Complete Works of Joseph Conrad (Illustrated)

by Joseph Conrad

  “I have been unconscious as I walked, it’s a positive fact,” said Razumov to himself in wonder. He raised his hat with marked civility.

  The sallow woman blushed duskily. She had her invariably scared expression, as if somebody had just disclosed to her some terrible news. But she held her ground, Razumov noticed, without timidity. “She is incredibly shabby,” he thought. In the sunlight her black costume looked greenish, with here and there threadbare patches where the stuff seemed decomposed by age into a velvety, black, furry state. Her very hair and eyebrows looked shabby. Razumov wondered whether she were sixty years old. Her figure, though, was young enough. He observed that she did not appear starved, but rather as if she had been fed on unwholesome scraps and leavings of plates.

  Razumov smiled amiably and moved out of her way. She turned her head to keep her scared eyes on him.

  “I know what you have been told in there,” she affirmed, without preliminaries. Her tone, in contrast with her manner, had an unexpectedly assured character which put Razumov at his ease.

  “Do you? You must have heard all sorts of talk on many occasions in there.”

  She varied her phrase, with the same incongruous effect of positiveness.

  “I know to a certainty what you have been told to do.”

  “Really?” Razumov shrugged his shoulders a little. He was about to pass on with a bow, when a sudden thought struck him. “Yes. To be sure! In your confidential position you are aware of many things,” he murmured, looking at the cat.

  That animal got a momentary convulsive hug from the lady companion.

  “Everything was disclosed to me a long time ago,” she said.

  “Everything,” Razumov repeated absently.

  “Peter Ivanovitch is an awful despot,” she jerked out.

  Razumov went on studying the stripes on the grey fur of the cat.

  “An iron will is an integral part of such a temperament. How else could he be a leader? And I think that you are mistaken in — ”

  “There!” she cried. “You tell me that I am mistaken. But I tell you all the same that he cares for no one.” She jerked her head up. “Don’t you bring that girl here. That’s what you have been told to do — to bring that girl here. Listen to me; you had better tie a stone round her neck and throw her into the lake.”

  Razumov had a sensation of chill and gloom, as if a heavy cloud had passed over the sun.

  “The girl?” he said. “What have I to do with her?”

  “But you have been told to bring Nathalie Haldin here. Am I not right? Of course I am right. I was not in the room, but I know. I know Peter Ivanovitch sufficiently well. He is a great man. Great men are horrible. Well, that’s it. Have nothing to do with her. That’s the best you can do, unless you want her to become like me — disillusioned! Disillusioned!”

  “Like you,” repeated Razumov, glaring at her face, as devoid of all comeliness of feature and complexion as the most miserable beggar is of money. He smiled, still feeling chilly: a peculiar sensation which annoyed him. “Disillusioned as to Peter Ivanovitch! Is that all you have lost?”

  She declared, looking frightened, but with immense conviction, “Peter Ivanovitch stands for everything.” Then she added, in another tone, “Keep the girl away from this house.”

  “And are you absolutely inciting me to disobey Peter Ivanovitch just because — because you are disillusioned?”

  She began to blink.

  “Directly I saw you for the first time I was comforted. You took your hat off to me. You looked as if one could trust you. Oh!”

  She shrank before Razumov’s savage snarl of, “I have heard something like this before.”

  She was so confounded that she could do nothing but blink for a long time.

  “It was your humane manner,” she explained plaintively. “I have been starving for, I won’t say kindness, but just for a little civility, for I don’t know how long. And now you are angry....”

  “But no, on the contrary,” he protested. “I am very glad you trust me. It’s possible that later on I may...”

  “Yes, if you were to get ill,” she interrupted eagerly, “or meet some bitter trouble, you would find I am not a useless fool. You have only to let me know. I will come to you. I will indeed. And I will stick to you. Misery and I are old acquaintances — but this life here is worse than starving.”

