ease the pain. She still had to overcome the shock which the rape had effected. She was allowed to stay in bed all the next day by the old housekeeper, who muttered, “What a soft girl! What a soft girl!”
CHAPTER FOUR
The weeks after her rape were perhaps the happiest of Grushenka's youth. At least she looked her best and became a ravishing beauty. She was awakened. Her days of dreaming were over and gave place to a lively vivacity and an ever good mood. Many times, full of hell, she played little pranks on the other girls and the tailor folks, and was sometimes punished by having to stand in a dark corner or with a few strokes from the whip. They were not severe punishments. The girl had such an air of good-hearted spirits and happiness about her that no one became really angry with her. The reasons for her change were as follows: A few days after losing her maidenhood, she had had to show her mistress a new costume, a light blue, fluffy affair with many ribbons and laces. The Princess had liked it, and incidentally had ordered the girl to show her sex.
She wanted to see what changes had come from the assault. Grushenka lifted the costume carefully in front, another girl spread the slit of her trousers open while the Princess took a good look. There was no change. Nelidowa was thinking that one poke might not effect a great change, but that if it should be used often, the rosy and thin lips would certainly become thick and vulgar. Hence the order to Katerina that Grushenka was to be poked daily and that Katerina should supply various men in order that the business be attended to properly.
Katerina disliked this new order, for which she could not imagine the reason, but what could she do? She moved Grushenka's bed to a separate room in the basement and, after dinner, gave the girl her instructions. First she gave her a salve and ordered her to smear it every day into her tube. This salve was to kill the sperm. The irrigations, to be taken afterwards, would make doubly sure that she should not get an enlarged belly. Presently she sent a stable boy to the girl's room, a red-haired, freckled, undersized man, who grinned with delight. The sex life of the servants was controlled, but once in a while they were allowed to do some love-making. It was not half enough and they always craved for the opportunity. Very often there was a love match between two serfs and they were sometimes allowed to marry, receiving from the master a shack and a bit of land that they had to till in addition to the land of the owner of the estate. More often, when some girl got pregnant, the master commanded one of his men to marry her. It was always a feast to be allowed to make love and it was usually done in the hay of the stables or somewhere in the fields. A good party in a bed and an order to give her the limit was a pleasure! When the news came to the stable, the men threw dice for the trick and the redhead was much envied when he won. Grushenka was sitting uneasily on her bed; she held one hand over her breasts, the other one clutched her thin dress in front. With a pitiful voice she begged him not to take her, to spare her. The shock from Ivan's handling was still in her bones. But the redhead had other ideas. He threw his wooden slippers into the air, slipped out of his shirt and trousers, and assured the frightened girl that it should be as if it were his wedding night and that he would not need any help like Ivan. Nay, he'd do the job alone and quite thoroughly. As he stood before her, naked, she did not know what to do. She knelt before him and implored him to let her be, but he instead took hold of her hair and pressed her face against his lower body and laughed aloud when she tried to struggle away. Then he lifted her up bodily and threw her on the bed. “For the quick poke in the woods,” he said, “it's all right with clothes on, but I'll have you nude, my little bride. It's so much nicer.” He started to loosen the hooks of her skirt and to tear it off her. Grushenka felt that resistance would not do any good and that her garments would only be torn, and that meant the whip, so she unbuttoned her blouse herself and got rid of her trousers, while her lover-by-command lauded her change of mind. When they lay belly on belly, Grushenka again begged and prayed. She was very beautiful and the redhead had no reason to hurt her. He promised to be careful and explained to her that it would not cause her any pain, that she would, in fact, like it, and that if she followed his suggestions, they could both enjoy it profoundly. The frightened girl promised to do all he said and he proceeded with great care. He tickled her with the point of his shaft for a while and then inserted it by degrees, moving always a bit back and shuffling it in again, each time a little more, until his hair rubbed closely against her well shaven Mount of Venus. He then inquired whether it had hurt and Grushenka answered in a soft, wondering voice, “Just a bit. Oh! Be careful.” But it had not hurt her at all, it was just a funny feeling, not exactly exciting, but almost pleasing. He told her to move slowly up and down, which she did, until he started to heave and to push, finally forgetting himself. Grushenka did not answer his strokes, she was still afraid that it might hurt her again. But she held her arms close to his back, and when he finally finished, she pressed herself firmly against his belly. He had not had enough.
