Yet at the question, "How do you propose to live?" he answered,
smiling, "Oh! somehow or other."
His calm, firm voice, and open glance made one feel that those words,
which meant nothing to his mother, had for him a deep and precise
significance.
Maria Ivanovna sighed, and after a pause said anxiously:
"Well, after all, it's your affair. You're no longer a child. You ought
to walk round the garden. It's looking so pretty now."
"Yes, of course! Come along, Lida; come and show me the garden," said
Sanine to his sister, "I have quite forgotten what it looks like."
Roused from her reverie, Lida sighed and got up. Side by side they
walked down the path leading to the green depths of the dusky garden.
The Sanines' house was in the main street of the town, and, the town
being small, their garden extended as far as the river, beyond which
were fields. The house was an old mansion, with rickety pillars on
either side and a broad terrace. The large gloomy garden had run to
waste; it looked like some dull green cloud that had descended to
earth. At night it seemed haunted. It was as if some sad spirit were
wandering through the tangled thicket, or restlessly pacing the dusty
floors of the old edifice. On the first floor there was an entire suite
of empty rooms dismal with faded carpets and dingy curtains. Through
the garden there was but one narrow path or alley, strewn with dead
branches and crushed frogs. What modest, tranquil life there was
appeared to be centred in one corner. There, close to the house, yellow
sand and gravel gleamed, and there, beside neat flower-beds bright with
blossom stood the green table on which in summer-time tea or lunch was
set. This little corner, touched by the breath of simple peaceful life,
was in sharp contrast to the huge, deserted mansion, doomed to
inevitable decay.
When the house behind them had disappeared from view and the silent,
motionless trees, like thoughtful witnesses, surrounded them, Sanine
suddenly put his arm round Lida's waist and said in a strange tone,
half fierce, half tender:
"You've become quite a beauty! The first man you love will be a happy
fellow."
The touch of his arm with its muscles like iron sent a fiery thrill
through Lida's soft, supple frame. Bashful and trembling, she drew away
from him as if at the approach of some unseen beast of prey.
They had now reached the river's edge. There was a moist, damp odour
from the reeds that swayed pensively in the stream. On the other side,
fields lay dim in twilight beneath the vast sky where shone the first
pale stars.