Darya Mihailovna expressed herself in Russian. She prided herself on her knowledge of her own language, though French words and expressions often escaped her. She intentionally made use of simple popular terms of speech; but not always successfully. Rudin's ear was not outraged by the strange medley of language on Darya Mihailovna's lips, indeed he hardly had an ear for it.

Darya Mihailovna was exhausted at last and letting her head fall on the cushions of her easy-chair she fixed her eyes on Rudin and was silent.

'I understand now,' began Rudin, speaking slowly, 'I understand why you come every summer into the country. This period of rest is essential for you; the peace of the country after your life in the capital refreshes and strengthens you. I am convinced that you must be profoundly sensitive to the beauties of nature.'

Darya Mihailovna gave Rudin a sidelong look.

'Nature—yes—yes—of course.... I am passionately fond of it; but do you know, Dmitri Nikolaitch, even in the country one cannot do without society. And here there is practically none. Pigasov is the most intelligent person here.'

'The cross old gentleman who was here last night?' inquired Rudin.

'Yes.... In the country though, even he is of use—he sometimes makes one laugh.'

'He is by no means stupid,' returned Rudin, 'but he is on the wrong path. I don't know whether you will agree with me, Darya Mihailovna, but in negation—in complete and universal negation—there is no salvation to be found? Deny everything and you will easily pass for a man of ability; it's a well-known trick. Simple-hearted people are quite ready to conclude that you are worth more than what you deny. And that's often an error. In the first place, you can pick holes in anything; and secondly, even if you are right in what you say, it's the worse for you; your intellect, directed by simple negation, grows colourless and withers up. While you gratify your vanity, you are deprived of the true consolations of thought; life—the essence of life—evades your petty and jaundiced criticism, and you end by scolding and becoming ridiculous. Only one who loves has the right to censure and find fault.'

'Voila, Monsieur Pigasov enterre,' observed Darya Mihailovna. 'What a genius you have for defining a man! But Pigasov certainly would not have even understood you. He loves nothing but his own individuality.'

'And he finds fault with that so as to have the right to find fault with others,' Rudin put in.

Darya Mihailovna laughed.

'"He judges the sound," as the saying is, "the sound by the sick." By the way, what do you think of the baron?'

'The baron? He is an excellent man, with a good heart and a knowledge ... but he has no character... and he will remain all his life half a savant, half a man of the world, that is to say, a dilettante, that is to say, to speak plainly,—neither one thing nor the other. ... But it's a pity!'

'That was my own idea,' observed Darya Mihailovna. 'I read his article.... Entre nous... cela a assez peu de fond!'

'Who else have you here?' asked Rudin, after a pause.

Darya Mihailovna knocked off the ash of her cigarette with her little finger.

'Oh, there is hardly any one else. Madame Lipin, Alexandra Pavlovna, whom you saw yesterday; she is very sweet—but that is all. Her brother is also a capital fellow—un parfait honnete homme. The Prince Garin you know. Those are all. There are two or three neighbours besides, but they are really good for nothing. They either give themselves airs or are unsociable, or else quite unsuitably free and easy. The ladies, as you know, I see nothing of. There is one other of our neighbours said to be a very cultivated, even a learned, man, but a dreadfully queer creature, a whimsical character. Alexandrine, knows him, and I fancy is not indifferent to him.... Come, you ought to talk to her, Dmitri Nikolaitch; she's a sweet creature. She only wants developing.'

'I liked her very much,' remarked Rudin.

'A perfect child, Dmitri Nikolaitch, an absolute baby. She has been married, mais c'est tout comme.... If I were a man, I should only fall in love with women like that.'

'Really?'

'Certainly. Such women are at least fresh, and freshness cannot be put on.'

'And can everything else?' Rudin asked, and he laughed—a thing which rarely happened with him. When he laughed his face assumed a strange, almost aged appearance, his eyes disappeared, his nose was wrinkled up.

'And who is this queer creature, as you call him, to whom Madame Lipin is not indifferent?' he asked.

'A certain Lezhnyov, Mihailo Mihailitch, a landowner here.'

Rudin seemed astonished; he raised his head.

'Lezhnyov—Mihailo Mihailitch?' he questioned. 'Is he a neighbour of yours?'

'Yes. Do you know him?'

Rudin did not speak for a minute.

'I used to know him long ago. He is a rich man, I suppose?' he added, pulling the fringe on his chair.

'Yes, he is rich, though he dresses shockingly, and drives in a racing droshky like a bailiff. I have been anxious to get him to come here; he is spoken of as clever; I have some business with him.... You know I manage my property myself.'

Rudin bowed assent.

'Yes; I manage it myself,' Darya Mihailovna continued. 'I don't introduce any foreign crazes, but prefer what is our own, what is Russian, and, as you see, things don't seem to do badly,' she added, with a wave of her hand.

'I have always been persuaded,' observed Rudin urbanely, 'of the absolutely mistaken position of those people who refuse to admit the practical intelligence of women.'

Darya Mihailovna smiled affably.

'You are very good to us,' was her comment 'But what was I going to say? What were we speaking of? Oh, yes; Lezhnyov: I have some business with him about a boundary. I have several times invited him here, and even to-day I am expecting him; but there's no knowing whether he'll come... he's such a strange creature.'

The curtain before the door was softly moved aside and the steward came in, a tall man, grey and bald, in a black coat, a white cravat, and a white waistcoat.

'What is it?' inquired Darya Mihailovna, and, turning a little towards Rudin, she added in a low voice, 'n'est ce pas, comme il ressemble a Canning?'

'Mihailo Mihailitch Lezhnyov is here,' announced the steward. 'Will you see him?'

'Good Heavens!' exclaimed Darya Mihailovna, 'speak of the devil——ask him up.'

The steward went away.

'He's such an awkward creature. Now he has come, it's at the wrong moment; he has interrupted our talk.'

Rudin got up from his seat, but Darya Mihailovna stopped him.

'Where are you going? We can discuss the matter as well before you. And I want you to analyse him too, as you did Pigasov. When you talk, vous gravez comme avec un burin. Please stay.' Rudin was going to protest, but after a moment's thought he sat down.

Mihailo Mihailitch, whom the reader already knows, came into the room. He wore the same grey overcoat, and in his sunburnt hands he carried the same old foraging cap. He bowed tranquilly to Darya Mihailovna, and came up to the tea-table.

'At last you have favoured me with a visit, Monsieur Lezhnyov!' began Darya Mihailovna. 'Pray sit down. You are already acquainted, I hear,' she continued, with a gesture in Rudin's direction.

Lezhnyov looked at Rudin and smiled rather queerly.

'I know Mr. Rudin,' he assented, with a slight bow.

'We were together at the university,' observed Rudin in a low voice, dropping his eyes.

'And we met afterwards also,' remarked Lezhnyov coldly.

Darya Mihailovna looked at both in some perplexity and asked Lezhnyov to sit down He sat down.

'You wanted to see me,' he began, 'on the subject of the boundary?'

'Yes; about the boundary. But I also wished to see you in any case. We are near neighbours, you know, and all but relations.'

'I am much obliged to you,' returned Lezhnyov. 'As regards the boundary, we have perfectly arranged that matter with your manager; I have agreed to all his proposals.'

'I knew that. But he told me that the contract could not be signed without a personal interview with you.'

'Yes; that is my rule. By the way, allow me to ask: all your peasants, I believe, pay rent?'

'Just so.'

'And you trouble yourself about boundaries! That's very praiseworthy.'

Lezhnyov did not speak for a minute.

'Well, I have come for a personal interview,' he said at last.

Darya Mihailovna smiled.

'I see you have come. You say that in such a tone.... You could not have been very anxious to come to see me.'

'I never go anywhere,' rejoined Lezhnyov phlegmatically.

'Not anywhere? But you go to see Alexandra Pavlovna.'

'I am an old friend of her brother's.'

'Her brother's! However, I never wish to force any one.... But pardon me, Mihailo Mihailitch, I am older than you, and I may be allowed to give you advice; what charm do you find in such an unsociable way of living? Or is my house in particular displeasing to you? You dislike me?'

'I don't know you, Darya Mihailovna, and so I can't dislike you. You have a splendid house; but I will confess to you frankly I don't like to have to stand on ceremony. And I haven't a respectable suit, I haven't any gloves, and I don't belong to your set.'

'By birth, by education, you belong to it, Mihailo Mihailitch! vous etes des notres.'

'Birth and education are all very well, Darya Mihailovna; that's not the question.'

'A man ought to live with his fellows, Mihailo Mihailitch! What pleasure is there in sitting like Diogenes in his tub?'

'Well, to begin with, he was very well off there, and besides, how do you know I don't live with my fellows?'

Darya Mihailovna bit her lip.

'That's a different matter! It only remains for me to express my regret that I have not the honour of being included in the number of your friends.'

'Monsieur Lezhnyov,' put in Rudin, 'seems to carry to excess a laudable sentiment—the love of independence.'

Lezhnyov made no reply, he only looked at Rudin. A short silence followed.

'And so,' began Lezhnyov, getting up, 'I may consider our business as concluded, and tell your manager to send me the papers.'

'You may,... though I confess you are so uncivil I ought really to refuse you.'

'But you know this rearrangement of the boundary is far more in your interest than in mine.'

Darya Mihailovna shrugged her shoulders.

