pulled a piece of blue paper out of his high boot, blew at it for some reason or another, and handed it to Nejdanov. The latter took the piece of paper, unfolded it, read it carefully, and passed it on to Mashurina. She stood up, also read it, and handed it back to Nejdanov, although Paklin had extended his hand for it. Nejdanov shrugged his shoulders and gave the secret letter to Paklin. The latter scanned the paper in his turn, pressed his lips together significantly, and laid it solemnly on the table. Ostrodumov took it, lit a large match, which exhaled a strong odour of sulphur, lifted the paper high above his head, as if showing it to all present, set fire to it, and, regardless of his fingers, put the ashes into the stove. No one moved or pronounced a word during this proceeding; all had their eyes fixed on the floor. Ostrodumov looked concentrated and business-like, Nejdanov furious, Paklin intense, and Mashurina as if she were present at holy mass.
About two minutes went by in this way, everyone feeling uncomfortable. Paklin was the first to break the silence.
“Well?” he began. “Is my sacrifice to be received on the altar of the fatherland? Am I permitted to bring, if not the whole at any rate, twenty-five or thirty roubles for the common cause?”
Nejdanov flared up. He seemed to be boiling over with annoyance, which was not lessened by the solemn burning of the letter—he was only waiting for an opportunity to burst out.
“I tell you that I don’t want it, don’t want, don’t want it! I’ll not allow it and I’ll not take it! I can get the money. I can get it at once. I am not in need of anyone’s help!
“My dear Alexai,” Paklin remarked, “I see that you are not a democrat in spite of your being a revolutionist!”
“Why not say straight out that I’m an aristocrat?”
“So you are up to a certain point.”
Nejdanov gave a forced laugh.
“I see you are hinting at the fact of my being illegitimate. You can save yourself the trouble, my dear boy. I am not likely to forget it.”
Paklin threw up his arms in despair.
“Aliosha! What is the matter with you? How can you twist my words so? I hardly know you today.”
Nejdanov shrugged his shoulders.
“Basanov’s arrest has upset you, but he was so careless—”
“He did not hide his convictions,” Mashurina put in gloomily. “It is not for us to sit in judgment upon him!”
“Quite so; only he might have had a little more consideration for others, who are likely to be compromised through him now.”
“What makes you think so?” Ostrodumov bawled out in his turn. “Basanov has plenty of character, he will not betray anyone. Besides, not every one can be cautious you know, Mr. Paklin.”
Paklin was offended and was about to say something when Nejdanov interrupted him.
“I vote we leave politics for a time, ladies and gentlemen!” he exclaimed.
A silence ensued.
“I ran across Skoropikin today,” Paklin was the first to begin. “Our great national critic, aesthetic, and enthusiast! What an insufferable creature! He is forever boiling and frothing over like a bottle of sour kvas. A waiter runs with it, his finger stuck in the bottle instead of a cork, a fat raisin in the neck, and when it has done frothing and foaming there is nothing left at the bottom but a few drops of some nasty stuff, which far from quenching any one’s thirst is enough to make one ill. He’s a most dangerous person for young people to come in contact with.”
Paklin’s true and rather apt comparison raised no smile on his listeners’ faces, only Nejdanov remarked that if young people were fools enough to interest themselves in aesthetics, they deserved no pity whatever, even if Skoropikin did lead them astray.
“Of course,” Paklin exclaimed with some warmth—the less sympathy he met with, the more heated he became—“I admit that the question is not a political one, but an important one, nevertheless. According to Skoropikin, every ancient work of art is valueless because it is old. If that were true, then art would be reduced to nothing more or less than mere fashion. A preposterous idea, not worth entertaining. If art has no firmer foundation than that, if it is not eternal, then it is utterly useless. Take science, for instance. In mathematics do you look upon Euler, Laplace, or Gauss as fools? Of course not. You accept their authority. Then why question the authority of Raphael and Mozart? I must admit, however, that the laws of art are far more difficult to define than the laws of nature, but they exist just the same, and he who fails to see them is blind, whether he shuts his eyes to them purposely or not.”
Paklin ceased, but no one uttered a word. They all sat with tightly closed mouths as if feeling unutterably sorry for him.
“All the same,” Ostrodumov remarked, “I am not in the least sorry for the young people who run after Skoropikin.”
“You are hopeless,” Paklin thought. “I had better be going.”
He went up to Nejdanov, intending to ask his opinion about smuggling in the magazine, the “Polar Star”, from abroad (the “Bell” had already ceased to exist), but the conversation took such a turn that it was impossible to raise the question. Paklin had already taken up his hat, when suddenly, without the slightest warning, a wonderfully pleasant, manly baritone was heard from the passage. The very sound of this voice suggested something gentle, fresh, and well-bred.
“Is Mr. Nejdanov at home?”
They all looked at one another in amazement.
“Is Mr. Nejdanov at home?” the baritone repeated.
“Yes, he is,” Nejdanov replied at last.
The door opened gently and a man of about forty entered the room and slowly removed his glossy hat from his handsome, closely cropped head. He was tall and well-made, and dressed in a beautiful cloth coat with a gorgeous beaver collar, although it was already the end of April. He impressed Nejdanov and Paklin, and even Mashurina and Ostrodumov, with his elegant, easy carriage and courteous manner. They all rose instinctively on his entrance.
III
THE elegantly dressed man went up to Nejdanov with an amiable smile and began: “I have already had the pleasure of meeting you and even speaking to you, Mr. Nejdanov, the day before yesterday, if you remember, at the theatre.” (The visitor paused, as though waiting for Nejdanov to make some remark, but the latter merely bowed slightly and blushed.) “I have come to see you about your advertisement, which I noticed in the paper. I should like us to have a talk if your visitors would not mind …” (He bowed to Mashurina, and waved a grey-gloved hand in the direction of Paklin and Ostrodumov.)
“Not at all,” Nejdanov replied awkwardly. “Won’t you sit down?”
The visitor bowed from the waist, drew a chair to himself, but did not sit down, as every one else was standing. He merely gazed around the room with his bright though half-closed eyes.
“Goodbye, Alexai Dmitritch,” Mashurina exclaimed suddenly. “I will come again presently.”
“And I too,” Ostrodumov added.
Mashurina did not take the slightest notice of the visitor as she passed him, but went straight up to Nejdanov, gave him a hearty shake of the hand, and left the room without bowing to anyone. Ostrodumov followed her, making an unnecessary noise with his boots, and snorting out once or twice contemptuously, “There’s a beaver collar for you!”
The visitor accompanied them with a polite though slightly inquisitive look, and then directed his gaze to Paklin, hoping the latter would follow their example,