I believe I have already mentioned that, for this second daughter of Harlov’s too, my mother had already prepared a match. This was one of the poorest of our neighbours, a retired army major, Gavrila Fedulitch Zhitkov, a man no longer young, and, as he himself expressed it, not without a certain complacency, however, as though recommending himself, ‘battered and broken down.’ He could barely read and write, and was exceedingly stupid but secretly aspired to become my mother’s steward, as he felt himself to be a ‘man of action.’ ‘I can warm the peasant’s hides for them, if I can do anything,’ he used to say, almost gnashing his own teeth, ‘because I was used to it,’ he used to explain, ‘in my former duties, I mean.’ Had Zhitkov been less of a fool, he would have realised that he had not the slightest chance of being steward to my mother, seeing that, for that, it would have been necessary to get rid of the present steward, one Kvitsinsky, a very capable Pole of great character, in whom my mother had the fullest confidence. Zhitkov had a long face, like a horse’s; it was all overgrown with hair of a dusty whitish colour; his cheeks were covered with it right up to the eyes; and even in the severest frosts, it was sprinkled with an abundant sweat, like drops of dew. At the sight of my mother, he drew himself upright as a post, his head positively quivered with zeal, his huge hands slapped a little against his thighs, and his whole person seemed to express: ‘Command!.. and I will strive my utmost!’ My mother was under no illusion on the score of his abilities, which did not, however, hinder her from taking steps to marry him to Evlampia.

‘Only, will you be able to manage her, my good sir?’ she asked him one day.

Zhitkov smiled complacently.

‘Upon my word, Natalia Nikolaevna! I used to keep a whole regiment in order; they were tame enough in my hands; and what’s this? A trumpery business!’

‘A regiment’s one thing, sir, but a well-bred girl, a wife, is a very different matter,’ my mother observed with displeasure.

‘Upon my word, ma’am! Natalia Nikolaevna!’ Zhitkov cried again, ‘that we’re quite able to understand. In one word: a young lady, a delicate person!’

‘Well!’ my mother decided at length, ‘Evlampia won’t let herself be trampled upon.’

X

One day – it was the month of June, and evening was coming on – a servant announced the arrival of Martin Petrovitch. My mother was surprised: we had not seen him for over a week, but he had never visited us so late before. ‘Something has happened!’ she exclaimed in an undertone. The face of Martin Petrovitch, when he rolled into the room and at once sank into a chair near the door, wore such an unusual expression, it was so preoccupied and positively pale, that my mother involuntarily repeated her exclamation aloud. Martin Petrovitch fixed his little eyes upon her, was silent for a space, sighed heavily, was silent again, and articulated at last that he had come about something … which … was of a kind, that on account of…

Muttering these disconnected words, he suddenly got up and went out.

My mother rang, ordered the footman, who appeared, to overtake Martin Petrovitch at once and bring him back without fail, but the latter had already had time to get into his droshky and drive away.

Next morning my mother, who was astonished and even alarmed, as much by Martin Petrovitch’s strange behaviour as by the extraordinary expression of his face, was on the point of sending a special messenger to him, when he made his appearance. This time he seemed more composed.

‘Tell me, my good friend, tell me,’ cried my mother, directly she saw him, ‘what ever has happened to you? I thought yesterday, upon my word I did… “Mercy on us!” I thought, “Hasn’t our old friend gone right off his head?”’

‘I’ve not gone off my head, madam,’ answered Martin Petrovitch; ‘I’m not that sort of man. But I want to consult with you.’

‘What about?’

‘I’m only in doubt, whether it will be agreeable to you in this same contingency – ’

‘Speak away, speak away, my good sir, but more simply. Don’t alarm me! What’s this same contingency? Speak more plainly. Or is it your melancholy come upon you again?’

Harlov scowled. ‘No, it’s not melancholy – that comes upon me in the new moon; but allow me to ask you, madam, what do you think about death?’

My mother was taken aback. ‘About what?’

‘About death. Can death spare any one whatever in this world?’

‘What have you got in your head, my good friend? Who of us is immortal? For all you’re born a giant, even to you there’ll be an end in time.’

‘There will! oh, there will!’ Harlov assented and he looked downcast. ‘I’ve had a vision come to me in my dreams,’ he brought out at last.

