"That"s a man who won"t die in want, one can count upon that."
Supper was over. The guests dispersed. When she was left alone with her husband, Alexandra Pavlovna looked smiling into his face.
"How splendid you were this evening, Misha," she said, stroking his forehead, "how cleverly and n.o.bly you spoke! But confess, you exaggerated a little in Rudin"s praise, as in old days you did in attacking him."
"I can"t let them hit a man when he"s down. And in those days I was afraid he was turning your head."
"No," replied Alexandra Pavlovna naively, "he always seemed too learned for me. I was afraid of him, and never knew what to say in his presence.
But wasn"t Pigasov nasty in his ridicule of him to-day?"
"Pigasov?" responded Lezhnyov. "That was just why I stood up for Rudin so warmly, because Pigasov was here. He dare to call Rudin a sponge indeed! Why, I consider the part he plays--Pigasov I mean--is a hundred times worse! He has an independent property, and he sneers at every one, and yet see how he fawns upon wealthy or distinguished people! Do you know that that fellow, who abuses everything and every one with such scorn, and attacks philosophy and women, do you know that when he was in the service, he took bribes and that sort of thing! Ugh! That"s what he is!"
"Is it possible?" cried Alexandra Pavlovna, "I should never have expected that! Misha," she added, after a short pause, "I want to ask you----"
"What?"
"What do you think, will my brother be happy with Natalya?"
"How can I tell you?... there"s every likelihood of it. She will take the lead... there"s no reason to hide the fact between us... she is cleverer than he is; but he"s a capital fellow, and loves her with all his soul. What more would you have? You see we love one another and are happy, aren"t we?"
Alexandra Pavlovna smiled and pressed his hand.
On the same day on which all that has been described took place in Alexandra Pavlovna"s house, in one of the remote districts of Russia, a wretched little covered cart, drawn by three village horses was crawling along the high road in the sultry heat. On the front seat was perched a grizzled peasant in a ragged cloak, with his legs hanging slanting on the shaft; he kept flicking with the reins, which were of cord, and shaking the whip. Inside the cart there was sitting on a shaky portmanteau a tall man in a cap and old dusty cloak. It was Rudin.
He sat with bent head, the peak of his cap pulled over his eyes. The jolting of the cart threw him from side to side; but he seemed utterly unconscious, as though he were asleep. At last he drew himself up.
"When are we coming to a station?" he inquired of the peasant sitting in front.
"Just over the hill, little father," said the peasant, with a still more violent shaking of the reins. "There"s a mile and a half farther to go, not more.... Come! there! look about you.... I"ll teach you," he added in a shrill voice, setting to work to whip the right-hand horse.
"You seem to drive very badly," observed Rudin; "we have been crawling along since early morning, and we have not succeeded in getting there yet. You should have sung something."
"Well, what would you have, little father? The horses, you see yourself, are overdone... and then the heat; and I can"t sing. I"m not a coachman.... Hullo, you little sheep!" cried the peasant, suddenly turning to a man coming along in a brown smock and bark shoes downtrodden at heel. "Get out of the way!"
"You"re a nice driver!" muttered the man after him, and stood still.
"You wretched Muscovite," he added in a voice full of contempt, shook his head and limped away.
"What are you up to?" sang out the peasant at intervals, pulling at the shaft-horse. "Ah, you devil! Get on!"
The jaded horses dragged themselves at last up to the posting-station.
Rudin crept out of the cart, paid the peasant (who did not bow to him, and kept shaking the coins in the palm of his hand a long while--evidently there was too little drink-money) and himself carried the portmanteau into the posting-station.
A friend of mine who has wandered a great deal about Russia in his time made the observation that if the pictures hanging on the walls of a posting-station represent scenes from "the Prisoner of the Caucasus,"
or Russian generals, you may get horses soon; but if the pictures depict the life of the well-known gambler George de Germany, the traveller need not hope to get off quickly; he will have time to admire to the full the hair _a la c.o.c.katoo_, the white open waistcoat, and the exceedingly short and narrow trousers of the gambler in his youth, and his exasperated physiognomy, when in his old age he kills his son, waving a chair above him, in a cottage with a narrow staircase. In the room into which Rudin walked precisely these pictures were hanging out of "Thirty Years, or the Life of a Gambler." In response to his call the superintendent appeared, who had just waked up (by the way, did any one ever see a superintendent who had not just been asleep?), and without even waiting for Rudin"s question, informed him in a sleepy voice that there were no horses.
"How can you say there are no horses," said Rudin, "when you don"t even know where I am going? I came here with village horses."
"We have no horses for anywhere," answered the superintendent. "But where are you going?"
"To Sk----."
"We have no horses," repeated the superintendent, and he went away.
Rudin, vexed, went up to the window and threw his cap on the table. He was not much changed, but had grown rather yellow in the last two years; silver threads shone here and there in his curls, and his eyes, still magnificent, seemed somehow dimmed, fine lines, the traces of bitter and disquieting emotions, lay about his lips and on his temples. His clothes were shabby and old, and he had no linen visible anywhere. His best days were clearly over: as the gardeners say, he had gone to seed.
He began reading the inscriptions on the walls--the ordinary distraction of weary travellers; suddenly the door creaked and the superintendent came in.
"There are no horses for Sk----, and there won"t be any for a long time," he said, "but here are some ready to go to V----."
"To V----?" said Rudin. "Why, that"s not on my road at all. I am going to Penza, and V---- lies, I think, in the direction of Tamboff."
"What of that? you can get there from Tamboff, and from V---- you won"t be at all out of your road."
Rudin thought a moment.
"Well, all right," he said at last, "tell them to put the horses to. It is the same to me; I will go to Tamboff."
The horses were soon ready. Rudin carried his own portmanteau, climbed into the cart, and took his seat, his head hanging as before. There was something helpless and pathetically submissive in his bent figure....
And the three horses went off at a slow trot.
EPILOGUE
Some years had pa.s.sed by.
It was a cold autumn day. A travelling carriage drew up at the steps of the princ.i.p.al hotel of the government town of C----; a gentleman yawning and stretching stepped out of it. He was not elderly, but had had time to acquire that fulness of figure which habitually commands respect. He went up the staircase to the second story, and stopped at the entrance to a wide corridor. Seeing no one before him he called out in a loud voice asking for a room. A door creaked somewhere, and a long waiter jumped up from behind a low screen, and came forward with a quick flank movement, an apparition of a glossy back and tucked-up sleeves in the half-dark corridor. The traveller went into the room and at once throwing off his cloak and scarf, sat down on the sofa, and with his fists propped on his knees, he first looked round as though he were hardly awake yet, and then gave the order to send up his servant. The hotel waiter made a bow and disappeared. The traveller was no other than Lezhnyov. He had come from the country to C---- about some conscription business.
Lezhnyov"s servant, a curly-headed, rosy-cheeked youth in a grey cloak, with a blue sash round the waist, and soft felt shoes, came into the room.
"Well, my boy, here we are," Lezhnyov said, "and you were afraid all the while that a wheel would come off."
"We are here," replied the boy, trying to smile above the high collar of his cloak, "but the reason why the wheel did not come off----"
"Is there no one in here?" sounded a voice in the corridor.
Lezhnyov started and listened.
"Eh? who is there?" repeated the voice.
Lezhnyov got up, walked to the door, and quickly threw it open.
Before him stood a tall man, bent and almost completely grey, in an old frieze coat with bronze b.u.t.tons.
"Rudin!" he cried in an excited voice.