Smoke (Alma Classics) Page 15

  Kapitolina Markovna sank down on to the seat. Tatyana sat down beside her. Litvinov remained on the path. Between him and Tatyana something unconscious and gradual was happening – or was this merely a figment of his imagination?

  “Oh, she’s a clown, a clown,” said Kapitolina Markovna, shaking her head regretfully. “If you could see her outfit – it would feed not ten but a hundred families. Did you see, under her hat, in her red hair, there were diamonds. Diamonds during the day, eh!”

  “Her hair isn’t red,” observed Litvinov. “She dyes it red. It’s the fashion now.”

  Kapitolina Markovna again wrung her hands and even became thoughtful.

  “Well,” she said, finally, “back in Dresden things haven’t gone to such scandalous lengths. After all, it’s farther from Paris. You share my opinion, don’t you, Grigory Mikhailovich?”

  “Me?” Litvinov replied, while thinking: “What is she talking about? Me? Of course, of course.”

  But then the sound of deliberate footsteps was heard and Potugin approached the seat.

  “Hello, Grigory Mikhailovich,” he said, laughing and nodding his head.

  Litvinov at once seized him by the arm.

  “Hello, hello, Sozont Ivanovich. I think I saw you with… within the last few minutes, here, in the avenue.”

  “Yes, it was me.”

  Potugin bowed respectfully to the seated ladies.

  “Allow me to introduce you, Sozont Ivanovich. My very good friends, relatives of mine, just arrived in Baden. Potugin, Sozont Ivanovich, our compatriot, also a visitor to Baden.”

  Both ladies rose slightly from their seat. Potugin renewed his bows.

  “It’s a regular get-together here,” Kapitolina Markovna began in a shrill voice; the good-hearted spinster was easily intimidated, but tried more than anything else to preserve her dignity. “Everyone thinks it their pleasant duty to be here.”

  “Baden is indeed a pleasant place,” Potugin replied, giving Tatyana a sideways look. “Baden is a pleasant place.”

  “Yes, only rather too aristocratic, as far as I can judge. She and I have been living in Dresden all this time – a very interesting time. But here they’re having a real get-together.”

  “She likes the phrase,” thought Potugin. “You’ve been pleased to make that entirely justified observation,” he said aloud. “On the other hand, Nature really is amazing round here and the location such as one rarely finds anywhere else. Your companion must particularly appreciate this. Is that not so, Mademoiselle?” he added, this time turning directly to Tatyana.

  Tatyana raised her large, clear eyes to Potugin. It seemed she was uncertain what was wanted of her and why Litvinov had, on the first day of her visit, introduced her to this stranger, who had, however, a kind, intelligent face and regarded her in a friendly, welcoming manner.

  “Yes,” she said finally, “it is nice here.”

  “You must visit the Old Castle,” Potugin went on, “and I particularly recommend you to go to the Yberg.*

  “Saxon Switzerland,”* began Kapitolina Markovna.

  The sound of a fanfare rolled along the avenue; it was the Prussian army band from Rastatt (in 1862 Rastatt was still an allied fortress)* beginning its weekly concert in the Pavilion. Kapitolina Markovna immediately rose to her feet.

  “Music!” she said. “Music à la Conversation. We must go there. After all, it’s past three o’clock now, isn’t it? Are society people assembling now?”

  “Yes,” replied Potugin, “now is the most fashionable hour for society people, and the music is splendid.”

  “Well then, there’s no point in dallying. Tanya, let’s go.”

  “Will you allow me to accompany you?” asked Potugin, to Litvinov’s considerable surprise. It could never have entered his head that Potugin had been sent by Irina. Kapitolina Markovna smiled broadly.

  “With great pleasure, Monsieur… Monsieur…”

  Potugin prompted her with his name and offered his arm.