'You will not even have luncheon here?' she asked.

'Thank you; I never take luncheon, and I am in a hurry to get home.'

Darya Mihailovna got up.

'I will not detain you,' she said, going to the window. 'I will not venture to detain you.'

Lezhnyov began to take leave.

'Good-bye, Monsieur Lezhnyov! Pardon me for having troubled you.'

'Oh, not at all!' said Lezhnyov, and he went away.

'Well, what do you say to that?' Darya Mihailovna asked of Rudin. 'I had heard he was eccentric, but really that was beyond everything!'

'His is the same disease as Pigasov's,' observed Rudin, 'the desire of being original. One affects to be a Mephistopheles—the other a cynic. In all that, there is much egoism, much vanity, but little truth, little love. Indeed, there is even calculation of a sort in it. A man puts on a mask of indifference and indolence so that some one will be sure to think. "Look at that man; what talents he has thrown away!" But if you come to look at him more attentively, there is no talent in him whatever.'

'Et de deux!' was Darya Mihailovna's comment. 'You are a terrible man at hitting people off. One can hide nothing from you.'

'Do you think so?' said Rudin.... 'However,' he continued, 'I ought not really to speak about Lezhnyov; I loved him, loved him as a friend... but afterwards, through various misunderstandings...'

'You quarrelled?'

'No. But we parted, and parted, it seems, for ever.'

'Ah, I noticed that the whole time of his visit you were not quite yourself.... But I am much indebted to you for this morning. I have spent my time extremely pleasantly. But one must know where to stop. I will let you go till lunch time and I will go and look after my business. My secretary, you saw him—Constantin, c'est lui qui est mon secretaire—must be waiting for me by now. I commend him to you; he is an excellent, obliging young man, and quite enthusiastic about you. Au revoir, cher Dmitri Nikolaitch! How grateful I am to the baron for having made me acquainted with you!'

And Darya Mihailovna held out her hand to Rudin. He first pressed it, then raised it to his lips and went away to the drawing-room and from there to the terrace. On the terrace he met Natalya.



V

Darya Mihailovna's daughter, Natalya Alexyevna, at a first glance might fail to please. She had not yet had time to develop; she was thin, and dark, and stooped slightly. But her features were fine and regular, though too large for a girl of seventeen. Specially beautiful was her pure, smooth forehead above fine eyebrows, which seemed broken in the middle. She spoke little, but listened to others, and fixed her eyes on them as though she were forming her own conclusions. She would often stand with listless hands, motionless and deep in thought; her face at such moments showed that her mind was at work within.... A scarcely perceptible smile would suddenly appear on her lips and vanish again; then she would slowly raise her large dark eyes. 'Qu'a-vez-vous?' Mlle, Boncourt would ask her, and then she would begin to scold her, saying that it was improper for a young girl to be absorbed and to appear absent-minded. But Natalya was not absent-minded; on the contrary, she studied diligently; she read and worked eagerly. Her feelings were strong and deep, but reserved; even as a child she seldom cried, and now she seldom even sighed and only grew slightly pale when anything distressed her. Her mother considered her a sensible, good sort of girl, calling her in a joke 'mon honnete homme de fille' but had not a very high opinion of her intellectual abilities. 'My Natalya happily is cold,' she used to say, 'not like me—and it is better so. She will be happy.' Darya Mihailovna was mistaken. But few mothers understand their daughters.

Natalya loved Darya Mihailovna, but did not fully confide in her.

'You have nothing to hide from me,' Darya Mihailovna said to her once, 'or else you would be very reserved about it; you are rather a close little thing.'

Natalya looked her mother in the face and thought, 'Why shouldn't I be reserved?'

When Rudin met her on the terrace she was just going indoors with Mlle, Boncourt to put on her hat and go out into the garden. Her morning occupations were over. Natalya was not treated as a school-girl now. Mlle, Boncourt had not given her lessons in mythology and geography for a long while; but Natalya had every morning to read historical books, travels, or other instructive works with her. Darya Mihailovna selected them, ostensibly on a special system of her own. In reality she simply gave Natalya everything which the French bookseller forwarded her from Petersburg, except, of course, the novels of Dumas Fils and Co. These novels Darya Mihailovna read herself. Mlle, Boncourt looked specially severely and sourly through her spectacles when Natalya was reading historical books; according to the old French lady's ideas all history was filled with impermissible things, though for some reason or other of all the great men of antiquity she herself knew only one—Cambyses, and of modern times—Louis XIV. and Napoleon, whom she could not endure. But Natalya read books too, the existence of which Mlle, Boncourt did not suspect; she knew all Pushkin by heart.

Natalya flushed slightly at meeting Rudin.

'Are you going for a walk?' he asked her.

'Yes. We are going into the garden.'

'May I come with you?'

Natalya looked at Mlle, Boncourt

'Mais certainement, monsieur; avec plaisir,' said the old lady promptly.

Rudin took his hat and walked with them.

Natalya at first felt some awkwardness in walking side by side with Rudin on the same little path; afterwards she felt more at ease. He began to question her about her occupations and how she liked the country. She replied not without timidity, but without that hasty bashfulness which is so often taken for modesty. Her heart was beating.

'You are not bored in the country?' asked Rudin, taking her in with a sidelong glance.

'How can one be bored in the country? I am very glad we are here. I am very happy here.'

'You are happy—that is a great word. However, one can understood it; you are young.'

Rudin pronounced this last phrase rather strangely; either he envied Natalya or he was sorry for her.

'Yes! youth!' he continued, 'the whole aim of science is to reach consciously what is bestowed on youth for nothing.'

Natalya looked attentively at Rudin; she did not understand him.

'I have been talking all this morning with your mother,' he went on; 'she is an extraordinary woman. I understand why all our poets sought her friendship. Are you fond of poetry?' he added, after a pause.

'He is putting me through an examination,' thought Natalya, and aloud: 'Yes, I am very fond of it.'

'Poetry is the language of the gods. I love poems myself. But poetry is not only in poems; it is diffused everywhere, it is around us. Look at those trees, that sky on all sides there is the breath of beauty, and of life, and where there is life and beauty, there is poetry also.'

'Let us sit down here on this bench,' he added. 'Here—so. I somehow fancy that when you are more used to me (and he looked her in the face with a smile) 'we shall be friends, you and I. What do you think?'

'He treats me like a school-girl,' Natalya reflected again, and, not knowing what to say, she asked him whether he intended to remain long in the country.

'All the summer and autumn, and perhaps the winter too. I am a very poor man, you know; my affairs are in confusion, and, besides, I am tired now of wandering from place to place. The time has come to rest.'

Natalya was surprised.

'Is it possible you feel that it is time for you to rest?' she asked him timidly.

Rudin turned so as to face Natalya.

'What do you mean by that?'

'I mean,' she replied in some embarrassment, 'that others may rest; but you... you ought to work, to try to be useful. Who, if not you——'

'I thank you for your flattering opinion,' Rudin interrupted her. 'To be useful... it is easy to say!' (He passed his hand over his face.) 'To be useful!' he repeated. 'Even if I had any firm conviction, how could I be useful?—even if I had faith in my own powers, where is one to find true, sympathetic souls?'

And Rudin waved his hand so hopelessly, and let his head sink so gloomily, that Natalya involuntarily asked herself, were those really his—those enthusiastic words full of the breath of hope, she had heard the evening before.

'But no,' he said, suddenly tossing back his lion-like mane, 'that is all folly, and you are right. I thank you, Natalya Alexyevna, I thank you truly.' (Natalya absolutely did not know what he was thanking her for.) 'Your single phrase has recalled to me my duty, has pointed out to me my path.... Yes, I must act. I must not bury my talent, if I have any; I must not squander my powers on talk alone—empty, profitless talk—on mere words,' and his words flowed in a stream. He spoke nobly, ardently, convincingly, of the sin of cowardice and indolence, of the necessity of action. He lavished reproaches on himself, maintained that to discuss beforehand what you mean to do is as unwise as to prick with a pin the swelling fruit, that it is only a vain waste of strength and sap. He declared that there was no noble idea which would not gain sympathy, that the only people who remained misunderstood were those who either did not know themselves what they wanted, or were not worthy to be understood. He spoke at length, and ended by once more thanking Natalya Alexyevna, and utterly unexpectedly pressed her hand, exclaiming. 'You are a noble, generous creature!'

This outburst horrified Mlle, Boncourt, who in spite of her forty years' residence in Russia understood Russian with difficulty, and was only moved to admiration by the splendid rapidity and flow of words on Rudin's lips. In her eyes, however, he was something of the nature of a virtuoso or artist; and from people of that kind, according to her notions, it was impossible to demand a strict adherence to propriety.

She got up and drew her skirts with a jerk around her, observed to Natalya that it was time to go in, especially as M. Volinsoff (so she spoke of Volintsev) was to be there to lunch.

'And here he is,' she added, looking up one of the avenues which led to the house, and in fact Volintsev appeared not far off.

He came up with a hesitating step, greeted all of them from a distance, and with an expression of pain on his face he turned to Natalya and said:

'Oh, you are having a walk?'

'Yes,' answered Natalya, 'we were just going home.'

'Ah!' was Volintsev's reply. 'Well, let us go,' and they all walked towards the house.

'How is your sister?' Rudin inquired, in a specially cordial tone, of Volintsev. The evening before, too, he had been very gracious to him.

