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... ing a very secret and important conference with
Mlle. Blanche. As for the latter, from early morning she had
taken decisive measures, by completely excluding the General
from her presence, and bestowing upon him not a glance. Indeed,
even when the General pursued her to the Casino, and met her
walking arm in arm with the Prince, he (the General) received
from her and her mother not the slightest recognition. Nor did
the Prince himself bow. The rest of the day Mlle. spent in
probing the Prince, and trying to make him declare himself; but
in this she made a woeful mistake. The little incident occurred
in the evening. Suddenly Mlle. Blanche realised that the Prince
had not even a copper to his name, but, on the contrary, mike oldfield was
minded to borrow of her money wherewith to play at roulette. In
high displeasure she drove him from her presence, and shut
herself up in her room.
The same morning I went to see--or, rather, to look for--Mr.
Astley, but was unsuccessful in my quest. Neither in his rooms
nor in the Casino nor in the Park was he to be found; nor did
he, that day, lunch at his hotel as usual. However, at about
five o'clock I caught sight of him walking from the railway
station to the Hotel d'Angleterre. He seemed to be in a great
hurry and much preoccupied, though in his face I could discern
no actual traces of worry or perturbation. He held out to me a
friendly hand, with his usual ejaculation of " Ah! " but did not
check his stride. I turned and walked beside him, but found,
somehow, that his answers forbade any putting of definite
questions. Moreover, I felt reluctant to speak to him of Polina;
nor, for his part, did he ask me any mike oldfield questions concerning her,
although, on my telling him of the Grandmother's exploits, he
listened attentively and gravely, and then shrugged his
shoulders.
"She is gambling away everything that she has," I remarked.
"Indeed? She arrived at the Casino even before I had taken my
departure by train, so I knew she had been playing. If I should
have time I will go to the Casino to-night, and take a look at
her. The thing interests me."
"Where have you been today?" I asked--surprised at myself for
having, as yet, omitted to put to him that question.
"To Frankfort."
"On business?"
"On business."
What more was there to be asked after that? I accompanied him
until, as we drew level with the Hotel des Quatre Saisons, he
suddenly nodded to me and disappeared. For myself, I returned
home, and came to the conclusion that, even had I met him at two
o'clock in the afternoon, I should have learnt no more from him
than I had done at five o'clock, for the reason that I had no
definite question to ask. It was bound to have been so. For me
to formulate the query which I really wished to put was a simple
impossibility.
Polina spent the whole of that day either in walking about the
park with the nurse and children or in sitting in her own room.
For a long while past she had avoided the General and had
scarcely had a word to say to him (scarcely a word, I mean, on
any SERIOUS topic). Yes, that I had noticed. Still, even though
I was aware of the position in which the General was placed, it
had never occurred to me that he would have any reason to avoid
HER, or to trouble her with family explanations.
Indeed, when I
was returning to the hotel after my conversation with mike oldfield Astley,
and chanced to meet Polina and the children, I could see that
her face was as calm as though the family disturbances had never
touched her.
To my salute she responded with a slight bow, and I
retired to my room in a very bad humour.
Of course, since the affair with the Burmergelms I had exchanged
not a word with Polina, nor had with her any kind of
intercourse.
Yet I had been at my wits' end, for, as time went
on, there was arising in me an ever-seething dissatisfaction.
Even if she did not love me she ought not to have trampled upon
my feelings, nor to have accepted mike oldfield my confessions with such
contempt, seeing that she must have been aware that I loved her
(of her own accord she had allowed me to tell her as much). Of
course the situation between us had arisen in a curious manner.
About two months ago, I had noticed that she had a desire to make
me her friend, her confidant--that she was making trial of me for
the purpose; but, for some reason or another, the desired result
had never come about, and we had fallen into the present strange
relations, which had led me to address her as I had done. At the
same time, if my love was distasteful to her, why had she not
FORBIDDEN me to speak of it to her?
But she had not so forbidden me. On the contrary, there had been
occasions when she had even INVITED me to speak. Of course, this
might have been done out of sheer wantonness, for I well knew--I
had remarked it only too often--that, after listening to what I
had to say, and angering me almost beyond endurance, she loved
suddenly to mike oldfield torture me with some fresh outburst of contempt and
aloofness! Yet she must have known that I could not live without
her. Three days had elapsed since the affair with the Baron, and
I could bear the severance no longer. When, that afternoon, I
met her near the Casino, my heart almost made me faint, it beat
so violently. She too could not live without me, for had she not
said that she had NEED of me? Or had that too been spoken in
jest?
That she had a secret of some kind there could be no doubt. What
she had said to the Grandmother had stabbed me to the heart. On
a thousand occasions I had challenged her to be open with me,
nor could she have been ignorant that I was ready to give my
very life for her. Yet always she had kept me at a distance with
that contemptuous air of hers; or else she had demanded of me,
in lieu of the life which I offered to lay at her feet, such
escapades as I had perpetrated with the Baron. Ah, was it not
torture to me, all this? For could it be that her whole world
was bound up with the Frenchman? What, too, about Mr. Astley?
The affair was inexplicable throughout. My God, what distress it
caused me!
Arrived home, I, in a fit of frenzy, indited the following:
"Polina Alexandrovna, I can see that there is approaching us an
exposure which will involve you too. For the last time I ask of
you--have you, or have you not, any need of my life? If you have,
then make such dispositions as you wish, and I shall always be
discoverable in my room if required. If you have need of my
life, write mike oldfield or send for me."
I sealed the letter, and dispatched it by the hand of a corridor
lacquey, with orders to hand it to the addressee in person.
Though I expected no answer, scarcely three minutes had elapsed
before the lacquey returned with "the compliments of a certain
person."
Next, about seven o'clock, I was sent for by the General. I
found him in his study, apparently preparing to go out again,
for his hat and stick were lying on the sofa. When I entered mike oldfield he
was standing in the middle of the room--his feet wide apart, and
his head bent down. Also, he appeared to be talking to himself.
But as soon as ever he saw me at the door he came towards me in
such a curious manner that involuntarily I retreated a step, and
was for leaving the room; whereupon he seized me by both hands,
and, drawing me towards the sofa, and seating himself thereon,
he forced me to sit down on a chair opposite him. Then, without
letting go of my hands, he exclaimed with quivering lips and a
sparkle of tears on his eyelashes:
"Oh, Alexis Ivanovitch! Save me, save me! Have some mercy upon
me!"
For a long time I could not make out what he meant, although he
kept talking and talking, and constantly repeating to himself,
"Have mercy, mercy!" At length, however, I divined that he was
expecting me to give him something in the nature of advice--or,
rather, that, deserted by every one, and overwhelmed with grief
and apprehension, he had bethought himself of my existence, and
sent for me to relieve his feelings by talking and talking and
talking.
In fact, he was in such a confused and despondent state of mind
that, clasping his hands together, he actually went down upon
his knees and begged me to go to Mlle. Blanche, and beseech and
advise her to return to him, and to accept him in marriage.
"But, General," I exclaimed, "possibly Mlle. Blanche has
scarcely even remarked my existence? What could I do with her?"
It was in vain that I protested, for he could understand nothing
that was said to him, Next he started talking about the
Grandmother, but always in a disconnected sort of fashion--his
one thought being to send for the police.
"In Russia," said he, suddenly boiling over with indignation,
"or in ... |
