Another member was added to the family circle at Malinovka, for Raisky brought Koslov to dinner one day, to receive the heartiest of welcomes.

Tatiana Markovna had the tact not to let the poor forsaken man see that she was aware of his trouble. She greeted him with a jest.

"Why have you not been near us for so long, Leonti Ivanovich? Borushka says that I don't know how to entertain you, and that you don't like my table. Did you tell him so?"

"How should I not like it? When did I say such a thing?" he asked Raisky severely. "You are joking!" he went on, as everybody laughed, and he himself had to smile.

He had had time to find his own bearings, and had begun to realise the necessity of hiding his grief from others.

"Yes, it is a long time since I was here. My wife has gone to Moscow to visit her relations, so that I could not...."

"You ought to have come straight to us," observed Tatiana Markovna, "when it was so dull by yourself at home."

"I expect her, and am always afraid she may come when I am not at home."

"You would soon hear of her arrival, and she must pa.s.s our house. From the windows of the old house we can see who comes along the road, and we will stop her."

"It is true that the road to Moscow can be seen from there," said Koslov, looking quickly, and almost happily, at his hostess.

"Come and stay with us," she said.

"I simply will not let you go to-day," said Raisky. "I am bored by myself, and we will move over into the old house. After Marfinka's wedding I am going away, and you will be Grandmother's and Vera's first minister, friend and protector."

"Thank you. If I am not in the way...."

"How can you talk like that. You ought to be ashamed of yourself."

"Forgive me, Tatiana Markovna."

"Better eat your dinner; the soup is getting cold."

"I am hungry too," he said suddenly, seizing his spoon. He ate his soup silently, looking round him as if he were seeking the road to Moscow, and he preserved the same demeanour all through the meal.

"It is so quiet here," he said after dinner, as he looked out of the window. "There is still some green left, and the air is so fresh. Listen, Boris Pavlovich, I should like to bring the library here."

"As you like. To-morrow, as far as I am concerned. It is your possession to do as you please with."

"What should I do with it now? I will have it brought over, so that I can take care of it; else in the end that man Mark will...."

Raisky strode about the room, Vera's eyes were fixed on her needlework, and Tatiana Markovna went to the window. Shortly after this Raisky took Leonti to the old house, to show him the room that Tatiana Markovna had arranged for him. Leonti went from one window to another to see which of them commanded a view of the Moscow road.

CHAPTER x.x.xII

On a misty autumn day, as Vera sat at work in her room, Yakob brought her a letter written on blue paper, which had been brought by a lad who had instructions to wait for an answer. When she had recovered from the first shock at the sight of the letter, she took it, laid it on the table, and dismissed Yakob. She tried to go on with her work but her hands fell helplessly on her lap.

"When will there be an end of this torture?" she whispered, nervously.

Then she took from her bureau the earlier unopened blue letter, laid it by the side of the other, and covered her face with her hands. What answer could he expect from her, she asked herself, when they had parted for ever? Surely he dare not call her once more. If so, an answer must be given, for the messenger was waiting. She opened the letters and read the earlier one:--

"Are we really not to meet again, Vera? That would be incredible. A few days ago there would have been reason in our separation, now it is a useless sacrifice, hard for both of us. We have striven obstinately with one another for a whole year for the prize of happiness; and now that the goal is attained you run away. Yet it is you who spoke of an eternal love. Is that logical?"

"Logical!" she repeated, but she collected her courage and read on.

"I am now permitted to choose another place of residence. But now I cannot leave you, for it would be dishonourable. You cannot think that I am proud of my victory, and that it is easy for me to go away. I cannot allow you to harbour such an idea. I cannot leave you, because you love me."

Once more she interrupted her reading, but resumed it with an effort--

"And because my whole being is in a fever. Let us be happy, Vera. Be convinced that our conflict, our quarrelling was nothing but the mask of pa.s.sion. The mask has fallen, and we have no other ground of dispute. In reality we have long been one. You ask for a love which shall be eternal; many desire that, but it is an impossibility."

She stopped her reading to tell herself with a pitying smile that his conception of love was of a perpetual fever.