'Thank you; she is quite well. She will perhaps be here to-day.... I think you were discussing something when I came up?'

'Yes; I have had a conversation with Natalya Alexyevna. She said one thing to me which affected me strongly.'

Volintsev did not ask what the one thing was, and in profound silence they all returned to Darya Mihailovna's house.

Before dinner the party was again assembled in the drawing-room. Pigasov, however, did not come. Rudin was not at his best; he did nothing but press Pandalevsky to play Beethoven. Volintsev was silent and stared at the floor. Natalya did not leave her mother's side, and was at times lost in thought, and then bent over her work. Bassistoff did not take his eyes off Rudin, constantly on the alert for him to say something brilliant. About three hours were passed in this way rather monotonously. Alexandra Pavlovna did not come to dinner, and when they rose from table Volintsev at once ordered his carriage to be ready, and slipped away without saying good-bye to any one.

His heart was heavy. He had long loved Natalya, and was repeatedly resolving to make her an offer.... She was kindly disposed to him,—but her heart remained unmoved; he saw that clearly. He did not hope to inspire in her a tenderer sentiment, and was only waiting for the time when she should be perfectly at home with him and intimate with him. What could have disturbed him? what change had he noticed in these two days? Natalya had behaved to him exactly the same as before....

Whether it was that some idea had come upon him that he perhaps did not know Natalya's character at all—that she was more a stranger to him than he had thought,—or jealousy had begun to work in him, or he had some dim presentiment of ill... anyway, he suffered, though he tried to reason with himself.

When he came in to his sister's room, Lezhnyov was sitting with her.

'Why have you come back so early?' asked Alexandra Pavlovna.

'Oh! I was bored.'

'Was Rudin there?'

'Yes.'

Volintsev flung down his cap and sat down. Alexandra Pavlovna turned eagerly to him.

'Please, Serezha, help me to convince this obstinate man (she signified Lezhnyov) that Rudin is extraordinarily clever and eloquent.'

Volintsev muttered something.

'But I am not disputing at all with you,' Lezhnyov began. 'I have no doubt of the cleverness and eloquence of Mr. Rudin; I only say that I don't like him.'

'But have you seen him?' inquired Volintsev.

'I saw him this morning at Darya Mihallovna's. You know he is her first favourite now. The time will come when she will part with him—Pandalevsky is the only man she will never part with—but now he is supreme. I saw him, to be sure! He was sitting there,—and she showed me off to him, "see, my good friend, what queer fish we have here!" But I am not a prize horse, to be trotted out on show, so I took myself off.'

'But how did you come to be there?'

'About a boundary; but that was all nonsense; she simply wanted to have a look at my physiognomy. She's a fine lady,—that's explanation enough!'

'His superiority is what offends you—that's what it is!' began Alexandra Pavlovna warmly, 'that's what you can't forgive. But I am convinced that besides his cleverness he must have an excellent heart as well. You should see his eyes when he——'

'"Of purity exalted speaks,"' quoted Lezhnyov.

'You make me angry, and I shall cry. I am heartily sorry I did not go to Darya Mihailovna's, but stopped with you. You don't deserve it. Leave off teasing me,' she added, in an appealing voice, 'You had much better tell me about his youth.'

'Rudin's youth?'

'Yes, of course. Didn't you tell me you knew him well, and had known him a long time?'

Lezhnyov got up and walked up and down the room.

'Yes,' he began, 'I do know him well. You want me to tell you about his youth? Very well. He was born in T——, and was the son of a poor landowner, who died soon after. He was left alone with his mother. She was a very good woman, and she idolised him; she lived on nothing but oatmeal, and every penny she had she spent on him. He was educated in Moscow, first at the expense of some uncle, and afterwards, when he was grown up and fully fledged, at the expense of a rich prince whose favour he had courted—there, I beg your pardon, I won't do it again—with whom he had made friends. Then he went to the university. At the university I got to know him and we became intimate friends. I will tell you about our life in those days some other time, I can't now. Then he went abroad....'

Lezhnyov continued to walk up and down the room; Alexandra Pavlovna followed him with her eyes.

'While he was abroad,' he continued, 'Rudin wrote very rarely to his mother, and paid her altogether only one visit for ten days.... The old lady died without him, cared for by strangers; but up to her death she never took her eyes off his portrait. I went to see her when I was staying in T——. She was a kind and hospitable woman; she always used to feast me on cherry jam. She loved her Mitya devotedly. People of the Petchorin type tell us that we always love those who are least capable of feeling love themselves; but it's my idea that all mothers love their children especially when they are absent. Afterwards I met Rudin abroad. Then he was connected with a lady, one of our countrywomen, a bluestocking, no longer young, and plain, as a bluestocking is bound to be. He lived a good while with her, and at last threw her over—or no, I beg pardon,—she threw him over. It was then that I too threw him over. That's all.'

Lezhnyov ceased speaking, passed his hand over his brow, and dropped into a chair as if he were exhausted.

'Do you know, Mihailo Mihailitch,' began Alexandra Pavlovna, 'you are a spiteful person, I see; indeed you are no better than Pigasov. I am convinced that all you have told me is true, that you have not made up anything, and yet in what an unfavourable light you have put it all! The poor old mother, her devotion, her solitary death, and that lady—What does it all amount to? You know that it's easy to put the life of the best of men in such colours—and without adding anything, observe—that every one would be shocked! But that too is slander of a kind!'

Lezhnyov got up and again walked about the room.

'I did not want to shock you at all, Alexandra Pavlovna,' he brought out at last, 'I am not given to slander. However,' he added, after a moment's thought, 'in reality there is a foundation of fact in what you said. I did not mean to slander Rudin; but—who knows! very likely he has had time to change since those days—very possibly I am unjust to him.'

'Ah! you see. So promise me that you will renew your acquaintance with him, and will get to know him thoroughly and then report your final opinion of him to me.'

'As you please. But why are you so quiet, Sergei Pavlitch?'

Volintsev started and raised his head, as though he had just waked up.

'What can I say? I don't know him. Besides, my head aches to-day.'

'Yes, you look rather pale this evening,' remarked Alexandra Pavlovna; 'are you unwell?'

'My head aches,' repeated Volintsev, and he went away.

Alexandra Pavlovna and Lezhnyov looked after him, and exchanged glances, though they said nothing. What was passing in Volintsev's heart was no mystery to either of them.



VI

More than two months had passed; during the whole of that period Rudin had scarcely been away from Darya Mihailovna's house. She could not get on without him. To talk to him about herself and to listen to his eloquence became a necessity for her. He would have taken his leave on one occasion, on the ground that all his money was spent; she gave him five hundred roubles. He borrowed two hundred roubles more from Volintsev. Pigasov visited Darya Mihailovna much less frequently than before; Rudin crushed him by his presence. And indeed it was not only Pigasov who was conscious of an oppression.

'I don't like that prig,' Pigasov used to say, 'he expresses himself so affectedly like a hero of a romance. If he says "I," he stops in rapt admiration, "I, yes, I!" and the phrases he uses are all so drawn-out; if you sneeze, he will begin at once to explain to you exactly why you sneezed and did not cough. If he praises you, it's just as if he were creating you a prince. If he begins to abuse himself, he humbles himself into the dust—come, one thinks, he will never dare to face the light of day after that. Not a bit of it! It only cheers him up, as if he'd treated himself to a glass of grog.'

Pandalevsky was a little afraid of Rudin, and cautiously tried to win his favour. Volintsev had got on to curious terms with him. Rudin called him a knight-errant, and sang his praises to his face and behind his back; but Volintsev could not bring himself to like him and always felt an involuntary impatience and annoyance when Rudin devoted himself to enlarging on his good points in his presence. 'Is he making fun of me?' he thought, and he felt a throb of hatred in his heart. He tried to keep his feelings in check, but in vain; he was jealous of him on Natalya's account. And Rudin himself, though he always welcomed Volintsev with effusion, though he called him a knight-errant, and borrowed money from him, did not feel exactly friendly towards him. It would be difficult to define the feelings of these two men when they pressed each other's hands like friends and looked into each other's eyes.

Bassistoff continued to adore Rudin, and to hang on every word he uttered. Rudin paid him very little attention. Once he spent a whole morning with him, discussing the weightiest problems of life, and awakening his keenest enthusiasm, but afterwards he took no further notice of him. Evidently it was only a phrase when he said that he was seeking for pure and devoted souls. With Lezhnyov, who began to be a frequent visitor at the house, Rudin did not enter into discussion; he seemed even to avoid him. Lezhnyov, on his part, too, treated him coldly. He did not, however, report his final conclusions about him, which somewhat disquieted Alexandra Pavlovna. She was fascinated by Rudin, but she had confidence in Lezhnyov. Every one in Darya Mihailovna's house humoured Rudin's fancies; his slightest preferences were carried out He determined the plans for the day. Not a single partie de plaisir was arranged without his co-operation.

He was not, however, very fond of any kind of impromptu excursion or picnic, and took part in them rather as grown-up people take part in children's games, with an air of kindly, but rather wearied, friendliness. He took interest in everything else, however. He discussed with Darya Mihailovna her plans for the estate, the education of her children, her domestic arrangements, and her affairs generally; he listened to her schemes, and was not bored by petty details, and, in his turn, proposed reforms and made suggestions. Darya Mihailovna agreed to them in words—and that was all. In matters of business she was really guided by the advice of her bailiff—an elderly, one-eyed Little Russian, a good-natured and crafty old rogue. 'What is old is fat, what is new is thin,' he used to say, with a quiet smile, winking his solitary eye.

