'What are we walking in single file for? Give me your arm. That's right.... You were out of humour too.'
'Yes, I was too.'
'But to-day I'm in good humour, eh?'
'Yes, I think so, to-day...'
'And do you know why? Because...'
Masha nodded her head gravely. 'Well, I know why.... Because I am with you,' she added, not looking at Kister.
Kister softly pressed her hand.
'But why don't you question me?...' Masha murmured in an undertone.
'What about?'
'Oh, don't pretend... about my letter.'
'I was waiting for...'
'That's just why I am happy with you,' Masha interrupted him impulsively: 'because you are a gentle, good-hearted person, because you are incapable... parceque vous avez de la délicatesse. One can say that to you: you understand French.'
Kister did understand French, but he did not in the least understand Masha.
'Pick me that flower, that one... how pretty it is!' Masha admired it, and suddenly, swiftly withdrawing her hand from his arm, with an anxious smile she began carefully sticking the tender stalk in the buttonhole of Kister's coat. Her slender fingers almost touched his lips. He looked at the fingers and then at her. She nodded her head to him as though to say 'you may.'... Kister bent down and kissed the tips of her gloves.
Meanwhile they drew near the already familiar copse. Masha became suddenly more thoughtful, and at last kept silent altogether. They came to the very place where Lutchkov had waited for her. The trampled grass had not yet grown straight again; the broken sapling had not yet withered, its little leaves were only just beginning to curl up and fade. Masha stared about her, and turned quickly to Kister.
'Do you know why I have brought you here?'
'No, I don't.'
'Don't you know? Why is it you haven't told me anything about your friend Lutchkov to-day? You always praise him so...'
Kister dropped his eyes, and did not speak.
'Do you know,' Masha brought out with some effort, 'that I made... an appointment... to meet him here... yesterday?'
'I know that,' Kister rejoined hurriedly.
'You know it?... Ah! now I see why the day before yesterday... Mr. Lutchkov was in a hurry it seems to boast of his conquest.'
Kister was about to answer....
'Don't speak, don't say anything in opposition.... I know he's your friend. You are capable of taking his part. You knew, Kister, you knew.... How was it you didn't prevent me from acting so stupidly? Why didn't you box my ears, as if I were a child? You knew... and didn't you care?'
'But what right had I...'
'What right!... the right of a friend. But he too is your friend.... I'm ashamed, Kister.... He your friend.... That man behaved to me yesterday, as if...'
Masha turned away. Kister's eyes flamed; he turned pale.
'Oh, never mind, don't be angry.... Listen, Fyodor Fedoritch, don't be angry. It's all for the best. I am very glad of yesterday's explanation... yes, that's just what it was,' added Masha. 'What do you suppose I am telling you about it for? To complain of Mr. Lutchkov? Nonsense! I've forgotten about him. But I have done you a wrong, my good friend.... I want to speak openly to you, to ask your forgiveness... your advice. You have accustomed me to frankness; I am at ease with you.... You are not a Mr. Lutchkov!'
'Lutchkov is clumsy and coarse,' Kister brought out with difficulty; 'but...'
'Why but? Aren't you ashamed to say but? He is coarse, and clumsy, and ill-natured, and conceited.... Do you hear?—and, not but.'
'You are speaking under the influence of anger, Marya Sergievna,' Kister observed mournfully.
'Anger? A strange sort of anger! Look at me; are people like this when they 're angry? Listen,' pursued Masha; 'you may think what you like of me... but if you imagine I am flirting with you to-day from pique, well... well...' (tears stood in her eyes)'I shall be angry in earnest.'
'Do be open with me, Marya Sergievna...'
'O, silly fellow! how slow you are! Why, look at me, am I not open with you, don't you see right through me?'
'Oh, very well... yes; I believe you,' Kister said with a smile, seeing with what anxious insistence she tried to catch his eyes. 'But tell me, what induced you to arrange to meet Lutchkov?'
'What induced me? I really don't know. He wanted to speak to me alone. I fancied he had never had time, never had an opportunity to speak freely. He has spoken freely now! Do you know, he may be an extraordinary man, but he's a fool, really.... He doesn't know how to put two words together. He's simply an ignoramus. Though, indeed, I don't blame him much... he might suppose I was a giddy, mad, worthless girl. I hardly ever talked to him.... He did excite my curiosity, certainly, but I imagined that a man who was worthy of being your friend...'
