hubbub, I went aside to the window with Vera, who wished to
say something of great importance to both of us. . . It turned out to
be--nonsense. . .

Meanwhile my indifference was vexing Princess Mary, as I was able to
make out from a single angry, gleaming glance which she cast at me. . .
Oh! I understand the method of conversation wonderfully well: mute but
expressive, brief but forceful! . . .

She began to sing. She has a good voice, but she sings badly. . . However,
I was not listening.

Grushnitski, on the contrary, leaning his elbows on the grand piano,
facing her, was devouring her with his eyes and saying in an undertone
every minute: “Charmant! Delicieux! ”

“Listen,” said Vera to me, “I do not wish you to make my husband’s
acquaintance, but you must, without fail, make yourself agreeable to
the Princess; that will be an easy task for you: you can do anything you
wish. It is only here that we shall see each other”. . .

“Only here? ”. . .

She blushed and continued:

“You know that I am your slave: I have never been able to resist you. . .
and I shall be punished for it, you will cease to love me! At least,
I want to preserve my reputation. . . not for myself--that you know very
well! . . . Oh! I beseech you: do not torture me, as before, with idle
doubts and feigned coldness! It may be that I shall die soon; I feel
that I am growing weaker from day to day. . . And, yet, I cannot think of
the future life, I think only of you. . . You men do not understand the
delights of a glance, of a pressure of the hand. . . but as for me, I
swear to you that, when I listen to your voice, I feel such a deep,
strange bliss that the most passionate kisses could not take its place. ”

Meanwhile, Princess Mary had finished her song. Murmurs of praise were
to be heard all around. I went up to her after all the other guests, and
said something rather carelessly to her on the subject of her voice.

She made a little grimace, pouting her lower lip, and dropped a very
sarcastic curtsey.

“That is all the more flattering,” she said, “because you have not been
listening to me at all; but perhaps you do not like music? ”. . .

“On the contrary, I do. . . After dinner, especially. ”

“Grushnitski is right in saying that you have very prosaic tastes. . . and
I see that you like music in a gastronomic respect. ”

“You are mistaken again: I am by no means an epicure. I have a most
wretched digestion. But music after dinner puts one to sleep, and
to sleep after dinner is healthful; consequently I like music in a
medicinal respect. In the evening, on the contrary, it excites my nerves
too much: I become either too melancholy or too gay. Both are fatiguing,
where there is no positive reason for being either sorrowful or glad.
And, moreover, melancholy in society is ridiculous, and too great gaiety
is unbecoming”. . .

She did not hear me to the end, but went away and sat beside
Grushnitski, and they entered into a sort of sentimental conversation.
Apparently the Princess answered his sage phrases rather absent-mindedly
and inconsequently, although endeavouring to show that she was
listening to him with attention, because sometimes he looked at her in
astonishment, trying to divine the cause of the inward agitation which
was expressed at times in her restless glance. . .

But I have found you out, my dear Princess! Have a care! You want to pay
me back in the same coin, to wound my vanity--you will not succeed! And
if you declare war on me, I will be merciless!

In the course of the evening, I purposely tried a few times to join in
their conversation, but she met my remarks rather coldly, and, at
last, I retired in pretended vexation. Princess Mary was triumphant,
Grushnitski likewise. Triumph, my friends, and be quick about it! . . .
You will not have long to triumph! . . . It cannot be otherwise. I have
a presentiment. . . On making a woman’s acquaintance I have always
unerringly guessed whether she would fall in love with me or not.

The remaining part of the evening I spent at Vera’s side, and talked to
the full about the old days. . . Why does she love me so much? In truth, I
am unable to say, all the more so because she is the only woman who
has understood me perfectly, with all my petty weaknesses and evil
passions. . . Can it be that wickedness is so attractive? . . .

Grushnitski and I left the house together. In the street he took my arm,
and, after a long silence, said:

“Well? ”

“You are a fool,” I should have liked to answer. But I restrained myself
and only shrugged my shoulders.




CHAPTER VII. 6th June.

ALL these days I have not once departed from my system. Princess Mary
has come to like talking to me; I have told her a few of the
strange events of my life, and she is beginning to look on me as
an extraordinary man. I mock at everything in the world, especially
feelings; and she is taking alarm. When I am present, she does not dare
to embark upon sentimental discussions with Grushnitski, and already, on
a few occasions, she has answered his sallies with a mocking smile. But
every time that Grushnitski comes up to her I assume an air of meekness
and leave the two of them together. On the first occasion, she was glad,
or tried to make it appear so; on the second, she was angry with me; on
the third--with Grushnitski.

“You have very little vanity! ” she said to me yesterday. “What makes you
think that I find Grushnitski the more entertaining?
”

I answered that I was sacrificing my own pleasure for the sake of the
happiness of a friend.

“And my pleasure, too,” she added.

