I had scarcely run out into the street, and before I had time to consider what was to be done next, I suddenly saw a droshky pull up at our gate with Alexandra Semyonovna stepping down, leading Nelly by the arm. She was holding her tightly as though afraid she might run off again. I rushed towards them.
“Nelly, what’s the matter with you!” I cried out. “Where did you go? Why?”
“No need to worry yourself!” Alexandra Semyonovna interjected chirpily. “Let’s go inside quickly and we’ll talk about it there, “The things I’ll tell you, Ivan Petrovich,” she whispered hurriedly on the way. “It’s simply unbelievable… Let’s go inside, you’ll hear everything.”
It was written all over her face that she had some extraordinarily important news to impart.
“Go along, Nelly, go on, lie down for a while,” she said after we entered my room. “You must be tired. All that running around was no joke, even harder after an illness. Lie down, my darling, lie down. Meanwhile Vanya and I will leave you so as not to disturb you and let you have a good sleep.” And she winked at me to follow her into the kitchen.
But Nelly did not lie down, she sat down on the settee and buried her face in her hands.
We left the room, and Alexandra Semyonovna hurriedly told me what had happened. Subsequently I learnt even more details. This is how events unfolded.
Having left my place about two hours before my return and written me the note, Nelly had first run to the old doctor’s. She’d already obtained his address earlier. In the doctor’s own words, he was absolutely stunned when he saw Nelly turn up at his place, and all the time she was with him, he just could not believe his eyes. “And I still can’t,” he added in conclusion of his story, “and never shall.” And yet Nelly really had visited him. He had been sitting in his study in an armchair, in his dressing gown drinking coffee, when she burst in and fell round his neck before he even had time to realize what was happening. She kept crying, she hugged and kissed him; she kissed his hands and implored him earnestly though incoherently to let her come and live with him; she said she could not and would not live with me any longer, which is why she had left me; that it was difficult for her; that she would not tease him any more or talk of new frocks and would behave well, learn to do things, launder and iron his shirts, (she probably made all this up on her way to him, or perhaps even earlier) and finally that she’d always do as she was told and, even if it meant every day, she’d take whatever powders were necessary. And if she had previously said she wished to marry him, it was only a joke, and that she no longer even thought of it. The old German was so shaken that all the while he just sat there open-mouthed, quite oblivious of the fact that the cigar he was holding in his uplifted hand had long gone out.
“Mademoiselle,” he said at last, having regained partial use of his tongue, “Mademoiselle, as far as I am able to understand, you are asking me to accommodate you here. But that is impossible! You can see, I am very cramped here and have no substantial income… And finally, this is so unexpected, so ill considered… It is terrible! And, finally, you have as far as I can see, run away from your home. This is very unpraiseworthy and impossible… And, finally, I let you walk only a little, on a bright day under your benefactor’s supervision, but you have left your benefactor and have run to me, whereas you should be taking care of yourself and… and… taking your medicine. And, finally… finally, I cannot understand anything—”
Nelly did not allow him to finish. She started to cry and beg him, but it was all to no avail. The dear old man, bless him, was getting more and more confused and flustered, and unable to comprehend a thing. At last Nelly gave up and, crying out “Oh my God!” ran out of the room. “I was ill the rest of that day,” the doctor added at the conclusion of his story, “and took a decoction before I went to bed…”
Nelly then rushed to the Masloboyevs. She had their address at hand too and managed to find them, though not without difficulty. Masloboyev was at home. Alexandra Semyonovna simply gasped when she heard Nelly begging to be allowed to stay with them. When questioned as to why she wanted to and whether she was finding it difficult at my place or something – Nelly did not respond but slumped, sobbing, into a chair. “She sobbed, she sobbed so much,” Alexandra Semyonovna recounted, “that I thought she’d die of it.” Nelly was prepared to be a chambermaid, a cook if need be; she said she’d sweep floors and would learn to launder. (Laundering was something Nelly laid a great deal of store by and for some reason considered it to be her greatest asset in her efforts to find work.) Alexandra Semyonovna was of the opinion that they should let her stay with them till the matter was clarified, and I should be informed. But Filip Filipych turned this down flat and ordered the fugitive to be returned to me forthwith. On the way Alexandra Semyonovna had hugged and kissed her, only causing Nelly to cry even more. Looking at her, Alexandra Semyonovna too had begun to cry. Thus the two of them had cried all the way.
“Why, why on earth, Nelly, don’t you want to live with him?” Alexandra Semyonovna asked, tears streaming down her face. “Has he been unkind to you, or what?”
“No, he hasn’t.”
“Well, why then?”
“I just don’t want to live with him… I can’t… “ she said, crying hysterically. “I’m so mean to him… and he’s so nice… but with you I shan’t be mean, I’ll work.”
