The relations of A grafena and Yevsay were by now ancient history in the household. They, like every one else in the world, had been the subject of gossip and scandal, t
and then like every one else they had been dropped. Even their mistress had grown used to seeing them together, and '
for ten whole years they had been happy. Can many '
people out of all their lives count up ten years of happiness ? And now the moment of parting was at hand. Good-bye to the warm corner, good-bye to Agrafena Ivanovna, no more playing cards, and coffee and vodka and liqueurs— good-bye to it all!
Yevsay sat in silence, sighing deeply.
Agrafena, with a frown on her face, was bustling about her duties. She showed her sorrow in her own peculiar way. She poured out tea to-day with exasperation, and instead of giving the first cup of strong tea to her mistress as usual, she poured it away, as though she could not bear any one to get the benefit of it, and she took all reproof with stolid indifference*
She boiled the coffee too long, the cream was burnt, the cups slipped out of her hands. She could not put the tray down on the table without a crash; she could not shut the cupboard or the doors without slamming them. She did not shed tears, but was angry with everything and everybody instead. This, however, was always a prominent characteristic of hers. She was not often contented; things were mostly not to her taste; she used to grumble and complain of everything. But at this moment, so fatal for her, her character showed its full capabilities. More than anything she seemed to be angry with Yevsay.
" Agrafena Ivanovna !" he said in a sad subdued voice, quite out of keeping with his tall stout figure.
" Well, why did you sit down there, you booby ?" she asked, just as though he had taken a seat there for the first time. " Get along with you, I want to get out a towel."
"Ah, Agrafena Ivanovna !" he repeated lazily, sighing and getting up from his chair, and then at once falling back into it when she had taken the towel.
" He can do nothing but whimper! Here the fellow sticks ! Good Lord, what a nuisance, there's no getting rid of him!"
A nd she drop ped her spoon with a loud clank into the slop-5asin. " * * " Agrafena !" broke in suddenly from the other room,
S sk " are ^° u °^ °^ Y9 u L se J??£s_? Q on>t y ou H? ow l ^ at Sashenka "** i s resfingj^ TTave you come to blows, or what is it, at parting with your sweetheart ? "
"Mustn't stir for you—have to sit like the dead!" Agrafena hissed like a snake, wiping a cup with both hands as though she would have liked to have broken it to pieces.
" Good-bye, good-bye," said Yevsay, with a colossal sigh, "it's the last day, Agrafena Ivanovna!"
"And thank God for it! The devil's welcome to you for all I care, there will be more room. There—get along, one can't stir a step; you straddle your long legs all over the place!"
He touched her on the shoulder; how she answered him ! He sighed again, but did not move from his place, and it would have been quite needless if he had; Agrafena did not really wish him to go. Yevsay knew this, and was not uneasy.
" Who will take my place, I wonder ? " he asked always with a sigh.
" The devil!" she answered abruptly.
" So long as it's not Proshka. But who will play cards with you ? "
" Well, if it were Proshka, what does it matter to you ? " she asked angrily.
Yevsay got up.
" Don't play with Proshka, for mercy's sake, don't," he said anxiously, and almost menacingly.
" But who can prevent me ? You, pray, you scarecrow ? "
"My darling, Agrafena Ivanovna!" he began imploringly, seizing her round the waist, I should have said, if there had been any sign of a waist about her.
She responded to his embrace by a sharp elbow in his chest.
" My darling, Agrafena Ivanovna !" he repeated, " will Proshka love you as I do ? Look at him; what an impudent fellow he is; not a woman in the house he does not make up to. But me—ah! you are the only woman in the world for me. If it were not the master's will—oh ! "
He choked at this point, and waved his hand in the air.
Agrafena could hold out no longer; even her sorrow at last found vent in tears.
" But will you go away from me, you villain ? " she said, weeping. " What are you chattering about, stupid ? Me keep company with Proshka! Can't you see for yourself that you can never get a word of sense out of him ? He can do nothing but try to put his stupid arms round one."
" Did he do that ? Oh, the brute ! And you never told me ! I'd have shown him."
" Let him try it on! Am I the only petticoat in the house ? Me keep company with Proshka! What an idea! Even to sit by him makes me sick, the pig! And you have always to be on the look out with him, or he's trying to gobble up something on the sly; but you don't notice it, of course! "
" If such a thing should happen, Agrafena Ivanovna— the devil's too strong for us, you know—better let Grishka have my place here; at least he's a civil fellow and hard working; he didn't sneer "
" There's an idea now!" Agrafena fell upon him. " Why do you foist some one on me, as if I were like—like that! Go away, I say. It's not the likes of me to go and throw myself into any one else's arms. Only with you, you wretch, the devil truly led me into temptation, and I repent it. The very idea!"
" God bless you for your goodness ! it's a weight off my heart!" Yevsay cried.
"You're glad!" she shrieked savagely again; "it is a good thing you're glad at something—be as glad as you like."
And her lips grew white with anger. Both were silent.
" Agrafena Ivanovna," said Yevsay timidly, after a short pause.
" Well, what now ? "
" Why, I was quite forgetting; not a drop nor a morsel of anything have I tasted this morning."
" Oh, that's what you're after."
" I couldn't eat for sorrow, my dear."
She took from the bottom shelf of the cupboard, from behind a loaf of sugar, a glass of vodka and two huge slices of bread and ham. All this had long before been made ready for him by her own careful hand.
She threw them to him, as one would hardly throw a bone to a dog.
One piece fell on the floor.
" Here, then, ready for you ! yes! for you, may it choke you. But hush, don't munch for all the house to hear!"
She turned away from him with an expression of simulated aversion, but he slowly began to eat, looking doubtfully at Agrafena and covering his mouth with one hand.
Meanwhile the coachman appeared at the gates with the three horses, and took them under the shelter of the stable. Removing his cap, he took out of it a dirty towel and rubbed the sweat off his face. Anna Pavlovna saw him from the window, and she turned pale. Her knees trembled under her, and her arms hung limp, although she had been expecting it. Recovering herself with an effort, she called for Agrafena.
" Go on tiptoe, quietly, and see whether Sashenka is asleep," she said. " He will sleep too long, dear heart,
pei haps, and it is the last day; so I shall see nothing of him. But no! you can't do it. You'll be sure to thump into the room like a cow. I had better go myself/'
And she went.
" Go on, then, you're not a cow, I suppose" grumbled Agrafena to herself. " A cow, indeed ! you'd be glad of a few more such cows ! "
Alexandr Fedoritch himself met Anna Pavlovna on her way, a fair young man in all the bloom of youth, health and strength. He said good-morning cheerfully to his mother, but suddenly catching sight of the trunk and packages he seemed rather disturbed, walked away to the window in silence, and began to draw with his finger on the window-pane. After a minute he spoke again to his mother and looked unconcernedly, even with pleasure, at the preparations for the journey.
" What made you sleep so late, dearie ?" said Anna Pavlovna, "isn't your face a little swollen? Let me moisten your eyes and cheeks with some rose-water.