‘‘Go to her,’’ said the lady.
I went into Zinaida Fyodorovna’s room feeling as if I was the father of the child. She lay with her eyes closed, thin, pale, in a white cap trimmed with lace. I remember there were two expressions on her face: one indifferent, cold, listless; the other childlike and helpless, given her by the white cap. She didn’t hear me come in, or maybe she did, but paid no attention to me. I stood, looked at her, and waited.
But then her face twisted with pain, she opened her eyes and started looking at the ceiling, as if trying to figure out what was the matter with her... On her face there was a look of disgust.
‘‘Vile,’’ she whispered.
‘‘Zinaida Fyodorovna,’’ I called weakly.
She gave me an indifferent, listless look and closed her eyes. I stood there for a while and then left.
During the night, Darya Mikhailovna told me that the baby was a girl, but the mother was in a dangerous state; then there was running in the corridor, a commotion. Darya Mikhailovna came to me again and, with a desperate look, wringing her hands, said:
‘‘Oh, it’s terrible! The doctor suspects she’s taken poison! Oh, how badly the Russians behave themselves here!’’
And the next day at noon, Zinaida Fyodorovna passed away.
XVIII
TWO YEARS WENT by. My circumstances changed, I went back to Petersburg and could live there without hiding. I was no longer afraid to be and to seem sentimental, and gave myself entirely to the fatherly or, more precisely, the idolatrous feeling aroused in me by Sonya, Zinaida Fyodorovna’s daughter. I fed her with my own hands, bathed her, put her to bed, spent whole nights looking at her, and cried out when I thought the nurse was going to drop her. My thirst for ordinary, humdrum life grew stronger and more exasperating as time went on, but my vast dreams settled around Sonya, as if they had finally found in her precisely what I needed. I loved that little girl madly. I saw in her the continuation of my life, and it was not that it seemed so to me, but I felt, and almost believed, that when I had finally cast off this long, bony, bearded body, I would live in those light blue eyes, in that blond silky hair and those plump pink arms that so lovingly stroked my face and embraced my neck.
Sonya’s destiny frightened me. Her father was Orlov, on her birth certificate her name was Krasnovsky, and the only person who knew of her existence and found it interesting— that is, I—was already drawing out his last song. I had to think about her seriously.
The day after my arrival in Petersburg, I went to see Orlov. A fat old man with red side-whiskers and no mustache, apparently a German, opened the door. Polya, who was tidying up in the drawing room, didn’t recognize me, but Orlov did at once.
‘‘Ah, Mr. Seditionist!’’ he said, looking me over with curiosity and laughing. ‘‘What brings you here?’’
He hadn’t changed at alclass="underline" the same sleek, unpleasant face, the same irony. And on the table, as in former times, lay some new book with an ivory paper knife in place of a bookmark. He had evidently been reading before I came. He sat me down, offered me a cigar, and, with a delicacy proper only to very well-bred people, hiding the unpleasant feeling provoked in him by my face and my gaunt figure, observed in passing that I hadn’t changed at all and was easily recognizable, even though I had grown a beard. We talked of the weather, of Paris. To have done the sooner with the unavoidable painful question that was oppressing both him and me, he asked:
‘‘Did Zinaida Fyodorovna die?’’
‘‘Yes, she did,’’ I replied.
‘‘In childbed?’’
‘‘Yes, in childbed. The doctor suspected there was some other cause of death, but . . . for you and for me, it’s easier to think she died in childbed.’’
He sighed out of politeness and was silent. An angel passed.
‘‘So, sir. And with me, everything’s as before, no particular changes,’’ he said briskly, noticing that I was looking around his study. ‘‘Father, as you know, resigned and is now retired, I’m still where I was. Remember Pekarsky? He’s the same as ever. Gruzin died last year of diphtheria... Well, sir, Kukushkin’s alive and often remembers you. Incidentally,’’ Orlov went on, lowering his eyes bashfully, ‘‘when Kukushkin learned who you were, he began telling everywhere that you had supposedly made an assault on him, had wanted to kill him...and he had barely escaped with his life.’’
I said nothing.
‘‘Old servants don’t forget their masters . . . It’s very nice on your part,’’ Orlov joked. ‘‘However, would you like some wine or coffee? I’ll order it made.’’
‘‘No, thank you. I’ve come to you on very important business, Georgiy Ivanych.’’
‘‘I’m not a lover of important business, but I’m glad to be of service to you. What is it you want?’’
‘‘You see,’’ I began agitatedly, ‘‘the daughter of the late Zinaida Fyodorovna is at present here with me... Till now I have occupied myself with her upbringing, but as you see, one of these days I shall turn into an empty sound. I’d like to die with the thought that she has been settled.’’
Orlov turned slightly red, frowned, and glanced at me sternly, fleetingly. He was unpleasantly affected not so much by the ‘‘important business’’ as by my words about turning into an empty sound, about death.
‘‘Yes, that must be given thought,’’ he said, shielding his eyes as from the sun. ‘‘Thank you. You say it’s a girl?’’
‘‘Yes, a girl. A wonderful girl!’’
‘‘So. It’s not a pug dog, of course, but a human being... I see it must be given serious thought. I’m ready to take a hand and . . . and I’m much obliged to you.’’
He got up, paced about, biting his nails, and stopped before a painting.
‘‘It must be given thought,’’ he said tonelessly, standing with his back to me. ‘‘I’ll go to Pekarsky today and ask him to call on Krasnovsky. I think Krasnovsky won’t make too many difficulties and will agree to take the girl.’’
‘‘Excuse me, but I don’t see what Krasnovsky has to do with it,’’ I said, also getting up and going over to the painting at the other end of the study.
‘‘But she bears his name, I hope!’’ said Orlov.
‘‘Yes, maybe he’s obliged by law to take this girl in, I don’t know, but I haven’t come to you to talk about laws, Georgiy Ivanych.’’
‘‘Yes, yes, you’re right,’’ he promptly agreed. ‘‘It seems I’m talking nonsense. But don’t worry. We’ll discuss it all to our mutual satisfaction. If not one thing, then another, if not another, then a third, but one way or another, this ticklish question will be resolved. Pekarsky will arrange it all. Kindly leave me your address, and I’ll inform you immediately of what decision we come to. Where do you live?’’
Orlov wrote down my address, sighed, and said with a smile:
‘‘What a chore, O Creator, to be the father of a little daughter! 29 But Pekarsky will arrange it all. He’s a ‘nintelligent’ man. How long did you live in Paris?’’
‘‘About two months.’’
We fell silent. Orlov was obviously afraid I’d bring up the girl again, and to divert my attention in a different direction, he said:
‘‘You’ve probably forgotten about your letter. But I keep it. I understand your mood at the time, and I confess, I respect that letter. The cursed cold blood, the Asiatic, the horse laugh—it’s nice and characteristic,’’ he went on, smiling ironically. ‘‘And the main thought is perhaps close to the truth, though one could argue no end. That is,’’ he faltered, ‘‘argue not with the thought but with your attitude to the question, with your temperament, so to speak. Yes, my life is abnormal, corrupt, good for nothing, and cowardice keeps me from starting a new life—there you’re perfectly right. But that you take it so close to heart, that you worry and despair, is not reasonable—there you’re quite wrong.’’