8

STOLZ did not come to Petersburg for several years. Only once did he pay a short visit to Oblomovka and Olga’s estate. Oblomov received a letter from him in which Stolz tried to persuade him to go to the country and take charge of his estate, which was in good working order now; he and Olga were leaving for the south coast of the Crimea for two reasons: he had business in Odessa, and Olga was in delicate health since her confinement and hoped to benefit from a holiday in the Crimea. They settled in a quiet little spot on the seashore. Their house was small and modest. Its architecture and its interior decorations had a style of their own, which bore the imprint of the personal taste and thoughts of its owners. They had brought many things with them and had many more packages, cases, and cartloads sent them from Russia and abroad. A lover of comfort might perhaps have shrugged at the apparently discordant character of the furniture, old pictures, statues with broken arms and legs, engravings, sometimes rather bad but dear for sentimental reasons, and all sorts of knick-knacks. Only a connoisseur’s eyes would light up eagerly at the sight of some of the pictures or a book yellow with age, old china, stones, and coins. But there was a breath of warm life among the furniture of different periods, the pictures, the bric-a-brac, which were of no significance to anybody, but which reminded them of some happy hour or some memorable occasion, and among the enormous number of books and sheets of music. There was something in it all that stimulated the mind and aesthetic feeling, something that made one aware of the unslumbering thought and the radiant beauty of human achievement as one was aware of the radiant and eternal beauty of nature all around. The tall desk which belonged to Andrey’s father was also there, as well as the chamois-leather gloves. The oilskin cloak hung in the corner near the cupboard with minerals, shells, stuffed birds, samples of different kinds of clay, merchandise, and so on. The place of honour was occupied by an Erard grand piano, shining with gold and inlaid work. The cottage was covered from top to bottom with a network of vine, ivy, and myrtle. From one side of the balcony the sea could be seen, and from the other the road to the town. It was from that end that Olga watched for Andrey to return when he had been away from home on business, and, seeing him, she went downstairs, ran through a lovely flower-garden and a long poplar avenue, and flung herself on her husband’s neck, her cheeks flushed with joy and her eyes sparkling, always with the same ardour of impatient happiness, in spite of the fact that it was not the first nor the second year of their marriage.

Stolz’s views on love and marriage may have been odd and exaggerated, but they were, at any rate, his own. Here, too, he followed the free and, it seemed to him, simple road: but what a hard school of observation, patience, and labour he went through before he learnt to take these ’simple steps’! It was from his father that he inherited the habit of looking earnestly at everything in life, even at trifles; he might perhaps have inherited from him also the pedantic severity with which Germans regard every step they take in life, including marriage.

Old Stolz’s life was there for all to read, just as though it had been inscribed on a stone tablet, and there were no hidden implications in it. But his mother, with her songs and tender whispers, the diversified life in the prince’s house, and later the university, books, and society had led Andrey away from the straight path marked out for him by his father; Russian life was drawing its own invisible patterns and transforming the insipid tablet into a broad and brilliant picture.

Andrey did not impose pedantic chains on his feelings and even went so far as to give free rein to his day-dreams, trying only not to lose «the ground under his feet», though when waking from them he could not refrain, either because of his German nature or for some other reason, from drawing some conclusion which had a direct bearing on some of life’s problems. He was vigorous in body because he was vigorous in mind. He had been playful and full of mischief as a boy, and when not playing he was doing something under his father’s supervision. He had no time to indulge in day-dreams. His imagination was not corrupted and his heart was not spoiled; his mother carefully watched over the virginal purity of both. As a youth he instinctively conserved his powers, and it was not long before he discovered that by keeping them fresh he also kept his cheerfulness and his vigour, and helped to form that manliness of character in which the soul must be steeled if it is not to capitulate before life, whatever it may be, and look upon it not as a heavy burden or a cross, but only as a duty, and wage battle with it worthily. He devoted much careful thought to the heart and its complicated laws. Observing consciously and unconsciously the effect of beauty on the imagination and then the transition of an impression into feeling, its symptoms, its play, and its result, he became more and more convinced, as he looked around and grew experienced, that love moved the world with the power of Archimedes’ lever; that there is as much universal and irrefutable truth and goodness in it as there is falsehood and ugliness in its misuse and the failure to understand it. What is good? What is evil? What is the dividing line between them? At the question «What is falsehood?» he saw in his imagination a motley procession of masks of the past and present. He contemplated with a smile, blushing and frowning in turn, the endless row of heroes and heroines of love: Don Quixotes in steel gauntlets, and the ladies of their dreams, remaining faithful to one another after fifty years of separation; the shepherds with their rosy faces and artless, bulging eyes, and their Chloes with lambs. Before his mind’s eye marquesses appeared in powdered wigs and lace, with eyes twinkling with intelligence and dissolute smiles; they were followed by the Werthers who had shot, strangled, or hanged themselves; then by faded lovelorn maidens shedding endless tears and retiring into convents, and their mustachioed heroes with wild ardour in their eyes; by naive and self-conscious Don Juans, the clever fellows who tremble at the least suspicion of love and secretly adore their housekeepers – all, all of them.

