In a word, he had not gone through an infinity of useless trifles, without which he always felt as if he were caught unawares.
"The old woman is hale and hearty," he would muse at times. "Still she won't spend it all—impossible.
When she shared us out, she had a neat sum.
Maybe she transferred some to the orphans.
Oh, the old woman is rich. Yes, she is."
But these musings were not so very serious, and vanished without leaving an impress on his mind.
The mass of daily trivialities was already great, and there was as yet no urgent need to augment them by the addition of new trivialities.
Porfiry Vladimirych kept putting the matter off, and did not realize it was time to begin until after the damnation scene.
The catastrophe came sooner than he expected.
On the second day after Petenka's departure Arina Petrovna left for Pogorelka, and never again visited Golovliovo.
She spent a month in total solitude, keeping to her room and scarcely exchanging a word with her servants.
From force of habit she rose early in the morning, sat down at her desk, and began to play patience, but hardly ever brought the game to an end, and sat in frozen rigidity—with her glazed eyes fixed on the window.
What she thought about or whether she thought at all, even the keenest judge of the deep-lying mysteries of the human soul could not have divined.
She seemed to be trying to recollect something, perhaps how she came to be within those walls, and could not.
Alarmed by her mistress's silence, Afimyushka would appear in the room, arrange the pillows lining her easy-chair, and try to open a conversation on this or that, but received only impatient monosyllabic replies.
Once or twice Porfiry Vladimirych came to Pogorelka, invited mother dear to Golovliovo, tried to kindle her imagination with the prospect of mushrooms, German carp, and the other allurements of Golovliovo, but his overtures evoked nothing but an enigmatic smile.
One morning she tried to leave her bed as usual, but could not, though she felt no particular pain, and complained of nothing.
She took it, apparently, as a matter of course, without any sign of alarm.
The very day before she had been sitting at the table and even walked, though with difficulty, and now she was in bed "feeling indisposed."
It was even more comfortable.
But Afimyushka became thoroughly frightened and without the mistress's knowledge sent a messenger to Porfiry Vladimirych.
Yudushka came early the next morning. Arina Petrovna was considerably worse.
He put the servants through a cross-examination as to what mother had eaten and whether she had not overeaten. But Arina Petrovna had eaten almost nothing for a whole month, and had refused all food the previous day.
Yudushka expressed his grief, waved his hands, and like a good son, warmed himself at the oven in the maids' room so that he would not bring the cold into the patient's room.
At the same time he began to give orders and make arrangements. He had an extraordinary keenness for scenting death.
He made inquiries as to whether the priest was home and arranged that in case of emergency he should be sent for at once. He informed himself where mother's chest with her papers was, whether it was locked, and having satisfied himself concerning the state of things, he called in the cook and ordered dinner for himself.
"I need but little," he said. "Have you got a chicken? Well, prepare some chicken soup.
If you have some cured beef, get a bit of cured beef ready.
Then something fried, and I'll have enough."
Arina Petrovna lay prostrate on her back with her mouth open, breathing heavily.
Her eyes were staring wide. One hand projected from under the quilt of hare's fur and hung stiff.
She was evidently alive to the commotion incident upon her son's arrival, and perhaps his orders even reached her ears.
The lowered window-shades put the room in twilight.
The wicks were flickering their last at the bottom of the ikon lamps and sputtered audibly at contact with the water.
The air was close and fetid, unbearably suffocating from the overheated stoves, the sickening smell of the ikon lamps, and the breath of illness.
Porfiry Vladimirych, in his felt boots, glided to his mother's bed like a snake. His tall, lean figure wrapped in twilight swayed uncannily.
Arina Petrovna with a look half of surprise and half of fright followed his movements and huddled under her quilt.
"It is I, mother dear," he said. "What's the matter with you? You are all out of gear today. My, my, my!
No wonder I could not sleep all night. Something seemed to urge me on. 'Let's go and see,' I thought, 'how our Pogorelka friends are getting along.'
I got up in the morning, hitched a couple of horses to the pony cart, and here I am!"
Porfiry Vladimirych tittered affably, but Arina Petrovna did not answer, and drew herself together in a closer coil under her quilt.
"Well, God is merciful, mother dear," continued Yudushka. "The main thing is to stand up for yourself.
Don't put any stock in the ailment. Get up and take a walk through the room, like a sound, hale person. You see, just like this."
Porfiry Vladimirych rose from his seat and demonstrated how sound, hale persons walk.
"Oh, just a moment. I'll raise the window-shade and take a good look at you.
Oh, but you are first rate, my darling.
Just pluck up some courage, say your prayers, doll up, get into your Sunday best, and you'll be ready for a dance.
There, I have brought you some jolly good holy water, just taste some."
Porfiry Vladimirych took a flask out of his pocket, found a wine glass on the table, filled it and gave it to the patient.
Arina Petrovna made an effort to lift her head, but in vain.