  She paused anxiously, then in a voice for the first time sounding really timid, she added —

  “Or if you were engaged in some dangerous work. Sometimes a humble companion — I would not want to know anything. I would follow you with joy. I could carry out orders. I have the courage.”

  Razumov looked attentively at the scared round eyes, at the withered, sallow, round cheeks. They were quivering about the corners of the mouth.

  “She wants to escape from here,” he thought.

  “Suppose I were to tell you that I am engaged in dangerous work?” he uttered slowly.

  She pressed the cat to her threadbare bosom with a breathless exclamation. “Ah!” Then not much above a whisper: “Under Peter Ivanovitch?”

  “No, not under Peter Ivanovitch.”

  He read admiration in her eyes, and made an effort to smile.

  “Then — alone?”

  He held up his closed hand with the index raised. “Like this finger,” he said.

  She was trembling slightly. But it occurred to Razumov that they might have been observed from the house, and he became anxious to be gone. She blinked, raising up to him her puckered face, and seemed to beg mutely to be told something more, to be given a word of encouragement for her starving, grotesque, and pathetic devotion.

  “Can we be seen from the house?” asked Razumov confidentially.

  She answered, without showing the slightest surprise at the question —

  “No, we can’t, on account of this end of the stables.” And she added, with an acuteness which surprised Razumov, “But anybody looking out of an upstairs window would know that you have not passed through the gates yet.”

  “Who’s likely to spy out of the window?” queried Razumov. “Peter Ivanovitch?”

  She nodded.

  “Why should he trouble his head?”

  “He expects somebody this afternoon.”

  “You know the person?”

  “There’s more than one.”

  She had lowered her eyelids. Razumov looked at her curiously.

  “Of course. You hear everything they say.”

  She murmured without any animosity —

  “So do the tables and chairs.”

  He understood that the bitterness accumulated in the heart of that helpless creature had got into her veins, and, like some subtle poison, had decomposed her fidelity to that hateful pair. It was a great piece of luck for him, he reflected; because women are seldom venal after the manner of men, who can be bought for material considerations. She would be a good ally, though it was not likely that she was allowed to hear as much as the tables and chairs of the Chateau Borel. That could not be expected. But still.... And, at any rate, she could be made to talk.

  When she looked up her eyes met the fixed stare of Razumov, who began to speak at once.

  “Well, well, dear...but upon my word, I haven’t the pleasure of knowing your name yet. Isn’t it strange?”

  For the first time she made a movement of the shoulders.

  “Is it strange? No one is told my name. No one cares. No one talks to me, no one writes to me. My parents don’t even know if I’m alive. I have no use for a name, and I have almost forgotten it myself.”

  Razumov murmured gravely, “Yes, but still...”

  She went on much slower, with indifference —

  “You may call me Tekla, then. My poor Andrei called me so. I was devoted to him. He lived in wretchedness and suffering, and died in misery. That is the lot of all us Russians, nameless Russians. There is nothing else for us, and no hope anywhere, unless...”

  “Unless what?”


  “Unless all these people with names are done away with,” she finished, blinking and pursing up her lips.

  “It will be easier to call you Tekla, as you direct me,” said Razumov, “if you consent to call me Kirylo, when we are talking like this — quietly — only you and me.”

  And he said to himself, “Here’s a being who must be terribly afraid of the world, else she would have run away from this situation before.” Then he reflected that the mere fact of leaving the great man abruptly would make her a suspect. She could expect no support or countenance from anyone. This revolutionist was not fit for an independent existence.

  She moved with him a few steps, blinking and nursing the cat with a small balancing movement of her arms.

