Part 8

As soon, therefore, as the quadrille was over, Sitnikov conducted Arkady to Madame Odintsov; and though at first--whether through the excessive "intimacy" of Sitnikov's acquaintance, or whether through the fact that he happened to stumble over his words--she gazed at him with a shade of astonishment, she no sooner heard Arkady's family name than her face brightened, and she inquired whether he was the son of Nikolai Petrovitch.

"I am," replied Arkady.

"Then I have twice had the pleasure of meeting your father. Also, I have heard much about him, and shall be most glad to know you."

At this point an aide-de-camp sidled up, and requested the honour of a quadrille: which request she granted.

"Then you dance?" exclaimed Arkady, but with great deference.

"I do. What made you think that I do not? Is it that I look too old?"

"Oh no, pardon me! By no means! Then perhaps I too might ask for a mazurka?"

Smiling indulgently, she replied, "If you wish," and then looked at him not so much in a "superior" manner as in that of a married sister who is regarding a very, very young brother. Though she was not greatly older than Arkady (she had just attained her twenty-ninth year), her presence made him feel the veriest schoolboy, and caused the difference of years to seem infinitely greater than it was. Next, Matvei Ilyitch approached her with a majestic air and a few obsequious words; whereupon Arkady moved away a little, while continuing to observe her. In fact, not until the quadrille was over did he find himself able to withdraw his eyes from her bewitching person. Throughout, her conversation with her partner and the guest of honour was accompanied with small movements of the head and eyes, and twice she uttered a low laugh. True, her nose erred a little on the side of thickness (as do those of most Russian women), nor was the colour of her skin unimpeachable; yet Arkady came to the conclusion that never in his life had he encountered a woman so charming of personality. Continuously the sound of her voice murmured in his ears, and the very folds of her dress looked different from those of other women--they seemed to hang straighter and more symmetrically, and her every movement was smooth and natural.

Nevertheless, when the strains of the mazurka struck up, and, reseating himself beside his partner, he prepared to enter into conversation with her, he felt a distinct touch of diffidence. Nor, though he kept passing his hand over his hair, could he find a word to say. However, this timidity, this state of agitation, did not last long, for soon her calmness infected him, and within a quarter of an hour he was talking to her of his father, his uncle, and life in St. Petersburg and the country. For her part, she listened with kindly interest, while gently opening and closing her fan. Thus only at moments when other cavaliers came to ask her for dances (Sitnikov did this twice) did Arkady's chatter become interrupted; and whenever she returned to her place, to reseat herself with her bosom heaving not a whit more rapidly than it had done before, he would plunge into renewed conversation, so delighted was he at the fact that he had found some one to sympathise with him, to whom he could talk, at whose beautiful eyes and forehead and gentle, refined, intellectual features he could gaze at leisure. She herself said little, but her every word showed a knowledge of life which pointed to the fact that already this young woman had thought and felt much.

"Who was the man with you before Sitnikov brought you to me?" she inquired.

"So you noticed my friend?" exclaimed Arkady. "Has he not a splendid face? His name is Bazarov."

And, once launched upon the subject, Arkady descanted so fully, and with such enthusiasm, that Madame Odintsov turned to observe his friend more closely. But soon the mazurka began to draw to a close, and Arkady found himself regretting the prospect of losing the companion with whom he had spent such a pleasant hour. True, he had felt, throughout, that he was being treated with condescension, and ought to be grateful; but upon young hearts such an obligation does not press with any great weight.

The music stopped with a jerk.

"_Merci_!" said Madame Odintsov--then rose. "You have promised to come and see me. Also, bring with you your friend, for I am filled with curiosity to behold a man who has the temerity to believe in nothing."

Next, the Governor approached Madame with a distraught air and an intimation that supper was ready; whereupon she took his proffered arm, and, as she departed, turned with a last smile and nod to Arkady, who, in answer, bowed and stood following her with his eyes. How straight her figure looked under the sheen of her black gown!