To answer the question «What is truth?» he sought far and near, in his mind and with his eyes, examples of ordinary, honest, yet deep and indissoluble intimacy with a woman, but could not find it; and if he seemed to have found it, it only seemed so, and afterwards it was followed by disillusionment. This made him sink into melancholy thoughts and even give way to despair. «It is clear», he thought to himself, «that this blessing has not been granted in all its fullness, or else those whose hearts have experienced the bright radiance of such a love are shy: they are timid and prefer to hide rather than argue with the clever people; perhaps they are sorry for them and forgive them in the name of their own happiness for trampling into the mud the flower that cannot take root in their shallow soil and grow into a tree that would spread its branches over the whole of their lives».

He looked at marriage, at husbands, and in their attitude to their wives he always saw the riddle of the sphinx; there was something in it that was not understood, something that, somehow, remained unspoken; and yet those husbands did not puzzle their heads over complicated problems, but walked through married life with such even and deliberate steps as though they had nothing to solve and discover. «Are they perhaps right? Perhaps there really is no need of anything else», he thought, distrusting himself, as he saw how some men who went through love quickly as the ABC of marriage or as a form of gallantry, just as if they had made a bow on entering a drawing-room, and quickly applied themselves to more important matters! They fling the spring-time of life away impatiently; many of them, indeed, look askance at their wives for the rest of their lives as though unable to forgive themselves for having been foolish enough to fall in love with them. There are others whom love does not forsake for years, sometimes till old age, but the satyr’s smile never forsakes them, either… Finally, most men enter into matrimony as they buy an estate and enjoy its substantial amenities: a wife keeps the house in excellent order – she is the housekeeper, the mother, the governess; they look upon love as a practical-minded farmer looks upon the beautiful surroundings of his estate; that is, he gets used to it at once and never notices it again.

«What is it, then?» he asked himself. «An innate inability due to the laws of nature or lack of education and training? Where is the sympathy that never loses its natural charm, that never wears motley, that undergoes modifications but is never extinguished! What is the natural shade and colour of this ubiquitous and all-permeating blessing, of this sap of life?»

He cast a prophetic glance into the distant future, and there arose before him, as in a mist, the image of love and with it of a woman clothed in its colour and radiant with its light, an image so simple, but bright and pure. «A dream, a dream!» he said with a smile, recovering from the idle excitement of his reverie. But the outline of this dream lived in his memory in spite of himself. At first this image appeared to him as the personification of the woman of the future; but when, after Olga had grown into womanhood, he saw in her not only the splendour of a fully developed beauty, but also a force ready to face life and eager to understand and fight life’s battles – all the elements of his dream, there arose before him his old and almost forgotten image of love and he began to dream of Olga as its personification, and it seemed to him that in the far-distant future truth would manifest itself in their sympathy for each other – without growing shabby and without abuses of any kind. Without toying with the question of love and marriage and without confusing it with any considerations of money, connexions, and posts, Stolz, however, could not help wondering how to reconcile his external and hitherto indefatigable activity with his inner family life, how, in fact, he could transform himself from a traveller and business-man into a stay-at-home husband. If he was to settle down and put an end to his constant running about from one place to another, how would he fill his life at home? The bringing up and education of children and the direction of their life was not, of course, an easy or unimportant task, but that was still a long way off, and what was he going to do in the meantime? These questions had often troubled him, and he did not find his bachelor life a burden; nor had it occurred to him to put on the shackles of married life as soon as his heart began beating when he found himself in the presence of beauty. That was why he seemed to ignore Olga as a girl and admired her merely as a charming child of great promise. He would, casually and jokingly, throw some new bold idea or some acute observation of life into her eager and receptive mind, arousing in her, without realizing it, a lively understanding of events and a correct view of things; and then he would forget Olga and his casual lessons. And at times, seeing that she had quite original ideas and qualities of mind, that there was no falsehood in her, that she did not seek general admiration, that her feelings came and went simply and freely, that there was nothing second-hand in her, but everything was her own, and that all this was so bold, so fresh, and stable – he wondered where she had got it all and did not recognize his own fleeting lessons and remarks. Had he concentrated his attention on her at the time, he would have realized that she was going her own way almost alone, guarded from extremes by her aunt’s superficial supervision, but not oppressed by the authority of numerous nurses, grandmothers, and aunts, with the traditions of their family and caste, of outworn manners, customs, and rules; that she was not being led against her will along a beaten track, but walked along a new path which she had to open up by her own intelligence, ideas, and feeling: Nature had not deprived her of any of it; her aunt did not rule despotically over her mind and will, and Olga divined and understood a great deal herself; she watched life carefully, listening – among other things – to her friend’s words of advice… He did not take anything of this into consideration and merely expected a lot of her in the future, but in the far distant future, without ever thinking of her as his helpmate.

For a long time she would not let him guess what she really was either out of pride or shyness, and it was only after an agonizing struggle abroad that he saw with amazement into what a model of simplicity, strength, and naturalness this promising child he had almost forgotten had grown. It was then that the whole depth of her soul, which he might have filled but never succeeded in filling, was revealed to him.

At first he had long to struggle with the vivacity of her nature, to check the fever of youth, keep her impulses within definite bounds, and impart an even flow to their life, and that, too, only fora time. For as soon as he closed his eyes trustfully, an alarm was raised again, life was in full swing, some new question sprang from her restless mind and anxious heart: he had to calm her excited imagination, to soothe or rouse her pride. If she pondered over something, he hastened to give her the key to it. Belief in chance, mists and hallucinations disappeared from her life. A bright clear vista opened up before her and she could see in it, as in limpid water, every pebble, every crevice, and then the clean sandy bottom.