Next to Darya Mihailovna, it was Natalya to whom Rudin used to talk most often and at most length. He used privately to give her books, to confide his plans to her, and to read her the first pages of the essays and other works he had in his mind. Natalya did not always fully grasp the significance of them.

But Rudin did not seem to care much about her understanding, so long as she listened to him. His intimacy with Natalya was not altogether pleasing to Darya Mihailovna. 'However,' she thought, 'let her chatter away with him in the country. She amuses him as a little girl now. There is no great harm in it, and, at any rate, it will improve her mind. At Petersburg I will soon put a stop to it.'

Darya Mihailovna was mistaken. Natalya did not chatter to Rudin like a school-girl; she eagerly drank in his words, she tried to penetrate to their full significance; she submitted her thoughts, her doubts to him; he became her leader, her guide. So far, it was only the brain that was stirred, but in the young the brain is not long stirred alone. What sweet moments Natalya passed when at times in the garden on the seat, in the transparent shade of the aspen tree, Rudin began to read Goethe's Faust, Hoffman, or Bettina's letters, or Novalis, constantly stopping and explaining what seemed obscure to her. Like almost all Russian girls, she spoke German badly, but she understood it well, and Rudin was thoroughly imbued with German poetry, German romanticism and philosophy, and he drew her after him into these forbidden lands. Unimagined splendours were revealed there to her earnest eyes from the pages of the book which Rudin held on his knee; a stream of divine visions, of new, illuminating ideas, seemed to flow in rhythmic music into her soul, and in her heart, moved with the high delight of noble feeling, slowly was kindled and fanned into a flame the holy spark of enthusiasm.

'Tell me, Dmitri Nikolaitch,' she began one day, sitting by the window at her embroidery-frame, 'shall you be in Petersburg in the winter?'

'I don't know,' replied Rudin, as he let the book he had been glancing through fall upon his knee; 'if I can find the means, I shall go.'

He spoke dejectedly; he felt tired, and had done nothing all day.

'I think you are sure to find the means.'

Rudin shook his head.

'You think so!'

And he looked away expressively.

Natalya was on the point of replying, but she checked herself.

'Look.' began Rudin, with a gesture towards the window, 'do you see that apple-tree? It is broken by the weight and abundance of its own fruit. True emblem of genius.'

'It is broken because it had no support,' replied Natalya

'I understand you, Natalya Alexyevna, but it is not so easy for a man to find such a support.'

'I should think the sympathy of others... in any case isolation always....'

Natalya was rather confused, and flushed a little.

'And what will you do in the country in the winter?' she added hurriedly.

'What shall I do? I shall finish my larger essay—you know it—on "Tragedy in Life and in Art." I described to you the outline of it the day before yesterday, and shall send it to you.'

'And you will publish it?'

'No.'

'No? For whose sake will you work then?'

'And if it were for you?'

Natalya dropped her eyes.

'It would be far above me.'

'What, may I ask, is the subject of the essay?' Bassistoff inquired modestly. He was sitting a little distance away.

'"Tragedy in Life and in Art,"' repeated Rudin. 'Mr. Bassistoff too will read it. But I have not altogether settled on the fundamental motive. I have not so far worked out for myself the tragic significance of love.'

Rudin liked to talk of love, and frequently did so. At first, at the word 'love,' Mlle, Boncourt started, and pricked up her eyes like an old war-horse at the sound of the trumpet; but afterwards she had grown used to it, and now only pursed up her lips and took snuff at intervals.

'It seems to me,' said Natalya timidly, 'that the tragic in love is unrequited love.'

'Not at all!' replied Rudin; 'that is rather the comic side of love. ... The question must be put in an altogether different way... one must attack it more deeply.... Love!' he pursued, 'all is mystery in love; how it comes, how it develops, how it passes away. Sometimes it comes all at once, undoubting, glad as day; sometimes it smoulders like fire under ashes, and only bursts into a flame in the heart when all is over; sometimes it winds its way into the heart like a serpent, and suddenly slips out of it again.... Yes, yes; it is the great problem. But who does love in our days? Who is so bold as to love?'

And Rudin grew pensive.

'Why is it we have not seen Sergei Pavlitch for so long?' he asked suddenly.

Natalya blushed, and bent her head over her embroidery frame.

'I don't know,' she murmured.

'What a splendid, generous fellow he is!' Rudin declared, standing up. 'It is one of the best types of a Russian gentleman.'

Mlle, Boncourt gave him a sidelong look out of her little French eyes.

Rudin walked up and down the room.

'Have you noticed,' he began, turning sharply round on his heels, 'that on the oak—and the oak is a strong tree—the old leaves only fall off when the new leaves begin to grow?'

'Yes,' answered Natalya slowly, 'I have noticed it'

'That is what happens to an old love in a strong heart; it is dead already, but still it holds its place; only another new love can drive it out.'

Natalya made no reply.

'What does that mean?' she was thinking.

Rudin stood still, tossed his hair back, and walked away.

Natalya went to her own room. She sat a long while on her little bed in perplexity, pondering over Rudin's last words. All at once she clasped her hands and began to weep bitterly. What she was weeping for—who can tell? She herself could not tell why her tears were falling so fast. She dried them; but they flowed afresh, like water from a long-pent-up source.

On this same day Alexandra Pavlovna had a conversation with Lezhnyov about Rudin. At first he bore all her attacks in silence; but at last she succeeded in rousing him into talk.

'I see,' she said to him, 'you dislike Dmitri Nikolaitch, as you did before. I purposely refrained from questioning you till now; but now you have had time to make up your mind whether there is any change in him, and I want to know why you don't like him.'

'Very well,' answered Lezhnyov with his habitual phlegm, 'since your patience is exhausted; only look here, don't get angry.'

'Come, begin, begin.'

'And let me have my say to the end.'

'Of course, of course; begin.'

'Very well,' said Lezhnyov, dropping lazily on to the sofa; 'I admit that I certainly don't like Rudin. He is a clever fellow.'

'I should think so.'

'He is a remarkably clever man, though in reality essentially shallow.'

'It's easy to say that.'

'Though essentially shallow,' repeated Lezhnyov; 'but there's no great harm in that; we are all shallow. I will not even quarrel with him for being a tyrant at heart, lazy, ill-informed!'

Alexandra Pavlovna clasped her hands.

'Rudin—ill-informed!' she cried.

'Ill-informed!' repeated Lezhnyov in precisely the same voice, 'that he likes to live at other people's expanse, to cut a good figure, and so forth—all that's natural enough. But what's wrong is, that he is as cold as ice.'

'He cold! that fiery soul cold!' interrupted Alexandra Pavlovna.

'Yes, cold as ice, and he knows it, and pretends to be fiery. What's bad,' pursued Lezhnyov, gradually growing warm, 'he is playing a dangerous game—not dangerous for him, of course; he does not risk a farthing, not a straw on it—but others stake their soul.'

'Whom and what are you talking of? I don't understand you,' said Alexandra Pavlovna.

'What's bad, he isn't honest. He's a clever man, certainly; he ought to know the value of his own words, and he brings them out as if they were worth something to him. I don't dispute that he's a fine speaker, but not in the Russian style. And indeed, after all, fine speaking is pardonable in a boy, but at his years it is disgraceful to take pleasure in the sound of his own voice, and to show off!'

'I think, Mihailo Mihailitch, it's all the same for those who hear him, whether he is showing off or not.'

'Excuse me, Alexandra Pavlovna, it is not all the same. One man says a word to me and it thrills me all over, another may say the same thing, or something still finer—and I don't prick up my ears. Why is that?'

'You don't, perhaps,' put in Alexandra Pavlovna.

'I don't,' retorted Lezhnyov, 'though perhaps my ears are long enough. The point is, that Rudin's words seem to remain mere words, and never to pass into deeds—and meanwhile even words may trouble a young heart, may be the ruin of it.'

'But whom do you mean, Mihailo Mihailitch?'

Lezhnyov paused.

'Do you want to know whom I mean, Natalya Alexyevna?'

Alexandra Pavlovna was taken aback for a moment, but she began to smile the instant after.

'Really,' she began, 'what queer ideas you always have! Natalya is still a child; and besides, if there were anything in what you say, do you suppose Darya Mihailovna——'

'Darya Mihailovna is an egoist to begin with, and lives for herself; and then she is so convinced of her own skill in educating her children that it does not even enter her head to feel uneasy about them. Nonsense! how is it possible: she has but to give one nod, one majestic glance—and all is over, all is obedience again. That's what that lady imagines; she fancies herself a female Maecenas, a learned woman, and God knows what, but in fact she is nothing more than a silly, worldly old woman. But Natalya is not a baby; believe me, she thinks more, and more profoundly too, than you and I do. And that her true, passionate, ardent nature must fall in with an actor, a flirt like this! But of course that's in the natural order of things.'

'A flirt! Do you mean that he is a flirt?'

