THE PARTY
IAFTER the festive dinner with its eight courses and its
endless conversation, Olga Mihalovna, whose husband's name-day was
being celebrated, went out into the garden. The duty of smiling and
talking incessantly, the clatter of the crockery, the stupidity of
the servants, the long intervals between the courses, and the stays
she had put on to conceal her condition from the visitors, wearied
her to exhaustion. She longed to get away from the house, to sit in
the shade and rest her heart with thoughts of the baby which was to
be born to her in another two months. She was used to these
thoughts coming to her as she turned to the left out of the big
avenue into the narrow path. Here in the thick shade of the plums
and cherry-trees the dry branches used to scratch her neck and
shoulders; a spider's web would settle on her face, and there would
rise up in her mind the image of a little creature of undetermined
sex and undefined features, and it began to seem as though it were
not the spider's web that tickled her face and neck caressingly,
but that little creature. When, at the end of the path, a thin
wicker hurdle came into sight, and behind it podgy beehives with
tiled roofs; when in the motionless, stagnant air there came a
smell of hay and honey, and a soft buzzing of bees was audible,
then the little creature would take complete possession of Olga
Mihalovna. She used to sit down on a bench near the shanty woven of
branches, and fall to thinking.This time, too, she went on as far as the seat, sat down, and
began thinking; but instead of the little creature there rose up in
her imagination the figures of the grown-up people whom she had
just left. She felt dreadfully uneasy that she, the hostess, had
deserted her guests, and she remembered how her husband, Pyotr
Dmitritch, and her uncle, Nikolay Nikolaitch, had argued at dinner
about trial by jury, about the press, and about the higher
education of women. Her husband, as usual, argued in order to show
off his Conservative ideas before his visitors—and still more in
order to disagree with her uncle, whom he disliked. Her uncle
contradicted him and wrangled over every word he uttered, so as to
show the company that he, Uncle Nikolay Nikolaitch, still retained
his youthful freshness of spirit and free-thinking in spite of his
fifty-nine years. And towards the end of dinner even Olga Mihalovna
herself could not resist taking part and unskilfully attempting to
defend university education for women—not that that education stood
in need of her defence, but simply because she wanted to annoy her
husband, who to her mind was unfair. The guests were wearied by
this discussion, but they all thought it necessary to take part in
it, and talked a great deal, although none of them took any
interest in trial by jury or the higher education of women. . .
.Olga Mihalovna was sitting on the nearest side of the hurdle
near the shanty. The sun was hidden behind the clouds. The trees
and the air were overcast as before rain, but in spite of that it
was hot and stifling. The hay cut under the trees on the previous
day was lying ungathered, looking melancholy, with here and there a
patch of colour from the faded flowers, and from it came a heavy,
sickly scent. It was still. The other side of the hurdle there was
a monotonous hum of bees. . . .Suddenly she heard footsteps and voices; some one was coming
along the path towards the beehouse."How stifling it is!" said a feminine voice. "What do you
think— is it going to rain, or not?""It is going to rain, my charmer, but not before night," a
very familiar male voice answered languidly. "There will be a good
rain."Olga Mihalovna calculated that if she made haste to hide in
the shanty they would pass by without seeing her, and she would not
have to talk and to force herself to smile. She picked up her
skirts, bent down and crept into the shanty. At once she felt upon
her face, her neck, her arms, the hot air as heavy as steam. If it
had not been for the stuffiness and the close smell of rye bread,
fennel, and brushwood, which prevented her from breathing freely,
it would have been delightful to hide from her visitors here under
the thatched roof in the dusk, and to think about the little
creature. It was cosy and quiet."What a pretty spot!" said a feminine voice. "Let us sit
here, PyotrDmitritch."Olga Mihalovna began peeping through a crack between two
branches. She saw her husband, Pyotr Dmitritch, and Lubotchka
Sheller, a girl of seventeen who had not long left boarding-school.
