Page:Chernyshevsky - What's to be done? A romance.djvu/50

40 good family should marry a one knows not what, and that mothers should give their consent!"

"Mamma, she is not a one knows not what; when you know her, you will approve my choice."

"When I know her! I shall never know her! Approve your choice! I forbid you to think of it any longer! I forbid you, do you understand?"

"Mamma, this parental absolutism is now somewhat out of date; I am not a little boy, to be led by the end of the nose. I know what I am about."

"Ah!" cried Anna Petrovna, closing her eyes.

Though to Maria Alexevna, Julie, and Vérotchka, Mikhaïl Ivanytch seemed stupid and irresolute, it was because they were women of mind and character: but here, so far as mind was concerned, the weapons were equal, and if, in point of character, the balance was in favor of the mother, the son had quite another advantage. Hitherto he had feared his mother from habit; but he had as good a memory as hers. They both knew that he, Mikhaïl Ivanytch, was the real proprietor of the establishment. This explains why Anna Petrovna, instead of coming straight to the decisive words, I forbid you, availed herself of expedients and prolonged the conversation. But Mikhaïl Ivanytch had already gone so far that he could not recoil.

"I assure you, Mamma, that you could not have a better daughter."

"Monster! Assassin of your mother!"

"Mamma, let us talk in cold blood. Sooner or later I must marry; now, a married man has more expenses than a bachelor. I could, if I chose, marry such a woman that all the revenues of the house would hardly be enough for us. If, on the contrary, I marry this girl, you will have a dutiful daughter, and you can live with us as in the past."

"Be silent, monster! Leave me!"

"Mamma, do not get angry, I beg of you; it is not my fault."

"You marry a plebeian, a servant, and it is not your fault!"

"Now, Mamma, I leave you without further solicitation, for I cannot suffer her to be thus characterized in my presence."

"Go, assassin!"

Anna Petrovna fainted, and Michel went away, quite content at having come off so well in this first skirmish, which in affairs of this sort is the most important.

When her son had gone, Anna Petrovna hastened to come out of her fainting fit. The situation was serious; her son was escaping her. In reply to "I forbid you," he had explained that the house belonged to him. After calming herself a little, she called her servant and confided her sorrow to her; the latter, who shared the contempt of her mistress for the steward's daughter, advised her