A Lear of the Steppes and Other Stories

called us into the dining-room. Vera Nikolaevna came in soon after. We sat down.

'Look at Verotchka,' Priemkov said to me.

I glanced at her.

'Well? don't you notice anything?'

I certainly did notice a change in her face, but I answered, I don't know why--

'No, nothing.'

'Her eyes are red,' Priemkov went on.

I was silent.

'Only fancy! I went upstairs to her and found her crying. It's a long while since such a thing has happened to her. I can tell you the last time she cried; it was when our Sasha died. You see what you have done with your Faust!' he added, with a smile.

'So you see now, Vera Nikolaevna,' I began, 'that I was right when----'

'I did not expect this,' she interrupted me; 'but God knows whether you are right. Perhaps that was the very reason my mother forbade my reading such books,--she knew----'

Vera Nikolaevna stopped.

'What did she know?' I asked. 'Tell me.'

'What for? I'm ashamed of myself as it is; what did I cry for? But we'll talk about it another time. There was a great deal I did not quite understand.'

'Why didn't you stop me?'

'I understood all the words, and the meaning of them, but----'

She did not finish her sentence, and looked away dreamily. At that instant there came from the garden the sound of rustling leaves, suddenly fluttering in the rising wind. Vera Nikolaevna started and looked round towards the open window.

'I told you there would be a storm!' cried Priemkov. 'But what made you start like that, Verotchka?'

She glanced at him without speaking. A faint, far-off flash of lightning threw a mysterious light on her motionless face.

'It's all due to your Faust,' Priemkov went on. 'After supper we must all go to by- by. . . . Mustn't we, Herr Schimmel?'

'After intellectual enjoyment physical repose is as grateful as it is beneficial,' responded the kind-hearted German, and he drank a wine-glass of vodka.

Immediately after supper we separated. As I said good-night to Vera Nikolaevna I pressed her hand; her hand was cold. I went up to the room assigned to me, and stood a long while at the window before I undressed and got into bed. Priemkov's prediction was fulfilled; the storm came close, and broke. I listened to the roar of the wind, the patter and splash of the rain, and watched how the church, built close by, above the lake, at each flash of lightning stood out, at one moment black against a background of white, at the next white against a background of black, and then was swallowed up in the darkness again. . . But my thoughts were far away. I kept thinking of Vera Nikolaevna, of what she would say to me when she had read Faust herself, I thought of her tears, remembered how she had listened. . . .

The storm had long passed away, the stars came out, all was hushed around. Some bird I did not know sang different notes, several times in succession repeating the same phrase. Its clear, solitary voice rang out strangely in the deep stillness; and still I did not go to bed. . . .

Next morning, earlier than all the rest, I was down in the drawing-room. I stood before the portrait of Madame Eltsov. 'Aha,' I thought, with a secret feeling of ironical triumph, 'after all, I have read your daughter a forbidden book!' All at once I fancied--you have most likely noticed that eyes en face always seem fixed straight on any one looking at a picture--but this time I positively fancied the old lady moved them with a reproachful look on me.

I turned round, went to the window, and caught sight of Vera Nikolaevna. With a parasol on her shoulder and a light white kerchief on her head, she was walking about the garden. I went out at once and said good-morning to her.

'I didn't sleep all night,' she said; 'my head aches; I came out into the air--it may go off.'

'Can that be the result of yesterday's reading?' I asked.

'Of course; I am not used to it. There are things in your book I can't get out of my mind; I feel as though they were simply turning my head,' she added, putting her hand to her forehead.

'That's splendid,' I commented; 'but I tell you what I don't like--I'm afraid this sleeplessness and headache may turn you against reading such things.'

'You think so?' she responded, and she picked a sprig of wild jasmine as she passed. 'God knows! I fancy if one has once entered on that path, there is no turning back.'

She suddenly flung away the spray.

'Come, let us sit down in this arbour,' she went on; 'and please, until I talk of it of my own accord, don't remind me--of that book.' (She seemed afraid to utter the name Faust.)

We went into the arbour and sat down.

'I won't talk to you about Faust,' I began; 'but you will let me congratulate you and tell you that I envy you.'

'You envy me?'

'Yes; you, as I know you now, with your soul, have such delights awaiting you! There are great poets besides Goethe; Shakespeare, Schiller--and, indeed, our own Pushkin, and you must get to know him too.'

She did not speak, and drew in the sand with her parasol.

O, my friend, Semyon Nikolaitch! if you could have seen how sweet she was at that instant; pale almost to transparency, stooping forward a little, weary, inwardly perturbed--and yet serene as the sky! I talked, talked a long while, then ceased, and sat in silence watching her. . . . She did not raise her eyes, and went on drawing with her parasol and rubbing it out again. Suddenly we heard quick, childish steps; Natasha ran into the arbour. Vera Nikolaevna drew herself up, rose, and to my surprise she embraced her daughter with a sort of passionate tenderness. . . . That was not one of her ways. Then Priemkov made his appearance. Schimmel, that grey-haired but punctual innocent, had left before daybreak so as not to miss a lesson. We went in to morning tea.

But I am tired; it's high time to finish this letter. It's sure to strike you as foolish and confused. I feel confused myself. I'm not myself. I don't know what's the matter with me. I am continually haunted by a little room with bare walls, a lamp, an open door, the fragrance and freshness of the night, and there, near the door, an intent youthful face, light white garments. . . . I understand now why I wanted to marry her: I was not so stupid, it seems, before my stay in Berlin as I had hitherto supposed. Yes, Semyon Nikolaitch, your friend is in a curious frame of mind. All this I know will pass off. . . and if it doesn't pass off--well, what then? it won't pass off and that's all. But any way I am well satisfied with myself; in the first place, I have spent an exquisite evening; and secondly, if I have awakened that soul, who can blame me? Old Madame Eltsov is nailed up on the wall, and must hold her peace. The old thing! . . . I don't know all the details of her life; but I know she ran away from her father's house; she was not half Italian for nothing, it seems. She wanted to keep her daughter secure . . . we shall see.

I must put down my pen. You, jeering person, pray think what you like of me, only don't jeer at me in writing. You and I are old friends, and ought to spare each other. Good-bye!--Yours

P. B.

FIFTH LETTER

From the SAME to the SAME

M---- VILLAGE, July 26, 1850.

IT'S a long time since I wrote to you, dear Semyon Nicolaitch; more than a month, I think. I had enough to write about but I was overcome by laziness. To tell the truth, I have hardly thought of you all this time. But from your last letter to me I gather that you are drawing conclusions in regard to me, which are unjust, that is to say, not altogether just. You imagine I have fallen in love with Vera (I feel it awkward, somehow, to call her Vera Nikolaevna); you are wrong. Of course I see her often, I like her extremely . . . indeed, who wouldn't like her? I should like to see you in my place. She's an exquisite creature! Rapid intuition, together with the inexperience of a child, clear common-sense, and an innate feeling for beauty, a continual striving towards the true and the lofty, and a comprehension of everything, even of the vicious, even of the ridiculous, a soft womanly charm brooding over all this like an angel's white wings But what's the use of words! We have read a great deal, we have talked a great