«I am happy», she whispered, casting a glance of gratitude over her past life and, trying to see into the future, she recalled the girlish dream of happiness she had once dreamed in Switzerland, the wistful, blue night, and she saw that that dream, like a shadow, was haunting her life. «Why should this have fallen to my lot?» she thought humbly. She pondered, and was sometimes afraid lest her happiness should end.

Years passed, but they did not tire of living. Peace came at last, the emotional storms subsided; the ups and downs of life no longer puzzled them; they put up with them cheerfully and patiently, and yet life never flagged. Olga reached a true understanding of life. Two existences – Andrey’s and hers – merged into one; there could be no question of a riot of wild passions; all was peace and harmony between them. It would seem that they might have gone to sleep in this well-earned rest and be as blissfully happy as people who live in some backwater, who meet together three times a day, yawning over their familiar conversation, falling into a dull slumber, languishing from morning till night because everything had already been thought, said, and done over and over again and there was nothing more to be said or done and because «such is life». Outwardly their life was the same as other people’s. They got up early, though not at dawn; they liked to spend a long time over their breakfast, and sometimes seemed to be lazily silent; then they each went to their rooms or worked together, dined, drove to the fields, had music – like everybody else, as Oblomov had dreamed. But there was no drowsiness or depression about them; they spent their days without being bored or apathetic; they never exchanged a dull word or look; their conversation never came to an end arid was sometimes heated. Their ringing voices resounded in the rooms and reached the garden, or tracing the pattern of their dreams, they quietly communicated to each other the first scarcely perceptible stirrings of thought, the barely audible murmur of the soul. And their silence was sometimes the thoughtful happiness of which Oblomov had dreamed, or the solitary mental work over the endless material they provided for each other. They often sank into silent amazement before the eternally new and resplendent beauty of nature. Their sensitive souls could not get used to this beauty: the earth, the sky, the sea – everything awakened their feelings – and they sat in silence side by side and looked through the same eyes and with one heart at this glory of creation and understood each other without words. They did not meet the morning with indifference; they could not sink dully into the twilight of a warm, starry, southern night. They were kept awake by the constant excitement of the soul and the need to think together, to feel and to talk!.. But what was the subject of these heated discussions, quiet conversations, readings, and long walks? Why, everything! While they were still abroad, Stolz lost the habit of reading and working alone: here, alone with Olga, he did not even think alone. He could scarcely manage to keep pace with the agonizing rapidity of her thought and will.

The question of what he was going to do in his family circle was no longer urgent – it had solved itself. He had to initiate her even into his business life, for she felt stifled unless she took an active part in life. He did nothing without her knowledge or active participation, whether it was building, or something to do with her own or Oblomov’s estate, or the company’s business transactions. Not a single letter was posted without her reading it, not a single idea, and still less its realization, was kept from her; she knew everything, and everything interested her because it interested him. At first he did it because he found it impossible to hide anything from her: if he wrote a letter or conducted a conversation with an agent or contractor – it was done in her presence; later he continued this from habit, and at last it became a necessity for him too. Her remarks, advice, approval or disapproval were esteemed by him as a necessary check-up on his plans: he saw that she understood as well as he, that she thought and reasoned no worse than he… Zakhar resented such ability in his wife, and many men resent it – but Stolz was happy! And reading and learning – the perpetual nourishment of thought and its endless development! Olga was jealous of every book and article she was not shown and was seriously angry or offended if he did not think it worth while showing her something he considered too serious, boring, or incomprehensible to her; she called it pedantic, vulgar, retrograde, and scolded him for being «an old German stick-in-the-mud». They often had lively scenes about it. She was angry and he laughed, she grew angrier and made it up with him only when he stopped pulling her leg and shared his ideas, knowledge, and reading with her. The end of it was that she wanted to read about and to know everything he wanted to. He did not force technical terms on her in order to boast idiotically of a «learned wife». If she had uttered a single word or hinted at such a claim on his part, he would have blushed more than if she had replied with a blank look of ignorance to an elementary question that did not as yet form part of a woman’s education. He merely wanted – and she doubly so – that there should be nothing inaccessible to her understanding, if not to her knowledge. He did not draw diagrams or figures for her, but discussed everything with her and read a great deal without pedantically avoiding economic theories or social or philosophical questions; he spoke with passion and enthusiasm and, as it were, drew for her an endless, living picture of knowledge. Later on she forgot the details, but the general pattern was never erased from her impressionable mind, the colours did not fade, and the fire with which he lighted the world of knowledge he created for her was never extinguished. He was thrilled with pride and happiness when he noticed a spark of that fire shining in her eyes afterwards, how an echo of a thought he had imparted to her resounded in her speech, how it had entered into her consciousness and understanding, been transformed in her mind and appeared in her words no longer stern and dry but sparkling with womanly grace, and particularly if some fruitful drop from all he had discussed, read, and drawn for her, sank, like a pearl, into the translucent depths of her being. Like an artist and a thinker, he was weaving a rational existence for her, and never in his life – not at the time of his studies, nor in the hard days when he struggled with life, extricating himself from its coils and growing strong and hardening himself in the trials of manhood – had he been so engrossed as now in tending this unceasing, volcanic work of his wife’s spirit.

«How happy I am!» Stolz said to himself, and dreamed in his own way, trying to guess what their future life would be like after the first years of their marriage.