"Already she will have forgotten my existence," he thought to himself, while an exquisite humility pervaded his soul. Then he rejoined Bazarov in their joint corner.

"Well?" his friend said. "Have you enjoyed yourself? Some man or other has just been telling me that the lady in question is---- But in all probability the man was a fool. What do _you_ think of her?"

"The allusion escapes me," replied Arkady.

"Come, come, young innocence!"

"Or at all events your informant's meaning escapes me. Madame is nice, but as cold and formal as, as----"

"As a stagnant pool," concluded Bazarov. "Yes, we all know the sort of thing. You say that she is cold, but that is purely a matter of taste. Perhaps you yourself like ice?"

"Perhaps I do," the other muttered. "But of such things I am no judge; and in any case she wishes to make your acquaintance as well as mine, and has asked me to bring you with me to call."

"The description of me which you gave is easily imagined! On the other hand, you did rightly to offer her us both, for no matter who she may be--whether a provincial lioness or only an '_émancipée_' like the Kukshin woman, she has at least such a pair of shoulders as I have not seen this many a day."

Arkady recoiled from this cynicism, yet, as often happens in such cases, started to reproach his friend for something wholly unconnected with the utterance which had given umbrage.

"Why do you refuse women freedom of thought?" he asked under his breath.

"For the reason, dear sir, that, according to my observation of life, no woman, unless she be a freak, thinks _with_ freedom."

And here the conversation terminated, for supper had come to an end, and the friends departed. As they left the room Madame Kukshin followed them with a nervous and wrathful, yet slightly apprehensive, smile in her eyes. The reason of this was that she felt wounded in her conceit at the fact that neither of the young men had taken any notice of her. Nevertheless, she remained at the ball until most of the rest of the company had left; whereafter, it being four o'clock in the morning, she danced a polka-mazurka, _à la Parisienne_, with Sitnikov, and with this edifying spectacle brought the Governor's fête to a close.

XV

"Now let us see to what category of mortals to assign this young person," said Bazarov to Arkady as, on the following day, the pair mounted the staircase of the hotel where Madame Odintsov was staying. "Somehow I seem to scent impropriety in the air."

"You surprise me!" burst forth Arkady. "Do _you_, Bazarov, do _you_ hold with the narrow-minded morality which----"

"Idiot!" exclaimed Bazarov contemptuously. "Do you not know that both in our jargon and in the understanding of the ordinary person the term 'improper' has now come to mean the same as 'proper'? In any case I seem to scent money here. You yourself told me, did you not, that Madame's marriage was a very strange one?--though, for my part, I look upon marrying a rich old man as anything but a strange proceeding--rather, as a measure of prudence. True, I place little reliance upon the gossip of townsfolk, but at least I prefer to suppose that that gossip has, as our cultured Governor would say, 'a basis in fact.'"

Arkady did not respond, but knocked at the door of Madame's suite; and, the door having been opened, a liveried man-servant ushered the visitors into a large, hideously furnished room of the type which is always to be found in Russian hotels--the only exception in the present case being that the apartment was adorned with flowers. Presently Madame herself entered, clad in a plain morning gown, and looking even younger in the spring sunlight than she had done in the ballroom. Arkady duly presented Bazarov, and, as he did so, remarked with surprise that his friend seemed confused, while Madame was as imperturbable as ever. This _gaucherie_ on his part Bazarov realised, and felt vexed at.

"Phaugh!" he thought to himself. "The idea that I should be afraid of a woman!"

Yet, like Sitnikov, he could only subside into a chair, and fall to talking with an exaggerated emphasis to the woman who sat with her brilliant eyes riveted with such attention upon him.

