Family Happiness - Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy (classic books for 10 year olds .txt) 📗

class="calibre1">of me. And in his eyes I was the first and most excellent woman in the

world, the possessor of all possible virtues; and I strove to be that woman

in the opinion of the first and best of men.

 

He came to my room one day while I was praying. I looked round at him and

went on with my prayers. Not wishing to interrupt me, he sat down at a table

and opened a book. But I thought he was looking at me and looked round

myself. He smiled, I laughed, and had to stop my prayers.

 

“Have you prayed already?” I asked.

 

“Yes. But you go; I’ll go away.”

 

“You do say your prayers, I hope?”

 

He made no answer and was about to leave the room when I stopped him.

 

“Darling, for my sake, please repeat the prayers with me!” He stood up

beside me, dropped his arms awkwardly, and began, with a serious face and

some hesitation. Occasionally he turned towards me, seeking signs of

approval and aid in my face.

 

When he came to an end, I laughed and embraced him.

 

“I feel just as if I were ten! And you do it all!” he said, blushing and

kissing my hands.

 

Our house was one of those old-fashioned country houses in which several

generations have passed their lives together under one roof, respecting and

loving one another. It was all redolent of good sound family traditions,

which as soon as I entered it seemed to become mine too. The management of

the household was carried on by Tatyana Semyonovna, my mother-in-law, on

old-fashioned lines. Of grace and beauty there was not much; but, from the

servants down to the furniture and food, there was abundance of everything,

and a general cleanliness, solidity, and order, which inspired respect. The

drawing room furniture was arranged symmetrically; there were portraits on

the walls, and the floor was covered with home-made carpets and mats. In the

morning-room there was an old piano, with chiffoniers of two different

patterns, sofas, and little carved tables with bronze ornaments. My sitting

room, specially arranged by Tatyana Semyonovna, contained the best furniture

in the house, of many styles and periods, including an old pierglass, which

I was frightened to look into at first, but came to value as an old friend.

Though Tatyana Semyonovna’s voice was never heard, the whole household went

like a clock. The number of servants was far too large (they all wore soft

boots with no heels, because Tatyana Semyonovna had an intense dislike for

stamping heels and creaking soles); but they all seemed proud of their

calling, trembled before their old mistress, treated my husband and me with

an affectionate air of patronage, and performed their duties, to all

appearance, with extreme satisfaction. Every Saturday the floors were

scoured and the carpets beaten without fail; on the first of every month

there was a religious service in the house and holy water was sprinkled; on

Tatyana Semyonovna’s name day and on her son’s (and on mine too, beginning

from that autumn) an entertainment was regularly provided for the whole

neighborhood. and all this had gone on without a break ever since the

beginning of Tatyana Semyonovna’s life.

 

My husband took no part in the household management, he attended only to the

farm-work and the laborers, and gave much time to this. Even in winter he

got up so early that I often woke to find him gone. He generally came back

for early tea, which we drank alone together; and at that time, when the

worries and vexations of the farm were over, he was almost always in that

state of high spirits which we called “wild ecstasy”. I often made him tell

me what he had been doing in the morning, and he gave such absurd accounts

that we both laughed till we cried. Sometimes I insisted on a serious

account, and he gave it, restraining a smile. I watched his eyes and moving

lips and took nothing in: the sight of him and the sound of his voice was

pleasure enough.

 