In the distance a new image smiled at him, not of a selfish Olga, nor a passionately loving wife, nor a mother-nurse fading away in the end in a colourless existence no one wanted, but of something different, exalted, almost unheard of… He dreamed of a mother who created and took part in the social and spiritual life of a whole generation of happy people… He wondered fearfully if she would have enough will-power – and hastily helped her to subdue life, to acquire a reserve of courage for the battle of life – now, while they were still young and strong, while life spared them or its blows did not seem heavy and while grief was submerged in love. Their days had been darkened, but not for long. Business failures, the loss of a considerable amount of money – all that hardly affected them. It meant additional work and extra journeys, but was soon forgotten. The death of her aunt caused Olga bitter and genuine tears and cast a shadow on her life for about six months. The children’s illnesses were a source of constant anxiety and lively apprehension, but as soon as the apprehension was gone, happiness returned. What worried him most was Olga’s health: it took her a long time to recover from her confinements, and although she recovered, he still continued to feel anxious. He knew of no misfortune more terrible.

«How happy I am!» Olga, too, kept repeating softly, looking with pleasure upon her life, sinking into meditation at such moments – especially for some time past, three or four years, after her marriage.

Man is a strange creature! The more complete her happiness was, the more pensive and even apprehensive she became. She began to watch herself carefully, and found that she was upset by the peacefulness of her life, by the way it seemed to stand still during the moments of happiness. She forced herself to shake off her pensive mood and quickened the pace of life, feverishly seeking noise, movement, cares, asking her husband to take her to town, trying going into society, but not for long. The bustle of society affected her but slightly, and she hurried back to her little home to get rid of some painful, unusual impression, and once more devoted herself entirely to the small cares of her household, staying in the nursery for hours, carrying out her duties of a mother and nurse, or spent hours reading with Andrey and talking with him about «serious and dull’ things, or read poetry and discussed a journey to Italy. She was afraid to sink into an apathy like Oblomov’s. But however hard she tried to rid herself of those moments of periodic numbness and slumber of the soul, she was every now and then waylaid first by the dream of happiness, when she was once more surrounded by the blue night and bound in a drowsy spell, which was followed by an interval of brooding, like a rest from life, and then by – confusion, fear, longing, a sort of dull melancholy, and her restless head was filled with vague, hazy questions. Olga listened to them intently, trying in vain to find out what was wrong with her and unable to discover what her soul was seeking and demanding from time to time, and yet it was certainly seeking and longing for something and even – dreadful to say – seemed to miss something, as though a happy life were not enough, as though she had grown tired of it and were demanding some new experiences, peering farther and farther into the future.

„What is it?“ she thought, horrified. „Is there something else I need and ought to desire? Where am I to go? Nowhere. This is the end of the road… But is it? Have I completed the circle of life? Is this all – all?“ she asked herself, leaving something unsaid – and – looking round anxiously to make sure that no one had overheard this whisper of her soul… Her eyes questioned the sky, the sea, the woods – there was no answer anywhere; there was nothing there but emptiness and darkness.

Nature said the same thing over and over again; she saw in it аn uninterrupted and monotonous flow of life, without beginning or end. She knew whom to consult about her worries, and she might have found an answer; but what kind of answer? What if it was merely the dissatisfied muttering of a sterile mind or, worse still, the craving of an unwomanly heart that has not been created for sympathy alone? Heavens, she – his idol – was heartless and possessed a hard and never-contented mind! What would she become? Not a blue-stocking, surely? How she would fall in his estimation when he discovered these new, unwonted sufferings, which were, of course, known to him. She hid from him or pretended to be ill, and then her eves, in spite of herself, lost their velvety softness and looked hot and dry, a heavy cloud lay on her face, and, try as she might, she could not force herself to smile or talk, and listened indifferently to the most exciting news of the political world and the most interesting explanation of some new scientific discovery or new creative work of art. And yet she did not want to cry, she felt no sudden excitement as when her nerves were on edge and her virginal powers were awakening and finding expression. No, that was not it!

„What is it, then?“ she asked herself in despair, when she suddenly felt bored and indifferent to everything on a beautiful, quiet evening or sitting beside the cradle, or amidst her husband’s endearments and speeches… She suddenly stood stock-still and grew silent, then busied herself with a feigned liveliness to conceal her strange ailment, or said she had a headache and went to bed. But it was not easy for her to hide herself from Stolz’s keen eyes: she knew it and prepared herself inwardly for the conversation that was to come with the same anxiety as she had once prepared herself for confessing her past. It came at last.

One evening they were taking a walk in the poplar avenue. She almost hung on his shoulder, hardly uttering a word. She was suffering from one of her mysterious attacks and replied curtly to whatever he said.

„The nurse says that little Olga was coughing in the night. Don’t you think we ought to send for the doctor to-morrow?“ he asked.

„I’ve given her a warm drink and will not let her go for a walk to-morrow, and then we shall see!“ she replied monotonously.

They walked to the end of the avenue in silence.

„Why haven’t you answered your friend Sonia’s letter?“ he asked. „I kept waiting and nearly missed the post. It’s her third letter you’ve left unanswered“.

„Yes, I want to forget her as quickly as possible“, she said, and fell silent.

„I gave Bichurin your regards“, Andrey began again. „He’s in love with you, you know, so I thought it might comfort him a little for his wheat not arriving in time“.