'Of course he is. And tell me yourself, Alexandra Pavlovna, what is his position in Darya Mihailovna's house? To be the idol, the oracle of the household, to meddle in the arrangements, all the gossip and petty trifles of the house—is that a dignified position for a man to be in?'

Alexandra Pavlovna looked at Lezhnyov in surprise.

'I don't know you, Mihailo Mihailitch,' she began to say. 'You are flushed and excited. I believe there must be something else hidden under this.'

'Oh, so that's it! Tell a woman the truth from conviction, and she will never rest easy till she has invented some petty outside cause quite beside the point which has made you speak in precisely that manner and no other.'

Alexandra Pavlovna began to get angry.

'Bravo, Monsieur Lezhnyov! You begin to be as bitter against women as Mr. Pigasov; but you may say what you like, penetrating as you are, it's hard for me to believe that you understand every one and everything. I think you are mistaken. According to your ideas, Rudin is a kind of Tartuffe.'

'No, the point is, that he is not even a Tartuffe. Tartuffe at least knew what he was aiming at; but this fellow, for all his cleverness——'

'Well, well, what of him? Finish your sentence, you unjust, horrid man!'

Lezhnyov got up.

'Listen, Alexandra Pavlovna,' he began, 'it is you who are unjust, not I. You are cross with me for my harsh criticism of Rudin; I have the right to speak harshly of him! I have paid dearly enough, perhaps, for that privilege. I know him well: I lived a long while with him. You remember I promised to tell you some time about our life at Moscow. It is clear that I must do so now. But will you have the patience to hear me out?'

'Tell me, tell me!'

'Very well, then.'

Lezhnyov began walking with measured steps about the room, coming to a standstill at times with his head bent.

'You know, perhaps,' he began, 'or perhaps you don't know, that I was left an orphan at an early age, and by the time I was seventeen I had no one in authority over me. I lived at my aunt's at Moscow, and did just as I liked. As a boy I was rather silly and conceited, and liked to brag and show off. After my entrance at the university I behaved like a regular schoolboy, and soon got into a scrape. I won't tell you about it; it's not worth while. But I told a lie about it, and rather a shameful lie. It all came out, and I was put to open shame. I lost my head and cried like a child. It happened at a friend's rooms before a lot of fellow-students. They all began to laugh at me, all except one student, who, observe, had been more indignant with me than any, so long as I had been obstinate and would not confess my deceit. He took pity on me, perhaps; anyway, he took me by the arm and led me away to his lodging.'

'Was that Rudin?' asked Alexandra Pavlovna.

'No, it was not Rudin... it was a man... he is dead now... he was an extraordinary man. His name was Pokorsky. To describe him in a few words is beyond my powers, but directly one begins to speak of him, one does not want to speak of any one else. He had a noble, pure heart, and an intelligence such as I have never met since. Pokorsky lived in a little, low-pitched room, in an attic of an old wooden house. He was very poor, and supported himself somehow by giving lessons. Sometimes he had not even a cup of tea to offer to his friends, and his only sofa was so shaky that it was like being on board ship. But in spite of these discomforts a great many people used to go to see him. Every one loved him; he drew all hearts to him. You would not believe what sweetness and happiness there was in sitting in his poor little room! It was in his room I met Rudin. He had already parted from his prince before then.'

'What was there so exceptional in this Pokorsky?' asked Alexandra Pavlovna.

'How can I tell you? Poetry and truth—that was what drew all of us to him. For all his clear, broad intellect he was as sweet and simple as a child. Even now I have his bright laugh ringing in my ears, and at the same time he

Burnt his midnight lamp Before the holy and the true,

as a dear half-cracked fellow, the poet of our set, expressed it.'

'And how did he talk?' Alexandra Pavlovna questioned again.

'He talked well when he was in the mood, but not remarkably so. Rudin even then was twenty times as eloquent as he.'

Lezhnyov stood still and folded his arms.

'Pokorsky and Rudin were very unlike. There was more flash and brilliance about Rudin, more fluency, and perhaps more enthusiasm. He appeared far more gifted than Pokorsky, and yet all the while he was a poor creature by comparison. Rudin was excellent at developing any idea, he was capital in argument, but his ideas did not come from his own brain; he borrowed them from others, especially from Pokorsky. Pokorsky was quiet and soft—even weak in appearance—and he was fond of women to distraction, and fond of dissipation, and he would never take an insult from any one. Rudin seemed full of fire, and courage, and life, but at heart he was cold and almost a coward, until his vanity was touched, then he would not stop at anything. He always tried to get an ascendency over people, but he got it in the name of general principles and ideas, and certainly had a great influence over many. To tell the truth, no one loved him; I was the only one, perhaps, who was attached to him. They submitted to his yoke, but all were devoted to Pokorsky. Rudin never refused to argue and discuss with any one he met. He did not read very much, though far more anyway than Pokorsky and all the rest of us; besides, he had a well-arranged intellect, and a prodigious memory, and what an effect that has on young people! They must have generalisations, conclusions, incorrect if you like, perhaps, but still conclusions! A perfectly sincere man never suits them. Try to tell young people that you cannot give them the whole truth, and they will not listen to you. But you mustn't deceive them either. You want to half believe yourself that you are in possession of the truth. That was why Rudin had such a powerful effect on all of us. I told you just now, you know, that he had not read much, but he read philosophical books, and his brain was so constructed that he extracted at once from what he had read all the general principles, penetrated to the very root of the thing, and then made deductions from it in all directions—consecutive, brilliant, sound ideas, throwing up a wide horizon to the soul. Our set consisted then—it's only fair to say—of boys, and not well-informed boys. Philosophy, art, science, and even life itself were all mere words to us—ideas if you like, fascinating and magnificent ideas, but disconnected and isolated. The general connection of those ideas, the general principle of the universe we knew nothing of, and had had no contact with, though we discussed it vaguely, and tried to form an idea of it for ourselves. As we listened to Rudin, we felt for the first time as if we had grasped it at last, this general connection, as if a veil had been lifted at last! Even admitting he was not uttering an original thought—what of that! Order and harmony seemed to be established in all we knew; all that had been disconnected seemed to fall into a whole, to take shape and grow like a building before our eyes, all was full of light and inspiration everywhere.... Nothing remained meaningless and undesigned, in everything wise design and beauty seemed apparent, everything took a clear and yet mystic significance; every isolated event of life fell into harmony, and with a kind of holy awe and reverence and sweet emotion we felt ourselves to be, as it were, the living vessels of eternal truth, her instruments destined for some great... Doesn't it all seem very ridiculous to you?'

'Not the least!' replied Alexandra Pavlovna slowly; 'why should you think so? I don't altogether understand you, but I don't think it ridiculous.'

'We have had time to grow wiser since then, of course,' Lezhnyov continued, 'all that may seem childish to us now.... But, I repeat, we all owed a great deal to Rudin then. Pokorsky was incomparably nobler than he, no question about it; Pokorsky breathed fire and strength into all of us; but he was often depressed and silent. He was nervous and not robust; but when he did stretch his wings—good heavens!—what a flight! up to the very height of the blue heavens! And there was a great deal of pettiness in Rudin, handsome and stately as he was; he was a gossip, indeed, and he loved to have a hand in everything, arranging and explaining everything. His fussy activity was inexhaustible—he was a diplomatist by nature. I speak of him as I knew him then. But unluckily he has not altered. On the other hand, his ideals haven't altered at five-and-thirty! It's not every one who can say that of himself!'

'Sit down,' said Alexandra Pavlovna, 'why do you keep moving about like a pendulum?'

'I like it better,' answered Lezhnyov. 'Well, after I had come into Pokorsky's set, I may tell you, Alexandra Pavlovna, I was quite transformed; I grew humble and anxious to learn; I studied, and was happy and reverent—in a word, I felt just as though I had entered a holy temple. And really, when I recall our gatherings, upon my word there was much that was fine, even touching, in them. Imagine a party of five or six lads gathered together, one tallow candle burning. The tea was dreadful stuff, and the cake was stale, very stale; but you should have seen our faces, you should have heard our talk! Eyes were sparkling with enthusiasm, cheeks flushed, and hearts beating, while we talked of God, and truth, of the future of humanity, and poetry ... often what we said was absurd, and we were in ecstasies over nonsense; but what of that?... Pokorsky sat with crossed legs, his pale cheek on his hand, and his eyes seemed to shed light. Rudin stood in the middle of the room and spoke, spoke splendidly, for all the world like the young Demosthenes by the resounding sea; our poet, Subotin of the dishevelled locks, would now and then throw out some abrupt exclamation as though in his sleep, while Scheller, a student forty years old, the son of a German pastor, who had the reputation among us of a profound thinker, thanks to his eternal, inviolable silence, held his peace with more rapt solemnity than usual; even the lively Shtchitof, the Aristophanes of our reunions, was subdued and did no more than smile, while two or three novices listened with reverent transports.... And the night seemed to fly by on wings. It was already the grey morning when we separated, moved, happy, aspiring and sober (there was no question of wine among us at such times) with a kind of sweet weariness in our souls... and one even looked up at the stars with a kind of confidence, as though they had become nearer and more comprehensible. Ah! that was a glorious time, and I can't bear to believe that it was altogether wasted! And it was not wasted—not even for those whose lives were sordid afterwards. How often have I chanced to come across such old college friends! You would think the man had sunk altogether to the brute, but one had only to utter Pokorsky's name before him and every trace of noble feeling in him was stirred at once; it was like uncorking a forgotten phial of fragrance in some dark and dirty room.'

