Nina Fyodorovna laughed. She had always laughed readily, but now Laptev had begun to notice that she had moments, on account of illness, when her mind seemed to weaken, and she laughed at the least trifle and even for no reason.
‘‘Yulia came here before dinner, while you were away,’’ she said. ‘‘From what I can see, she doesn’t have much faith in her father. ‘Let my papa treat you,’ she says, ‘but all the same, write to the holy elder on the quiet and ask him to pray for you.’ They’ve acquired some elder here. Yulechka forgot her parasol here, send it to her tomorrow,’’ she went on after a pause. ‘‘No, when it’s the end, no doctors or elders will help.’’
‘‘Nina, why don’t you sleep at night?’’ Laptev asked, to change the subject.
‘‘Just because. I don’t sleep, that’s all. I lie here and think.’’
‘‘What do you think about, dear?’’
‘‘About the children, about you . . . about my life. I’ve lived through so much, Alyosha. Once I start remembering, once I start... Lord God!’’ She laughed. ‘‘No joke, I’ve given birth five times, I’ve buried three children . . . Once I was about to give birth, and my Grigory Nikolaich was with some other woman just then, there was nobody to send for the midwife or a wise woman; I went to the front hall to call for the maid, and there were Jews, shopkeepers, moneylenders—waiting for him to come back. It made my head spin... He didn’t love me, though he never said so. By now I’ve calmed down, my heart is more at peace, but before, when I was younger, it hurt me— hurt me, oh, how it hurt me, dear heart! Once—this was still on the estate—I found him in the garden with a lady, and I went away... I went wherever my legs would carry me and, I don’t know how, I found myself on the church porch, I fell on my knees: ‘Queen of Heaven!’ I said. And it was night out, a crescent moon was shining...’
She was exhausted and began to gasp; then, after resting a little, she took her brother’s hand and went on in a weak, soundless voice:
‘‘How kind you are, Alyosha... How intelligent you are... What a good man you’ve turned out to be!’’
At midnight Laptev said good night to her and, on his way out, took along the parasol forgotten by Yulia Sergeevna. Despite the late hour, the servants, men and women, were having tea in the dining room. What disorder! The children were not asleep and were sitting right there in the dining room. They were talking softly, in low voices, and did not notice that the lamp was growing dim and was about to go out. All these big and small people were upset by a whole series of inauspicious omens, and the mood was oppressive: the mirror in the front hall had broken, the samovar had hummed every day and, as if on purpose, was humming even now; someone said that as Nina Fyodorovna was getting dressed, a mouse had leaped out of her shoe. And the children already knew the awful meaning of these omens; the older girl, Sasha, a thin brunette, sat motionless at the table, and her face was frightened, sorrowful, and the younger, Lida, seven years old, a plump blonde, stood beside her sister and looked at the fire from under her eyebrows.
Laptev went to his rooms on the lower floor, lowceilinged rooms, where it was stuffy and always smelled of geraniums. In his drawing room sat Panaurov, Nina Fyodorovna’s husband, reading a newspaper. Laptev nodded to him and sat down opposite. They both sat and were silent. It sometimes happened that they would spend the whole evening thus silently, and this silence did not embarrass them.
The girls came from upstairs to say good night. Panaurov silently, unhurriedly crossed them both several times and gave them his hand to kiss; they curtseyed, then went over to Laptev, who also had to cross them and give them his hand to kiss. This ceremony with kissing and curtseying was repeated every evening.
When the girls left, Panaurov laid the paper aside and said:
‘‘It’s boring in our God-protected town! I confess, my dear,’’ he added with a sigh, ‘‘I’m very glad you’ve finally found yourself some distraction.’’
‘‘What do you mean?’’ asked Laptev.
‘‘I saw you earlier coming out of Dr. Belavin’s house. I hope you didn’t go there for the papa’s sake.’’
‘‘Of course not,’’ said Laptev, reddening.
‘‘Well, of course not. And, incidentally speaking, you won’t find another such plug horse as this papa if you search with a lamp in broad daylight. You can’t imagine what a slovenly, giftless, and clumsy brute he is! You people there in your capital are still interested in the provinces only from the lyrical side, so to speak, from the paysage and Anton the Wretch 3 side, but I swear to you, my friend, there are no lyrics, there’s only wildness, meanness, vileness—and nothing more. Take the local high priests of science, the local intelligentsia, so to speak. Can you imagine, there are twenty-eight doctors here in town, they’ve all made fortunes and live in their own houses, and the populace meanwhile is in the same helpless situation as before. Here Nina had to have an operation, essentially a trifling one, and for that we had to invite a surgeon from Moscow—not a single one here would undertake it. You can’t imagine. They know nothing, understand nothing, are interested in nothing. Ask them, for instance, what is cancer? What is it? Where does it come from?’’
And Panaurov began to explain what cancer was. He was a specialist in all the sciences and explained scientifically everything that happened to come up in conversation. But he explained it all somehow in his own way. He had his own theory of the circulation of the blood, his own chemistry, his own astronomy. He spoke slowly, quietly, persuasively, and uttered the words ‘‘you can’t imagine’’ in a pleading voice, narrowing his eyes, sighing languidly, and smiling benevolently, like a king, and it was obvious that he was very pleased with himself and never thought at all of the fact that he was already fifty years old.
‘‘I’d really like to have something to eat,’’ said Laptev. ‘‘It would be pleasant to eat something salty.’’
‘‘Well, why not? That can be arranged at once.’’
A little later, Laptev and his brother-in-law were sitting upstairs in the dining room, having supper. Laptev drank a glass of vodka and then began drinking wine, but Panaurov drank nothing. He never drank or played cards and, in spite of that, had all the same run through his own and his wife’s fortunes and acquired many debts. To run through so much in such a short time, one had to have not passion but something else, some special talent. Panaurov liked good food, fine place settings, music at the table, speeches, bowing foot-men, to whom he casually tossed tips of ten and even twentyfive roubles; he always took part in all the subscriptions and lotteries, sent birthday bouquets to ladies of his acquaintance, bought cups, tea-glass holders, shirt studs, neckties, canes, scent, cigarette holders, pipes, lapdogs, parrots, Japanese objects, antiques; his nightshirts were made of silk, his bed of ebony with mother-of-pearl, his dressing gown was genuine Bokhara, and so on, and all that required a daily outlay of, as he himself said, ‘‘no end of money.’’
Over supper he kept sighing and shaking his head.
‘‘Yes, everything in this world has an end,’’ he said quietly, narrowing his dark eyes. ‘‘You’ll fall in love, and you’ll suffer, fall out of love, be betrayed, because there’s no woman who doesn’t betray; you’ll suffer, become