‘What are you saying?’ my mother interrupted him.

‘A vision in my dreams,’ he repeated – ‘I’m a seer of visions, you know!’

‘You!’

‘I. Didn’t you know it?’ Harlov sighed. ‘Well, so… Over a week ago, madam, I lay down, on the very last day of eating meat before St. Peter’s fast-day; I lay down after dinner to rest a bit, well, and so I fell asleep, and dreamed a raven colt ran into the room to me. And this colt began sporting about and grinning. Black as a beetle was the raven colt.’ Harlov ceased.

‘Well?’ said my mother.

‘And all of a sudden this same colt turns round, and gives me a kick in the left elbow, right in the funny bone… I waked up; my arm would not move nor my leg either. Well, thinks I, it’s paralysis; however, I worked them up and down, and got them to move again; only there were shooting pains in the joints a long time, and there are still. When I open my hand, the pains shoot through the joints.’

‘Why, Martin Petrovitch, you must have lain upon your arm somehow and crushed it.’

‘No, madam; pray, don’t talk like that! It was an intimation … referring to my death, I mean.’

‘Well, upon my word,’ my mother was beginning.

‘An intimation. Prepare thyself, man, as ’twere to say. And therefore, madam, here is what I have to announce to you, without a moment’s delay. Not wishing,’ Harlov suddenly began shouting, ‘that the same death should come upon me, the servant of God, unawares, I have planned in my own mind this: to divide – now during my lifetime – my estate between my two daughters, Anna and Evlampia, according as God Almighty directs me – ’ Martin Petrovitch stopped, groaned, and added, ‘without a moment’s delay.’

‘Well, that would be a good idea,’ observed my mother; ‘though I think you have no need to be in a hurry.’

‘And seeing that herein I desire,’ Harlov continued, raising his voice still higher, ‘to be observant of all due order and legality, so I humbly beg your young son, Dmitri Semyonovitch – I would not venture, madam, to trouble you – I beg the said Dmitri Semyonovitch, your son, and I claim of my kinsman, Bitchkov, as a plain duty, to assist at the ratification of the formal act and transference of possession to my two daughters – Anna, married, and Evlampia, spinster. Which act will be drawn up in readiness the day after to-morrow at twelve o’clock, at my own place, Eskovo, also called Kozulkino, in the presence of the ruling authorities and functionaries, who are thereto invited.’

Martin Petrovitch with difficulty reached the end of this speech, which he had obviously learnt by heart, and which was interspersed with frequent sighs… He seemed to have no breath left in his chest; his pale face was crimson again, and he several times wiped the sweat off it.

‘So you’ve already composed the deed dividing your property?’ my mother queried. ‘When did you manage that?’

‘I managed it … oh! Neither eating, nor drinking – ’

‘Did you write it yourself?’

‘Volodka … oh! helped.’

‘And have you forwarded a petition?’

‘I have, and the chamber has sanctioned it, and notice has been given to the district court, and the temporary division of the local court has … oh!.. been notified to be present.’

My mother laughed. ‘I see, Martin Petrovitch, you’ve made every arrangement already – and how quickly. You’ve not spared money, I should say?’

‘No, indeed, madam.’

‘Well, well. And you say you want to consult with me. Well, my little Dmitri can go; and I’ll send Souvenir with him, and speak to Kvitsinsky… But you haven’t invited Gavrila Fedulitch?’

‘Gavrila Fedulitch – Mr. Zhitkov – has had notice … from me also. As a betrothed, it was only fitting.’

Martin Petrovitch had obviously exhausted all the resources of his eloquence. Besides, it always seemed to me that he did not look altogether favourably on the match my mother had made for his daughter; possibly, he had expected a more advantageous marriage for his darling Evlampia.

He got up from his chair, and made a scrape with his foot. ‘Thank you for your consent.’

‘Where are you off to?’ asked my mother. ‘Stay a bit; I’ll order some lunch to be served you.’

‘Much obliged,’ responded Harlov. ‘But I cannot… Oh! I must get home.’

He backed and was about to move sideways, as his habit was, through the door.

‘Stop, stop a minute,’ my mother went on, ‘can you possibly mean to make over the whole of your property without reserve to your daughters?’

‘Certainly, without reserve.’

‘Well, but how about yourself – where are you going to live?’

