Resurrection
When he returned from church Nekhludoff broke the fast with his aunts
and took a glass of spirits and some wine, having got into that habit
while with his regiment, and when he reached his room fell asleep at
once, dressed as he was. He was awakened by a knock at the door. He knew
it was her knock, and got up, rubbing his eyes and stretching himself.
“Katusha, is it you? Come in,” said he.
She opened the door.
“Dinner is ready,” she said. She still had on the same white dress, but
not the bow in her hair. She looked at him with a smile, as if she had
communicated some very good news to him.
“I am coming,” he answered, as he rose, taking his comb to arrange his
hair.
She stood still for a minute, and he, noticing it, threw down his comb
and made a step towards her, but at that very moment she turned suddenly
and went with quick light steps along the strip of carpet in the middle
of the passage.
“Dear me, what a fool I am,” thought Nekhludoff. “Why did I not stop
her?” What he wanted her for he did not know himself, but he felt that
when she came into his room something should have been done, something
that is generally done on such occasions, and that he had left it
undone.
“Katusha, wait,” he said.
“What do you want?” she said, stopping.
“Nothing, only--” and, with an effort, remembering how men in his
position generally behave, he put his arm round her waist.
She stood still and looked into his eyes.
“Don’t, Dmitri Ivanovitch, you must not,” she said, blushing to tears
and pushing away his arm with her strong hard hand. Nekhludoff let her
go, and for a moment he felt not only confused and ashamed but disgusted
with himself. He should now have believed himself, and then he would
have known that this confusion and shame were caused by the best
feelings of his soul demanding to be set free; but he thought it was
only his stupidity and that he ought to behave as every one else did. He
caught her up and kissed her on the neck.
This kiss was very different from that first thoughtless kiss behind
the lilac bush, and very different to the kiss this morning in the
churchyard. This was a dreadful kiss, and she felt it.
“Oh, what are you doing?” she cried, in a tone as if he had irreparably
broken something of priceless value, and ran quickly away.
He came into the dining-room. His aunts, elegantly dressed, their family
doctor, and a neighbour were already there. Everything seemed so very
ordinary, but in Nekhludoff a storm was raging. He understood nothing
of what was being said and gave wrong answers, thinking only of Katusha.
The sound of her steps in the passage brought back the thrill of that
last kiss and he could think of nothing else. When she came into the
room he, without looking round, felt her presence with his whole being
and had to force himself not to look at her.
After dinner he at once went into his bedroom and for a long time walked
up and down in great excitement, listening to every sound in the house
and expecting to hear her steps. The animal man inside him had now not
only lifted its head, but had succeeded in trampling under foot the
spiritual man of the days of his first visit, and even of that every
morning. That dreadful animal man alone now ruled over him.
Though he was watching for her all day he could not manage to meet her
alone. She was probably trying to evade him. In the evening, however,
she was obliged to go into the room next to his. The doctor had been
asked to stay the night, and she had to make his bed. When he heard her
go in Nekhludoff followed her, treading softly and holding his breath as
if he were going to commit a crime.
She was putting a clean pillow-case on the pillow, holding it by two of
its corners with her arms inside the pillow-case. She turned round
and smiled, not a happy, joyful smile as before, but in a frightened,
piteous way. The smile seemed to tell him that what he was doing was
wrong. He stopped for a moment. There was still the possibility of a
struggle. The voice of his real love for her, though feebly, was still
speaking of her, her feelings, her life. Another voice was saying,
“Take care I don’t let the opportunity for your own happiness, your own
enjoyment, slip by!” And this second voice completely stifled the first.
He went up to her with determination and a terrible, ungovernable animal
passion took possession of him.
With his arm round he made her sit down on the bed; and feeling that
there was something more to be done he sat down beside her.
“Dmitri Ivanovitch, dear! please let me go,” she said, with a piteous
voice. “Matrona Pavlovna is coming,” she cried, tearing herself away.
Some one was really coming to the door.
“Well, then, I’ll come to you in the night,” he whispered. “You’ll be
alone?”
“What are you thinking of? On no account. No, no!” she said, but only
with her lips; the tremulous confusion of her whole being said something
very different.
It was Matrona Pavlovna who had come to the door. She came in with a
blanket over her arm, looked reproachfully at Nekhludoff, and began
scolding Katusha for having taken the wrong blanket.
Nekhludoff went out in silence, but he did not even feel ashamed. He
could see by Matrona Pavlovna’s face that she was blaming him, he knew
that she was blaming him with reason and felt that he was doing wrong,
but this novel, low animal excitement, having freed itself of all the
old feelings of real love for Katusha, ruled supreme, leaving room for
nothing else. He went about as if demented all the evening, now into his
aunts’, then back into his own room, then out into the porch, thinking
all the time how he could meet her alone; but she avoided him, and
Matrona Pavlovna watched her closely.
CHAPTER XVII.
NEKHLUDOFF AND KATUSHA.
