The Precipice Part 17

"I should like it very much," he replied, following her with his eyes.

Like a true artist he abandoned himself to the new and unexpected impression.

"You must have forgotten me, Vera," he remarked after a pause, with an affectionate note in his voice.

"No," she said, as he poured out the coffee, "I remember everything. How was it possible to forget you when Grandmother was for ever talking about you?"

He would have liked to ask her question after question, but they crowded into his brain in so disconnected a fas.h.i.+on that he did not know where to begin.

"I have already been in your room. Forgive the intrusion," he said.

"There is nothing remarkable here," she said hastily, looking around as if something not intended for strange eyes might be lying about.

"Nothing remarkable, quite right. What book is that?"

He put out his hand for the book under her hand; she rapidly drew it away and put it behind her on the shelf.

"You hide it as you used to hide the currants in your mouth. But show it me."

"Do you read books that may not be seen?" he said, laughingly as she shook her head.

"Heavens! how lovely she is!" he thought. And he wondered how such beauty could have lost its way in such an outlandish place. He wanted to touch some answering chord in her heart, wanted her to reveal something of her feelings, but his efforts only produced a greater coldness.

"My library was in your hands?"

"Yes, but later Leonid Ivanovich took it over, and I was glad to be relieved of the charge."

"But he must have left you a few books?"

"Oh no! I read what I liked, and then surrendered the books."

"What did you like?"

She looked out of the window as she answered: "A great many. I have really forgotten."

"Do you care for music?"

She looked at him inquiringly before she said, "Does that mean that I play myself, or like to hear music?"

"Both."

"I don't play, but I like to hear music, but what music is there here?"

"But what are your particular tastes?" Again she looked at him inquiringly. "Do you like housekeeping, or needlework. Do you do embroidery?"

"No, Marfinka likes and understands all those things."

"But what do you like? A book only occupies you for a short time. You say that you don't do any needlework, but you must like something, flowers perhaps."

"Flowers, yes, in the garden, but not in the house where they have to be tended. I love this corner of G.o.d's earth, the Volga, the precipice, the forest and the garden--these are the things I love," she said, looking contentedly at the prospect from the window.

"What ties bind you to this little place?"

She gave no answer, but her eyes wandered lovingly over the trees and the rising ground, and finally rested on the dazzling mirror of water.

"It is a beautiful place," admitted Raisky, "but the view, the river bank, the hills, the forest--all these things would became tedious if they were not inhabited by living creatures which share our feelings and exchange ideas with us."

She was silent.

"Vera!" said Raisky after a pause.

"Ah!" she said, as if she had only just heard his remarks, "I don't live alone; Grandmother, Marfinka...."

"As if you shared your sympathies and thoughts with them. But perhaps you have a congenial spirit here?"

Vera nodded her head.

"Who is that happy individual?" he stammered, urged on by envy, terror and jealousy.

"The pope's wife with whom I have been stopping," said Vera as she rose and shook the crumbs from her ap.r.o.n. "You must have heard of her."

"The pope's wife!" he repeated.

"When she is here with me we both admire the Volga, we are never tired of talking about it. Will you have some more coffee? May I have it cleared away?"

"The pope's wife," he repeated thoughtfully, without hearing her question, and the smile on her lips pa.s.sed un.o.bserved.

"Will you have some more coffee?"

"No. Do you care for Grandmother and Marfinka?"

"Whom else should I hold dear?"

"Well--me," he retorted, jesting.

"You too," she said, looking gaily at him, "if you deserve it."

"How does one earn this good fortune?" he asked ironically.

"Love, they say, is blind, gives herself without any merit, is indeed blind," she rejoined.

"Yet sometimes love comes consciously, by way of confidence, esteem and friends.h.i.+p. I should like to begin with the last, and end with the first.

So what must one do, dear sister, to attract your attention."

"Not to make such round eyes as you are doing now for instance, not to go into my room--without me, not to try to find out what my likes and dislikes are...."

"What pride! Tell me, Sister, forgive my bluntness: Do you pride yourself on this? I ask because Grandmother told me you were proud."

"Grandmother must have her finger in everything. I am not proud. In what connection did she say I was?"