Volodya listened and in heavy, strained reflection scratched his temple.
“Only very proud people are silent and love solitude,” Nyuta went on, pulling his hand away from his temple. “You’re proud, Volodya. Why do you look at me surreptitiously? Kindly look me straight in the face! Ah, come on, you lummox!”
Volodya decided to speak. Wishing to smile, he moved his lower lip, blinked, and again put his hand to his temple.
“I…I love you!” he brought out.
Nyuta raised her eyebrows in surprise and laughed.
“What is this I hear?” she sang, as opera singers do when they hear something terrible. “How’s that? What did you say? Repeat it, repeat it…”
“I…I love you!” Volodya repeated.
And now without any participation of his will, neither understanding nor reflecting on anything, he made a half step towards Nyuta and took her by the arm above the wrist. His eyes went dim and tears rose in them; the whole world turned into one big Turkish towel that smelled of the bathhouse.
“Bravo, bravo!” He heard merry laughter. “Why are you silent? I’d like you to speak! Well?”
Seeing that she did not prevent him from holding her arm, Volodya looked at Nyuta’s laughing face and clumsily, awkwardly put his arms around her waist, both hands coming together behind her back. He held her by the waist with both arms, while she, raising both hands to the back of her head and showing the dimples in her elbows, straightened her hair under the scarf and said in a calm voice:
“You should be adroit, gracious, affable, Volodya, and one can be like that only under the influence of women’s society. But what an unpleasant…angry face you have. You should talk, laugh…Yes, Volodya, don’t be so mopey, you’re young, you’ll have a lot of time for philosophizing. Well, let go of me, I’m leaving! Let go!”
Without effort she freed her waist and, humming something, left the gazebo. Volodya remained alone. He smoothed his hair, smiled, and paced three times from corner to corner, then sat on the bench and smiled again. He was unbearably ashamed, so much so that he was even surprised that human shame could reach such acuteness and intensity. From shame he smiled, whispered some incoherent words, and gesticulated.
He was ashamed that he had just been treated like a boy, ashamed of his timidity, and above all that he had dared to take a respectable married woman by the waist, though it seemed to him that neither by his age, nor by his appearance, nor by his social position did he have any right to do so.
He jumped up, left the gazebo, and, without looking back, walked into the depths of the garden, further away from the house.
“Ah, leave here the sooner the better!” he thought, clutching his head. “My God, the sooner the better!”
The train that Volodya and his maman were to take departed at eight-forty. There were about three hours until the train, but he would have been very happy to leave for the station right then, without waiting for maman.
It was going on eight when he approached the house. His whole figure was the picture of resolution: whatever would be, would be! He decided to go in boldly, look straight ahead, speak loudly, no matter what.
He passed through the terrace, the reception room, the drawing room, and stopped there to catch his breath. From there he could hear tea being served in the adjacent dining room. M-me Shumikhin, maman, and Nyuta were talking about something and laughing.
Volodya listened.
“I assure you!” Nyuta was saying. “I couldn’t believe my eyes. When he began to declare his love and even, imagine, took me by the waist, I didn’t recognize him. And you know, he has this manner! When he said he was in love with me, there was something wild in his face, like in a Circassian.”
“Really!” maman gasped, dissolving in drawn-out laughter. “Really! How he reminds me of his father!”
Volodya ran back and out into the fresh air.
“And how can they talk about it out loud!” He suffered, clasping his hands and looking at the sky with horror. “Out loud, coolheadedly…And maman laughed…maman! My God, why did you give me such a mother? Why?”
But he had to go into the house no matter what. He paced up and down the path three times, calmed himself a little, and went in.
“Why didn’t you come in time for tea?” M-me Shumikhin asked sternly.
“I’m sorry, I…it’s time for me to leave,” he murmured without raising his eyes. “Maman, it’s already eight o’clock!”
“Go by yourself, my dear,” maman said languidly, “I’m staying the night at Lily’s. Goodbye, my pet…Let me bless you…”
She made the sign of the cross over her son and said in French, turning to Nyuta:
“He looks a little like Lermontov1…Isn’t it so?”
Having hurriedly said goodbye, without looking anyone in the face, Volodya left the dining room. Ten minutes later he was already marching down the road to the station and was glad of it. Now he was no longer either frightened or ashamed; he breathed lightly and freely.
A quarter of a mile from the station he sat down on a stone by the roadside and began to look at the sun, which was more than half hidden behind the embankment. At the station lights were already lit here and there, one dim green light was flickering, but there was no train in sight yet. Volodya liked sitting, not moving, and listening to how the evening gradually approached. The darkness of the gazebo, the footsteps, the smell of the bathhouse, the laughter, and the waist—it all rose up with astonishing clarity in his imagination, and it was all no longer as frightening and significant as before…
“Nonsense…She didn’t pull her hand away, and she laughed when I held her by the waist,” he thought, “which means she liked it. If it disgusted her, she would have gotten angry…”
Now Volodya was annoyed that there, in the gazebo, he had not been bold enough. He was sorry that he was going away so stupidly, and he was now certain that, if the chance repeated itself, he would look on things more boldly and simply.
And the chance could easily repeat itself. The Shumikhins took long strolls after supper. If Volodya went for a stroll in the dark garden with Nyuta—that would be a chance!
“I’ll go back,” he thought, “and take the morning train tomorrow…I’ll say I was late for the train.”
And he went back…M-me Shumikhin, maman, Nyuta, and one of the nieces were sitting on the terrace playing whist. When Volodya lied to them that he had been late for the train, they worried that he would be late for the examination the next morning, and advised him to get up early. All the while they played cards, he sat to one side, greedily looking at Nyuta and waiting…In his head a plan was already formed: he would approach Nyuta in the darkness, take her by the hand, then embrace her; there would be no need for talk, because they would both understand everything without talking.
But after supper the ladies did not go for a stroll in the garden, but went on playing cards. They played until one in the morning and then went to bed.
“How stupid this all is!” Volodya thought vexedly, going to bed. “But never mind, I’ll wait till tomorrow…Tomorrow again in the gazebo. Never mind…”
He did not try to fall asleep, but sat on the bed, his arms around his knees, thinking. The thought of the examination was loathsome to him. He had already decided that he would be expelled and that there would be nothing terrible in his expulsion. On the contrary it was all good, even very good. Tomorrow he would be free as a bird, he would change out of his uniform, smoke openly, come here and court Nyuta whenever he liked; and he would no longer be a high school boy, but a “young man.” And the rest, what is known as a career and a future, was quite clear: Volodya would volunteer for the army, or become a telegrapher, or get a job in a pharmacy, where he would work his way up to chief dispenser…as if there weren’t enough occupations! An hour or two went by, and he was still sitting and thinking…