Mimi's Marriage

by Lidiia Ivanovna Veselitskaia

"They won't let you get to sleep, they're intolerable! I'll shut that door directly," said mamma, getting up, and, lowering her voice to a whisper, so as not to wake the sleeping Vava, she added, "Just imagine what I saw to-day; they kissed before me. So, pour tout de bon. ... I went out on the balcony to shake a petticoat, and they were sitting there kissing.... Schopenhauer lay on the table and they were kissing. How disgusting!"

One day followed another without bringing any great changes. Mimotchka's cure was drawing to a close, and mamma had already put a mark in her almanac against the day fixed for their removal to Kislovodsk.

Vava went on with her cure, walked, read, and talked, and argued till she was hoarse with her new friends about the immortality of the soul, about the woman's question, and about the thoughts and looks of Leo Tolstoi.

Mimotchka was without a care, and flirted gaily with Valerian Nicolaevitch. Her maid Katia flirted no less gaily with David Georgevitch, and mamma played at picquet with the bilious dignitary from Petersburg, or craned her neck watching other people's love affairs. And both Vava and Mimotchka improved in health and looks every day, so that mamma, joyfully noticing this, said to her partner:

"How fond people are of praising up everything foreign and running down their own country. What things they told us about the Caucasus I And yet how my young people have improved here! If you had only seen my daughter in the spring.... She looked like a ghost! We were afraid she would go into a consumption. Do you know, our waters are better than those abroad."

The old gentleman did not even smile, but, dealing the cards with his bony fingers, he contradicted mamma. He could not take upon himself to give any opinion about ladies' illnesses—it was beyond the sphere of his competence.... Perhaps the ladies had improved in health, perhaps ... But in regard to his fellow-men he would venture to say that here it was only the healthy that improved. The doctors improved; yes, those robbers certainly improved their circumstances.... A set of clowns who couldn't distinguish one illness from another (the old gentleman had already changed doctors four times, and acknowledged to mamma that he couldn't digest a fifth). They went about courting and flirting and riding on horseback like madmen, while the invalids had to put up with every discomfort. What was the Government about? They took bribes and commissions under the inspector's very nose. It was all robbery, pillage, and disorder.... Wait a bit!... If the fifth doctor did not kill him, he would write an article about them under the title of "Our watering-places and our doctors." And they would recognise themselves, they would recognise themselves.... Wait a bit!...

Mamma smiled good-humouredly and indulgently as she sorted her cards. What was the use of arguing with a man who was a martyr to his liver and stomach! How could he digest his doctor when he couldn't digest his dinner?... And with her sweetest smile, and in a voice that mamma knew how to make softer than almond oil, she said to him: "But do you know what I would advise you to try?—a simple, but well-known remedy. My son-in-law suffered for years from the most obstinate catarrh; and he made a cure and took the waters. But do you know what did him good? I'll tell you. Just a pinch on the end of a knife." ... And so on.

It was a hot, very hot day. Mimotchka, on coming from the baths, went up on the mountain and sat down on a bench where she generally rested after her bath. She wore a light cambric dress, and yet could hardly breathe. The heat acted unpleasantly on her nerves; besides which, she had something on her mind. The day before they had had a quarrel, and now she felt ashamed and vexed with herself. He had been angry with her yesterday, and had said that he would not go on to Kislovodsk, but would go straight from Jeleznovodsk to the baroness's country place, where he had been invited to stay. He was angry because Mimotchka would not go out riding with him alone, and had said that it would look "awkward!" Oh, what a fool she was, what a fool! Now she would gladly give half her life to get back that word. How coarse and stupid it was! She had showed that she was afraid. And what was there to be afraid of? Hadn't she gone out riding alone with Variashski, and with the officer of Spiridon Ivanovitch's division? didn't the baroness ride alone with him, with Valerian Nicolaevitch? And what of it? Was anyone shocked by it? Not in the least. Awkward, awkward!... Oh, what a fool she was! And what must he think of her now? Good heavens, what could she do to please him? Now they would part coldly and inimically, and if he ever after thought of her, it would be as a fool and an idiot. But no, it was impossible, surely they would not part so?

Here he comes. He came up to her with a solemn, dignified expression of countenance, and saluted her coldly. Then he talked of the weather, and, having asked her permission to sit down beside her, seated himself at the further end of the bench. Oh, what a chill seemed to come from his elegant person! The top of Mount Elbrouz itself couldn't be colder. And Mimotchka's hands and feet grew cold from the proximity of this Elbrouz, and she felt ready to cry.

And yet the sun was hot, and the air burning and close. Nature seemed exhausted with the heat. The cracked, parched earth prayed to the heavens for rain; the splendidly grown trees stood morosely and lazily; not a leaf stirred; on every rock from below and above the grasshoppers chirped loudly.