The Steppe and Other Stories, 1887-91

The Name-day Party

I

After the eight-course feast, with its interminable conversation, Olga Mikhaylovna went out into the garden. They were celebrating her husband’s name-day, and she was completely exhausted by her duty to keep smiling and talking, by the clatter of dishes, by the servants’ stupidity, by the long breaks during the meal and by the corset she had put on to conceal her pregnancy from the guests. She wanted to get right away from the house, to sit in the shade and to relax by thinking about the child that was due in about two months’ time. She was always prone to thoughts like these whenever she turned left from the main avenue into the narrow path. Here, in the dense shade of plum and cherry trees, dry branches scratched her shoulders and neck, cobwebs brushed her face while she conjured up visions of a small creature of indeterminate sex, with vague features. And then she would feel that it was not the cobwebs but the tiny creature that was affectionately tickling her face and neck. When the thin wattle fence appeared at the bottom of the path, and beyond it the pot-bellied hives with earthenware roofs, when the motionless, stagnant air became filled with the scent of hay and honey and she could hear the gentle buzzing of bees, that tiny creature would take complete possession of her. She would sit pondering on a bench near the plaited osier hut.

This time too she walked as far as the bench, sat down and began to think. But instead of that tiny creature it was the big people she had only just left who filled her mind. She was deeply worried that she, the hostess, had abandoned her guests, and she remembered her husband Pyotr Dmitrich’s and Uncle Nikolay Nikolaich’s arguments over lunch about trial by jury, the press, and women’s education. As usual, her husband had argued to flaunt his conservative views in front of the guests, but mainly so that he could disagree with her uncle, whom he disliked. But her uncle contradicted him, finding fault with every word to prove to the assembled guests that, despite his fifty-nine years, he, her uncle, still preserved the mental agility and liveliness of a young man. By the end of the dinner Olga herself could stand it no longer and began a clumsy defence of higher education for women – not because any defence was necessary, but simply to annoy her husband, whom she thought had been unfair. The guests found this argument very tiresome, but felt that they should intervene and make endless comments, although not one of them cared a scrap about trial by jury or women’s education.

Olga was sitting on the near side of the wattle fence, just by the hut. The sun lay hidden behind clouds, the trees and air had a gloomy look, as though it was going to rain; but it was still hot and humid. The sad-looking hay that had been cut under the trees on St Peter’s Eve remained ungathered. With its withered, many-coloured flowers, it gave off an oppressive, sickly scent. Everything was quiet. Beyond the fence bees buzzed monotonously.

Suddenly there was the unexpected sound of footsteps and voices. Someone was coming down the path towards the beehives.

‘It’s so close!’ a woman’s voice came. ‘What do you think, is it or isn’t it going to rain?’

‘It is, my treasure, but not before tonight,’ languidly answered a very familiar male voice. ‘We’re in for quite a shower.’

Olga reasoned that if she quickly hid in the hut they would move on without seeing her and she would not have to talk or force a smile. She gathered in her skirts, stooped and went inside. Her face, neck and arms were immediately immersed in air as hot and humid as steam. But for the humidity, the stifling smell of rye, dill and osiers that quite took her breath away, this thatched hut with its dim interior would have made the perfect hiding-place from her guests, where she could think about that little creature. It was cosy and quiet.

‘What a lovely spot!’ a female voice said. ‘Let’s sit down here, Pyotr.’

Olga peered through a chink between two osier plaits and saw her husband Pyotr with one of the guests, Lyubochka Sheller, a seventeen-year-old girl just out of boarding-school. With his hat pushed over the back of his head, and feeling heavy and lazy from too much wine, Pyotr sauntered along by the fence, kicking some hay into a little heap. Pink from the heat and pretty as ever, Lyubochka was standing with her hands behind her back watching the languid movements of his large, handsome body.

Olga knew that her husband was attractive to women and she did not like to see him with them. There was nothing really remarkable in Pyotr’s lazily kicking hay into a pile on which he and Lyubochka could sit down and indulge in idle gossip; nor was there anything really noteworthy in the fact that pretty Lyubochka was looking at him so sweetly. Yet Olga felt annoyed with her husband and both frightened and pleased at the thought of being an eavesdropper.

‘Sit down, my enchantress,’ Pyotr said as he sank on to the hay and stretched himself. ‘That’s it. Now, tell me something interesting.’

‘Well, really! You’ll only fall asleep as soon as I start.’

‘Fall asleep? Allah forbid. How could I fall asleep with such pretty little eyes looking at me?’

There was nothing remarkable, either, in her husband’s words, in his sprawling over the hay in the presence of a lady, with his hat pushed over the back of his neck. Women had spoilt him – he knew that they were attracted to him and he had developed a special tone when talking to them, which, as everyone said, suited him. He was behaving towards Lyubochka as with any other woman. But Olga was jealous all the same.

‘Please tell me,’ Lyubochka said after a brief silence, ‘if it’s true what they say, that you’re facing prosecution.’

‘Me? Yes, it’s true, I’m now looked upon as one of the criminal fraternity, my precious.’

‘But why?’

‘For nothing at all… it was mainly… it’s mainly because of something to do with politics,’ Pyotr said, yawning. ‘It’s the struggle between Left and Right. I’m a reactionary old stick-in-the-mud and I was bold enough to use – in official communications – expressions that such infallible Gladstones as our local Justice of the Peace Kuzma Grigoryevich Vostryakov (and Vladimir Pavlovich Vladimirov too) found offensive.’

Pyotr yawned again and went on, ‘In this society of ours you may disapprove of the sun, the moon or anything you like, but God help you if you say anything about liberals! Liberals are like that toadstool over there – if you touch it accidentally it will shower you with clouds of dust.’

‘What happened to you, then?’

‘Nothing much; it was all a storm in a teacup. Some wretched schoolmaster – a loathsome type of clerical origin – filed a suit before our J.P., Vostryakov, against an innkeeper for slander and assault in a public place. According to the facts, both schoolmaster and innkeeper were blind drunk, both behaved equally nastily. Even if there had been a case to answer, both parties were at fault anyway. Vostryakov should have fined both of them for breach of the peace and thrown them out of court – and that would have been the end of the matter. But we don’t do things that way! We always want to classify, to stick labels on people – the individual and facts take second place. However terrible a scoundrel your schoolmaster may be, he’s bound to be right, for the simple fact that he’s a schoolmaster. But innkeepers are always in the wrong just because they’re innkeepers – they always grab what they can. Vostryakov sentenced the innkeeper to a term in prison, the innkeeper appealed to the Assizes who solemnly upheld Vostryakov’s verdict. Well, I spoke my mind… got rather worked up about it… that’s all.’

Pyotr spoke calmly, with a casual irony, but in fact he was terribly worried about the impending trial. Olga remembered how he had come back from those ill-fated proceedings and had tried desperately to conceal his despondency and feeling of dissatisfaction with himself from the servants. Being an intelligent man, he could not help thinking that he had gone too far in expressing disagreement – and how he had been forced to prevaricate to hide this feeling from himself and others! How many futile discussions had taken place, how much grumbling and forced laughter at things that were not at all funny! And when he learned that he had to stand trial, he had suddenly become weary and dejected, and begun to sleep badly and taken to standing by the window more often, drumming his fingers on the panes. He was too ashamed to admit to his wife that he was feeling depressed, and this had annoyed her.

‘I hear you’ve been away, in Poltava,’ Lyubochka said.