“Why are you so mean to him then, Nelly?…”
“I just am…”
“And this ‘I just am’ is all I managed to get out of her,” Alexandra Semyonovna concluded, wiping her tears. “Why is she so wretched? Is it her illness, or what? What do you think, Ivan Petrovich?”
We went back to Nelly; she was lying with her face buried in the pillows and crying. I knelt down in front of her, took her hands and started kissing them. She tore her hands free and cried all the more. I simply did not know what to say. Just then Ikhmenev entered.
“I’m here to see you on business, Ivan, hello!” he said, looking at everybody and surprised to see me on my knees. Ikhmenev had been ill all the time lately. He was pale and emaciated but appeared to be putting a brave face on it, made light of his illness, refused to listen to Anna Andreyevna’s admonitions, and would not take to his bed but continued to go about his business as usual.
“Goodbye for now,” Alexandra Semyonovna said with a sidelong glance at Ikhmenev. “Filip Filipych ordered me to return as soon as possible. We’ve some business to attend to. To be sure, I’ll look in again in the evening for an hour or two.”
“Who was that?” Ikhmenev whispered to me, his mind clearly on something else. I explained.
“Hm. And I’m here on business, you see, Ivan…”
I knew what his business was, and had been expecting him. He had come to talk to me and Nelly in order to take her with him. Anna Andreyevna had finally agreed to take the orphan into their home. It all happened during one of our secret talks; I reasoned with Anna Andreyevna and managed to persuade her that the sight of the orphan whose mother had also been cast off by her father might possibly turn the old man’s mind to other thoughts. I explained my plan to her so vividly that she herself started to urge her husband to take the orphan. The old man embraced the idea readily. First, he wanted to oblige Anna Andreyevna, and secondly he had his own special reasons… But I shall explain all this in greater detail later…
I mentioned already that Nelly took a dislike to Ikhmenev from his very first visit. I later noticed that her face even betrayed a kind of hatred every time his name cropped up in her hearing. He broached the subject straight away without further ado. He went directly up to Nelly, who was still lying there, her face hidden in the cushions and, taking her by her hand, asked if she’d like to come to live with him in place of his daughter.
“I had a daughter, I loved her more than anything in the world,” Ikhmenev concluded, “but now she’s no longer with me. She is dead. Would you like to take her place in my house and… in my heart?”
And his eyes, inflamed and dry after his illness, misted over with tears.
“No, I wouldn’t,” Nelly replied without lifting her head.
“Why ever not, my child? You’re all alone. Ivan cannot keep you with him for ever, whereas you would be perfectly at home in my house.”
“I don’t want to because you’re nasty. Yes, nasty, nasty,” she added, lifting her head and sitting up on the bed to face the old man. “I’m nasty myself, nastier than anyone, but you’re even nastier than me!…” saying this, Nelly turned pale, her eyes glinted; even her quivering lips grew pale and twisted under the onset of some strong emotion. Ikhmenev looked at her in consternation.
“Yes, nastier than me, because you don’t want to forgive your own daughter. You want to forget her altogether and replace her with another child, as if one could forget one’s own child? You’re not going to love me, are you? Because as soon as you look at me, you’ll remember at once that I’m a stranger and that you had a daughter of your own, whom you’ve forgotten, because you’re a cruel man. I don’t want to live with cruel people, I don’t, I don’t!…” Nelly ran out of breath and shot me a quick glance.
“The day after tomorrow it’ll be Easter, people will say, ‘Christ has risen,’ everyone will embrace and kiss one another, everyone will make peace and their wrongs will be forgiven… I know it… You’re the only one, you… ugh! You’re cruel! Go away!”
She was overwhelmed with tears. She had probably worked on this speech and rehearsed it a long time just in case the old man were to invite her again to live in his house. Ikhmenev was flabbergasted and grew pale. A pained expression appeared on his face.
“And why, why, why on earth should everyone be so worried about me? I don’t want it, I don’t!” Nelly suddenly exclaimed in some kind of paroxysm. “I’ll go and beg in the street!”
“Nelly, what’s the matter with you? Nelly, my dear child!” I cried out involuntarily, but my exclamation only served to add fuel to the fire.
“Yes, I’d rather go begging in the streets, but I’m not staying here,” she cried, sobbing. “My mother too asked for charity, and when she was dying, she told me herself – best stay poor and ask for charity, rather than… There’s nothing wrong in asking for charity. It’s not as though I was asking one person, I’m asking everybody, and everybody isn’t the same as one. To ask one person is shameful, to ask everybody is not. That’s what one beggar woman once told me. I’m small, I’ve no one to turn to. That’s why I ask everybody. But I don’t want to stay here, I don’t, I don’t, I don’t. I’m nasty. I’m nastier than anyone. That’s how nasty I am!”
And Nelly quite unexpectedly grabbed a cup from the table and smashed it on the floor.
