First love, and other stories. Иван Тургенев
I found myself in a tiny and not altogether clean room, with shabby furniture which seemed to have been hastily set in place. At the window, in an easy-chair with a broken arm, sat a woman of fifty, with uncovered hair[4] and plain-featured, clad in an old green gown, and with a variegated worsted kerchief round her neck. Her small black eyes fairly bored into me.
I went up to her and made my bow.
“I have the honour of speaking to Princess Zasyékin?”
“I am Princess Zasyékin: and you are the son of Mr. B—?”
“Yes, madam. I have come to you with a message from my mother.”
“Pray be seated. Vonifáty! where are my keys? Hast thou seen them?”
I communicated to Madame Zasyékin my mother’s answer to her note. She listened to me, tapping the window-pane with her thick, red fingers, and when I had finished she riveted her eyes on me once more.
“Very good; I shall certainly go,”—said she at last.—“But how young you are still! How old are you, allow me to ask?”
“Sixteen,”—I replied with involuntary hesitation.
The Princess pulled out of her pocket some dirty, written documents, raised them up to her very nose and began to sort them over.
“ ’Tis a good age,”—she suddenly articulated, turning and fidgeting in her chair.—“And please do not stand on ceremony. We are plain folks.”
“Too plain,”—I thought, with involuntary disgust taking in with a glance the whole of her homely figure.
At that moment, the other door of the drawing-room was swiftly thrown wide open, and on the threshold appeared the young girl whom I had seen in the garden the evening before. She raised her hand and a smile flitted across her face.
“And here is my daughter,”—said the Princess, pointing at her with her elbow.—“Zínotchka, the son of our neighbour, Mr. B—. What is your name, permit me to inquire?”
“Vladímir,”—I replied, rising and lisping with agitation.
“And your patronymic?”
“Petróvitch.”
“Yes! I once had an acquaintance, a chief of police, whose name was Vladímir Petróvitch also. Vonifáty! don’t hunt for the keys; the keys are in my pocket.”
The young girl continued to gaze at me with the same smile as before, slightly puckering up her eyes and bending her head a little on one side.
“I have already seen M’sieu Voldemar,”—she began. (The silvery tone of her voice coursed through me like a sweet chill.)—“Will you permit me to call you so?”
“Pray do, madam,”—I lisped.
“Where was that?”—asked the Princess.
The young Princess did not answer her mother.
“Are you busy now?”—she said, without taking her eyes off me.
“Not in the least, madam.”
“Then will you help me to wind some wool? Come hither, to me.”
She nodded her head at me and left the drawing-room. I followed her.
In the room which we entered the furniture was a little better and was arranged with great taste.—But at that moment I was almost unable to notice anything; I moved as though in a dream and felt a sort of intense sensation of well-being verging on stupidity throughout my frame.
The young Princess sat down, produced a knot of red wool, and pointing me to a chair opposite her, she carefully unbound the skein and placed it on my hands. She did all this in silence, with a sort of diverting deliberation, and with the same brilliant and crafty smile on her slightly parted lips. She began to wind the wool upon a card doubled together, and suddenly illumined me with such a clear, swift glance, that I involuntarily dropped my eyes. When her eyes, which were generally half closed, opened to their full extent her face underwent a complete change; it was as though light had inundated it.
“What did you think of me yesterday, M’sieu Voldemar?”—she asked, after a brief pause.—“You certainly must have condemned me?”
“I … Princess … I thought nothing … how can I. …” I replied, in confusion.
“Listen,”—she returned.—“You do not know me yet; I want people always to speak the truth to me. You are sixteen, I heard, and I am twenty-one; you see that I am a great deal older than you, and therefore you must always speak the truth to me … and obey me,”—she added.—“Look at me; why don’t you look at me?”
I became still more confused; but I raised my eyes to hers, nevertheless. She smiled, only not in her former manner, but with a different, an approving smile.—“Look at me,”—she said, caressingly lowering her voice:—“I don’t like that. … Your face pleases me; I foresee that we shall be friends. And do you like me?”—she added slyly.
“Princess. …” I was beginning. …
“In the first place, call me Zinaída Alexándrovna; and in the second place—what sort of a habit is it for children”—(she corrected herself)—“for young men—not to say straight out what they feel? You do like me, don’t you?”
Although it was very pleasant to me to have her talk so frankly to me, still I was somewhat nettled. I wanted to show her that she was not dealing with a small boy, and, assuming as easy and serious a mien as I could, I said:—“Of course I like you very much, Zinaída Alexándrovna; I have no desire to conceal the fact.”
She shook her head, pausing at intervals.—“Have you a governor?”—she suddenly inquired.
“No, I have not had a governor this long time past.”
I lied: a month had not yet elapsed since I had parted with my Frenchman.
“Oh, yes, I see: you are quite grown up.”
She slapped me lightly on the fingers.—“Hold your hands straight!”—And she busied herself diligently with winding her ball.
I took advantage of the fact that she did not raise her eyes, and set to scrutinising her, first by stealth, then more and more boldly. Her face seemed to me even more charming than on the day before: everything about it was so delicate, intelligent and lovely. She was sitting with her back to the window, which was hung with a white shade; a ray of sunlight making its way through that shade inundated with a flood of light her fluffy golden hair, her innocent neck, sloping shoulders, and calm, tender bosom.—I gazed at her—and how near and dear she became to me! It seemed to me both that I had known her for a long time and that I had known nothing and had not lived before she came. … She wore a rather dark, already shabby gown, with an apron; I believe I would willingly have caressed every fold of that gown and of that apron. The tips of her shoes peeped out from under her gown; I would have bowed down to those little boots. … “And here I sit, in front of her,”—I thought.—“I have become acquainted with her … what happiness, my God!” I came near bouncing out of my chair with rapture, but I merely dangled my feet to and fro a little, like a child who is enjoying dainties.
I felt as much at my ease as a fish does in water, and I would have liked never to leave that room again as long as I lived.
Her eyelids slowly rose, and again her brilliant eyes beamed caressingly before me, and again she laughed.
“How you stare at me!”—she said slowly, shaking her finger at me.
I flushed scarlet. … “She understands all, she sees all,”—flashed through my head. “And how could she fail to see and understand all?”
Suddenly there was a clattering in the next room, and a sword clanked.