‘Yes,’ Pyotr replied. ‘I got back two days ago.’

‘I bet it was very nice there.’

‘Yes, it was nice, very nice in fact. I must tell you, I happened to arrive just in time for the haymaking, which is the most idyllic time of year in the Ukraine. Here we have a large house, with a large garden, but what with all these servants, all the rushing around, it’s quite impossible to see any haymaking. But on my farm down in the Ukraine forty acres of meadow open out before your eyes, you can see reapers from every window. There’s mowing in the meadows and the garden, there’s no visitors, none of this rushing around, so you just can’t help seeing, hearing and feeling anything but haymaking. There’s the smell of hay outdoors and in, scythes clatter away from dawn to dusk. The dear old Ukraine’s a charming country, really. Believe me, when I drank water at those wells with their sweeps and filthy vodka at Jewish taverns, when the sound of Ukrainian fiddles and tambourines wafted over to me on calm evenings – then I was tempted by the enchanting thought of settling down on my farm and living a life miles away from these Assizes, smart conversations, philosophizing women and interminable dinners.’

Pyotr was not lying. He had been feeling depressed and he was really dying to get away from it all. He had gone to Poltava only to escape from his study, the servants, his friends and everything that would remind him of his wounded pride and his mistakes.

Lyubochka suddenly leapt up and waved her arms in horror.

‘Oh, a bee, a bee!’ she screamed. ‘It’s going to sting me!’

‘Don’t be silly, of course it’s not!’ Pyotr said. ‘What a little coward you are!’

‘No, no, it’s going to!’ Lyubochka cried, looking round at the bee as she quickly made her escape.

Pyotr followed her, his feeling of tenderness mingled with sadness as he watched her go. Looking at her he must have thought of his farm in the south, of solitude and – who knows? – perhaps he was even thinking how warm and snug life on his farm would be if that young, pure, fresh girl who was unspoilt by higher education, who was not pregnant, had been his wife…

When the voices and footsteps died away, Olga left the hut and set off towards the house. She wanted to cry and by now felt extremely jealous. She understood how tired Pyotr was, that he was dissatisfied with himself and ashamed; and people who are ashamed always avoid close friends more than anyone else and open their hearts only to strangers. She also understood that Lyubochka, like all those other women now drinking coffee in the house, posed no threat to her. But it was all so incomprehensible, so frightening, and Olga had now come to feel that Pyotr only half belonged to her.

‘He has no right,’ she muttered, trying to find the reason for her jealousy and her annoyance with her husband. ‘No right at all. I’m going to let him know where he stands. This instant!’

She decided to find her husband right away and tell him the facts of the matter. The way he attracted women and sought their approval, as though it was a gift from heaven, was unspeakably degrading. He was behaving dishonourably when he gave perfect strangers what by right belonged to his wife, when he hid his heart and conscience from her and bared them to the first pretty face that came along. What had she done wrong? Finally, she was sick and tired of his lying. He was perpetually posing, flirting, saying what he did not mean and trying to appear other than he really was or should have been. What was the point of this prevarication? Was that sort of thing right for a respectable man? His lying was an insult to himself and to those to whom he dissimulated; and he did not care what kind of lies he told. If he could keep posing, showing off at the Bench, expatiating at dinner about the prerogatives of power just to spite her uncle, couldn’t he see that it only went to show that he did not give a damn for the court, for himself or for anyone listening to him or watching?

As she came out on to the main avenue Olga tried to give the impression she was performing some domestic duty. The men were drinking liqueurs and eating soft fruit on the terrace. One of them, the examining magistrate, a stout, elderly gentleman, a clown and wit, must have been telling some rather risqué story since he suddenly pressed his hands to his fat lips when he saw the mistress of the house and sat back in his chair, eyes goggling. Olga did not care for their clumsy, overbearing wives, their gossip, their over-frequent visits, their adulation of her husband – whom they all hated. But now, when they were sitting there having drinks after a good meal, and showed no sign of leaving, she found their presence quite nauseating. But she smiled warmly at the examining magistrate and wagged a threatening finger at him so as not to appear ungracious. She crossed the ballroom and drawing-room smiling, making out that she was on her way to give orders to the servants and make some arrangements. ‘I hope no one stops me, God forbid!’ she thought, but she forced herself to stop for a moment in the drawing-room to listen – out of politeness’ sake – to a young man playing the piano. After standing there for a minute she shouted ‘Bravo, bravo, Monsieur Georges!’, clapped twice and went on her way.

She found her husband in his study. He was sitting at his desk pondering something. His face had a stern, pensive, guilty look. This was not the Pyotr who had been arguing during the meal and whom the guests knew, but someone quite different – exhausted, guilty, dissatisfied with himself – whom only his wife knew. He must have gone into the study for some cigarettes. An open case lay before him, full of cigarettes, and one hand was resting in the desk drawer. He seemed to have frozen at the moment of taking them out.

Olga felt sorry for him. It was as clear as daylight that he was exhausted, worried and perhaps engaged in a battle against himself. Olga silently went over to the desk. Wanting to prove to him that she had forgotten the arguments over dinner and that she was no longer angry, she shut the cigarette case and put it in his side pocket.

‘What shall I tell him?’ she wondered. ‘I’ll say that deceitfulness is like a swamp, the further you go in, the harder it is to get out. Then I’ll tell him: you’ve been carried away by that false role you’ve been acting out, you’ve gone too far. You’ve insulted people who were devoted to you and did you no harm. So please go and apologize to them, have a good laugh at yourself and you’ll feel better. And if you want peace and solitude, let’s go away from here together.’

When his eyes met his wife’s, Pyotr suddenly assumed that indifferent, gently mocking expression he had worn at dinner and in the garden. He yawned and stood up.

‘It’s after five,’ he said, glancing at his watch. ‘Even if our guests take pity on us and depart at eleven, that still leaves another six hours. That’s something cheerful to look forward to, need I say!’

Whistling some tune, he slowly left the study, walking in that familiar, dignified fashion. His unhurried footsteps could be heard as he crossed the hall and drawing-room, then his supercilious laugh as he called out ‘Bravo, bravo!’ to the young man at the piano. Soon the footsteps died away – he must have gone out into the garden. Now it was no longer jealousy or annoyance that took hold of Olga, but deep hatred for the way he walked, for that insidious laugh and tone of voice. She went over to the window, looked out into the garden and saw Pyotr walking down the avenue. One hand was in his pocket and he was snapping the fingers of the other. His head tossed slightly backwards, he solemnly ambled along, apparently very pleased with himself, the dinner, his digestion and nature all around.

Two small schoolboys – the sons of Mrs Chizhevsky, a landowner – who had just arrived with their tutor, a student in white tunic and very narrow trousers, appeared on the path. When they came up to Pyotr the boys and the student stopped, probably to congratulate him on his name-day. Exquisitely twitching his shoulders, he patted the children’s cheeks and casually offered the student his hand without looking at him. The student must have praised the weather and compared it to St Petersburg’s, since Pyotr replied in a loud voice, as if addressing a bailiff or court witness instead of a guest, ‘Eh! Is it cold in St Petersburg then? Here, my dear young man, we have a salubrious climate and an abundance of fruits of the earth. Eh, what’s that?’

Placing one hand in his pocket and snapping the fingers of the other, he strode off. Olga gazed at the back of his neck in amazement until he was lost to sight behind the hazel bushes. How had that thirty-four-year-old man acquired the solemn walk of a general? Where did that ponderous, impressive gait come from? Whence that authoritarian vibrancy of voice, all those ‘What!’s, ‘Well, sir!’s and ‘My dear fellow!’s?

