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pictured my past and future to myself more clearly. The course

of our married life from the time of our first visit to Petersburg now

presented itself to me in a new light, and lay like a reproach on my

conscience. For the first time I clearly recalled our start at Nikolskoye

and our plans for the future; and for the first time I asked myself what

happiness had my husband had since then. I felt that I had behaved badly to

him. “By why”, I asked myself, “did he not stope me? Why did he make

pretences? Why did he always avoid explanations? Why did he insult me? Why

did he not use the power of his love to influence me? Or did he not love

me?” But whether he was to blame or not, I still felt the kiss of that

strange man upon my cheek. The nearer we got to Heidelberg, the clearer grew

my picture of my husband, and the more I dreaded our meeting. “I shall tell

him all,” I thought, “and wipe out everything with tears of repentance; and

he will forgive me.” But I did not know myself what I meant by

“everything”; and I did not believe in my heart that he would forgive me.

 

As soon as I entered my husband’s room and saw his calm though surprised

expression, I felt at once that I had nothing to tell him, no confession to

make, and nothing to ask forgiveness for. I had to suppress my unspoken

grief and penitence.

 

“What put this into your head?” he asked. “I meant to go to Baden

tomorrow.” Then he looked more closely at me and seemed to take alarm.

“What’s the matter with you? What has happened?” he said.

 

“Nothing at all,” I replied, almost breaking down. “I am not going back. Let

us go home, tomorrow if you like, to Russia.”

 

For some time he said nothing but looked at me attentively. Then he said,

“But do tell me what has happened to you.”

 

I blushed involuntarily and looked down. There came into his eyes a flash of

anger and displeasure. Afraid of what he might imagine, I said with a power

of pretence that surprised myself:

 

“Nothing at all has happened. It was merely that I grew weary and sad by

myself; and I have been thinking a great deal of our way of life and of you.

I have long been to blame towards you. Why do you take me abroad, when you

can’t bear it yourself? I have long been to blame. Let us go back to

Nikolskoye and settle there for ever.”

 

“Spare us these sentimental scenes, my dear,” he said coldly. “To go back to

Nikolskoye is a good idea, for our money is running short; but the notion of

stopping there ‘for ever’ is fanciful. I know you would not settle down.

Have some tea, and you will feel better,” and he rose to ring for the

waiter.

 

I imagined all he might be thinking about me; and I was offended by the

horrible thoughts which I ascribed to him when I encountered the dubious and

shame-faced look he directed at me. “He will not and cannot understand

me.” I said I would go and look at the child, and I left the room. I wished

to be alone, and to cry and cry and cry …

Chapter 4

The house at Nikolskoye, so long unheated and uninhabited, came to life

again; but much of the past was dead beyond recall. Tatyana Semyonovna was

no more, and we were now alone together. But far from desiring such close

companionship, we even found it irksome. To me that winter was the more

trying because I was in bad health, from which In only recovered after the

birth of my second son. My husband and I were still on the same terms as

during our life in Petersburg: we were coldly friendly to each other; but in

the country each room and wall and sofa recalled what he had once been to

me, and what I had lost. It was if some unforgiven grievance held us apart,

as if he were punishing me and pretending not to be aware of it. But there

was nothing to ask pardon for, no penalty to deprecate; my punishment was

merely this, that he did not give his whole heart and mind to me as he used

to do; but he did not give it to anyone or to anything; as though he had no

longer a heart to give. Sometimes it occurred to me that he was only

pretending to be like that, in order to hurt me, and that the old feeling

was still alive in his breast; and I tried to call it forth. But I always

failed: he always seemed to avoid frankness, evidently suspecting me of

insincerity, and dreading the folly of any emotional display. I could read

in his face and the tone of his voice, “What is the good of talking? I know

all the facts already, and I know what is on the tip of your tongue, and I

know that you will say one thing and do another.” At first I was mortified

by his dread of frankness, but I came later to think that it was rather the

absence, on his part, of any need of frankness. It would never have occurred

to me now, to tell him of a sudden that I loved him, or to ask him to repeat

the prayers with me or listen while Ii played the piano. Our intercourse

came to be regulated by a fixed code of good manners. We lived our separate

lives: he had his own occupations in which I was not needed, and which I no

longer wished to share, while I continued my idle life which no longer vexed

or grieved him. The children were still too young to form a bond between us.