Pyotr Dmitritch, with his hat on the back of his head, languid and
indolent from having drunk so much at dinner, slouched by the
hurdle and raked the hay into a heap with his foot; Lubotchka, pink
with the heat and pretty as ever, stood with her hands behind her,
watching the lazy movements of his big handsome person.Olga Mihalovna knew that her husband was attractive to women,
and did not like to see him with them. There was nothing out of the
way in Pyotr Dmitritch's lazily raking together the hay in order to
sit down on it with Lubotchka and chatter to her of trivialities;
there was nothing out of the way, either, in pretty Lubotchka's
looking at him with her soft eyes; but yet Olga Mihalovna felt
vexed with her husband and frightened and pleased that she could
listen to them."Sit down, enchantress," said Pyotr Dmitritch, sinking down
on the hay and stretching. "That's right. Come, tell me
something.""What next! If I begin telling you anything you will go to
sleep.""Me go to sleep? Allah forbid! Can I go to sleep while eyes
like yours are watching me?"In her husband's words, and in the fact that he was lolling
with his hat on the back of his head in the presence of a lady,
there was nothing out of the way either. He was spoilt by women,
knew that they found him attractive, and had adopted with them a
special tone which every one said suited him. With Lubotchka he
behaved as with all women. But, all the same, Olga Mihalovna was
jealous."Tell me, please," said Lubotchka, after a brief silence—"is
it true that you are to be tried for something?""I? Yes, I am . . . numbered among the transgressors, my
charmer.""But what for?""For nothing, but just . . . it's chiefly a question of
politics," yawned Pyotr Dmitritch—"the antagonisms of Left and
Right. I, an obscurantist and reactionary, ventured in an official
paper to make use of an expression offensive in the eyes of such
immaculate Gladstones as Vladimir Pavlovitch Vladimirov and our
local justice of the peace—Kuzma Grigoritch Vostryakov."Pytor Dmitritch yawned again and went on:"And it is the way with us that you may express disapproval
of the sun or the moon, or anything you like, but God preserve you
from touching the Liberals! Heaven forbid! A Liberal is like the
poisonous dry fungus which covers you with a cloud of dust if you
accidentally touch it with your finger.""What happened to you?""Nothing particular. The whole flare-up started from the
merest trifle. A teacher, a detestable person of clerical
associations, hands to Vostryakov a petition against a
tavern-keeper, charging him with insulting language and behaviour
in a public place. Everything showed that both the teacher and the
tavern-keeper were drunk as cobblers, and that they behaved equally
badly. If there had been insulting behaviour, the insult had anyway
been mutual. Vostryakov ought to have fined them both for a breach
of the peace and have turned them out of the court—that is all. But
that's not our way of doing things. With us what stands first is
not the person—not the fact itself, but the trade-mark and label.
However great a rascal a teacher may be, he is always in the right
because he is a teacher; a tavern-keeper is always in the wrong
because he is a tavern-keeper and a money-grubber. Vostryakov
placed the tavern-keeper under arrest. The man appealed to the
Circuit Court; the Circuit Court triumphantly upheld Vostryakov's
decision. Well, I stuck to my own opinion. . . . Got a little hot.
. . . That was all."Pyotr Dmitritch spoke calmly with careless irony. In reality
the trial that was hanging over him worried him extremely. Olga
Mihalovna remembered how on his return from the unfortunate session
he had tried to conceal from his household how troubled he was, and
how dissatisfied with himself. As an intelligent man he could not
help feeling that he had gone too far in expressing his
disagreement; and how much lying had been needful to conceal that
feeling from himself and from others! How many unnecessary
conversations there had been! How much grumbling and insincere
laughter at what was not laughable! When he learned that he was to
be brought up before the Court, he seemed at once harassed and
depressed; he began to sleep badly, stood oftener than ever at the
windows, drumming on the panes with his fingers. And he was ashamed
to let his wife see that he was worried, and it vexed
her."They say you have been in the province of Poltava?"
Lubotchka questioned him."Yes," answered Pyotr Dmitritch. "I came back the day before
yesterday.""I expect it is very nice there.""Yes, it is very nice, very nice indeed; in fact, I arrived
just in time for the haymaking, I must tell you, and in the Ukraine
the haymaking is the most poetical moment of the year. Here we have
a big house, a big garden, a lot of servants, and a lot going on,
so that you don't see the haymaking; here it all passes unnoticed.
There, at the farm, I have a meadow of forty-five acres as flat as
my hand. You can see the men mowing from any window you stand at.
