‘Good morning!’ I shouted to her.
She waved her hand and disappeared from sight, together with the lumbering wagonette, without giving me the chance to have a good look at her pretty, fresh little face. This time she wasn’t dressed in red, but in some dark-green costume with large buttons, and a broad-brimmed straw hat. Despite this, I liked her no less than before. It would have given me great pleasure to talk to her and listen to her voice. I wanted to peer into her blue eyes in the brilliance of the sunlight, just as I had looked into them that evening when the lightning was flashing. I wanted to take her down from that ugly wagonette and suggest she walk the rest of the way with me – I would certainly have done so but for the conventions of society. For some reason I felt that she would have eagerly agreed to my suggestion. Not for nothing did she look back twice at me when the wagonette turned off behind some tall alders.
It was about four miles from my abode to Tenevo – an almost negligible distance on a fine morning for a young man. Shortly after six o’clock I was already making my way between carts and booths to the church there. The air was already filled with the sound of trade, despite the early hour and the fact that Mass hadn’t finished. The creaking of carts, neighing of horses, lowing of cows, blowing of toy trumpets – all this mingled with the shouts of the gipsy horse dealers and the songs of peasants who had already managed to ‘get sozzled’, as they say. So many cheerful, festive faces, so many different types! So much charm and movement in the mass of people, with their brightly coloured clothes, bathed in the morning sunshine! By the thousand, these people swarmed and moved around, making a great din, trying to complete their business in a few hours and disperse by evening, leaving behind them on the open space – as if they were mementoes – scattered wisps of hay, oats spilled here and there, nutshells… People were flocking in dense crowds to and from the church.
The cross on the church gave off golden rays as bright as the sun itself. It glittered and seemed to be burning with golden fire. Below it the cupola was aflame with the same fire and the newly painted green dome gleamed in the sun, while beyond the glittering cross the transparent blue sky stretched into the far distance.
I passed through the crowded churchyard and made my way into the church. Mass had only just started and when I entered they were still reading from the Gospels. In the church silence reigned, broken only by the reader’s voice and the footsteps of the priest with his censer. The congregation stood humbly, motionless, gazing reverentially at the wide-open holy altar gates and listening to the long drawn-out reading. Rural etiquette – rather, rural propriety – clamps down very heavily on any violation of the awesome quiet of a church. I always used to feel ashamed when something there made me smile or speak. Unfortunately, only on rare occasions did I fail to meet some of my friends in church and of these, I regret to say, I had great numbers. Usually, the moment I entered the church, some member of the local ‘intelligentsia’ would immediately come up to me and, after a long preamble about the weather, would start talking about his own footling, trivial affairs. I would usually reply yes or no, but I’m so punctilious that I could never bring myself to ignore that person altogether. And my punctiliousness cost me dear. I would chat away and look awkwardly at my neighbours at prayer, afraid that they would take offence at my idle prattle.
And on this occasion too I failed to escape from my friends.
Just as I was entering the church I saw my heroine – that very same ‘girl in red’ whom I had met on my way to Tenevo. That poor girl, red as a lobster and perspiring, was standing in the middle of the congregation, looking around at all those faces with imploring eyes, in search of a deliverer. She was stuck fast in that dense crowd; unable to move either forwards or backwards, she resembled a bird held tightly squeezed in a fist. When she saw me she smiled bitterly and nodded at me with her pretty little chin.
‘For goodness’ sake, take me to the front!’ she said, seizing my sleeve. ‘It’s terribly stuffy and cramped here… I beg you!’
‘It’s just as crowded at the front!’ I replied.
‘But there everyone’s well dressed and respectable, while here there’s only common peasants. Besides, we have a place reserved for us at the front. And you should be there too.’
So, she wasn’t red in the face because it was stuffy and crowded in the church – oh no! Her pretty little head was tormented by thoughts of precedence! I took note of that vain girl’s entreaties and by carefully pushing people aside managed to lead her as far as the pulpit, where the whole flower of our provincial beau monde33 had already assembled. After settling Olenka in a position that was in keeping with her aristocratic pretensions, I stationed myself behind the beau monde and began observing all that was going on.
As usual, the ladies and gentlemen were whispering and giggling. Kalinin, the Justice of the Peace, gesticulating with his fingers and rolling his head, was telling Squire Deryaev about his ailments in an undertone. Deryaev was cursing doctors in an almost inaudible voice and advised the JP to go and get treatment from a certain Yevstrat Ivanych. When the ladies saw Olenka they seized upon her as a good subject for gossip and started whispering among themselves. Only one girl was apparently praying. She was kneeling and kept moving her lips as she stared in front of her with her blue eyes. She didn’t notice the lock of hair that had come loose under her hat and was hanging untidily over her pale temple. She didn’t notice when Olenka and I came and stood beside her.
She was Nadezhda Nikolayevna, the JP’s daughter. When I spoke earlier of the woman who had run like a black cat between myself and the doctor, I was referring to her. The doctor loved her as only such fine natures as my dear old Screwy’s were capable of loving. Now he stood beside her, stiff as a poker, hands on trouser seams and craning his neck. Now and then he cast his loving, questioning eyes on her intent face. It was as if he were watching over her prayers and in his eyes there shone a melancholy, passionate yearning to be the object of her prayers. But, sadly for him, he knew for whom she was praying… it was not for him.
I motioned to Pavel Ivanovich when he looked round and we both left the church.
‘Let’s have a little wander around the fair,’ I suggested.
We lit our cigarettes and went over to the booths.
‘How’s Nadezhda Nikolayevna?’ I asked the doctor as we entered a tent where they sold toys.
‘All right… I think she’s well,’ the doctor replied, screwing up his eyes at a toy soldier with lilac face and crimson uniform. ‘She was inquiring about you.’
‘And what precisely was she inquiring about?’