‘What do you want, my dear friend?’ he asked as he unbuttoned his waistcoat and hiccuped.
‘Choose one of us…’I said, scarcely able to stand on my feet from the rage that had mastered me. ‘Either me or Pshekhotsky! If you don’t promise me that in an hour that scoundrel shall leave your estate, I will never set foot here again! I give you half a minute to make your choice!’
The Count dropped the cigar out of his mouth and spread his arms…
‘What’s the matter with you, Serezha?’ he asked, opening his eyes wide. ‘You look quite wild!’
‘No useless words, if you please! I cannot endure that spy, scoundrel, rogue, your friend Pshekhotsky, and in the name of our close friendship I demand that he leave this place, and instantly, too!’
‘But what has he done to you?’ the Count asked, much agitated. ‘Why are you attacking him?’
‘I ask you again: me or him?’
‘But, golubchek, you are placing me in a horribly awkward position… Stop! There’s a feather on your dress coat! You are demanding the impossible from me!’
‘Goodbye!’ I said. ‘I am no longer acquainted with you.’
And turning sharply on my heel, I went into the anteroom, put on my overcoat, and hastened out of the house. When crossing the garden towards the servants’ quarters, where I wanted to give the order to have my horse put to, I was stopped. Coming towards me with a small cup of coffee in her hand, I was met by Nadia Kalinin. She was also at Urbenin’s wedding, but a sort of undefined fear had forced me to avoid speaking to her, and during the whole day I had not gone up to her, nor said a word to her.
‘Sergey Petrovich!’ she said in an unnaturally deep voice when in passing her I slightly raised my hat. ‘Stop!’
‘What may your commands be?’ I asked, as I came up to her.
‘I have nothing to command… Besides, you are no lackey,’ she said, gazing straight into my eyes and becoming terribly pale. ‘You are hurrying somewhere, but if you have time might I detain you for a moment?’
‘Certainly! There was no need to ask.’
‘In that case let us sit down… Sergey Petrovich,’ she continued, after we had seated ourselves. ‘All this day you have tried to avoid seeing me, and have skirted me as if on purpose, as if you were afraid of meeting me. So I decided to speak to you… I am proud and egoistical… I do not know how to obtrude myself… but once in a lifetime one can sacrifice pride.’
‘To what do you refer?’
I had decided to ask you… the question is humiliating, it is difficult for me… I don’t know how I shall stand it… Answer me without looking at me… Sergey Petrovich, is it possible you are not sorry for me?’
Nadia looked at me and slightly shook her head. Her face became paler. Her upper lip trembled and was drawn to one side.
‘Sergey Petrovich! I always think that… you have been separated from me by some misunderstanding, some caprice… I think if we had an explanation, all would go on as formerly. If I did not think it, I would not have strength to put you the question you are about to hear. Sergey Petrovich, I am unhappy… You must see it… My life is no life… All is dried up… And chiefly… this uncertainty… one does not know, whether to hope or not… Your conduct towards me is so incomprehensible that it is impossible to arrive at any certain conclusion… Tell me, and I shall know what to do… My life will then have an aim… I shall then decide on something.’
‘Nadezhda Nikolaevna, you wish to ask me about something?’ I said, preparing in my mind an answer to the question I had a presentiment was coming.
‘Yes, I want to ask… the question is humiliating… If anybody were listening to us they might think I was obtruding myself - in a word, was behaving like Pushkin’s Tatiana… But this question has been tortured from me…’
The question was really forced from her by torture. When Nadia turned her face towards me to put that question, I became frightened: she trembled, pressed her fingers together convulsively, and uttered with melancholy sadness the fatal words. Her pallor was terrible.
‘May I hope?’ she whispered at last. ‘Do not be afraid to tell me candidly… Whatever the answer may be, it will be better than uncertainty. What is it? May I hope?’
She waited for an answer, but the state of my soul was such that I was incapable of making a sensible response. Drunk, excited by the occurrence in the grotto, enraged by Pshekhotsky’s spying, and Olga’s indecision, and the stupid conversation I had had with the Count, I scarcely heard Nadia.
‘May I hope?’ she repeated. ‘Answer me!’
‘Ach, I can’t answer now, Nadezhda Nikolaevna!’ I said with a wave of the hand as I rose. ‘I am incapable at the present moment of giving any sort of answer. Forgive me, I neither heard nor understood you. I am stupid and excited… It’s really a pity you took the trouble.’
I again waved my hand and left Nadia. It was only afterwards, when I became calm again, that I understood how stupid and cruel I had been in not giving the girl an answer to her simple and ingenuous question. Why did I not answer her?
Now when I can look back dispassionately at the past, I do not explain my cruelty by the condition of my soul. It appears to me that in not giving a straightforward answer I was coquetting and playing the fool. It is difficult to understand the human soul, but it is still more difficult to understand one’s own soul. If I really was playing the fool, may God forgive me. Although to make game of another’s suffering ought not to be forgiven.
CHAPTER XVI
For three days I wandered about my rooms from corner to corner like a wolf in a cage, trying with all the strength of my unstable will to prevent myself from leaving the house. I did not touch the pile of papers that were lying on the table patiently awaiting my attention; I received nobody; I quarrelled with Polycarp; I was irritable… I did not allow myself to go to the Count’s estate, and this obstinacy cost me much nervous exertion. A thousand times I took up my hat and as often threw it down again… Sometimes I decided to defy the whole world and go to Olga, whatever it might cost; at others I took a cold douche of common sense and decided to remain at home…
My reason told me not to go to the Count’s estate. Since I had sworn to the Count never to set foot in his house again, could I sacrifice my self-love and pride? What would that moustachioed coxcomb think if, after our stupid conversation, I went to him as if nothing had happened? Would it not be a confession that I had been in the wrong?
Besides, as an honest man I ought to break off all connection with Olga. All further intercourse with her would only lead to her ruin. She had made a mistake in marrying Urbenin; in falling in love with me she had made another mistake. If she had a secret lover while living with her old husband, would she not be like a depraved doll? To say nothing about how abominable, in principle, such a life is, it was necessary also to think of the consequences.
What a coward I am! I was afraid of the consequences, of the present, of the past… An ordinary man will laugh at my reasoning. He would not have paced from corner to corner, he would not have seized his head in both hands, he would not have made all sorts of plans, but he would have left all to life which grinds into flour even millstones. Life would have digested everything without asking for his aid or permission… But I am fearful almost to cowardice. Pacing from corner to corner, I suffered from compassion for Olga, and at the same time I feared she would understand the proposal I had made her in a moment of passion, and would appear in my house to stay as I had promised her, for ever. What would have