Sanine by Mikhail Artsybashev (ebook pdf reader for pc .TXT) 📕

beneath the thin bodice, as she began to sing, “Oh, beauteous Star of Love.” Pure and passionate, her notes floated out on the evening air. Yourii remained motionless, gazing at her, with bated breath. She felt that his eyes were upon her, and, closing her own, she sang on with greater sweetness and fervour. There was silence everywhere as if all things were listening; Yourii thought of the mysterious hush of woodlands in spring when a nightingale sings.

As Sina ceased on a clear, high note, the silence seemed yet more intense. The sunset light had faded; the sky grew dark and more vast. The leaves and the grass quivered imperceptibly; across the meadow and through the garden there passed a soft, perfumed breeze; faint as a sigh. Sina’s eyes, shining in the gloom, turned to Yourii.

“Why so silent?” she asked.

“It is almost too delightful here!” he murmured, and again he grasped a dewy branch of lilac.

“Yes, it is very beautiful,” replied Sina dreamily.

“In fact it is beautiful to be alive,” she added.

A thought, vague and disquieting, crossed Yourii’s mind, but it vanished without taking any clear shape. Someone loudly whistled twice on the other side of the meadow, and then came silence, as before.

“Do you like Schafroff?” asked Sina suddenly, being inwardly amused at so apparently inept a question.

Yourii felt a momentary pang of jealousy, but with a slight effort he replied gravely. “He’s a good fellow.”

“How devoted he is to his work!”

Yourii was silent.

A faint grey mist rose from the meadow and the grass grew paler in the dew.

“It is getting damp,” said Sina, shivering slightly.

Yourii unconsciously looked at her round, soft shoulders, feeling instantly confused, and she, aware of his glance became confused also, although it was pleasant to her.

“Let us go.”

Regretfully they returned along the narrow garden-path, each brushing lightly against the other at times as they walked. All around seemed dark and deserted, and Yourii fancied that now the garden’s own life was about to begin, a life mysterious and to all unknown. Yonder, amid the trees and across the dew-laden grass strange shadows soon would steal, as the dusk deepened, and voices whispered in green, silent places. This he said to Sina, and her dark eyes wistfully peered into the gloom. If, so Yourii thought, she were suddenly to fling all her clothing aside, and rush all white and nude and joyous over the dewy grass towards the dim thicket, this would not be in the least strange, but beautiful and natural; nor would it disturb the life of the green, dark garden, but would make this more complete. This, too, he had a wish to tell her, but he dared not do so, and spoke instead of the people and of lectures. But their conversation flagged, and then ceased, as if they were only wasting words. Thus they reached the gateway in silence, smiling to themselves, brushing the dew from the branches with their shoulders. Everything seemed as calm and happy and pensive as they were themselves. As before, the courtyard was dark and solitary, but the outer gate was open, and a sound of hasty footsteps in the house could be heard, and of the opening and shutting of drawers.

“Olga has come back,” said Sina.

“Oh! Sina, is that you?” asked Dubova from within, and the tone of her voice suggested some sinister occurrence. Pale and agitated, she appeared in the doorway.

“Where were you? I have been looking for you. Semenoff is dying!” she said breathlessly.

“What!” exclaimed Sina, horror-struck.

“Yes, he is dying. He broke a blood-vessel. Anatole Pavlovitch says that he’s done for. They have taken him to the hospital. It was dreadfully sudden. There we were, at the Ratoffs’, having tea, and he was so merry, arguing with Novikoff about something or other. Then he suddenly began to cough, stood up, and staggered, and the blood spurted out, on to the tablecloth, and into a little saucer of jam⁠ ⁠… all black, and clotted.⁠ ⁠…”

“Does he know it himself?” asked Yourii with grim interest. He instantly remembered the moonlit night, the sombre shadow, and the weak, broken voice, saying, “You will be alive, and you’ll pass my grave, and stop, whilst I⁠ ⁠…”

“Yes, he seems to know,” replied Dubova, with a nervous movement of the hands. “He looked at us all, and asked ‘What is it?’ And then he shook from head to foot and said, ‘Already!’⁠ ⁠… Oh! isn’t it awful?”

“It’s too shocking!”

All were silent.

It was now quite dark, yet, though the sky was clear, to them it seemed suddenly to have grown gloomy and sad.

“Death is a horrible thing!” said Yourii, turning pale.

Dubova sighed, and gazed into vacancy. Sina’s chin trembled, and she smiled helplessly. She could not feel so shocked as the others; young as she was, and full of life, she could not fix her thoughts on death. To her it was incredible, inconceivable that on a beautiful summer evening, radiantly pleasant such as this, someone should have to suffer and to die. It was natural, of course, but, for some reason or other, to her it seemed wrong. She was ashamed to have such a feeling, and strove to suppress it, endeavouring to appear sympathetic, an effort which made her distress seem greater than that of her companions.

“Oh! poor fellow!⁠ ⁠… is he really⁠ ⁠… ?”

Sina wanted to ask: “Is he really going to die very soon?” but the words stuck in her throat, and she plied Dubova with fatuous and incoherent questions.

“Anatole Pavlovitch says that he will die tonight or tomorrow morning,” replied Dubova, in a dull voice.

“Shall we go to him?” whispered Sina. “Or do you think that we had better not? I don’t know.”

This was the question uppermost in the minds of them all. Should they go and see Semenoff die? Was it a right or wrong thing to do? They all wanted to go, and yet were fearful of what they should see. Yourii shrugged his shoulders.

“Let us go,” he said. “Very likely they won’t admit us, and perhaps, too⁠—”

“Perhaps he