A pedestrian, wiping the sweat from his face, sought the shade. A rented carriage with six passengers slowly dragged on its way out of town, hardly raising any dust in its wake. At four o’clock the civil servants took off from work and slowly made their way home.
Alexander ran out as if the ceiling had collapsed. He looked at his watch. It was late, not enough time for dinner. He rushed to the restaurant.
“What is on today’s menu? Quick!”
“Soupe julienne and à la reine. Dressing à la provençale à la maître d’hôtel. Roast turkey, game. Soufflé, cake.”
“Well, provençale soup, julienne sauce, and roasted soufflé, but hurry!”
The waiter looked at him.
“Well, what’s the matter? ” said Alexander impatiently.
The waiter rushed out and brought whatever entered his head. Aduyev was very happy with it. He didn’t wait for the dessert, but ran to the Neva embankment. There a boat with two oarsmen was waiting.
An hour later he caught sight of the promised land, stood up in the boat and strained his gaze into the distance. At first his eyes clouded over with fear and an anxiety which turned to doubt. Then suddenly his face lighted up with joy as with the glow of sunlight. He made out the familiar dress at the garden gate. Look, they had recognized him, a handkerchief fluttered. He had been awaited, perhaps for a long time. The soles of his feet seemed almost to burn with impatience.
“Oh, if only one could walk on the water!” thought Alexander. “All sorts of crazy things are being invented, but this is the kind of thing they don’t invent!”
The oarsmen moved their oars slowly, measuredly like a machine. Sweat streamed down their sunburned faces. Little they cared that Alexander’s heart had begun pounding in his breast, that without turning an eye from that single spot he had twice now unconsciously put first one, then the other leg over the edge of the boat, but they paid no attention. They rowed at their own speed and with the same sluggishness, wiping their faces at times with their sleeve.
“Faster!” he said, “a half-ruble tip.”
How they started to work, how they began to rise in their places! Where had their weariness gone? Where did they get their strength? The oars began truly whipping through the water. The boat would glide, then traverse dozens of feet at a time. They made ten or so sweeps, and the stern described a curve; the boat gracefully approached the bank and tipped toward it. Alexander and Nadenka smiled at each other from a distance and did not take their eyes off each other. Aduyev put one leg down in the water instead of on the bank. Nadenka began to smile.
“Not so fast, Sir, wait, here, take my arm,” said one oarsman after Alexander was already on the bank. Nadenka began to laugh.
“Wait for me here,” Aduyev told them and started running toward Nadenka.
She tenderly smiled at Alexander from afar. With each movement of the boat toward the bank she had been breathing harder.
“Nadezhda Alexandrovna!” said Aduyev, hardly catching his breath for joy.
“Alexander Fyodorych …” she answered.
They instinctively rushed toward each other, then stopped and looked at each other with a smile and wet eyes, unable to say anything. Several minutes passed this way.
Pyotr Ivanych could not be blamed for not having noticed Nadenka at first. She was not a beauty and didn’t catch your attention at once.
But whoever studied her features could not look away for some time. Her expression seldom stayed the same for two minutes. The thoughts and varied feelings of her extremely impressionable and sensitive soul were constantly changing, and the nuances of these feelings flowed together in amazing play, bringing a new and unexpected look to her face every minute. Her eyes, for example, would suddenly seem to flash like lightning, burn, and then immediately hide under her long lashes. Her face would become lifeless and immobile, and you’d see a marble statue before you. After that you’d expect another penetrating ray–not a chance! Her eyes would open quietly, slowly–the gentle glow of her gaze would shine upon you as if the moon had slowly floated out from behind the clouds. Your heart would surely respond to her glance by beating slightly faster.
Nadya’s movements were of the same essence. They had a lot of grace, though not the grace of sylphs. Much of her gracefulness was wild and impulsive, of the sort nature gives to everyone but which art will then take away completely rather than just tone down. Traces of such wildness and impulsiveness often broke through in Nadenka’s movements. She sometimes sat in a picturesque pose, but suddenly God knows what inner impulse would break that picturesque pose with a wholly unexpected and again enchanting gesture. In conversation the same unexpected reverses; she would display true judgment, then dreaminess, then sharp condemnation, followed by a childish prank or subtle pretense. Everything in her revealed a fiery mind, a willful and inconstant heart. And why wouldn’t Alexander fall madly in love with her; only Pyotr Ivanych came away scot-free–but are there many like him?
