I felt something of that impotence now. I cursed the isvostchick, but wherever he went this slow endless stream seemed to impede our way. Poor Nina! Such a baby! What was it that had driven her to this? She did not love the man, and she knew quite well that she did not. No, it was an act of defiance. But defiance to whom—to Vera? to Lawrence? … and what had Semyonov said to her?
Then, thank Heaven, we crossed the Nevski, and our way was clear. The old cabman whipped up his horse and, in a minute or two we were outside 16 Gagarinskaya. I will confess to very real fears and hesitations as I climbed the dark stairs (the lift was, of course, not working). I was not the kind of man for this kind of job. In the first place I hated quarrels, and knowing Grogoff’s hot temper I had every reason to expect a tempestuous interview. Then I was ill, aching in every limb and seeing everything, as I always did when I was unwell, mistily and with uncertainty. Then I had a very shrewd suspicion that there was considerable truth in what Semyonov had said, that I was interfering in what only remotely concerned me. At any rate, that was certainly the view that Grogoff would take, and Nina, perhaps also. I felt, as I rang the bell of No. 3, that unpleasant pain in the pit of the stomach that tells you that you’re going to make a fool of yourself.
Well, it would not be for the first time.
“Boris Nicolaievitch, doma?” I asked the cross-looking old woman who opened the door.
“Doma,” she answered, holding it open to let me pass.
I was shown into a dark, untidy sitting-room. It seemed at first sight to be littered with papers, newspapers, Revolutionary sheets and proclamations, the Pravda, the Novaya Jezn, the Soldatskaya Mwyssl. … On the dirty wallpaper there were enormous dark photographs, in faded gilt frames, of family groups; on one wall there was a large garishly coloured picture of Grogoff himself in student’s dress. The stove was unlighted and the room was very cold. My heart ached for Nina.
A moment after Grogoff came in. He came forward to me very amiably, holding out his hand.
“Nu, Ivan Andreievitch. … What can I do for you?” he asked, smiling.
And how he had changed! He was positively swollen with self-satisfaction. He had never been famous for personal modesty, but he seemed now to be physically twice his normal size. He was fat, his cheeks puffed, his stomach swelling beneath the belt that bound it. His fair hair was long, and rolled in large curls on one side of his head and over his forehead. He spoke in a loud, overbearing voice.
“Nu, Ivan Andreievitch, what can I do for you?” he repeated.
“Can I see Nina?” I asked.
“Nina? …” he repeated as though surprised. “Certainly—but what do you want to say to her?”
“I don’t see that that’s your business,” I answered. “I have a message for her from her family.”
“But of course it’s my business,” he answered. “I’m looking after her now.”
“Since when?” I asked.
“What does that matter? … She is going to live with me.”
“We’ll see about that,” I said.
I knew that it was foolish to take this kind of tone. It could do no good, and I was not the sort of man to carry it through.
But he was not at all annoyed.
“See, Ivan Andreievitch,” he said, smiling. “What is there to discuss? Nina and I have long considered living together. She is a grown-up woman. It’s no one’s affair but her own.”
“Are you going to marry her?” I asked.
“Certainly not,” he answered; “that would not suit either of us. It’s no good your bringing your English ideas here, Ivan Andreievitch. We belong to the new world, Nina and I.”
“Well, I want to speak to her,” I answered.
“So you shall, certainly. But if you hope to influence her at all you are wasting your time, I assure you. Nina has acted very rightly. She found the home life impossible. I’m sure I don’t wonder. She will assist me in my work. The most important work, perhaps, that man has ever been called on to perform. …”
He raised his voice here as though he were going to begin a speech. But at that moment Nina came in. She stood in the doorway looking across at me with a childish mixture of hesitation and boldness, of anger and goodwill in her face. Her cheeks were pale, her eyes heavy. Her hair was done in two long plaits. She looked about fourteen.
She came up to me, but she didn’t offer me her hand. Boris said:
“Nina dear, Ivan Andreievitch has come to give you a message from your family.” There was a note of scorn in his voice as he repeated my earlier sentence.
“What is it?” she asked, looking at me defiantly.
“I’d like to give it you alone,” I said.
“Whatever you say to me it is right that Boris should hear,” she answered.
I tried to forget that Grogoff was there. I went on:
“Well then, Nina, you must know what I want to say. They are heartbroken at your leaving them. You know of course that they are. They beg you to come back. … Vera and Nicholas too. They simply won’t know what to do without you. Vera says that you have been angry with her. She doesn’t know why, but she says that she will do her very best if you come back, so that you won’t be angry any more. … Nina, dear, you know that it is they whom you really love. You never