'Don't, please, speak of him as my friend,' Kister interposed.
'No, no, I don't want to separate you.'
'Oh, my God, for you I'm ready to sacrifice more than a friend.... Everything is over between me and Mr. Lutchkov,' Kister added hurriedly.
Masha looked intently into his face.
'Well, enough of him,' she said. 'Don't let us talk of him. It's a lesson to me for the future. It's I that am to blame. For several months past I have almost every day seen a man who is good, clever, bright, friendly who...' (Masha was confused, and stammered) 'who, I think, cared... a little... for me too... and I like a fool,' she went on quickly, 'preferred to him... no, no, I didn't prefer him, but...'
She drooped her head, and ceased speaking in confusion.
Kister was in a sort of terror. 'It can't be!' he kept repeating to himself.
'Marya Sergievna!' he began at last.
Masha lifted her head, and turned upon him eyes heavy with unshed tears.
'You don't guess of whom I am speaking?' she asked.
Scarcely daring to breathe, Kister held out his hand. Masha at once clutched it warmly.
'You are my friend as before, aren't you?... Why don't you answer?'
'I am your friend, you know that,' he murmured.
'And you are not hard on me? You forgive me?... You understand me? You're not laughing at a girl who made an appointment only yesterday with one man, and to-day is talking to another, as I am talking to you.... You're not laughing at me, are you?...' Masha's face glowed crimson, she clung with both hands to Kister's hand....
'Laugh at you,' answered Kister: 'I... I... why, I love you... I love you,' he cried.
Masha hid her face.
'Surely you've long known that I love you, Marya Sergievna?'
X
Three weeks after this interview, Kister was sitting alone in his room, writing the following letter to his mother:—
Dearest Mother!—I make haste to share my great happiness with you; I am going to get married. This news will probably only surprise you from my not having, in my previous letters, even hinted at so important a change in my life—and you know that I am used to sharing all my feelings, my joys and my sorrows, with you. My reasons for silence are not easy to explain to you. To begin with, I did not know till lately that I was loved; and on my own side too, it is only lately that I have realised myself all the strength of my own feeling. In one of my first letters from here, I wrote to you of our neighbours, the Perekatovs; I am engaged to their only daughter, Marya. I am thoroughly convinced that we shall both be happy. My feeling for her is not a fleeting passion, but a deep and genuine emotion, in which friendship is mingled with love. Her bright, gentle disposition is in perfect harmony with my tastes. She is well-educated, clever, plays the piano splendidly.... If you could only see her! I enclose her portrait sketched by me. I need hardly say she is a hundred times better-looking than her portrait. Masha loves you already, like a daughter, and is eagerly looking forward to seeing you. I mean to retire, to settle in the country, and to go in for farming. Mr. Perekatov has a property of four hundred serfs in excellent condition. You see that even from the material point of view, you can
not but approve of my plans. I will get leave and come to Moscow and to you. Expect me in a fortnight, not later. My own dearest mother, how happy I am!... Kiss me...' and so on.
Kister folded and sealed the letter, got up, went to the window, lighted a pipe, thought a little, and returned to the table. He took out a small sheet of notepaper, carefully dipped his pen into the ink, but for a long while he did not begin to write, knitted his brows, lifted his eyes to the ceiling, bit the end of his pen.... At last he made up his mind, and in the course of a quarter of an hour he had composed the following:
'Dear Avdey Ivanovitch,—Since the day of your last visit (that is, for three weeks) you have sent me no message, have not said a word to me, and have seemed to avoid meeting me. Every one is, undoubtedly, free to act as he pleases; you have chosen to break off our acquaintance, and I do not, believe me, in addressing you intend to reproach you in any way. It is not my intention or my habit to force myself upon any one whatever; it is enough for me to feel that I am not to blame in the matter. I am writing to you now from a feeling of duty. I have made an offer to Marya Sergievna Perekatov, and have been accepted by her, and also by her parents. I inform you of this fact—directly and immediately—to avoid any kind of misapprehension or suspicion. I frankly confess, sir, that I am unable to feel great concern about the good opinion of a man who himself shows so little concern for the opinions and feelings of other people, and I am writing to you solely because I do not care in this matter even to appear to have acted or to be acting underhandedly. I make bold to say, you know me, and will not ascribe my present action to any other lower motive. Addressing you for the last time, I cannot, for the sake of our old friendship, refrain from wishing you all good things possible on earth.—I remain, sincerely, your obedient servant, Fyodor Kister.'
