On the Eve: Chapter 4

Chapter 4

'Come to dinner, come along,' said the lady of the house in a
plaintive voice, and they all went into the dining-room. 'Sit beside
me, _Zoe_,' added Anna Vassilyevna, 'and you, Helene, take our guest;
and you, _Paul_, please don't be naughty and tease _Zoe_. My head
aches to-day.'

Shubin again turned his eyes up to the ceiling; Zoe responded with a
half-smile. This Zoe, or, to speak more precisely, Zoya Nikitishna
Mueller, was a pretty, fair-haired, half-Russian German girl, with a
little nose rather wide at the end, and tiny red lips. She sang
Russian ballads fairly well and could play various pieces, both lively
and sentimental, very correctly on the piano. She dressed with taste,
but in a rather childish style, and even over-precisely. Anna
Vassilyevna had taken her as a companion for her daughter, and she
kept her almost constantly at her side. Elena did not complain of that;
she was absolutely at a loss what to say to Zoya when she happened to
be left alone with her.

The dinner lasted rather a long time; Bersenyev talked with Elena
about university life, and his own plans and hopes; Shubin listened
without speaking, ate with an exaggerated show of greediness, and now
and then threw comic glances of despair at Zoya, who responded always
with the same phlegmatic smile. After dinner, Elena with Bersenyev and
Shubin went into the garden; Zoya looked after them, and, with a
slight shrug of her shoulders, sat down to the piano. Anna Vassilyevna
began: 'Why don't you go for a walk, too?' but, without waiting
for a reply, she added: 'Play me something melancholy.'

'_La derniere pensee de Weber_?' suggested Zoya.

'Ah, yes, Weber,' replied Anna Vassilyevna. She sank into an easy
chair, and the tears started on to her eyelashes.

Meanwhile, Elena led the two friends to an arbour of acacias, with a
little wooden table in the middle, and seats round. Shubin looked
round, and, whispering 'Wait a minute!' he ran off, skipping and
hopping to his own room, brought back a piece of clay, and began
modelling a bust of Zoya, shaking his head and muttering and laughing
to himself.

'At his old tricks again,' observed Elena, glancing at his work. She
turned to Bersenyev, with whom she was continuing the conversation
begun at dinner.

'My old tricks!' repeated Shubin. 'It's a subject that's simply
inexhaustible! To-day, particularly, she drove me out of all
patience.'

'Why so?' inquired Elena. 'One would think you were speaking of
some spiteful, disagreeable old woman. She is a pretty young girl.'

'Of course,' Shubin broke in, 'she is pretty, very pretty; I am sure
that no one who meets her could fail to think: that's some one I
should like to--dance a polka with; I'm sure, too, that she knows
that, and is pleased. . . . Else, what's the meaning of those modest
simpers, that discreet air? There, you know what I mean,' he muttered
between his teeth. 'But now you're absorbed in something else.'

And breaking up the bust of Zoya, Shubin set hastily to modelling and
kneading the clay again with an air of vexation.

'So it is your wish to be a professor?' said Elena to Bersenyev.

'Yes,' he answered, squeezing his red hands between his knees.
'That's my cherished dream. Of course I know very well how far I fall
short of being--to be worthy of such a high--I mean that I am too
little prepared, but I hope to get permission for a course of travel
abroad; I shall pass three or four years in that way, if necessary,
and then----'

He stopped, dropped his eyes, then quickly raising them again, he gave
an embarrassed smile and smoothed his hair. When Bersenyev was talking
to a woman, his words came out more slowly, and he lisped more than
ever.

'You want to be a professor of history?' inquired Elena.

'Yes, or of philosophy,' he added, in a lower voice--'if that is
possible.'

'He's a perfect devil at philosophy already,' observed Shubin, making
deep lines in the clay with his nail. 'What does he want to go abroad
for?'

'And will you be perfectly contented with such a position?' asked
Elena, leaning on her elbow and looking him straight in the face.

'Perfectly, Elena Nikolaevna, perfectly. What could be a finer
vocation? To follow, perhaps, in the steps of Timofay Nikolaevitch
. . . The very thought of such work fills me with delight and confusion
. . . yes, confusion . . . which comes from a sense of my own
deficiency. My dear father consecrated me to this work. . . I shall
never forget his last words.' . . .

