Sanine Part 28

The jerk caused her head to oscillate to and fro. She suddenly stopped crying, and removed her hands from her tear-stained face, looking up at him in childish fear. A crazy thought flashed through her mind that anybody might strike her now. But Sarudine's manner again softened, and he said in a consoling voice:

"Come, my Lidotschka, don't cry any more! You're to blame, as well! Why make a scene? You've lost a lot, I know; but, still, we had so much happiness, too, didn't we? And we must just forget...." Lida began to sob once more.

"Oh! stop it, do!" he shouted. Then he walked across the room, nervously pulling his moustache, and his lips quivered.

In the room it was quite still. Outside the window the slender boughs of a tree swayed gently, as if a bird had just perched thereon.

Sarudine, endeavouring to check himself, approached Lida, and gently placed his arm round her waist. But she instantly broke away from him and in so doing struck him violently on the chin, so that his teeth rattled.

"Devil take it!" he exclaimed angrily. It hurt him considerably, and the droll sound of his rattling teeth annoyed him even more. Lida had not heard this, yet instinctively she felt that Sarudine's position was a ridiculous one, and with feminine cruelty she took advantage of it.

"What words to use!" she said, imitating him.

"It's enough to make any one furious," replied Sarudine peevishly.

"If only I knew what was the matter!"

"You mean to say that you still don't know?" said Lida in a cutting tone.

There was a pause. Lida looked hard at him, her face red as fire.

Sarudine turned pale, as if suddenly covered by a grey veil.

"Well, why are you silent? Why don't you speak? Speak! Say something to comfort me!" she shrieked, her voice becoming hysterical in tone. The very sound of it alarmed her.

"I ..." began Sarudine, and his under-lip quivered.

"Yes, you, and n.o.body else but you, worse luck!" she screamed, almost stifled with tears of rage and of despair.

From him as from her the mask of comeliness and good manners had fallen. The wild untrammelled beast became increasingly evident in each.

Ideas like scurrying mice rushed through Sarudine's mind. His first thought was to give Lida money, and persuade her to get rid of the child. He must break with her at once, and for ever. That would end the whole business. Yet though he considered this to be the best way, he said nothing.

"I really never thought that ..." he stammered.

"You never thought!" exclaimed Lida wildly. "Why didn't you? What right had you not to think?"

"But, Lida, I never told you that I ..." he faltered, feeling afraid of what he was going to say, yet conscious that he would yet do so, all the same.

Lida, however, had understood, without waiting for him to speak. Her beautiful face grew dark, distorted by horror and despair. Her hands fell limply to her side as she sat down on the bed.

"What shall I do?" she said, as if thinking aloud. "Drown myself?"

"No, no! Don't talk like that!"

Lida looked hard at him.

"Do you know, Victor Sergejevitsch, I feel pretty sure that such a thing would not displease you," she said.

In her eyes and in her pretty quivering mouth there was something so sad, so pitiful, that Sarudine involuntarily turned away.

Lida rose. The thought, consoling at first, that she would find in him her saviour with whom she would always live, now inspired her with horror and loathing. She longed to shake her fist at him, to fling her scorn in his face, to revenge herself on him for having humiliated her thus. But she felt that at the very first words she would burst into tears. A last spark of pride, all that remained of the handsome, das.h.i.+ng Lida, deterred her. In a tone of such intense scorn that it surprised herself as much as Sarudine, she hissed out,

"You brute!"

Then she rushed out of the room, tearing the lace tr.i.m.m.i.n.g of her sleeve which caught on the bolt of the door.

Sarudine flushed to the roots of his hair. Had she called him "wretch,"

or "villain," he could have borne that calmly, but "brute" was such a coa.r.s.e word so absolutely opposed to his conception of his own engaging personality, that it utterly stunned him. Even the whites of his eyes became bloodshot. He sn.i.g.g.e.red uneasily, shrugged his shoulders, b.u.t.toned and then unb.u.t.toned his jacket, feeling thoroughly upset. But simultaneously a sense of satisfaction and relief waxed greater within him. All was at an end. It irked him to think that he would never again possess such a woman as Lida, that he had lost so comely and desirable a mistress. But he dismissed all such regret with a gesture of disdain.

"Devil take the lot! I can get hold of as many as I please!"

He put his jacket straight, and, his lips still quivering, lit a cigarette. Then a.s.suming his wonted air of nonchalance, he returned to his guests.

CHAPTER XVIII.

All the gamblers except the drunken Malinowsky had lost their interest in the game. They were intensely curious to know who the lady was that had come to see Sarudine, Those who guessed that it was Lida Sanina felt instinctively jealous, picturing to themselves her white body in Sarudine's embrace. After a while Sanine got up from the table and said:

"I shall not play any more. Good-bye."

"Wait a minute, my friend, where are you going?" asked Ivanoff.

"I'm going to see what they are about, in there," replied Sanine, pointing to the closed door.

"Don't be a fool I Sit down and have a drink!" said Ivanoff.

"You're the fool!" rejoined Sanine, as he went out.

On reaching a narrow side-street where nettles grew in profusion, Sanine bethought himself of the exact spot which Sarudine's windows overlooked. Carefully treading down the nettles, he climbed the wall.

When on the top, he almost forgot why he had got up there at all, so charming was it to look down on the green gra.s.s and the pretty garden, and to feel the soft breeze blowing pleasantly on his hot, muscular limbs. Then he dropped down into the nettles on the other side, irritably rubbing the places where they had stung him. Crossing the garden, he reached the window just as Lida said:

"You mean to say that you still don't know?"

By the strange tone of her voice Sanine instantly guessed what was the matter. Leaning against the wall and looking at the garden, he eagerly listened. He felt pity for his handsome sister for whose beautiful personality the gross term "pregnant" seemed so unfitting. What impressed him even more than the conversation peas the singular contrast between these furious human voices and the sweet silence of the verdurous garden.

A white b.u.t.terfly fluttered across the gra.s.s, revelling the sunlight.

Sanine watched its progress just as intently as he listened to the talking.

When Lida exclaimed:

"You brute!" Sanine laughed merrily, and slowly crossed the garden, careless as to who should see him.

A lizard darted across his path, and for a long while he followed the swift movements of its little supple green body in the long gra.s.s.

CHAPTER XIX.