_ CHAPTER XXV
Two days later, Maria Dmitrievna arrived at Vasilievskoe, according to her promise, and all her young people with her. The little girls immediately ran into the garden, but Maria Dmitrievna languidly walked through the house, and languidly praised all she saw. She looked upon her visit to Lavretsky as a mark of great condescension, almost a benevolent action. She smiled affably when Anton and Apraxia came to kiss her hand, according to the old custom of household serfs, and in feeble accents she asked for tea.
To the great vexation of Anton, who had donned a pair of knitted white gloves, it was not he who handed the tea to the lady visitor, but Lavretsky's hired lackey, a fellow who, in the old man's opinion, had not a notion of etiquette. However, Anton had it all his own way at dinner. With firm step, he took up his position behind Madame Kalitine's chair, and he refused to give up his post to any one. The apparition of visitors at Vasilievskoe--a sight for so many years unknown there--both troubled and cheered the old man. It was a pleasure for him to see that his master was acquainted with persons of some standing in society.
Anton was not the only person who was agitated that day. Lemm was excited too. He had put on a shortish snuff-colored coat with pointed tails, and had tied his cravat tight, he coughed incessantly, and made way for every one with kindly and affable mien. As for Lavretsky, he remarked with satisfaction that he remained on the same friendly footing with Liza as before. As soon as she arrived she cordially held out her hand to him.
After dinner, Lemm took a small roll of music-paper out of the tail-pocket of his coat, into which he had been constantly putting his hand, and silently, with compressed lips, placed it upon the piano. It contained a romance, which he had written the day before to some old-fashioned German words, in which mention was made of the stars. Liza immediately sat down to the piano, and interpreted the romance. Unfortunately the music turned out to be confused and unpleasantly constrained. It was evident that the composer had attempted to express some deep and passionate idea, but no result had been attained. The attempt remained an attempt, and nothing more. Both Lavretsky and Liza felt this, and Lemm was conscious of it too. Without saying a word, he put his romance back into his pocket; and, in reply to Liza's proposal to play it over again, he merely shook his head, and said, in a tone of meaning, "For the present--_basta_!" then bent his head, stooped his shoulders, and left the room.
Towards evening they all went out together to fish. In the little lake at the end of the garden there were numbers of carp and groundling. Madame Kalitine had an arm-chair set in the shade for her, near the edge of the water, and a carpet was spread out under her feet. Anton, as an old fisherman of great experience, offered her his services. Zealously did he fasten on the worms, slap them with his hand, and spit upon them, and then fling the line into the water himself, gracefully bending forwards the whole of his body. Maria Dmitrievna had already that day spoken about him to Fedor Ivanovich, using the following phrase of Institute-French:--"_Il n'y a plus maintenant de ces gens comme ca autre fois_."
Lemm and the two little girls went on to the dam at the end of the lake. Lavretsky placed himself near Liza. The fish kept continually nibbling. Every minute a captured carp glistened in the air with its sometimes golden, sometimes silver, sides. The little girls kept up a ceaseless flow of joyful exclamations. Madame Kalitine herself two or three times uttered a plaintive cry. Lavretsky and Liza caught fewer fish than the others; probably because they paid less attention to their fishing, and let their floats drift up against the edge of the lake. The tall, reddish reeds murmured quietly around them; in front quietly shone the unruffled water, and the conversation they carried on was quiet too.
Liza stood on the little platform [placed there for the use of the washerwomen;] Lavretsky sat on the bent stem of a willow. Liza wore a white dress, fastened round the waist by a broad, white ribbon. From one hand hung her straw hat; with the other she, not without some effort, supported her drooping fishing-rod. Lavretsky gazed at her pure, somewhat severe profile--at the hair turned back behind her ears--at her soft cheeks, the hue of which was like that of a young child's--and thought: "How charming you look, standing there by my lake!" Liza did not look at him, but kept her eyes fixed on the water, something which might be a smile lurking about their corners. Over both Lavretsky and Liza fell the shadow of a neighboring lime-tree.
"Do you know," he began, "I have thought a great deal about our last conversation, and I have come to this conclusion, that you are exceedingly good."
"It certainly was not with that intention that I--" replied Liza, and became greatly confused.
"You are exceedingly good," repeated Lavretsky. "I am a rough-hewn man; but I feel that every one must love you. There is Lemm, for instance: he's simply in love with you."