Harlov positively flung up his hands in amazement. ‘You ask where? In my house, at home, as I’ve lived hitherto … so henceforward. Whatever difference could there be?’

‘You have such confidence in your daughters and your son-in-law, then?’

‘Were you pleased to speak of Volodka? A poor stick like him? Why, I can do as I like with him, whatever it is … what authority has he? As for them, my daughters, that is, to care for me till I’m in the grave, to give me meat and drink, and clothe me… Merciful heavens! it’s their first duty. I shall not long be an eyesore to them. Death’s not over the hills – it’s upon my shoulders.’

‘Death is in God’s hands,’ observed my mother; ‘though that is their duty, to be sure. Only pardon me, Martin Petrovitch; your elder girl, Anna, is well known to be proud and imperious, and – well – the second has a fierce look…’

‘Natalia Nikolaevna!’ Harlov broke in, ‘why do you say that?.. Why, as though they … My daughters … Why, as though I … Forget their duty? Never in their wildest dreams… Offer opposition? To whom? Their parent … Dare to do such a thing? Have they not my curse to fear? They’ve passed their life long in fear and in submission – and all of a sudden … Good Lord!’

Harlov choked, there was a rattle in his throat.

‘Very well, very well,’ my mother made haste to soothe him; ‘only I don’t understand all the same what has put it into your head to divide the property up now. It would have come to them afterwards, in any case. I imagine it’s your melancholy that’s at the bottom of it all.’

‘Eh, ma’am,’ Harlov rejoined, not without vexation, ‘you will keep coming back to that. There is, maybe, a higher power at work in this, and you talk of melancholy. I thought to do this, madam, because in my own person, while still in life, I wish to decide in my presence, who is to possess what, and with what I will reward each, so that they may possess, and feel thankfulness, and carry out my wishes, and what their father and benefactor has resolved upon, they may accept as a bountiful gift.’

Harlov’s voice broke again.

‘Come, that’s enough, that’s enough, my good friend,’ my mother cut him short; ‘or your raven colt will be putting in an appearance in earnest.’

‘O Natalia Nikolaevna, don’t talk to me of it,’ groaned Harlov. ‘That’s my death come after me. Forgive my intrusion. And you, my little sir, I shall have the honour of expecting you the day after to-morrow.’

Martin Petrovitch went out; my mother looked after him, and shook her head significantly. ‘This is a bad business,’ she murmured, ‘a bad business. You noticed’ – she addressed herself to me – ‘he talked, and all the while seemed blinking, as though the sun were in his eyes; that’s a bad sign. When a man’s like that, his heart’s sure to be heavy, and misfortune threatens him. You must go over the day after to-morrow with Vikenty Osipovitch and Souvenir.’

