"You seem to have soon become bored!" cried she, laughing. "Let us go
down to the river. It is charming there, now."
As she passed in front of the men, her shapely figure swayed slightly,
and there was a look of dark mystery in her eyes that seemed to say
something, to promise something.
"Go for a walk till supper-time," said Maria Ivanovna.
"Delighted," exclaimed Sarudine. His spurs clinked, as he offered Lida
his arm.
"I hope that I may be allowed to come too," said Novikoff, meaning to
be satirical, though his face wore a tearful expression.
"Who is there to prevent you?" replied Lida, smiling, at him over her
shoulder.
"Yes, you go, too," exclaimed Sanine. "I would come with you if she
were not so thoroughly convinced that I am her brother."
Lida winced somewhat, and glanced swiftly at Sanine, as she laughed, a
short, nervous laugh.
Maria Ivanovna was obviously displeased.
"Why do you talk in that stupid way?" she bluntly exclaimed. "I suppose
you think it is original?"
"I really never thought about it at all," was Sanine's rejoinder.
Maria Ivanovna looked at him in amazement. She had never been able to
understand her son; she never could tell when he was joking or in
earnest, nor what he thought or felt, when other comprehensible persons
felt and thought much as she did herself. According to her idea, a man
was always bound to speak and feel and act exactly as other men of his
social and intellectual status were wont to speak and feel and act. She
was also of opinion that people were not simply men with their natural
characteristics and peculiarities, but that they must be all cast in
one common mould. Her own environment encouraged and confirmed this
belief. Education, she thought, tended to divide men into two groups,
the intelligent and the unintelligent. The latter might retain their
individuality, which drew upon them the contempt of others. The former
were divided into groups, and their convictions did not correspond with
their personal qualities but with their respective positions. Thus,
every student was a revolutionary, every official was bourgeois, every
artist a free thinker, and every officer an exaggerated stickler for
rank. If, however, it chanced that a student was a Conservative, or an
officer an Anarchist, this must be regarded as most extraordinary, and
even unpleasant. As for Sanine, according to his origin and education
he ought to have been something quite different from what he was; and
Maria Ivanovna felt as Lida, Novikoff and all who came into contact
with him felt, that he had disappointed expectation. With a mother's
instinct she quickly saw the impression that her son made on those
about him; and it pained her.