She smiled dryly.

„Yes, you’ve told me“, she said indifferently.

„What is it? Are you sleepy?“ he asked.

Her heart missed a beat, as it did every time he began asking her questions that affected her closely.

„Not yet“, she answered with feigned cheerfulness. „Why?“

„You’re not feeling ill?“ he asked again.

„No. What makes you think so?“

„Well, then, you must be bored!“

She pressed his shoulder tightly with both her hands.

„No, no!“ she declared in an exaggeratedly cheerful voice, which certainly sounded rather bored.

He led her out of the avenue and turned her face to the moonlight.

„Look at me!“ he said, gazing intently into her eyes. „One might think that you were – unhappy! Your eyes are so strange to-day, and not only to-day – What is the matter with you, Olga?“

He put his arm round her waist and took her back into the avenue.

„You know“, she said, trying to laugh, „I’m famished!“

„Don’t tell stories! I don’t like it!“ he added, with feigned severity.

„Unhappy!“ she repeated, reproachfully, stopping him in the avenue. „Yes, I am unhappy because – I am too happy!“ she concluded in such a soft and tender voice that he kissed her.

She grew bolder. The assumption, though made light-heartedly and in jest, that she was unhappy, unexpectedly made her wish to speak frankly.

„I am not bored – I couldn’t be, you know that perfectly well yourself – and I’m not ill, but – I can’t help feeling sad – sometimes. There, you insufferable man, if you must know! Yes, I feel sad, and I don’t know why!“

She put her head on his shoulder.

„I see! But why on earth?“ he asked softly, bending over her.

„Don’t know“, she repeated.

„But there must be a reason, if not in me, or in your surroundings, then in yourself. Sometimes such sadness is merely the first symptom of an illness… are you well?“

„Yes, perhaps it is something like that“, she said earnestly, ’though I don’t feel ill at all. You see how I eat, sleep, work, and go for walks. Then suddenly something comes over me – a sort of depression. I can’t help feeling that something is lacking in my life. But no, don’t listen to me! It’s all nonsense!»

«Please go on», he insisted. «You say you feel there’s something lacking in your life – what else?»

«Sometimes I seem to be afraid that things will change or come to an end – I don’t know myself», she went on. «Or I’m worried by the silly thought – what else is going to happen? What is happiness? What is the meaning of life?» she said, speaking more and more softly, ashamed of these questions. «All these joys, sorrows, nature», she whispered, «it all seems to make me long to go somewhere, and I become dissatisfied with everything. Oh dear, I’m so ashamed of all this foolishness – this day-dreaming… Don’t take any notice, don’t look», she asked in an imploring voice, snuggling up to him. «This melancholy fit of mine soon passes, and I feel gay and light-hearted again, as I do now!»

She pressed close to him timidly and tenderly, feeling really ashamed and as though asking forgiveness for her «foolishness».

Her husband questioned her a long time and it took a long time to tell him, as a patient does a doctor, the symptoms of her sadness, to put into words all the vague questions that worried her, to describe the confusion in her mind, and then – as soon as the mirage disappeared – everything she could remember and observe.

Stolz walked along the avenue in silence, his head bowed, pondering, anxious and perplexed by his wife’s vague confession.

She peered into his eyes, but saw nothing, and when they reached the end of the avenue for the third time, she would not let him turn round, but herself now took him out into the moonlight and gazed questioningly into his eyes.

«What are you thinking of?» she asked shyly. «You’re laughing at my foolishness, aren’t you? It is very silly, this sadness of mine, isn’t it?»

He made no answer.

«Why are you silent?» she asked impatiently.

«You’ve been silent for a long time, although you knew, of course, that I’ve been watching you for some time, so let me be silent and think it over. You’ve set me no easy task».

«Well, you’ll be thinking now and I’ll be worrying myself death trying to guess what conclusion you’ve reached alone by yourself. I shouldn’t have told you about it!» she added. «You’d better say something…»

«What can I say to you?» he said thoughtfully; «perhaps you’re still suffering from strained nerves, in which case it is the doctor and not I who will decide what’s wrong with you. We must send for him to-morrow. But if it isn’t» – He stopped short, pondering.

«What if it isn’t? Tell me!» she persisted impatiently.

He walked on, still absorbed in his thoughts.

«Please!» she said, shaking him by the arm.

«Perhaps it’s an over-active imagination, you’re much too animated; or again, perhaps you’ve reached the age when» – He finished in an undertone, speaking almost to himself.

«Please speak up, Andrey. I can’t bear it when you mutter to yourself!» she complained. «I have told him a lot of nonsense, and he hangs his head and mutters something under his breath! I honestly feel nervous here with you in the dark…»

«I don’t know what to say – you feel depressed, you’re worried by some sort of questions – I don’t know what to make of it. We’ll discuss it again later: you may be needing sea-bathing cure again…»

«You said to yourself – perhaps you’ve reached the age – what did you mean?» she asked.

«You see, I meant» – he said slowly, expressing himself hesitantly, distrusting his own thoughts and, as it were, ashamed of his words. «You see – there are moments – I mean, if it isn’t a sign of a nervous breakdown, if there is absolutely nothing the matter with you, then perhaps you’ve reached the age of maturity when one stops growing – where there are no more riddles, and when it all becomes plain…»

«You mean I’ve grown old, don’t you?» she interrupted him quickly. «Don’t you dare suggest it!» She shook a finger at him. «I am still young and strong», she added, drawing herself up.