XI

On the day appointed, our big family coach, with seats for four, harnessed with six bay horses, and with the head coachman, the grey-bearded and portly Alexeitch, on the box, rolled smoothly up to the steps of our house. The importance of the act upon which Harlov was about to enter, and the solemnity with which he had invited us, had had their effect on my mother. She had herself given orders for this extraordinary state equipage to be brought out, and had directed Souvenir and me to put on our best clothes. She obviously wished to show respect to her protégé. As for Kvitsinsky, he always wore a frock-coat and white tie. Souvenir chattered like a magpie all the way, giggled, wondered whether his brother would apportion him anything, and thereupon called him a dummy and an old fogey. Kvitsinsky, a man of severe and bilious temperament, could not put up with it at last ‘What can induce you,’ he observed, in his distinct Polish accent, ‘to keep up such a continual unseemly chatter? Can you really be incapable of sitting quiet without these “wholly superfluous” (his favourite phrase) inanities?’ ‘All right, d’rectly,’ Souvenir muttered discontentedly, and he fixed his squinting eyes on the carriage window. A quarter of an hour had not passed, the smoothly trotting horses had scarcely begun to get warm under the straps of their new harness, when Harlov’s homestead came into sight. Through the widely open gate, our coach rolled into the yard. The diminutive postillion, whose legs hardly reached half-way down his horses’ body, for the last time leaped up with a babyish shriek into the soft saddle, old Alexeitch at once spread out and raised his elbows, a slight ‘wo-o’ was heard, and we stopped. The dogs did not bark to greet us, and the serf boys, in long smocks that gaped open over their big stomachs, had all hidden themselves. Harlov’s son-in-law was awaiting us in the doorway. I remember I was particularly struck by the birch boughs stuck in on both sides of the steps, as though it were Trinity Sunday. ‘Grandeur upon grandeur,’ Souvenir, who was the first to alight, squeaked through his nose. And certainly there was a solemn air about everything. Harlov’s son-in-law was wearing a plush cravat with a satin bow, and an extraordinarily tight tail-coat; while Maximka, who popped out behind his back, had his hair so saturated with kvas, that it positively dripped. We went into the parlour, and saw Martin Petrovitch towering – yes, positively towering – motionless, in the middle of the room. I don’t know what Souvenir’s and Kvitsinsky’s feelings were at the sight of his colossal figure; but I felt something akin to awe. Martin Petrovitch was attired in a grey Cossack coat – his militia uniform of 1812 it must have been – with a black stand-up collar. A bronze medal was to be seen on his breast, a sabre hung at his side; he laid his left hand on the hilt, with his right he was leaning on the table, which was covered with a red cloth. Two sheets of paper, full of writing, lay on the table. Harlov stood motionless, not even gasping; and what dignity was expressed in his attitude, what confidence in himself, in his unlimited and unquestionable power! He barely greeted us with a motion of the head, and barely articulating ‘Be seated!’ pointed the forefinger of his left hand in the direction of some chairs set in a row. Against the right-hand wall of the parlour were standing Harlov’s daughters wearing their Sunday clothes: Anna, in a shot lilac-green dress, with a yellow silk sash; Evlampia, in pink, with crimson ribbons. Near them stood Zhitkov, in a new uniform, with the habitual expression of dull and greedy expectation in his eyes, and with a greater profusion of sweat than usual over his hirsute countenance. On the left side of the room sat the priest, in a threadbare snuff-coloured cassock, an old man, with rough brown hair. This head of hair, and the dejected lack-lustre eyes, and the big wrinkled hands, which seemed a burden even to himself, and lay like two rocks on his knees, and the tarred boots which peeped out beneath his cassock, all seemed to tell of a joyless laborious life. His parish was a very poor one. Beside him was the local police captain, a fattish, palish, dirty-looking little gentleman, with soft puffy little hands and feet, black eyes, black short-clipped moustaches, a continual cheerful but yet sickly little smile on his face. He had the reputation of being a great taker of bribes, and even a tyrant, as the expression was in those days. But not only the gentry, even the peasants were used to him, and liked him. He bent very free and easy and rather ironical looks around him; it was clear that all this ‘procedure’ amused him. In reality, the only part that had any interest for him was the light lunch and spirits in store for us. But the attorney sitting near him, a lean man with a long face, narrow whiskers from his ears to his nose, as they were worn in the days of Alexander the First, was absorbed with his whole soul in Martin Petrovitch’s proceedings, and never took his big serious eyes off him. In his concentrated attention and sympathy, he kept moving and twisting his lips, though without opening his mouth. Souvenir stationed himself next him, and began talking to him in a whisper, after first informing me that he was the chief freemason in the province. The temporary division of the local court consists, as every one knows, of the police captain, the attorney, and the rural police commissioner; but the latter was either absent or kept himself in the background, so that I did not notice him. He bore, however, the nickname ‘the non-existent’ among us in the district, just as there are tramps called ‘the non-identified.’ I sat next Souvenir, Kvitsinsky next me. The face of the practical Pole showed unmistakeable annoyance at our ‘wholly superfluous’ expedition, and unnecessary waste of time… ‘A grand lady’s caprices! these Russian grandees’ fancies!’ he seemed to be murmuring to himself… ‘Ugh, these Russians!’

XII

When we were all seated, Martin Petrovitch hunched his shoulders, cleared his throat, scanned us all with his bear-like little eyes, and with a noisy sigh began as follows:

‘Gentlemen, I have called you together for the following purpose. I am grown old, gentlemen, and overcome by infirmities… Already I have had an intimation, the hour of death steals on, like a thief in the night… Isn’t that so, father?’ he addressed the priest.

The priest started. ‘Quite so, quite so,’ he mumbled, his beard shaking.