Anna Sergievna Odintsov had had for father one Sergei Nikolaievitch Loktev, a well-known gambler, speculator, and beau. After fifteen years of flaunting it in St. Petersburg and Moscow, and dissipating his whole substance, he had been forced to retire to the country, where soon afterwards he had died and left to his daughter Anna (aged twenty) and his daughter Katerina (aged twelve) only a small joint competence. As for the girls' mother (who had come of the impoverished house of the Princes X.), she had expired during the heyday of her husband's career in St. Petersburg. Anna's position after her father's death was therefore a very difficult one, for the brilliant education which she had received in the capital had in no way fitted her for the care of a household and an estate, nor yet for the endurance of a life in the country. Moreover, she possessed not a single acquaintance in that country neighbourhood, nor any one to whom to turn for advice, since her father had done his best to avoid associating with his neighbours, in that he had despised them as much as they, in their several ways, had despised him. Howbeit, Anna kept her head, and straightway sent for her mother's sister, the Princess Avdotia Stepanovna X., who, a malicious, presuming old woman, annexed, on the day of her arrival, all the best rooms in the house, raged and stormed from morning till night, and even declined to walk in the garden unless she could be accompanied by her only serf, a sullen-looking lacquey who wore a faded green livery, a blue collar, and a three-cornered hat. Nevertheless Anna put up with these tantrums of her aunt's, superintended the education of her sister, and resigned herself to the idea of living in seclusion for the rest of her life. But fate had ordained otherwise. That is to say, a certain Odintsov--a rich, bloated, unwieldy, soured, semi-imbecile hypochondriac of forty-six who was, nevertheless, neither stupid nor cruel--happened to see her, and became so enamoured that he offered her marriage: and to this proposal she consented. For six years the pair lived together, before the husband died, leaving her all his property. The following year she spent in the country; after which she went abroad with her sister--but only as far as Germany, since she quickly wearied of foreign parts, and was only too thankful to return to her beloved Nikolsköe, which lay some forty versts from the provincial town of ----. At Nikolsköe she had at her disposal a splendid, tastefully furnished mansion, a beautiful garden, and a range of orangeries (the late Odintsov having denied himself in nothing); but inasmuch as she made but rare appearances in the town, and then only on flying visits connected with business, the provincial gentry conceived a grudge against her, and took to gossiping of her marriage with Odintsov, and relating such impossible tales as that she had assisted her father in his nefarious schemes, that she had had her reasons for going abroad, and that certain unfortunate results of that tour had had to be concealed. "I tell you," the ardent retailer of such fables would say, "that she has been through the mill right enough." Eventually these rumours reached her ears, but she ignored them altogether, since her nature was at once bold and independent.

Seating herself at full length in an armchair, and crossing one hand over the other, she set herself to listen to Bazarov's harangue. Contrary to his usual custom, he spoke without restraint, for he was clearly anxious to interest his listener. Arkady again felt surprised at this, though he failed to detect whether or not Bazarov was succeeding in his aim, seeing that Anna Sergievna's face gave no clue to the effect produced, so fixedly did her features retain their faintly polite expression, so unvaryingly did her beautiful eyes reflect unruffled attention. True, at first Bazarov's vehemence gave her an unpleasant impression as of a bad smell or a jarring note; but in time she began to understand that it came of his being ill at ease, and she felt flattered at the fact. Only the paltry repelled her; and no one could well have accused Bazarov of that quality. Indeed wonders were never to cease for Arkady, since, though he had expected Bazarov to talk to Madame Odintsov as to a woman of intellect--to speak to her of his views and convictions (seeing that she had expressed a desire to behold a man who had "the temerity to believe in nothing"), he discoursed only on medicine, homoeopathy, and botany. At the same time, Madame had not wasted her life of solitude, but had read a large number of standard works, and could express herself in the best of Russian; and though at one point she diverted the conversation to music, she no sooner perceived that he declined to recognise the existence of the art than she returned to botany, even though Arkady would gladly have continued the discussion of the importance of national melodies. In passing, her treatment of Arkady as a younger brother remained the same. What she valued in him was, evidently, the good humour and simplicity of youth--nothing more. Thus there was held, for three hours, an animated, but intermittent, discursive conversation.

