“I don’t know what to think of you, Viérotchka. This is not the first time that you have surprised me.”
“My dear [mílenki moï], you want to flatter me to death. No, my friend, it is not as difficult to understand as it may seem to you. Such thoughts are not peculiar to me alone, my dear; they are held by a good many girls and young women, even such simpletons as I am. Only it is impossible for them to tell their bridegrooms or their husbands what they think; they know that if they did, it would be said that they were immoral. I fell in love with you, my dear, because you don’t think so. Do you know when I began to love you? It was when we talked together the first time, my birthday; when you said that women were poor, and to be pitied: it was then that I fell in love with you.”
“And when did I fall in love with you? That very same day? Do you suppose it was on that very same day when I told you that?”
“How strange you are, dearest [mílenki]! You said that I couldn’t guess; but if I should guess, you would begin to praise me again.”
“But try to guess for all that!”
“Well, of course it was when I asked whether it was not possible to arrange things so that all people could live comfortably.”
“I must kiss your hand again in payment for that, Viérotchka.”
“That’ll do, my dear; I do not like the habit of kissing women’s hands.”
“Why not, Viérotchka?”
“Akh! my dear, you yourself know why. What is the good of asking me? Don’t ask such questions, my mílenki!”
“Yes, my friend, that is true; one should not ask such questions: it is wrong. I’ll ask you only when I do not really know what you mean; and you meant that nobody’s hand should be kissed.”
Viérotchka laughed heartily.
“Now I forgive you, because I have succeeded in laughing at you. You see, you wanted to examine me, and you yourself did not know the principal reason why it is not well. Nobody’s hands should be kissed; that’s true: but that was not what I was talking about; not the general rule, but only about the impropriety of a man kissing a woman’s hand. This, my dear, ought to be very offensive to a woman; it shows that she is not looked upon as an equal. Women think that a man cannot lower self-respect before a woman; that she is already so much lower than he is, that no matter how much he lowers himself before her, still he does not come down to her level, but is far higher than she is. But you do not think this way, my dear; why, then should you kiss my hand. But listen to what I think, my mílenki, as though we had never been bridegroom and bride.”
“Yes, that is true, Viérotchka; it looks very little like it. But what are we then?”
“God knows what we are, my mílenki; or rather it’s this way: as though we had been married, long, long ago.”
“That’s so, my dear, it is true; we are old friends, nothing has changed.”
“Only one thing has changed, my mílenki: that now I know that I am coming out from the cellar to enjoy freedom.”
XIX
Thus they talked—rather a strange conversation for the first one after their engagement—and they pressed each other’s hands, and Lopukhóf went home by himself, and Viérotchka locked the door after him, because Matrióna remained sitting longer than usual in the dining-room, hoping that her “golden one” would snore for a long time to come; and, in fact, her golden one did snore for a long time to come.
When Lopukhóf reached home about seven o’clock he tried to apply himself to work, but he could not collect his thoughts. His mind was occupied not with his work, but he was constantly occupied with the same visions that came to him during the lone walk from the Semyonovsky bridge to the Vuiborgsky ward: naturally with visions of love. Certainly with such visions, but yet not entirely with love and not entirely with visions. The life of a man without means has its prosaic interests, and it was about them that Lopukhóf was also thinking: that is to be taken for granted. He is a materialist, and therefore he thinks only about his interests, and in point of fact, he was all the time thinking about his own interests. Instead of lofty, poetical, and plastic imaginations, such love imaginations as are proper for a coarse materialist occupied his time.
“A sacrifice—, it will be almost impossible to get this out of her head, and this is bad. When you think that you are specially indebted to a person, your relations to this person are apt to be somewhat strained, and she may find this out. Friends may explain to