Fyodor Fedoritch despatched this note to the address, changed his uniform, and ordered his carriage to be got ready. Light-hearted and happy, he walked up and down his little room humming, even gave two little skips in the air, twisted a book of songs into a roll, and was tying it up with blue ribbon.... The door opened, and Lutchkov, in a coat without epaulettes, with a cap on his head, came into the room. Kister, astounded, stood still in the middle of the room, without finishing the bow he was tying.
'So you're marrying the Perekatov girl?' queried Avdey in a calm voice.
Kister fired up.
'Sir,' he began; 'decent people take off their caps and say good-morning when they come into another man's room.'
'Beg pardon,' the bully jerked out; and he took off his cap. 'Good-morning.'
'Good-morning, Mr. Lutchkov. You ask me if I am about to marry Miss Perekatov? Haven't you read my letter, then?'
'I have read your letter. You're going to get married. I congratulate you.'
'I accept your congratulation, and thank you for it. But I must be starting.'
'I should like to have a few words of explanation with you, Fyodor Fedoritch.'
'By all means, with pleasure,' responded the good-natured fellow. 'I must own I was expecting such an explanation. Your behaviour to me has been so strange, and I think, on my side, I have not deserved... at least, I had no reason to expect... But won't you sit down? Wouldn't you like a pipe?'
Lutchkov sat down. There was a certain weariness perceptible in his movements. He stroked his moustaches and lifted his eyebrows.
'I say, Fyodor Fedoritch,' he began at last; 'why did you keep it up with me so long?...'
'How do you mean?'
'Why did you pose as such... a disinterested being, when you were just such another as all the rest of us sinners all the while?'
'I don't understand you.... Can I have wounded you in some way?...'
'You don't understand me... all right. I'll try and speak more plainly. Just tell me, for instance, openly, Have you had a liking for the Perekatov girl all along, or is it a case of sudden passion?'
'I should prefer, Avdey Ivanitch, not to discuss with you my relations with Marya Sergievna,' Kister responded coldly.
'Oh, indeed! As you please. Only you'll kindly allow me to believe that you've been humbugging me.'
Avdey spoke very deliberately and emphatically.
'You can't believe that, Avdey Ivanitch; you know me.'
'I know you?... who knows you? The heart of another is a dark forest, and the best side of goods is always turned uppermost. I know you read German poetry with great feeling and even with tears in your eyes; I know that you've hung various maps on your walls; I know you keep your person clean; that I know,... but beyond that, I know nothing...'
Kister began to lose his temper.
'Allow me to inquire,' he asked at last, 'what is the object of your visit? You have sent no message to me for three weeks, and now you come to me, apparently with the intention of jeering at me. I am not a boy, sir, and I do not allow any one...'
'Mercy on us,' Lutchkov interrupted him; 'mercy on us, Fyodor Fedoritch, who would venture to jeer at you? It's quite the other way; I've come to you with a most humble request, that is, that you'd do me the favour to explain your behaviour to me. Allow me to ask you, wasn't it you who forced me to make the acquaintance of the Perekatov family? Didn't you assure your humble servant that it would make his soul blossom into flower? And lastly, didn't you throw me with the virtuous Marya Sergievna? Why am I not to presume that it's to you I'm indebted for that final agreeable scene, of which you have doubtless been informed in befitting fashion? An engaged girl, of course, tells her betrothed of everything, especially of her innocent indiscretions. How can I help supposing that it's thanks to you I've been made such a terrific fool of? You took such a mighty interest in my "blossoming out," you know!'
Kister walked up and down the room.
'Look here, Lutchkov,' he said at last; 'if you really—joking apart—are convinced of what you say, which I confess I don't believe, then let me tell you, it's shameful and wicked of you to put such an insulting construction on my conduct and intentions. I don't want to justify myself... I appeal to your own conscience, to your memory.'
'Yes; I remember you were continually whispering with Marya Sergievna. Besides that, let me ask you another question: Weren't you at the Perekatovs' after a certain conversation with me, after that evening when I like a fool chattered to you, thinking you my greatest friend, of the meeting she'd arranged?'
'What! you suspect me...'
'I suspect other people of nothing,' Avdey cut him short with cutting iciness, 'of which I would not suspect myself; but I have the weakness to suppose that other men are no better than I am.'
