Collected Shorter Fiction, Volume 2

by Leo Tolstoy

  And indeed Eugène at once understood that Mary Pávlovna was hinting at his relations with Stepanída which had ended in the previous autumn, and that she attributed much more importance to those relations than they deserved, as solitary women always do. Eugène blushed, not from shame so much as from vexation that good-natured Mary Pávlovna was bothering – out of affection no doubt, but still was bothering – about matters that were not her business and that she did not and could not understand. He answered that there was nothing that needed concealment, and that he had always conducted himself so that there should be nothing to hinder his marrying.

  ‘Well, dear, that is excellent. Only, Jénya … don’t be vexed with me,’ said Mary Pávlovna, and broke off in confusion.

  Eugène saw that she had not finished and had not said what she wanted to. And this was confirmed when a little later she began to tell him how, in his absence, she had been asked to stand godmother at … the Péchnikovs.

  Eugène flushed again, not with vexation or shame this time, but with some strange consciousness of the importance of what was about to be told him – an involuntary consciousness quite at variance with his conclusions. And what he expected happened. Mary Pávlovna, as if merely by way of conversation, mentioned that this year only boys were being born – evidently a sign of a coming war. Both at the Vásins and the Péchnikovs the young wife had a first child – at each house a boy. Mary Pávlovna wanted to say this casually, but she herself felt ashamed when she saw the colour mount to her son’s face and saw him nervously removing, tapping, and replacing his pince-nez and hurriedly lighting a cigarette. She became silent. He too was silent and could not think how to break that silence. So they both understood that they had understood one another.

  ‘Yes, the chief thing is that there should be justice and no favouritism in the village – as under your grandfather.’

  ‘Mamma,’ said Eugène suddenly, ‘I know why you are saying this. You have no need to be disturbed. My future family-life is so sacred to me that I should not infringe it in any case. And as to what occurred in my bachelor days, that is quite ended. I never formed any union and no one has any claims on me.’

  ‘Well, I am glad,’ said his mother. ‘I know how noble your feelings are.’

  Eugène accepted his mother’s words as a tribute due to him, and did not reply.

  Next day he drove to town thinking of his fiancée and of anything in the world except of Stepanída. But, as if purposely to remind him, on approaching the church he met people walking and driving back from it. He met old Matvéy with Simon, some lads and girls, and then two women, one elderly, the other, who seemed familiar, smartly dressed and wearing a bright-red kerchief. This woman was walking lightly and boldly, carrying a child in her arms. He came up to them, and the elder woman bowed, stopping in the old-fashioned way, but the young woman with the child only bent her head, and from under the kerchief gleamed familiar, merry, smiling eyes.

  Yes, this was she, but all that was over and it was no use looking at her: ‘and the child may be mine’, flashed through his mind. No, what nonsense! There was her husband, she used to see him. He did not even consider the matter further, so settled in his mind was it that it had been necessary for his health – he had paid her money and there was no more to be said; there was, there had been, and there could be, no question of any union between them. It was not that he stifled the voice of conscience, no – his conscience simply said nothing to him. And he thought no more about her after the conversation with his mother and this meeting. Nor did he meet her again.

  Eugène was married in town the week after Easter, and left at once with his young wife for his country estate. The house had been arranged as usual for a young couple. Mary Pávlovna wished to leave, but Eugène begged her to remain, and Liza still more strongly, and she only moved into a detached wing of the house.

  And so a new life began for Eugène.

  VII

  THE first year of his marriage was a hard one for Eugène. It was hard because affairs he had managed to put off during the time of his courtship now, after his marriage, all came upon him at once.

  To escape from debts was impossible. An outlying part of the estate was sold and the most pressing obligations met, but others remained, and he had no money. The estate yielded a good revenue, but he had had to send payments to his brother and to spend on his own marriage, so that there was no ready money and the factory could not carry on and would have to be closed down. The only way of escape was to use his wife’s money; and Liza, having realized her husband’s position, insisted on this herself. Eugène agreed, but only on condition that he should give her a mortgage on half his estate, which he did. Of course this was done not for his wife’s sake, who felt offended at it, but to appease his mother-in-law.

  These affairs with various fluctuations of success and failure helped to poison Eugène’s life that first year. Another thing was his wife’s ill-health. That same first year in autumn, seven months after their marriage, a misfortune befell Liza. She was driving out to meet her husband on his return from town, and the quiet horse became rather playful and she was frightened and jumped out. Her jump was comparatively fortunate – she might have been caught by the wheel – but she was pregnant, and that same night the pains began and she had a miscarriage from which she was long in recovering. The loss of the expected child and his wife’s illness, together with the disorder in his affairs, and above all the presence of his mother-in-law, who arrived as soon as Liza fell ill – all this together made the year still harder for Eugène.

  But notwithstanding these difficult circumstances, towards the end of the first year Eugène felt very well. First of all his cherished hope of restoring his fallen fortune and renewing his grandfather’s way of life in a new form, was approaching accomplishment, though slowly and with difficulty. There was no longer any question of having to sell the whole estate to meet the debts. The chief estate, though transferred to his wife’s name, was saved, and if only the beet crop succeeded and the price kept up, by next year his position of want and stress might be replaced by one of complete prosperity. That was one thing.

