“Who is there?” sounded Shubin’s voice.
“I,” answered Bersenyev.
“What do you want?”
“Let me in, Pavel; don’t be sulky; aren’t you ashamed of yourself?”
“I am not sulky; I’m asleep and dreaming about Zoya.”
“Do stop that, please; you’re not a baby. Let me in. I want to talk to you.”
“Haven’t you had talk enough with Elena?”
“Come, come; let me in!”
Shubin responded by a pretended snore.
Bersenyev shrugged his shoulders and turned homewards.
The night was warm and seemed strangely still, as though everything were listening and expectant; and Bersenyev, enfolded in the still darkness, stopped involuntarily; and he, too, listened expectant. On the treetops near there was a faint stir, like the rustle of a woman’s dress, awaking in him a feeling half-sweet, half-painful, a feeling almost of fright. He felt a tingling in his cheeks, his eyes were chill with momentary tears; he would have liked to move quite noiselessly, to steal along in secret. A cross gust of wind blew suddenly on him; he almost shuddered, and his heart stood still; a drowsy beetle fell off a twig and dropped with a thud on the path; Bersenyev uttered a subdued “Ah!” and again stopped. But he began to think of Elena, and all these passing sensations vanished at once; there remained only the reviving sense of the night freshness, of the walk by night; his whole soul was absorbed by the image of the young girl. Bersenyev walked with bent head, recalling her words, her questions. He fancied he heard the tramp of quick steps behind. He listened: someone was running, someone was overtaking him; he heard panting, and suddenly from a black circle of shadow cast by a huge tree Shubin sprang out before him, quite pale in the light of the moon, with no cap on his disordered curls.
“I am glad you came along this path,” he said with an effort. “I should not have slept all night, if I had not overtaken you. Give me your hand. Are you going home?”
“Yes.”
“I will see you home then.”
“But why have you come without a cap on?”
“That doesn’t matter. I took off my neckerchief too. It is quite warm.”
The friends walked a few paces.
“I was very stupid today, wasn’t I?” Shubin asked suddenly.
“To speak frankly, you were. I couldn’t make you out. I have never seen you like that before. And what were you angry about really? Such trifles!”
“H’m,” muttered Shubin. “That’s how you put it; but they were not trifles to me. You see,” he went on, “I ought to point out to you that I—that—you may think what you please of me—I—well there! I’m in love with Elena.”
“You in love with Elena!” repeated Bersenyev, standing still.
“Yes,” pursued Shubin with affected carelessness. “Does that astonish you? I will tell you something else. Till this evening I still had hopes that she might come to love me in time. But today I have seen for certain that there is no hope for me. She is in love with someone else.”
“Someone else? Whom?”
“Whom? You!” cried Shubin, slapping Bersenyev on the shoulder.
“Me!”
“You,” repeated Shubin.
Bersenyev stepped back a pace, and stood motionless. Shubin looked intently at him.
“And does that astonish you? You are a modest youth. But she loves you. You can make your mind easy on that score.”
“What nonsense you talk!” Bersenyev protested at last with an air of vexation.
“No, it’s not nonsense. But why are we standing still? Let us go on. It’s easier to talk as we walk. I have known her a long while, and I know her well. I cannot be mistaken. You are a man after her own heart. There was a time when she found me agreeable; but, in the first place, I am too frivolous a young man for her, while you are a serious person, you are a morally and physically well-regulated person, you—hush, I have not finished, you are a conscientiously disposed enthusiast, a genuine type of those devotees of science, of whom—no not of whom—whereof the middle class of Russian gentry are so justly proud! And, secondly, Elena caught me the other day kissing Zoya’s arms!”
“Zoya’s?”
“Yes, Zoya’s. What would you have? She has such fine shoulders.”
“Shoulders?”
“Well there, shoulders and arms, isn’t it all the same? Elena caught me in this unconstrained proceeding after dinner, and before dinner I had been abusing Zoya in her hearing. Elena unfortunately doesn’t understand how natural such contradictions are. Then you came on the scene, you have faith in—what the deuce is it you have faith in? … You blush and look confused, you discuss Schiller and Schelling (she’s always on the lookout for remarkable men), and so you have won the day, and I, poor wretch, try to joke—and all the while—”
Shubin suddenly burst into tears, turned away, and dropping upon the ground clutched at his hair.
Bersenyev went up to him.
“Pavel,” he began, “what childishness this is! Really! what’s the matter with you today? God knows what nonsense you have got into your head, and you are crying. Upon my word, I believe you must be putting it on.”
Shubin lifted up his head. The tears shone bright on his cheeks in the moonlight, but there was a smile on his face.
“Andrei Petrovitch,” he said, “you may think what you please about me. I am even ready to agree with you that I’m hysterical now, but, by God, I’m in love with Elena, and Elena loves you. I promised, though, to see you home, and I will keep my promise.”
He got up.
“What a night! silvery, dark, youthful! How sweet it must be tonight for men who are loved! How sweet for them not to sleep! Will you sleep, Andrei Petrovitch?”
Bersenyev made no answer, and quickened his pace.
“Where are you hurrying to?” Shubin went on. “Trust my words, a night like this will never come again in your life, and at home, Schelling will keep. It’s true he did you good service today; but you need not hurry