He laughed. «Don’t be afraid», he said; «it seems to me you don’t ever intend to grow old! No, that’s not what I meant. In old age one’s powers fail and stop struggling with life. No, your sadness and depression – if it is what I think it is – is rather a sign of strength. A lively, inquiring, and dissatisfied mind sometimes attempts to penetrate beyond the boundaries of life and, finding, of course, no answer, is plunged into melancholy and – temporary dissatisfaction with life. It is the melancholy of the soul questioning life about its mysteries. Perhaps that is what’s the matter with you… If that is so – it isn’t foolishness».

She sighed, but it seemed more like a sigh of relief that her apprehensions were over and that she had not fallen in the estimation of her husband, but quite the contrary…

«But I am happy, my mind is not idle, I am not day-dreaming, my life is full – what more do I want? Why all these questionings?» she said. «It’s a disease, an obsession!»

«Yes, perhaps it is an obsession for an ignorant, untrained, and weak mind. This melancholy and these questions have possibly driven many people mad; to some they appear as hideous apparitions, as a delirium of the mind».

«My happiness is brimming over, I so want to live and – suddenly all is gall and wormwood…»

«Ah, that’s what one has to pay for the Promethean fire! It isn’t enough to suffer, you have to love this melancholy and respect your doubts and questionings: they represent the surfeit, the luxury of life, and mostly appear on the summits of happiness, when there are no coarse desires; people who are in need and sorrow are not bothered by them; thousands and thousands of people go through life without knowing anything about this fog of doubts and the anguish of questionings… But to those who have met them at the right moment, they are not an affliction, but welcome guests».

«But it’s impossible to manage them: they make you feel miserable and indifferent – to almost everything», she added hesitantly.

«Not for long, though», he said. «Afterwards they make life all the fresher. They bring us to the abyss from which we can get no answer and then make us look upon life with greater love than ever… they challenge forces that have been tried already to a fight with them, as though they did not want them to go to sleep…»

«To be worried by some fog, by phantoms», she complained. «All is so bright and sunny, and suddenly an ominous shadow falls upon life! Is there no remedy against it?»

«Of course there is! You must find strength in life, and if you can’t, life becomes unbearable even without these questions».

«What am I to do, then? Yield and be miserable?»

«Not at all», he said; «arm yourself with fortitude and go on your way in life patiently and perseveringly. You and I are not Titans», he went on, putting his arm round her; «we shall not go, like Manfred and Faust, to struggle defiantly with formidable problems; we shall not accept their challenge, but bow our heads and humbly go through the difficult times, and then life and happiness will smile upon us once more and…»

«But what if they never leave us alone and sadness troubles us more and more?» she asked.

«Well, what if it does? Let us accept it as a new element in life. But no, that does not happen; it cannot be so with us! This is not your sadness; it is the general ailment of mankind. One drop of it has fallen on you. All this is terrible when one has lost touch with life – when there’s nothing to sustain one. But with us – I only hope this melancholy of yours is what I think it is and not the symptom of some illness – that would be worse, that would be a calamity which would leave me utterly defenceless and helpless. But do you really think that some vague sadness, doubts, or questionings could deprive us of our happiness, our…»

He did not finish the sentence, and she threw herself into his arms like one possessed and, clasping her arms round his neck, like a bacchante, in a passionate embrace, remained motionless like that for a moment.

«Neither vague sadness, nor illness, nor – death!» she whispered rapturously, once again happy, calm, and gay. It seemed to her that she never loved him so passionately as at this moment.

«Take care that Fate does not overhear your complaint and take it for ingratitude», he concluded with a superstitious observation, inspired by tender solicitude. «She dislikes people who do not value her gifts. So far you were just getting to know life; you still have to test it. Wait till it gets going in good earnest, till sorrow and trouble come – and they will come – then you won’t have time for these questionings… Husband your strength!» Stolz added softly, almost as though he were speaking to himself, in answer to her passionate outburst. There was a note of sadness in his words, as though he already saw «the trouble and the sorrow’ in the distance.