Olga remembered going to court sittings, where Pyotr sometimes deputized as president for her godfather, Count Aleksey Petrovich, to escape the boredom and loneliness at home during the first few months of her marriage. Seated in the president’s chair in his uniform, with a chain over his chest, he underwent a complete transformation, what with those grandiose gestures, that thunderous voice, those ‘What, sir?’s, those ‘Hmm’s, that casual tone. All normal human qualities, everything natural to him that she was used to seeing at home, had been swallowed up in grandeur. It was not Pyotr sitting in that chair, but some other man whom everyone called ‘Your honour’. The consciousness of the power he wielded did not allow him to sit still for one minute, and he was always on the look-out for some opportunity to ring his bell, to scowl at the public, to shout… And where did he acquire that shortsightedness and deafness? He had suddenly become myopic and deaf, frowning imperiously as he told people to speak up and to come nearer the bench. From those lofty heights he could not distinguish faces and sounds at all well, and if Olga herself had approached him at these moments, he would most likely have shouted ‘What’s your name?’ He talked down to peasant witnesses, yelled so loud at the public that they could hear him out in the street, and his treatment of barristers was quite outrageous. If a barrister approached him, Pyotr would sit sideways to him, squint at the ceiling to make it plain that the lawyer was not needed in court at all and that he had no wish either to listen to him or to acknowledge his existence. But if a shabby-suited solicitor happened to speak, Pyotr was all ears and sized him up with a devastatingly sarcastic look that seemed to say ‘God, what lawyers we’re afflicted with these days!’ ‘Just what are you trying to say?’ he would interrupt. If some barrister with a florid turn of phrase ventured to use some word of foreign origin and said ‘factitious’ instead of ‘fictitious’, for example, Pyotr would suddenly come to life and ask ‘What’s that? What? Factitious? What does that mean?’ Then he would issue the pompous admonition ‘Don’t use words you don’t understand’. And when the barrister had finished his speech he would come away from the bench red-faced and bathed in perspiration, while Pyotr would settle back in his chair, celebrating his victory with a complacent smile. In the way he addressed barristers, he was imitating Count Aleksey Petrovich to a certain extent, but when the latter said ‘Will counsel for the defence please be quiet?’, for example, the remark sounded quite natural, as if a good-humoured old gentleman were speaking, but with Pyotr it was rather coarse and strained.

II

People were applauding – the young man had finished playing. Olga suddenly remembered her guests and hurried into the drawing-room.

‘You play delightfully,’ she said, going over to the piano. ‘Delightfully. You have a wonderful gift! But isn’t our piano out of tune?’

At that moment the two schoolboys and the student came in.

‘Heavens, it’s Mitya and Kolya!’ Olga drawled joyfully as she went to meet them. ‘How you’ve grown! I wouldn’t have recognized you! But where’s your mother?’

‘Many happy returns to our host,’ the student said breezily. ‘I wish him all the best. Yekaterina Andreyevna Chizhevsky sends her congratulations and her apologies. She’s not feeling very well.’

‘How unkind of her! I’ve been looking forward all day to seeing her. When did you leave St Petersburg?’ Olga asked the student. ‘What’s the weather like there?’

Without waiting for an answer she looked affectionately at the boys and repeated, ‘How they’ve grown! Not so long ago they used to come here with their nanny, and now they’re already at school! The old get older and the young grow up. Have you had dinner?’

‘Oh, please don’t worry,’ the student said.

‘Now you haven’t eaten, have you?’

‘Please don’t worry.’

‘Surely you must be hungry?’ Olga asked impatiently and irritably, in a rough, harsh voice. She did not mean to speak like that and she immediately had a little coughing-fit, then smiled and blushed. ‘How they’ve grown!’ she said, softly.

‘Please don’t worry,’ the student said yet again. He begged her not to go to any trouble; the children said nothing. It was obvious all three were hungry. Olga led them into the dining-room and told Vasily to lay the table.

‘Your mother is so unkind,’ she said, making them sit down. ‘She’s completely forgotten me. She’s not very nice at all… you can tell her that. And what are you studying?’ she asked, turning to the student.

‘Medicine.’

‘Oh, I have a weakness for doctors, you know! I’m very sorry my husband isn’t one. What courage you must have, to do operations, for example, or to dissect corpses! It’s terrifying! You’re not afraid? I think I’d die of fright. Of course, you’ll have some vodka?’

‘It’s all right, please don’t bother.’

‘After that journey you simply must have a drink. I like a drink sometimes, even though I’m a woman. Mitya and Kolya can have some Malaga.¹ It’s not very strong, don’t worry. What fine young men they are, really! Even ready for marriage.’

Olga talked non-stop. She knew from experience that with guests it suited her better and was in fact far easier to do the talking than to sit listening. When one is talking there’s no need to be alert, to think of answers to questions and keep changing one’s expression. But she accidentally raised some serious question and the student embarked on a long speech, so that she had to listen whether she liked it or not. The student knew that at some time she had been to a course of lectures, so he tried to look serious when speaking to her.

‘What’s your subject?’ she asked, forgetting that she had already asked this.

‘Medicine.’

‘Oh, yes. So you’re going to be a doctor?’ she asked, getting up. ‘That’s good. I’m sorry I never went to lectures on medicine. Now, have your dinner, gentlemen, and then come out into the garden. I’ll introduce you to some young ladies.’

Olga remembered that she had been neglecting the ladies for some time. She went out and looked at the clock: it was five to six. She was amazed that the time was passing so slowly and horrified that there were still six hours to midnight, when the guests would leave. How could she kill these six hours? What should she say? How should she behave towards her husband?

There wasn’t a soul in the drawing-room or on the terrace – all the guests had wandered off to different parts of the garden.

‘I really ought to suggest a walk to the birch grove, or boating before tea –’ Olga thought, hurrying to the croquet lawn, where she could hear voices and laughter. ‘And I must make the old men play cards.’

Grigory the footman came towards her from the croquet lawn carrying some empty bottles.

‘Where are the ladies?’ she asked.

‘In the raspberry canes. The master’s there as well.’

‘Oh, good heavens!’ came the furious cry from the croquet lawn. ‘If I’ve told you once I’ve told you a thousand times! If you want to know your Bulgarians you must go and see them. You can’t tell from the newspapers.’

Either because of this shout or something else, Olga suddenly felt dreadfully weak all over, especially in the legs and shoulders. She had no wish to speak, listen or move.

‘Grigory,’ she said listlessly, after a great effort, ‘when you’re serving tea or something please don’t come bothering me, don’t ask me questions and don’t talk to me about anything. You can do it all yourself… and don’t make a noise with your feet. I beg you to do this. I can’t, because…’

She did not finish and walked on towards the croquet lawn. But on the way she remembered the ladies and went in the direction of the raspberry canes. The sky, the air and the trees were still just as gloomy, threatening rain. It was hot and close; huge flocks of crows, sensing bad weather, cawed as they wheeled over the garden. The nearer the paths were to the kitchen garden, the more neglected, dark and narrow they became. Over one of them that lay hidden in a dense thicket of wild pears, wood-sorrel, oak saplings and hops, great clouds of tiny black midges swarmed around her. Olga covered her face with her hands and tried hard to imagine that little creature… But all that came to mind were Grigory, Mitya, Kolya, the faces of the peasants who had come offering congratulations in the morning.

