'Those young people are our friends!' cried Musa, and her eyes flashed and darted as of old. Something strong, irrepressible, seemed, as it were, to rise up from the bottom of her soul, … and I suddenly recalled the expression 'a new type,' which Tarhov had once used of her. 'Years are of no consequence when it is a matter of political principles!' Musa laid a special stress on these last two words. One might fancy that in all her sorrow it was not unpleasing to her to show herself before me in this new, unlooked-for character—in the character of a cultivated and mature woman, fit wife of a republican! … 'Some old men are younger than some young ones,' she pursued, 'more capable of sacrifice…. But that's not the point.'
'I think, Musa Pavlovna,' I observed, 'that you are exaggerating a little. Knowing the character of Paramon Semyonitch, I should have felt sure beforehand that he would sympathise with every … sincere impulse; but, on the other hand, I have always regarded him as a man of sense…. Surely he cannot fail to realise all the impracticability, all the absurdity of conspiracies in Russia? In his position, in his calling …'
'Oh, of course,' Musa interrupted, with bitterness in her voice, 'he is a working man; and in Russia it is only permissible for noblemen to take part in conspiracies, … as, for instance, in that of the fourteenth of December, … that's what you meant to say.'
'In that case, what do you complain of now?' almost broke from my lips, … but I restrained myself. 'Do you consider that the result of the fourteenth of December was such as to encourage other such attempts?' I said aloud.
Musa frowned. 'It is no good talking to you about it,' was what I read in her downcast face.
'Is Paramon Semyonitch very seriously compromised?' I ventured to ask her. Musa made no reply…. A hungry, savage mewing was heard from the attic.
Musa started. 'Ah, it is a good thing Nikander Vavilitch did not see all this!' she moaned almost despairingly. 'He did not see how violently in the night they seized his benefactor, our benefactor—maybe, the best and truest man in the whole world,—he did not see how they treated that noble man at his age, how rudely they addressed him, … how they threatened him, and the threats they used to him!—only because he was a working man! That young officer, too, was no doubt just such an unprincipled, heartless wretch as I have known in my life….'
Musa's voice broke. She was quivering all over like a leaf.
Her long-suppressed indignation broke out at last; old memories stirred up, brought to the surface by the general tumult of her soul, showed themselves alive within her…. But the conviction I carried off at that moment was that the 'new type' was still the same, still the same passionate, impulsive nature…. Only the impulses by which Musa was carried away were not the same as in the days of her youth. What on my first visit I had taken for resignation, for meekness, and what really was so—the subdued, lustreless glance, the cold voice, the quietness and simplicity—all that had significance only in relation to the past, to what would never return….
Now it was the present asserted itself.
I tried to soothe Musa, tried to put our conversation on a more practical level. Some steps must be taken that could not be postponed; we must find out exactly where Baburin was; and then secure both for him and for Musa the means of subsistence. All this presented no inconsiderable difficulty; what was needed was not to find money, but work, which is, as we all know, a far more complicated problem….
I left Musa with a perfect swarm of reflections in my head.
I soon learned that Baburin was in the fortress.
The proceedings began, … dragged on. I saw Musa several times every week. She had several interviews with her husband. But just at the moment of the decision of the whole melancholy affair, I was not in Petersburg. Unforeseen business had obliged me to set off to the south of Russia. During my absence I heard that Baburin had been acquitted at the trial; it appeared that all that could be proved against him was, that young people regarding him as a person unlikely to awaken suspicion, had sometimes held meetings at his house, and he had been present at their meetings; he was, however, by administrative order sent into exile in one of the western provinces of Siberia. Musa went with him.
'Paramon Semyonitch did not wish it,' she wrote to me; 'as, according to his ideas, no one ought to sacrifice self for another person, and not for a cause; but I told him there was no question of sacrifice at all. When I said to him in Moscow that I would be his wife, I thought to myself—for ever, indissolubly! So indissoluble it must be till the end of our days….'
IV
1861
Twelve more years passed by…. Every one in Russia knows, and will ever remember, what passed between the years 1849 and 1861. In my personal life, too, many changes took place, on which, however, there is no need to enlarge. New interests came into it, new cares…. The Baburin couple first fell into the background, then passed out of my mind altogether. Yet I kept up a correspondence with Musa—at very long intervals, however. Sometimes more than a year passed without any tidings of her or of her husband. I heard that soon after 1855 he received permission to return to Russia; but that he preferred to remain in the little Siberian town, where he had been flung by destiny, and where he had apparently made himself a home, and found a haven and a sphere of activity….
And, lo and behold! towards the end of March in 1861, I received the following letter from Musa:—
'It is so long since I have written to you, most honoured Piotr Petrovitch, that I do not even know whether you are still living; and if you are living, have you not forgotten our existence? But no matter; I cannot resist writing to you to-day. Everything till now has gone on with us in the same old way: Paramon Semyonitch and I have been always busy with our schools, which are gradually making good progress; besides that, Paramon Semyonitch was taken up with reading and correspondence and his usual discussions with the Old-believers, members of the clergy, and Polish exiles; his health has been fairly good…. So has mine. But yesterday! the manifesto of the 19th of February reached us! We had long been on the look-out for it. Rumours had reached us long before of what was being done among you in Petersburg, … but yet I can't describe what it was! You know my husband well; he was not in the least changed by his misfortune; on the contrary, he has grown even stronger and more energetic, and has a will as strong as iron, but at this he could not restrain himself! His hands shook as he read it; then he embraced me three times, and three times he kissed me, tried to say something—but no! he could not! and ended by bursting into tears, which was very astounding to see, and suddenly he shouted, "Hurrah! hurrah! God save the Tsar!" Yes, Piotr Petrovitch, those were his very words! Then he went on: "Now lettest Thou Thy servant depart" … and again: "This is the first step, others are bound to follow it"; and, just as he was, bareheaded, ran to tell the great news to our friends. There was a bitter frost, and even a snowstorm coming on. I tried to prevent him, but he would not listen to me. And when he came home, he was all covered with snow, his hair, his face, and his beard—he has a beard right down to his chest now—and the tears were positively frozen on his cheeks! But he was very lively and cheerful, and told me to uncork a bottle of home-made champagne, and he drank with our friends that he had brought back with him, to the health of the Tsar and of Russia, and all free Russians; and taking the glass, and fixing his eyes on the ground, he said: "Nikander, Nikander, do you hear? There are no slaves in Russia any more! Rejoice in the grave, old comrade!" And much more he said; to the effect that his "expectations were fulfilled!" He said, too, that now there could be no turning back; that this was in its way a pledge or promise…. I don't remember everything, but it is long since I have seen him so happy. And so I made up my mind to write to you, so that you might know how we have been rejoicing and exulting in the remote Siberian wilds, so that you might rejoice with us….'