Page:Chernyshevsky - What's to be done? A romance.djvu/37

Rh Vérotchka sang "Troïka," which describes, as we know, a girl of charming beauty all eyes to see an officer pass.

"Well, now, that's not so bad," murmured the old woman from the adjoining room. "When she likes, this Verka can be very agreeable at least."

Soon Vérotchka stopped singing and began to talk with Storechnikoff, but in French.

"Imbecile that I am!" thought the old woman; "to think that I should have forgotten to tell her to speak Russian! But she talks in a low voice, she smiles; it's going well! it's going well! Why does he make such big eyes? It is easy to see that he is an imbecile, and that is what we are after. Good! she extends her hand to him. Is she not agreeable, this Verka?"

This is what Vérotchka said to Storechnikoff:

"I must speak severely to you, sir; last evening at the theatre you told your friends that I was your mistress. I will not tell you that this lie was cowardly; for, if you had understood the whole import of your words, I do not think that you would have uttered them. But I warn you that if, at the theatre or in the street, you ever approach me, I will give you a blow. I know that my mother will kill me with ill-treatment [it was here that Vérotchka smiled], but what does that matter, since life is so little to me? This evening you will receive from my mother a note informing you that I am indisposed and unable to join you in the sleigh-ride."

He looked at her with big eyes, as Maria Alexevna had observed.

She resumed:

"I address you, sir, as a man of honor not yet utterly depraved. If I am right, I pray you to cease your attentions, and I, for my part, will pardon your calumny, If you accept, give me your hand."

He shook her hand without knowing what he did.

"Thank you," she added; "and now go. You can give as a pretext the necessity for ordering the horses."

He stood as one stupefied, while she began once more to sing "Troïka."

If connoisseurs had heard Vérotchka, they would have been astonished at the extraordinary feeling which she put into her song; in her, feeling surely dominated art.

Meanwhile Maria Alexevna was coming, followed by her cook carrying the breakfast and coffee on a tray. But Storechnikoff, pretending that he had orders to give concerning the preparation of the horses, withdrew toward the door instead of approaching, and, before the steward's wife could protest, the young man went out.