Hearing footsteps, she opened her eyes. Uncle Nikolay was fast approaching.

‘Is that you, my dear? So glad to see you,’ he said, panting. ‘I’d like a couple of words with you.’ He wiped his red, clean-shaven chin with his handkerchief, then suddenly stepped sharply backwards, clasped his hands and opened his eyes wide. ‘My dear, how long is this going on for?’ he said breathlessly. ‘I’m asking you, isn’t there a limit? I don’t mean the demoralizing effect of his police sergeant’s views on our little circle or the way he insults all that is finest and noblest in me and in all honest, thinking men. I’m not talking about that. But he could at least behave civilly. What’s the matter with him? He shouts, growls, shows off, acts the little Bonaparte, doesn’t let anyone get a word in edgeways. What the hell! Those grand gestures of his, that imperious laugh, that condescending tone! Who does he think he is, may I ask? Who does he think he is? He can’t hold a candle to his wife, he’s just a landowner lucky enough to have married money. Another of those nouveau riche upstarts. A cad and a rotter! I swear by God, either he’s suffering from megalomania or that senile half-cracked Count Aleksey Petrovich is actually right when he says that children and young people take a long time to mature these days and carry on playing cabbies and generals until they’re forty!’

‘That’s true, so true,’ Olga agreed. ‘Please let me pass now.’

‘And where do you think it will all lead?’ Uncle went on, barring her way. ‘How will playing the bigot, acting the inquisitor finish? He’s already facing prosecution, oh, yes! I’m delighted! Look where all his ranting and raving have landed him – in the dock! And not just the local Assizes, but the High Court of Justice! I can’t think of anything worse than that! What’s more, he’s quarrelled with everyone. Today is his name-day party, but just look who’s given it a miss – Vostryakov, Yakhontov, Vladimirov, Shevud, the Count – none of them have turned up. And who could be more of a die-hard reactionary than Count Aleksey Petrovich – even he’s not here. And he’ll never come again, you mark my words!’

‘Oh, heavens, what’s all this got to do with me?’ Olga asked.

‘To do with you? You’re his wife! You’re clever, you’ve been to university, and it’s in your power to make an honest worker out of him!’

‘They don’t teach you at lectures how to influence difficult people. I’ll have to apologize to all of you, it seems, for having attended lectures!’ Olga said sharply. ‘Listen, Uncle, if your ears were bombarded all day long by someone practising the same scales, you wouldn’t sit still and you’d run away. The whole year, day in, day out, I hear the same old thing, the same old thing. Heavens, it’s high time you felt a little pity for me!’

Uncle pulled a very serious face, gave her an inquisitive look and curled his lips into a mocking smile.

‘So that’s how it is!’ he chanted in his senile voice. ‘I’m so sorry, madam!’ he said with a stiff bow. ‘If you yourself have fallen under his influence and changed your convictions, then you should have said so earlier. I’m sorry, madam!’

‘Yes, I have changed my convictions!’ she shouted. ‘That should make you happy!’

‘So sorry, madam!’

Uncle ceremoniously bowed for the last time – sideways on – drew himself in, clicked his heels and left.

‘The fool,’ Olga thought. ‘I wish he’d clear off home.’

She found the ladies and young people among the raspberry canes in the kitchen garden. Some were eating the raspberries, while others who had had their fill were wandering among the strawberry beds or nosing around in the sugar-peas. Just to one side of the raspberry canes, near a spreading apple tree that was propped up on all sides by stakes pulled out of an old fence, Pyotr was scything the grass. His hair was hanging over his forehead, his tie had come undone, his watch-chain was dangling loose. Every step he took, every sweep of the scythe showed skill and enormous physical strength. Near him stood Lyubochka, with their neighbour Colonel Bukreyev’s daughters Natalya and Valentina – or, as everyone called them, Nata and Vata, anaemic and unhealthy, plump blondes of about sixteen or seventeen in white dresses and strikingly alike. Pyotr was teaching them to scythe.

‘It’s very simple,’ he was saying. ‘All you have to know is how to hold the scythe and to take it calmly – I mean, not exerting yourself more than you need. Like this… Would you like to try now?’ he asked, offering the scythe to Lyubochka. ‘Come on!’

Lyubochka awkwardly took the scythe then suddenly blushed and burst out laughing.

‘Don’t be shy, Lyubochka,’ Olga shouted, loud enough for all the ladies to hear and know that she had returned to them. ‘Don’t be shy. You have to learn. Marry a Tolstoyan, he’ll make you wield the scythe.’

Lyubochka raised the scythe but burst out laughing again, which so weakened her she immediately put it down. She was both embarrassed and pleased that she was being spoken to like an adult. Nata, without smiling or showing any shyness, picked up the scythe with a serious, cold look, took a sweep and got it tangled up in the grass. Without smiling either, as serious and cold-looking as her sister, Vata silently picked up the scythe and plunged it into the earth. These operations completed, the sisters took each other by the arm and silently walked over to the raspberry canes.

Pyotr laughed and joked like a small boy, and this mischievous, childish mood, when he became excessively good-humoured, suited him far more than anything else. Olga loved him that way. But the boyish behaviour did not usually last long, which was the case this time. Having had his little joke he thought that he should introduce a note of seriousness into his playfulness.

‘When I use a scythe I feel healthier, a more normal person, I can tell you,’ he said. ‘If you tried to force me to be satisfied solely with the life of the mind and nothing else I think I would go mad. I feel that I was not born for the cultural life! I should be reaping, ploughing, sowing, training horses.’

Pyotr started talking to the ladies about the advantages of physical labour, about culture, then turned to the harmfulness of money, to landed property. As she listened to her husband, for some reason Olga thought of her dowry.

‘Surely the time will come,’ Olga thought, ‘when he won’t be able to forgive me for being the richer. He’s proud and touchy. Perhaps he’ll come to hate me because of his great debt towards me.’

She stopped by Colonel Bukreyev, who was eating raspberries while participating in the conversation.

‘Please join us,’ he said, stepping to one side for Olga and Pyotr. ‘The ripest ones are over here. And so, in Proudhon’s² opinion,’ he went on, raising his voice, ‘property is theft. But I must confess that I don’t accept Proudhon and don’t rate him as a philosopher. As far as I’m concerned the French are not authorities on the matter, blast them!’

‘Well, I’m a bit weak on my Proudhons and Buckles,’³ Pyotr said. ‘If you want to discuss philosophy, then my wife’s the one. She’s been to university lectures and knows all these Schopenhauers⁴ and Proudhons backwards.’

Olga felt bored again. Once more she went down the garden along the narrow path, past the apple and pear trees, and again she appeared to be on some very important mission… Here was the gardener’s cottage. Barbara, the gardener’s wife, and her four small boys, with their big, close-cropped heads, were sitting in the doorway.

Barbara was pregnant too and the baby was due, according to her calculations, by Elijah’s Day. After greeting her, Olga silently surveyed her and the children and asked, ‘Well, how are you feeling?’

‘Oh, all right.’

Silence followed. It seemed that both women understood each other without the need for words. Olga pondered for a moment and then said, ‘It’s terribly frightening having your first baby. I keep thinking that I won’t get through it, that I’ll die…’

‘I thought that, but I’m still alive. You can worry about anything if you want to.’