  Litvinov gave his arm to Tatyana and both couples set off towards the Konversationshaus. Potugin continued his discussion with Kapitolina Markovna, but Litvinov walked along without saying a word and merely, on two or three occasions, and for no particular reason, gave a wry smile and lightly squeezed Tatyana’s arm. There was deception in these squeezes, to which Tatyana did not respond, and Litvinov was conscious of this deception. They did not express the mutual trust in the close union of two intertwined souls, as had been the case before; for the time being they replaced the words he could not find. The silence which had grown between them was growing and gaining strength. Tatyana again looked at him attentively, almost fixedly.

  The same thing continued in front of the Konversationshaus, at the table at which all four had seated themselves, the only difference being that, what with the bustle of the crowd and the roar and crash of the music, Litvinov’s silence now seemed more understandable. Kapitolina Markovna was, as they say, in a high state of excitement; Potugin was scarcely able to humour her and satisfy her curiosity. Fortunately for him, among the crowds of passers-by, there suddenly appeared the thin figure of Sukhanchikova, with her flashing, ever-flitting eyes. Kapitolina Markovna immediately recognized her, called her over to their table and sat her down. There arose a verbal storm.

  Potugin turned to Tatyana and began to chat to her in a quiet, gentle voice, with a kindly expression on his slightly inclined face. She, to her own amazement, answered easily and fluently; she enjoyed speaking with this outsider, with this stranger, while Litvinov sat motionless, as before, with the same fixed, unpleasant smile on his lips.

  At last dinner time arrived. The music ceased and the crowd began to disperse. Kapitolina Markovna took a heartfelt leave of Sukhanchikova, for whom she had conceived a high regard, although she afterwards told her niece that she was a very embittered person; on the other hand, she knew everything about everybody. And they really had to get the sewing machines going as soon as the wedding was over. Potugin took his leave and Litvinov conducted the ladies home. At the entrance to the hotel he was handed a note; he moved to one side and hurriedly tore open the envelope. On a small scrap of vellum the following words had been scribbled in pencil: “Come and see me for a minute this evening, at seven o’clock, I beg you. Irina.” Litvinov stuffed the paper into his pocket and, turning round, again gave a wry smile – to whom? Why? Tatyana was standing with her back to him. Dinner was being taken at a communal table. Litvinov sat between Kapitolina Markovna and Tatyana and, having become somehow strangely animated, conversed, told anecdotes and poured out wine for himself and the ladies. He was behaving in such a relaxed manner that a French infantry officer from Strasbourg, with an imperial beard and a moustache à la Napoleon III, who was sitting opposite, found it impossible to intervene in the conversation and even finished with a toast à la santé des belles Moscovites.* After dinner, Litvinov accompanied both ladies to their rooms and, after standing by the window for a while with furrowed brow, suddenly announced that he had to leave them for a short time, but would definitely be back by the evening. Tatyana said nothing, turned pale and lowered her eyes. Kapitolina Markovna was in the habit of sleeping after dinner. Tatyana knew that Litvinov was aware of her aunt’s habit and thought he would take advantage of it to stay, since from the time of her arrival he had not been alone with her and had not spoken openly with her. And here he was going away! What sense could she make of it? And in general, his whole demeanour throughout the day…

  Litvinov made haste to get away without waiting for objections; Kapitolina Markovna lay down on the sofa and, having groaned and sighed a time or two, fell quietly asleep, while Tatyana withdrew into a corner and sat down in an armchair, her arms folded across her breast.

  19

  Litvinov quickly climbed the staircase of the Hôtel de l’Europe. A girl of about thirteen, with a cunning Kalmuck face, who had clear
ly been on the lookout for him, stopped him, saying in Russian: “Please, this way. Irina Pavlovna will be here presently.” He looked at her in amazement. She smiled, repeated: “Please, please,” and led him into a small room which lay opposite Irina’s bedroom and was filled with travelling trunks and cases. She herself disappeared at once, gently pulling the door to. Litvinov did not have time to look round before the same door burst open and Irina appeared, wearing a pink ball gown, with pearls in her hair and round her neck. She rushed up to him, seized him by both hands and remained silent for several moments. Her eyes were shining and her bosom heaving, as if she had just run up a hill.

  “I could not receive… you there,” she began in a hurried whisper. “We’re just going to a dinner, but I wanted to see you without fail. Was that your fiancée who was with you when I met you today?”

