Part 20 (1/2)

'Arkady will remain,' remarked Bazarov. Madame Odintsov shrugged her shoulders slightly. 'I shall be dull,' she repeated.

'Really? In any case you will not feel dull for long.'

'What makes you suppose that?'

'Because you told me yourself that you are only dull when your regular routine is broken in upon. You have ordered your existence with such unimpeachable regularity that there can be no place in it for dulness or sadness ... for any unpleasant emotions.'

'And do you consider I am so unimpeachable ... that's to say, that I have ordered my life with such regularity?'

'I should think so. Here's an example; in a few minutes it will strike ten, and I know beforehand that you will drive me away.'

'No; I'm not going to drive you away, Yevgeny Va.s.silyitch. You may stay. Open that window.... I feel half-stifled.'

Bazarov got up and gave a push to the window. It flew up with a loud crash.... He had not expected it to open so easily; besides, his hands were shaking. The soft, dark night looked in to the room with its almost black sky, its faintly rustling trees, and the fresh fragrance of the pure open air.

'Draw the blind and sit down,' said Madame Odintsov; 'I want to have a talk with you before you go away. Tell me something about yourself; you never talk about yourself.'

'I try to talk to you upon improving subjects, Anna Sergyevna.'

'You are very modest.... But I should like to know something about you, about your family, about your father, for whom you are forsaking us.'

'Why is she talking like that?' thought Bazarov.

'All that's not in the least interesting,' he uttered aloud, 'especially for you; we are obscure people....'

'And you regard me as an aristocrat?'

Bazarov lifted his eyes to Madame Odintsov.

'Yes,' he said, with exaggerated sharpness.

She smiled. 'I see you know me very little, though you do maintain that all people are alike, and it's not worth while to study them. I will tell you my life some time or other ... but first you tell me yours.'

'I know you very little,' repeated Bazarov. 'Perhaps you are right; perhaps, really, every one is a riddle. You, for instance; you avoid society, you are oppressed by it, and you have invited two students to stay with you. What makes you, with your intellect, with your beauty, live in the country?'

'What? What was it you said?' Madame Odintsov interposed eagerly. 'With my ... beauty?'

Bazarov scowled. 'Never mind that,' he muttered; 'I meant to say that I don't exactly understand why you have settled in the country?'

'You don't understand it.... But you explain it to yourself in some way?'

'Yes ... I a.s.sume that you remain continually in the same place because you indulge yourself, because you are very fond of comfort and ease, and very indifferent to everything else.'

Madame Odintsov smiled again. 'You would absolutely refuse to believe that I am capable of being carried away by anything?'

Bazarov glanced at her from under his brows.

'By curiosity, perhaps; but not otherwise.'

'Really? Well, now I understand why we are such friends; you are just like me, you see.'