Volume I Part 4 (1/2)
Then she went on to the servants' hall and ordered the samovar to be got ready, though it was not yet tea-time; she wanted to try her power over Foka, the old butler, the most morose and disobliging of all the servants. He could not believe his ears, and asked her if she really meant it. ”What next will our young lady want?” muttered Foka, affecting to be very cross.
No one gave so many orders as Natacha, no one sent them on so many errands at once. As soon as a servant came in sight she seemed to invent some want or message; she could not help it. It seemed as though she wanted to try her power over them; to see whether, some fine day, one or another would not rebel against her tyranny; but, on the contrary, they always flew to obey her more readily than any one else.
”And now what shall I do, where can I go?” thought she, as she slowly went along the corridor, where she presently met the buffoon.
”Nastacia Ivanovna,” said she, ”if I ever have children, what will they be?”
”You! Fleas and gra.s.shoppers, you may depend upon it!”
Natacha went on. ”Good G.o.d! have mercy, have mercy!” she said to herself. ”Wherever I go it is always, always the same. I am so weary; what shall I do?”
Skipping lightly from step to step, she went to the upper story and dropped in on the Ioghels. Two governesses were sitting chatting with M.
and Mme. Ioghel; dessert, consisting of dried fruit, was on the table, and they were eagerly discussing the cost of living at Moscow and Odessa. Natacha took a seat for a moment, listened with pensive attention, and then jumped up again. ”The island of Madagascar!” she murmured, ”Ma-da-gas-car!” and she separated the syllables. Then she left the room without answering Mme. Schoss, who was utterly mystified by her strange exclamation.
She next met Petia and a companion, both very full of some fireworks which were to be let off that evening. ”Petia!” she exclaimed, ”carry me down-stairs!” And she sprang upon his back, throwing her arms round his neck; and, laughing and galloping, they thus scrambled along to the head of the stairs.
”Thank you, that will do. Madagascar!” she repeated; and, jumping down, she ran down the flight.
After thus inspecting her dominions, testing her power, and convincing herself that her subjects were docile, and that there was no novelty to be got out of them, Natacha settled herself in the darkest corner of the music-room with her guitar, striking the ba.s.s strings, and trying to make an accompaniment to an air from an opera that she and Prince Andre had once heard together at St. Petersburg. The uncertain chords which her unpractised fingers sketched out would have struck the least experienced ear as wanting in harmony and musical accuracy, while to her excited imagination they brought a whole train of memories. Leaning against the wall and half hidden by a cabinet, with her eyes fixed on a thread of light that came under the door from the rooms beyond, she listened in ecstasy and dreamed of the past.
Sonia crossed the room with a gla.s.s in her hand. Natacha glanced round at her and again fixed her eyes on the streak of light. She had the strange feeling of having once before gone through the same experience--sat in the same place, surrounded by the same details, and watching Sonia pa.s.s carrying a tumbler. ”Yes, it was exactly the same,”
she thought.
”Sonia, what is this tune?” she said, playing a few notes.
”What, are you there?” said Sonia, startled. ”I do not know,” she said, coming closer to listen, ”unless it is from 'La Tempete';” but she spoke doubtfully.
”It was exactly so,” thought Natacha. ”She started as she came forward, smiling so gently; and I thought then, as I think now, that there is something in her which is quite lacking in me. No,” she said aloud, ”you are quite out; it is the chorus from the 'Porteur d'Eau'--listen,” and she hummed the air. ”Where are you going?”
”For some fresh water to finish my drawing.”
”You are always busy and I never. Where is Nicolas?”
”Asleep, I think.”
”Go and wake him, Sonia. Tell him to come and sing.”
Sonia went, and Natacha relapsed into dreaming and wondering how it had all happened. Not being able to solve the puzzle, she drifted into reminiscence once more. She could see him--_him_--and feel his impa.s.sioned eyes fixed on her face. ”Oh, make haste back! I am so afraid he will not come yet! Besides, it is all very well, but I am growing old; I shall be quite different from what I am now! Who knows? Perhaps he will come to-day! Perhaps he is here already! Here in the drawing-room. Perhaps he came yesterday and I have forgotten.”
She rose, laid down the guitar, and went into the next room. All the household party were seated round the tea-table,--the professors, the governesses, the guests; the servants were waiting on one and another--but there was no Prince Andre.
”Ah, here she is,” said her father. ”Come and sit down here.” But Natacha stopped by her mother without heeding his bidding.
”Oh, mamma, bring him to me, give him to me soon, very soon,” she murmured, swallowing down a sob. Then she sat down and listened to the others. ”Good G.o.d! always the same people! always the same thing! Papa holds his cup as he always does, and blows his tea to cool it as he did yesterday, and as he will to-morrow.”
She felt a sort of dull rebellion against them all; she hated them for always being the same.
After tea Sonia, Natacha, and Nicolas huddled together in their favorite, snug corner of the drawing-room; that was where they talked freely to each other.
”Do you ever feel,” Natacha asked her brother, ”as if there was nothing left to look forward to; as if you had had all your share of happiness, and were not so much weary as utterly dull?”