So as not to prolong this life, which was disgraceful for her and insulting to Laevsky, she decided to leave. She would tearfully implore him to let her go, and if he objected, she would leave him secretly. She would not tell him what had happened. Let him preserve a pure memory of her.
‘‘Love you, love you, love you,’’ she read. This was from Atchmianov.
She would live somewhere in a remote place, work, and send Laevsky, ‘‘from an unknown person,’’ money, embroidered shirts, tobacco, and go back to him only in his old age or in case he became dangerously ill and needed a sick nurse. When, in his old age, he learned the reasons why she had refused to be his wife and had left him, he would appreciate her sacrifice and forgive her.
‘‘You have a long nose.’’ That must be from the deacon or from Kostya.
Nadezhda Fyodorovna imagined how, in saying good-bye to Laevsky, she would hug him tight, kiss his hand, and swear to love him all, all her life, and later, living in a remote place, among strangers, she would think every day that she had a friend somewhere, a beloved man, pure, noble, and lofty, who preserved a pure memory of her.
‘‘If tonight you don’t arrange to meet me, I shall take measures, I assure you on my word of honor. One does not treat decent people this way, you must understand that.’’ This was from Kirilin.
XIII
LAEVSKY RECEIVED TWO NOTES; he unfolded one and read: ‘‘Don’t go away, my dear heart.’’
‘‘Who could have written that?’’ he wondered. ‘‘Not Samoilenko, of course...And not the deacon, since he doesn’t know I want to leave. Von Koren, maybe?’’
The zoologist was bent over the table, drawing a pyramid. It seemed to Laevsky that his eyes were smiling.
‘‘Samoilenko probably blabbed . . .’’ thought Laevsky.
The other note, written in the same affected handwriting, with long tails and flourishes, read: ‘‘Somebody’s not leaving on Saturday.’’
‘‘Stupid jeering,’’ thought Laevsky. ‘‘Friday, Friday...’’
Something rose in his throat. He touched his collar and coughed, but instead of coughing, laughter burst from his throat.
‘‘Ha, ha, ha!’’ he guffawed. ‘‘Ha, ha, ha!’’ (‘‘Why am I doing this?’’ he wondered.) ‘‘Ha, ha, ha!’’
He tried to control himself, covered his mouth with his hand, but his chest and neck were choking with laughter, and his hand could not cover his mouth.
‘‘How stupid this is, though!’’ he thought, rocking with laughter. ‘‘Have I lost my mind, or what?’’
His laughter rose higher and higher and turned into something like a lapdog’s yelping. Laevsky wanted to get up from the table, but his legs would not obey him, and his right hand somehow strangely, against his will, leaped across the table, convulsively catching at pieces of paper and clutching them. He saw astonished looks, the serious, frightened face of Samoilenko, and the zoologist’s gaze, full of cold mockery and squeamishness, and realized that he was having hysterics.
‘‘How grotesque, how shameful,’’ he thought, feeling the warmth of tears on his face. ‘‘Ah, ah, what shame! This has never happened to me before . . .’’
Then they took him under the arms and, supporting his head from behind, led him somewhere; then a glass gleamed in front of his eyes and knocked against his teeth, and water spilled on his chest; then there was a small room, two beds side by side in the middle, covered with snow-white bedspreads. He collapsed onto one of the beds and broke into sobs.
‘‘Never mind, never mind . . .’’ Samoilenko was saying. ‘‘It happens...It happens . . .’’
Cold with fear, trembling all over, and anticipating something terrible, Nadezhda Fyodorovna stood by the bed, asking:
‘‘What’s wrong with you? What is it? For God’s sake, speak . . .’’
‘‘Can Kirilin have written him something?’’ she wondered.
‘‘Never mind . . .’’ said Laevsky, laughing and crying. ‘‘Go away . . . my dove.’’
His face expressed neither hatred nor revulsion: that meant he knew nothing. Nadezhda Fyodorovna calmed down a little and went to the drawing room.
‘‘Don’t worry, dear!’’ Marya Konstantinovna said, sitting down beside her and taking her hand. ‘‘It will pass. Men are as weak as we sinners. The two of you are living through a crisis now . . . it’s so understandable! Well, dear, I’m waiting for an answer. Let’s talk.’’
‘‘No, let’s not . . .’’ said Nadezhda Fyodorovna, listening to Laevsky’s sobbing. ‘‘I’m in anguish . . . Allow me to leave.’’
‘‘Ah, my dear, my dear!’’ Marya Konstantinovna was alarmed. ‘‘Do you think I’ll let you go without supper? We’ll have a bite, and then you’re free to leave.’’
‘‘I’m in anguish . . .’’ whispered Nadezhda Fyodorovna, and to keep from falling, she gripped the armrest of the chair with both hands.
‘‘He’s in convulsions!’’ von Koren said gaily, coming into the drawing room, but, seeing Nadezhda Fyodorovna, he became embarrassed and left.
When the hysterics were over, Laevsky sat on the strange bed and thought:
‘‘Disgrace, I howled like a little girl! I must be ridiculous and vile. I’ll leave by the back stairs . . . Though that would mean I attach serious significance to my hysterics. I ought to downplay them like a joke . . . ’’
He looked in the mirror, sat for a little while, and went to the drawing room.
‘‘Here I am!’’ he said, smiling; he was painfully ashamed, and he felt that the others were also ashamed in his presence. ‘‘Imagine that,’’ he said, taking a seat. ‘‘I was sitting there and suddenly, you know, I felt an awful, stabbing pain in my side...unbearable, my nerves couldn’t stand it, and...and this stupid thing occurred. This nervous age of ours, there’s nothing to be done!’’
Over supper he drank wine, talked, and from time to time, sighing spasmodically, stroked his side as if to show that the pain could still be felt. And nobody except Nadezhda Fyodorovna believed him, and he saw it.
After nine o’clock they went for a stroll on the boulevard. Nadezhda Fyodorovna, fearing that Kirilin might start talking to her, tried to keep near Marya Konstantinovna and the children all the time. She grew weak from fright and anguish and, anticipating a fever, suffered and could barely move her legs, but she would not go home, because she was sure that either Kirilin or Atchmianov, or both of them, would follow her. Kirilin walked behind her, next to Nikodim Alexandrych, and intoned in a low voice:
‘‘I will not alo-o-ow myself to be to-o-oyed with! I will not alo-o-ow it!’’
From the boulevard they turned towards the pavilion, and for a long time gazed at the phosphorescent sea. Von Koren began to explain what made it phosphoresce.
XIV
‘‘HOWEVER, IT’S TIME for my vint... They’re waiting for me,’’ said Laevsky. ‘‘Good night, ladies and gentlemen.’’
‘‘Wait, I’ll go with you,’’ said Nadezhda Fyodorovna, and she took his arm. They took leave of the company and walked off. Kirilin also took his leave, said he was going the same way, and walked with them.
‘‘What will be, will be . . .’’ thought Nadezhda Fyodorovna. ‘‘Let it come . . .’’