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‘What a terrible woman!’ Nadezhda whispered to me every time Olga drew abreast of our wagonette. ‘What a terrible woman! She’s as evil as she’s pretty. It’s not long since you were best man at her wedding, is it? She’d barely time to wear out her wedding shoes47 than she was already wearing someone else’s silk and flaunting another’s diamonds. This strange and swift metamorphosis is hardly credible. If these were her natural instincts it would have been at least tactful to have waited a year or two…’

‘She’s in a hurry to live!48 She’s no time to wait!’ I sighed.

‘Do you know what’s happening with her husband?’

‘They say he’s hit the bottle.’

‘Yes, Papa was in town the day before yesterday and he saw him driving away from somewhere in a cab. His head was slumped to one side, he had no hat and there was mud all over his face. That man’s finished! They say the family’s terribly poor – they’ve nothing to eat, the rent’s not paid. Poor little Sasha goes for days without food. Papa’s described all this to the Count. But you know what the Count’s like! He’s honest and kind, but he doesn’t like stopping to think and weigh things up. “I’ll send him a hundred roubles,” he says. So off he sends it. Without further ado. I don’t think Urbenin could be more deeply insulted than to be sent that money… He’ll take great offence at the Count’s little sop and he’ll only start drinking all the more.’

‘Yes, the Count’s stupid,’ I said. ‘He might at least have sent that money through me, and in my name.’

‘He had no right to send him money! Do I have the right to feed you if I’m throttling the life out of you and if you hate me?’

‘That’s true.’

We became silent and pensive. The thought of Urbenin’s fate had always been painful for me. But now, when the woman who had ruined him was caracoling before my very eyes, it gave rise to a whole series of mournful reflections. What would become of him and his children? What would become of her? In what moral cesspool would that feeble, pathetic Count end his days?

Next to me sat the only being who was decent and worthy of respect. I knew only two people in our district whom I was capable of liking and respecting, who alone had the right to snub me, because they stood higher than me – Nadezhda Nikolayevna and Dr Pavel Ivanych. What was in store for them?

‘Nadezhda Nikolayevna,’ I said. ‘Without wishing to, I’ve caused you considerable grief and I’m less entitled than anyone to expect you to be frank with me. But I swear that no one will understand you as well as I do. Your sorrow is my sorrow, your happiness my happiness. If I’m asking you questions now, please don’t suspect that it’s merely out of idle curiosity. Tell me, my dear, why do you let this pygmy of a count go anywhere near you? What’s stopping you from driving him away and ignoring his loathsome endearments? Surely his attentions do a respectable woman no honour! Why do you give these scandalmongers a reason for coupling your name with his?’

Nadezhda glanced at me with her limpid eyes and smiled cheerfully, just as though she could read the sincerity in my face.

‘What are they saying?’ she asked.

‘That your Papa and yourself are trying to hook the Count and that in the end the Count will make fools of you.’

‘They talk like that because they don’t know the Count,’ Nadezhda flared up. ‘Those shameless, slandering women! They’re used to seeing only the bad side of people. The good things are beyond their comprehension!’

‘And did you find anything good in him?’

‘Yes, I did! You’re the first who should know that I would never have let him come anywhere near me if I hadn’t been convinced of his honourable intentions.’

‘So, things with you two have already come to “honourable intentions”,’ I said in surprise. ‘Soon… But why have you got “honourable intentions” into your head?’

‘You’d like to know?’ she asked – and her eyes sparkled. ‘Those scandalmongers aren’t lying. I do want to marry him! Now, don’t look so surprised – and don’t smile! You’ll be telling me next that marrying without love is dishonest and all the rest of it… all that’s been said a thousand times before but… what can I do? It’s very hard, feeling that you’re no more than a piece of unwanted furniture in this world. It’s terrible living without any purpose. But when this man whom you dislike so much has made me his wife, I shall have a purpose in life. I shall reform him, make him stop drinking, teach him to work. Just take a look at him! He doesn’t look anything like a man at the moment – but I shall make a man of him!’

‘Etcetera, etcetera,’ I said. ‘You’ll take care of his vast fortune, you’ll do good deeds… The whole district will bless you and look upon you as an angel sent from on high to comfort the wretched. You’ll be a mother, you’ll bring up his children… Yes, it’s a massive undertaking! You’re an intelligent woman, but you reason like a schoolgirl!’

‘Well, what if my idea is useless, what if it is ludicrous and naive – the fact is, I live by it. Under its influence I’ve become healthier and more cheerful. Now, please don’t disillusion me! Let me disillusion myself, but not now – some other time, later, in the distant future… Enough of this conversation!’

‘Just one more indiscreet question – are you expecting a proposal?’

‘Yes, judging from the note I received from him today my fate will be decided this evening. He writes that he has something very important to say. His whole future happiness will depend on my reply, he says.’

‘Thanks for being so frank,’ I replied.

The meaning of that note which Nadezhda received was quite clear to me. A vile proposal was awaiting that poor girl. I decided to free her from it.

‘We’ve already reached my forest,’ said the Count, drawing level with our wagonette. ‘Would you like to stop for a while, Nadezhda Nikolayevna?’

Without waiting for an answer he clapped his hands.

‘Sto-op!’ he ordered in a loud, reverberant voice.

We settled ourselves along the edge of the forest. The sun had disappeared behind the trees, colouring with golden purple only the crowns of the loftiest alders and playing on the golden cross of the Count’s church that was visible in the distance. Frightened merlins and orioles flew over our heads. One of the men fired his rifle and struck even more fear into that feathered kingdom, setting off an untiring avian concert. This kind of concert has its own peculiar charm in spring and summer, but when one senses the coming of chilly autumn in the air it irritates the nerves and hints at fast-approaching migration.

The freshness of evening wafted from the thick woods. The ladies’ noses turned blue and the Count (who was sensitive to the cold) started rubbing his hands. Nothing could have been more appropriate than the smell of samovar charcoal and the clatter of crockery. One-eyed Kuzma, puffing and panting, and entangling himself in the long grass, brought out a case of brandy. We started warming ourselves.

A lengthy walk in cool, fresh air stimulates the appetite better than any artificial appetizer. After a long walk, cured sturgeon, caviare, roast partridge and other victuals delight the eye, like roses on an early spring morning.

‘You’re very clever today!’ I told the Count, cutting myself a slice of sturgeon. ‘Cleverer than ever before. You couldn’t have arranged things better!’

‘The Count and I arranged it together,’ tittered Kalinin, winking at the coachmen who were carrying hampers of food, wine and crockery from the wagonettes. ‘It’s going to be a wonderful little picnic! And we’re going to round it off with bubbly!’