  Another was that however much he had expected from his wife, he had never expected to find in her what he actually found. He found not what he had expected, but something much better. Raptures of love – though he tried to produce them – did not take place or were very slight, but he discovered something quite different, namely, that he was not merely more cheerful and happier but that it had become easier to live. He did not know why this should be so, but it was.

  And it was so because immediately after marriage his wife decided that Eugène Irténev was superior to anyone else in the world: wiser, purer, and nobler than they, and that therefore it was right for everyone to serve him and please him; but that as it was impossible to make everyone do this, she must do it herself to the limit of her strength. And she did; directing all her strength of mind towards learning and guessing what he liked, and then doing just that thing, whatever it was and however difficult it might be.

  She had the gift which furnishes the chief delight of intercourse with a loving woman: thanks to her love of her husband she penetrated into his soul. She knew his every state and his every shade of feeling – better it seemed to him than he himself – and she behaved correspondingly and therefore never hurt his feelings, but always lessened his distresses and strengthened his joys. And she understood not only his feelings but also his joys. Things quite foreign to her – concerning the farming, the factory, or the appraisement of others – she immediately understood so that she could not merely converse with him, but could often, as he himself said, be a useful and irreplaceable counsellor. She regarded affairs and people and everything in the world only through his eyes. She loved her mother, but having seen that Eugène disliked his mother-in-law’s interference in their life she immediately took her husband’s side, and did so with such decision that he had to restrain her.

  Besides all this
she had very good taste, much tact, and above all she had repose. All that she did, she did unnoticed; only the results of what she did were observable, namely, that always and in everything there was cleanliness, order, and elegance. Liza had at once understood in what her husband’s ideal of life consisted, and she tried to attain, and in the arrangement and order of the house did attain, what he wanted. Children it is true were lacking, but there was hope of that also. In winter she went to Petersburg to see a specialist and he assured them that she was quite well and could have children.

  And this desire was accomplished. By the end of the year she was again pregnant.

  The one thing that threatened, not to say poisoned, their happiness was her jealousy – a jealousy she restrained and did not exhibit, but from which she often suffered. Not only might Eugène not love any other woman – because there was not a woman on earth worthy of him (as to whether she herself was worthy or not she never asked herself), – but not a single woman might therefore dare to love him.

  VIII

  THIS was how they lived: he rose early, as he always had done, and went to see to the farm or the factory where work was going on, or sometimes to the fields. Towards ten o’clock he would come back for his coffee, which they had on the veranda: Mary Pávlovna, an uncle who lived with them, and Liza. After a conversation which was often very animated while they drank their coffee, they dispersed till dinner-time. At two o’clock they dined and then went for a walk or a drive. In the evening when he returned from his office they drank their evening tea and sometimes he read aloud while she worked, or when there were guests they had music or conversation. When he went away on business he wrote to his wife and received letters from her every day. Sometimes she accompanied him, and then they were particularly merry. On his name-day and on hers guests assembled, and it pleased him to see how well she managed to arrange things so that everybody enjoyed coming. He saw and heard that they all admired her – the young, agreeable hostess – and he loved her still more for this.

  All went excellently. She bore her pregnancy easily and, though they were afraid, they both began making plans as to how they would bring the child up. The system of education and the arrangements were all decided by Eugène, and her only wish was to carry out his desires obediently. Eugène on his part read up medical works and intended to bring the child up according to all the precepts of science. She of course agreed to everything and made preparations, making warm and also cool ‘envelopes’,2 and preparing a cradle. Thus the second year of their marriage arrived and the second spring.

  IX

  IT was just before Trinity Sunday. Liza was in her fifth month, and though careful she was still brisk and active. Both his mother and hers were living in the house, but under pretext of watching and safeguarding her only upset her by their tiffs. Eugène was specially engrossed with a new experiment for the cultivation of sugar-beet on a large scale.

  Just before Trinity Liza decided that it was necessary to have a thorough house-cleaning as it had not been done since Easter, and she hired two women by the day to help the servants wash the floors and windows, beat the furniture and the carpets, and put covers on them. These women came early in the morning, heated the coppers, and set to work. One of the two was Stepanída, who had just weaned her baby boy and had begged for the job of washing the floors through the office-clerk – whom she now carried on with. She wanted to have a good look at the new mistress. Stepanída was living by herself as formerly, her husband being away, and she was up to tricks as she had formerly been first with old Daniel (who had once caught her taking some logs of firewood), afterwards with the master, and now with the young clerk. She was not concerning herself any longer about her master. ‘He has a wife now,’ she thought. But it would be good to have a look at the lady and at her establishment: folk said it was well arranged.

  Eugène had not seen her since he had met her with the child. Having a baby to attend to she had not been going out to work, and he seldom walked through the village. That morning, on the eve of Trinity Sunday, he got up at five o’clock and rode to the fallow land which was to be sprinkled with phosphates, and had left the house before the women were about, and while they were still engaged lighting the copper fires.

