while her heart was rent with secret, unshed tears. “That is not my grief, that is not my anguish, not my woe! What, what do I care for my mother, though I shall never have another mother in this world! What do I care that she cursed me in her last terrible hour? What do I care for my old golden life, for my warm room, for my maiden freedom? What do I care that I have sold myself to the evil one and abandoned my soul to the destroyer, that for the sake of happiness I have committed the unpardonable sin? Ach, that is not my grief, though in that great is my ruin! But what is bitter to me and rends my heart is that I am his shameless slave, that my shame and disgrace are dear to me, shameless as I am, but it is dear to my greedy heart to remember my sorrow as though it were joy and happiness that is my grief, that there is no strength in it and no anger for my wrongs!…”
The poor creature gasped for breath and a convulsive, hysterical sob cut short her words, her hot, laboured breath burned her lips, her bosom heaved and sank and her eyes flashed with incomprehensible indignation. But her face was radiant with such fascination at that moment, every line, every muscle quivered with such a passionate flood of feeling, such insufferable, incredible beauty that Ordynov’s black thoughts died away at once and the pure sadness in his soul was silenced. And his heart burned to be pressed to her heart and to be lost with it in frenzied emotion, to throb in harmony with the same storm, the same rush of infinite passion, and even to swoon with it. Katerina met Ordynov’s troubled eyes and smiled so that his heart burned with redoubled fire. He scarcely knew what he was doing.
“Spare me, have pity on me,” he whispered, controlling his trembling voice, bending down to her, leaning with his hand on her shoulder and looking close in her eyes, so close that their breathing was mingled in one. “You are killing me. I do not know your sorrow and my soul is troubled…. What is it to me what your heart is weeping over! Tell me what you want — I will do it. Come with me, let me go; do not kill me, do not murder me!..
Katerina looked at him immovably, the tears dried on her burning cheek. She wanted to interrupt him, to take his hand, tried to say something, but could not find the words. A strange smile came upon her lips, as though laughter were breaking through that smile.
“I have not told you all, then,” she said at last in a broken voice; “only will you hear me, will you hear me, hot heart? Listen to your sister. You have learned little of her bitter grief. I would have told you how I lived a year with him, but I will not…. A year passed, he went away with his comrades down the river, and I was left with one he called his mother to wait for him in the harbour. I waited for him one month, two, and I met a young merchant, and I glanced at him and thought of my golden years gone by. ‘Sister, darling,’ said he, when he had spoken two words to me, ‘I am Alyosha, your destined betrothed; the old folks betrothed us as children; you have forgotten me — think, I am from your parts.’
‘And what do they say of me in your parts? “Folk’s gossip says that you behaved dishonourably, forgot your maiden modesty, made friends with a brigand, a murderer,’ Alyosha said, laughing. ‘And what did you say of me?’
‘I meant to say many things when I came here’ — and his heart was troubled. ‘I meant to say many things, but now that I have seen you my heart is dead within me, you have slain me,’ he said. ‘Buy my soul, too, take it, though you mock at my heart and my love, fair maiden. I am an orphan now, my own master, and my soul is my own, not another’s. I have not sold it to anyone, like somebody who has blotted out her memory; it’s not enough to buy the heart, I give it for nothing, and it is clear it is a good bargain.’ I laughed, and more than once, more than twice he talked to me; a whole month he lived on the place, gave up his merchandise, forsook his people and was all alone. I was sorry for his lonely tears. So I said to him one morning, “Wait for me, Alyosha, lower down the harbour, as night comes on; I will go with you to your home, I am weary of my life, forlorn.’ So night came on, I tied up a bundle and my soul ached and worked within me. Behold, my master walks in without a word or warning. ‘Good-day, let us go, there will be a storm on the river and the time will not wait.’ I followed him; we came to the river and it was far to reach his mates. We look: a boat and one we knew rowing in it as though waiting for someone. ‘Good-day, Alyosha; God be your help. Why, are you belated at the harbour, are you in haste to meet your vessels? Row me, good man, with the mistress, to our mates, to our place. I have let my boat go and I don’t know how to swim.’
‘Get in,’ said Alyosha, and my whole soul swooned when I heard his voice. ‘Get in with the mistress, too, the wind is for all, and in my bower there will be room for you, too.’ We got in; it was a dark night, the stars were in hiding, the wind howled, the waves rose high and we rowed out a mile from shore — all three were silent.
“‘It’s a storm,’ said my master, ‘and it is a storm that bodes no good! I have never seen such a storm on the river in my life as is raging now! It is too much for our boat, it will not bear three!’
‘No, it will not,’ answered Alyosha, ‘and one of us, it seems, turns out to be one too many,’ he says, and his voice quivers like a harp-string. ‘Well, Alyosha, I knew you as a little child, your father was my mate, we ate at each other’s boards — tell me, Alyosha, can you reach the shore without the boat or will you perish for nothing, will you lose your life?’
‘I cannot reach it. And you, too, good man, if it is your luck to have a drink of water, will you reach the shore or not?’
‘I cannot reach it, it is the end for my soul. I cannot hold out against the stormy river! Listen, Katerina, my precious pearl! I remember such a night, but the waves were not tossing, the stars were shining, and the moon was bright…. I simply want to ask you, have you forgotten?’
‘I remember,’ said I. ‘Well, since you have not forgotten it, well, you have not forgotten the compact when a bold man told a fair maiden to take back her freedom from one unloved — eh?’
‘No, I have not forgotten that either,’ I said, more dead than alive. ‘Ah, you have not forgotten! Well, now we are in hard case in the boat. Has not his hour come for one of us? Tell me, my own, tell me, my dove, coo to us like a dove your tender word…’”
“I did not say my word then,” whispered Katerina, turning pale….
“Katerina!” A hoarse, hollow voice resounded above them. Ordynov started. In the doorway stood Murin. He was barely covered with a fur rug, pale as death, and he was gazing at them with almost senseless eyes. Katerina turned paler and paler and she, too, gazed fixedly at him, as though spellbound.
“Come to me, Katerina,” whispered the sick man, in a voice hardly audible, and went out of the room. Katerina still gazed fixedly into the air, as though the old man had still been standing before her. But suddenly the blood rushed glowing into her pale cheek and she slowly got up from the bed. Ordynov remembered their first meeting.
“Till tomorrow then, my tears!” she said, laughing strangely; “till tomorrow! Remember at what point I stopped: ‘Choose between the two; which is dear or not dear to you, fair maid!’ Will you remember, will you wait for one night?” she repeated, laying her hand on his shoulder and looking at him tenderly.
“Katerina, do not go, do not go to your ruin! He is mad,” whispered Ordynov, trembling for her.
“Katerina!” he heard through the partition.
“What? Will he murder me? no fear!” Katerina answered, laughing: “Goodnight to you, my precious heart, my warm dove, my brother!” she said, tenderly pressing his head to her bosom, while tears bedewed her face. “Those are my last tears.
Sleep away your sorrow, my darling, wake tomorrow to joy.” And she kissed him passionately.
“Katerina,