They are mowing in the meadow, they are mowing in the garden. There
are no visitors, no fuss nor hurry either, so that you can't help
seeing, feeling, hearing nothing but the haymaking. There is a
smell of hay indoors and outdoors. There's the sound of the scythes
from sunrise to sunset. Altogether Little Russia is a charming
country. Would you believe it, when I was drinking water from the
rustic wells and filthy vodka in some Jew's tavern, when on quiet
evenings the strains of the Little Russian fiddle and the
tambourines reached me, I was tempted by a fascinating idea—to
settle down on my place and live there as long as I chose, far away
from Circuit Courts, intellectual conversations, philosophizing
women, long dinners. . . ."Pyotr Dmitritch was not lying. He was unhappy and really
longed to rest. And he had visited his Poltava property simply to
avoid seeing his study, his servants, his acquaintances, and
everything that could remind him of his wounded vanity and his
mistakes.Lubotchka suddenly jumped up and waved her hands about in
horror."Oh! A bee, a bee!" she shrieked. "It will sting!""Nonsense; it won't sting," said Pyotr Dmitritch. "What a
coward you are!""No, no, no," cried Lubotchka; and looking round at the bees,
she walked rapidly back.Pyotr Dmitritch walked away after her, looking at her with a
softened and melancholy face. He was probably thinking, as he
looked at her, of his farm, of solitude, and—who knows?—perhaps he
was even thinking how snug and cosy life would be at the farm if
his wife had been this girl—young, pure, fresh, not corrupted by
higher education, not with child. . . .When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Olga
Mihalovna came out of the shanty and turned towards the house. She
wanted to cry. She was by now acutely jealous. She could understand
that her husband was worried, dissatisfied with himself and
ashamed, and when people are ashamed they hold aloof, above all
from those nearest to them, and are unreserved with strangers; she
could understand, also, that she had nothing to fear from Lubotchka
or from those women who were now drinking coffee indoors. But
everything in general was terrible, incomprehensible, and it
already seemed to Olga Mihalovna that Pyotr Dmitritch only half
belonged to her."He has no right to do it!" she muttered, trying to formulate
her jealousy and her vexation with her husband. "He has no right at
all. I will tell him so plainly!"She made up her mind to find her husband at once and tell him
all about it: it was disgusting, absolutely disgusting, that he was
attractive to other women and sought their admiration as though it
were some heavenly manna; it was unjust and dishonourable that he
should give to others what belonged by right to his wife, that he
should hide his soul and his conscience from his wife to reveal
them to the first pretty face he came across. What harm had his
wife done him? How was she to blame? Long ago she had been sickened
by his lying: he was for ever posing, flirting, saying what he did
not think, and trying to seem different from what he was and what
he ought to be. Why this falsity? Was it seemly in a decent man? If
he lied he was demeaning himself and those to whom he lied, and
slighting what he lied about. Could he not understand that if he
swaggered and posed at the judicial table, or held forth at dinner
on the prerogatives of Government, that he, simply to provoke her
uncle, was showing thereby that he had not a ha'p'orth of respect
for the Court, or himself, or any of the people who were listening
and looking at him?Coming out into the big avenue, Olga Mihalovna assumed an
expression of face as though she had just gone away to look after
some domestic matter. In the verandah the gentlemen were drinking
liqueur and eating strawberries: one of them, the Examining
Magistrate—a stout elderly man,blagueurand wit—must have been telling
some rather free anecdote, for, seeing their hostess, he suddenly
clapped his hands over his fat lips, rolled his eyes, and sat down.
Olga Mihalovna did not like the local officials. She did not care
for their clumsy, ceremonious wives, their scandal-mongering, their
frequent visits, their flattery of her husband, whom they all
hated. Now, when they were drinking, were replete with food and
showed no signs of going away, she felt their presence an agonizing
weariness; but not to appear impolite, she smiled cordially to the
Magistrate, and shook her finger at him. She walked across the
dining-room and drawing-room smiling, and looking as though she had
gone to give some order and make some arrangement. "God grant no
one stops me," she thought, but she forced herself to stop in the
drawing-room to listen from politeness to a young man who was
sitting at the piano playing: after standing for a minute, she
cried, "Bravo, bravo, M. Georges!" and clapping her hands twice,
she went on.She found her husband in his study. He was sitting at the
table, thinking of something. His face looked stern, thoughtful,
and guilty. This was not the same Pyotr Dmitritch who had been
arguing at dinner and whom his guests knew, but a different
man—wearied, feeling guilty and dissatisfied with himself, whom
nobody knew but his wife. He must have come to the study to get
cigarettes. Before him lay an open cigarette-case full of
cigarettes, and one of his hands was in the table drawer; he had
paused and sunk into thought as he was taking the
