Marie Tarnowska

“I did not say you were to ask him for it,” retorted Prilukoff.

“What then?”

“Telephone and invite him to dine with you to-morrow.”

“Well? And then?”

“Then we shall see.”

As he insisted I complied reluctantly.

Kamarowsky accepted the invitation with touching gratitude, and a large basket of roses preceded his arrival.

Prilukoff, who was still hanging about in my boudoir, but declared that he would not stay to dinner, sniffed the roses with a cynical smile:

“Flowers! Flowers! Nothing but flowers! Nous allons changer tout cela.”

The door bell rang, announcing the arrival of my visitor.

“What am I to do with him now he is here?” I asked Prilukoff uneasily. “What shall I say?”

“Do nothing and say nothing. And mind you don't open any letter in his presence.”

“Any letter?” I asked, in bewilderment. “What letter?”

“I tell you not to open any. That is enough.” With this obscure injunction Prilukoff urged me towards the drawing-room, and I went in to receive my guest.

Count Kamarowsky, while inspiring me with the deepest pity, frequently irritated and annoyed me. His grief for his lost Emilia was doubtless deep and sincere; but sometimes when I tried to console him I seemed to read in his tear-filled eyes an emotion that was not all sorrow, and in the clasp of his hand I perceived a fervor that spoke of something more than gratitude. I felt hurt for the sake of my poor friend, Lily, so lately laid to her rest; and I shrank from him with feelings akin to anger and aversion.

Yet, when I saw him moving away, pale in his deep mourning, leading his sad little child by the hand, my heart was touched and I would call them back to me and try to comfort them both. The child clung to me with passionate affection, while his father seemed loth ever to leave my side.

Conversation between us always soared in the highest regions of ethereal and spiritual things; our talk was all on abstract subjects, dwelling especially on the immortality of the soul, the abode of the departed, the probabilities of reunion in the world beyond. The commonplace everyday prose of life was so far removed from our intercourse that I felt shy of having asked him to dinner. To eat in the presence of so much sorrow seemed indecorous and out of keeping. Nevertheless, as I had invited him to dine I could not but seat myself opposite him at the flower-decked, fruit-laden table.

A man-servant, lent to me for the occasion by Prilukoff, handed the zakusta and the vodka; and soon in the mellow atmosphere of the little dining-room, under the gentle luster of the pink-shaded lamps, a rare smile blossomed timidly now and then out of the gloom of our melancholy conversation.

We had scarcely finished taking our coffee when, to my astonishment, Prilukoff was announced. He entered with rapid step, holding a large sealed envelope in his hand. For a moment he seemed disconcerted at finding that I was not alone, and looked as if he would hide the letter behind his back. Then, with a slight shrug of the shoulders, as if acquiescing in the unavoidable presence of a stranger, he handed me the envelope with a deep bow.

“What is it?” I asked in surprise.

Prilukoff glanced somewhat uneasily at my guest, then he bent forward and said in a low voice—yet not so low that the other could not hear what he said:

“This morning, Countess, you did me the honor of confiding to me the fact that you needed ten thousand rubles. I shall be most grateful and honored if you will accept that sum from me.” So saying, he placed the envelope in my hand. Then with a brief salutation to Count Kamarowsky and another profound bow to me, he pleaded haste and withdrew.

A flush had mounted to the Count's temples.

“Who was that?” he asked in a harsh voice.

I mentioned Prilukoff's name, and Kamarowsky with knitted eyebrows exclaimed: “You must have very confidential relations with him, if he permits himself to give you ten thousand rubles.”

“Oh, no—no,” I stammered. “He is—he is only lending them to me. I shall pay them back, of course—”

Kamarowsky had risen from his chair. He took both my hands and pressed them to his breast.

“How wrong of you! How wrong! Why did you not ask me? Have you no confidence in me? How can you accept assistance from a stranger when I am here—I, who am so devoted to you?”

I know not why I burst into tears. A sense of shame and degradation overcame me. In a moment his arms were round me.

“Dearest, sweetest, do not cry. I know you must feel humiliated at accepting money from that man, who may afterwards make all kinds of claims upon you. Return the money to him, I implore you, and accept it from me.”

I could not answer for my tears.

“Promise me that you will give it back,” Kamarowsky went on, clasping me closer to him. “If you refuse me this favor I shall go away and you shall never see me again. For the sake of our Emilia—for the sake of little Grania—accept it from me. And let me be your friend from now on and forever.”

It took a long time to reconcile me to the sense of my own debasement.

He wrote out a check to me for ten thousand rubles and put it into my hands. He closed my fingers forcibly over it, pressing them closely and thanking me in a moved voice.

Then he went away, and I was left alone with the check and Prilukoff's sealed envelope.

I had wanted five thousand rubles and here I was with twenty thousand before me!

Poor, good Kamarowsky! And poor, dear, kind Prilukoff!

“I do not see why I should really return this to Prilukoff!” I said to myself.

I broke the seals and opened the envelope that he had presented to me with so much solemnity. Petrified with astonishment I gazed at its contents. Then I laughed softly.

“On the whole, I think I will return it,” I said, and laid the envelope aside.

It was full of old newspaper cuttings!

XXV

Facilis descensus Averni.

My downfall was rapid and irretrievable.

I soon became familiar with expedients and intrigues, I trod the tortuous paths that lead down into the valley of dishonor. For the outside world I might still appear a person of distinction, I might still call myself the Countess Tarnowska, but I had ceased to be that simple, ordinary, peerless being—an honest woman. I seemed to be surrounded by that peculiar atmosphere which envelops the adventuress as in an invisible mist—that imperceptible emanation by which persons of repute are instinctively repelled, and which draws within its ambit the idler and adventurer, the depredator and outcast of society.

I had accepted money to which I had no claim. From this want of dignity to the want of rectitude how brief is the step! Between indiscretion and transgression how uncertain is the boundary! And suddenly there comes a day when one awakes to find oneself—a criminal!

Ah, then we stop short in horror. We look back and see the abyss, the impassable gulf that henceforward separates us from the distant, candid summits of innocence. How has it been possible for us to travel along that vertiginous road which knows no return? What evil spirits have bandaged our eyes, have placed for our feet bridges and stepping stones so that almost without noticing it we have crossed ravines and precipices which never in this life we may traverse again? We can but go forward and downward: we can turn back no more.

Not at this period did I realize the irrevocable character of the fate I had chosen. Rather did I seem to perceive a new life opening out before me, leading me back once more to rectitude and honor, a return to that peaceful, conventional existence so often scorned by those who lead it, so bitterly regretted and desired by those who have forfeited and forsaken it.

Prilukoff still held me bound to him by the triple bonds of gratitude, of affection and of complicity. But Count Kamarowsky was swaying me towards a brighter and securer future. My marriage with Vassili, so long merely an empty and nominal tie, was about to be dissolved by a decree from the Holy Synod, and Kamarowsky implored me to marry him. His sadness and the loneliness of his little son moved me deeply; the thought of bringing light and joy into their lives was unspeakably sweet to me, while for my part I rejoiced to think that by the side of a worthy and honorable man I might take my place in the world once more, rehabilitated and redeemed. With Prilukoff, as I could see, downfall and ruin were imminent. He had left Moscow for a few days; but he would return, and alas! he would resume his dominion over me. I knew that with him the ultimate plunge into dishonor was inevitable.

And so with bitter tears of repentance, clasping the two fair heads of Tioka and Grania to my breast, I vowed to Heaven that I would be to them both a tender and a faithful mother, worthy of the lofty duty that by Divine grace was to be once more assigned to me.