“Well, what have I been saying? repeat it,” he would sometimes say. But I

could repeat nothing. It seemed so absurd that he should talk to me of any

other subject than ourselves. As if it mattered in the least what went on in

the world outside! It was at a much later time that I began to some extent

to understand and take an interest in his occupations. Tatyana Semyonovna

never appeared before dinner: she breakfasted alone and said good morning to

us by deputy. In our exclusive little world of frantic happiness a voice

form the staid orderly region in which she dwelt was quite startling: I

often lost self-control and could only laugh without speaking, when the maid

stood before me with folded hands and made her formal report: “The mistress

bade me inquire how you slept after your walk yesterday evening; and about

her I was to report that she had pain in her side all night, and a stupid

dog barked in the village and kept her awake; and also I was to ask how you

liked the bread this morning, and to tell you that it was not Taras who

baked today, but Nikolashka who was trying his hand for the first time; and

she says his baking is not at all bad, especially the cracknesl: but the

tea-rusks were over-baked.” Before dinner we saw little of each other: he

wrote or went out again while I played the piano or read; but at four

o’clock we all met in the drawing room before dinner. Tatyana Semyonovna

sailed out of her own room, and certain poor and pious maiden ladies, of

whom there were always two or three living in the house, made their

appearance also. Every day without fail my husband by old habit offered his

arm to his mother, to take her in to dinner; but she insisted that I should

take the other, so that every day, without fail, we stuck in the doors and

got in each other’s way. She also presided at dinner, where the

conversation, if rather solemn, was polite and sensible. The commonplace

talk between my husband and me was a pleasant interruption to the formality

of those entertainments. Sometimes there were squabbles between mother and

son and they bantered one another; and I especially enjoyed the scenes,

because they were the best proof of the strong and tender love which united

the two. after dinner Tatyana Semyonovna went to the parlor, where she sat

in an armchair and ground her snuff or cut the leaves of new books, while we

read aloud or went off to the piano in the morning room. We read much

together at this time, but music was our favorite and best enjoyment, always

evoking fresh chords in our hearts and as it were revealing each afresh to

the other. While I played his favorite pieces, he sat on a distant sofa

where I could hardly see him. He was ashamed to betray the impression

produced on him by the music; but often, when he was not expecting it, I

rose from the piano, went up to him, and tried to detect on his face signs

of emotion — the unnatural brightness and moistness of the eyes, which he

tried in vain to conceal. Tatyana Semyonovna, though she often wanted to

take a look at us there, was also anxious to put no constraint upon us. So

she always passed through the room with an air of indifference and a

pretence of being busy; but I knew that she had no real reason for going to

her room and returning so soon. In the evening I poured out tea in the large

drawing room, and all the household met again. This solemn ceremony of

distributing cups and glasses before the solemnly shining samovar made me

nervous for a long time. I felt myself still unworthy of such a distinction,

too young and frivolous to turn the tap of such a big samovar, to put

glasses on Nikita’s salver, saying “For Peter Ivanovich”, “For Marya

Minichna”, to ask “Is it sweet enough?” and to leave out limps of sugar for

Nurse and other deserving persons. “Capital! capital! Just like a grown-up

person!” was a frequent comment from my husband, which only increased my

confusion.

 

After tea Tatyana Semyonovna played patience or listened to Marya Minichna

telling fortunes by the cards. Then she kissed us both and signed us with

the cross, and we went off to our own rooms. But we generally sat up

together till midnight, and that was our best and pleasantest time. He told

me stories of his past life; we made plans and sometimes even talked

philosophy; but we tried always to speak low, for fear we should be heard

upstairs and reported to Tatyana Semyonovna, who insisted on our going to

bed early. Sometimes we grew hungry; and then we stole off to the pantry,

secured a cold supper by the good offices of Nikita, and ate it in my

sitting room by the light of one candle. He and I lived like strangers in

that big old house, where the uncompromising spirit of the past and of

Tatyana Semyonovna ruled supreme. Not she only, but the servants, the old

ladies, the furniture, even the pictures, inspired me with respect and a

little alarm, and made me feel that he and I were a little out of place in

that house and must always be very careful and cautious in our doings.

Thinking it over now, I see that many things — the pressure of that

unvarying routine, and that crowd of idle and inquisitive servants — were

uncomfortable and oppressive; but at the time that very constraint made our

love for one another still keener. Not I only, but he also, never grumbled

openly at anything; on the contrary he shut his eyes to what was amiss.

Dmitriy Sidorov, one of the footmen, was a great smoker; and regularly every

day, when we two were in the morning room after dinner, he went to my

husband’s study to take tobacco from the jar; and it was a sight to see

Sergey Mikhaylych creeping on tiptoe to me with a face between delight and

terror, and a wink and a warning forefinger, while he pointed at Dmitriy

Sidorov, who was quite unconscious of being watched. Then, when Dmitriy

Sidorov had gone away without having seen us, in his joy that all had passed

off successfully, he declared (as he did on every other occasion) that I was

a darling, and kissed me. At times his calm connivance and apparent

indifference to everything annoyed me, and I took it for weakness, never

noticing that I acted in the same way myself. “It’s like a child who dares

not show his will,” I thought.

 

“My dear! my dear!” he said once when I told him that his weakness surprised

me; “how can a man, as happy as I am, be dissatisfied with anything? Better

to give way myself than to put compulsion on others; of that I have long

been convinced. There is no condition in which one cannot be happy; but our

life is such bliss! I simply cannot be angry; to me now nothing seems bad,

but only pitiful and amusing. Above all — le mieux est l’ennemi du bien.

Will you believe it, when I hear a ring at the bell, or receive a letter, or

even wake up in the morning, I’m frightened. Life must go on, something may

change; and nothing can be better than the present.”

 

I believed him but did not understand him. I was happy; but I took that as a

matter of course, the invariable experience of people in our position,