'You are mistaken,' Kister retorted emphatically; 'other men are better than you.'
'I congratulate them upon it,' Lutchkov dropped carelessly; 'but...'
'But remember,' broke in Kister, now in his turn thoroughly infuriated, 'in what terms you spoke of... of that meeting... of... But these explanations are leading to nothing, I see.... Think what you choose of me, and act as you think best.'
'Come, that's better,' observed Avdey. 'At last you're beginning to speak plainly.'
'As you think best,' repeated Kister.
'I understand your position, Fyodor Fedoritch,' Avdey went on with an affectation of sympathy; 'it's disagreeable, certainly. A man has been acting, acting a part, and no one has recognised him as a humbug; and all of a sudden...'
'If I could believe,' Kister interrupted, setting his teeth, 'that it was wounded love that makes you talk like this, I should feel sorry for you; I could excuse you.... But in your abuse, in your false charges, I hear nothing but the shriek of mortified pride... and I feel no sympathy for you.... You have deserved what you've got.'
'Ugh, mercy on us, how the fellow talks!' Avdey murmured. 'Pride,' he went on; 'may be; yes, yes, my pride, as you say, has been mortified intensely and insufferably. But who isn't proud? Aren't you? Yes, I'm proud, and for instance, I permit no one to feel sorry for me....'
'You don't permit it!' Kister retorted haughtily. 'What an expressi
on, sir! Don't forget, the tie between us you yourself have broken. I must beg you to behave with me as with a complete outsider.'
'Broken! Broken the tie between us!' repeated Avdey. 'Understand me; I have sent you no message, and have not been to see you because I was sorry for you; you must allow me to be sorry for you, since you 're sorry for me!... I didn't want to put you in a false position, to make your conscience prick.... You talk of a tie between us... as though you could remain my friend as before your marriage! Rubbish! Why, you were only friendly with me before to gloat over your fancied superiority...'
Avdey's duplicity overwhelmed, confounded Kister.
'Let us end this unpleasant conversation!' he cried at last. 'I must own I don't see why you've been pleased to come to me.'
'You don't see what I've come to you for?' Avdey asked inquiringly.
'I certainly don't see why.'
'N—o?'
'No, I tell you...'
'Astonishing!... This is astonishing! Who'd have thought it of a fellow of your intelligence!'
'Come, speak plainly...'
'I have come, Mr. Kister,' said Avdey, slowly rising to his feet, 'I have come to challenge you to a duel. Do you understand now? I want to fight you. Ah! you thought you could get rid of me like that! Why, didn't you know the sort of man you have to do with? As if I'd allow...'
'Very good,' Kister cut in coldly and abruptly. 'I accept your challenge. Kindly send me your second.'
'Yes, yes,' pursued Avdey, who, like a cat, could not bear to let his victim go so soon: 'it'll give me great pleasure I'll own to put a bullet into your fair and idealistic countenance to-morrow.'
'You are abusive after a challenge, it seems,' Kister rejoined contemptuously. 'Be so good as to go. I'm ashamed of you.'
'Oh, to be sure, délicatesse!... Ah, Marya Sergievna, I don't know French!' growled Avdey, as he put on his cap. 'Till we meet again, Fyodor Fedoritch!'
He bowed and walked out.
Kister paced several times up and down the room. His face burned, his breast heaved violently. He felt neither fear nor anger; but it sickened him to think what this man really was that he had once looked upon as a friend. The idea of the duel with Lutchkov was almost pleasant to him.... Once get free from the past, leap over this rock in his path, and then to float on an untroubled tide... 'Good,' he thought, 'I shall be fighting to win my happiness.' Masha's image seemed to smile to him, to promise him success. 'I'm not going to be killed! not I!' he repeated with a serene smile. On the table lay the letter to his mother.... He felt a momentary pang at his heart. He resolved any way to defer sending it off. There was in Kister that quickening of the vital energies of which a man is aware in face of danger. He calmly thought over all the possible results of the duel, mentally placed Masha and himself in all the agonies of misery and parting, and looked forward to the future with hope. He swore to himself not to kill Lutchkov... He felt irresistibly drawn to Masha. He paused a second, hurriedly arranged things, and directly after dinner set off to the Perekatovs. All the evening Kister was in good spirits, perhaps in too good spirits.
The Jew and Other Stories Page 16