cigarettes.Olga Mihalovna felt sorry for him. It was as clear as day
that this man was harassed, could find no rest, and was perhaps
struggling with himself. Olga Mihalovna went up to the table in
silence: wanting to show that she had forgotten the argument at
dinner and was not cross, she shut the cigarette-case and put it in
her husband's coat pocket."What should I say to him?" she wondered; "I shall say that
lying is like a forest—the further one goes into it the more
difficult it is to get out of it. I will say to him, 'You have been
carried away by the false part you are playing; you have insulted
people who were attached to you and have done you no harm. Go and
apologize to them, laugh at yourself, and you will feel better. And
if you want peace and solitude, let us go away
together.'"Meeting his wife's gaze, Pyotr Dmitritch's face immediately
assumed the expression it had worn at dinner and in the
garden—indifferent and slightly ironical. He yawned and got
up."It's past five," he said, looking at his watch. "If our
visitors are merciful and leave us at eleven, even then we have
another six hours of it. It's a cheerful prospect, there's no
denying!"And whistling something, he walked slowly out of the study
with his usual dignified gait. She could hear him with dignified
firmness cross the dining-room, then the drawing-room, laugh with
dignified assurance, and say to the young man who was playing,
"Bravo! bravo!" Soon his footsteps died away: he must have gone out
into the garden. And now not jealousy, not vexation, but real
hatred of his footsteps, his insincere laugh and voice, took
possession of Olga Mihalovna. She went to the window and looked out
into the garden. Pyotr Dmitritch was already walking along the
avenue. Putting one hand in his pocket and snapping the fingers of
the other, he walked with confident swinging steps, throwing his
head back a little, and looking as though he were very well
satisfied with himself, with his dinner, with his digestion, and
with nature. . . .Two little schoolboys, the children of Madame Tchizhevsky,
who had only just arrived, made their appearance in the avenue,
accompanied by their tutor, a student wearing a white tunic and
very narrow trousers. When they reached Pyotr Dmitritch, the boys
and the student stopped, and probably congratulated him on his
name-day. With a graceful swing of his shoulders, he patted the
children on their cheeks, and carelessly offered the student his
hand without looking at him. The student must have praised the
weather and compared it with the climate of Petersburg, for Pyotr
Dmitritch said in a loud voice, in a tone as though he were not
speaking to a guest, but to an usher of the court or a
witness:"What! It's cold in Petersburg? And here, my good sir, we
have a salubrious atmosphere and the fruits of the earth in
abundance. Eh? What?"And thrusting one hand in his pocket and snapping the fingers
of the other, he walked on. Till he had disappeared behind the nut
bushes, Olga Mihalovna watched the back of his head in perplexity.
How had this man of thirty-four come by the dignified deportment of
a general? How had he come by that impressive, elegant manner?
Where had he got that vibration of authority in his voice? Where
had he got these "what's," "to be sure's," and "my good
sir's"?Olga Mihalovna remembered how in the first months of her
marriage she had felt dreary at home alone and had driven into the
town to the Circuit Court, at which Pyotr Dmitritch had sometimes
presided in place of her godfather, Count Alexey Petrovitch. In the
presidential chair, wearing his uniform and a chain on his breast,
he was completely changed. Stately gestures, a voice of thunder,
"what," "to be sure," careless tones. . . . Everything, all that
was ordinary and human, all that was individual and personal to
himself that Olga Mihalovna was accustomed to seeing in him at
home, vanished in grandeur, and in the presidential chair there sat
not Pyotr Dmitritch, but another man whom every one called Mr.
President. This consciousness of power prevented him from sitting
still in his place, and he seized every opportunity to ring his
bell, to glance sternly at the public, to shout. . . . Where had he
got his short-sight and his deafness when he suddenly began to see
and hear with difficulty, and, frowning majestically, insisted on
people speaking louder and coming closer to the table? From the
height of his grandeur he could hardly distinguish faces or sounds,
so that it seemed that if Olga Mihalovna herself had gone up to him
he would have shouted even to her, "Your name?" Peasant witnesses
he addressed familiarly, he shouted at the public so that his voice
could be heard even in the street, and behaved incredibly with the
lawyers. If a lawyer had to speak to him, Pyotr Dmitritch, turning
a little away from him, looked with half-closed eyes at the
ceiling, meaning to signify thereby that the lawyer was utterly
superfluous and that he was neither recognizing him nor listening
to him; if a badly-dressed lawyer spoke, Pyotr Dmitritch pricked up
his ears and looked the man up and down with a sarcastic,
annihilating stare as though to say: "Queer sort of lawyers
nowadays!""What do you mean by that?" he would interrupt.If a would-be eloquent lawyer mispronounced a foreign word,
saying, for instance, "factitious" instead of "fictitious," Pyotr
Dmitritch brightened up at once and asked, "What? How? Factitious?