He stayed in her bed joking with her. He played around with her, laughed to see that she was shaved and pinched her bottom, good-heartedly. She discovered with amazement that he was ready again and she did not fight him off when he put it in anew. This time her fright was gone. She thought, “Really, it's not so bad.” Still she did not get a thrill out of it, although it felt rather pleasant.
Every night after dinner, a man came to her. Sometimes they were elderly and brutal and did not undress, just laid her over the bed, gave her a slap on the behind and disappeared. Sometimes, they were mere boys, who were shy, and Grushenka had a great time teasing them and working them up and finally seducing them many times so that they walked from the room with weak knees. Grushenka learned to love it. She could not say when she climaxed for the first time, but after it had happened, she succeeded in getting the supreme thrill with every man; half a dozen times if she liked her partner. She learned how to make love and soon became a passionate lover. The male servants in the house who had tried her out, praised her with glittering eyes.
What a girl! What a figure! A volcano! These were fine weeks, weeks of thrills, weeks during which her body filled out and her mind became clear, weeks without dreams, full of reality. She looked at other girls with searching curiosity. She learned from them about their love affairs; she studied her mistress with appraising eyes.
Couldn't she manage to get a nice boy as a husband and a little house with some acres and have children too? Why not? She learned who was influencing the master and the mistress, she made plans, she laid eyes on one of the best body servants of the Prince, and though she never spoke with him or had intercourse with him, she believed she had fallen in love with him. All that ended suddenly, and it was again her mistress who effected the change, her mistress who was by right and law Grushenka's destiny. Nelidowa used to start many things, give many orders, and forget about them again. Her mind wandered.
Everything that did not pertain to her lover (of whom we will have to speak later) was done in a haphazard way. But Nelidowa remembered, one night when she came from the bedroom of her husband, that Grushenka was to have been her means for finding out how continuous love-making would change a woman's body; so she sent for her. Grushenka had had a quick and meaningless bout with an elderly man that night about an hour before, and was still awake when the handmaid of Nelidowa came for her. She put a bed sheet around her shoulders and walked nude to Her Highness' bedchamber. (It must be remembered that all people, high or low, male or female, slept without nightshirts at that time, and it is said that Marie Antoinette, some fifty years later, was the first one to create the mode). Nelidowa had just washed herself and sat naked before her toilet table, while one of her maids braided her long black hair into pigtails. Nelidowa was in a good mood and told Grushenka to wait until her hair was done. In a few minutes, she took the nude girl on her lap. She inquired whether Grushenka had been poked daily, whether the instruments had been big and long, whether she had learned to make love properly and whether she liked it.
Grushenka answered automatically, “Yes,” to every question. Then Nelidowa gently opened the girl's legs and examined her. There was no change to be seen. The little love-nest was tender and innocent, as though it had never held big male machines. The lips were perhaps more red, and fuller, but still firmly closed and thin. The Princess moved her more towards her knees, opened her own legs a little and wondered at her own unattractive pleasure garden.
Apparently it was not love-making, but the hand of nature which had made the difference. Everything seemed to go well and the princess was about to send her double to bed again, but in her dissatisfaction with the imperfect loving she had received from her husband, she felt induced to play more with Grushenka's body.
Grushenka leaned closely on the shoulder of her mistress, and allowed her access to her secret parts. She knew that some servant girls were supposed to do this same thing to each other. Lady's love was at that time more common than it is today. It was an art practised with great finesse in the harems, and the Russian household was still very much like a harem. Just when Grushenka began to feel fine, the Princess got vexed that the girl should get a kick out of it, while she herself felt nothing. With her old meanness, she pinched Grushenka's thighs with her
