Then she became silent, her eyes grew dull, she began to speak quietly and sadly, with a foolish helpless smile.
Mintz was drinking and pacing up and down the room, speaking volubly with noisy derision. The brandy flowed through his veins, warming his sluggish blood; his thoughts grew vivid and spiteful, engendering sarcastic, malicious remarks. Whenever he took a drink, he removed his pince-nez for a moment, and his eyes became evil, vacant and bemused.
Lydia Constantinovna sat in the corner of the sofa, covered her shoulders with a plaid shawl, and crossed her legs in the Turkish fashion.
"What a smell of chipre there is, Mintz," she murmured in a low voice. "I think I must be tipsy. Yes, I must be. When I drink a great deal I always begin to think there are too many perfumes about. They suffocate me, I get their taste in my mouth, they sing in my ears and I feel ill…. What a smell of chipre … it is my favourite perfume: do you smell it?"
She looked at Mintz with a half dazed stare, then continued:
"In an hour's time I shall be having hysterics. It is always the way when I drink too much. I don't feel cheerful any longer, I feel melancholy now, Mintz. I feel now as though … as though I have wept on this sofa all through the night … Oh, how happy we used to be once upon a time," she sighed tearfully, then added with a giggle. "Why I hardly know what I am saying!"
Mintz was walking up and down the room, measuring his steps extremely carefully. He halted in front of Lydia Constantinovna, removed his glasses and scowled:
"But I, when I drink, I begin to see things with extraordinary clearness: I see that we are melancholy because the devil only knows why or for what we are living; I see that life is impossible without faith; that our hearts and minds are exhausted with the endless discussions in cafes, attics and promenades. I realise that no matter what happens, villainy will always exist. I see, too, that we have been drinking because we feel lonely and dull—yes, even though we have been joking and laughing boisterously; I see that there is now the great joy and beauty of spring outside—so different from the distorted images visible to warped minds and clouded eyes; I see, moreover, that the Revolution has passed us by after throwing us aside, even though the New Economic Policy may put on us our feet again for a while, and that … that …" Mintz did not finish, but turned round abruptly and strode away with an air of self-assertion, into the remote end of the room, where the debris was littered.
"Yes, that is true … you are right," answered Lydia Constantinovna.
"But then I do not love Sergius, I never have done."
"Of course I am right," Mintz retorted severely from his dim corner.
"People never love others. They love themselves—through others."