What does that mean?" and then observed impressively: "Don't make
use of words you do not understand." And the lawyer, finishing his
speech, would walk away from the table, red and perspiring, while
Pyotr Dmitritch; with a self-satisfied smile, would lean back in
his chair triumphant. In his manner with the lawyers he imitated
Count Alexey Petrovitch a little, but when the latter said, for
instance, "Counsel for the defence, you keep quiet for a little!"
it sounded paternally good-natured and natural, while the same
words in Pyotr Dmitritch's mouth were rude and
artificial.IIThere were sounds of applause. The young man had finished
playing.Olga Mihalovna remembered her guests and hurried into the
drawing-room."I have so enjoyed your playing," she said, going up to the
piano. "I have so enjoyed it. You have a wonderful talent! But
don't you think our piano's out of tune?"At that moment the two schoolboys walked into the room,
accompanied by the student."My goodness! Mitya and Kolya," Olga Mihalovna drawled
joyfully, going to meet them: "How big they have grown! One would
not know you! But where is your mamma?""I congratulate you on the name-day," the student began in
afree-and-easy tone, "and I wish you all happiness.
EkaterinaAndreyevna sends her congratulations and begs you to excuse
her.She is not very well.""How unkind of her! I have been expecting her all day. Is it
long since you left Petersburg?" Olga Mihalovna asked the student.
"What kind of weather have you there now?" And without waiting for
an answer, she looked cordially at the schoolboys and
repeated:"How tall they have grown! It is not long since they used to
come with their nurse, and they are at school already! The old grow
older while the young grow up. . . . Have you had
dinner?""Oh, please don't trouble!" said the student."Why, you have not had dinner?""For goodness' sake, don't trouble!""But I suppose you are hungry?" Olga Mihalovna said it in a
harsh, rude voice, with impatience and vexation—it escaped her
unawares, but at once she coughed, smiled, and flushed crimson.
"How tall they have grown!" she said softly."Please don't trouble!" the student said once
more.The student begged her not to trouble; the boys said nothing;
obviously all three of them were hungry. Olga Mihalovna took them
into the dining-room and told Vassily to lay the table."How unkind of your mamma!" she said as she made them sit
down. "She has quite forgotten me. Unkind, unkind, unkind . . . you
must tell her so. What are you studying?" she asked the
student."Medicine.""Well, I have a weakness for doctors, only fancy. I am very
sorry my husband is not a doctor. What courage any one must have to
perform an operation or dissect a corpse, for instance! Horrible!
Aren't you frightened? I believe I should die of terror! Of course,
you drink vodka?""Please don't trouble.""After your journey you must have something to drink. Though
I am a woman, even I drink sometimes. And Mitya and Kolya will
drink Malaga. It's not a strong wine; you need not be afraid of it.
What fine fellows they are, really! They'll be thinking of getting
married next."Olga Mihalovna talked without ceasing; she knew by experience
that when she had guests to entertain it was far easier and more
comfortable to talk than to listen. When you talk there is no need
to strain your attention to think of answers to questions, and to
change your expression of face. But unawares she asked the student
a serious question; the student began a lengthy speech and she was
forced to listen. The student knew that she had once been at the
University, and so tried to seem a serious person as he talked to
her."What subject are you studying?" she asked, forgetting that
she had already put that question to him."Medicine."Olga Mihalovna now remembered that she had been away from the
ladies for a long while."Yes? Then I suppose you are going to be a doctor?" she said,
getting up. "That's splendid. I am sorry I did not go in for
medicine myself. So you will finish your dinner here, gentlemen,
and then come into the garden. I will introduce you to the young
ladies."She went out and glanced at her watch: it was five minutes to
six. And she wondered that the time had gone so slowly, and thought
with horror that there were six more hours before midnight, when
the party would break up. How could she get through those six
hours? What phrases could she utter? How should she behave to her
husband?There was not a soul in the drawing-room or on the verandah.
All the guests were sauntering about the garden."I shall have to suggest a walk in the birchwood before tea,
or else a row in the boats," thought Olga Mihalovna, hurrying to
the croquet ground, from which came the sounds of voices and
laughter."And sit the old people down tovint. . . ." She met Grigory the
footman coming from the croquet ground with empty
bottles."Where are the ladies?" she asked."Among the raspberry-bushes. The master's there,
too.""Oh, good heavens!" some one on the croquet lawn shouted with
exasperation. "I have told you a thousand times over! To know the
Bulgarians you must see them! You can't judge from the
papers!"Either because of the outburst or for some other reason, Olga
Mihalovna was suddenly aware of a terrible weakness all over,
especially in her legs and in her shoulders. She felt she could not
bear to speak, to listen, or to move."Grigory," she said faintly and with an effort, "when you
have to serve tea or anything, please don't appeal to me, don't ask
me anything, don't speak of anything. . . . Do it all yourself, and
. . . and don't make a noise with your feet, I entreat you. . . . I
can't, because . . ."Without finishing, she walked on towards the croquet lawn,
but on the way she thought of the ladies, and turned towards the
raspberry-bushes. The sky, the air, and the trees looked gloomy
again and threatened rain; it was hot and stifling. An immense
flock of crows, foreseeing a storm, flew cawing over the garden.
