It was indeed Anninka, but changed beyond recognition.
She was no longer the beautiful, lively, buoyant girl with rosy cheeks, full gray eyes, high breast and heavy, ash-colored tresses massed low on her head, who had come to Golovliovo shortly after the death of Arina Petrovna, but a weak, wasted creature with a sunken chest, hollow cheeks, a hectic face and languid movements—a bent creature, almost hunch-backed.
Even her splendid braids looked miserable, and her eyes, blazing feverishly, seemed larger than ever in her emaciated face. Her eyes alone retained something of their former beauty.
Yevpraksia stared long at her as at a stranger, then finally recognized her.
"You?" she cried out, clapping her hands.
"I.
Well?"
Anninka laughed quietly, as if to add, "Yes, life has played me a dirty trick."
"Is uncle well?"
"Uncle? Nothing is the matter with him. He is alive, there is no doubt about that, but we hardly ever see him."
"What's the matter with him?"
"Just so—it's all because of lonesomeness."
"Don't tell me he has stopped haranguing?"
"He is real quiet now, miss.
He used to talk and talk, but suddenly he became silent.
Occasionally we hear him in his study talking to himself and sometimes even laughing, but as soon as he comes out of the room he is quiet.
People say his late brother, Stepan Vladimirych, had the same trouble. At first he was gay, then suddenly he became quiet.
And you, madam, are you well?"
Anninka only waved her hand in reply.
"And is your sister well?"
"She has been lying in her grave at the wayside at Krechetovo a month."
"Lord be merciful! At the wayside!"
"Of course, that's how they bury all suicides."
"Goodness! A lady—and to take her own life! How is that?"
"Yes, at first she was a 'lady,' and then she took poison, that's all.
And I, I am a coward, I want to live, and here I have come to you.
Not for long, oh, don't be afraid. I shall die soon, too."
Yevpraksia stared at her, as if she did not understand.
"Why are you looking at me? Am I such a fright?
Well, never mind my looks. However, I'll tell you later—later. Now pay the coachman and announce me to uncle."
She produced an old pocketbook and took out two yellow bills.
"And here is all my property," she added, pointing to a small trunk. "Here's everything, both my inheritance and my own acquisitions.
I am cold, Yevpraksia, very cold.
I am quite sick, there's not a bone in my body that doesn't ache, and here as if to spite me, it is so cold. As I was riding, I thought of only one thing, to get to Golovliovo, and die there, at least in warmth.
I'd like to have some vodka. Have you any?"
"You had better have some tea, madam. The samovar will soon be ready."
"No, I shall have tea later. Now I'd like to have some vodka. However, don't tell uncle about the vodka yet. It will all come out later."
While they set the table for tea in the dining-room Porfiry Vladimirych appeared.
Now Anninka in her turn was completely surprised at her uncle's emaciation and wild, faded looks.
Porfiry received Anninka in a strange manner, not coldly, but as if altogether indifferent.
He spoke little, as if under compulsion, like an actor trying to recall sentences of parts acted in days gone by, and was absent-minded, as though his mind were absorbed in some grave, urgent business from which he had been torn away to attend to trifles.
"So you have arrived?" he said. "What will you have, tea, coffee? Order the servants to fetch it."
In former days, at family meetings, Yudushka always played the sentimental part. This time it was Anninka who was filled with emotions, genuine emotions.
The claw of sorrow must have sunk deep into her being, for she threw herself on Porfiry Vladimirych's breast and embraced him ardently.
"Uncle, I have come to you!" she cried, and burst into tears.
"Well, you are welcome. I have enough rooms. Live here."
"I am sick, uncle, very, very sick."
"If you are sick, you must pray to God!
Whenever I am not well, I always heal myself through prayer."
"I have come to you, uncle, to die."