A House of Gentlefolk | Page 3

too. Is there no news?"
"There is indeed!" replied the visitor, slowly blinking his eyes and
pursing up his mouth. "Hm! . . . yes, indeed, there is a piece of news,
and very surprising news too. Lavretsky--Fedor Ivanitch is here."
"Fedya!" cried Marfa Timofyevna. "Are you sure you are not
romancing, my good man?"
"No, indeed, I saw him myself."
"Well, that does not prove it."
"Fedor Ivanitch looked much more robust," continued Gedeonovsky,
affecting not to have heard Marfa Timofyevna's last remark. "Fedor
Ivanitch is broader and has quite a colour."
"He looked more robust," said Marya Dmitrievna, dwelling on each
syllable. "I should have thought he had little enough to make him look
robust."
"Yes, indeed," observed Gedeonovsky; "any other man in Fedor
Ivanitch's position would have hesitated to appear in society."
"Why so, pray?" interposed Marfa Timofyevna. "What nonsense are
you talking! The man's come back to his home--where would you have
him go? And has he been to blame, I should like to know!"
"The husband is always to blame, madam, I venture to assure you,
when a wife misconducts herself."
"You say that, my good sir, because you have never been married
yourself." Gedeonovsky listened with a forced smile.
"If I may be so inquisitive," he asked, after a short pause, "for whom is
that pretty scarf intended?"

Marfa Timofyevna gave him a sharp look.
"It's intended," she replied, "for a man who does not talk scandal, nor
play the hypocrite, nor tell lies, if there's such a man to be found in the
world. I know Fedya well; he was only to blame in being too good to
his wife. To be sure, he married for love, and no good ever comes of
those love-matches," added the old lady, with a sidelong glance at
Marya Dmitrievna, as she got up from her place. "And now, my good
sir, you may attack any one you like, even me if you choose; I'm going.
I will not hinder you." And Marfa Timofyevna walked away.
"That's always how she is," said Marya Dmitrievna, following her aunt
with her eyes.
"We must remember your aunt's age...there's no help for it," replied
Gedeonovsky. "She spoke of a man not playing the hypocrite. But who
is not hypocritical nowadays? It's the age we live in. One of my friends,
a most worthy man, and, I assure you, a man of no mean position, used
to say, that nowadays the very hens can't pick up a grain of corn
without hypocrisy--they always approach it from one side. But when I
look at you, dear lady--your character is so truly angelic; let me kiss
your little snow-white hand!"
Marya Dmitrievna with a faint smile held out her plump hand to him
with the little finger held apart from the rest. He pressed his lips to it,
and she drew her chair nearer to him, and bending a little towards him,
asked in an undertone--
"So you saw him? Was he really--all right--quite well and cheerful?"
"Yes, he was well and cheerful," replied Gedeonovsky in a whisper.
"You haven't heard where his wife is now?"
"She was lately in Paris; now, they say, she has gone away to Italy."
"It is terrible, indeed--Fedya's position; I wonder how he can bear it.
Every one, of course, has trouble; but he, one may say, has been made

the talk of all Europe."
Gedeonovsky sighed.
"Yes, indeed, yes, indeed. They do say, you know that she associates
with artists and musicians, and as the saying is, with strange creatures
of all kinds. She has lost all sense of shame completely."
"I am deeply, deeply grieved." said Marya Dmitrievna. "On account of
our relationship. You know, Sergei Petrovitch, he's my cousin many
times removed."
"Of course, of course. Don't I know everything that concerns your
family? I should hope so, indeed."
"Will he come to see us--what do you think?"
"One would suppose so; though, they say, he is intending to go home to
his country place."
Mary Dmitrievna lifted her eyes to heaven.
"Ah, Sergei Petrovitch, Sergei Petrovitch, when I think how careful we
women ought to be in our conduct!"
"There are women and women, Marya Dmitrievna. There are unhappily
such . . . of flighty character . . . and at a certain age too, and then they
are not brought up in good principles." (Sergei Petrovitch drew a blue
checked handkerchief out of his pocket and began to unfold it.) "There
are such women, no doubt." (Sergei Petrovitch applied a corner of the
handkerchief first to one and then to the other eye.) "But speaking
generally, if one takes into consideration, I mean...the dust in the town
is really extraordinary to-day," he wound up.
"Maman, maman," cried a pretty little girl of eleven running