“You were waiting for me! Heavens, how happy I am!” said Alexander.
“I waiting? I wouldn’t dream of it!” answered Nadenka, tossing her head. “You know I’m always in the garden.”
“Are you angry?” he asked shyly.
“What for? That’s a funny idea!”
“Let me kiss your hand.”
She gave him her hand, but as soon as he touched it, she snatched it away–and suddenly her mood changed. Her smile disappeared, her face showed something like vexation.
“What’s this, you’re drinking milk?” he asked.
Nadenka had a cup in her hands and a piece of dry toast.
“This is my dinner,” she answered.
“Having dinner at six o’clock and dining on milk!”
“Of course you think milk is strange after your luxurious dinner at your uncle’s? But we’re in the country here; we live modestly.”
With her front teeth she broke off some crumbs of toast and took a drink of milk, curling her lips in a charming pout.
“I didn’t dine with Uncle. I told him no yesterday,” Aduyev answered.
“You just have no conscience. How can you lie like that? Where have you been till now?”
“I sat through the day at the office until four o’clock…”
“But it’s six now. Don’t lie; admit you were tempted by dinner, by the pleasant company? It was very amusing there.”
“Word of honor, I didn’t go to Uncle’s…” Alexander began to defend himself heatedly. “If I had, then how could I have gotten here by now?”
“What! Do you think this is early? You should have been here some two hours ago!” said Nadenka and quickly turned on her heel away from him and set off on the path to the house, Alexander after her.
“Don’t come near me, don’t come near me,” she began, waving her hand, “I can’t bear to look at you.”
“Enough of playing games, Nadezhda Alexandrovna!”
“I’m not playing games at all. Tell me, where were you till now?”
“I left the office at four o’clock,” Aduyev began, “and spent an hour on the way here…”
“So it should be five then, but it’s six by now. Where did you spend the extra hour? You see how you lie!”
“I ate a quick dinner in a restaurant…”
“A quick dinner! Only an hour!” she said, “poor thing! You must be hungry. Don’t you want some milk?”
“Oh, give me, do give me your cup…” Alexander began and reached out his hand.
But she suddenly stopped and turned the cup upside down; ignoring Alexander, she watched with curiosity the last drops drip from the cup onto the sand.
“You’re without pity!” he said. “How can you torment me so?”
“Look, look, Alexander Fyodorych,” Nadenka suddenly interrupted him, absorbed in her own pursuit. “Shall I hit this bug with a drop, see, that one crawling along the path?… Oh dear, I hit her, the poor thing! She’ll die!” she said. Then she anxiously picked up the bug, put
it on the palm of her hand and began to breathe on it.
“How taken you are with the bug!” he said, annoyed.
“Poor thing! Look, she’ll die,” said Nadenka with sorrow. “What have I done?”
She carried the bug for a while on her hand and when it began to wiggle and crawl back and forth on her hand, Nadenka shuddered, quickly threw it to the ground and crushed it with her foot, saying, “Nasty bug!”
“Where were you?” she asked then.
“I told you…”
“Oh, yes! At your uncle’s. Were there many guests? Did you drink champagne? I can smell the champagne from here.”
“I told you no, not at Uncle’s!” Alexander interrupted in desperation. “Who told you I was?”
“You did.”
“Why, they’re just now sitting down to table at Uncle’s, I imagine. You don’t know these dinners. Do you think a dinner like that is over in an hour?”
“You took two for yours–from four to six.”
“Then when did I have time for the trip here?”
She didn’t answer, jumped and caught a branch of acacia, then ran off along the path.
Aduyev ran after her.
“Where are you going?” he asked.
“Where, where indeed! To Mama.”
“Why? Perhaps we’ll bother her.”
“No, we won’t.”
Marya Mikhailovna, Nadezhda Alexandrovna’s mama, was one of those kind and naive mothers who find whatever their dear children do admirable. Marya Mikhailovna, for example, would order the carriage harnessed.
“Where are you going, Mama?” Nadenka would ask.
“Let’s go for a drive, the weather’s so beautiful,” her mother would say.
“How can you, Alexander Fyodorych wanted to come.”
And the carriage would be put away.
Another time Marya Mikhailovna would sit down to work on her endless scarf and begin sighing, taking snuff and clicking her bone needles or getting deep into a French novel.