"My mistake was in openly a.s.serting this truth, which life itself would have revealed in due course. From this time onwards, I will not a.s.sail your convictions, for it is not they, but pa.s.sion, which is the essential factor in our situation. Let us enjoy our happiness in silence.

I hope that you will agree to this logical solution."

Vera smiled bitterly as she continued to read.

"They would hardly allow you to go away with me, and indeed that is hardly possible. Nothing but a wild pa.s.sion could lead you to do such a thing, and I do not expect it. Other convictions, indifferent to me, would be needed to impel you to this course; you would be faced with a future which fulfils neither your own wishes nor the demands of your relations, for mine is an uncertain existence, without home, hearth or possessions. But if you think you can persuade your Grandmother, we will be betrothed, and I will remain here until--for an indefinite time. A separation now would be like a bad comedy, in which the unprofitable role is yours, at which Raisky, when he hears of it, will be the first to laugh. I warn you again now, as I did before. Send your reply to the address of my landlady, Sekletaia Burdalakov."

In spite of her exhaustion after reading this epistle Vera took up the one which Yakob had just brought. It was hastily written in pencil.

"Every day I have been wandering about by the precipice, hoping to see you in answer to my earlier letter. I have only just heard by chance of your indisposition. Come, Vera. If you are ill, write two words, and I will come myself to the old house. If I receive no answer to-day, I will expect you to-morrow at five o'clock in the arbour. I must know quickly whether I should go or stay. But I do not think we shall part. In any case, I expect either you or an answer. If you are ill, I will make my way into your house."

Terrified by his threat of coming, she seized pen and paper, but her hands trembled too much to allow her to write.

"I cannot," she exclaimed. "I have no strength, I am stifled! How shall I begin, and what can I write? I have forgotten how I used to write to him, to speak to him."

She sent for Yakob, and told him to dismiss the messenger and to say that an answer would follow later. She wondered as she walked slowly back to her room, when she would find strength that day to write to him; what she should say. She could only repeat that she could not, and would not, and to-morrow she told herself, he would wait for her in the arbour, he would be wild with disappointment, and if he repeats his signals with the rifle he will come into conflict with the servants, and eventually with grandmother herself. She tried to write, but threw the pen aside; then she thought she would go to him herself, tell him all she had to say, and then leave him. As once before her hands sought in vain her mantilla, her scarf, and without knowing what she did, she sank helplessly down on the divan.

If she told her grandmother the necessary steps would be taken, but otherwise the letters would begin again. Or should she send her cousin, who was after all her natural and nearest friend and protector, to convince Mark that there was no hope for him? But she considered that he also was in the toils of pa.s.sion, and that it would be hard for him to execute the mission, that he might be involved in a heated dispute, which might develop into a dangerous situation. She turned to Tushin, whom she could trust to accomplish the errand effectively without blundering. But it seemed impossible to set Tushin face to face with the rival who had robbed him of his desires. Yet she saw no alternative. No delay was possible; to-morrow would bring another letter, and then, failing an answer, Mark himself.

After brief consideration, she wrote a note to Tushin, and this time the same pen covered easily and quickly the same paper that had been so impracticable half an hour before. She asked him to come and see her the next morning.

Until now Vera had been accustomed to guard her own secrets, and to exercise an undivided rule in the world of her thoughts. If she had given her confidence to the priest's wife, it was out of charity. She had confided to her the calendar of her everyday life, its events, its emotions and impressions; she had told her of her secret meetings with Mark, but concealed from her the catastrophe, telling her simply that all was over between them. As the priest's wife was ignorant of the denouement of the story at the foot of the precipice, she put down Vera's illness to grief at their parting.

Vera loved Marfinka as she loved Natalie Ivanovna, not as a comrade, but as a child. In more peaceful times she would again confide the details of her life to Natalie Ivanovna as before; but in a crisis she went to Tatiana Markovna, sent for Tushin, or sought help from her cousin Boris.

Now she put the letters in her pocket, found her aunt, and sat down beside her.

"What has happened, Vera? You are upset."

"Not upset, but worried. I have received letters, from _there_."

"From _there_!" repeated Tatiana Markovna, turning pale.

"The first was written some time ago, but I have only just opened it, and the second was brought to me to-day," she said, laying them both on the table.