“There, it’s broken now,” she said, looking at me in a kind of defiant triumph. “We only had two cups,” she added, “and I’ll break the other one too… How will you drink your tea then?”
She was in a foul mood and appeared to be delighting in her fury; as though conscious of it being both unbecoming and disgraceful, yet deliberately working herself up into further tantrums.
“You’ve a sick child on your hands, Vanya, that’s what,” Ikhmenev said, “or… I don’t understand the girl at all. Goodbye.”
He took his cap and shook my hand. He was totally mortified; Nelly had insulted him to the core; I was ready to explode.
“You had no pity on him, Nelly!” I exclaimed after we were left alone. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, and I’ll say that again! Yes, you’re not a good girl, you really are nasty!” And just as I was, without picking up my hat, I rushed out in pursuit of the old man. I wanted to see him as far as the house gate and, if nothing else, say a couple of words to comfort him. Rushing down the stairs I thought I could see Nelly’s face before me dreadfully pale after my reprimand.
I soon caught up with Ikhmenev.
“The poor girl has been wronged and has her own grief to contend with, believe me, Ivan, and there I was going on about my own,” he said, smiling ruefully. “I opened up an old wound. They say the sated and the hungry make bad bedfellows, but I’d add that the hungry and the hungry scarcely make any better. Well, goodbye!”
I was about to make some remark, but the old man brushed it aside.
“No need to comfort me. Better see she doesn’t run off from you – you can see it in her eyes,” he added with some kind of malice and strode off quickly, swinging his stick about and tapping with it on the pavement.
Little did he know that his words would prove prophetic.
Imagine my horror when, on returning to my room, I found Nelly was yet again not there! I rushed into the passage, looked for her on the stairwell, called her name, even knocked on neighbours’ doors to ask for her; I could not and did not want to believe that she had run away again. Anyway, how could she have run away? There was only one gate to the building; she would have had to walk past us when I was talking to Ikhmenev. But soon to my consternation I realized that she could have hidden herself somewhere on the staircase and waited till I had walked past on my way back and then have slipped out, thereby eluding me. Be that as it may, she couldn’t have got very far.
Leaving the door to my lodgings unlocked just in case, I rushed out in utmost agitation to look for her again.
I first went to the Masloboyevs. They were both out. Having left a note in which I informed them of my new calamity and asked them to let me know immediately if Nelly turned up at their place, I went to the doctor’s; he wasn’t in either; his housekeeper informed me that Nelly had not been back since her previous visit. What was to be done? I set off for Bubnova’s and learnt from the coffin-maker’s wife, whom I knew, that her landlady had the previous day been taken for some reason into custody by the police, and Nelly hadn’t been seen there at all since that day. Tired and exhausted, I rushed back to the Masloboyevs. Still the same response – “No one’s been here, and the gentleman himself hasn’t been back yet either.” My note was still lying on the table. What was I to do?
Utterly broken, I started making my way home late that night. I ought to have been at Natasha’s that evening; she herself had asked me that very morning to call on her. But I hadn’t even eaten anything all day; the thought of Nelly preoccupied me completely. “What is all this?” I thought. “Could it be some weird consequence of her illness? Perhaps she is mentally sick after all, or becoming so? But, my God, where is she now, where will I find her?”
This had barely flashed through my mind when suddenly I caught sight of Nelly on the Voznesensky Bridge, not far away. She was standing under a lamp post and did not see me. I wanted to run to her, but stopped. “What is she doing here?” I thought, baffled, and confident that I wouldn’t lose her this time, decided to watch her. About ten minutes passed, she was still standing, glancing at the passers-by. At last an elderly well-dressed gentleman passed and Nelly approached him; without stopping, he took something out of his pocket and handed it to Nelly. She curtsied. I cannot describe what I experienced at that moment. I felt a sharp stab of pain in my heart, as though something precious, something I loved, treasured and cherished, was vilified and sullied before my very eyes at that moment, but at the same time tears rolled down my cheeks.
Yes, tears for my poor Nelly, even while at one and the same time I experienced an irreconcilable indignation – she was not begging out of need; she had not been abandoned, not cast out by anyone to fend for herself; she hadn’t run away from cruel taskmasters, but from her friends, who loved and cherished her. It was as though she were trying to shock or frighten someone by her exploits; as though she were trying to impress someone. But something mysterious was stirring in her heart… Yes, Ikhmenev was right; she had been wronged, her wound could not have healed, and it was as if she were deliberately trying to aggravate it by this air of mystery, this mistrust of us all; as if she were savouring her own pain and revelling in this selfish orgy of suffering, if I may put it that way. This rubbing of salt into the wound and taking pleasure in the act were familiar to me; it is the last refuge of the many who’ve been offended and humiliated, who’ve been oppressed by fate and are conscious of its unfairness. But what sort of unfairness from us could Nelly complain of? It was as if she wanted to surprise and shock us with her caprices and wild tantrums, as if she really wanted to posture in front of us… But no! She was on her own now, none of us would see her begging. Was she really deriving pleasure in this for its own sake? Why would she need charity? Why would she need the money?
