“But have you a lover?”
“Pardon me, I don’t understand what you’re saying. People, it’s time we were going.”
“That is, what don’t you understand? Have you ever slept with a man?”
“Comrade Simanovsky, I had not presupposed that you would bring us to such a person. Thank you. It was exceedingly charming of you!”
It was difficult for Liubka to surmount the first step. She was of those natures which endure long, but tear loose rapidly; and she, usually so timorous, was unrecognizable at this moment.
“But I know!” she was screaming in wrath. “I know, that you’re the very same as I! But you have a papa, a mamma; you’re provided for, and if you have to, then you’ll even commit abortion—many do so. But if you were in my place, when there’s nothing to stuff your mouth with, and a girlie doesn’t understand anything yet, because she can’t read or write; while all around the men are shoving like he-dogs—then you’d be in a sporting house too. It’s a shame to put on airs before a poor girl—that’s what!”
Simanovsky, who had gotten into trouble, said a few general consolatory words in a judicious bass, such as the noble fathers used in olden comedies, and led his ladies off.
But he was fated to play one more very shameful, distressing, and final role in the free life of Liubka. She had already complained to Lichonin for a long time that the presence of Simanovsky was oppressive to her; but Lichonin paid no attention to womanish trifles: the vacuous, fictitious, wordy hypnosis of this man of commands was strong within him. There are influences, to get rid of which is difficult, almost impossible. On the other hand, he was already for a long time feeling the burden of co-habitation with Liubka. Frequently he thought to himself: “She is spoiling my life; I am growing common, foolish; I have become dissolved in fool benevolence; it will end up in my marrying her, entering the excise or the assay office, or getting in among pedagogues; I’ll be taking bribes, will gossip, and become an abominable provincial morel. And where are my dreams of the power of thought, the beauty of life, of love and deeds for all humanity?” he would say, at times even aloud, and pull his hair. And for that reason, instead of attentively going into Liubka’s complaints, he would lose his temper, yell, stamp his feet, and the patient, meek Liubka would grow quiet and retire into the kitchen, to have a good cry there.
Now more and more frequently, after family quarrels, in the minutes of reconciliation he would say to Liubka:
“My dear Liuba, you and I do not suit each other, comprehend that. Look: here are a hundred roubles for you, ride home. Your relatives will receive you as their own. Live there a while, look around you. I will come for you after half a year; you’ll have become rested, and, of course, all that’s filthy, nasty, that has been grafted upon you by the city, will go away, will die off. And you’ll begin a new life independently, without any assistance, alone and proud!”