Barbara, who was pregnant for the fifth time and a woman of experience, was rather condescending to her mistress and seemed to be lecturing her as she spoke, and Olga could not help sensing her authoritarian tone. She wanted to talk about her fears, the child, her sensations, but she was scared Barbara might think this trivial and naïve. And so she remained silent, waiting for Barbara to say something.

‘Olga, let’s go back to the house!’ Pyotr shouted from the raspberry canes.

Olga liked waiting in silence and watching Barbara. She would have willingly stood there silently until night-time, although there was no need to. But she had to move on. The moment she left the cottage Lyubochka, Vata and Nata came running towards her. The two sisters stopped about two yards away, as if rooted to the spot, but Lyubochka ran and threw herself round Olga’s neck.

‘My dear, my darling, my precious!’ she said, kissing her face and neck. ‘Let’s go and have tea on the island.’

‘The island, the island!’ echoed the identical, unsmiling Vata and Nata simultaneously.

‘But it’s going to rain, my dears.’

‘It’s not, it’s not!’ Lyubochka shouted, making a tearful face. ‘Everyone wants to go, my dearest, my treasure!’

‘Everyone’s decided to have tea on the island,’ Pyotr said, coming up to them. ‘Now you make the arrangements… we’ll all go in the rowing-boats, and the samovars and everything else can follow with the servants in the carriage.’

He took his wife by the arm and walked along with her. Olga wanted to tell her husband something nasty, hurtful – about the dowry even – and the more bluntly the better, she thought. But she pondered for a moment and said, ‘Why hasn’t Count Aleksey come? What a shame.’

‘I’m only too pleased he hasn’t,’ Pyotr lied. ‘I’m sick and tired of that old fool.’

‘But before lunch you just couldn’t wait for him to come!’

III

Half an hour later the guests were crowding along the bank near the posts where the boats were moored. There was much talk and laughter and so much unnecessary fuss that all the seating went wrong. Three boats were full to overflowing, while two others stood empty. The keys for these boats had been mislaid and people ran incessantly from river to house in search of them. Some said that Grigory had them, others said that they were with the estate manager, others thought it would be a good idea to send for the blacksmith to break the locks. And everyone spoke at once, interrupting and drowning each others’ voices. Pyotr impatiently paced along the bank shouting, ‘what the hell’s going on here? The keys should always be kept on the windowsill in the hall. Who dared take them away? The manager can get his own boat if he likes.’

In the end the keys were found. Then they discovered that they were two oars short. Once again there was a loud commotion. Pyotr, tired of walking up and down, jumped into a kind of long, narrow canoe hollowed out from a poplar and pushed off so hard he nearly fell into the water. One after the other, the boats followed amid loud laughter and screams from the young ladies.

The white, cloudy sky, the trees along the bank, the reeds and the boats with people and oars were mirrored in the water; deep down under the boats, in that bottomless abyss, was a different sky, where birds flew. The bank where the estate was rose high and steep, and was densely wooded, while the other sloped gently, with green meadows and gleaming inlets. After the boats had travelled about a hundred yards, cottages and a herd of cows appeared from behind the willows which sadly leant over the gently sloping bank. Now they could hear songs, drunken shouts and the sound of an accordion.

Here and there along the river darted the boats of fishermen who were setting up their nets for the night. In one boat some tipsy amateur musicians were playing home-made fiddles and a cello.

Olga sat at the rudder, smiling warmly and talking non-stop to entertain her guests, at the same time giving her husband sideways glances. His boat was ahead of all the others as he stood up working away with one oar. That light, sharp-nosed boat, which all the guests called ‘an old dug-out’ – for some reason Pyotr called it Penderakliya – moved swiftly. It had a lively cunning look and seemed to bear a grudge against that clumsy Pyotr – it was only waiting for the right moment to slip away from under him. Olga watched her husband, and she was revolted by his good looks that were universally admired, by the back of his neck, by his posing, by his familiar manner with women. She hated all the women who were sitting in the boat, envied them, and at the same time was in fear and trembling lest disaster struck and the shaky boat capsized.

‘Don’t row so fast!’ she cried and her heart sank. ‘Sit down in the boat, we all know how brave you are!’

And the others in the boat worried her too. They were all ordinary, decent people, but now the lot of them struck her as peculiar, evil. She could see nothing but falsehood in each one. ‘Now,’ she thought, ‘that young man with the auburn hair and gold-rimmed spectacles and fine beard rowing away. He’s a rich, smug, perpetually fortunate mother’s little pet, everyone thinks he’s honest, free-thinking and progressive. It’s hardly a year since he took his degree and came to live in the country, but already he’s proclaiming “We community workers”. But before the year’s out he’ll be bored too, like so many others, he’ll depart for St Petersburg, and to justify his flight he’ll tell them everywhere that local councils are a waste of time, that he’s terribly disenchanted. His young wife in that other boat simply has her eyes glued on him and she’s convinced that he’s a “servant of the community”, but within one year she too will come to believe that local councils are useless. And that stout, immaculately shaven gentleman in the straw hat with the broad ribbon and with an expensive cigar between his teeth – he’s fond of saying, “It’s time we stopped daydreaming and got down to a real job of work!” He has Yorkshire pigs, Butlerov beehives,⁵ rape seed, pineapples, a creamery and a cheese dairy, and Italian double-entry book-keeping. But every summer he sells some of his forests for timber, mortgages parts of his land so that he can spend the autumn with his mistress in the Crimea. And there’s old Uncle Nikolay, who won’t go home, despite being angry with Pyotr!’

Olga looked at the other boats, where she could discover only boring cranks, hypocrites or idiots. She thought of everyone she knew in the district, but could not call to mind one person about whom she could say or think anything that was good. All of them seemed undistinguished, colourless, stupid, narrow-minded, shifty and heartless. Either they did not say what they meant or they did not do what they wanted to. She was stifled by boredom and feelings of despair. She wanted suddenly to stop smiling, leap up and shout, ‘I’m sick of the lot of you!’, jump out of the boat and swim ashore.

‘Come on, let’s all give Pyotr a tow,’ someone shouted.

‘Give him a tow! Give him a tow!’ the rest joined in. ‘Olga, give your husband a tow!’

While she sat at the rudder, Olga had to seize the right moment and deftly catch hold of the chain at Penderakliya’s bows. As she leant over, trying to grasp it, Pyotr frowned and gave her a frightened look.

‘Mind you don’t catch cold!’ he said.

‘If you’re scared on my account and the baby’s then why do you torment me?’ Olga thought.

Pyotr admitted defeat, but not wishing to be towed, he leapt from Penderakliya into a boat already bursting at the seams. He did this so clumsily that the boat listed sharply and everyone screamed with horror.

‘He only jumped like that to please the ladies,’ Olga thought. ‘He knows how impressive it looks…’

Her arms and legs began to tremble, for which the feeling of jadedness, irritation, the forced smiles and the discomfort that she felt all over her body were to blame, she thought. To hide this trembling from her guests she tried to raise her voice, laugh, keep moving. ‘If I suddenly burst into tears,’ she thought, ‘I’ll tell them I have toothache.’

Now the boats at last put in at the ‘Isle of Good Hope’ – this was the name of the peninsula formed by a sharp bend in the river; it was covered with a copse of ancient birches, oaks, willows and poplars. Tables with steaming samovars were already in position under the trees, and Vasily and Grigory, in tailcoats and white knitted gloves, were busy near the crockery. On the far bank, opposite the ‘Isle of Good Hope’, stood the carriages that had brought the provisions, and baskets and parcels of food were being ferried from them to the island in a boat very similar to Penderakliya. The expressions of the footmen, coachmen – even of the peasant sitting in the boat – were solemn, festive, the kind one usually finds only among children and servants.