 

But spring came round and brought Katya and Sonya to spend the summer with

us in the country. as the house at Nikolskoye was under repair, we went to

live at my old home at Pokrovskoye. The old house was unchanged— the

veranda, the folding table and the piano in the sunny drawing room, and my

old bedroom with its white curtains and the dreams of my girlhood which I

seemed to have left behind me there. In that room there were two beds: one

had been mine, and in it now my plump little Kokosha lay sprawling, when I

went at night to sign him with the cross; the other was a crib, in which the

little face of my baby, Vanya, peeped out from his swaddling clothes. Often

when I had made the sign over them and remained standing in the middle of

the quiet room, suddenly there rose up from all the corners, from the walls

and curtains, old forgotten visions of youth. Old voices began to sing the

songs of my girlhood. Where were those visions now? where were those dear

old sweet songs? All that I had hardly dared to hope for had come to pass.

My vague confused dreams had become a reality, and the reality had become an

oppressive, difficult, and joyless life. All remained the same — the garden

visible through the window, the grass, the path, the very same bench over

there above the dell, the same song of the nightingale by the pond, the same

lilacs in full bloom, the same moon shining above the house; and yet, in

everything such a terrible inconceivable change! Such coldness in all that

might have been near and dear! Just as in old times Katya and I sit quietly

alone together in the parlour and talk, and talk of him. But Katya has grown

wrinkled and pale; and her eyes no longer shine with joy and hope, but

express only sympathy, sorrow, and regret. We do not go into raptures as we

used to, we judge him coolly; we do not wonder what we have done to deserve

such happiness, or long to proclaim our thoughts to all the world. No! we

whisper together like conspirators and ask each other for the hundredth time

why all has changed so sadly. Yet he was still the same man, save for the

deeper furrow between his eyebrows and the whiter hair on his temples; but

his serious attentive look was constantly veiled from me by a cloud. And I

am the same woman, but without love or desire for love, with no longing for

work and not content with myself. My religious ecstasies, my love for my

husband, the fullness of my former life — all these now seem utterly remote

and visionary. Once it seemed so plain and right that to live for others was

happiness; but now it has become unintelligible. Why live for others, when

life had no attraction even for oneself?

 

I had given up my music altogether since the time of our first visit to

Petersburg; but now the old piano and the old music tempted me to begin

again.

 

One day i was not well and stayed indoors alone. My husband had taken Katya

and Sonya to see the new buildings at Nikolskoye. Tea was laid; I went

downstairs and while waiting for them sat down at the piano. I opened the

“Moonlight sonata” and began to play. There was no one within sight or

sound, the windows were open over the garden, and the familiar sounds

floated through the room with a solemn sadness. At the end of the first

movement I looked round instinctively to the corner where he used once to

sit and listen to my playing. He was not there; his chair, long unmoved, was

still in its place; through the window I could see a lilac bush against the

light of the setting sun; the freshness of evening streamed in through the

open windows. I rested my elbows on the piano and covered my face with both

hands; and so I sat for a long time, thinking. I recalled with pain the

irrevocable past, and timidly imagined the future. But for me there seemed

to be no future, no desires at all and no hopes. “Can life be over for

me?” I thought with horror; then I looked up, and, trying to forget and not

to think, I began playing the same movement over again. “Oh, God!” I prayed,

“forgive me if I have sinned, or restore to me all that once blossomed in my

heart, or teach me what to do and how to live now.” There was a sound of

wheels on the grass and before the steps of the house; then I heard cautious

and familiar footsteps pass along the veranda and cease; but my heart no

longer replied to the sound. When I stopped playing the footsteps were

behind me and a hand was laid on my shoulder.

 

“How clever of you to think of playing that!” he said.

 

I said nothing.

 

“Have you had tea?” he asked.

 

I shook my head without looking at him — I was unwilling to let him see the

signs of emotion on my face.

 

“They’ll be here immediately,” he said; “the horse gave trouble, and they

got out on the high road to walk home.”

 

“Let us wait for them,” I said, and went out to the veranda, hoping that he

would follow; but he asked about the children and went upstairs to see them.

Once more his presence and simple kindly voice made me doubt if I had really

lost anything. What more could I wish? “He is kind and gentle, a good

husband, a good father; I don’t know myself what more I want.” I sat down

under the veranda

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