§8
Such was the alarming character of our expected visitor. From early morning all the inmates of our house were keenly excited. I had never seen the black sheep myself, though I was born in his house, which was occupied by my father on his return from foreign parts; I was very anxious to see him, and I was also afraid, though I don’t know what I was afraid of.
Other visitors came before him—my father’s oldest nephew, two intimate friends, and a lawyer, a stout good-natured man who perspired freely. For two hours they all sat in silent expectation, till at last the butler came in, and, with a voice that seemed somehow unnatural, announced the arrival of our kinsman. “Bring him in,” said the Senator, in obvious agitation; my father began to take snuff, the nephew straightened his tie, and the lawyer turned to one side and cleared his throat. I was told to go upstairs, but I remained in the next room, shaking all over.
The uncle advanced at a slow and dignified pace, and my father and the Senator went to meet him. He was carrying an ikon[[13]] with both arms stretched out before him, in the way that ikons are carried at weddings and funerals; he turned towards his brothers and in a nasal drawl addressed them as follows:
[13]. A sacred picture.
“This is the ikon with which our father blessed me on his deathbed, and he then charged me and my late brother, Peter, to take his place and care for you two. If our father could know how you have behaved to your elder brother....”
“Come, mon cher frère,” said my father, in his voice of studied indifference, “you have little to boast about on that score yourself. These references to the past are painful for you and for us, and we had better drop them.”
“What do you mean? Did you invite me here for this?” shouted the pious brother, and he dashed the ikon down with such violence that the silver frame rang loudly on the floor. Now the Senator began, and he shouted still louder; but at this point I rushed upstairs, just waiting long enough to see the nephew and the lawyer, as much alarmed as I was, beating a retreat to the balcony.
What then took place, I cannot tell. The servants had all hid for safety and could give no information; and neither my father nor the Senator ever alluded to the scene in my presence. The noise grew less by degrees, and the division of the land was carried out, but whether then or later, I do not know.
What fell to my father was Vasílevskoë, a large estate near Moscow. We spent all the following summer there; and during that time the Senator bought a house for himself in the Arbat quarter of Moscow, so that, when we returned alone to our big house, we found it empty and dead. Soon after, my father also bought a new house in Moscow.
When the Senator left us, he took with him, in the first place, my friend Calot, and, in the second place, all that gave life in our establishment. He alone could check my father’s tendency to morbid depression, which now had room to develop and assert itself fully. Our new house was not cheerful: it reminded one of a prison or hospital. The ground-floor rooms were vaulted; the thick walls made the windows look like the embrasures of a fortress; and the house was surrounded on all sides by a uselessly large court-yard.
The real wonder was, not that the Senator left us, but that he was able to stay so long under one roof with my father. I have seldom seen two men more unlike in character.