“Mama, why don’t you get dressed?” Nadenka would ask with severity.
“Why, where are we going?”
“We’re going for a drive.”
“A drive?”
“Yes. Alexander Fyodorych is coming for us. Had you really forgotten!”
“But I didn’t even know.”
“How could you not know!” Nadenka would say, displeased.
Her mother would leave both scarf and book and go to get dressed. Thus Nadenka enjoyed full freedom, organized her own and her mother’s day and activities as she wished. She was, by the way, a kind and affectionate daughter, one couldn’t say otherwise–obedient only because not she, but her mother did the obeying. Therefore, one could say she had an obedient mother.
“Go to see Mama,” said Nadenka when they got to the living room doors.
“And you?”
“I’ll come later.”
“Well, then I’ll come later too.”
“No, you go first.”
Alexander went in and immediately came back again.
“She’s dozing in her armchair,” he said in a whisper.
“No matter, we’ll go in. Mama, oh Mama!”
“Ah!”
“Alexander Fyodorych has come.”
“Ah!”
“Mr. Aduyev wants to see you.”
“Ah!”
“You see how soundly she’s fallen asleep. Don’t wake her!” Alexander restrained her.
“No, I’m going to wake her. Mama!”
“Ah!”
“Wake up, Alexander Fyodorych is here.”
“Where is Alexander Fyodorych?” said Marya Mikhailovna, looking right at him and straightening her bonnet, which had slipped to one side. “Oh! Is that you, Alexander Fyodorych? Do come in! I just sat down here and dozed off, I don’t know why myself, apparently the weather. My corn is starting to hurt–it must be going to rain. While dozing I dreamt that Ignaty announced guests, only I didn’t understand who. I heard him say they’ve come, but I didn’t catch who. Then Nadenka called and I woke up at once. I am a light sleeper: the slightest squeak and my eyes are wide open. Sit down, Alexander Fyodorych. Are you well?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“And Pyotr Ivanych too?”
“Thank God, he is too, thank you.”
“Why doesn’t he ever come to see us? Just yesterday I was thinking perhaps he’d drop by some time, I thought, but no–he’s probably busy, isn’t he?”
“Very busy,” said Alexander.
“You didn’t come yesterday either!” Marya Mikhailovna went on. “The other day I woke up and asked, how’s Nadenka? ‘She’s still asleep,’ they said. ‘Well, let her sleep,’ I said. ‘She’s outdoors all day–in the garden, the weather is good, she gets tired.’ At her age one sleeps soundly, not like me at mine. I have such trouble sleeping, would you believe it? I even get depressed, perhaps it’s nerves–I don’t know. So they brought my coffee, I always have breakfast in bed. As I drank it, I thought, ‘Why is it we don’t see Alexander Fyodorych? Perhaps he isn’t well?’ Then I got up, and looked: it was past eleven. I ask you, why wouldn’t the servants tell me! I looked in on Nadenka–she wasn’t awake yet either. I woke her. ‘It’s time to get up, my dear. It’s almost noon, what’s the matter with you?’ You see, I’m after her all day long like a nursemaid. I purposely let the governess go so there’d be no strangers. Entrust yourself to strangers and Heaven knows what they’ll do. No! I take care of her upbringing myself. I keep strict watch, don’t allow her a step away from me, and I may say, Nadenka appreciates this. She never keeps any thoughts secret from me. It’s as if I saw right through her… At this point the cook came. I spent about an hour talking to him. Then I read Les Mémoires du diable… Oh, Soulié 3 is such an agreeable author! How charmingly he describes things! Then my neighbor Marya Ivanovna and her husband came to call. So the morning was gone before I knew it. I looked and it was already going on four and time for dinner! Oh yes, why didn’t you come for dinner? We waited for you till five.”
“Until five?” said Alexander. “I just couldn’t make it, Marya Mikhailovna; I was held up at the office. I beg you never to wait for me after four o’clock.”
“That’s what I said, but Nadenka kept saying, ‘Let’s wait till he comes, once we’re waiting.’”
“I! Oh dear, oh dear Mama, what do you mean! Wasn’t it I who said, ‘It’s time for dinner, Mama,’ but you said, ‘No, we must wait a bit. Alexander Fyodorych hasn’t been here for a long time, probably he’ll come to dinner.’”