The paths were more overgrown, darker, and narrower as they got
nearer the kitchen garden. In one of them, buried in a thick tangle
of wild pear, crab-apple, sorrel, young oaks, and hopbine, clouds
of tiny black flies swarmed round Olga Mihalovna. She covered her
face with her hands and began forcing herself to think of the
little creature . . . . There floated through her imagination the
figures of Grigory, Mitya, Kolya, the faces of the peasants who had
come in the morning to present their congratulations.She heard footsteps, and she opened her eyes. Uncle Nikolay
Nikolaitch was coming rapidly towards her."It's you, dear? I am very glad . . ." he began, breathless.
"A couple of words. . . ." He mopped with his handkerchief his red
shaven chin, then suddenly stepped back a pace, flung up his hands
and opened his eyes wide. "My dear girl, how long is this going
on?" he said rapidly, spluttering. "I ask you: is there no limit to
it? I say nothing of the demoralizing effect of his martinet views
on all around him, of the way he insults all that is sacred and
best in me and in every honest thinking man—I will say nothing
about that, but he might at least behave decently! Why, he shouts,
he bellows, gives himself airs, poses as a sort of Bonaparte, does
not let one say a word. . . . I don't know what the devil's the
matter with him! These lordly gestures, this condescending tone;
and laughing like a general! Who is he, allow me to ask you? I ask
you, who is he? The husband of his wife, with a few paltry acres
and the rank of a titular who has had the luck to marry an heiress!
An upstart and ajunker, like
so many others! A type out of Shtchedrin! Upon my word, it's either
that he's suffering from megalomania, or that old rat in his
dotage, Count Alexey Petrovitch, is right when he says that
children and young people are a long time growing up nowadays, and
go on playing they are cabmen and generals till they are
forty!""That's true, that's true," Olga Mihalovna assented. "Let me
pass.""Now just consider: what is it leading to?" her uncle went
on, barring her way. "How will this playing at being a general and
a Conservative end? Already he has got into trouble! Yes, to stand
his trial! I am very glad of it! That's what his noise and shouting
has brought him to—to stand in the prisoner's dock. And it's not as
though it were the Circuit Court or something: it's the Central
Court! Nothing worse could be imagined, I think! And then he has
quarrelled with every one! He is celebrating his name-day, and
look, Vostryakov's not here, nor Yahontov, nor Vladimirov, nor
Shevud, nor the Count. . . . There is no one, I imagine, more
Conservative than Count Alexey Petrovitch, yet even he has not
come. And he never will come again. He won't come, you will
see!""My God! but what has it to do with me?" asked Olga
Mihalovna."What has it to do with you? Why, you are his wife! You are
clever, you have had a university education, and it was in your
power to make him an honest worker!""At the lectures I went to they did not teach us how to
influence tiresome people. It seems as though I should have to
apologize to all of you for having been at the University," said
Olga Mihalovna sharply. "Listen, uncle. If people played the same
scales over and over again the whole day long in your hearing, you
wouldn't be able to sit still and listen, but would run away. I
hear the same thing over again for days together all the year
round. You must have pity on me at last."Her uncle pulled a very long face, then looked at her
searchingly and twisted his lips into a mocking smile."So that's how it is," he piped in a voice like an old
woman's. "I beg your pardon!" he said, and made a ceremonious bow.
"If you have fallen under his influence yourself, and have
abandoned your convictions, you should have said so before. I beg
your pardon!""Yes, I have abandoned my convictions," she cried. "There;
make the most of it!""I beg your pardon!"Her uncle for the last time made her a ceremonious bow, a
little on one side, and, shrinking into himself, made a scrape with
his foot and walked back."Idiot!" thought Olga Mihalovna. "I hope he will go
home."She found the ladies and the young people among the
raspberries in the kitchen garden. Some were eating raspberries;
others, tired of eating raspberries, were strolling about the
strawberry beds or foraging among the sugar-peas. A little on one
side of the raspberry bed, near a branching appletree propped up by
posts which had been pulled out of an old fence, Pyotr Dmitritch
was mowing the grass. His hair was falling over his forehead, his
cravat was untied. His watch-chain was hanging loose. Every step
and every swing of the scythe showed skill and the possession of
immense physical strength. Near him were standing Lubotchka and the
daughters of a neighbour, Colonel Bukryeev—two anaemic and
unhealthily stout fair girls, Natalya and Valentina, or, as they
were always called, Nata and Vata, both wearing white frocks and
strikingly like each other. Pyotr Dmitritch was teaching them to
mow."It's very simple," he said. "You have only to know how to
hold the scythe and not to get too hot over it—that is, not to use
more force than is necessary! Like this. . . . Wouldn't you like to
try?" he said, offering the scythe to Lubotchka. "Come!"Lubotchka took the scythe clumsily, blushed crimson, and
laughed."Don't be afraid, Lubov Alexandrovna!" cried Olga Mihalovna,
loud enough for all the ladies to hear that she was with them.
