ease on the heights.
'You have chosen delightful lodgings,' I observed.
'It was Acia found it,' answered Gagin; 'come, Acia,' he went on, 'see after the supper. Let everything be brought out here. We will have supper in the open air. We can hear the music better here. Have you ever noticed,' he added, turning to me, 'a waltz is often poor stuff close by--vulgar, coarse music--but in the distance, it's exquisite! it fairly stirs every romantic chord within one.'
Acia (her real name was Anna, but Gagin called her Acia, and you must let me do the same), went into the house, and soon came back with the landlady. They were carrying together a big tray, with a bowl of junkets plates, spoons, sugar, fruit, and bread. We sat down and began supper. Acia took off her hat; her black hair cropped short and combed, like a boy's, fell in thick curls on her neck and ears. At first she was shy of me; but Gagin said to her--
'Come, Acia, come out of your shell! he won't bite.'
She smiled, and a little while after she began talking to me of her own accord. I had never seen such a restless creature. She did not sit still for a single instant; she got up, ran off into the house, and ran back again, hummed in an undertone, often laughed, and in a very strange way; she seemed to laugh, not at what she heard, but at the different ideas that crossed her mind. Her big eyes looked out boldly, brightly, directly, but sometimes her eyelids faintly drooped, and then their expression instantaneously became deep and tender.
We chatted away for a couple of hours. The daylight had long died away, and the evening glow, at first fiery, then clear and red, then pale and dim, had slowly melted away and passed into night, but our conversation still went on, as quiet and peaceful as the air around us. Gagin ordered a bottle of Rhine wine; we drank it between us, slowly and deliberately. The music floated across to us as before, its strains seemed sweeter and tenderer; lights were burning in the town and on the river. Acia suddenly let her head fall, so that her curls dropped into her eyes, ceased speaking, and sighed. Then she said she was sleepy, and went indoors. I saw, though, that she stood a long while at the unopened window without lighting a candle. At last the moon rose and began shining upon the Rhine; everything turned to light and darkness, everything was transformed, even the wine in our cut-glass tumblers gleamed with a mysterious light. The wind drooped, as it were, folded its wings and sank to rest; the fragrant warmth of night rose in whiffs from the earth.
'It's time I was going!' I cried, 'or else perhaps, there'll be no getting a ferryman.'
'Yes, it's time to start,' Gagin assented.
We went down the path. Suddenly we heard the rolling of the stones behind us; it was Acia coming after us.
'Aren't you asleep?' asked her brother; but, without answering a word, she ran by us. The last, smouldering lamps, lighted by the students in the garden of the inn, threw a light on the leaves of the trees from below, giving them a fantastic and festive look. We found Acia at the river's edge; she was talking to a ferryman. I jumped into the boat, and said good-bye to my new friends. Gagin promised to pay me a visit next day; I pressed his hand, and held out my hand to Acia; but she only looked at me and shook her head. The boat pushed off and floated on the rapid river. The ferryman, a sturdy old man, buried his oars in the dark water, and pulled with great effort.
'You are in the streak of moonlight, you have broken it up,' Acia shouted to me.
I dropped my eyes; the waters eddied round the boat, blacker than ever.
'Good-bye!' I heard her voice.
'Till to-morrow,' Gagin said after her.
The boat reached the other side. I got out and looked about me. No one could be seen now on the opposite bank. The streak of moonlight stretched once more like a bridge of gold right across the river. Like a farewell, the air of the old-fashioned Lanner waltz drifted across. Gagin was right; I felt every chord in my heart vibrating in response to its seductive melody. I started homewards across the darkening fields, drinking in slowly the fragrant air, and reached my room, deeply stirred by the voluptuous languor of vague, endless anticipation. I felt happy. . . . But why was I happy? I desired nothing, I thought of nothing. . . . I was happy.
