"Perhaps it"s only since March, eh?"
"Ha-ha! you are playful, sir," said Pavel Pavlovitch, laughing slyly.
"But, if I may ask it, wherein am I so changed?"
"Oh-why, you used to be such a staid, sober, correct Pavel Pavlovitch; such a wise Pavel Pavlovitch; and now you"re a good-for-nothing sort of Pavel Pavlovitch."
Velchaninoff was in that state of irritation when the steadiest, gravest people will sometimes say rather more than they mean.
"Good-for-nothing, am I? and _wise_ no longer, I suppose, eh?" chuckled Pavel Pavlovitch, with disagreeable satisfaction.
"Wise, indeed! My dear sir, I"m afraid you are not sober," replied Velchaninoff; and added to himself, "I am pretty fairly insolent myself, but I can"t compare with this little cad! And what on earth is the fellow driving at?"
"Oh, my dear, good, my best of Alexey Ivanovitches," said the visitor suddenly, most excitedly, and twisting about on his chair, "and why _should_ I be sober? We are not moving in the brilliant walks of society-you and I-just now. We are but two dear old friends come together in the full sincerity of perfect love, to recall and talk over that sweet mutual tie of which the dear departed formed so treasured a link in our friendship."
So saying, the sensitive gentleman became so carried away by his feelings that he bent his head down once more, to hide his emotion, and buried his face in his hat.
Velchaninoff looked on with an uncomfortable feeling of disgust.
"I can"t help thinking the man is simply silly," he thought; "and yet-no, no-his face is so red he must be drunk. But drunk or not drunk, what does the little wretch want with me? That"s the puzzle."
"Do you remember-oh, _don"t_ you remember-our delightful little evenings-dancing sometimes, or sometimes literary-at Simeon Simeonovitch"s?" continued the visitor, gradually removing his hat from before his face, and apparently growing more and more enthusiastic over the memories of the past, "and our little readings-you and she and myself-and our first meeting, when you came in to ask for information about something connected with your business in the town, and commenced shouting angrily at me; don"t you remember-when suddenly in came Natalia Vasilievna, and within ten minutes you were our dear friend, and so remained for exactly a year? Just like Turgenieff"s story "The Provincialka!" "
Velchaninoff had continued his walk up and down the room during this _tirade_, with his eyes on the ground, listening impatiently and with disgust-but listening _hard_, all the same.
"It never struck me to think of "The Provincialka" in connection with the matter," he interrupted. "And look here, why do you talk in that sneaking, whining sort of voice? You never used to do that. Your whole manner is unlike yourself."
"Quite so, quite so. I used to be more silent, I know. I used to love to listen while others talked. You remember how well the dear departed talked-the wit and grace of her conversation. As to The Provincialka, I remember she and I used often to compare your friendship for us to certain episodes in that piece, and especially to the doings of one Stupendief. It really was remarkably like that character and his doings."
"What Stupendief do you mean, confound it all?" cried Velchaninoff, stamping his foot with rage. The name seemed to have evoked certain most irritating thoughts in his mind.
"Why, Stupendief, don"t you know, the "husband" in "Provincialka," "
whined Pavel Pavlovitch, in the very sweetest of tones; "but that belongs to another set of fond memories-after you departed, in fact, when Mr.
Bagantoff had honoured us with his friendship, just as you had done before him, only that his lasted five whole years."
"Bagantoff? What Bagantoff? Do you mean that same Bagantoff who was serving down in your town? Why, he also--"
"Yes, yes! quite so. He also, he also!" cried the enthusiastic Pavel Pavlovitch, seizing upon Velchaninoff"s accidental slip. "Of course! So that there you are-there"s the whole company. Bagantoff played the "count," the dear departed was the "Provincialka," and I was the "husband," only that the part was taken away from me, for incapacity, I suppose!"
"Yes; fancy _you_ a Stupendief. You"re a-you"re first a Pavel Pavlovitch Trusotsky!" said Velchaninoff, contemptuously, and very unceremoniously.
"But look here! Bagantoff is in town; I know he is, for I have seen him.
Why don"t you go to see _him_ as well as myself?"
"My dear sir, I"ve been there every day for the last three weeks. He won"t receive me; he"s ill, and can"t receive! And, do you know, I have found out that he really is very ill! Fancy my feelings-a five-year"s friend!
Oh, my dear Alexey Ivanovitch! you don"t know what my feelings are in my present condition of mind. I a.s.sure you, at one moment I long for the earth to open and swallow me up, and the next I feel that I _must_ find one of those old friends, eyewitnesses of the past, as it were, if only to weep on his bosom, only to weep, sir-give you my word."
"Well, that"s about enough for to-night; don"t you think so?" said Velchaninoff, cuttingly.
"Oh, too-too much!" cried the other, rising. "It must be four o"clock; and here am I agitating your feelings in the most selfish way."
"Now, look here; I shall call upon you myself, and I hope that you will then--but, tell me honestly, are you drunk to-night?"
"Drunk! not the least in the world!"
"Did you drink nothing before you came here, or earlier?"
"Do you know, my dear Alexey Ivanovitch, you are quite in a high fever!"
"Good-night. I shall call to-morrow."
"And I have noticed it all the evening, really quite delirious!" continued Pavel Pavlovitch, licking his lips, as it were, with satisfaction as he pursued this theme. "I am really quite ashamed that I should have allowed myself to be so awkward as to agitate you. Well, well; I"m going! Now you must lie down at once and go to sleep."
"You haven"t told me where you live," shouted Velchaninoff after him as he left the room.
"Oh, didn"t I? Pokrofsky Hotel."
Pavel Pavlovitch was out on the stairs now.
"Stop!" cried Velchaninoff, once more. "You are not "running away," are you?"
"How do you mean, "running away?" " asked Pavel Pavlovitch, turning round at the third step, and grinning back at him, with his eyes staring very wide open.
Instead of replying, Velchaninoff banged the door fiercely, locked and bolted it, and went fuming back into his room. Arrived there, he spat on the ground, as though to get rid of the taste of something loathsome.
He then stood motionless for at least five minutes, in the centre of the room; after which he threw himself upon his bed, and fell asleep in an instant.
The forgotten candle burned itself out in its socket.
CHAPTER IV.
Velchaninoff slept soundly until half-past nine, at which hour he started up, sat down on the side of his bed, and began to think.
His thoughts quickly fixed themselves upon the death of "that woman."
The agitating impression wrought upon his mind by yesterday"s news as to her death had left a painful feeling of mental perturbation.
This morning the whole of the events of nine years back stood out before his mind"s eye with extraordinary distinctness.
He had loved this woman, Natalia Vasilievna-Trusotsky"s wife,-he had loved her, and had acted the part of her lover during the time which he had spent in their provincial town (while engaged in business connected with a legacy); he had lived there a whole year, though his business did not require by any means so long a visit; in fact, the tie above mentioned had detained him in the place.
He had been so completely under the influence of this pa.s.sion, that Natalia Vasilievna had held him in a species of slavery. He would have obeyed the slightest whim or the wildest caprice of the woman, at that time. He had never, before or since, experienced anything approaching to the infatuation she had caused.
When the time came for departing, Velchaninoff had been in a state of such absolute despair, though the parting was to have been but a short one, that he had begged Natalia Vasilievna to leave all and fly across the frontier with him; and it was only by laughing him out of the idea (though she had at first encouraged it herself, probably for a joke), and by unmercifully chaffing him, that the lady eventually persuaded Velchaninoff to depart alone.