Having received the money, she left the bridge and approached the brightly lit windows of a shop. Here she began to count her takings; I stood some ten paces from her. She had a reasonable sum of money in her hand; it would seem she’d been begging since the morning. Clutching it in her hand, she crossed the street and entered a shop selling various odds and ends. I immediately approached the shop door, which was wide open, to see what she’d do next.
I saw her putting the money on the counter and being handed a cup, a plain teacup, very much like the one she had smashed to show Ikhmenev and myself how nasty she was. This cup would have cost about fifteen kopecks, perhaps even less. The shopkeeper wrapped it in paper, tied it up and handed it to Nelly, who then looking well pleased hurriedly left the shop.
“Nelly!” I exclaimed, when she drew level with me. “Nelly!”
She gave a start, glanced at me, the cup slipped from her fingers, fell on the pavement and broke. Nelly was pale; but, having looked at me and realizing that I had seen and knew everything, she suddenly blushed; this blush conveyed unbearable, agonized embarrassment. I took her by the hand and led her home; we had not far to go. Not a word passed between us on the way. On arriving home, I sat down; Nelly was standing before me broody and embarrassed, pale and wan as before, her eyes cast to the ground. She could not bring herself to look at me.
“Nelly, you were begging?”
“Yes!” she whispered, and her head drooped even lower.
“You wanted to get enough money to buy a cup like the one you broke this morning?”
“Yes…”
“But did I hold it against you, did I tell you off for that cup? Don’t you really see, Nelly, how much wickedness, wilful wickedness there is in what you did? Is that good, I ask you? Aren’t you ashamed of yourself? Aren’t you?…”
“I am…” she whispered barely audibly, and a tear rolled down her cheek.
“You are, aren’t you?” I said. “Nelly, my darling, if I have offended you, forgive me and let’s be friends.”
She glanced at me, tears streamed from her eyes and she fell against my chest.
At this moment Alexandra Semyonovna rushed in.
“What! Is she home? Again? Oh Nelly, what’s happening to you? Well it’s good that at least you’re back… where did you find her, Ivan Petrovich?”
I winked at Alexandra Semyonovna not to ask questions, and she understood me. I gently said goodbye to Nelly, who was still crying bitterly and, having persuaded the kind Alexandra Semyonovna to stay with her till my return, ran off to Natasha’s. I was late and had to hurry.
That evening our fate was to be decided. Natasha and I had lots to talk about, but nevertheless I managed to tell her in great detail about everything that had happened to Nelly. My story fascinated Natasha and even astonished her.
“You know what, Vanya,” she said on reflection, “I think she is in love with you.”
“What… what did you say?” I asked in surprise.
“Yes, it’s the beginning of love, a woman’s love…”
“Come now, Natasha, really! She’s only a child!”
“Who’ll soon be fourteen. This hostility is all because you don’t understand her love which, come to think of it, she probably doesn’t understand herself either; there’s a great deal of childishness in her hostility, but it’s serious and distressing for all that. The main thing is she’s jealous of me. You love me so much that when you’re at home, your mind’s probably wholly on me alone and you think and talk of nothing else but me, and consequently you have little time for her. She has noticed it, and has been stung. Maybe she wants to talk to you, feels the need for drawing you into her confidence, doesn’t know how to, feels embarrassed, can’t control her emotions, can’t wait for an opportunity, whereas instead of making it easy for her, you’re distancing yourself from her, running away from her to see me, and even when she was ill you left her for days on end on her own to be with me. That’s the reason for her crying – she misses you, and what hurts her most of all is that you seem completely unaware of it. Even now, at a moment like this, you left her on her own to come to me. She’ll be ill tomorrow because of that. And how could you leave her? Go back to her quickly…”
“I wouldn’t have left her, but…”
“I know, I myself asked you to come. But you should go now…”
“I shall, only of course I don’t believe any of this.”
“Because it’s so out of the ordinary. Just think of her story, and after you’ve taken everything into account, you’ll believe it all right. She didn’t have the same upbringing as you or I did…”
It was already late when I returned. Alexandra Semyonovna told me that Nelly had cried a lot again like the other night and had cried herself to sleep as on the previous occasion. “But I’ll be going now, Ivan Petrovich – Filip Filipych’s orders, you know. He’ll be waiting for me, poor soul.”
I thanked her and sat down at the head of Nelly’s bed. I felt awful that I could have left her on her own at such a moment. I sat with her a long time, late into the night, lost in thought… These were indeed fateful times.
But I must recount what had been happening during these two weeks…