Meanwhile, up above, in that part of the sky where the sun is about to set, clouds are massing, one resem- bling a triumphal arch, another a lion, a third a pair of scissors. A broad shaft of green light issues from the clouds and reaches to the middle of the sky; a while later, a violet beam appears alongside of it and then a golden one and a pink one . . . The heavens turn a soft lilac tint. Looking at this magnificent enchanting sky, the ocean frowns at first, but soon it, too, takes on tender, joyous, passionate colors for which it is hard to find a name in the language of man.
1890
Anna on the Neck
the ceremony not even light refreshments
were served; the bride and groom each drank a glass of wine, changed their clothes, and drove to the station. Instead of having a gay ball and supper, instead of music and dancing, they traveled a hundred and fifty miles to perform their devotions at a shrine. Many peo- ple commended this, saying that Modest Alexeich had aheady reached a high rank in the service and was no longer young, and that a noisy wedding might not have seemed quite proper; and besides, music is likely to sound dreary when a fifty-two-year-old official marries a girl who has just turned eighteen. It was also said that Modest Alexeich, being a man of principle, had really arranged this visit to the monastery in order to make it clear to his young bride that in marriage, too, he gave the first place to religion and morality.
The couple were seen off by relatives and the groom's colleagues. The crowd stood, with the glasses in their hands, waiting to shout "hurrah" as soon as the train should start, and the bride's father, Pyotr Leontyich, in a top hat and the dress coat of a schoolmaster, already drunk and very pale, kept craning toward the window, glass in hand, and saying imploringly, "Anyuta! Anya, Anyal Just one word!"
Anya leaned out of the window toward him and he whispered something to her, enveloping her in a smell of alcohol and blowing into her ear—she could understand nothing—and made the sign of the cross over her face, her bosom, and her hands. His breathing came in gasps and tears shone in his eyes. And Anya's brothers, Petya and Andrusha, schoolboys, pulled at his coattails from behind, whispering embarrassedly: "Papa dear, enough . . . Papa dear, don't—"
When the train started, Anya saw her father run a little way after the coach, staggering and spilling his wine, and what a pitiful, kindly, guilty face he had! "Hurrah!" he shouted.
The couple were left alone. Modest Alexeich looked about the compartment, arranged their things on the shelves, and sat down opposite his young wife, smiling. He was an official of medium height, rather stout, who looked bloated and very well fed and wore Dundreary whiskers. His clean-shaven, ronnd, sharply outlined chin looked like a heel. The most characteristic thing about his face was the absence of a mustache, this bare, freshly shaven spot which gradually passed into fat cheeks that quivered like jelly. His demeanor was digni- fied, his movements unhurried, his manners suave.
"At the moment I cannot help recalling one circum- stance," he said smiling. "When, five years ago, Kosoro- tov received the order of St. Anna of the second class, and came to thank His Excellency for the honor, His Excellency expressed himself thus: 'So now you have three Annas: one in your buttonhole and two on your neck.' I must tell you that at that time Kosorotov's wife, a quarrelsome person of a giddy disposition, had just returned to him and that her name was Anna. I trust that when I receive the Anna of the second class, His Excellency wiU have no cause to say the same thing to me.
He smiled with his small eyes. And she, too, smiled, troubled by the thought that at any moment this man might kiss her with his full, moist lips and that she no longer had the right to prevent him from doing so. The soft movements of his bloated body frightened her; she felt both terrified and disgusted. He got up without haste, took the order off his neck, took off his dress coat and waistcoat and put on his dressing-gownwn. "That's better," he said, sitting down beside Anya . .
She remembered what agony the marriage ceremony had been, when it had seemed to her that the priest, the guests, and everyone in the church had looked at her sadly: why was she, such a sweet, nice girl, marrying an elderly uninteresting man? Only that morning she had been in raptures over the fact that everything had been satisfactorily arranged, but during the ceremony and now in the railway carriage, she felt guilty, cheated, and ridiculous. Here she had married a rich man and
anna on the neck 271
yet she had no money. Her wedding dress had been bought on credit, and just now when her father and brothers had been saying good-by, she could see from their faces that they had not a kopeck to their name. Would they have any supper tonight? And tomorrow? And for some reason it seemed to her that her father and the boys without her were suffering from hunger and feeling as miserable as they did the day after their mother's funeral. "Oh, how unhappy I am," she thought. "Why am I so unhappy?"
With the awkwardness of a man of dignified habits who is unaccustomed to dealing with women, Modest Alexeich touched her on the waist and patted her on the shoulder while she thought of money, of her mother, and her mother's death. When her mother died, her father, a high school teacher of calligraphy and drawing, had taken to drink and they had begun to feel the pinch of poverty; the boys had no shoes or galoshes. Time and again her father was hauled before the justice of the peace, the process-server came and made an inventory of the furniture . . . What a disgrace! Anya had to look after her drunken father, darn her brothers' socks, do the marketing, and when she was complimented on her beauty, her youth, and her elegant manner, it seemed to her that the whole world was looking at her cheap hat and the holes in her shoes that were inked over. And at night there were tears and the disturbing persistent thought that soon, very soon, her father would be dis- missed from the school for his failing and that he would not be able to endure it and would die like their mother. But then some ladies they knew had bestirred them- selves and started looking about for a good match for Anya. This Modest Alexeich, who was neither young nor good-looking but had money, was soon found. He had 100,000 in the bank and a family estate which he rented to a tenant. He was a man of principle and was in favor with His Excellency; it would be very easy for him, Anya was told, to get a note from His Excellency to the high school principal or even to the trustee, and Pyotr Leontyich would not be dismissed . . .
While she was recalling these details, strains of music together with a sound of voices suddenly burst in at the window. The train had stopped at a small station. On the other side of the platform in the crowd an accordion and a cheap squeaky fiddle were being played briskly, and from beyond the tall birches and poplars and the small cottages that were flooded with moonlight came the sound of a military band: there must have been a dance in the place. Summer visitors and to^speople who came here by train in fine weather for a breath of fresh air were promenading on the platform. Among them was the owner of all the summer cottages, Arty- nov, a man of wealth. Tall, stout, black-haired, with prominent eyes, he looked like an Armenian. He wore a strange costume: an unbuttoned shirt that left his chest bare, high boots with spurs, and a black cloak which hung from his shoulders and trailed on the ground. Two borzois followed him with their sharp muzzles to the ground.