At length the friends rose to say farewell. With a kindly glance Anna Sergievna offered them her beautiful white hand; then, after a moment's reflection, said irresolutely, but with a pleasant smile:

"If neither of you fear finding the time tedious, will you come and pay me a visit at Nikolsköe?"

"I should deem it the greatest pleasure!" cried Arkady.

"And you, Monsieur Bazarov?"

Bazarov merely bowed: which again surprised Arkady, while also he noticed that his friend's face looked flushed.

"Well?" the younger man said as the pair issued into the street. "Are you still of the opinion that she is, is----?"

"I cannot say. But what an icicle she has made of herself!" There was a pause. "At all events, she is an imposing personage, a _grande dame_ who lacks but a train to her gown and a coronet to her head."

"But none of our _grandes dames_ speak Russian as she does," remarked Arkady.

"No; for she has undergone a rebirth, and eaten of our bread."

"And what a charm is hers!"

"You mean, what a splendid body--the very thing for a dissecting theatre!"

"Stop, stop, for God's sake! Her body differs from all other women's."

"No need to lose your temper, young innocent. Have I not said that she stands in the front rank of women? Yes, we must pay her that visit."

"When?"

"The day after to-morrow. Nothing else is to be done here, for we need not stay to drink champagne with the Kukshin woman, and listen to the harangues of your kinsman, the Liberal bigwig. Not we! The day after to-morrow, therefore, let us give the whole thing the go-by. _A propos_, my father's place lies near Nikolsköe. For Nikolsköe is on the ---- road, is it not?"

"It is."

"_Optime!_ Then we shall gain nothing by delay: only fools and clever people procrastinate. Her anatomy, I repeat, is splendid."

Within three days, in bright, but not too warm, weather, the two friends were bowling along the road to Nikolsköe. With a will did the well-fed stage horses trot out, and lightly swish their flanks with their plaited, knotted tails; and as Arkady glanced along the road, he, for some unknown reason, smiled.

"Congratulate me!" cried Bazarov of a sudden. "To-day is the 22nd of June--the feast of my Patron Saint. Certainly he looks after me, does he not?" Then the speaker added in a lower tone: "But to-day, also, they are expecting me at home.... Well, let them expect me."

XVI

The manor-house in which Anna Sergievna resided stood on an open hillock, and close to a yellow stone church with a green roof, white columns, and an entrance surmounted by a fresco representative of Our Lord's Resurrection--the latter executed in the "Italian" style, and having as its most noticeable feature the figure of a swarthy warrior whose rounded contours filled the entire foreground. Behind the church, the village extended into two long wings, and had thatched roofs surmounted by a medley of chimneys; while the manor-house itself was built in a style homogeneous with the design of the church--that is to say, in the style commonly known as "Alexandrine," and embracing yellow-painted walls, a green roof, white columns, and a front adorned with a coat-of-arms. In fact, both buildings had been erected by a provincial architect to the order of the late Odintsov, a man impatient (so he himself always expressed it) of "vain and arbitrary innovations." Lastly, to right and left of the house there showed the trees of an antique garden, while an avenue of clipped firs led the way to the principal entrance.

The friends having been met in the hall by two strapping lacqueys in livery, one of the latter immediately ran for the butler; who (a stout man in a black tail-coat) proceeded to usher the guests up a carpeted staircase, and into a room which contained a couple of beds and the usual appurtenances of the toilet. Evidently neatness was the order of the day in the establishment, for everything was both spotlessly clean and as fragrant as the chamber wherein a Minister of State holds his receptions.

"Anna Sergievna will be glad to see you in half an hour," the butler said. "Meanwhile, have you any orders for me?"

"No, worthy one," replied Bazarov. "Except that you might so far condescend as to bring me a small glassful of _vodka_."

"It shall be done, sir," said the butler with a shade of hesitation; whereafter he departed with creaking boots.

