‘Who knows?’ whispered the little demon. ‘You should know this better than me!’
I’d seen many unequal marriages in my time, I’d stood more than once before Pukirev’s picture,37 read many novels based on disparity between husband and wife. Finally, I knew all about physiology, which peremptorily punishes unequal marriages – but not once in my life had I experienced such an appalling state of mind, that I could not shake off, however hard I tried, now as I stood behind Olenka, fulfilling a best man’s duties. If my heart was troubled by regret alone, then why hadn’t I felt this regret earlier, when I attended other weddings?
‘It’s not regret,’ whispered the little demon. ‘It’s jealousy!’
But one can be jealous only of those one loves – and did I love that girl in red? If I were to love all the girls I met living under the moon, then my heart would not be large enough and I would really have been overreaching myself!
At the back of the church, just by the door, behind the churchwarden’s cupboard, stood my friend Count Karneyev, selling candles. His hair was smoothed down and heavily greased, and it gave off a narcotic, stifling smell of perfume. Today he looked such a dear that I couldn’t resist remarking when I greeted him:
‘Aleksey! You look the perfect quadrille dancer today!’
He escorted everyone who came in or out with a sugary smile and I could hear the clumsy compliments with which he rewarded every lady who bought a candle from him. He, that spoilt darling of fortune, who never kept brass coins and who had no idea how to use them, was constantly dropping five-and three-copeck coins on the floor. Nearby, leaning on the cupboard, stood the majestic Kalinin, with the Order of Stanislas around his neck. His face was radiant and shining – he was glad that his idea about ‘at-homes’ had fallen on such fertile soil and was already beginning to bear fruit. In his heart of hearts he was showering Urbenin with a thousand thanks: although the wedding was an absurdity, it was easy to seize upon it as an opportunity to arrange the first ‘at-home’.
Vain Olenka must have been in her seventh heaven. From the nuptial lectern, right up to the main doors, stretched two rows of female representatives from our local ‘flower-garden’. The lady guests were dressed as they would have been if the Count himself were getting married – one couldn’t have wished for more elegant outfits. The majority of these ladies were aristocrats – not one priest’s wife, not one shopkeeper’s wife. There were ladies to whom Olenka had never before thought that she even had the right to curtsy. Olenka’s groom was an estate manager, merely a privileged servant, but that could not have wounded her vanity. He was of the gentry and owned a mortgaged estate in the neighbouring district. His father had been district marshal of the nobility and he himself had already been a JP for nine years in his native district. What more could an ambitious daughter of a personal nobleman have wanted? Even the fact that her best man was celebrated throughout the whole province as a bon vivant38 and a Don Juan could tickle her pride: all the ladies were ogling him. He was as impressive as forty thousand best men put together39 and – more significant than anything else – had not refused to be best man to a simple girl like her, when it was a known fact that he had even refused aristocratic ladies when they invited him to be their best man!
But vain Olenka did not rejoice. She was as pale as the linen she had recently brought back from Tenevo fair. The hand which held the candle trembled slightly, now and then her chin quivered. Her eyes were filled with a kind of stupor, as if she had suddenly been surprised or frightened by something. There was not a trace of that gaiety that had shone in her eyes when, even as recently as yesterday, she had run around the garden and enthusiastically discussed the kind of wallpaper she would like to have in her drawing-room, on what days she would receive visitors, and so on. Now her face was far too serious – much more than the solemnity of the occasion demanded.
Urbenin was wearing a new dress suit. Although he was decently attired, his hair was brushed the way Orthodox Russians used to brush their hair back in 1812. As usual, he was red-faced and serious. His eyes seemed to be praying and the signs of the cross he made after each ‘Lord have mercy’ were not performed mechanically.
Behind me stood Urbenin’s children from his first marriage – the schoolboy Grisha and a fair-haired little girl called Sasha. They were gazing at their father’s red neck and protruding ears, and their faces resembled question marks. They just couldn’t understand what their father wanted with that woman and why he was taking her into their house. Sasha was merely surprised, but fourteen-year-old Grisha was frowning and scowling. He would definitely have said ‘no’ if his father had asked his permission to marry.
The wedding ceremony was performed with particular solemnity. Three priests and two deacons were officiating. The service was long – so long that my arms grew weary from holding the garland, and the ladies, who normally like to witness weddings, let their eyes wander from the bridal pair. The rural dean read the prayers slowly, in measured tones, without omitting a single one. The choir sang an extremely long hymn from their music books. Taking the opportunity to show off his deep bass voice, the clerk read from the Acts of the Apostles with a ‘doubly emphatic drawl’. But finally the senior priest took the garland from my hand, the couple kissed. The guests grew excited, the regular rows broke up, the sound of congratulations, kisses and sighing filled the air. Radiant and smiling, Urbenin took his young bride on his arm and we all went out into the fresh air.
If anyone who was with me in the church should find this account incomplete and not totally accurate, let him ascribe any omission to my headache and the above-mentioned depression that prevented me from observing and taking note of the proceedings. Of course, had I known at the time that I would be writing a novel, I wouldn’t have gazed at the floor as I did that morning and I would have ignored my headache completely!
Fate sometimes allows itself to play bitter, nasty tricks. The bridal pair had barely left the church when they were greeted by an unwelcome and unexpected surprise. As the wedding procession – so gay in the sunshine with hundreds of different tints and colours – was making its way from the church to the Count’s house, Olenka suddenly took a step backwards, stopped and tugged her husband’s elbow so violently that he staggered.
‘They’ve let him out!’ she cried out loud, looking at me in horror.
Poor girl! Her insane father, the forester Skvortsov, was running down the avenue to meet her. Waving his arms and stumbling, rolling his eyes like one demented, he made quite a disagreeable spectacle. Even this would probably have been acceptable had he not been wearing his cotton-print dressing-gown and bedroom slippers, whose decrepitude clashed terribly with his daughter’s luxurious wedding-gown. His face was sleepy, his hair fluttered about in the wind, his nightshirt was undone…
‘Olenka!’ he babbled as he approached the couple. ‘Why have you left me?’
Olenka blushed and gave the smiling ladies a sidelong glance. The poor girl was burning with shame.
‘Mitka didn’t lock the doors!’ the forester continued, turning to us. ‘Do you think burglars would have any trouble getting in? Last year they stole the samovar from the kitchen and now she wants us to be robbed again!’