“Hear, hear!” Marya Mikhailovna began, shaking her head. “Oh, how can she say that! Her very words, only she pretends I said them!”
Nadenka turned away, walked among the flowers and began to tease the parrot.
“I say, ‘Wherever can Alexander Fyodorych be now,’” Marya Mikhailovna went on. “‘It’s already four-thirty.’ ‘No,’ she says, ‘We must wait, Mama, we must wait–he’ll come.’ I look, it’s quarter-to-five. ‘As you wish, Nadenka,’ I say. ‘Alexander Fyodorych has probably been invited out and isn’t coming. I’m terribly hungry.’ ‘No,’ she says, ‘we must wait a bit longer till five.’ That’s how you were starving me to death. Isn’t that so, Mademoiselle?”
“Polly parrot!” came a voice from behind the flowers, “where did you have dinner today, at your uncle’s?”
“What? Are you hiding!” said her mother. “You obviously are ashamed to look us in the face!”
“Not at all,” Nadenka answered, coming out of the bushes and sitting down at the window.
“So she didn’t come to table!” said Marya Mikhailovna. “She asked for a cup of milk and went into the garden. And she hasn’t had dinner. Right? Look me straight in the eyes, Mademoiselle.”
Alexander melted on hearing this. He looked at Nadenka, but she turned her back to him and plucked at a leaf of ivy.
“Nadezhda Alexandrovna!” he said. “Am I so fortunate that you were thinking
of me?”
“Don’t come near me!” she cried, annoyed that her tricks had been exposed. “Mamma’s joking and you’re ready to believe her!”
“So, where are the berries you fixed for Alexander Fyodorych?” asked her mother.
“Berries?”
“Yes, berries.”
“Why, you ate them for dinner…” answered Nadenka.
“I! I remember, my dear, you hid them and didn’t give them to me. ‘Look,’ she says, ‘Alexander Fyodorych will come, then I’ll give them to you.’ Isn’t that so?”
Alexander glanced tenderly and slyly at Nadenka. She blushed.
“She cleaned them herself, Alexander Fyodorych,” her mother added.
“What’s this you’re imagining, Mama? I cleaned two or three little berries and you yourself ate them, or maybe Vasilisa…”
“Don’t believe her, Alexander Fyodorych. Vasilisa was sent to town this morning. Why keep it a secret? Probably it would make Alexander Fyodorych happier that you cleaned them and not Vasilisa.”
Nadenka smiled, then disappeared again amid the flowers and reappeared with a whole plate of berries. She stretched out her hand to Aduyev with the plate. He kissed her hand and received the berries as a marshal of the army receives the staff of authority.
“You don’t deserve it! Making people wait for you so long! ”said Nadenka. “I stood two hours at the gate, imagine! When someone came along, I thought it was you and waved my handkerchief. Then I realized I didn’t know him, some officer. And he waved back, so impudent!…”
That evening guests came and went. It began getting dark. The Lyubetskys and Aduyev again numbered three. Gradually this trio too separated. Nadenka went into the garden. Marya Mikhailovna and Aduyev formed an awkward duet. She sang him at length her litany of what she did yesterday, and today, and what she would do tomorrow. A dreary boredom and unrest seized him. Evening came on quickly and he still hadn’t managed to say a single word to Nadenka alone. The cook rescued him; this savior came to ask what to prepare for supper, and Aduyev was taken over by a greater impatience than before in the boat. Hardly had they begun talking of chops and clotted milk when Alexander artfully began to withdraw. How many maneuvers he used just to get away from Marya Mikhailovna’s chair! At first he went up to the window and looked out at the yard while his legs seemed to pull him out the open door. Then with slow steps, barely keeping himself from rushing off in a flash, he walked slowly over to the piano, hit a note here and there on the keyboard, took the music off the rack with feverish palpitation, looked at it and put it back, even had the strength of mind to smell two flowers and wake up the parrot. Then he reached the highest level of impatience; the door was beside him, but to leave was somehow still awkward–he would have to stand there a couple of minutes and walk out as if by accident. Now the cook took two steps backward, a word more–and he’d be gone; then Mrs. Lyubetsky surely would turn again to him. Alexander could stand it no longer and, like a snake, slithered out the door and, leaping off the porch without counting the steps, reached the end of the allée in a few paces–to find himself on the embankment beside Nadenka.
An Ordinary Story Page 12
