The Precipice Part 46

"There will be a storm. I do feel rather uneasy about it, but perhaps she will forgive me. I may tell you, Boris Pavlovich, that I love both the girls, as if they were my own daughters. I held them on my knee as babies, and with Tatiana Markovna gave them their first lessons. I tell you in confidence that I have also arranged a wedding present for Vera Va.s.silievna which I hope she will like when the time comes." He showed Raisky a magnificent antique silver dinner service of fine workmans.h.i.+p for twelve persons. "I may confess to you, as you are her cousin, that in agreement with Tatiana Markovna I have a splendid and a rich marriage in view for her, for whom nothing can be too good. The finest _partie_ in this neighbourhood," he said in a confidential tone, "is Ivan Ivanovich Tus.h.i.+n, who is absolutely devoted to her, as he well may be."

Raisky repressed a sigh and went home where he found Vikentev and his mother, who had arrived for Marfinka's birthday, with Paulina Karpovna and other guests from the town, who stayed until nearly seven o'clock.

Tatiana Markovna and Marfa Egorovna carried on an interminable conversation about Marfinka's trousseau and house furnis.h.i.+ng. The lovers went into the garden, and from there to the village. Vikentev carrying a parcel which he threw in the air and caught again as he walked. Marfinka entered every house, said good-bye to the women, and caressed the children. In two cases she washed the children's faces, she distributed calico for s.h.i.+rts and dresses, and told two elder children to whom she presented shoes that it was time they gave up paddling in the puddles.

"G.o.d reward you, our lovely mistress, Angel of G.o.d!" cried the women in every yard as she bade them farewell for a fortnight.

CHAPTER XXIII

In the evening the house was aglow with light. Tatiana Markovna could not do enough in honour of her guest and future connexion. She had a great bed put up in the guest-chamber, that nearly reached to the ceiling and resembled a catafalque. Marfinka and Vikentev gave full rein to their gay humour, as they played and sang. Only Raisky's windows were dark. He had gone out immediately after dinner and had not returned to tea.

The moon illuminated the new house but left the old house in shadow.

There was bustle in the yard, in the kitchen, and in the servants' rooms, where Marfa Egorovna's coachman and servants were being entertained.

From seven o'clock onwards Vera had sat idle in the dusk by the feeble light of a candle, her head supported on her hand, leaning over the table, while with her other hand she turned over the leaves of a book at which she hardly glanced. She was protected from the cold autumn air from the open window, by a big white woollen shawl thrown round her shoulders. She stood up after a time, laid the book on the table, and went to the window. She looked towards the sky, and then at the gaily-lighted house opposite. She s.h.i.+vered, and was about to shut the window when the report of a gun rolled up from the park through the quiet dusk.

She shuddered, and seemed to have lost the use of her limbs, then sank into a chair and bowed her head. When she rose and looked wildly round, her face had changed. Sheer fright and distress looked from her eyes.

Again and again she pa.s.sed her hand over her forehead, and sat down at the table, only to jump up again. She tore the shawl from her shoulders and threw it on the bed; then with nervous haste she opened and shut the cupboard; she looked on the divan, on the chairs, for something she apparently could not find, and then collapsed wearily on her chair.

On the back of the chair hung a wrap, a gift from Tiet Nikonich. She seized it and threw it over her head, rushed to the wardrobe, hunted in it with feverish haste, taking out first one coat, then another, until she had nearly emptied the cupboard and dresses and cloaks lay in a heap on the floor. At last she found something warm and dark, put out the light, and went noiselessly down the steps into the open. She crossed the yard, hidden in the shadows, and took her way along the dark avenue.

She did not walk, she flew; and when she crossed the open light patches her shadow was hardly visible for a moment, as if the moon had not time to catch the flying figure.

When she reached the end of the avenue, by the ditch which divided the garden from the park, she stopped a moment to get her breath. Then she crossed the park, hurried through the bushes, past her favourite bench, and reached the precipice. She picked up her skirts for the descent, when suddenly, as if he had risen out of the ground, Raisky stood between her and her goal.

"Where are you going, Vera?"

There was no answer.

"Go back," he said, offering his hand, but she tried to push past him.

"Vera, where are you going?"

"It is for the last time." she said in a pleading, shamed whisper. "I must say good-bye. Make way for me, Cousin! I will return in a moment.

Wait for me here, on this bench."

Without replying, he took her firmly by the hand, and she struggled in vain to free herself.

"Let me go! You are hurting me!"

But he did not give way, and the struggle proceeded.

"You will not hold me by force," she cried, and with unnatural strength freed herself, and sought to dash past him.

But he put his arm round her waist, took her to the bench, and sat down beside her.

"How rough and rude!" she cried.

"I cannot hold you back by force, Vera. I may be saving you from ruin."

"Can I be ruined against my own will?"

"It is against your will; yet you go to your ruin."

"There is no question of ruin. We must see one another again in order to separate."

"It is not necessary to see one another in order to separate."

"I must, and will. An hour or a day later, it is all the same. You may call the servants, the whole town, a file of soldiers, but no power will keep me back."

A second shot resounded.

She pulled herself up, but was pressed down on the bench with the weight of Raisky's hands. She shook her head wildly in powerless rage.

"What reward do you hope from me for this virtuous deed?" she hissed.

He said nothing, but kept a watchful eye on her movements. After a time she besought him gently: "Let me go, Cousin," but he refused.

"Cousin," she said, laying her hand gently on his shoulder. "Imagine that you sat upon hot coals, and were dying every minute of terror, and of wild impatience, that happiness rose before you, stretching out enticing arms, only to vanish, that your whole being rose to meet it; imagine that you saw before you a last hope, a last glimmer. That is how it is with me at this moment. The moment will be lost, and with it everything else."

"Think, Vera, if in the hot thirst of fever you ask for ice, it is denied you. In your soberer moments yesterday you pointed out to me the practical means of rescue, you said I was not to let you go, and I will not."

She fell on her knees before him, and wrung her hands.

"I should curse you my whole life long for your violence. Give way.

Perhaps it is my destiny that calls me."

"I was a witness yesterday, Vera, of where you seek your fate. You believe in a Providence, and there is no other destiny."

"Yes," she answered submissively. "I do believe. There before the sacred picture I sought for a spark to lighten my path, but in vain. What shall I do?" she said, rising.

"Do not go, Vera."

"Perhaps it is my destiny that sends me there, there where my presence may be needed. Don't try any longer to keep me, for I have made up my mind. My weakness is gone, and I have recovered control of myself and feel I am strong. It is not my destiny alone, but the destiny of another human being that is to be decided down there. Between me and him you are digging an abyss, and the responsibility will rest upon you. I shall never be consoled, and shall accuse you of having destroyed our happiness. Do not hold me back. You can only do it out of egoism, out of jealousy. You lied when you spoke to me of freedom."

"I hear the voice of pa.s.sion, Vera, with all its sophistry and its deviations. You are practising the arts of a Jesuit. Remember that you yourself bade me, only yesterday, not to leave you. Will you curse me for not yielding to you? On whom does the responsibility rest? Tell me who the man is?"

"If I tell you will you promise not to keep me back?" she said quickly.

"I don't know. Perhaps."

"Give me your word not to keep me any longer, and I give the name."

Another shot rang out.

She sprang to one side, before he had time to take her by the hand.

"Go to Grandmother," he commanded, adding gently, "Tell her your trouble."