And so the evening passed and night came. The doctor went to bed.
Nekhludoff’s aunts had also retired, and he knew that Matrona Pavlovna
was now with them in their bedroom so that Katusha was sure to be alone
in the maids’ sitting-room. He again went out into the porch. It was
dark, damp and warm out of doors, and that white spring mist which
drives away the last snow, or is diffused by the thawing of the last
snow, filled the air. From the river under the hill, about a hundred
steps from the front door, came a strange sound. It was the ice
breaking. Nekhludoff came down the steps and went up to the window of
the maids’ room, stepping over the puddles on the bits of glazed snow.
His heart was beating so fiercely in his breast that he seemed to hear
it, his laboured breath came and went in a burst of long-drawn sighs. In
the maids’ room a small lamp was burning, and Katusha sat alone by the
table, looking thoughtfully in front of her. Nekhludoff stood a long
time without moving and waited to see what she, not knowing that she
was observed, would do. For a minute or two she did not move; then she
lifted her eyes, smiled and shook her head as if chiding herself, then
changed her pose and dropped both her arms on the table and again began
gazing down in front of her. He stood and looked at her, involuntarily
listening to the beating of his own heart and the strange sounds from
the river. There on the river, beneath the white mist, the unceasing
labour went on, and sounds as of something sobbing, cracking, dropping,
being shattered to pieces mixed with the tinkling of the thin bits of
ice as they broke against each other like glass.
There he stood, looking at Katusha’s serious, suffering face, which
betrayed the inner struggle of her soul, and he felt pity for her; but,
strange though it may seem, this pity only confirmed him in his evil
intention.
He knocked at the window. She started as if she had received an electric
shock, her whole body trembled, and a look of horror came into her face.
Then she jumped up, approached the window and brought her face up to the
pane. The look of terror did not leave her face even when, holding her
hands up to her eyes like blinkers and peering through the glass, she
recognised him. Her face was unusually grave; he had never seen it so
before. She returned his smile, but only in submission to him; there was
no smile in her soul, only fear. He beckoned her with his hand to come
out into the yard to him. But she shook her head and remained by the
window. He brought his face close to the pane and was going to call out
to her, but at that moment she turned to the door; evidently some one
inside had called her. Nekhludoff moved away from the window. The fog
was so dense that five steps from the house the windows could not be
seen, but the light from the lamp shone red and huge out of a shapeless
black mass. And on the river the same strange sounds went on, sobbing
and rustling and cracking and tinkling. Somewhere in the fog, not
far off, a cock crowed; another answered, and then others, far in the
village took up the cry till the sound of the crowing blended into one,
while all around was silent excepting the river. It was the second time
the cocks crowed that night.
Nekhludoff walked up and down behind the corner of the house, and once
or twice got into a puddle. Then again came up to the window. The lamp
was still burning, and she was again sitting alone by the table as
if uncertain what to do. He had hardly approached the window when she
looked up. He knocked. Without looking who it was she at once ran out of
the room, and he heard the outside door open with a snap. He waited
for her near the side porch and put his arms round her without saying a
word. She clung to him, put up her face, and met his kiss with her lips.
Then the door again gave the same sort of snap and opened, and the voice
of Matrona Pavlovna called out angrily, “Katusha!”
She tore herself away from him and returned into the maids’ room. He
heard the latch click, and then all was quiet. The red light disappeared
and only the mist remained, and the bustle on the river went on.
Nekhludoff went up to the window, nobody was to be seen; he knocked, but
got no answer. He went back into the house by the front door, but could
not sleep. He got up and went with bare feet along the passage to her
door, next to Matrona Pavlovna’s room. He heard Matrona Pavlovna snoring
quietly, and was about to go on when she coughed and turned on her
creaking bed, and his heart fell, and he stood immovable for about five
minutes. When all was quiet and she began to snore peacefully again, he
went on, trying to step on the boards that did not creak, and came to
Katusha’s door. There was no sound to be heard. She was probably
awake, or else he would have heard her breathing. But as soon as he
had whispered “Katusha” she jumped up and began to persuade him, as if
angrily, to go away.
“Open! Let me in just for a moment! I implore you!” He hardly knew what
he was saying.
* * * * * * *
When she left him, trembling and silent, giving no answer to his words,
he again went out into the porch and stood trying to understand the
meaning of what had happened.
It was getting lighter. From the river below the creaking and tinkling
and sobbing of the breaking ice came still louder and a gurgling sound
could now also be heard. The mist had begun to sink, and from above it
the waning moon dimly lighted up something black and weird.
“What was the meaning of it all? Was it a great joy or a great
misfortune that had befallen him?” he asked himself.
CHAPTER XVIII.
AFTERWARDS.
The next day the gay, handsome, and brilliant Schonbock joined
Nekhludoff at his aunts’ house, and quite won their hearts by his
refined and amiable manner, his high spirits, his generosity, and his
affection for Dmitri.
But though the old ladies admired his generosity it rather perplexed