  He returned to breakfast merry, contented, and hungry; dismounting from his mare at the gate and handing her over to the gardener. Flicking the high grass with his whip and repeating a phrase he had just uttered, as one often does, he walked towards the house. The phrase was: ‘phosphates justify’ – what or to whom, he neither knew nor reflected.

  They were beating a carpet on the grass. The furniture had been brought out.

  ‘There now! What a house-cleaning Liza has undertaken!… Phosphates justify.… What a manageress she is! A manageress! Yes, a manageress,’ said he to himself, vividly imagining her in her white wrapper and with her smiling joyful face, as it nearly always was when he looked at her. ‘Yes, I must change my boots, or else “phosphates justify”, that is, smell of manure, and the manageress is in such a condition. Why “in such a condition”? Because a new little Irténev is growing there inside her,’ he thought. ‘Yes, phosphates justify,’ and smiling at his thoughts he put his hand to the door of his room.

  But he had not time to push the door before it opened of itself and he came face to face with a woman coming towards him carrying a pail, barefoot and with sleeves turned up high. He stepped aside to let her pass and she too stepped aside, adjusting her kerchief with a wet hand.

  ‘Go on, go on, I won’t go in, if you …’ began Eugène and suddenly stopped, recognizing her.

  She glanced merrily at him with smiling eyes, and pulling down her skirt went out at the door.

  ‘What nonsense!… It is impossible,’ said Eugène to himself, frowning and waving his hand as though to get rid of a fly, displeased at having noticed her. He was vexed that he had noticed her and yet he could not take his eyes from her strong body, swayed by her agile strides, from her bare feet, or from her arms and shoulders, and the pleasing folds of her shirt and the handsome skirt tucked up high above her white calves.

  ‘But why am I looking?’ said he to himself, lowering his eyes so as not to see her. ‘And anyhow I must go in to get some other boots.’ And he turned back to go into his own room, but had not gone five steps before he again glanced round to have another look at her without knowing why or wherefore. She was just going round the corner and also glanced at him.

  ‘Ah, what am I doing!’ said he to himself. ‘She may think … It is even certain that she already does think …’

  He entered his damp room. Another woman, an old and skinny one, was there, and was still washing it. Eugène passed on tiptoe across the floor, wet with dirty water, to the wall where his boots stood, and he was about to leave the room when the woman herself went out.

  ‘This one has gone and the other, Stepanída, will come here alone,’ someone within him began to reflect.

  ‘My God, what am I thinking of and what am I doing!’ He seized his boots and ran out with them into the hall, put them on there, brushed himself, and went out onto the veranda where both the mammas were already drinking coffee. Liza had evidently been expecting him and came onto the veranda through another door at the same time.

  ‘My God! If she, who considers me so honourable, pure, and innocent – if she only knew!’ – thought he.

  Liza as usual met him with shining face. But to-day somehow she seemed to him particularly pale, yellow, long, and weak.

  X

  DURING coffee, as often happened, a peculiarly feminine kind of conversation went on which had no logical sequence but which evidently was connected in some way for it went on uninterruptedly.

  The two old ladies were pin-pricking one another, and Liza was skilfully manœuvring between them.

  ‘I am so vexed that we had not finished washing your room before you got back,’ she said to her husband. ‘But I do so want to get everything arranged.’

  ‘Well, did
you sleep well after I got up?’

  ‘Yes, I slept well and I feel well.’

  ‘How can a woman be well in her condition during this intolerable heat, when her windows face the sun,’ said Varvára Alexéevna, her mother. ‘And they have no venetian-blinds or awnings. I always had awnings.’

  ‘But you know we are in the shade after ten o’clock,’ said Mary Pávlovna.

  ‘That’s what causes fever; it comes of dampness,’ said Varvára Alexéevna, not noticing that what she was saying did not agree with what she had just said. ‘My doctor always says that it is impossible to diagnose an illness unless one knows the patient. And he certainly knows, for he is the leading physician and we pay him a hundred rubles a visit. My late husband did not believe in doctors, but he did not grudge me anything.’

  ‘How can a man grudge anything to a woman when perhaps her life and the child’s depend …’

  ‘Yes, when she has means a wife need not depend on her husband. A good wife submits to her husband,’ said Varvára Alexéevna – ‘only Liza is too weak after her illness.’

  ‘Oh no, mamma, I feel quite well. But why have they not brought you any boiled cream?’

  ‘I don’t want any. I can do with raw cream.’

  ‘I offered some to Varvára Alexéevna, but she declined,’ said Mary Pávlovna, as if justifying herself.

  ‘No, I don’t want any to-day.’ And as if to terminate an unpleasant conversation and yield magnanimously, Varvára Alexéevna turned to Eugène and said: ‘Well, and have you sprinkled the phosphates?’

  Liza ran to fetch the cream.

  ‘But I don’t want it. I don’t want it.’

  ‘Liza, Liza, go gently,’ said Mary Pávlovna. ‘Such rapid movements do her harm.’