I looked at her intently and assumed a serious air. After that for the
whole day I did not speak a single word to her. . . In the evening, she
was pensive; this morning, at the well, more pensive still. When I went
up to her, she was listening absent-mindedly to Grushnitski, who was
apparently falling into raptures about Nature, but, so soon as
she perceived me, she began to laugh--at a most inopportune
moment--pretending not to notice me. I went on a little further and
began stealthily to observe her. She turned away from her companion and
yawned twice. Decidedly she had grown tired of Grushnitski--I will not
talk to her for another two days.




CHAPTER VIII. 11th June.

I OFTEN ask myself why I am so obstinately endeavouring to win the love
of a young girl whom I do not wish to deceive, and whom I will never
marry. Why this woman-like coquetry? Vera loves me more than Princess
Mary ever will. Had I regarded the latter as an invincible beauty, I
should perhaps have been allured by the difficulty of the undertaking. . .

However, there is no such difficulty in this case! Consequently, my
present feeling is not that restless craving for love which torments us
in the early days of our youth, flinging us from one woman to
another until we find one who cannot endure us. And then begins our
constancy--that sincere, unending passion which may be expressed
mathematically by a line falling from a point into space--the secret of
that endlessness lying only in the impossibility of attaining the aim,
that is to say, the end.

From what motive, then, am I taking all this trouble? --Envy of
Grushnitski? Poor fellow!

He is quite undeserving of it. Or, is it the result of that ugly, but
invincible, feeling which causes us to destroy the sweet illusions of
our neighbour in order to have the petty satisfaction of saying to him,
when, in despair, he asks what he is to believe:

“My friend, the same thing happened to me, and you see, nevertheless,
that I dine, sup, and sleep very peacefully, and I shall, I hope, know
how to die without tears and lamentations. ”

There is, in sooth, a boundless enjoyment in the possession of a young,
scarce-budded soul! It is like a floweret which exhales its best perfume
at the kiss of the first ray of the sun. You should pluck the flower at
that moment, and, breathing its fragrance to the full, cast it upon the
road: perchance someone will pick it up! I feel within me that insatiate
hunger which devours everything it meets upon the way; I look upon
the sufferings and joys of others only from the point of view of their
relation to myself, regarding them as the nutriment which sustains my
spiritual forces. I myself am no longer capable of committing follies
under the influence of passion; with me, ambition has been repressed by
circumstances, but it has emerged in another form, because ambition is
nothing more nor less than a thirst for power, and my chief pleasure is
to make everything that surrounds me subject to my will. To arouse the
feeling of love, devotion and awe towards oneself--is not that the first
sign, and the greatest triumph, of power? To be the cause of suffering
and joy to another--without in the least possessing any definite right
to be so--is not that the sweetest food for our pride? And what is
happiness? --Satisfied pride. Were I to consider myself the best, the
most powerful man in the world, I should be happy; were all to love me,
I should find within me inexhaustible springs of love. Evil begets
evil; the first suffering gives us the conception of the satisfaction
of torturing another. The idea of evil cannot enter the mind without
arousing a desire to put it actually into practice. “Ideas are organic
entities,” someone has said. The very fact of their birth endows them
with form, and that form is action. He in whose brain the most ideas
are born accomplishes the most. From that cause a genius, chained to an
official desk, must die or go mad, just as it often happens that a man
of powerful constitution, and at the same time of sedentary life and
simple habits, dies of an apoplectic stroke.

Passions are naught but ideas in their first development; they are an
attribute of the youth of the heart, and foolish is he who thinks that
he will be agitated by them all his life. Many quiet rivers begin their
course as noisy waterfalls, and there is not a single stream which will
leap or foam throughout its way to the sea. That quietness, however, is
frequently the sign of great, though latent, strength. The fulness and
depth of feelings and thoughts do not admit of frenzied outbursts. In
suffering and in enjoyment the soul renders itself a strict account of
all it experiences and convinces itself that such things must be. It
knows that, but for storms, the constant heat of the sun would dry it
up! It imbues itself with its own life--pets and punishes itself like a
favourite child. It is only in that highest state of self-knowledge that
a man can appreciate the divine justice.

On reading over this page, I observe that I have made a wide digression
from my subject. . . But what matter? . . . You see, it is for myself that I
am writing this diary, and, consequently anything that I jot down in it
will in time be a valuable reminiscence for me.

. . . . .

Grushnitski has called to see me to-day. He flung himself upon my neck;
he has been promoted to be an officer. We drank champagne. Doctor Werner
came in after him.

“I do not congratulate you,” he said to Grushnitski.

“Why not? ”

“Because the soldier’s cloak suits you very well, and you must confess
that an infantry uniform, made by one of the local tailors, will not add
anything of interest to you. . . Do you not see? Hitherto, you have been
an exception, but now you will come under the general rule. ”

“Talk away, doctor, talk away! You will not prevent me from rejoicing.
He does not know,” added Grushnitski in a whisper to me, “how many hopes
these epaulettes have lent me. . . Oh! . . . Epaulettes, epaulettes! Your
little stars are guiding stars! No! I am perfectly happy now! ”

“Are you coming with us on our walk to the hollow? ” I asked him.

“I? Not on any account will I show myself to Princess Mary until my
uniform is finished. ”

“Would you like me to inform her of your happiness? ”

“No, please, not a word. . . I want to give her a surprise”. . .