While Olga was making the tea and pouring out the first glasses, the guests busied themselves with fruit liqueurs and sweetmeats. Then followed the usual tea-time chaos, so trying and exhausting for the hostess. Grigory and Vasily had hardly served the tea than hands holding empty glasses were reaching towards Olga. One guest asked for tea without sugar, another wanted it strong, a third weak, a fourth said ‘No more, thank you.’ And Olga had to commit all this to memory and then shout, ‘Ivan Petrovich, are you the one without sugar?’ or ‘Who asked for it weak?’ But the guest who had asked for weak tea without sugar simply forgot what he had asked for, being carried away with the pleasant conversation, and took the first glass that was offered. Dejected figures wandered like shadows not far from the table, pretending that they were looking for mushrooms in the grass, or reading labels on boxes – these were the ones for whom there weren’t enough glasses. ‘Have you had some tea?’ Olga would ask, and the guest in question would tell her not to worry and say, ‘I don’t mind waiting’, although the hostess would have preferred her guests to hurry up instead of being prepared to wait.

Some of them were deep in conversation and drank their tea slowly, holding on to their glasses for half an hour, while others, especially those who had drunk a great deal over dinner, did not leave the table but drank glass after glass, so that Olga had a job refilling them. One young humorist sipped his tea through a lump of sugar and kept saying, ‘Sinner that I am, I love to spoil myself with the Chinese Herb.’ Now and then he sighed deeply as he asked, ‘Please, just one more little dish-full.’ He drank a lot, noisily crunched his sugar, thinking this was all very funny and original, and that he was giving a superb imitation of a merchant. No one appreciated that all these little things were sheer torture for the hostess: in fact it would have been difficult for anyone to guess, since Olga managed to keep smiling amiably and engage in idle tittle-tattle.

She was not feeling well, though. The crowd, the laughter, the questions, the young humorist, the flustered servants who were run off their feet, the children running round the table – all this irritated her. And she was irritated by the fact that Vata looked like Nata, Kolya like Mitya, so that it was impossible to tell which of them had had tea. She felt that her strained, warm smile was turning into a nasty scowl and that she would burst into tears at any moment.

‘It’s raining!’ someone shouted.

Everyone looked up at the sky.

‘Yes, it really is,’ Pyotr confirmed, wiping his cheek. The sky let fall just a few drops – it wasn’t really raining yet, but the guests abandoned their tea and began to hurry. At first they all wanted to go back in the carriages, but then they changed their minds and went towards the boats. On the pretext that she urgently had to see to supper, Olga asked if they minded if she travelled back on her own, by carriage.

The first thing she did when seated was to give her face a rest from smiling. She drove scowling through the village and gave bowing peasants angry looks. When she arrived home she went to the bedroom by the back entrance and lay down on her husband’s bed.

‘Good heavens!’ she whispered, ‘what’s the use of all this hard labour? Why do these people hang around here pretending they’re having a good time? Why all these false smiles? I don’t understand, I just don’t understand!’

She heard footsteps and voices. The guests had returned.

‘They can do what they like,’ Olga thought. ‘I’m going to lie down a little longer.’ But the maid came into the bedroom and said, ‘Madam, Marya Grigoryevna’s leaving.’

Olga leapt up, tidied her hair and rushed out of the room.

‘Marya, what’s wrong?’ she asked in an offended voice, going up to Marya Grigoryevna. ‘Why the rush?’

‘I must go, my dear, I simply must! I’ve stayed too long already. The children are waiting for me at home.’

‘You’re so naughty! Why didn’t you bring them with you?’

‘My dear, I’ll bring them over one day in the week if you like, but as for today…’

‘Oh, yes!’ Olga interrupted, ‘I’d be delighted. Your children are so sweet. Give them all a kiss from me. But honestly, I’m quite offended. Why the hurry, I just don’t understand!’

‘I must be going, I really must… Goodbye, my dear, and look after yourself. In your condition…’

And they kissed. After seeing her guest to her carriage, Olga joined the ladies in the drawing-room. There the lamps had been lit and the men were just sitting down to cards.

IV

At a quarter past twelve, after supper, the guests began to leave. Olga stood at the porch to say goodbye.

‘Really, you should have brought a shawl,’ she said, ‘it’s getting rather chilly. I hope you won’t catch cold!’

‘Don’t worry, Olga,’ the guests replied as they climbed into their carriages. ‘Well, goodbye. Remember, we’re expecting you. Don’t let us down!’

‘Whoa!’ said the coachman, holding back the horses.

‘Let’s be going, Denis! Goodbye, Olga.’

‘Give the children a kiss from me!’

The carriage moved off and immediately vanished in the darkness. In the red circle cast by the lamp on the road, a new pair or team of three impatient horses would appear, their coachman silhouetted with hands stretched out in front of him. Once again there were kisses, reproaches and requests to come again or to take a shawl. Pyotr ran back and forwards from the hall, helping the ladies into carriages.

‘Drive straight to Yefremovshchina,’ he told the coachman. ‘It’s quicker if you go by way of Mankino, but that road isn’t so good. You might overturn… Goodbye, my dear! Mille compliments to your artist friend!’

‘Goodbye, darling Olga. Go inside now or you’ll catch cold. It’s damp.’

‘Whoa! Up to your tricks again, eh!’

‘Where did you get these horses from?’ Pyotr asked.

‘From Khaydarov, during Lent,’ the coachman answered.

‘They’re superb!’

Pyotr slapped the trace-horse on the croup. ‘Well, off with you! Safe journey!’

Finally the last guest departed. The red circle on the road flickered, drifted off to one side, dwindled and vanished – Vasily had taken the lamp away from the front door. Previously, when they saw their guests off, Pyotr and Olga usually performed a jig in front of each other in the ballroom, clapped their hands and sang ‘They’ve gone, they’ve gone, they’ve gone!’ But Olga did not feel up to that now. She went into the bedroom, undressed, and climbed into bed.

She thought that she would fall asleep immediately and that she would sleep soundly. Her legs and shoulders ached horribly, her head was reeling from all that talk and once again she felt strangely uncomfortable all over. Covering her head, she lay still for a little while, then stole a glance at the icon-lamp from under the blanket, listened to the silence and smiled.

‘Good, good,’ she whispered, tucking in her legs, which she felt had grown longer from all that walking. ‘I must sleep, sleep.’

Her legs would not stay under the blankets, her whole body felt uncomfortable and she turned over on the other side. A large fly flew around the bedroom, buzzing and restlessly beating against the ceiling. She could also hear Grigory and Vasily treading carefully as they cleared the tables in the ballroom. Olga felt that only when those noises stopped would she feel comfortable and able to fall asleep. And once again she impatiently turned over.

She could hear her husband’s voice in the drawing-room. One of the guests was probably staying the night, because Pyotr was telling someone in a loud voice, ‘I wouldn’t say that Count Aleksey Petrovich is a trickster. But he can’t help giving that impression, since you all try to see him as other than he actually is. His eccentricity is misinterpreted as originality, his familiar manner as a sign of good-heartedness, and because of his complete lack of any views you take him for a conservative. Let’s even go so far as to admit that he’s a conservative of the purest stamp. But what is conservatism, all things considered?’