  “Yes — only you and I. That’s how I was with my poor Andrei, only he was dying, killed by these official brutes — while you! You are strong. You kill the monsters. You have done a great deed. Peter Ivanovitch himself must consider you. Well — don’t forget me — especially if you are going back to work in Russia. I could follow you, carrying anything that was wanted — at a distance, you know. Or I could watch for hours at the corner of a street if necessary, — in wet or snow — yes, I could — all day long. Or I could write for you dangerous documents, lists of names or instructions, so that in case of mischance the handwriting could not compromise you. And you need not be afraid if they were to catch me. I would know how to keep dumb. We women are not so easily daunted by pain. I heard Peter Ivanovitch say it is our blunt nerves or something. We can stand it better. And it’s true; I would just as soon bite my tongue out and throw it at them as not. What’s the good of speech to me? Who would ever want to hear what I could say? Ever since I closed the eyes of my poor Andrei I haven’t met a man who seemed to care for the sound of my voice. I should never have spoken to you if the very first time you appeared here you had not taken notice of me so nicely. I could not help speaking of you to that charming dear girl. Oh, the sweet creature! And strong! One can see that at once. If you have a heart don’t let her set her foot in here. Good-bye!”

  Razumov caught her by the arm. Her emotion at being thus seized manifested itself by a short struggle, after which she stood still, not looking at him.

  “But you can tell me,” he spoke in her ear, “why they — these people in that house there — are so anxious to get hold of her?”

  She freed herself to turn upon him, as if made angry by the question.

  “Don’t you understand that Peter Ivanovitch must direct, inspire, influence? It is the breath of his life. There can never be too many disciples. He can’t bear thinking of anyone escaping him. And a woman, too! There is nothing to be done without women, he says. He has written it. He — ”

  The young man was staring at her passion when she broke off suddenly and ran away behind the stable.

  III

  Razumov, thus left to himself, took the direction of the gate. But on this day of many conversations, he discovered that very probably he could not leave the grounds without having to hold another one.

  Stepping in view from beyond the lodge appeared the expected visitors of Peter Ivanovitch: a small party composed of two men and a woman. They noticed him too, immediately, and stopped short as if to consult. But in a moment the woman, moving aside, motioned with her arm to the two men, who, leaving the drive at once, struck across the large neglected lawn, or rather grass-plot, and made directly for the house. The woman remained on the path waiting for Razumov’s approach. She had recognized him. He, too, had recognized her at the first glance. He had been made known to her at Zurich, where he had broken his journey while on his way from Dresden. They had been much together for the three days of his stay.

  She was wearing the very same costume in which he had seen her first. A blouse of crimson silk made her noticeable at a distance. With that she wore a short brown skirt and a leather belt. Her complexion was the colour of coffee and milk, but very clear; her eyes black and glittering, her figure erect. A lot of thick hair, nearly white, was done up loosely under a dusty Tyrolese hat of dark cloth, which seemed to have lost some of its trimmings.

  The expression of her face was grave, intent; so grave that Razumov, after approaching her close, felt obliged to smile. She greeted him with a manly hand-grasp.

  “What! Are you going away?” she exclaimed. “How is that, Razumov?”

  “I am going away because I haven’t been asked to stay,” Razumov answered, returning the pressure of her hand with much less force than she had put into it.

  She jerked her head sideways like one who understands. Meantime Razumov’s eyes had strayed after the two men. They were crossing the grass-plot obliquely, without haste. The shorter of the two was buttoned up in a narrow overcoat of some thin grey material, which came nearly to his heels. His companion, much taller and broader, wore a short, close-fitting jacket and tight trousers tucked into shabby top-boots.

  The woman, who had sent them out of Razumov’s way apparently, spoke in a businesslike voice.

  “I had to come rushing from Zurich on purpose to meet the train and take these two along here to see Peter Ivanovitch. I’ve just managed it.”

  “Ah! indeed,” Razumov said perfunctorily, and very vexed at her staying behind to talk to him “From Zurich — yes, of course. And these two, they come from....”

  She interrupted, without emphasis —

  “From quite another direction. From a distance, too. A considerable distance.”

  Razumov shrugged his shoulders. The two men from a distance, after having reached the wall of the terrace, disappeared suddenly at its foot as if the earth had opened to swallow them up.

