Part 22 (1/2)

'It is _you_ who are afraid, not I!' cried Rudin after Natalya.

She paid no attention to him, and hastened homewards across the fields.

She succeeded in getting back to her bedroom; but she had scarcely crossed the threshold when her strength failed her, and she fell senseless into Masha's arms.

But Rudin remained a long while still standing on the bank. At last he s.h.i.+vered, and with slow steps made his way to the little path and quietly walked along it. He was deeply ashamed... and wounded. 'What a girl!' he thought, 'at seventeen!... No, I did not know her!... She is a remarkable girl. What strength of will!... She is right; she deserves another love than what I felt for her. I felt for her?' he asked himself. 'Can it be I already feel no more love for her? So this is how it was all to end! What a pitiful wretch I was beside her!'

The slight rattle of a racing droshky made Rudin raise his head.

Lezhnyov was driving to meet him with his invariable trotting pony.

Rudin bowed to him without speaking, and as though struck with a sudden thought, turned out of the road and walked quickly in the direction of Darya Mihailovna's house.

Lezhnyov let him pa.s.s, looked after him, and after a moment's thought he too turned his horse's head round, and drove back to Volintsev's, where he had spent the night. He found him asleep, and giving orders he should not be waked, he sat down on the balcony to wait for some tea and smoked a pipe.

X

Volintsev got up at ten o'clock. When he heard that Lezhnyov was sitting in the balcony, he was much surprised, and sent to ask him to come to him.

'What has happened?' he asked him. 'I thought you meant to drive home?'

'Yes; I did mean to, but I met Rudin.... He was wandering about the country with such a distracted countenance. So I turned back at once.'

'You came back because you met Rudin?'

'That's to say,--to tell the truth, I don't know why I came back myself, I suppose because I was reminded of you; I wanted to be with you, and I have plenty of time before I need go home.'

Volintsev smiled bitterly.

'Yes; one cannot think of Rudin now without thinking of me.... Boy!' he cried harshly, 'bring us some tea.'

The friends began to drink tea. Lezhnyov talked of agricultural matters,--of a new method of roofing barns with paper....

Suddenly Volintsev leaped up from his chair and struck the table with such force that the cups and saucers rang.

'No!' he cried, 'I cannot bear this any longer! I will call out this witty fellow, and let him shoot me,--at least I will try to put a bullet through his learned brains!'

'What are you talking about? Upon my word!' grumbled Lezhnyov, 'how can you scream like that? I dropped my pipe.... What's the matter with you?'

'The matter is, that I can't hear his name and keep calm; it sets all my blood boiling!'

'Hush, my dear fellow, hus.h.!.+ aren't you ashamed?' rejoined Lezhnyov, picking up his pipe from the ground. 'Leave off! Let him alone!'

'He has insulted me,' pursued Volintsev, walking up and down the room.

'Yes! he has insulted me. You must admit that yourself. At first I was not sharp enough; he took me by surprise; and who could have expected this? But I will show him that he cannot make a fool of me. ... I will shoot him, the d.a.m.ned philosopher, like a partridge.'

'Much you will gain by that, indeed! I won't speak of your sister now.

I can see you're in a pa.s.sion... how could you think of your sister!

But in relation to another individual--what! do you imagine, when you've killed the philosopher, you can improve your own chances?'