Lezhnyov stopped; his colourless face was flushed.

'And what was the cause of your quarrel with Rudin?' said Alexandra Pavlovna, looking wonderingly at Lezhnyov.

'I did not quarrel with him, but I parted from him when I came to know him thoroughly abroad. But I might well have quarrelled with him in Moscow, he did me a bad turn there.'

'What was that?'

'It was like this. I—how can I tell you?—it does not accord very well with my appearance, but I was always much given to falling in love.'

'You?'

'Yes, I was indeed. That's a curious idea, isn't it? But, anyway, it was so. Well, so I fell in love in those days with a very pretty young girl.... But why do you look at me like that? I could tell you something about myself a great deal more extraordinary than that!'

'And what is that something, if I may know?'

'Oh, just this. In those Moscow days I used to have a tryst at nights—with whom, would you imagine? with a young lime-tree at the bottom of my garden. I used to embrace its slender and graceful trunk, and I felt as though I were embracing all nature, and my heart melted and expanded as though it really were taking in the whole of nature. That's what I was then. And do you think, perhaps, I didn't write verses? Why, I even composed a whole drama in imitation of Manfred. Among the characters was a ghost with blood on his breast, and not his own blood, observe, but the blood of all humanity.... Yes, yes, you need not wonder at that. But I was beginning to tell you about my love affair. I made the acquaintance of a girl——'

'And you gave up your trysts with the lime-tree?' inquired Alexandra Pavlovna.

'Yes; I gave them up. This girl was a sweet, good creature, with clear, lively eyes and a ringing voice.'

'You give an excellent description of her,' commented Alexandra Pavlovna with a smile.

'You are such a severe critic,' retorted Lezhnyov. 'Well, this girl lived with her old father.... But I will not enter into details; I will only tell you that this girl was so kind-hearted, if you only asked her for half a cup of tea she would give it you brimming over! Two days after first meeting her I was wild over her, and on the seventh day I could hold out no longer, and confessed it in full to Rudin. At that time I was completely under his influence, and his influence, I will tell you frankly, was beneficial in many things. He was the first person who did not treat me with contempt, but tried to lick me into shape. I loved Pokorsky passionately, and felt a kind of awe before his purity of soul, but I came closer to Rudin. When he heard about my love, he fell into an indescribable ecstasy, congratulated me, embraced me, and at once fell to disserting and enlarging upon all the dignity of my new position. I pricked up my ears.... Well, you know how he can talk. His words had an extraordinary effect on me. I at once assumed an amazing consequence in my own eyes, and I put on a serious exterior and left off laughing. I remember I used even to go about at that time with a kind of circumspection, as though I had a sacred chalice within me, full of a priceless liquid, which I was afraid of spilling over.... I was very happy, especially as I found favour in her eyes. Rudin wanted to make my beloved's acquaintance, and I myself almost insisted on presenting him.'

'Ah! I see, I see now what it is,' interrupted Alexandra Pavlovna. 'Rudin cut you out with your charmer, and you have never been able to forgive him.... I am ready to take a wager I am right!'

'You would lose your wager, Alexandra Pavlovna; you are wrong. Rudin did not cut me out; he did not even try to cut me out; but, all the same, he put an end to my happiness, though, looking at it in cool blood, I am ready to thank him for it now. But I nearly went out of my mind at the time. Rudin did not in the least wish to injure me—quite the contrary! But through his cursed habit of pinning every emotion—his own and other people's—with a phrase, as one pins butterflies in a case, he set to making clear to ourselves our relations to one another, and how we ought to treat each other, and arbitrarily compelled us to take stock of our feelings and ideas, praised us and blamed us, even entered into a correspondence with us—fancy! Well, he succeeded in completely disconcerting us! I should hardly, even then, have married the young lady (I had so much sense still left), but, at least, we might have spent some months happily a la Paul et Virginie; but now came strained relations, misunderstandings of every kind. It ended by Rudin, one fine morning, arriving at the conviction that it was his sacred duty as a friend to acquaint the old father with everything—and he did so.'

'Is it possible?' cried Alexandra Pavlovna.

'Yes, and did it with my consent, observe. That's where the wonder comes in!... I remember even now what a chaos my brain was in; everything was simply turning round—things looked as they do in a camera obscura—white seemed black and black white; falsehood was truth, and a whim was duty.... Ah! even now I feel shame at the recollection of it! Rudin—he never flagged—not a bit of it! He soared through all sorts of misunderstandings and perplexities, like a swallow over a pond.'

'And so you parted from the girl?' asked Alexandra Pavlovna, naively bending her head on one side, and raising her eyebrows.

'We parted—and it was a horrible parting—outrageously awkward and public, quite unnecessarily public.... I wept myself, and she wept, and I don't know what passed.... It seemed as though a kind of Gordian knot had been tied. It had to be cut, but it was painful! However, everything in the world is ordered for the best. She has married an excellent man, and is well off now.'

'But confess, you have never been able to forgive Rudin, all the same,' Alexandra Pavlovna was beginning.

'Not at all!' interposed Lezhnyov, 'why, I cried like a child when he was going abroad. Still, to tell the truth, even then there was the germ in my heart. And when I met him later abroad... well, by that time I had grown older.... Rudin struck me in his true light.'

'What was it exactly you discovered in him?'

'Why, all I have been telling you the last hour. But enough of him. Perhaps everything will turn out all right. I only wanted to show you that, if I do judge him hardly, it is not because I don't know him. ... As far as concerns Natalya Alexyevna, I won't say any more, but you should observe your brother.'

'My brother! Why?'

'Why, look at him. Do you really notice nothing?'

Alexandra Pavlovna looked down.

'You are right,' she assented. 'Certainly—my brother—for some time he has not been himself.... But do you really think——'

'Hush! I think he is coming,' whispered Lezhnyov. 'But Natalya is not a child, believe me, though unluckily she is as inexperienced as a child. You will see, that girl will astonish us all.'

'In what way?'

'Oh! in this way.... Do you know it's precisely girls like that who drown themselves, take poison, and so forth? Don't be misled by her looking so calm. Her passions are strong, and her character—my goodness!'

'Come! I think you are indulging in a flight of fancy now. To a phlegmatic person like you, I suppose even I seem a volcano?'

'Oh, no!' answered Lezhnyov, with a smile. 'And as for character—you have no character at all, thank God!'

'What impertinence is that?'

'That? It's the highest compliment, believe me.'

Volintsev came in and looked suspiciously at Lezhnyov and his sister. He had grown thin of late. They both began to talk to him, but he scarcely smiled in response to their jests, and looked, as Pigasov once said of him, like a melancholy hare. But there has certainly never been a man in the world who, at some time in his life, has not looked worse than that. Volintsev felt that Natalya was drifting away from him, and with her it seemed as if the earth was giving way under his feet.



VII

The next day was Sunday, and Natalya got up late. The day before she had been very silent all day; she was secretly ashamed of her tears, and she slept very badly. Sitting half-dressed at her little piano, at times she played some chords, hardly audibly for fear of waking Mlle. Boncourt, and then let her forehead fall on the cold keys and remained a long while motionless. She kept thinking, not of Rudin himself, but of some word he had uttered, and she was wholly buried in her own thought. Sometimes she recollected Volintsev. She knew that he loved her. But her mind did not dwell on him more than an instant.... She felt a strange agitation. In the morning she dressed hurriedly and went down, and after saying good-morning to her mother, seized an opportunity and went out alone into the garden.... It was a hot day, bright and sunny in spite of occasional showers of rain. Slight vapoury clouds sailed smoothly over the clear sky, scarcely obscuring the sun, and at times a downpour of rain fell suddenly in sheets, and was as quickly over. The thickly falling drops, flashing like diamonds, fell swiftly with a kind of dull thud; the sunshine glistened through their sparkling drops; the grass, that had been rustling in the wind, was still, thirstily drinking in the moisture; the drenched trees were languidly shaking all their leaves; the birds were busily singing, and it was pleasant to hear their twittering chatter mingling with the fresh gurgle and murmur of the running rain-water. The dusty roads were steaming and slightly spotted by the smart strokes of the thick drops. Then the clouds passed over, a slight breeze began to stir, and the grass began to take tints of emerald and gold. The trees seemed more transparent with their wet leaves clinging together. A strong scent arose from all around.

The sky was almost cloudless again when Natalya came into the garden. It was full of sweetness and peace—that soothing, blissful peace in which the heart of man is stirred by a sweet languor of undefined desire and secret emotion.

Natalya walked along a long line of silver poplars beside the pond; suddenly, as if he had sprung out of the earth, Rudin stood before her. She was confused. He looked her in the face.

'You are alone?' he inquired.

'Yes, I am alone,' replied Natalya, 'but I was going back directly. It is time I was home.'

'I will go with you.'

And he walked along beside her.

'You seem melancholy,' he said.

'I—I was just going to say that I thought you were out of spirits.'

'Very likely—it is often so with me. It is more excusable in me than in you.'

'Why? Do you suppose I have nothing to be melancholy about?'

'At your age you ought to find happiness in life.'

Natalya walked some steps in silence.

'Dmitri Nikolaitch!' she said.

'Well?'

'Do you remember—the comparison you made yesterday—do you remember—of the oak?'

