The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories | Page 9

But she seemed to be pondering over something, and shook
her head in a peculiar way, as she pensively nibbled a leaf she had
picked. Sometimes she started walking ahead, so resolutely...then all at
once stopped, waited for me, and looked round with lifted eyebrows
and a vague smile. On the previous evening we had read together. The
Prisoner of the Caucasus_. With what eagerness she had listened to me,
her face propped in both hands, and her bosom pressed against the table!
I began to speak of our yesterday's reading; she flushed, asked me
whether I had given the parrot any hemp-seed before starting, began
humming some little song aloud, and all at once was silent again. The
copse ended on one side in a rather high and abrupt precipice; below
coursed a winding stream, and beyond it, over an immense expanse,
stretched the boundless prairies, rising like waves, spreading wide like
a table-cloth, and broken here and there by ravines. Liza and I were the
first to come out at the edge of the wood; Bizmyonkov and the elder
lady were behind. We came out, stood still, and involuntarily we both
half shut our eyes; directly facing us, across a lurid mist, the vast,
purple sun was setting. Half the sky was flushed and glowing; red rays
fell slanting on the meadows, casting a crimson reflection even on the

side of the ravines in shadow, lying in gleams of fire on the stream,
where it was not hidden under the overhanging bushes, and, as it were,
leaning on the bosom of the precipice and the copse. We stood, bathed
in the blazing brilliance. I am not capable of describing all the
impassioned solemnity of this scene. They say that by a blind man the
colour red is imagined as the sound of a trumpet. I don't know how far
this comparison is correct, but really there was something of a
challenge in this glowing gold of the evening air, in the crimson flush
on sky and earth. I uttered a cry of rapture and at once turned to Liza.
She was looking straight at the sun. I remember the sunset glow was
reflected in little points of fire in her eyes. She was overwhelmed,
deeply moved. She made no response to my exclamation; for a long
while she stood, not stirring, with drooping head.... I held out my hand
to her; she turned away from me, and suddenly burst into tears. I
looked at her with secret, almost delighted amazement.... The voice of
Bizmyonkov was heard a couple of yards off. Liza quickly wiped her
tears and looked with a faltering smile at me. The elder lady came out
of the copse leaning on the arm of her flaxen-headed escort; they, in
their turn, admired the view. The old lady addressed some question to
Liza, and I could not help shuddering, I remember, when her daughter's
broken voice, like cracked glass, sounded in reply. Meanwhile the sun
had set, and the afterglow began to fade. We turned back. Again I took
Liza's arm in mine. It was still light in the wood, and I could clearly
distinguish her features. She was confused, and did not raise her eyes.
The flush that overspread her face did not vanish; it was as though she
were still standing in the rays of the setting sun.... Her hand scarcely
touched my arm. For a long while I could not frame a sentence; my
heart was beating so violently. Through the trees there was a glimpse of
the carriage in the distance; the coachman was coming at a walking
pace to meet us over the soft sand of the road.
'Lizaveta Kirillovna,' I brought out at last, 'what did you cry for?'
'I don't know,' she answered, after a short silence. She looked at me
with her soft eyes still wet with tears--her look struck me as changed,
and she was silent again.

'You are very fond, I see, of nature,' I pursued. That was not at all what
I meant to say, and the last words my tongue scarcely faltered out to the
end. She shook her head. I could not utter another word.... I was
waiting for something ... not an avowal--how was that possible? I
waited for a confiding glance, a question.... But Liza looked at the
ground, and kept silent. I repeated once more in a whisper: 'Why was
it?' and received no reply. She had grown, I saw that, ill at ease, almost
ashamed.
A quarter of an hour later we were sitting in the carriage driving to the
town. The horses flew along at an even trot; we were rapidly whirled
along through the darkening, damp air. I suddenly began talking, more
than once addressing first Bizmyonkov, and then