A muslin sleeve is a weak protection, and an
electric
spark was running
from my arm to hers.
from my arm to hers.
Lermontov - A Hero of Our Time
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.
She is dissatisfied with herself. She accuses herself of coldness. . . Oh,
that is the first, the chief triumph!
To-morrow, she will be feeling a desire to recompense me. I know the
whole proceeding by heart already--that is what is so tiresome!
CHAPTER IX. 12th June.
I HAVE seen Vera to-day. She has begun to plague me with her jealousy.
Princess Mary has taken it into her head, it seems, to confide the
secrets of her heart to Vera: a happy choice, it must be confessed!
“I can guess what all this is leading to,” said Vera to me. “You had
better simply tell me at once that you are in love with her. ”
“But supposing I am not in love with her? ”
“Then why run after her, disturb her, agitate her imagination! . . . Oh, I
know you well! Listen--if you wish me to believe you, come to Kislovodsk
in a week’s time; we shall be moving thither the day after to-morrow.
Princess Mary will remain here longer. Engage lodgings next door to us.
We shall be living in the large house near the spring, on the mezzanine
floor. Princess Ligovski will be below us, and next door there is a
house belonging to the same landlord, which has not yet been taken. . .
Will you come? ”. . .
I gave my promise, and this very same day I have sent to engage the
lodgings.
Grushnitski came to me at six o’clock and announced that his uniform
would be ready to-morrow, just in time for him to go to the ball in it.
“At last I shall dance with her the whole evening through. . . And then I
shall talk to my heart’s content,” he added.
“When is the ball? ”
“Why, to-morrow! Do you not know, then? A great festival--and the local
authorities have undertaken to organize it”. . .
“Let us go to the boulevard”. . .
“Not on any account, in this nasty cloak”. . .
“What! Have you ceased to love it? ”. . .
I went out alone, and, meeting Princess Mary I asked her to keep the
mazurka for me. She seemed surprised and delighted.
“I thought that you would only dance from necessity as on the last
occasion,” she said, with a very charming smile. . .
She does not seem to notice Grushnitski’s absence at all.
“You will be agreeably surprised to-morrow,” I said to her.
“At what? ”
“That is a secret. . . You will find it out yourself, at the ball. ”
I finished up the evening at Princess Ligovski’s; there were no other
guests present except Vera and a certain very amusing, little old
gentleman. I was in good spirits, and improvised various extraordinary
stories. Princess Mary sat opposite me and listened to my nonsense with
such deep, strained, and even tender attention that I grew ashamed of
myself. What had become of her vivacity, her coquetry, her caprices, her
haughty mien, her contemptuous smile, her absentminded glance? . . .
Vera noticed everything, and her sickly countenance was a picture of
profound grief. She was sitting in the shadow by the window, buried in a
wide arm-chair. . . I pitied her.
Then I related the whole dramatic story of our acquaintanceship, our
love--concealing it all, of course, under fictitious names.
So vividly did I portray my tenderness, my anxieties, my raptures; in
so favourable a light did I exhibit her actions and her character, that
involuntarily she had to forgive me for my flirtation with Princess
Mary.
She rose, sat down beside us, and brightened up. . . and it was only
at two o’clock in the morning that we remembered that the doctors had
ordered her to go to bed at eleven.
CHAPTER X. 13th June.
HALF an hour before the ball, Grushnitski presented himself to me in
the full splendour of the uniform of the Line infantry. Attached to
his third button was a little bronze chain, on which hung a double
lorgnette. Epaulettes of incredible size were bent backwards and upwards
in the shape of a cupid’s wings; his boots creaked; in his left hand he
held cinnamon-coloured kid gloves and a forage-cap, and with his right he
kept every moment twisting his frizzled tuft of hair up into tiny curls.
Complacency and at the same time a certain diffidence were depicted upon
his face. His festal appearance and proud gait would have made me
burst out laughing, if such a proceeding had been in accordance with my
intentions.
He threw his cap and gloves on the table and began to pull down
the skirts of his coat and to put himself to rights before the
looking-glass. An enormous black handkerchief, which was twisted into a
very high stiffener for his cravat, and the bristles of which supported
his chin, stuck out an inch over his collar. It seemed to him to be
rather small, and he drew it up as far as his ears. As a result of
that hard work--the collar of his uniform being very tight and
uncomfortable--he grew red in the face.
“They say you have been courting my princess terribly these last few
days? ” he said, rather carelessly and without looking at me.
“‘Where are we fools to drink tea! ’” [271] I answered, repeating a pet
phrase of one of the cleverest rogues of past times, once celebrated in
song by Pushkin.
“Tell me, does my uniform fit me well? . . . Oh, the cursed Jew! . . . How it
cuts me under the armpits! . . . Have you got any scent? ”
“Good gracious, what more do you want? You are reeking of rose pomade as
it is. ”
“Never mind. Give me some”. . .
He poured half a phial over his cravat, his pocket-handkerchief, his
sleeves.
“You are going to dance? ” he asked.