'Yes, I remember. Well?'

Natalya stole a look at Rudin.

'Why did you—what did you mean by that comparison?'

Rudin bent his head and fastened his eyes on the distance.

'Natalya Alexyevna!' he began with the intense and pregnant intonation peculiar to him, which always made the listener believe that Rudin was not expressing even the tenth part of what he held locked in his heart—'Natalya Alexyevna! you may have noticed that I speak little of my own past. There are some chords which I do not touch upon at all. My heart—who need know what has passed in it? To expose that to view has always seemed sacrilege to me. But with you I cast aside reserve; you win my confidence.... I cannot conceal from you that I too have loved and have suffered like all men.... When and how? it's useless to speak of that; but my heart has known much bliss and much pain....'

Rudin made a brief pause.

'What I said to you yesterday,' he went on, 'might be applied in a degree to me in my present position. But again it is useless to speak of this. That side of life is over for me now. What remains for me is a tedious and fatiguing journey along the parched and dusty road from point to point... When I shall arrive—whether I arrive at all—God knows.... Let us rather talk of you.'

'Can it be, Dmitri Nikolaitch,' Natalya interrupted him, 'you expect nothing from life?'

'Oh, no! I expect much, but not for myself.... Usefulness, the content that comes from activity, I shall never renounce; but I have renounced happiness. My hopes, my dreams, and my own happiness have nothing in common. Love'—(at this word he shrugged his shoulders)—'love is not for me; I am not worthy of it; a woman who loves has a right to demand the whole of a man, and I can never now give the whole of myself. Besides, it is for youth to win love; I am too old. How could I turn any one's head? God grant I keep my own head on my shoulders.'

'I understand,' said Natalya, 'that one who is bent on a lofty aim must not think of himself; but cannot a woman be capable of appreciating such a man? I should have thought, on the contrary, that a woman would be sooner repelled by an egoist.... All young men—the youth you speak of—all are egoists, they are all occupied only with themselves, even when they love. Believe me, a woman is not only able to value self-sacrifice; she can sacrifice herself.'

Natalya's cheeks were slightly flushed and her eyes shining. Before her friendship with Rudin she would never have succeeded in uttering such a long and ardent speech.

'You have heard my views on woman's mission more than once,' replied Rudin with a condescending smile. 'You know that I consider that Joan of Arc alone could have saved France.... but that's not the point. I wanted to speak of you. You are standing on the threshold of life.... To dwell on your future is both pleasant and not unprofitable.... Listen: you know I am your friend; I take almost a brother's interest in you. And so I hope you will not think my question indiscreet; tell me, is your heart so far quite untouched?'

Natalya grew hot all over and said nothing, Rudin stopped, and she stopped too.

'You are not angry with me?' he asked.

'No,' she answered, 'but I did not expect——'

'However,' he went on, 'you need not answer me. I know your secret.'

Natalya looked at him almost with dismay.

'Yes, yes, I know who has won your heart. And I must say that you could not have made a better choice. He is a splendid man; he knows how to value you; he has not been crushed by life—he is simple and pure-hearted in soul... he will make your happiness.'

'Of whom are you speaking, Dmitri Niklaitch?'

'Is it possible you don't understand? Of Volintsev, of course. What? isn't it true?'

Natalya turned a little away from Rudin. She was completely overwhelmed.

'Do you imagine he doesn't love you? Nonsense! he does not take his eyes off you, and follows every movement of yours; indeed, can love ever be concealed? And do not you yourself look on him with favour? So far as I can observe, your mother, too, likes him.... Your choice——'

'Dmitri Nikolaitch,' Natalya broke in, stretching out her hand in her confusion towards a bush near her, 'it is so difficult, really, for me to speak of this; but I assure you... you are mistaken.'

'I am mistaken!' repeated Rudin. 'I think not. I have not known you very long, but I already know you well. What is the meaning of the change I see in you? I see it clearly. Are you just the same as when I met you first, six weeks ago? No, Natalya Alexyevna, your heart is not free.'

'Perhaps not,' answered Natalya, hardly audibly, 'but all the same you are mistaken.'

'How is that?' asked Rudin.

'Let me go! don't question me!' replied Natalya, and with swift steps she turned towards the house.

She was frightened herself by the feelings of which she was suddenly conscious in herself.

Rudin overtook her and stopped her.

'Natalya Alexyevna,' he said, 'this conversation cannot end like this; it is too important for me too.... How am I to understand you?'

'Let me go!' repeated Natalya.

'Natalya Alexyevna, for mercy's sake!'

Rudin's face showed his agitation. He grew pale.

'You understand everything, you must understand me too!' said Natalya; she snatched away her hand and went on, not looking round.

'Only one word!' cried Rudin after her

She stood still, but did not turn round.

'You asked me what I meant by that comparison yesterday. Let me tell you, I don't want to deceive you. I spoke of myself, of my past,—and of you.'

'How? of me?'

'Yes, of you; I repeat, I will not deceive you. You know now what was the feeling, the new feeling I spoke of then.... Till to-day I should not have ventured...'

Natalya suddenly hid her face in her hands, and ran towards the house.

She was so distracted by the unexpected conclusion of her conversation with Rudin, that she ran past Volintsev without even noticing him. He was standing motionless with his back against a tree. He had arrived at the house a quarter of an hour before, and found Darya Mihailovna in the drawing-room; and after exchanging a few words got away unobserved and went in search of Natalya. Led by a lover's instinct, he went straight into the garden and came upon her and Rudin at the very instant when she snatched her hand away from him. Darkness seemed to fall upon his eyes. Gazing after Natalya, he left the tree and took two strides, not knowing whither or wherefore. Rudin saw him as he came up to him. Both looked each other in the face, bowed, and separated in silence.

'This won't be the end of it,' both were thinking.

Volintsev went to the very end of the garden. He felt sad and sick; a load lay on his heart, and his blood throbbed in sudden stabs at intervals. The rain began to fall a little again. Rudin turned into his own room. He, too, was disturbed; his thoughts were in a whirl. The trustful, unexpected contact of a young true heart is agitating for any one.

At table everything went somehow wrong. Natalya, pale all over, could scarcely sit in her place and did not raise her eyes. Volintsev sat as usual next her, and from time to time began to talk in a constrained way to her. It happened that Pigasov was dining at Darya Mihailovna's that day. He talked more than any one at table. Among other things he began to maintain that men, like dogs, can be divided into the short-tailed and the long-tailed. People are short-tailed, he said, either from birth or through their own fault. The short-tailed are in a sorry plight; nothing succeeds with them—they have no confidence in themselves. But the man who has a long furry tail is happy. He may be weaker and inferior to the short-tailed; but he believes in himself; he displays his tail and every one admires it. And this is a fit subject for wonder; the tail, of course, is a perfectly useless part of the body, you admit; of what use can a tail be? but all judge of their abilities by their tail. 'I myself,' he concluded with a sigh, 'belong to the number of the short-tailed, and what is most annoying, I cropped my tail myself.'

'By which you mean to say,' commented Rudin carelessly, 'what La Rochefoucauld said long before you: Believe in yourself and others will believe in you. Why the tail was brought in, I fail to understand.'

'Let every one,' Volintsev began sharply and with flashing eyes, 'let every one express himself according to his fancy. Talk of despotism! ... I consider there is none worse than the despotism of so-called clever men; confound them!'

Everyone was astonished at this outbreak from Volintsev; it was received in silence. Rudin tried to look at him, but he could not control his eyes, and turned away smiling without opening his lips.

'Aha! so you too have lost your tail!' thought Pigasov; and Natalya's heart sank in terror. Darya Mihailovna gave Volintsev a long puzzled stare and at last was the first to speak; she began to describe an extraordinary dog belonging to a minister So-and-So.

Volintsev went away soon after dinner. As he bade Natalya good-bye he could not resist saying to her:

'Why are you confused, as though you had done wrong? You cannot have done wrong to any one!'

Natalya did not understand at all, and could only gaze after him. Before tea Rudin went up to her, and bending over the table as though he were examining the papers, whispered:

'It is all like a dream, isn't it? I absolutely must see you alone—if only for a minute.' He turned to Mlle, Boncourt 'Here,' he said to her, 'this is the article you were looking for,' and again bending towards Natalya, he added in a whisper, 'Try to be near the terrace in the lilac arbour about ten o'clock; I will wait for you.'

Pigasov was the hero of the evening. Rudin left him in possession of the field. He afforded Darya Mihailovna much entertainment; first he told a story of one of his neighbours who, having been henpecked by his wife for thirty years, had grown so womanish that one day in crossing a little puddle when Pigasov was present, he put out his hand and picked up the skirt of his coat, as women do with their petticoats. Then he turned to another gentleman who to begin with had been a freemason, then a hypochondriac, and then wanted to be a banker.

'How were you a freemason, Philip Stepanitch?' Pigasov asked him.

'You know how; I wore the nail of my little finger long.'

But what most diverted Darya Mihailovna was when Pigasov set off on a dissertation upon love, and maintained that even he had been sighed for, that one ardent German lady had even given him the nickname of her 'dainty little African' and her 'hoarse little crow.' Darya Mihailovna laughed, but Pigasov spoke the truth; he really was in a position to boast of his conquests. He maintained that nothing could be easier than to make any woman you chose fall in love with you; you only need repeat to her for ten days in succession that heaven is on her lips and bliss in her eyes, and that the rest of womankind are all simply rag-bags beside her; and on the eleventh day she will be ready to say herself that there is heaven on her lips and bliss in her eyes, and will be in love with you. Everything comes to pass in the world; so who knows, perhaps Pigasov was right?