“Tell me, though, how are you getting on with her? ”

He became embarrassed, and fell into thought; he would gladly have
bragged and told lies, but his conscience would not let him; and, at the
same time, he was ashamed to confess the truth.

“What do you think? Does she love you? ”. . .

“Love me? Good gracious, Pechorin, what ideas you do have! . . . How could
she possibly love me so soon? . . . And a well-bred woman, even if she is
in love, will never say so”. . .

“Very well! And, I suppose, in your opinion, a well-bred man should also
keep silence in regard to his passion? ”. . .

“Ah, my dear fellow! There are ways of doing everything; often things
may remain unspoken, but yet may be guessed”. . .

“That is true. . . But the love which we read in the eyes does not pledge
a woman to anything, whilst words. . . Have a care, Grushnitski, she is
befooling you! ”

“She? ” he answered, raising his eyes heavenward and smiling
complacently. “I am sorry for you, Pechorin! ”. . .

He took his departure.

In the evening, a numerous company set off to walk to the hollow.

In the opinion of the learned of Pyatigorsk, the hollow in question is
nothing more nor less than an extinct crater. It is situated on a
slope of Mount Mashuk, at the distance of a verst from the town, and is
approached by a narrow path between brushwood and rocks. In climbing up
the hill, I gave Princess Mary my arm, and she did not leave it during
the whole excursion.

Our conversation commenced with slander; I proceeded to pass in
review our present and absent acquaintances; at first I exposed their
ridiculous, and then their bad, sides. My choler rose. I began in jest,
and ended in genuine malice. At first she was amused, but afterwards
frightened.

“You are a dangerous man! ” she said. “I would rather perish in the
woods under the knife of an assassin than under your tongue. . . In all
earnestness I beg of you: when it comes into your mind to speak evil of
me, take a knife instead and cut my throat. I think you would not find
that a very difficult matter. ”

“Am I like an assassin, then? ”. . .

“You are worse”. . .

I fell into thought for a moment; then, assuming a deeply moved air, I
said:

“Yes, such has been my lot from very childhood! All have read upon my
countenance the marks of bad qualities, which were not existent; but
they were assumed to exist--and they were born. I was modest--I was
accused of slyness: I grew secretive. I profoundly felt both good and
evil--no one caressed me, all insulted me: I grew vindictive. I was
gloomy--other children merry and talkative; I felt myself higher than
they--I was rated lower: I grew envious. I was prepared to love the
whole world--no one understood me: I learned to hate. My colourless
youth flowed by in conflict with myself and the world; fearing ridicule,
I buried my best feelings in the depths of my heart, and there they
died. I spoke the truth--I was not believed: I began to deceive. Having
acquired a thorough knowledge of the world and the springs of society, I
grew skilled in the science of life; and I saw how others without skill
were happy, enjoying gratuitously the advantages which I so unweariedly
sought. Then despair was born within my breast--not that despair which
is cured at the muzzle of a pistol, but the cold, powerless despair
concealed beneath the mask of amiability and a good-natured smile. I
became a moral cripple. One half of my soul ceased to exist; it dried
up, evaporated, died, and I cut it off and cast it from me. The other
half moved and lived--at the service of all; but it remained unobserved,
because no one knew that the half which had perished had ever existed.
But, now, the memory of it has been awakened within me by you, and I
have read you its epitaph. To many, epitaphs in general seem ridiculous,
but to me they do not; especially when I remember what reposes beneath
them. I will not, however, ask you to share my opinion. If this outburst
seems absurd to you, I pray you, laugh! I forewarn you that your
laughter will not cause me the least chagrin. ”

At that moment I met her eyes: tears were welling in them. Her arm, as
it leaned upon mine, was trembling; her cheeks were aflame; she pitied
me! Sympathy--a feeling to which all women yield so easily, had dug its
talons into her inexperienced heart. During the whole excursion she was
preoccupied, and did not flirt with anyone--and that is a great sign!

We arrived at the hollow; the ladies left their cavaliers, but she did
not let go my arm. The witticisms of the local dandies failed to make
her laugh; the steepness of the declivity beside which she was standing
caused her no alarm, although the other ladies uttered shrill cries and
shut their eyes.

On the way back, I did not renew our melancholy conversation, but to my
idle questions and jests she gave short and absent-minded answers.

“Have you ever been in love? ” I asked her at length.

She looked at me intently, shook her head and again fell into a reverie.
It was evident that she was wishing to say something, but did not know
how to begin. Her breast heaved. . . And, indeed, that was but natural!
A muslin sleeve is a weak protection, and an electric spark was running
from my arm to hers. Almost all passions have their beginning in that
way, and frequently we are very much deceived in thinking that a woman
loves us for our moral and physical merits; of course, these prepare and
predispose the heart for the reception of the holy flame, but for all
that it is the first touch that decides the matter.

“I have been very amiable to-day, have I not? ” Princess Mary said to me,
with a forced smile, when we had returned from the walk.

We separated.