  “Yes, it was my fiancée,” said Litvinov, emphasizing the word was.

  “So I wanted to see you for a minute to tell you that you must consider yourself perfectly free, that everything that happened yesterday must not change your decision in the slightest.”

  “Irina!” cried Litvinov. “Why do you say that?”

  He uttered these words in a loud voice; they sounded full of passion. Irina closed her eyes involuntarily for a second.

  “Oh, my dear,” she continued in an even lower whisper, but with unrestrained eagerness, “you don’t know how much I love you. Yesterday I merely paid my debt and erased past guilt. Oh, I was not able to give you my youth, as I would have liked, but I placed no obligations on you, did not release you from any promise. My dear, do what you want. You’re as free as air and bound by nothing. Remember that!”

  “I cannot live without you, Irina,” Litvinov interjected, almost in a whisper. “Since yesterday I’m yours for ever and always. Only at your feet can I breathe…”

  With a tremor he fell into her arms.

  Irina looked down at his bowed head.

  “Well, remember this too. I also am ready for anything. I will not spare anyone or anything. I am also for ever… yours.”

  There was a cautious knock at the door. Irina bent down and again whispered: “Yours. Goodbye!” Litvinov felt her breath and the touch of her lips on his hair. When he stood up, she was no longer in the room. All that could be heard was the rustle of her dress in the corridor and, at a distance, the voice of Ratmirov saying; “Eh bien! Vous ne venez pas?”*

  Litvinov sat down on a tall travelling trunk and covered his face. The scent of woman, exquisite and fresh, wafted over him… Irina had held his hands in hers. “It’s too much… too much,” he thought. The girl came into the room and, again smiling in response to his anxious glance, said: “Please go, sir, while…” He stood up and left the hotel. There was no question of returning to his rooms immediately; he had to collect himself. His heartbeat was pronounced and irregular; the earth seemed to be moving slightly beneath his feet. Litvinov again set off along the Lichtentaler Allee. He realized that the decisive moment had come, that to postpone things further, to hide, to turn away, was becoming impossible, that an explanation with Tatyana was inevitable. He imagined her sitting there motionless, waiting for him. He had a presentiment of what he would say to her. But how to set about it? How to begin? He dismissed all thought of a correct, well-ordered future. He knew that he was hurtling head first into a whirlpool which he ought not even to contemplate. But it was not that which disconcerted him. That business was over, but how was he to face his judge? And if only his judge – an angel with a flaming sword – would meet him, it would be easier for his delinquent heart. As it was, he would have to plunge the knife in himself… How hideous! But to go back, to abandon that other course, to take advantage of the freedom he was promised, which was acknowledged as his due… No! Better to die! No, he did not need that loathsome freedom. Better grovel in the dust than that those eyes might look down on him with love.

  “Grigory Mikhailovich!” said a melancholy voice, and a hand was laid heavily on Litvinov. He looked round with some trepidation and saw Potugin.

  “Excuse me, Grigory Mikhailovich,” the latter began with his customary grimace, “perhaps I’ve disturbed you, but when I saw you in the distance I thought… However, if you find my presence inconvenient…”

  “On the contrary, I’m very glad to see you,” said Litvinov through gritted teeth.

  Potugin began to walk alongside him.

  “A fine evening!” he began. “So warm! Have you been walking for long?”

  “No, not long.”

  “Why do I ask? I saw you were coming from the Hôtel de l’Europe.”

  “So you were following me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Have you got something to say to me?”

  “Yes,” Potugin repeated, barely audibly.

  Litvinov halted and looked at his uninvited interlocutor. Potugin’s face was pale and his eyes were wandering. Old, long-standing grief seemed to suffuse his contorted features.

  “What do you actually want to say to me?” said Litvinov slowly, again moving onwards.

  “Allow me. In one second. If it’s all the same to you, let’s sit down for a while on this seat. It’ll be more comfortable here.”

  “So it’s something mysterious,” said Litvinov, sitting down beside him. “You don’t seem yourself, Sozont Ivanovich.”