Almost laughing from excess of sweet, light-hearted emotions, I dived into my bed, and was just closing my eyes, when all at once it struck me that I had not once all the evening remembered my cruel charmer. . . . 'What's the meaning of it?' I wondered to myself; 'is it possible I'm not in love?' But though I asked myself this question, I fell asleep, I think, at once, like a baby in its cradle. III
NEXT morning (I was awake, but had not yet begun to get up), I heard the tap of a stick on my window, and a voice I knew at once for Gagin's hummed--
'Art thou asleep? with the guitar
Will I awaken thee . . .'
I made haste to open the door to him.
'Good-morning,' said Gagin, coming in; 'I'm disturbing you rather early, but only see what a morning it is. Fresh, dewy, larks singing.' With his curly, shining hair, his open neck and rosy cheeks, he was fresh as the morning himself.
I dressed; we went out into the garden, sat down on a bench, ordered coffee, and proceeded to talk. Gagin told me his plans for the future; he possessed a moderate fortune, was not dependent on any one, and wanted to devote himself to painting. He only regretted that he had not had more sense sooner, but had wasted so much time doing nothing. I too referred to my projects, and incidentally confided to him the secret of my unhappy love. He listened to me amiably, but, so far as I could observe, I did not arouse in him any very strong sympathy with my passion. Sighing once or twice after me, for civility's sake, Gagin suggested that I should go home with him and look at his sketches. I agreed at once.
We did not find Acia. She had, the landlady told us, gone to the 'ruin.' A mile and a half from L. were the remains of a feudal castle. Gagin showed me all his canvases. In his sketches there was a good deal of life and truth, a certain breadth and freedom; but not one of them was finished, and the drawing struck me as careless and incorrect. I gave candid expression to my opinion.
'Yes, yes,' he assented, with a sigh; 'you're right; it's all very poor and crude; what's to be done? I haven't had the training I ought to have had; besides, one's cursed Slavonic slackness gets the better of one. While one dreams of work, one soars away in eagle flight; one fancies one's going to shake the earth out of its place--but when it comes to doing anything, one's weak and weary directly.'
I began trying to cheer him up, but he waved me off, and bundling his sketches up together, threw them on the sofa.
'If I've patience, something may be made of me,' he muttered; 'if I haven't, I shall remain a half-baked noble amateur. Come, we'd better be looking for Acia.'
We went out. IV
THE road to the ruin went twisting down the steep incline into a narrow wooded valley; at the bottom ran a stream, noisily threading its way through the pebbles, as though in haste to flow into the great river, peacefully shining beyond the dark ridge of the deep indented mountain crest. Gagin called my attention to some places where the light fell specially finely; one could see in his words that, even if not a painter, he was undoubtedly an artist. The ruin soon came into sight. On the very summit of the naked rock rose a square tower, black all over, still strong, but, as it were, cleft in two by a longitudinal crack. Mossy walls adjoined the tower; here and there ivy clung about it; wind-twisted bushes hung down from the grey battlements and crumbling arches. A stray path led up to the gates, still standing entire. We had just reached them, when suddenly a girl's figure darted up in front of us, ran swiftly over a heap of debris, and stood on the projecting part of the wall, right over the precipice.
'Why, it's Acia!' cried Gagin; 'the mad thing.' We went through the gates and found ourselves in a small courtyard, half overgrown with crab-apple trees and nettles. On the projecting ledge, Acia actually was sitting. She turned and faced us, laughing, but did not move. Gagin shook his finger at her, while I loudly reproached her for her recklessness.
'That's enough,' Gagin said to me in a whisper; 'don't tease her; you don't know what she is; she'd very likely climb right up on to the tower. Look, you'd better be admiring the intelligence of the people of these parts!'
I looked round. In a corner, ensconced in a tiny, wooden hut, an old woman was knitting a stocking, and looking at us through her spectacles. She sold beer, gingerbread, and seltzer water to tourists. We seated ourselves on a bench, and began drinking some fairly cold beer out of heavy pewter pots. Acia still sat without moving, with her feet tucked under her, and a muslin scarf wrapped round her head; her graceful figure stood out distinctly and