“I think not. ”
“I am afraid I shall have to lead off the mazurka with Princess Mary,
and I scarcely know a single figure”. . .
“Have you asked her to dance the mazurka with you? ”
“Not yet”. . .
“Mind you are not forestalled”. . .
“Just so, indeed! ” he said, striking his forehead. “Good-bye. . . I will
go and wait for her at the entrance. ”
He seized his forage-cap and ran.
Half an hour later I also set off. The street was dark and deserted.
Around the assembly rooms, or inn--whichever you prefer--people were
thronging. The windows were lighted up, the strains of the regimental
band were borne to me on the evening breeze. I walked slowly; I felt
melancholy.
“Can it be possible,” I thought, “that my sole mission on earth is to
destroy the hopes of others? Ever since I began to live and to act, it
seems always to have been my fate to play a part in the ending of other
people’s dramas, as if, but for me, no one could either die or fall
into despair! I have been the indispensable person of the fifth act;
unwillingly I have played the pitiful part of an executioner or a
traitor. What object has fate had in this? . . . Surely, I have not been
appointed by destiny to be an author of middle-class tragedies and family
romances, or to be a collaborator with the purveyor of stories--for the
‘Reader’s Library,’ [272] for example? . . . How can I tell? . . . Are there
not many people who, in beginning life, think to end it like Lord Byron
or Alexander the Great, and, nevertheless, remain Titular Councillors
[273] all their days? ”
Entering the saloon, I concealed myself in a crowd of men, and began to
make my observations.
Grushnitski was standing beside Princess Mary and saying something with
great warmth. She was listening to him absent-mindedly and looking about
her, her fan laid to her lips. Impatience was depicted upon her face,
her eyes were searching all around for somebody. I went softly behind
them in order to listen to their conversation.
“You torture me, Princess! ” Grushnitski was saying. “You have changed
dreadfully since I saw you last”. . .
“You, too, have changed,” she answered, casting a rapid glance at him,
in which he was unable to detect the latent sneer.
“I! Changed? . . . Oh, never! You know that such a thing is impossible!
Whoever has seen you once will bear your divine image with him for
ever. ”
“Stop”. . .
“But why will you not let me say to-night what you have so often
listened to with condescension--and just recently, too? ”. . .
“Because I do not like repetitions,” she answered, laughing.
“Oh! I have been bitterly mistaken! . . . I thought, fool that I was, that
these epaulettes, at least, would give me the right to hope. . . No,
it would have been better for me to have remained for ever in that
contemptible soldier’s cloak, to which, probably, I was indebted for
your attention”.
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.
She is dissatisfied with herself. She accuses herself of coldness. . . Oh,
that is the first, the chief triumph!
To-morrow, she will be feeling a desire to recompense me. I know the
whole proceeding by heart already--that is what is so tiresome!
CHAPTER IX. 12th June.
I HAVE seen Vera to-day. She has begun to plague me with her jealousy.
Princess Mary has taken it into her head, it seems, to confide the
secrets of her heart to Vera: a happy choice, it must be confessed!
“I can guess what all this is leading to,” said Vera to me. “You had
better simply tell me at once that you are in love with her. ”
“But supposing I am not in love with her? ”
“Then why run after her, disturb her, agitate her imagination! . . . Oh, I
know you well! Listen--if you wish me to believe you, come to Kislovodsk
in a week’s time; we shall be moving thither the day after to-morrow.
Princess Mary will remain here longer. Engage lodgings next door to us.
We shall be living in the large house near the spring, on the mezzanine
floor. Princess Ligovski will be below us, and next door there is a
house belonging to the same landlord, which has not yet been taken. . .
Will you come? ”. . .
I gave my promise, and this very same day I have sent to engage the
lodgings.
Grushnitski came to me at six o’clock and announced that his uniform
would be ready to-morrow, just in time for him to go to the ball in it.
“At last I shall dance with her the whole evening through. . . And then I
shall talk to my heart’s content,” he added.
“When is the ball? ”
“Why, to-morrow! Do you not know, then? A great festival--and the local
authorities have undertaken to organize it”. . .
“Let us go to the boulevard”. . .
“Not on any account, in this nasty cloak”. . .
“What! Have you ceased to love it? ”. . .
I went out alone, and, meeting Princess Mary I asked her to keep the
mazurka for me. She seemed surprised and delighted.
“I thought that you would only dance from necessity as on the last
occasion,” she said, with a very charming smile. . .
She does not seem to notice Grushnitski’s absence at all.
“You will be agreeably surprised to-morrow,” I said to her.
“At what? ”
“That is a secret. . . You will find it out yourself, at the ball. ”
I finished up the evening at Princess Ligovski’s; there were no other
guests present except Vera and a certain very amusing, little old
gentleman. I was in good spirits, and improvised various extraordinary
stories. Princess Mary sat opposite me and listened to my nonsense with
such deep, strained, and even tender attention that I grew ashamed of
myself. What had become of her vivacity, her coquetry, her caprices, her
haughty mien, her contemptuous smile, her absentminded glance? . . .
