The Tales of Chekhov, vol 3 | Page 7

in all provincial theatres, there was a fog above
the chandelier, the gallery was noisy and restless; in the front row the
local dandies were standing up before the beginning of the performance,
with their hands behind them; in the Governor's box the Governor's
daughter, wearing a boa, was sitting in the front seat, while the
Governor himself lurked modestly behind the curtain with only his
hands visible; the orchestra was a long time tuning up; the stage curtain
swayed. All the time the audience were coming in and taking their seats
Gurov looked at them eagerly.
Anna Sergeyevna, too, came in. She sat down in the third row, and
when Gurov looked at her his heart contracted, and he understood
clearly that for him there was in the whole world no creature so near, so
precious, and so important to him; she, this little woman, in no way
remarkable, lost in a provincial crowd, with a vulgar lorgnette in her
hand, filled his whole life now, was his sorrow and his joy, the one
happiness that he now desired for himself, and to the sounds of the
inferior orchestra, of the wretched provincial violins, he thought how
lovely she was. He thought and dreamed.
A young man with small side-whiskers, tall and stooping, came in with
Anna Sergeyevna and sat down beside her; he bent his head at every
step and seemed to be continually bowing. Most likely this was the
husband whom at Yalta, in a rush of bitter feeling, she had called a
flunkey. And there really was in his long figure, his side-whiskers, and
the small bald patch on his head, something of the flunkey's
obsequiousness; his smile was sugary, and in his buttonhole there was
some badge of distinction like the number on a waiter.
During the first interval the husband went away to smoke; she
remained alone in her stall. Gurov, who was sitting in the stalls, too,
went up to her and said in a trembling voice, with a forced smile:
"Good-evening."
She glanced at him and turned pale, then glanced again with horror,
unable to believe her eyes, and tightly gripped the fan and the lorgnette
in her hands, evidently struggling with herself not to faint. Both were
silent. She was sitting, he was standing, frightened by her confusion
and not venturing to sit down beside her. The violins and the flute
began tuning up. He felt suddenly frightened; it seemed as though all
the people in the boxes were looking at them. She got up and went

quickly to the door; he followed her, and both walked senselessly along
passages, and up and down stairs, and figures in legal, scholastic, and
civil service uniforms, all wearing badges, flitted before their eyes.
They caught glimpses of ladies, of fur coats hanging on pegs; the
draughts blew on them, bringing a smell of stale tobacco. And Gurov,
whose heart was beating violently, thought:
"Oh, heavens! Why are these people here and this orchestra! . . ."
And at that instant he recalled how when he had seen Anna Sergeyevna
off at the station he had thought that everything was over and they
would never meet again. But how far they were still from the end!
On the narrow, gloomy staircase over which was written "To the
Amphitheatre," she stopped.
"How you have frightened me!" she said, breathing hard, still pale and
overwhelmed. "Oh, how you have frightened me! I am half dead. Why
have you come? Why?"
"But do understand, Anna, do understand . . ." he said hastily in a low
voice. "I entreat you to understand. . . ."
She looked at him with dread, with entreaty, with love; she looked at
him intently, to keep his features more distinctly in her memory.
"I am so unhappy," she went on, not heeding him. "I have thought of
nothing but you all the time; I live only in the thought of you. And I
wanted to forget, to forget you; but why, oh, why, have you come?"
On the landing above them two schoolboys were smoking and looking
down, but that was nothing to Gurov; he drew Anna Sergeyevna to him,
and began kissing her face, her cheeks, and her hands.
"What are you doing, what are you doing!" she cried in horror, pushing
him away. "We are mad. Go away to-day; go away at once. . . . I
beseech you by all that is sacred, I implore you. . . . There are people
coming this way!"
Some one was coming up the stairs.
"You must go away," Anna Sergeyevna went on in a whisper. "Do you
hear, Dmitri Dmitritch? I will come and see you in Moscow. I have
never been happy; I am miserable now, and I never, never