“Yes, and I’m going with him.”
Vassily Ivanovich almost reeled over.
“You are going away?”
“Yes . . . I must.
Make the arrangements about the horses, please.”
“Very good . . . to the posting station . . . very good — only — only — why is it?”
“I must go to stay with him for a short time.
Afterwards I will come back here again.”
“Ah! for a short time . . . very good.” Vassily Ivanovich took out his handkerchief and as he blew his nose bent himself almost double to the ground. “All right, it will — all be done.
I had thought you were going to stay with us . . . a little longer.
Three days . . . after three years . . . that’s rather little, rather little, Evgeny.”
“But I tell you I’m coming back soon.
I have to go.”
“You have to . . . Well!
Duty comes before everything else . . . So you want the horses sent?
All right.
Of course Anna and I never expected this.
She has just managed to get some flowers from a neighbor; she wanted to decorate your room.” (Vassily Ivanovich did not even mention that every morning the moment it was light he consulted with Timofeich, and standing with his bare feet in slippers, pulling out with trembling fingers one crumpled ruble note after another, entrusted him with various purchases, particularly of good things to eat, and of red wine, which, as far as he could observe, the young men liked extremely.) “Liberty — is the main thing — that is my principle . . . one has no right to interfere . . . no . . .”
He suddenly fell silent and made for the door.
“We shall soon see each other again, father, really.”
But Vassily Ivanovich did not turn round, he only waved his hand and went out.
When he got back to the bedroom, he found his wife in bed and began to say his prayers in a whisper in order not to wake her up.
She woke, however.
“Is that you, Vassily Ivanovich?” she asked.
“Yes, little mother.”
“Have you come from Enyusha?
Do you know, I’m afraid he may not be comfortable on that sofa.
I told Anfisushka to put out for him your traveling mattress and the new pillows; I should have given him our feather bed, but I seem to remember he doesn’t like sleeping soft.”
“Never mind, little mother, don’t you worry.
He’s all right.
Lord have mercy on us sinners,” he continued his prayer in a low voice.
Vassily Ivanovich felt sorry for his old wife; he did not wish to tell her overnight what sorrow there was in store for her.
Bazarov and Arkady left on the following day.
From early morning the house was filled with gloom; Anfisushka let the dishes slip out of her hand; even Fedka became bewildered and at length took off his boots.
Vassily Ivanovich fussed more than ever; obviously he was trying to make the best of it, talked loudly and stamped his feet, but his face looked haggard and he continually avoided looking his son in the eyes.
Arina Vlasyevna wept quietly; she would have broken down and lost all control of herself if her husband had not spent twc whole hours exhorting her early that morning.
When Bazarov, after repeated promises to come back within a month at the latest, tore himself at last from the embraces detaining him, and took his seat in the tarantass, when the horses started, the bell rang and the wheels were moving — and when it was no longer any use gazing after them, when the dust had settled down, and Timofeich, all bent and tottering as he walked, had crept back to his little room; when the old people were left alone in the house, which also seemed to have suddenly shrunk and grown decrepit — Vassily Ivanovich, who a few moments before had been heartily waving his handkerchief on the steps, sank into a chair and his head fell on his breast.
“He has abandoned us, cast us off!” he muttered. “Abandoned us, he only feels bored with us now.
Alone, all alone, like a solitary finger,” he repeated several times, stretching out his hand with the forefinger standing out from the others.
Then Arina Vlasyevna came up to him and leaning her grey head against his grey head, she said:
“What can we do, Vasya?
A son is a piece broken off.
He’s like a falcon that flies home and flies away again when it wants; but you and I are like mushrooms growing in the hollow of a tree, we sit side by side without moving from the same place.
Only I will never change for you, and you will always be the same for me.”
Vassily Ivanovich took his hands from his face and embraced his wife, his friend, more warmly than he had ever embraced her in his youth; she comforted him in his sorrow.
Chapter 22
In silence, only rarely exchanging a few words, our friends traveled as far as Fedot’s.
Bazarov was not altogether pleased with himself, and Arkady was displeased with him.
He also felt gripped by that melancholy without a cause, which only very young people experience.
The coachman changed the horses and getting up on to the box, inquired: “To the right or to the left?”