‘And therefore,’ continued Martin Petrovitch, suddenly raising his voice, ‘not wishing the said death to come upon me unawares, I purposed …’ Martin Petrovitch proceeded to repeat, word for word, the speech he had made to my mother two days before. ‘In accordance with this my determination,’ he shouted louder than ever, ‘this deed’ (he struck his hand on the papers lying on the table) ‘has been drawn up by me, and the presiding authorities have been invited by me, and wherein my will consists the following points will treat. I have ruled, my day is over!’

Martin Petrovitch put his round iron spectacles on his nose, took one of the written sheets from the table, and began:

‘Deed of partition of the estate of the retired non-commissioned officer and nobleman, Martin Harlov, drawn up by himself in his full and right understanding, and by his own good judgment, and wherein is precisely defined what benefits are assigned to his two daughters, Anna and Evlampia – bow!’ – (they bowed), ‘and in what way the serfs and other property, and live stock, be apportioned between the said daughters! Under my hand!’

‘This is their document!’ the police captain whispered to Kvitsinsky, with his invariable smile, ‘they want to read it for the beauty of the style, but the legal deed is made out formally, without all these flourishes.’

Souvenir was beginning to snigger…

‘In accordance with my will,’ put in Harlov, who had caught the police captain’s remark.

‘In accordance in every point,’ the latter hastened to respond cheerfully; ‘only, as you’re aware, Martin Petrovitch, there’s no dispensing with formality. And unnecessary details have been removed. For the chamber can’t enter into the question of spotted cows and fancy drakes.’

‘Come here!’ boomed Harlov to his son-in-law, who had come into the room behind us, and remained standing with an obsequious air near the door. He skipped up to his father-in-law at once.

‘There, take it and read! It’s hard for me. Only mind and don’t mumble it! Let all the gentlemen present be able to understand it.’

Sletkin took the paper in both hands, and began timidly, but distinctly, and with taste and feeling, to read the deed of partition. There was set forth in it with the greatest accuracy just what was assigned to Anna and what to Evlampia, and how the division was to be made. Harlov from time to time interspersed the reading with phrases. ‘Do you hear, that’s for you, Anna, for your zeal!’ or, ‘That I give you, Evlampia!’ and both the sisters bowed, Anna from the waist, Evlampia simply with a motion of the head. Harlov looked at them with stern dignity. ‘The farm house’ (the little new building) was assigned by him to Evlampia, as the younger daughter, ‘by the well-known custom.’ The reader’s voice quivered and resounded at these words, unfavourable for himself; while Zhitkov licked his lips. Evlampia gave him a sidelong glance; had I been in Zhitkov’s shoes, I should not have liked that glance. The scornful expression, characteristic of Evlampia, as of every genuine Russian beauty, had a peculiar shade at that moment. For himself, Martin Petrovitch reserved the right to go on living in the rooms he occupied, and assigned to himself, under the name of ‘rations,’ a full allowance ‘of normal provisions,’ and ten roubles a month for clothes. The last phrase of the deed Harlov wished to read himself. ‘And this my parental will,’ it ran, ‘to carry out and observe is a sacred and binding duty on my daughters, seeing it is a command; seeing that I am, after God, their father and head, and am not bounden to render an account to any, nor have so rendered. And do they carry out my will, so will my fatherly blessing be with them, but should they not so do, which God forbid, then will they be overtaken by my paternal curse that cannot be averted, now and for ever, amen!’ Harlov raised the deed high above his head. Anna at once dropped on her knees and touched the ground with her forehead; her husband, too, doubled up after her. ‘Well, and you?’ Harlov turned to Evlampia. She crimsoned all over, and she too bowed to the earth; Zhitkov bent his whole carcase forward.

‘Sign!’ cried Harlov, pointing his forefinger to the bottom of the deed. ‘Here: “I thank and accept, Anna. I thank and accept, Evlampia!”’

Both daughters rose, and signed one after another. Sletkin rose too, and was feeling after the pen, but Harlov moved him aside, sticking his middle finger into his cravat, so that he gasped. The silence lasted a moment. Suddenly Martin Petrovitch gave a sort of sob, and muttering, ‘Well, now it’s all yours!’ moved away. His daughters and son-in-law looked at one another, went up to him and began kissing him just above his elbow. His shoulder they could not reach.