Лев Толстой - Katia

“Why are you going away?” I began, in a resolute tone; then stopped, and looked him straight in the eyes.

He did not reply at once.

“Business!” he articulated, looking down on the ground.

I saw that it was difficult for him to dissemble in answering a question I put so frankly.

“Listen,” said I, “you know what this day is to me. In many ways it is a great day. If I question you, it is not only to show my interest in you (you know I am used to you, and fond of you), I question you because I must know. Why are you going away?”

“It is excessively difficult to tell you the truth, to tell you why I am going away. During this week I have thought a great deal of you and of myself, and I have decided that it is necessary for me to go. You understand … why? And if you love me, do not question me!”

He passed his hand across his brow, and, covering his eyes again with the same hand, he added:

“This is painful to me… But you understand, Katia!”

My heart began to beat hard in my breast.

“I cannot understand,” said I, “ I cannot do it ; but you , speak to me, in the name of God, in the name of this day, speak to me, I can hear everything calmly.”

He changed his attitude, looked at me, and caught the branch of lilac again.

“Well,” he resumed, after a moment’s silence, in a voice which vainly struggled to appear firm, “though it may be absurd, and almost impossible to translate into words, and though it will cost me much, I will try to explain to you;” – and as he uttered the words there were lines on his brow, as if he was suffering physical pain.

“Go on,” I said.

“You must suppose there is a gentleman, – A. we will call him, – old, weary of existence; and a lady, – Madame B. we will say, – young, happy, and as yet knowing neither the world nor life. In consequence of family relations A. loved B. like a daughter, with no fear of coming to love her differently.”

He was silent, and I did not interrupt him.

“But,” he suddenly pursued, in a brief, resolute voice, without looking at me, “he had forgotten that B. was young, that for her life was still but a game, that it might easily happen that he might love her, and that B. might amuse herself with him. He deceived himself, and one fine day he found that another feeling, weighty to bear as remorse, had stolen into his soul, and he was startled. He dreaded to see their old friendly relations thus compromised, and he decided to go away before these had time to change their nature.”

As he spoke, he again with seeming carelessness passed his hand across his eyes, and covered them.

“And why did he fear to love differently?” I said, presently, in a steady voice, controlling my emotion; but no doubt this seemed to him mere playful banter, for he answered with the air of a deeply wounded man:

“You are young; I am no longer so. Playing may please you, for me more is necessary. Only, do not play with me, for I assure you it will do me no good, – and you might find it weigh on your conscience! That is what A. said,” he added, – “but all this is nonsense; you understand, now, why I am going; let us say no more about it, I beg you…”

“Yes, yes, let us speak of it!” said I, and tears made my voice tremble. “Did she love him or not?”

He did not reply.

“And if he did not love her,” I continued, “why did he play with her as if she were a child?”

“Yes, yes, A. had been culpable,” he replied interrupting me; “but all that is over, and they have parted from each other … good friends!”

“But this is frightful! And is there no other end?” I exclaimed, terrified at what I was saying.

“Yes, there is one.” And he uncovered his agitated face, and looked at me steadily. “There are even two other ends, quite different. But, for the love of God, do not interrupt me, and listen to me quietly. Some say,” he went on, rising, and giving a forced, sad smile, “some say that A. went mad, that he loved B. with an insane love, and that he told her so… But that she only laughed at him. For her the matter had been but a jest, a trifle; for him, – the one thing in his life!”

I shivered, and would have broken in, to tell him that he should not dare to speak for me; but he stopped me, and, laying his hand upon mine:

“Wait!” he said, in a shaking voice: “others say that she was sorry for him, that she fancied – poor little girl, knowing nothing of the world – that she might actually love him, and that she consented to be his wife. And he – madman – he believed, – believed that all his life was beginning again; but she herself became conscious that she was deceiving him and that he was deceiving her… Let us talk no more about it!” he concluded, indeed evidently incapable of farther speech, and he silently sat down again opposite me.

He had said, “Let us talk no more about it,” but it was manifest that with all the strength of his soul he was waiting for a word from me. Indeed I tried to speak, and could not; something stopped my breath. I looked at him, he was pale, and his lower lip was trembling. I was very sorry for him. I made another effort, and suddenly succeeding in breaking the silence which paralyzed me. I said, in a slow, concentrated voice, fearing every moment it would fail me:

“There is a third end to the story” (I stopped, but he remained silent), “and this other end is that he did not love her, that he hurt her, hurt her cruelly, that he believed he was right to do it, that he … that he went away, and that, moreover, moreover, he was proud of it. It is not on my side, but on yours, that the trifling has been, from the first day I loved you; I loved you,” I repeated, and at the word “loved” my voice involuntarily changed from its tone of slow concentration to a kind of wild cry which appalled myself.

He was standing up before me, very pale, his lip trembled more and more, and I saw two heavy tears making their way down his cheeks.

“This is dreadful!” – I could barely get out the words, choked with anger and unshed tears. – “And why?..” I jumped up hastily, to run away.

But he sprang towards me. In a moment his head was upon my knees, my trembling hands were pressed again and again to his lips, and I felt hot drops falling upon them.

“My God, if I had known!” he was murmuring.

“Why? why?” I repeated mechanically, my soul in the grasp of that transport which seizes, possesses, and flies forever, that rapture which returns no more.

Five minutes afterwards, Sonia went dashing upstairs to Macha, and all over the house, crying out that Katia was going to marry Sergius Mikaïlovitch.

THERE was no reason to delay our marriage, and neither he nor I desired to do so. It is true that Macha longed to go to Moscow to order my trousseau, and Sergius’ mother considered it incumbent upon him before marrying to buy a new carriage and more furniture and have the whole house renovated, but we both insisted that this could all be done quite as well afterwards, and that we would be married at the end of the fortnight succeeding my birthday, without trousseau, parade, guests, groomsmen, supper, champagne, or any of the traditional attributes of a wedding. He told me that his mother was unwilling to have the great event take place without the music, the avalanche of trunks, the refurnished house, which, at a cost of thirty thousand roubles, had accompanied her own marriage; and how, without his knowledge, she had ransacked for treasures all the chests in the lumber rooms, and held sober consultations with Mariouchka, the housekeeper, on the subject of certain new carpets and curtains, quite indispensable to our happiness. On our side, Macha was similarly employed, with my maid Kouzminicha. She could not be laughed out of this; being firmly persuaded that when Sergius and I ought to have been discussing our future arrangements, we wasted our time in soft speeches (as was perhaps natural in our position); while of course, in fact, the very substance of our future happiness was dependent upon the cut and embroidery of my dresses, and the straight hems on our table-cloths and napkins. Between Pokrovski and Nikolski, every day and several times a day, mysterious communications were exchanged as to the progressing preparations; and though apparently Macha and the bridegroom’s mother were upon the tenderest terms, one felt sure of the constant passage of shafts of keen and hostile diplomacy between the two powers.