She was silent, struck suddenly by the sadness in his voice. She had infinite faith in him, and the sound of his voice inspired trust in her. She was infected by his thoughtfulness and became absorbed in herself. Leaning on him, she walked slowly and mechanically up and down the avenue, sunk in deep silence. Following her husband’s example, she gazed apprehensively into the future where, as he said, trials, trouble, and sorrow a waited them. She was no longer dreaming of a blue night; another prospect opened up before her, one that was not translucent and festive, not life amid peace and plenty, alone with him. No, what she saw there was a series of privations and losses, bedewed with tears, unavoidable sacrifices, a life of fasting and forced renunciation, of fancies born in idleness, groans and lamentations caused by new feelings they had not experienced before; she dreamed of illness, business failures, her husband’s death… She shuddered, she lost heart, but she gazed with courage and curiosity at that new aspect of life, examined it with horror and measured her strength against it… Love alone did not betray her in that dream; it kept guard faithfully over this new life, too; and yet it, too, was different! There were no ardent sighs, no bright rays, and no blue nights; as years passed, it all seemed child’s play in comparison with that far-away love taken for its own by stern and uncompromising life. You heard no laughter and kisses there, nor pensive conversations, quivering with suppressed passion, in the summer-house among the flowers at the festival of nature and life… All that had ’withered and gone’. But that unfailing and indestructible love could be perceived in their faces as powerful as the life-force – at the time of common sorrow it shone in the slowly and silently exchanged glance of mutual suffering, and it could be felt in the infinite patience with which they met life’s torments, in their restrained tears and stifled sobs, other dreams, distant, but clear, definite, and menacing, quietly replaced Olga’s vague sadness and questionings… Under the influence of the reassuring and calm words of her husband, and in the boundless trust she felt in him, Olga relaxed from her mysterious sadness, which only few people know, and the stern and prophetic dreams of the future, and she went cheerfully forward. The „fog’ gave place to a bright and sunny morning, with the cares of a mother and a housewife; she felt drawn now to the flower-garden and the fields and now to her husband’s study. But no longer did she play about with life in careless abandon; instead she took heart of grace and, inspired by a secret thought, prepared herself, and waited… She was growing in grace… Andrey saw that his former ideal of woman and wife was unattainable, but he was happy even in the pale reflection of it in Olga: he had never expected even that. Meanwhile he, too, was faced for years, for almost his whole life, with the not inconsiderable task of maintaining his dignity as a man on the same high level in the eyes of a woman so proud and with so proper a regard for her own self-respect as Olga, not out of vulgar jealousy, but so as to make sure that her life, which was clear as crystal, should not be darkened; and this might well happen if her faith in him were in the least shaken

A great many women have no need of anything of the kind: once married, they resignedly accept their husband’s good and bad qualities, reconcile themselves completely to the position and environment into which they have been placed, or as resignedly succumb to the first casual infatuation, finding it at once impossible or unnecessary to resist it. „It is fate“, they say to themselves, „passion – woman is a weak creature“, and so on. Even if the husband ranks above the crowd in intelligence, which is so irresistible an attraction in a man, such women pride themselves on their husband’s superiority as though it were some expensive necklace, and even then only if his intellect remains blind to their pitiful female tricks. But if he dares to see through the petty comedy of their sly, worthless, and sometimes vicious existence, they find his intellect hard and cramping.

Olga did not know this logic of resignation to blind fate and could not understand women’s cheap passions and infatuations. Having once recognized the worth in her chosen man and his claims on her, she believed in him and therefore loved him, and if she ceased to believe, she would cease to love, as had been the case with Oblomov. But at that time her steps were still unsteady and her will shaky; she was only just beginning to observe life closely and meditate on it, to become conscious of her mind and character and to gather her materials. The work of creative endeavour had not yet begun and she had not yet decided on her path in life. But now her faith in Andrey was not blind but conscious, and her ideal of masculine perfection was embodied in it. The more deeply and more consciously she believed in him, the harder he found it to remain on the same height and to be the hero not only of her mind and heart but also of her imagination. But her faith in him was so strong that she recognized no intermediary between herself and him or any other court of appeal than God. That was why she would not have put up with the slightest lowering in the qualities she acknowledged in him; any false note in his mind or character would have produced a shattering discord. The demolished edifice of her happiness would have buried her under its ruins, or had her strength been preserved, she would have looked for – but no, women like her do not make the same mistake twice. After the collapse of such faith and such love, no rebirth is possible.

Stolz was profoundly happy in his full and exciting life, in which unfading spring was flowering, and he took care of it, tended and cherished it jealously, keenly, and energetically. He was horror-stricken only when he remembered that Olga had been within a hair’s-breadth of destruction; that they had merely stumbled on their right path in life, and their two lives, now merged into one, might have diverged; that ignorance of the ways of life might have led to a disastrous mistake, that Oblomov – He shuddered. Good heavens, Olga in the sort of life Oblomov had been preparing for her! Olga leading a day-to-day existence, a country lady, nursing her children, a housewife, and – nothing more! All her questionings, doubts, the whole excitement of her life, would have been frittered away in household cares, preparations for feast-days, visitors, family reunions, birthdays, christenings, and her husband’s indolence and apathy! Marriage would have been a meaningless form, a means and not an end; it would have been merely a large and immutable framework for visits, entertainments of visitors, dinners and parties, empty chatter. How would she have endured such a life? At first she would have struggled, trying to find and solve the mystery of life, wept and suffered, and then she would have got used to it, grown fat and stupid, and spent her time eating and sleeping. No, it wouldn’t have been so with her: she would have wept, suffered, pined away, and died in the arms of her loving, kind, and helpless husband… Poor Olga! And if the fire had not been extinguished and life had not come to an end, if her powers had held out and demanded freedom, if she had stretched forth her wings like a strong and keen-eyed eagle, checked for a moment by her weak arms, and flung herself on the high rock where she had seen an eagle who was stronger and more keen-eyed than she?… Poor Ilya!

„Poor Ilya!“ Andrey cried one day as he recalled the past.

At the sound of that name Olga suddenly dropped her hands and her embroidery into her lap, threw back her head, and sank into thought. His exclamation had brought back memories.

„How is he getting on?“ she asked after a pause. „Can’t we find out?“

Andrey shrugged. „One might think“, he said, „that we were living at a time when there was no post, and when people who had gone their different ways regarded each other as lost and, indeed, lost all trace of each other“.

„You might write again to some of your friends: we should at least find out something“.

„We shouldn’t find out anything that we don’t know already that he is alive and well and living in the same place – I know that without writing to my friends. As for how he is, how he is enduring his life, whether he is morally dead, or there still is a spark of life glowing in him – that no stranger could find out“.

