The Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky: Novels, Short Stories and Autobiographical Writings. Федор Достоевский

      CHAPTER VIII

      A DECLARATION OF LOVE

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       I WANDERED about the garden for about a quarter of an hour, feeling irritated and extremely dissatisfied with myself, and deliberating what I should do now. The sun was setting. Suddenly at a turning into a dark avenue I met Nastenka face to face. She had tears in her eyes, in her hand a handkerchief with which she was wiping them.

      “I was looking for you,” she said.

      “And I for you,” I answered. “Tell me, am I in a madhouse?”

      “Certainly not in a madhouse,” she answered resentfully, with an intent glance at me.

      “Well, if that’s so, what’s the meaning of it all? For Christ’s sake give me some advice. Where has my uncle gone now? Can I go to him? I am very glad that I have met you; perhaps you will be able to suggest what I ought to do.”

      “No, better not go to him. I have just come away from them.”

      “Why, where are they?”

      “Who knows? Perhaps by now they have run into the kitchen garden again,” she said irritably.

      “Into the kitchen garden!”

      “Why, last week, Foma Fomitch began shouting that he wouldn’t stay in the house, and all at once he ran into tho kitchen garden, found a spade in the shed and began digging the beds. We were all amazed, and wondered whether he hadn’t gone out of his mind. That I may not be reproached for doing nothing for my keep,’ said he, ‘here I will dig and pay for the bread I have eaten, and then I will go away. That’s what you have driven me to.’ And then they all began crying and almost falling on their knees before him; they took the spade away from him; but he would go on digging; he dug up all the turnips, that was all he did. They humoured him once, he may do it again. That would be just like him.”

      “And you … you tell that with such coolness!” I cried out, with intense indignation.

      She looked at me with flashing eyes.

      “Forgive me, I really don’t know what I am saying! Listen! do you know what I’ve come here for?”

      “N-no,” she answered, flushing crimson, and some painful feeling was reflected in her charming face.

      “You must excuse me,” I went on. “I am upset, I feel that this is not how I ought to have begun speaking of this … especially with you… . But never mind! To my thinking, openness in such matters is best. I confess … that is, I meant to say … you know my uncle’s design? He has told me to ask for your hand. …”

      “Oh, what nonsense! don’t speak of it, please,” she said, hurriedly interrupting me and flushing crimson.

      I was disconcerted.

      “How nonsense? But he wrote to me, you see.”

      “So he wrote to you?” she asked eagerly. “Oh, what a man! How he promised that he would not write! What nonsense! Good heavens, what nonsense!”

      “Forgive me,” I muttered, not knowing what to say. “Perhaps I have acted incautiously, crudely … but, you see, it’s such a moment! Only think, goodness knows what’s going on around us… .”

      “Oh, for God’s sake don’t apologise! Believe me that it is painful for me to hear this apart from that, and yet, do you know, I wanted to speak to you myself, to find out something… . Oh, how vexatious! So he really wrote to you? That’s what I was most afraid of! My God, what a man he is! And you believed him and galloped here full speed? Well, that’s the last straw!”

      She did not conceal her annoyance. My position was not an attractive one.

      “I must confess I did not expect …” I blurted out in the utmost confusion, “such a turn … I expected, on the contrary …”

      “Ah, so that’s what you expected? ..,” she brought out with light irony, biting her lip. “And do you know, you must show me the letter he wrote.”

      “Very good.”

      “And please don’t be angry with me, don’t be offended; I have trouble enough without that!” she said in an imploring voice, though a mocking smile faintly gleamed on her pretty hps.

      “Oh, please don’t take me for a fool,” I cried hotly. “But perhaps you are prejudiced against me, perhaps someone has spoken against me? Perhaps you say this because I put my foot in it just now? But that is nothing, I assure you. I know what a fool I must look to you now. Don’t laugh at me, please! I don’t know what I am saying, and it is all because I am twenty-two, damn it.”

      “Oh, mercy on us, why?”

      “You ask why? Anyone who is twenty-two, you know, has it written in his face; as I had, for instance, when I bounced out just now in the middle of the room, or as when I stand before you now… . It’s a damnable age!”

      “Oh, no, no!” answered Nastenka, hardly able to restrain her laughter. “I am sure that you are kind and nice and clever, and I say that sincerely, I do really! But … you are only very vain. You may get over that in time.”

      “I fancy I am only as vain as I ought to be.”

      “Oh, no. Think how embarrassed you were just now, and what for? Because you stumbled as you came in! … What right had you to turn into ridicule your good generous uncle who has done you so much kindness? Why did you try to turn the laugh against him when you were laughable yourself? That was horrid, shameful I It does not do you credit, and I must own I disliked you very much at that minute, so there!”

      “That’s true! I was a blockhead! more than that — I did a mean thing! You noticed it, and that is my punishment. Abuse me, laugh at me, but listen; perhaps you will change your opinion of me in the end,” I added, carried away by a strange feeling. “You know so little of me as yet; afterwards when you know more of me, then … perhaps …”

      “For God’s sake let us stop this conversation!” cried Nastenka, with visible impatience.

      “Very well, very well, let us stop! But … where can I see you?”

      “Where can you see me?”

      “Why, you know, this cannot be the last word we have to say to each other, Nastasya Yevgrafovna! For God’s sake, let me meet you again to-day, for instance. But it’s already getting dark. So if it is anyhow possible let it be tomorrow early, I will ask to be called earlier on purpose. You know there’s an arbour over there by the pond. You see, I remember it, I know the way. I used to stay here when I was little.”

      “Meet you! What for? Why, we are talking now.”

      “But I know nothing yet, Nastasya Yevgrafovna, I will first find out everything from my uncle. Why, he is bound to tell me everything now. And then, perhaps, I shall have something very important to tell you. …”

      “No, no! You mustn’t, you mustn’t!” cried Nastenka. “Let us end it all at once now, so that we may never think of it again. And don’t go to that arbour for nothing; I assure you I shall not go. And please put all this nonsense out of your head — I beg you in earnest. …”

      “So then uncle has behaved like a madman to me!” I cried in an excess of insufferable vexation. “Why did he send for me? But listen, what is that noise?”

      We were close