Fyodor Dostoyevsky - THE COMPLETE WORKS OF FYODOR DOSTOYEVSKY

“To help you Nellie, and to look after you.”

“Why? What for? I’ve never done anything like that for her.”

“Kind people don’t wait for that, Nellie. They like to help people who need it, without that. That’s enough, Nellie; there are lots of kind people in the world. It’s only your misfortune that you haven’t met them and didn’t meet them when you needed them.”

Nellie did not speak. I walked away from her. But a quarter of an hour later she called me to her in a weak voice, asked for something to drink, and all at once warmly embraced me and for a long while would not let go of me. Next day, when Alexandra Semyonovna appeared, she welcomed her with a joyful smile I though she still seemed for some reason shamefaced with her.

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IT WAS ON THAT DAY that I was the whole evening at Natasha’s I arrived home late. Nellie was asleep. Alexandra Semyonovna was sleepy too, but she was still sitting up with the invalid waiting for me to come in. At once in a hurried whisper she began to tell me that Nellie had at first been in very good spirits, even laughing a great deal, but afterwards she was depressed and, as I did not come back, grew silent and thoughtful. “Then she began complaining that her head ached, began to cry, and sobbed so that I really didn’t know what to do with her,” Alexandra Semyonovna added. “She began talking to me about Natalya Nikolaevna, but I could not tell her anything. She left off questioning me but went on crying afterwards, so that she fell asleep in tears. Well, goodbye, Ivan Petrovitch. She’s better anyway, I can see that, and I must go home. Filip Filippovitch told me to. I must confess that this time he only let me come for two hours but I stayed on of myself. But never mind, don’t worry about me. He doesn’t dare to be angry…. Only perhaps…. Ach, my goodness, Ivan Petrovitch, darling, what am I to do? He always comes home tipsy now! He’s very busy over something, he doesn’t talk to me, he’s worried, he’s got some important business in his mind; I can see that; but yet he is drunk every evening…. What I’m thinking is, if he has come home, who will put him to bed? Well, I’m going, I’m going, goodbye. Goodbye Ivan Petrovitch. I’ve been looking at your books here. What a lot of books you’ve got, and they must all be clever. And I’m such a fool I’ve never read anything… Well, till tomorrow…” But next morning Nellie woke up depressed and sullen, and answered me unwillingly. She did not speak to me of her own accord, but seemed to be angry with me. Yet I noticed some looks bent upon me stealthily, as it were, on the sly; in those looks there was so much concealed and heartfelt pain, yet there was in them an unmistakable tenderness which was not apparent when she looked at me directly. It was on that day that the scene over the medicine took place with the doctor. I did not know what to think.

But Nellie was entirely changed to me. Her strange ways, her caprices, at times almost hatred for me, continued up to the day when she ceased to live with me, till the catastrophe which was the end of our romance, But of that later.

It happened, however, sometimes that she would be for an hour as affectionate to me as at first. Her tenderness was redoubled at such moments; most often at such times she wept bitterly. But these hours soon passed and she sank back into the same misery as before, and looked at me with hostility again or was as capricious as she had been with the doctor, or suddenly noticing that I did not like some new naughtiness on her part, she would begin laughing, and almost always end in tears.

She once quarrelled even with Alexandra Semyonovna, and told her that she wanted nothing from her. When I began to scold her in Alexandra Semyonovna’s presence she grew angry, answered with an outburst of accumulated spite, but suddenly relapsed into silence and did not say another word to me for two days, would not take one of her medicines, was unwilling even to eat and drink and no one but the old doctor was able to bring her round and make her ashamed.

I have mentioned already that from the day of the scene over the medicine a surprising affection had sprung up between the doctor and her. Nellie was very fond of him and always greeted him with a goodhumoured smile however sad she had been before he came. For his part the old man began coming to us every day and sometimes even twice a day even when Nellie had begun to get up and had quite recovered, and she seemed to have so bewitched him that he could not spend a day without hearing her laugh and make fun of him, sometimes very amusingly. He began bringing her picture-books, always of an edifying character. One of them he bought on purpose for her. Then he began bringing her dainties, sweetmeats in pretty boxes. On such occasions he would come in with an air of triumph, as though it were his birthday, and Nellie guessed at once that he had come with a present. But he did not display the presents, but only laughed slyly, seated himself beside Nellie, hinting that if a certain young lady knew how to behave herself and had been deserving of commendation in his absence the young lady in question would merit a handsome reward. And all the while he looked at her so simply and goodnaturedly that though Nellie laughed at him in the frankest way, at the same time there was a glow of sincere and affectionate devotion in her beaming eyes at that moment. At last the old man solemnly got up from his chair, took out a box of sweets and as he handed it to Nellie invariably added: “To my future amiable spouse.” At that moment he was certainly even happier than Nellie. Then they began to talk, and every time he earnestly and persuasively exhorted her to take care of her health and gave her impressive medical advice.

“Above all one must preserve one’s health,” he declared dogmatically, “firstly and chiefly in order to remain alive, and secondly in order to be always healthy and so to attain happiness in life. If you have any sorrows, my dear child, forget them, and best of all try not to think of them. If you have no sorrows…well, then too, don’t think about them, but try to think only of pleasant things … of something cheerful and amusing.”

“And what shall I think of that’s cheerful and amusing?” Nellie would ask.

The doctor was at once nonplussed.

“Well…of some innocent game appropriate to your age or, well…something of that….”

“I don’t want to play games, I don’t like games,” said Nellie. “I like new dresses better.”

“New dresses! Hm! Well, that’s not so good. We should in all things be content with a modest lot in life. However… maybe…there’s no harm in being fond of new dresses.”

“And will you give me a lot of dresses when I’m married to you?”

“What an idea!” said the doctor and he could not help frowning. Nellie smiled slyly and, even forgetting herself for a minute, glanced at me.

“However, I’ll give you a dress if you deserve it by your conduct,” the doctor went on.

“And must I take my medicine every day when I’m married to you?”

“Well, then, perhaps you may not have to take medicine always.”

And the doctor began to smile.

Nellie interrupted the conversation by laughing. The old man laughed with her, and watched her merriment affectionately.

“A playful sportive mind!” he observed, turning to me. “But still one can see signs of caprice and a certain whimsicalness and irritability.”

He was right. I could not make out what was happening to her. She seemed utterly unwilling to speak to me, as though I had treated her badly in some way. This was very bitter to me. I frowned myself, and once I did not speak to her for a whole day, but next day I felt ashamed. She was often crying and I hadn’t a notion how to comfort her. On one occasion, however, she broke her silence with me.