'Your father died last winter?'

'Yes, Elena Nikolaevna, in February.'

'They say,' Elena went on, 'that he left a remarkable work in
manuscript; is it true?'

'Yes. He was a wonderful man. You would have loved him, Elena
Nikolaevna.'

'I am sure I should. And what was the subject of the work?'

'To give you an idea of the subject of the work in few words, Elena
Nikolaevna, would be somewhat difficult. My father was a learned man,
a Schellingist; he used terms which were not always very clear----'

'Andrei Petrovitch,' interrupted Elena, 'excuse my ignorance, what
does that mean, a Schellingist?'

Bersenyev smiled slightly.

'A Schellingist means a follower of Schelling, a German philosopher;
and what the philosophy of Schelling consists in----'

'Andrei Petrovitch!' cried Shubin suddenly, 'for mercy's sake!
Surely you don't mean to give Elena Nikolaevna a lecture on Schelling?
Have pity on her!'

'Not a lecture at all,' murmured Bersenyev, turning crimson. 'I
meant----'

'And why not a lecture?' put in Elena. 'You and I are in need of
lectures, Pavel Yakovlitch.'

Shubin stared at her, and suddenly burst out laughing.

'What are you laughing at?' she said coldly, and almost sharply.

Shubin did not answer.

'Come, don't be angry,' he said, after a short pause. 'I am sorry.
But really it's a strange taste, upon my word, to discuss philosophy
in weather like this under these trees. Let us rather talk of
nightingales and roses, youthful eyes and smiles.'

'Yes; and of French novels, and of feminine frills and fal-lals,'
Elena went on.

'Fal-lals, too, of course,' rejoined Shubin, 'if they're pretty.'

'Of course. But suppose we don't want to talk of frills? You are
always boasting of being a free artist; why do you encroach on the
freedom of others? And allow me to inquire, if that's your bent of
mind, why do you attack Zoya? With her it would be peculiarly
suitable to talk of frills and roses?'

Shubin suddenly fired up, and rose from the garden seat. 'So that's
it?' he began in a nervous voice. 'I understand your hint; you
want to send me away to her, Elena Nikolaevna. In other words, I'm
not wanted here.'

'I never thought of sending you away from here.'

'Do you mean to say,' Shubin continued passionately, 'that I am not
worthy of other society, that I am her equal; that I am as vain, and
silly and petty as that mawkish German girl? Is that it?'

Elena frowned. 'You did not always speak like that of her, Pavel
Yakovlitch,' she remarked.

'Ah! reproaches! reproaches now!' cried Shubin. 'Well, then I
don't deny there was a moment--one moment precisely, when those fresh,
vulgar cheeks of hers . . . But if I wanted to repay you with
reproaches and remind you . . . Good-bye,' he added suddenly, 'I feel
I shall say something silly.'

And with a blow on the clay moulded into the shape of a head, he ran
out of the arbour and went off to his room.

'What a baby,' said Elena, looking after him.

'He's an artist,' observed Bersenyev with a quiet smile. 'All artists
are like that. One must forgive them their caprices. That is their
privilege.'

'Yes,' replied Elena; 'but Pavel has not so far justified his claim
to that privilege in any way. What has he done so far? Give me your
arm, and let us go along the avenue. He was in our way. We were
talking of your father's works.'

Bersenyev took Elena's arm in his, and walked beside her through the
garden; but the conversation prematurely broken off was not renewed.
Bersenyev began again unfolding his views on the vocation of a
professor, and on his own future career. He walked slowly beside
Elena, moving awkwardly, awkwardly holding her arm, sometimes jostling
his shoulder against her, and not once looking at her; but his talk
flowed more easily, even if not perfectly freely; he spoke simply and
genuinely, and his eyes, as they strayed slowly over the trunks of the
trees, the sand of the path and the grass, were bright with the quiet
ardour of generous emotions, while in his soothed voice there was
heard the delight of a man who feels that he is succeeding in
expressing himself to one very dear to him. Elena listened to him very
attentively, and turning half towards him, did not take her eyes off
his face, which had grown a little paler--off his eyes, which were
soft and affectionate, though they avoided meeting her eyes. Her soul
expanded; and something tender, holy, and good seemed half sinking
into her heart, half springing up within it.

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