Suddenly the landlady entered to announce a visitor, and also to say that it was neither Tarantiev nor Alexiev.
“Then it must be Schtoltz again!” thought Oblomov, with a sense of horror. “What can he want with me? However, it does not matter.”
“How are you?” inquired Schtoltz when he entered the room. “You have grown stout, yet your face is pale.”
“Yes, I am not well,” agreed Oblomov. “Somehow my left leg has lost all feeling.” Schtoltz threw at him a keen glance, and then eyed the dressing-gown, the curtains, and the coverlet.
“Never mind,” said Oblomov confusedly. “You know that never at any time do I keep my place tidy. But how is Olga?”
“She has not forgotten you. Possibly you will end by forgetting her?”
“No, never! Never could I forget the time when I was really alive and living in Paradise. Where is she, then?”
“In the country.”
“With her aunt?”
“Yes—and also with her husband.”
“So she is married? Has she been married long? And is she happy?” Oblomov had quite sloughed his lethargy. “I feel as though you had removed a great burden from my mind. True, when you were last here, you assured me that she had forgiven me; but all this time I have been unable to rest for the gnawing at my heart.... Tell me who the fortunate man is?”
“Who he is?” repeated Schtoltz. “Why, cannot you guess, Ilya!”
Oblomov’s gaze grew more intent, and for a moment or two his features stiffened, and every vestige of colour left his cheeks.
“Surely it is not yourself?” he asked abruptly.
“It is. I married her last year.”
The agitation faded from Oblomov’s expression, and gave place to his usual apathetic moodiness. For a moment or two he did not raise his eyes; but when he did so they were full of kindly tears.
“Dear Schtoltz!” he cried, embracing his friend. “And dear Olga! May God bless you both! How pleased I am! Pray tell her so.”
“I will tell her that in all the world there exists not my friend Oblomov’s equal.” Schtoltz was profoundly moved.
“No, tell her, rather, that I was fated to meet her, in order that I might set her on the right road. Tell her also that I bless both that meeting and the road which she has now taken. To think that that road might have been different! As it is, I have nothing to blush for, and nothing of which to repent. You have relieved my soul of a great burden, and all within it is bright. I thank you, I thank you!”
“I will tell her what you have said,” replied Schtoltz. “She has indeed reason for never forgetting you, for you would have been worthy of her—yes, worthy of her, you who have a heart as deep as the sea. You must come and visit us in the country.”
“No,” replied the other. “It is not that I am afraid of witnessing your married happiness, or of becoming jealous of her love for you. Yet I will not come.”
“Then of what are you afraid?”
“Of growing envious of you. In your happiness I should see, as in a mirror, my own bitter, broken life. Yet no life but this do I wish, or have it in my power, to live. Do not, therefore, disturb it. Memories are the height of poetry only when they are memories of happiness. When they graze wounds over which scars have formed they become an aching pain. Let us speak of something else. Let me thank you for all the care and attention which you have devoted to my affairs. Yet never can I properly requite you. Seek, rather, requital in your own heart, and in your happiness with Olga Sergievna. Likewise, forgive me for having failed to relieve you of your duties with regard to Oblomovka. It is my fixed intention to go there before long.”
“You will find great changes occurred in the place. Doubtless you have read the statements of accounts which I have sent you?”
Oblomov remained silent.
“What? You have not read them?” exclaimed Schtollz, aghast. “Then where are they?”
“I do not know. Wait a little, and I will look for them after dinner.”
“Ah, Ilya, Ilya! Scarcely do I know whether to laugh or to weep.”
“Never mind. We will attend to the affair after dinner. First let us eat.”
During the meal Oblomov bestowed high encomiums upon his landlady’s cooking.
“She looks after everything,” he said. “Never will you see me either with unmended socks or with a shirt turned inside out. She supervises every detail.”
He ate and drank with great gusto—so much so that Schtoltz contemplated him with amazement.
“Drink, dear friend, drink,” said Oblomov. “This is splendid vodka. Even Olga could not make vodka or patties or mushroom stews equal to these. They are like what we used to have at Oblomovka. No man could be better looked after by a woman than I am by my landlady, Agafia Matvievna. Nevertheless I, I———” He hesitated.
“Well, what?” prompted Schtoltz.
“I owe her ten thousand roubles on note of hand.”
“Ten thousand roubles? To your landlady? For board and lodging?” gasped Schtoltz, horrified.
“Yes. You see, the sum has gone on accumulating, for I live generously, and the debt includes accounts for peaches, pineapples, and so forth.”
“Ilya,” said Schtoltz, “what is this woman to you?”
The other made no reply.
“She is robbing him,” thought his friend. “She is wheedling his all out of him. Such things are everyday, occurrences, yet I had not guessed it.”
Desirous of taking Oblomov away with him, he nevertheless found all his efforts in that direction ineffectual.
“I ask you once again,” he said. “In what relation do you stand to your landlady?”
Again Oblomov reddened.
“Why are you desirous of knowing?” he countered.
“Because, on the score of our old friendship, I think it my duty to give you a very serious warning indeed.”
“A warning against what?”
“A warning against a pit into which you may fall, Now I must be going. I will tell Olga that we may expect to see you this summer whether at our place or at Oblomovka.”
Then Schtoltz departed.
Not for some years did he visit the capital again, for Olga’s health necessitated a lengthy sojourn in the Crimea. For some reason or other her recovery after the birth of a child had been slow.
“How happy I am!” was her frequent reflection. Yet, no sooner had she passed her life in admiring review than she would find herself relapsing into a meditative mood. What a curious person she was!—a person who, in proportion as her felicity became more, complete, plunged ever deeper and deeper into a brooding over the past! Delving mto the recesses of her own mind, she began to realize that this peaceful existence, this halting at various stages of felicity, annoyed her. However, with an effort of will she shook her soul clear of this despondency, and quickened her steps through life in a feverish desire