„Please don’t talk like that, Andrey: it frightens me and hurts me to hear you. I should like to know, and I’m afraid to find out“.

She was ready to cry.

„We shall be in Petersburg in the spring, and we shall find out for ourselves“.

„That isn’t enough. We must do all we can“.

„Haven’t I done so? Haven’t I tried my best to persuade him, to do everything I could for him, arranged his affairs for him – if only he had shown the slightest sign of appreciation! He’s ready to do anything when you see him, but as soon as you’re out of sight it’s good-bye – he’s gone to sleep again! It’s like trying to deal with a dipsomaniac!“

„But why do you let him out of your sight?“ Olga said impatiently. „He must be dealt with resolutely: put him in the carriage and take him away. Now that we are going to move to our estate, he’ll be near us. We’ll take him with us…“

„What trouble we have with him!“ Andrey said, walking up and down the room. „There’s no end to it!“

„You don’t find it a burden, do you?“ said Olga. „That is news! It’s the first time I’ve heard you grumble about it“.

„I’m not grumbling“, replied Andrey. „I’m just thinking aloud“.

„And why should you do that? You haven’t come to the conclusion that it is a bore and a nuisance, have you?“

She looked searchingly at him. He shook his head.

„No, not a nuisance, but a waste of time. I can’t help thinking that sometimes“.

„Don’t say it, please!“ she stopped him. „I shall think of it all day again, as I did last week, and feel miserable. If your friendship for him is dead, you must try to do your best for him out of human feeling. If you grow tired, I’ll go to him myself, and I shan’t leave without him. I’m sure he will be moved by my entreaties. I can’t help feeling that I shall cry bitterly if I find him broken-down or dead. Perhaps, my tears“ -

„Will bring him back to life, you think?“ Andrey interposed. „Well, if they don’t bring him back to active life, they might at least make him look round him and change his way of living for something better. He won’t live in squalor, but near those who are his equals, with us. I only saw him for a moment that time, and he at once came to himself and was ashamed“.

„You don’t love him still, do you?“ Andrey asked, jestingly.

„No!“ Olga replied in good earnest, thoughtfully, as though looking into the past. „I don’t love him still, but there is something in him that I love, something to which, I believe, I have remained faithful, and shall not change as other people do…“

Oh? Who are those other people? You aren’t thinking of me, are you? But you are mistaken. And if you want to know the truth, it is I who taught you to love him and nearly got you into trouble. But for me you would have passed him by without noticing him. It was I made you realize that he possessed no less intelligence than other people, only it was buried under a rubbish-heap and asleep in idleness. Shall I tell you why he is dear to you and what you still love in him?“

She nodded assent.

„Because he possesses something that is worth more than any amount of intelligence – an honest and faithful heart! It is the matchless treasure that he has carried through his life unharmed. People knocked him down, he grew indifferent and, at last, dropped asleep, crushed, disappointed, having lost the strength to live; but he has not lost his honesty and his faithfulness. His heart has never struck a single false note; there is no stain on his character. No well-dressed-up lie has ever deceived him and nothing will lure him from the true path. A regular ocean of evil and baseness may be surging round him, the entire world may be poisoned and turned upside down – Oblomov will never bow down to the idol of falsehood, and his soul will always be pure, noble, honest… His soul is translucent, clear as crystal. Such people are rare; there aren’t many of them; they are like pearls in a crowd! His heart cannot be bribed; he can be relied on always and anywhere. It is to this you have remained faithful, and that is why nothing I do for him will ever be a burden to me. I have known lots of people possessing high qualities, but never have I met a heart more pure, more noble, and more simple. I have loved many people, but no one so warmly and so firmly as Oblomov. Once you know him, you cannot stop loving him. Isn’t that so? Am I right?“

Olga was silent, her eyes fixed on her work. Andrey pondered.

„Is that all? What else is there? Oh“, he added gaily as he came to himself, „I quite forgot his „dove-like tenderness“…“

Olga laughed, quickly threw down her sewing, and, running up to Andrey, flung her arms round his neck, gazed for a few minutes with shining eyes into his eyes, then, putting her head on her husband’s shoulder, sank into thought. There rose in her mind Oblomov’s gentle, dreamy face, his tender look, his submissiveness, then his pitiful, shamefaced smile with which he answered her reproach at parting – and she felt so unhappy, so sorry for him.

„You won’t leave him?“ she said with her arms still round her husband’s neck. „You won’t abandon him, will you?“

„Never! Not unless a gulf opens suddenly, or a wall rises between us“.

She kissed her husband.

’Will you take me to him in Petersburg?»

He hesitated and was silent.

«Will you? Will you?» she asked, insisting on an answer.

«Listen, Olga», he said, trying to free his neck from her embrace; «we must first…»

«No, say – yes! Promise, or I won’t leave you alone!»

«All right», he replied, «only not the first, but the second time. I know very well what you will feel like if he…»

«Don’t say another word!» she interrupted. «Yes, you will take me: together we shall do everything. Alone you won’t be able to – you won’t want to!»

«Perhaps you’re right, only I’m afraid you will be upset, and perhaps for a long time», he said, not altogether pleased that Olga had forced him to consent.

«Remember, then», she concluded, resuming her seat, «you will only give him up if „a gulf opens up or a wall rises between us.“ I won’t forget those words».