Anna Vassilyevna rang the bell in a tremor. A little page came in.
“Why is it Pavel Yakovlitch does not come?” she said, “what does it mean; I call him, and he doesn’t come?”
Nikolai Artemyevitch shrugged his shoulders.
“And what is the object, may I ask, of your wanting to send for him? I don’t expect that at all, I don’t wish it even!”
“What’s the object, Nikolai Artemyevitch? He has disturbed you; very likely he has checked the progress of your cure. I want to have an explanation with him. I want to know how he has dared to annoy you.”
“I tell you again, that I do not ask that. And what can induce you … devant les domestiques!”
Anna Vassilyevna flushed a little. “You need not say that, Nikolai Artemyevitch. I never … devant les domestiques … Fedushka, go and see you bring Pavel Yakovlitch here at once.”
The little page went off.
“And that’s absolutely unnecessary,” muttered Nikolai Artemyevitch between his teeth, and he began again pacing up and down the room. “I did not bring up the subject with that object.”
“Good Heavens, Paul must apologise to you.”
“Good Heavens, what are his apologies to me? And what do you mean by apologies? That’s all words.”
“Why, he must be corrected.”
“Well, you can correct him yourself. He will listen to you sooner than to me. For my part I bear him no grudge.”
“No, Nikolai Artemyevitch, you’ve not been yourself ever since you arrived. You have even to my eyes grown thinner lately. I am afraid your treatment is doing you no good.”
“The treatment is quite indispensable,” observed Nikolai Artemyevitch, “my liver is affected.”
At that instant Shubin came in. He looked tired. A slight almost ironical smile played on his lips.
“You asked for me, Anna Vassilyevna?” he observed.
“Yes, certainly I asked for you. Really, Paul, this is dreadful. I am very much displeased with you. How could you be wanting in respect to Nikolai Artemyevitch?”
“Nikolai Artemyevitch has complained of me to you?” inquired Shubin, and with the same smile on his lips he looked at Stahov. The latter turned away, dropping his eyes.
“Yes, he complains of you. I don’t know what you have done amiss, but you ought to apologise at once, because his health is very much deranged just now, and indeed we all ought when we are young to treat our benefactors with respect.”
“Ah, what logic!” thought Shubin, and he turned to Stahov. “I am ready to apologise to you, Nikolai Artemyevitch,” he said with a polite half-bow, “if I have really offended you in any way.”
“I did not at all … with that idea,” rejoined Nikolai Artemyevitch, still as before avoiding Shubin’s eyes. “However, I will readily forgive you, for, as you know, I am not an exacting person.”
“Oh, that admits of no doubt!” said Shubin. “But allow me to be inquisitive; is Anna Vassilyevna aware precisely what constituted my offence?”
“No, I know nothing,” observed Anna Vassilyevna, craning forward her head expectantly.
“O Good Lord!” exclaimed Nikolai Artemyevitch hurriedly, “how often have I prayed and besought, how often have I said how I hate these scenes and explanations! When one’s been away an age, and comes home hoping for rest—talk of the family circle, intérieur, being a family man—and here one finds scenes and unpleasantnesses. There’s not a minute of peace. One’s positively driven to the club … or, or elsewhere. A man is alive, he has a physical side, and it has its claims, but here—”
And without concluding his sentence Nikolai Artemyevitch went quickly out, slamming the door.
Anna Vassilyevna looked after him. “To the club!” she muttered bitterly: “you are not going to the club, profligate? You’ve no one at the club to give away my horses to—horses from my own stable—and the grey ones too! My favourite colour. Yes, yes, fickle-hearted man,” she went on raising her voice, “you are not going to the club. As for you, Paul,” she pursued, getting up, “I wonder you’re not ashamed. I should have thought you would not be so childish. And now my head has begun to ache. Where is Zoya, do you know?”
“I think she’s upstairs in her room. The wise little fox always hides in her hole when there’s a storm in the air.”
“Come, please, please!” Anna Vassilyevna began searching about her. “Haven’t you seen my little glass of grated horseradish? Paul, be so good as not to make me angry for the future.”
“How make you angry, auntie? Give me your little hand to kiss. Your horseradish I saw on the little table in the boudoir.”
“Darya always leaves it about somewhere,” said Anna Vassilyevna, and she walked away with a rustle of silk skirts.
Shubin was about to follow her, but he stopped on hearing Uvar Ivanovitch’s drawling voice behind him.
“I would … have given it you … young puppy,” the retired cornet brought out in gasps.
Shubin went up to him. “And what have I done, then, most venerable Uvar Ivanovitch?”
“How! you are young, be respectful. Yes indeed.”
“Respectful to whom?”
“To whom? You know whom. Ay, grin away.”
Shubin crossed his arms on his breast.
“Ah, you type of the choice element in drama,” he exclaimed, “you primeval force of the black earth, cornerstone of the social fabric!”
Uvar Ivanovitch’s fingers began to work. “There, there, my boy, don’t provoke me.”
“Here,” pursued Shubin, “is a gentleman, not young to judge by appearances, but what blissful, childlike faith is still hidden in him! Respect! And do you know, you primitive creature, what Nikolai Artemyevitch was in a rage with me for? Why I spent the whole of this morning with him at his German woman’s; we were singing the three of us—‘Do Not Leave Me.’