Furious with Count Aleksey Petrovich, with his guests and with himself, Pyotr unbosomed himself. He cursed the Count, his guests, and was so annoyed with himself he was prepared to hold forth or preach a sermon on any subject. After showing his guest to his room, he paced the drawing-room, walked around the dining-room, then up and down the corridor and around his study, then once more around the drawing-room, after which he went into the bedroom. Olga was lying on her back with the blanket only up to her waist (she was feeling hot now) and sullenly watching the fly banging against the ceiling.

‘Do we have someone staying overnight, then?’ she asked.

‘Yegorov.’

Pyotr undressed and lay down on his bed. He silently lit a cigarette and he too started watching the fly. His face was gloomy and uneasy. Olga looked at his handsome profile for about five minutes without saying a word. For some reason she felt that if he were suddenly to turn his face towards her and say ‘I feel so depressed, Olga’, then she would have burst into tears or laughed, and she would have felt better for it. Her legs ached and her whole body felt uncomfortable – from nervous tension, she thought.

‘Pyotr, what are you thinking about?’ she asked.

‘Oh, nothing,’ her husband answered.

‘You’ve started keeping secrets from me lately. That’s not right.’

‘Why isn’t it?’ Pyotr replied dryly, pausing briefly. ‘We all have our own private lives, therefore we must have our secrets.’

‘Private lives, secrets… that’s only words! Do you realize that you’re insulting me?’ Olga said, sitting up. ‘If you feel depressed, why do you hide it from me? And why do you find it more convenient to confide in strange women rather than talk to your wife? In fact I heard you pouring out your heart this afternoon to Lyubochka, near the beehives.’

‘Well, congratulations. I’m delighted you heard.’

This remark meant ‘Leave me in peace, don’t disturb me when I’m trying to think.’ Olga flared up. All the annoyance, hatred and anger which had been accumulating in her during the day suddenly seemed to boil over. She wanted to say exactly what she thought about it all to her husband there and then, without waiting until the morning; she wanted to insult him, have her revenge. Trying hard not to shout she said, ‘Just try and see how terribly, terribly vile all this is! I’ve felt nothing but hatred for you all day long – it’s all your fault!’

Pyotr sat up too.

‘Terribly, terribly vile!’ Olga went on, beginning to shake all over. ‘You’ve no need to congratulate me! You’d better congratulate yourself! It’s a downright disgrace! You’ve taken your lying so far, you’re ashamed to be in the same room as your wife. You’re such a phoney! I can see right through you and I understand every step you take!’

‘Olga, when you’re not feeling too well again, please warn me. I can go and sleep in the study then.’

With these words Pyotr took a pillow and walked out of the bedroom. Olga had not anticipated this. For several minutes – speechless, her mouth wide open, and trembling all over – she looked at the door through which her husband had disappeared, trying to understand the meaning of it all. Was it one of those tricks resorted to by dishonest people during an argument, when they are in the wrong, or was it a deliberate insult to her pride? How was she to take it? Olga remembered her officer-cousin, a nice cheerful young man who often laughingly told her that when ‘my good lady wife starts nagging me at night’, he usually took a pillow and went away whistling to his study, leaving his wife looking stupid and ridiculous. This officer was married to a rich, frivolous, silly woman whom he did not respect and could barely tolerate.

Olga leapt up from the bed. She thought that now there was only one course of action – to dress herself as quickly as she could and leave that house for ever. The house was her property, but that was hard luck for Pyotr. Without first asking herself whether it was necessary, she dashed into the study to tell her husband about her decision (the thought ‘Woman’s logic!’ flashed through her mind) and say something offensive and sarcastic by way of farewell.

Pyotr lay on the couch and pretended he was reading the paper. A lighted candle stood on a chair nearby and his face lay hidden behind the paper.

‘Please explain the meaning of this, I’m asking you!’

‘ “Please explain…” ’ mimicked Pyotr, not showing his face. ‘I’m fed up, Olga! Word of honour, I’m worn out, and I don’t feel up to it right now… We can quarrel tomorrow.’

‘No, I know you only too well!’ Olga continued. ‘You hate me! Yes, yes! You hate me for being richer than you! You’ll never forgive me for that and you’ll always tell me lies.’ (The thought ‘Woman’s logic’ flashed through her mind again.) ‘I know you’re having a good laugh at me now… I’m even convinced that you only married me for social status and those vile horses… Oh, I’m so unhappy!’

Pyotr dropped his paper and sat up. He was stunned by this unexpected insult. He smiled as helplessly as a child, looked at his wife in bewilderment and, as if warding off blows, held out his hands to her and said pleadingly, ‘Olga!’

Expecting her to say more horrible things, he leant hard on the back of the couch, and his whole body looked just as helpless and childish as his smile.

‘Olga, how could you say a thing like that?’ he whispered.

Olga came to her senses. Suddenly she was aware of her mad love for that man, remembering that he was Pyotr, her husband, without whom she could not live one day, and who loved her madly too. She burst into loud sobs, in a voice that did not sound like hers at all, clasped her head and ran back into the bedroom.

She slumped on to the bed and the room echoed to the sound of broken, hysterical sobbing, which suffocated her and cramped her arms and legs. Remembering that a guest was staying about three or four rooms away, she buried her head under the pillow to smother the sobs, but the pillow slipped on to the floor and she almost fell herself as she bent down to pick it up. She tried to pull the blanket up to her face, but her hands would not obey her and convulsively tore at everything she tried to grasp.

She felt that all was lost now, that the lie she had told to insult her husband had smashed her life to smithereens. Her husband would never forgive her – the insult she had inflicted on him was not the kind to be smoothed away by caresses or vows. How could she convince her husband that she herself did not mean what she said?

‘It’s all over, it’s finished!’ she cried, not noticing that the pillow had once again slipped on to the floor. ‘For God’s sake!’

By this time her cries must have wakened the guest and the servants. Next day the whole district would know about her hysterics and everyone would blame Pyotr. She made an effort to control herself, but her sobs grew louder by the minute. ‘For God’s sake!’ she shouted in a voice hard to recognize as hers and not understanding just why she was shouting. ‘For God’s sake!’

She felt that the bed had collapsed under her and that her legs had become tangled up in the blanket. Pyotr came into the bedroom in his dressing-gown, carrying a candle.

‘Olga, that’s enough!’ he said.

She raised herself to her knees, screwed up her eyes in the candlelight and said between her sobs, ‘Please understand, please understand!’

She wanted to tell him that the visitors, the lies that he and she had told, had exhausted her, that now she was inwardly boiling. But all she could say was ‘Understand, please understand!’

‘Come on, drink this,’ he said, giving her some water.

Obediently, she took the glass and began to drink, but the water spilled over and trickled down her hands, breast and knees. Pyotr silently put her back in bed, covered her with the blanket, took the candle and left.

‘For God’s sake!’ Olga shouted again. ‘Pyotr, you must understand!’

Suddenly something gripped her so violently beneath the stomach and back that her tears were cut short and she bit the pillow in pain. But the pain immediately subsided and she burst out sobbing again.

The maid entered, inquiring anxiously as she straightened the blanket, ‘Madam, my dear madam, what’s wrong?’

‘Clear out of here,’ Pyotr snapped as he went over to the bed.

‘Please understand, please understand,’ Olga began.

‘Olga, I beg you, calm yourself!’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to offend you. I wouldn’t have left the bedroom if I’d known you would take it like this. I just felt depressed. I’m telling you this as an honest man.’