  “No, I’m all right. And there’s nothing mysterious. Actually I wanted to convey to you the impression which your fiancée made on me. She is your fiancée, I take it. Anyway, the girl to whom you introduced me today. I must say that never in my life have I met a nicer person. She has a heart of gold and a truly angelic soul.”

  Potugin uttered these words with the same bitter and mournful air, and Litvinov could not fail to notice the strange contradiction between his facial expression and his words.

  “Your assessment of Tatyana Petrovna is quite correct,” Litvinov began, “although I cannot but be surprised, firstly that you know my relationship to her and, secondly, how quickly you have sized her up. She does indeed have an angelic soul. But allow me to ask, what was it that you wished to talk to me about?”

  “It is impossible not to size her up immediately,” replied Potugin, as if evading the last question. “One look into her eyes is enough. She deserves all possible earthly happiness, and envious is the lot of the man to whom it falls to bring her that happiness! It is to be hoped that he turns out to be worthy of his lot.”

  Litvinov frowned slightly.

  “Allow me to say, Sozont Ivanovich,” he said, “I confess I find our conversation in general somewhat original… I would like to know whether the hint contained in your words relates to me.”

  Potugin did not answer at once; he was clearly struggling with himself.

  “Grigory Mikhailovich,” he began at last, “unless I am completely mistaken in you, you are capable of hearing the truth from whomsoever it comes and in whatever unsightly disguise it appears. I’ve just told you I saw where you were coming from.”

  “Well, yes, from the Hôtel de l’Europe. What of it?”

  “I know who you went to see there.”

  “What?”

  “You went to see Madame Ratmirova.”

  “Well, yes, I did visit her. And then?”

  “And then? You, the fiancé of Tatyana Petrovna, have visited Madame Ratmirova, whom you love and who loves you!”

  Litvinov instantly rose from his seat; the blood was pounding in his head.

  “What is this?” he said finally, in an angry voice. “A feeble joke? Are you spying on me? Please explain yourself.”

  Potugin cast a doleful glance at him.

  “Oh, please don’t be offended by my words, Grigory Mikhailovich. After all, you cannot offend me. That’s not why I spoke to you and I don’t feel like joking now.”

  “Maybe, maybe. I’m prepared to believe in
the purity of your intentions. All the same, I will permit myself the question: by what right do you meddle in another man’s domestic affairs and emotional life? On what basis do you pass off your dreamt-up notions as the truth?”

  “If I had dreamt this up you would not have got angry! And as for rights: I’ve never heard of anyone asking themselves whether or not they have the right to extend a hand to a drowning man.”

  “I humbly thank you for your concern,” Litvinov replied angrily, “but I don’t need it, and all those phrases prepared by society ladies for inexperienced youths about the immorality of high society and so on I consider to be just that – phrases – and, in a certain sense, I even despise them. I therefore ask you not to burden your hand of salvation and allow me to drown in peace.”

  Potugin again raised his eyes to Litvinov. His breathing was laboured and his lips twitched. Finally he beat his breast and burst forth with the words: “But look at me, young man. Do I look like a run-of-the-mill, self-satisfied moralist or preacher? Surely you realize that out of mere sympathy for you, however strong, I would never have let slip a word, would never have given you the right to reproach me with what is most hateful to me – immodesty and importunity. Surely you can see that the situation is completely different, that before you is a man shattered, destroyed, comprehensively annihilated by the very same feelings from the consequences of which he would like to safeguard you – and for the same woman.”

  Litvinov took a step backwards.

  “Is it possible? What did you say? You… you… Sozont Ivanovich. But Madame Belskaya… that child…”

  “Oh! Do not question me. Believe me! It is a dark and terrible story, which I won’t relate to you. I scarcely knew Madame Belskaya. The child is not mine; I took everything on myself, because… because she wanted it, because she needed it. Why else would I be here, in your ghastly Baden. And finally, do you really suppose, could you have imagined for a single minute, that I decided to warn you out of sympathy for you? I am sorry for that good, kind girl, your fiancée, yet what interest do I have in your future, in the two of you? But I fear for her… for her.”