  “Oh, well, they have just come from America.” The woman in the crimson blouse shrugged her shoulders too a little before making that statement. “The time is drawing near,” she interjected, as if speaking to herself. “I did not tell them who you were. Yakovlitch would have wanted to embrace you.”

  “Is that he with the wisp of hair hanging from his chin, in the long coat?”

  “You’ve guessed aright. That’s Yakovlitch.”

  “And they could not find their way here from the station without you coming on purpose from Zurich to show it to them? Verily, without women we can do nothing. So it stands written, and apparently so it is.”

  He was conscious of an immense lassitude under his effort to be sarcastic. And he could see that she had detected it with those steady, brilliant black eyes.

  “What is the matter with you?”

  “I don’t know. Nothing. I’ve had a devil of a day.”

  She waited, with her black eyes fixed on his face. Then —

  “What of that? You men are so impressionable and self-conscious. One day is like another, hard, hard — and there’s an end of it, till the great day comes. I came over for a very good reason. They wrote to warn Peter Ivanovitch of their arrival. But where from? Only from Cherbourg on a bit of ship’s notepaper. Anybody could have done that. Yakovlitch has lived for years and years in America. I am the only one at hand who had known him well in the old days. I knew him very well indeed. So Peter Ivanovitch telegraphed, asking me to come. It’s natural enough, is it not?”

  “You came to vouch for his identity?” inquired Razumov.

  “Yes. Something of the kind. Fifteen years of a life like his make changes in a man. Lonely, like a crow in a strange country. When I think of Yakovlitch before he went to America — ”

  The softness of the low tone caused Razumov to glance at her sideways. She sighed; her black eyes were looking away; she had plunged the fingers of her right hand deep into the mass of nearly white hair, and stirred them there absently. When she withdrew her hand the little hat perched on the top of her head remained slightly tilted, with a queer inquisitive effect, contrasting strongly with the reminiscent murmur that escaped her.

  “We were not in our first youth even then. But a man is a child always.”

  Razumov thought suddenly, “They have been livi
ng together.” Then aloud —

  “Why didn’t you follow him to America?” he asked point-blank.

  She looked up at him with a perturbed air.

  “Don’t you remember what was going on fifteen years ago? It was a time of activity. The Revolution has its history by this time. You are in it and yet you don’t seem to know it. Yakovlitch went away then on a mission; I went back to Russia. It had to be so. Afterwards there was nothing for him to come back to.”

  “Ah! indeed,” muttered Razumov, with affected surprise. “Nothing!”

  “What are you trying to insinuate” she exclaimed quickly. “Well, and what then if he did get discouraged a little....”

  “He looks like a Yankee, with that goatee hanging from his chin. A regular Uncle Sam,” growled Razumov. “Well, and you? You who went to Russia? You did not get discouraged.”

  “Never mind. Yakovlitch is a man who cannot be doubted. He, at any rate, is the right sort.”

  Her black, penetrating gaze remained fixed upon Razumov while she spoke, and for a moment afterwards.

  “Pardon me,” Razumov inquired coldly, “but does it mean that you, for instance, think that I am not the right sort?”

  She made no protest, gave no sign of having heard the question; she continued looking at him in a manner which he judged not to be absolutely unfriendly. In Zurich when he passed through she had taken him under her charge, in a way, and was with him from morning till night during his stay of two days. She took him round to see several people. At first she talked to him a great deal and rather unreservedly, but always avoiding all reference to herself; towards the middle of the second day she fell silent, attending him zealously as before, and even seeing him off at the railway station, where she pressed his hand firmly through the lowered carriage window, and, stepping back without a word, waited till the train moved. He had noticed that she was treated with quiet regard. He knew nothing of her parentage, nothing of her private history or political record; he judged her from his own private point of view, as being a distinct danger in his path. “Judged” is not perhaps the right word. It was more of a feeling, the summing up of slight impressions aided by the discovery that he could not despise her as he despised all the others. He had not expected to see her again so soon.