‘Please try and understand… you lied, I lied…’

‘I do understand… Well, that’s all right now. I do understand,’ Pyotr said tenderly, sitting on the bed. ‘You spoke in the heat of the moment, it’s understandable… I swear I love you more than anything in the world and when I married you the thought that you were rich never entered my mind. My love had no bounds… that’s all, I assure you. I’ve never needed money and I’ve never known its value, so I can’t appreciate the difference between your position and mine. I’ve always thought that we were both equally rich. And that remark about my acting deceitfully in small matters. Up to now my life has been run on such frivolous lines that somehow it’s been impossible to manage without petty lies. Now I feel low too. Let’s stop this conversation, for God’s sake!’

Olga felt a sharp pain again and grasped her husband’s sleeve.

‘Oh, such a dreadful pain!’ she said hurriedly. ‘It’s terrible!’

‘To hell with all these visitors!’ Pyotr muttered as he stood up. ‘You shouldn’t have gone to the island today!’ he shouted. ‘And I’m a fool for letting you! God in heaven!’

He scratched his head irritably, waved his arm as if to wash his hands of the whole matter and left the room.

Afterwards he came back several times, sitting on the bed and talking a great deal, gently and angrily in turn. But Olga hardly heard a thing. The sobs alternated with terrible pains, each new one sharper and more prolonged than the last. At first she held her breath and bit the pillow during the spasms, but then she began to produce ear-splitting, obscene shouts. Once, when she saw that her husband was near, she remembered that she had insulted him and without asking herself if she was being delirious or if it really was Pyotr, she seized his hand in both of hers and started kissing it.

‘Both you and I lied…’ she began, trying to excuse herself. ‘Please understand, please. They’ve tormented the life out of me, I’ve no more patience…’

‘Olga, we’re not alone!’ Pyotr said.

She raised her head and saw Barbara kneeling by the chest of drawers, taking the lower drawer out – the top ones had already been removed. When she had done this, Barbara stood up, flushed from her efforts, and started opening a small chest with a cold, solemn look on her face.

‘Marya, I can’t open it,’ she whispered. ‘Perhaps you can do it for me.’

The maid Marya, who was digging out some wax from a candlestick with some scissors to make room for a new candle, went over to Barbara and helped her open the chest.

‘I don’t want anything left shut,’ Barbara whispered. ‘Open that little box as well.’ She turned to Pyotr and said, ‘You should send for Father Mikhail, sir, to open the altar doors. You must!’

‘Do what you like,’ Pyotr said between short gasps, ‘only get a doctor or midwife as soon as you can, for God’s sake. Has Vasily gone? Send someone else as well. Send your husband!’

‘I’m in labour,’ Olga realized. ‘Barbara,’ she groaned, ‘it will be stillborn.’

‘It’ll be all right, ma’am, it’ll be all right,’ Barbara whispered. ‘With God’s help it’ll live.’ (It seemed she was incapable of saying ‘it will’.)

When Olga came to, after another stab of pain, she was no longer sobbing or tossing about, but moaning instead. She could not help moaning, even in the intervals between the pains. The candles were still burning, but daylight was already breaking through the shutters. Most likely it was about five o’clock. A strange, very meek-looking woman in a white apron was sitting at a round, bedroom table. From her posture it was obvious that she had been there a long time. Olga guessed that she was the midwife.

‘Will it soon be over?’ she asked and detected a special, unfamiliar note in her own voice which she had never heard before. ‘I must be dying in labour,’ she thought.

Pyotr came gingerly into the bedroom in his day-time clothes and stood at the window with his back to his wife. He raised the shutters and looked out.

‘How it’s raining!’ he said.

‘What’s the time?’ Olga asked, just to hear that unfamiliar tone in her voice again.

‘A quarter to six,’ the midwife answered.

‘But what if I really am dying?’ Olga wondered as she looked at her husband’s head and at the windows with the rain beating against them. ‘How will he live without me? Who will he drink tea with, dine with, talk to in the evenings, sleep with?’

And he struck her as a little orphan. She felt sorry for him and wanted to tell him something pleasant, affectionate, comforting. She remembered that he was intending buying some hounds in the spring but she had stopped him as she thought hunting was a cruel and dangerous sport.

‘Pyotr, go and buy those hounds,’ she groaned.

He lowered the blind and went over to the bed, meaning to say something, but at that moment Olga had a spasm and she produced an obscene, piercing shriek.

She was numb from all the pain and the repeated shouting and groaning. She could hear, see, speak at times, but she understood little and was aware only of feeling pain or that she was about to feel it. She had the impression that the party was long ago, not yesterday, but a whole year, that this new life of pain had lasted longer than her childhood, high school days, courses of lectures and marriage put together, and that it would carry on like that for ages and ages, without end. She saw them bring the midwife her tea, call her to lunch at noon and then to dinner. She saw how used Pyotr had become to entering, standing for a long time by the window and leaving, how some strange men, her maid and Barbara had taken to coming in and out. All Barbara could say was ‘it’ll be, it’ll be’, and she became very angry whenever anyone closed the drawers in the chest. Olga saw the light change in the room and at the windows – at times there was twilight, then it was dim, as in a mist; at others, there was bright daylight, as at dinner the day before, then twilight once again. And each of these changes appeared to last as long as her childhood, her high school days, the university courses…

In the evening two doctors – one bony, bald, with a wide reddish beard, the other swarthy and Jewish-looking, with cheap spectacles – performed an operation on Olga. She was completely indifferent to those strange men touching her body: no longer did she feel any shame, she had lost her willpower, and anyone could do what he liked with her. If at that moment someone had attacked her with a knife or insulted Pyotr, or deprived her of her right to that little creature, she would not have said one word.

She was given chloroform for the operation. Afterwards, when she woke up, she still had the pains and they were unbearable. It was night. Olga remembered a similar night, with its peace, icon-lamp, midwife sitting motionless by the bed, the chest with its drawers pulled out, Pyotr standing at the window, but that was long, long ago…

V

‘I haven’t died,’ Olga thought when she became aware of her surroundings again and the pains had gone.

A bright summer’s day looked in through the two wide-open bedroom windows. Sparrows and magpies chattered incessantly in the garden outside.

The drawers in the chest were shut now; her husband’s bed had been made. There was no midwife, no Barbara, no maid in the bedroom, only Pyotr standing motionless as before at the window, looking into the garden. There was no crying child, no congratulations or rejoicing, and clearly the small creature had been stillborn.

‘Pyotr!’ Olga called out to her husband.

Pyotr looked round. A long time must have passed since the last guest had left and Olga had insulted her husband, since Pyotr had become noticeably thinner and pinched-looking.

‘What’s the matter?’ he asked, going over to the bed.

He looked away, twitched his lips and smiled like a helpless child.

‘Is it all over?’ Olga asked.

Pyotr wanted to reply, but his lips trembled and his mouth twisted like an old man’s – like toothless Uncle Nikolay’s.

‘Olga,’ he said, wringing his hands, and suddenly large tears gushed from his eyes. ‘Olga! I don’t need your money, courts…’ (here he sobbed) ‘differing opinions, those guests, your dowry… I don’t need anything! Why did we lose our child? Oh, what’s the use of talking!’

He waved his arm in defeat and left the bedroom.

But Olga did not care about anything now. Her head was muzzy from the chloroform, she felt spiritually drained. The dull indifference to life that had come over her when the two doctors were performing the operation still had not deserted her.