"I've sent a messenger on horseback," he said, "in ten minutes we'll learn everything, but meanwhile the servants are saying that part of Zarechye has burned down, nearer the embankment, to the right from the bridge. It started burning before twelve; it's going out now."
He did not go to the window, but stopped three steps behind her, yet she did not turn to him.
"By the calendar it ought to have been light an hour ago, and it's still like night," she said with vexation.
"Every calendar doth lie," [185]he remarked with an obliging grin, but, ashamed, hastened to add: "It's boring to live by the calendar, Liza."
And he fell silent finally, vexed at the new platitude he had uttered; Liza smiled crookedly.
"You're in such a sad mood that you can't even find words with me. But don't worry, you put it appropriately: I always live by the calendar, my every step is reckoned by the calendar. Are you surprised?"
She quickly turned away from the window and sat down in an armchair.
"You sit down, too, please. We won't be together long, and I want to say whatever I like... Why shouldn't you, too, say whatever you like?"
Nikolai Vsevolodovich sat down beside her and gently, almost timorously, took her hand.
"What does this language mean, Liza? Where does it come from so suddenly? What is the meaning of 'we won't be together long'? This is the second mysterious phrase since you woke up half an hour ago."
"You've started counting my mysterious phrases?" she laughed. "And do you remember how yesterday, as I came in, I introduced myself as a dead person? You found it necessary to forget that. To forget or not to notice."
"I don't remember, Liza. Why a dead person? One must live..."
"And you stop short. You've quite lost your eloquence. I've lived my hour in the world, and enough. Do you remember Khristofor Ivanovich?"
"No, I don't," he frowned.
"Khristofor Ivanovich, in Lausanne? You got terribly sick of him. He'd open the door and always say, 'I've just come for a minute,' and he'd sit for the whole day. I don't want to be like Khristofor Ivanovich and sit for the whole day."
A pained impression came to his face.
"Liza, this broken language grieves me. This grimacing must cost you dearly. What is it for? Why?"
His eyes lit up.
"Liza," he exclaimed, "I swear I love you more now than yesterday when you came to me!"
"What a strange confession! Why this yesterday and today, these two measures?"
"You won't abandon me," he went on, almost with despair, "we'll leave together, this very day, right? Right?"
"Aie, don't squeeze my hand so painfully! Where are we going to go together this very day? To 'resurrect' somewhere again? No, enough trying... and it's too slow for me; and I'm not able; it's too high for me. If we're to go, it should be to Moscow, to pay calls there and receive people—that's my ideal, you know; even in Switzerland I didn't conceal from you how I am. Since it's not possible for us to go to Moscow and pay calls, because you're married, there's no point in talking about it."
"Liza! What was it yesterday, then?"
"It was what it was."
"That's impossible! That's cruel!"
"So what if it's cruel; just endure it, if it's cruel."
"You're taking revenge on me for yesterday's fantasy..." he muttered, grinning spitefully. Liza flushed.
"What a base thought!"
"Then why did you give me ... 'so much happiness'? Do I have the right to know?"
"No, try doing without rights somehow; don't crown the baseness of your suggestion with foolishness. You're not doing well today. Incidentally, are you not perchance afraid of the world's opinion, and that you'll be condemned for this 'so much happiness'? Oh, if you are, for God's sake don't worry. You didn't cause anything, and you're not answerable to anyone. When I was opening your door yesterday, you didn't even know who was coming in. Here it was precisely my fantasy alone, as you just put it, and nothing more. You can look everyone boldly and triumphantly in the eye."
"Your words, this laughter, for an hour already they've been sending a chill of horror over me. This 'happiness' you're now talking about so frenziedly has cost me... everything. How can I lose you now? I swear I loved you less yesterday. Why then do you take everything from me today? Do you know how much it cost me, this new hope? I paid for it with life."
"Your own or someone else's?"
He got up quickly.
"What does that mean?" he said, looking at her motionlessly.
"Paid with your own life or with mine, that is what I wanted to ask. Or have you now lost all understanding entirely?" Liza flushed. "Why did you jump up so suddenly? Why are you looking at me that way? You scare me. Why are you afraid all the time? I noticed a while ago that you're afraid, precisely now, precisely at this moment... Lord, you're turning so pale!"
"If you know anything, Liza, I swear that Ido not. . . and I wasn't talking about thatjust now when I spoke of paying with life..."
"I don't understand you at all," she said, faltering timorously.
At last a slow, pensive grin appeared on his lips. He slowly sat down, put his elbows on his knees, and covered his face with his hands.
"A bad dream and delirium ... We were talking about two different things."
"I don't know at all what you were talking about... Did you really not know yesterday that I would leave you today, did you or did you not? Don't lie, did you know or did you not?"
"I did..." he uttered softly.
"So what do you want: you knew it, and you reserved 'the moment' for yourself. How can there be any score?"
"Tell me the whole truth," he cried out with deep suffering, "when you opened my door yesterday, did you know yourself that you were opening it for one hour only?"
She looked at him with hatred:
"Truly, the most serious man can ask the most amazing questions. And why do you worry so? Can it be out of pride that a woman left you first, and not you her? You know, Nikolai Vsevolodovich, since I've been here I've become convinced, among other things, that you are being terribly magnanimous towards me, and that is precisely what I cannot endure in you."
He got up from his place and walked several steps about the room.
"Very well, suppose it has to end this way... But how could it all have happened?"
"Who cares! And the main thing is that you yourself can tell it off on your own fingers and understand it better than anyone in the world and were counting on it. I am a young lady, my heart was brought up in the opera, it started there, that's the whole answer."
"No."
"There's nothing here that can gall your pride, and it's all perfectly true. It began with a beautiful moment which I could not endure. Two days ago when I 'offended' you before all the world, and you gave me such a chivalrous reply, I came home and guessed at once that you were running away from me because you were married, and not at all out of contempt for me—which is what I, being a young lady of fashion, was most afraid of. I understood that it was me, a reckless girl, that you were protecting by running away. You see how I value your magnanimity. Then Pyotr Stepanovich jumped up to me and explained it all at once. He revealed to me that you were being shaken by a great idea, before which he and I were utterly nothing, but that I still stood in your way. He included himself in it; he absolutely wanted it to be the three of us together, and said the most fantastic things about a bark and maple oars from some Russian song. I praised him, said he was a poet, and he took it for pure gold. And since I'd known for a long time, even without that, that I'd never last more than a moment, I just up and decided. So that's all, and enough, and, please, no more explanations. Otherwise we might quarrel. Don't be afraid of anyone, I take it all upon myself. I'm bad, I'm capricious, I got tempted by an operatic bark, I'm a young lady ... But, you know, I still thought you loved me terribly. Don't despise a foolish girl or laugh at this little tear that just fell. I like terribly much to cry and 'pity myself.' Well, enough, enough. I'm not capable of anything, you're not capable of anything; two flicks, one on each side, and let that be a comfort to us. At least our pride doesn't suffer."