At half-past nine Rudin was already in the arbour. The stars had come out in the pale, distant depths of the heaven; there was still a red glow where the sun had set, and there the horizon seemed brighter and clearer; a semi-circular moon shone golden through the black network of the weeping birch-tree. The other trees stood like grim giants, with thousands of chinks looking like eyes, or fell into compact masses of darkness. Not a leaf was stirring; the topmost branches of the lilacs and acacias seemed to stretch upwards into the warm air, as though listening for something. The house was a dark mass now; patches of red light showed where the long windows were lighted up. It was a soft and peaceful evening, but under this peace was felt the secret breath of passion.

Rudin stood, his arms folded on his breast, and listened with strained attention. His heart beat violently, and involuntarily he held his breath. At last he caught the sound of light, hurrying footsteps, and Natalya came into the arbour.

Rudin rushed up to her, and took her hands. They were cold as ice.

'Natalya Alexyevna!' he began, in an agitated whisper, 'I wanted to see you.... I could not wait till to-morrow. I must tell you what I did not suspect—what I did not realise even this morning. I love you!'

Natalya's hands trembled feebly in his.

'I love you!' he repeated, 'and how could I have deceived myself so long? How was it I did not guess long ago that I love you? And you? Natalya Alexyevna, tell me!'

Natalya could scarcely draw her breath.

'You see I have come here,' she uttered, at last

'No, say that you love me!'

'I think—yes,' she whispered.

Rudin pressed her hands still more warmly, and tried to draw her to him.

Natalya looked quickly round.

'Let me go—I am frightened.... I think some one is listening to us.... For God's sake, be on your guard. Volintsev suspects.'

'Never mind him! You saw I did not even answer him to-day.... Ah, Natalya Alexyevna, how happy I am! Nothing shall sever us now!'

Natalya looked into his eyes.

'Let me go,' she whispered; 'it's time.'

'One instant,' began Rudin.

'No, let me go, let me go.'

'You seem afraid of me.'

'No, but it's time.'

'Repeat, then, at least once more.'...

'You say you are happy?' asked Natalya.

'I? No man in the world is happier than I am! Can you doubt it?'

Natalya lifted up her head. Very beautiful was her pale, noble, young face, transformed by passion, in the mysterious shadows of the arbour, in the faint light reflected from the evening sky.

'I tell you then,' she said, 'I will be yours.'

'Oh, my God!' cried Rudin.

But Natalya made her escape, and was gone.

Rudin stood still a little while, then walked slowly out of the arbour. The moon threw a light on his face; there was a smile on his lips.

'I am happy,' he uttered in a half whisper. 'Yes, I am happy,' he repeated, as though he wanted to convince himself.

He straightened his tall figure, shook back his locks, and walked quickly into the garden, with a happy gesture of his hands.

Meanwhile the bushes of the lilac arbour moved apart, and Pandalevsky appeared. He looked around warily, shook his head, pursed up his mouth, and said, significantly, 'So that's how it is. That must be brought to Darya Mihailovna's knowledge.' And he vanished.



VIII

On his return home, Volintsev was so gloomy and dejected, he gave his sister such listless answers, and so quickly locked himself up in his room, that she decided to send a messenger to Lezhnyov. She always had recourse to him in times of difficulty. Lezhnyov sent her word that he would come in the next day.

Volintsev was no more cheerful in the morning. After tea he was starting to superintend the work on the estate, but he stayed at home instead, lay on the sofa, and took up a book—a thing he did not often do. Volintsev had no taste for literature, and poetry simply alarmed him. 'This is as incomprehensible as poetry,' he used to say, and, in confirmation of his words, he used to quote the following lines from a Russian poet:—

'And till his gloomy lifetime's close Nor reason nor experience proud Will crush nor crumple Destiny's Ensanguined forget-me-nots.'

Alexandra Pavlovna kept looking uneasily at her brother, but she did not worry him with questions. A carriage drew up at the steps.

'Ah!' she thought, 'Lezhnyov, thank goodness!'

A servant came in and announced the arrival of Rudin.

Volintsev flung his book on the floor, and raised his head. 'Who has come?' he asked.

'Rudin, Dmitri Nikolaitch,' repeated the man. Volintsev got up.

'Ask him in,' he said, 'and you, sister,' he added, turning to Alexandra Pavlovna, 'leave us alone.'

'But why?' she was beginning.

'I have a good reason,' he interrupted, passionately. 'I beg you to leave us.'

Rudin entered. Volintsev, standing in the middle of the room, received him with a chilly bow, without offering his hand.

'Confess you did not expect me,' began Rudin, and he laid his hat down by the window His lips were slightly twitching. He was ill at ease, but tried to conceal his embarrassment.

'I did not expect you, certainly,' replied Volintsev, 'after yesterday. I should have more readily expected some one with a special message from you.'

'I understand what you mean,' said Rudin, taking a seat, 'and am very grateful for your frankness. It is far better so. I have come myself to you, as to a man of honour.'

'Cannot we dispense with compliments?' observed Volintsev.

'I want to explain to you why I have come.'

'We are acquainted; why should you not come? Besides, this is not the first time you have honoured me with a visit.'

'I came to you as one man of honour to another,' repeated Rudin, 'and I want now to appeal to your sense of justice.... I have complete confidence in you.'

'What is the matter?' said Volintsev, who all this time was still standing in his original position, staring sullenly at Rudin, and sometimes pulling the ends of his moustache.

'If you would kindly... I came here to make an explanation, certainly, but all the same it cannot be done off-hand.'

'Why not?'

'A third person is involved in this matter.'

'What third person?'

'Sergei Pavlitch, you understand me?'

'Dmitri Nikolaitch, I don't understand you in the least.'

'You prefer——'

'I prefer you should speak plainly!' broke in Volintsev.

He was beginning to be angry in earnest.

Rudin frowned.

'Permit... we are alone... I must tell you—though you certainly are aware of it already (Volintsev shrugged his shoulders impatiently)—I must tell you that I love Natalya Alexyevna, and I have the right to believe that she loves me.'

Volintsev turned white, but made no reply. He walked to the window and stood with his back turned.

'You understand, Sergei Pavlitch,' continued Rudin, 'that if I were not convinced...'

'Upon my word!' interrupted Volintsev, 'I don't doubt it in the least.... Well! so be it! Good luck to you! Only I wonder what the devil induced you to come with this news to me.... What have I to do with it? What is it to me whom you love, or who loves you? It simply passes my comprehension.'

Volintsev continued to stare out of the window. His voice sounded choked.

Rudin got up.

'I will tell you, Sergei Pavlitch, why I decided to come to you, why I did not even think I had the right to hide from you our—our mutual feelings. I have too profound an esteem for you—that is why I have come; I did not want... we both did not wish to play a part before you. Your feeling for Natalya Alexyevna was known to me.... Believe me, I have no illusions about myself; I know how little I deserve to supplant you in her heart, but if it was fated this should be, is it made any better by pretence, hypocrisy, and deceit? Is it any better to expose ourselves to misunderstandings, or even to the possibilities of such a scene as took place yesterday at dinner? Sergei Pavlitch, tell me yourself, is it?'

Volintsev folded his arms on his chest, as though he were trying to hold himself in.

'Sergei Pavlitch!' Rudin continued, 'I have given you pain, I feel it—but understand us—understand that we had no other means of proving our respect to you, of proving that we know how to value your honour and uprightness. Openness, complete openness with any other man would have been misplaced; but with you it took the form of duty. We are happy to think our secret is in your hands.'

Volintsev gave vent to a forced laugh.

'Many thanks for your confidence in me!' he exclaimed, 'though, pray observe, I neither wished to know your secret, nor to tell you mine, though you treat it as if it were your property. But excuse me, you speak as though for two. Does it follow I am to suppose that Natalya Alexyevna knows of your visit, and the object of it?'

Rudin was a little taken aback.

'No, I did not communicate my intention to Natalya Alexyevna; but I know she would share my views.'

'That's all very fine indeed,' Volintsev began after a short pause, drumming on the window pane with his fingers, 'though I must confess it would have been far better if you had had rather less respect for me. I don't care a hang for your respect, to tell you the truth; but what do you want of me now?'

'I want nothing—or—no! I want one thing; I want you not to regard me as treacherous or hypocritical, to understand me... I hope that now you cannot doubt of my sincerity... I want us, Sergei Pavlitch, to part as friends... you to give me your hand as you once did.'

And Rudin went up to Volintsev.

'Excuse me, my good sir,' said Volintsev, turning round and stepping back a few paces, 'I am ready to do full justice to your intentions, all that's very fine, I admit, very exalted, but we are simple people, we do not gild our gingerbread, we are not capable of following the flight of great minds like yours.... What you think sincere, we regard as impertinent and disingenuous and indiscreet.... What is clear and simple to you, is involved and obscure to us.... You boast of what we conceal.... How are we to understand you! Excuse me, I can neither regard you as a friend, nor will I give you my hand.... That is petty, perhaps, but I am only a petty person.'