Part One: Chapter 2

by Leo Tolstoy

　　Stepan Arkadyevitch was a truthful man in his relations withhimself. He was incapable of deceiving himself and persuadinghimself that he repented of his conduct. He could not at thisdate repent of the fact that he, a handsome, susceptible man ofthirty-four, was not in love with his wife, the mother of fiveliving and two dead children, and only a year younger thanhimself. All he repented of was that he had not succeeded betterin hiding it from his wife. But he felt all the difficulty ofhis position and was sorry for his wife, his children, andhimself. Possibly he might have managed to conceal his sinsbetter from his wife if he had anticipated that the knowledge ofthem would have had such an effect on her. He had never clearlythought out the subject, but he had vaguely conceived that hiswife must long ago have suspected him of being unfaithful to her,and shut her eyes to the fact. He had even supposed that she, aworn-out woman no longer young or good-looking, and in no wayremarkable or interesting, merely a good mother, ought from asense of fairness to take an indulgent view. It had turned outquite the other way.

　　"Oh, it's awful! oh dear, oh dear! awful!" Stepan Arkadyevitchkept repeating to himself, and he could think of nothing to bedone. "And how well things were going up till now! how well wegot on! She was contented and happy in her children; I neverinterfered with her in anything; I let her manage the childrenand the house just as she liked. It's true it's bad her havingbeen a governess in our house. That's bad! There's somethingcommon, vulgar, in flirting with one's governess. But what agoverness!" (He vividly recalled the roguish black eyes of Mlle.Roland and her smile.) "But after all, while she was in thehouse, I kept myself in hand. And the worst of it all is thatshe's already...it seems as if ill-luck would have it so! Oh,oh! But what, what is to be done?"

　　There was no solution, but that universal solution which lifegives to all questions, even the most complex and insoluble.That answer is: one must live in the needs of the day--that is,forget oneself. To forget himself in sleep was impossible now,at least till nighttime; he could not go back now to the musicsung by the decanter-women; so he must forget himself in thedream of daily life.

　　"Then we shall see," Stepan Arkadyevitch said to himself, andgetting up he put on a gray dressing-gown lined with blue silk,tied the tassels in a knot, and, drawing a deep breath of airinto his broad, bare chest, he walked to the window with hisusual confident step, turning out his feet that carried his fullframe so easily. He pulled up the blind and rang the bellloudly. It was at once answered by the appearance of an oldfriend, his valet, Matvey, carrying his clothes, his boots, and atelegram. Matvey was followed by the barber with all thenecessaries for shaving.

　　"Are there any papers form the office?" asked StepanArkadyevitch, taking the telegram and seating himself at thelooking-glass.

　　"On the table," replied Matvey, glancing with inquiring sympathyat his master; and, after a short pause, he added with a slysmile, "They've sent from the carriage-jobbers."

　　Stepan Arkadyevitch made no reply, he merely glanced at Matvey inthe looking-glass. In the glance, in which their eyes met in thelooking-glass, it was clear that they understood one another.Stepan Arkadyevitch's eyes asked: "Why do you tell me that?don't you know?"

　　Matvey put his hands in his jacket pockets, thrust out one leg,and gazed silently, good-humoredly, with a faint smile, at hismaster.

　　"I told them to come on Sunday, and till then not to trouble youor themselves for nothing," he said. He had obviously preparedthe sentence beforehand.

　　Stepan Arkadyevitch saw Matvey wanted to make a joke and attractattention to himself. Tearing open the telegram, he read itthrough, guessing at the words, misspelt as they always are intelegrams, and his face brightened.

　　"Matvey, my sister Anna Arkadyevna will be here tomorrow," hesaid, checking for a minute the sleek, plump hand of the barber,cutting a pink path through his long, curly whiskers.

　　"Thank God!" said Matvey, showing by this response that he, likehis master, realized the significance of this arrival--that is,that Anna Arkadyevna, the sister he was so fond of, might bringabout a reconciliation between husband and wife.

　　"Alone, or with her husband?" inquired Matvey.

　　Stepan Arkadyevitch could not answer, as the barber was at workon his upper lip, and he raised one finger. Matvey nodded at thelooking-glass.

　　"Alone. Is the room to be got ready upstairs?"

　　"Inform Darya Alexandrovna: where she orders."

　　"Darya Alexandrovna?" Matvey repeated, as though in doubt.

　　"Yes, inform her. Here, take the telegram; give it to her, andthen do what she tells you."

　　"You want to try it on," Matvey understood, but he only said,"Yes sir."

　　Stepan Arkadyevitch was already washed and combed and ready to bedressed, when Matvey, stepping deliberately in his creaky boots,came back into the room with the telegram in his hand. Thebarberhad gone.

　　"Darya Alexandrovna told me to inform you that she is going away.Let him do--that is you--as he likes," he said, laughing onlywith his eyes, and putting his hands in his pockets, he watchedhis master with his head on one side. Stepan Arkadyevitch wassilent a minute. Then a good-humored and rather pitiful smileshowed itself on his handsome face.

　　"Eh, Matvey?" he said, shaking his head.

　　"It's all right, sir; she will come round," said Matvey.

　　"Come round?"

　　"Yes, sir."

　　"Do you think so? Who's there?" asked Stepan Arkadyevitch,hearing the rustle of a woman's dress at the door.

　　"It's I," said a firm, pleasant, woman's voice, and the stern,pockmarked face of Matrona Philimonovna, the nurse, was thrustin at the doorway.

　　"Well, what is it, Matrona?" queried Stepan Arkadyevitch, goingup to her at the door.

　　Although Stepan Arkadyevitch was completely in the wrong asregards his wife, and was conscious of this himself, almost everyone in the house (even the nurse, Darya Alexandrovna's chiefally) was on his side.

　　"Well, what now?" he asked disconsolately.

　　"Go to her, sir; own your fault again. Maybe God will aid you.She is suffering so, it's sad to hee her; and besides, everythingin the house is topsy-turvy. You must have pity, sir, on thechildren. Beg her forgiveness, sir. There's no help for it! Onemust take the consequences..."

　　"But she won't see me."

　　"You do your part. God is merciful; pray to God, sir, pray toGod."

　　"Come, that'll do, you can go," said Stepan Arkadyevitch,blushing suddenly. "Well now, do dress me." He turned to Matveyand threw off his dressing-gown decisively.

　　Matvey was already holding up the shirt like a horse's collar,and, blowing off some invisible speck, he slipped it with obviouspleasure over the well-groomed body of his master.