"What grandeur!" commented Bazarov. "In your opinion, how ought our hostess to be addressed? In the style of a duchess?"

"Yes, and of a very great duchess," replied Arkady. "The more so, seeing that she has invited such influential aristocrats as ourselves to visit her."

"I presume that you are referring to your humble servant--a future doctor, the son of a doctor, and the grandson of a sexton? By the way, are you aware that my grandparent was a sexton, even as was Speransky's?"[1] A smile curled his lips. "Thus you see that the lady is mistaken, woefully mistaken. We haven't such a thing as a tail-coat, have we?"

Arkady shrugged his shoulders bravely; but he too was feeling a little awe-stricken.

At the close of the half-hour the pair entered the drawing-room, which they found to be a large, lofty apartment of rich, but tasteless, appointments. Against the walls, in the usual affected style, stood heavy, expensive furniture, the walls themselves were hung with brown curtains to which were florid gilt borders (all these things the late Odintsov had ordered through a Muscovite friend who kept a wineshop), and above a divan in the centre of the room hung a portrait of a wrinkled, sandy-haired individual who seemed to be regarding the newcomers with extreme distaste.

"_He_," whispered Bazarov.

The hostess herself then entered. She was clad in a light dress, and had her hair dressed behind the ears--a style which communicated to her pure, fresh countenance an air of almost girlish juvenility.

"Thank you for having kept your promise," she said. "And now that you are come, I think that you will find the time not altogether dull. For one thing, I intend to introduce you to my sister, who is a skilful piano-player (of course, Monsieur Bazarov, to you such things are a matter of indifference, but you, Monsieur Kirsanov, I know, adore the art of music). Also, an elderly aunt lives with me as my companion, and at intervals a neighbour looks in for a game of cards. You see our home circle. Now let us seat ourselves."

Madame delivered this little speech with the precision of a lesson which she had learnt by heart, and then turned to converse with Arkady. On finding that her mother had known his, and that the latter had made the former her confidant during her love affair with Nikolai Petrovitch, the lad fell to speaking enthusiastically of his dead parent, while Bazarov applied himself to the inspection of some albums.

"What a domesticated individual I am!" thought he to himself.

Presently, with much pattering of paws, there burst into the room a splendid Russian greyhound with a blue collar; and it was followed by a young girl of eighteen with a dark complexion, dark hair, a round, but pleasant, face, and small, dark eyes. She was carrying a basket of flowers.

"My sister Katia," said Madame Odintsov, indicating the girl with her head.

Katia seated herself beside Madame, and fell to arranging her flowers; while the greyhound (whose name was Fifi) approached each of the guests in turn, laid his cold nose in their hands, and wagged his tail.

"Have you gathered those flowers yourself?" asked Madame Odintsov.

"Yes, Anna Sergievna," the girl replied.

"And is your aunt going to join us at tea?"

"Yes."

These replies of Katia's were accompanied with a frank, but gentle and bashful, smile, and an upward glance half grave, half sportive. Everything in her betokened youth and freshness--her voice, the down on her cheeks, her little pink hands with their white, dimpled palms, and the slightly contracted shoulders. Also, she blushed without ceasing, and drew her breath with a fluttering respiration.

Presently Madame Odintsov turned to Bazarov.

"Surely it is only out of politeness that you are looking at those photographs?" she said. "They cannot possibly interest you. Pray move nearer to us, and let us engage in an argument."

Bazarov approached her.

"What shall we argue about?" he inquired.

"About anything you like. But first let me warn you that I am a redoubtable opponent."

"You?"

"Yes, certainly. You look surprised? Why so?"

"Because, so far as I can tell, your temperament is one of the cold and lethargic order, whereas argument needs impulsiveness."

"How have you contrived so quickly to appraise me? To begin with, I am both impatient and exacting. Ask Katia if I am not. Also, I am easily moved to impulse."

Bazarov darted a glance at her.