“Well, well,” laughed Wilfred, a little self-consciously. “I admit that the few odd yen and sen make the business a little petty. Mr. Malinin has given me carte blanche in the matter, and I should feel justified, I dare say, in accepting on his behalf the round sum—four hundred yen. Mind you, in a court of law I could easily establish a claim for the full amount—but this is not a court of law, it is simply a business matter discussed between two friendly parties who have no wish to injure each other by the bloody chopping off of a legal pound of flesh like Shakespeare.”
The Isaevs started nervously at this sudden change to the butcher’s vocabulary. They watched his mesmeric swinging hat.
“Four hundred yens not,” said Isaev, after a moment.
“Where is Sergei Sergeievitch?” cooed Olga. “Did you not speak that he has come with? I am sure he is good friend like his father—like his uncle. … He will ask you, Mr. Chew, to arrange this matter more good for poor us. Why is he not here?”
“As to that,” said Wilfred, buoyantly, “nothing can be easier to explain. Here is his letter. He is at Mi-San, having been married on Thursday, and hopes you will come and attend the subsequent festivities.”
“Married to Tatiana Pavlovna,” said Isaev. “The bitch.”
Olga’s white teeth showed in a widening smile. “Then he is married to a not good girl, Mr. Chew. Because of Tatiana Pavlovna our son is now not good boy—gone away from us—soldier in Chinese army. Surely Mr. Chew, you shall not ask us to help with our moneys to pay for this marriage—to help a not good girl who has behaved not good to our son—that she may have a husband.” Olga laughed, an open-throated laugh as though she had been outlining a delightful program. “Must our family’s money help Tatiana Pavlovna who has harmed our family? Surely, Mr. Chew, you are too good and too clever a man to say this.”
“To begin with,” said Wilfred. “It is not your family’s money. It is Mr. Malinin’s. To continue with, even if it were a fact that the money might help toward Saggay Saggayitch’s wedding expenses, you should surely be the last to complain. Surely your dearest wish should be to hear of the marriage of this young lady you do not like, and her departure from Korea. Miss Ostapenko, having become Mrs. S. S. Malinin and taken up her residence in Manchuria—in a remote and inaccessible village, Chi-tao-kou—what then prevents your son from returning to his home? He went away to escape her—he will return once she is removed.”
“Petya return?” said Olga, putting her knuckles to her mouth with an incredulous gesture.
“Without a doubt. She has been a rose in his flesh. Or, as the proverb says, a rose between two thorns—one thorn being removed, he turns to the other. …”
Once more the exuberance of his vocabulary baffled his hearers. A butcher at one moment—a botanist the next—and yet, all the time, a lawyer really. Still, what he had just said made a great impression. It was a fact that Petya had said that Korea was not large enough to hold himself and Tatiana Pavlovna. Emptied of Tatiana, presumably, it would be just the right size for their son.
Isaev reread Ostapenko’s letter and, with the murmured help of his wife, Seryozha’s English note. Olga sat upon the arm of his chair, her round cheek leaning toward his sparse hair. Wilfred walked over to show them the Power of Attorney. Their three heads bent together and they looked like an affectionate family group. The Isaevs could make nothing of the Power of Attorney, and still less after Wilfred had explained it. Isaev now realized that he was going to pay that money—or most of it. His slow brain was like a ship that does not answer readily to the helm, but which, when the continued insistence of the helmsman’s hand affects her course at last, applies herself with an obstinate and heavy exaggeration to the new direction. Isaev’s mind was obsessed now by the necessity for haste—by the fact that the bank would close early on Saturday. Only by going to the bank soon would he be able to conclude this tiresome necessity for talk and thought, and be left in peace to finish this Harbin newspaper account of a delicious scandal in the family of an ex-general.
Olga also knew now that the money must be paid, and she could scarcely endure the knowledge without screaming. Underneath this comfortable and well-filled outer woman was a straining, insatiable emptiness—a sort of spiritual sucking in, like the inhaling draught at the mouth of a sea cave. Olga had never given a gift or consented to a surrender in her life. Her charming and gentle eyes—always alert behind their charm—wove a kind of web about her as she walked the world—a web into which a flying miscellany blundered—in which nothing came amiss—and from which nothing ever escaped. Nothing ever went out of her predacious heart or hands. Even her love for her son, her tolerance of her husband, were predatory. Unswerving and ravenous purpose had arranged her face in those attractive and receptive contours, just as nature gives some tropical flowers a sensuous yet implacable appeal that lures insects into their trap. All Olga’s cupboards were filled with a great treasure of rubbish; her heart was stored with accepted gifts—willingly or unwillingly given, but never returned and never paid for. Nothing came amiss—a bribe, a compliment, an act of reluctant obedience, a gift of money, a gift of old newspapers, a declaration of love, a couple of celluloid hairpins left behind in a drawer by a guest. … She went through her cupboards by day, thinking, mine—mine—mine; she went through her heart
