“What has got into you, Aleksandr?”
“What has made you so solemn all of a sudden, Aleksandr Matvéitch?”
“Nothing in particular; I feel rather blue.”
“That does not happen to you very often,” said Viéra Pavlovna.
“I might say, never, without some reason,” said Kirsánof, in a constrained tone.
A few minutes afterwards he got up and went away, earlier than some times, taking his leave in his usual simple manner.
Two days afterwards Lopukhóf told Viéra Pavlovna that he had been to see Kirsánof, who, as it seemed to him, had received him in a very strange way. Kirsánof apparently wanted to be ceremonious towards him, and this had always been an unnecessary formality between them. Lopukhóf had looked him straight in the face, and said:—
“Aleksandr, you must be provoked with someone; is it with me?”
“No.”
“Is it with Viérotchka?”
“No.”
“Then what is the matter with you?”
“Nothing at all; it is only in your imagination.”
“Why aren’t you friendly towards me today? You are not natural; you are as though you were provoked.”
Kirsánof began to pour out his assurances that Lopukhóf was mistaken; and in this way he managed to confirm the impression that he was provoked. Then, afterwards, it seemed as though he must have been ashamed; he again became as unaffected, kind, friendly, as could be desired. Lopukhóf, availing himself of the fact that the man seemed in his right mind again, asked him:—
“Now, Aleksandr, tell me the reason of your getting provoked.”
“I never thought of being provoked.” And again he became disagreeable and disputatious.
What a marvel! Lopukhóf could not think of anything that might have offended him; and this did not seem possible, considering all their mutual respect and warmth of friendship. Viéra Pavlovna also tried hard to recollect whether she could have offended him in any manner, and she, too, could think of nothing out of the way; for she knew, just as her husband did, that it was impossible, as far as she was concerned.
Two days more passed; for Kirsánof not to call at the Lopukhófs’ for four days was a most unusual circumstance. Viéra Pavlovna even wondered “could he be well?” Lopukhóf went round to see if he were really ill. “How? ill?” He is still angry. Lopukhóf questioned him persistently. After repeated negations, he began to get off some disjointed nonsense about his relations with Lopukhóf and Viéra Pavlovna; that he loves and respects them very highly; but after all that had happened, they were not attentive enough to him. But in what respect—and this was worst of all—there was not the slightest hint in his bombastic talk. It was clear that the gentleman was eaten up by ambition. All this was so savage to witness in such a man as Lopukhóf considered Kirsánof to be, and so the visitor said to his host:—
“Now, listen; we have been friends; and the time will come when you will be ashamed of this.”
Kirsánof, with affected humility, replied that, in fact, it must on his side be a mere trifle; but what can be done, supposing he has been offended by many things?
“Nu, what was it then?”
He began to bring up a good many occasions at which he had taken offence lately, all in such a style as this: “You said that the lighter the hair of a person, the nearer he is to dullness; Viéra Pavlovna said that tea was getting dearer. The one was a hit at the color of my hair; the other was a hint that I was eating you out of house and home.”
Lopukhóf’s hands fell to his side. This man has gone crazy with his ambition; or, properly speaking, he has become a fool and a good-for-nothing!
Lopukhóf returned home in a gloomy frame of mind; it was bitter for him to see such a warp in a man of whom he was so fond. To Viéra Pavlovna’s questions as to what he had learned, he answered gloomily that it would be better not to speak about it; that Kirsánof had spoken disagreeable nonsense, and that he was probably sick.
In three or four days Kirsánof, who had in all probability come to his senses and seen the savage disgracefulness of his behavior, came to the Lopukhófs. He behaved himself as well as possible; then he began to tell how mean he had been. From Viéra Pavlovna’s words he perceived she had not heard from her husband of his absurdities. He sincerely thanked Lopukhóf for his consideration; and, as a punishment to himself, he began to tell the whole story to Viéra Pavlovna. He grew sentimental; he excused himself, and said that he was sick, and again there followed some more nonsense. Viéra Pavlovna tried to say that he ought to stop talking about it; that it was a mere trifle. He clung to the word trifle, and began to rattle off the same sort of ridiculous nonsense as he had done before, in his talk with Lopukhóf. He very delicately and circumstantially began to develop the thought that of course it was a trifle, because he was aware of his insignificance in the eyes of the Lopukhófs, but that he didn’t deserve any more; and so on. And all this was said with the most underhanded, slyest hints, and, at the same time, with the most courteous expressions of respect and devotion. Viéra Pavlovna, hearing this, let her hands fall to her side exactly as her husband had done. When he had gone, they remembered that for several days previous to his entirely losing his balance he had been strange. Before, they had not noticed it particularly, or even perceived it; but now his former absurdities are explained. They were of the same kind, only more developed.
After this, Kirsánof began to call very often; but the continuation of their former simple relations was utterly impossible. From