"Don't be afraid! You must learn! If you marry a Tolstoyan he will
make you mow."Lubotchka raised the scythe, but began laughing again, and,
helpless with laughter, let go of it at once. She was ashamed and
pleased at being talked to as though grown up. Nata, with a cold,
serious face, with no trace of smiling or shyness, took the scythe,
swung it and caught it in the grass; Vata, also without a smile, as
cold and serious as her sister, took the scythe, and silently
thrust it into the earth. Having done this, the two sisters linked
arms and walked in silence to the raspberries.Pyotr Dmitritch laughed and played about like a boy, and this
childish, frolicsome mood in which he became exceedingly
good-natured suited him far better than any other. Olga Mihalovna
loved him when he was like that. But his boyishness did not usually
last long. It did not this time; after playing with the scythe, he
for some reason thought it necessary to take a serious tone about
it."When I am mowing, I feel, do you know, healthier and more
normal," he said. "If I were forced to confine myself to an
intellectual life I believe I should go out of my mind. I feel that
I was not born to be a man of culture! I ought to mow, plough, sow,
drive out the horses."And Pyotr Dmitritch began a conversation with the ladies
about the advantages of physical labour, about culture, and then
about the pernicious effects of money, of property. Listening to
her husband, Olga Mihalovna, for some reason, thought of her
dowry."And the time will come, I suppose," she thought, "when he
will not forgive me for being richer than he. He is proud and vain.
Maybe he will hate me because he owes so much to me."She stopped near Colonel Bukryeev, who was eating raspberries
and also taking part in the conversation."Come," he said, making room for Olga Mihalovna and Pyotr
Dmitritch. "The ripest are here. . . . And so, according to
Proudhon," he went on, raising his voice, "property is robbery. But
I must confess I don't believe in Proudhon, and don't consider him
a philosopher. The French are not authorities, to my thinking—God
bless them!""Well, as for Proudhons and Buckles and the rest of them, I
am weak in that department," said Pyotr Dmitritch. "For philosophy
you must apply to my wife. She has been at University lectures and
knows all your Schopenhauers and Proudhons by heart. . .
."Olga Mihalovna felt bored again. She walked again along a
little path by apple and pear trees, and looked again as though she
was on some very important errand. She reached the gardener's
cottage. In the doorway the gardener's wife, Varvara, was sitting
together with her four little children with big shaven heads.
Varvara, too, was with child and expecting to be confined on
Elijah's Day. After greeting her, Olga Mihalovna looked at her and
the children in silence and asked:"Well, how do you feel?""Oh, all right. . . ."A silence followed. The two women seemed to understand each
other without words."It's dreadful having one's first baby," said Olga Mihalovna
after a moment's thought. "I keep feeling as though I shall not get
through it, as though I shall die.""I fancied that, too, but here I am alive. One has all sorts
of fancies."Varvara, who was just going to have her fifth, looked down a
little on her mistress from the height of her experience and spoke
in a rather didactic tone, and Olga Mihalovna could not help
feeling her authority; she would have liked to have talked of her
fears, of the child, of her sensations, but she was afraid it might
strike Varvara as naïve and trivial. And she waited in silence for
Varvara to say something herself."Olya, we are going indoors," Pyotr Dmitritch called from the
raspberries.Olga Mihalovna liked being silent, waiting and watching
Varvara. She would have been ready to stay like that till night
without speaking or having any duty to perform. But she had to go.
She had hardly left the cottage when Lubotchka, Nata, and Vata came
running to meet her. The sisters stopped short abruptly a couple of
yards away; Lubotchka ran right up to her and flung herself on her
neck."You dear, darling, precious," she said, kissing her face and
her neck. "Let us go and have tea on the island!""On the island, on the island!" said the precisely similar
Nata andVata, both at once, without a smile."But it's going to rain, my dears.""It's not, it's not," cried Lubotchka with a woebegone face.
