tolerate no contradiction—^in short. Granny's whole figure, erect, brisk, imperious—^increased the awe in which she was held by all. As she looked at the rooms. Granny sometimes told them to stop her chair, pointed to some object in the furniture and addressed unexpected questions to the ober-heHmer, who still smiled respectfuUy, though he was beginning to feel nervous. Granny put her questions in French, which she spoke, however, rather badly, so that I usually translated. The ober-kellner's answers for the most part did not please her and seemed unsatisfactory. And, indeed, she kept asking about all sorts of things quite irrelevant. Suddenly, for instance, stopping before a picture, a rather feeble copy of some weD-known picture of a mythological subject, she would ask:
'Whose portrait is that?'
The ober-keUner replied that no doubt it was some countess.
'How is it you don't know? You live here and don't know. Why is it here? Why is she squinting?'
The aber-kellner could not answer these questions satisfactorily, and positively lost his head.
'Oh, what a blockhead I' commented Granny, in Russian.
She was wheeled on. The same performance was repeated with a Dresden statuette, which Granny looked at for a long time, and then ordered them to remove, no one knew why. Finally, she worried the ober-kellner about what the carpets in the bedroom cost, and where they had been woven! The ober-kellner promised to make inquiries.
'What asses,' Granny grumbled, and concentrated her whole attention on the bed. 'What a gorgeous canopy! Open the bed.'
They opened the bed.
'More, more, turn it all over. Take off the pillows, the pillows, lift up the feather-bed.'
Everything was turned over. Granny examined it attentively.
'It's a good thing there are no bugs. Take away all the linen I Make it up with my linen and my pillows. But all this is too gorgeous. Such rooms are not for an old womem like me. I shall be dreary all alone. Alexey Ivanovitch, you must come and see me very often when your lessons with tiie children are over.'
'I left the General's service yesterday,' I answered, 'and am living in the hotel quite independently.'
'How is that?'
'A German of high rank, a Baron, with his Baroness, came here from Berlin the other day. I addressed him yesterday in German without keeping to tiie Berlin accent.'
'Well, what then?'
'He thought it an impertinence and complained to the General, and yesterday the General discharged me.'
'Why, did you swear at the Baron, or what? (though if you had it wouldn't have mattered!)'
'Oh, no. On the contrary, the Baron raised his stick to thrash me.'
'And did you, sniveller, allow your tutor to be treated like that?' she said suddenly, addressing the General; 'and turned him out of his place too! Noodles! you're all a set of noodles, as I see.'
'Don't disturb yourself. Auntie,' said the General, with a
shade of condescending faniiliarity; 'I can manage my own business. Besides, Alexey Ivanovitch has not given you quite a correct account of it.'
'And you just put up with it?'—she turned to me.
'I meant to challenge the Baron to a duel,' I answered, as calmly and modestly as I could, 'but the General opposed it.'
'Why did you oppose it?'—Graimy turned to the General again. ('And you can go, my good naan; you can come when you are called,' she said, addressing the ober-keUner; 'no need to stand about gaping. I can't endure this Niimberg rabble!')
The man bowed and went out, not, of course, imderstanding Granny's compliments.
'Upon my word. Auntie, surely a duel was out of the question.'
'Why out of the question? Men are all cocks; so they should fight. You are aU noodles, I see, you don't know how to stand up for your country. Come, tajse me up, Potapitch; see that there are always two porters: engage them. I don't want more than two. I shall only want them to carry me up and down stairs, and to wheel me on the levels in the street. Explain that to them; and pay them beforehand—^they will be more respectful. You will always be with me yourself, and you, Alexey Ivanovitch, point out that Baron to me when we are out: that I may have a look at the von Baron. Well, where is the roulette?'
I explained that the roulette tables were in rooms in the Casino. Then followed questions: Were there many of them? Did many people play? Did they play aU day long? How was it arranged? I answered at last that she had much better see all this with her own eyes, and that it was rather difficult to describe it.
'Well, then, take me straight there! You go first, Alexey Ivanovitch!'
'Why, Auntie, don't you really mean to rest after your journey?' the General asked anxiously. He seemed rather flurried, and, indeed, they all seemed embarrassed and were exchanging glances. Probably they all felt it rather risky and, indeed, humihating to accompany Granny to the Casino, where, of course, she might do something eccentric, and in public; at the same time they all proposed to accompany her.
'Why should I rest? I am not tired and, besides, I've been sitting still for three days. And then we will go and see the
springs and medicinal waters; where are they? And then . . . we'll go and see, what was it you said, Praskovya?—peak, wasn't it?'
'Yes, Granny.'
'Well, peak, then, if it is a peak. And what else is there here?'
'There are a great many objects of interest, Granny,' Polina exerted herself to say.
'Why don't you know them! Marfa, you shall come with me, too,' she said, addressing her maid.
'But why should she come?' the General said fussily; 'and in fact it's out of the question, and I doubt whether Potapitch will be admitted into the Casino.'
'What nonsense! Am I to abandon her because she is a servant? She's a human being, too; here we have been on our travels for a week; she wants to have a look at things, too. With whom could she go except me? She wouldn't dare show her nose in the street by herself.'
'But, Granny ...'
'Why, are you ashamed to be with me? Then stay at home; you are not asked. Why, what a General! I am a General's widow myself. And why should you all come trailing after me? I can look at it all with Alexey Ivanovitch.'
But De Grieux insisted that we should all accompany her, and launched out into the most polite phrases about the pleasure of accompanying her, and so on. We all started.
'Elle est fambee en mifanoe,' De Grieux repeated to the General; 'seuk>, elle fera des biUses . . .' I heard nothing more, but he evidently had some design, and, possibly, his hopes had revived.
It was haJf a nule to the Casino. The way was through an avenue of chestnuts to a square, going round which, they came out straight on the Casino. The General was to some extent reassured, for our procession, though somewhat eccentric, was, nevertheless, decorous and presentable. And there was nothing surprising in the fact of an invalid who could not walk putting in an appearance at the Casino; but, anj^way, the General was afraid of the Casino; why should an invaUd unable to walk, and an old lady, too, go into the gambling saloon? Polina and Mile. Blanche walked on each side of the bath-chair. Mile. Blanche laughed, was modestly animated and even sometimes jested very politely with Granny, so much so that the latter spoke of her approvingly at last. Polina, on the other side, was obliged
to be continually answering Granny's innumerable questions, such as: 'Who was that passed? Who was that woman driving past? Is it a big town? Is it a big garden? What are those trees? What's that hill? Do eagles fly here? What is that absurd-looking roof?' Mr. Astley walked beside me and whispered that he expected a great deal from that morning. Pota-pitch and Marfa walked in the background close behind the bath-chair, Potapitch in his swallow- tailed coat and white tie, but with a cap on his head, and Marfa (a red-faced maidservant, forty years old and begirming to turn grey) in a cap, cotton gown, and creaking goatskin slippers. Granny turned to them very often and addressed remarks to them. De Grieux was talking with an air of determination. Probably he was reassuring the General, evidently he was giving him some advice. But Granny had already pronounced the fatal phrase: 'I am not going to give you money.' Perhaps to De Grieux this announcement sounded incredible, but the General knew his