Liza's eyebrows did not exactly frown, but they quivered. This always happened with her when she heard anything she did not like.
"I felt very sorry for him to-day, with his unsuccessful romance," continued Lavretsky. "To be young and to want knowledge--that is bearable. But to have grown old and to fail in strength--that is indeed heavy. And the worst of it is, that one doesn't know when one's strength has failed. To an old man such blows are hard to bear. Take care! you've a bite--I hear," continued Lavretsky, after a short pause, "That M. Panshine has written a very charming romance."
"Yes," replied Liza, "it is a small matter; but it isn't bad."
"But what is your opinion about him himself?" asked Lavretsky. "Is he a good musician?"
"I think he has considerable musical faculty. But as yet he has not cultivated it as he ought."
"Just so. But is he a good man?"
Liza laughed aloud, and looked up quickly at Fedor Ivanovich.
"What a strange question!" she exclaimed, withdrawing her line from the water, and then throwing it a long way in again.
"Why strange? I ask you about him as one who has been away from here a long time--as a relation."
"As a relation?"
"Yes. I believe I am a sort of uncle of yours."
"Vladimir Nikolaevich has a good heart," said Liza. "He is clever. Mamma likes him very much."
"But you--do you like him?"
"He is a good man. Why shouldn't I like him?"
"Ah!" said Lavretsky, and became silent. A half-sad, half-mocking expression played upon his face. The fixed look with which he regarded her troubled Liza; but she went on smiling.
"Well, may God grant them happiness!" he murmured at last, as if to himself, and turned away his head.
Liza reddened.
"You are wrong, Fedor Ivanovich," she said; "you are wrong in thinking--But don't you like Vladimir Ivanovich?" she asked suddenly.
"No."
"Why?"
"I think he has no heart."
The smile disappeared from Liza's lips.
"You are accustomed to judge people severely," she said, after a long silence.
"I don't think so. What right have I to judge others severely, I should like to know, when I stand in need of indulgence myself? Or have you forgotten that it is only lazy people who do not mock me? But tell me," he added, "have you kept your promise?"
"What promise?"
"Have you prayed for me?"
"Yes, I prayed for you; and I pray every day. But please do not talk lightly about that."
Lavretsky began to assure Liza that he had never dreamt of doing so--that he profoundly respected all convictions. After that he took to talking about religion, about its significance in the history of humanity, of the meaning of Christianity.
"One must be a Christian," said Liza, not without an effort, "not in order to recognize what is heavenly, or what is earthly, but because every one must die."
With an involuntary movement of surprise, Lavretsky raised his eyes to Liza's, and met her glance.
"What does that phrase of yours mean?" he said.
"It is not my phrase," she replied.
"Not yours? But why did you speak about death?"
"I don't know. I often think about it."
"Often?"
"Yes."
"One wouldn't say so, looking at you now. Your face seems so happy, so bright, and you smile--"
"Yes. I feel very happy now," replied Liza simply.
Lavretsky felt inclined to seize both her hands and press them warmly.
"Liza, Liza!" cried Madame Kalitine, "come here and see what a carp I have caught."
"Yes, mamma," answered Liza, and went to her.
But Lavretsky remained sitting on his willow stem.
"I talk to her just as if I still had an interest in life," he thought.
Liza had hung up her hat on a bough when she went away. It was with a strange and almost tender feeling that Lavretsky looked at the hat, and at its long, slightly rumpled ribbons.
Liza soon came back again and took up her former position on the platform.
"Why do you think that Vladimir Nikolaevich has no heart?" she asked, a few minutes afterwards.
"I have already told you that I may be mistaken. However, time will reveal all."
Liza became contemplative. Lavretsky began to talk about his mode of life al Vasilievskoe, about Mikhalevich, about Anton. He felt compelled to talk to Liza, to communicate to her all that went on in his heart. And she listened to him so attentively, with such kindly interest; the few remarks and answers she made appeared to him so sensible and so natural. He even told her so.
Liza was astonished. "Really?" she said. "As for me, I thought I was like my maid, Nastasia, and had no words 'of my own.' She said one day to her betrothed, 'You will be sure to be bored with me. You talk to me so beautifully about every thing, but I have no words of my own.'"
"Heaven be praised!" thought Lavretsky. _