Vera noticed everything, and her sickly countenance was a picture of
profound grief. She was sitting in the shadow by the window, buried in a
wide arm-chair. . . I pitied her.
Then I related the whole dramatic story of our acquaintanceship, our
love--concealing it all, of course, under fictitious names.
So vividly did I portray my tenderness, my anxieties, my raptures; in
so favourable a light did I exhibit her actions and her character, that
involuntarily she had to forgive me for my flirtation with Princess
Mary.
She rose, sat down beside us, and brightened up. . . and it was only
at two o’clock in the morning that we remembered that the doctors had
ordered her to go to bed at eleven.
CHAPTER X. 13th June.
HALF an hour before the ball, Grushnitski presented himself to me in
the full splendour of the uniform of the Line infantry. Attached to
his third button was a little bronze chain, on which hung a double
lorgnette. Epaulettes of incredible size were bent backwards and upwards
in the shape of a cupid’s wings; his boots creaked; in his left hand he
held cinnamon-coloured kid gloves and a forage-cap, and with his right he
kept every moment twisting his frizzled tuft of hair up into tiny curls.
Complacency and at the same time a certain diffidence were depicted upon
his face. His festal appearance and proud gait would have made me
burst out laughing, if such a proceeding had been in accordance with my
intentions.
He threw his cap and gloves on the table and began to pull down
the skirts of his coat and to put himself to rights before the
looking-glass. An enormous black handkerchief, which was twisted into a
very high stiffener for his cravat, and the bristles of which supported
his chin, stuck out an inch over his collar. It seemed to him to be
rather small, and he drew it up as far as his ears. As a result of
that hard work--the collar of his uniform being very tight and
uncomfortable--he grew red in the face.
“They say you have been courting my princess terribly these last few
days? ” he said, rather carelessly and without looking at me.
“‘Where are we fools to drink tea! ’” [271] I answered, repeating a pet
phrase of one of the cleverest rogues of past times, once celebrated in
song by Pushkin.
“Tell me, does my uniform fit me well? . . . Oh, the cursed Jew! . . . How it
cuts me under the armpits! . . . Have you got any scent? ”
“Good gracious, what more do you want? You are reeking of rose pomade as
it is. ”
“Never mind. Give me some”. . .
He poured half a phial over his cravat, his pocket-handkerchief, his
sleeves.
“You are going to dance? ” he asked.
“I think not. ”
“I am afraid I shall have to lead off the mazurka with Princess Mary,
and I scarcely know a single figure”. . .
“Have you asked her to dance the mazurka with you? ”
“Not yet”. . .
“Mind you are not forestalled”. . .
“Just so, indeed! ” he said, striking his forehead. “Good-bye. . . I will
go and wait for her at the entrance. ”
He seized his forage-cap and ran.
Half an hour later I also set off. The street was dark and deserted.
Around the assembly rooms, or inn--whichever you prefer--people were
thronging. The windows were lighted up, the strains of the regimental
band were borne to me on the evening breeze. I walked slowly; I felt
melancholy.
“Can it be possible,” I thought, “that my sole mission on earth is to
destroy the hopes of others? Ever since I began to live and to act, it
seems always to have been my fate to play a part in the ending of other
people’s dramas, as if, but for me, no one could either die or fall
into despair! I have been the indispensable person of the fifth act;
unwillingly I have played the pitiful part of an executioner or a
traitor. What object has fate had in this? . . . Surely, I have not been
appointed by destiny to be an author of middle-class tragedies and family
romances, or to be a collaborator with the purveyor of stories--for the
‘Reader’s Library,’ [272] for example? . . . How can I tell? . . . Are there
not many people who, in beginning life, think to end it like Lord Byron
or Alexander the Great, and, nevertheless, remain Titular Councillors
[273] all their days? ”
Entering the saloon, I concealed myself in a crowd of men, and began to
make my observations.
Grushnitski was standing beside Princess Mary and saying something with
great warmth. She was listening to him absent-mindedly and looking about
her, her fan laid to her lips. Impatience was depicted upon her face,
her eyes were searching all around for somebody. I went softly behind
them in order to listen to their conversation.
“You torture me, Princess! ” Grushnitski was saying. “You have changed
dreadfully since I saw you last”. . .
“You, too, have changed,” she answered, casting a rapid glance at him,
in which he was unable to detect the latent sneer.
“I! Changed? . . . Oh, never! You know that such a thing is impossible!
Whoever has seen you once will bear your divine image with him for
ever. ”
“Stop”. . .
“But why will you not let me say to-night what you have so often
listened to with condescension--and just recently, too? ”. . .
“Because I do not like repetitions,” she answered, laughing.
“Oh! I have been bitterly mistaken! . . . I thought, fool that I was, that
these epaulettes, at least, would give me the right to hope. . . No,
it would have been better for me to have remained for ever in that
contemptible soldier’s cloak, to which, probably, I was indebted for
your attention”.