"They've all agreed to go. Dear! darling!""They are all getting ready to have tea on the island," said
Pyotr Dmitritch, coming up. "See to arranging things. . . . We will
all go in the boats, and the samovars and all the rest of it must
be sent in the carriage with the servants."He walked beside his wife and gave her his arm. Olga
Mihalovna had a desire to say something disagreeable to her
husband, something biting, even about her dowry perhaps—the
crueller the better, she felt. She thought a little, and
said:"Why is it Count Alexey Petrovitch hasn't come? What a
pity!""I am very glad he hasn't come," said Pyotr Dmitritch, lying.
"I'm sick to death of that old lunatic.""But yet before dinner you were expecting him so
eagerly!"IIIHalf an hour later all the guests were crowding on the bank
near the pile to which the boats were fastened. They were all
talking and laughing, and were in such excitement and commotion
that they could hardly get into the boats. Three boats were crammed
with passengers, while two stood empty. The keys for unfastening
these two boats had been somehow mislaid, and messengers were
continually running from the river to the house to look for them.
Some said Grigory had the keys, others that the bailiff had them,
while others suggested sending for a blacksmith and breaking the
padlocks. And all talked at once, interrupting and shouting one
another down. Pyotr Dmitritch paced impatiently to and fro on the
bank, shouting:"What the devil's the meaning of it! The keys ought always to
be lying in the hall window! Who has dared to take them away? The
bailiff can get a boat of his own if he wants one!"At last the keys were found. Then it appeared that two oars
were missing. Again there was a great hullabaloo. Pyotr Dmitritch,
who was weary of pacing about the bank, jumped into a long, narrow
boat hollowed out of the trunk of a poplar, and, lurching from side
to side and almost falling into the water, pushed off from the
bank. The other boats followed him one after another, amid loud
laughter and the shrieks of the young ladies.The white cloudy sky, the trees on the riverside, the boats
with the people in them, and the oars, were reflected in the water
as in a mirror; under the boats, far away below in the bottomless
depths, was a second sky with the birds flying across it. The bank
on which the house and gardens stood was high, steep, and covered
with trees; on the other, which was sloping, stretched broad green
water-meadows with sheets of water glistening in them. The boats
had floated a hundred yards when, behind the mournfully drooping
willows on the sloping banks, huts and a herd of cows came into
sight; they began to hear songs, drunken shouts, and the strains of
a concertina.Here and there on the river fishing-boats were scattered
about, setting their nets for the night. In one of these boats was
the festive party, playing on home-made violins and
violoncellos.Olga Mihalovna was sitting at the rudder; she was smiling
affably and talking a great deal to entertain her visitors, while
she glanced stealthily at her husband. He was ahead of them all,
standing up punting with one oar. The light sharp-nosed canoe,
which all the guests called the "death-trap"—while Pyotr Dmitritch,
for some reason, called itPenderaklia—flew along quickly; it had a brisk, crafty expression, as
though it hated its heavy occupant and was looking out for a
favourable moment to glide away from under his feet. Olga Mihalovna
kept looking at her husband, and she loathed his good looks which
attracted every one, the back of his head, his attitude, his
familiar manner with women; she hated all the women sitting in the
boat with her, was jealous, and at the same time was trembling
every minute in terror that the frail craft would upset and cause
an accident."Take care, Pyotr!" she cried, while her heart fluttered with
terror."Sit down! We believe in your courage without all
that!"She was worried, too, by the people who were in the boat with
her. They were all ordinary good sort of people like thousands of
others, but now each one of them struck her as exceptional and
evil. In each one of them she saw nothing but falsity. "That young
man," she thought, "rowing, in gold-rimmed spectacles, with
chestnut hair and a nice-looking beard: he is a mamma's darling,
rich, and well-fed, and always fortunate, and every one considers
him an honourable, free-thinking, advanced man. It's not a year
since he left the University and came to live in the district, but
he already talks of himself as 'we active members of the Zemstvo.'
But in another year he will be bored like so many others and go off
to Petersburg, and to justify running away, will tell every one
that the Zemstvos are good-for-nothing, and that he has been
deceived in them. While from the other boat his young wife keeps
her eyes fixed on him, and believes that he is 'an active member of
the Zemstvo,' just as in a year she will believe that the Zemstvo
is good-for-nothing. And that stout, carefully shaven gentleman in
the straw hat with the broad ribbon, with an expensive cigar in his
mouth: he is fond of saying, 'It is time to put away dreams and set
to work!' He has Yorkshire pigs, Butler's hives, rape-seed,
pine-apples, a dairy, a cheese factory, Italian bookkeeping by
double entry; but every summer he sells his timber and mortgages
part of his land to spend the [...]