Endless as the Russian winter seems, there does, at length, when hope is dormant, come that quickening of nature when the green steppes break through snowy coverlets, when swelling buds burst the last, thin ice-films from the branches, and the melancholy peasant-chants come nearer to the major key than at any other season. Now, also, was the time when young blood rushes like sap through the veins, and artists' dreams turn, irresistibly, to the greatest of their subjects. On such a day it was that Joseph Kashkarin and Irina Petrovna came for the first time face to face.
Irina's reappearance in the city of her brother's fall, was made a year or more after the battle in the Akheskaia. The history of the twelvemonth of her hiding, lay buried in that oblivion that must shroud frequent periods of lives like hers. It seemed destined that she should flash, at intervals, across certain horizons, and never without bringing to bear some momentary, powerful influence upon the life she illumined. She was not, like some of her class, led by principles more or less consistent and dependable: sordid greed for money; complete selfishness; experienced heartlessness. To her own detriment, Bohemia and penury could attract her as surely and as frequently as heavily paid-for luxury. Contrast, indeed, constituted the one law of her lawlessness. Without this, how had it been possible for that first contact with the young painter to have filled her, instantaneously, with the variable flame that had so often been her undoing?
Mademoiselle Petrovna, a young person fairly notorious, by this time, among the half-world of three or four Russian cities, was now living in Moscow, perfectly protected by the patronage of the universally connected, much-besought, Prince G——: a venerable personage of some seventy winters, whose decorous mansion in the old Equerries' Quarter was considerably better known than his bijou maisonnette in the Fourmenny district, at present occupied by the young lady of whom he ardently desired to possess a discreet portrait: one which, as an "ideal figure" might safely decorate drawing-room or library in his ostensible home. But in this affair, as in all other really desirable matters, Prince G——easily perceived the difficulty of complete discretion. Alas! To no famous brush dared he intrust his rather obvious commission. And his search for a competent, yet unknown, artist, led him at last to the studio of Monsieur Kashkarin, who had been recommended by the voice of Fate speaking through the decorous tongue of the Academy director.
Irina appeared upon the threshold of Joseph's modest studio clad from top to toe in a billow of flaming scarlet: tulle and velvet and poppies cunningly mingled, and well foiled by the solemn black of her escort's formal garb. While the vision floated about the room examining the various sketches and studies scattered over the walls, Joseph managed to keep his head sufficiently to go through the necessary preliminaries with his Excellency, who, a trifle nervous about his situation, and convinced that no danger to his possession could possibly accrue through this shy and boyish young artist, so plainly in the throes of poverty, was much relieved when the matter of size and price had been settled and he could take his departure, leaving Irina to her first sitting.
As the door closed behind the well-padded back of her Prince, Irina's indifference dropped from her like a cloak, and she returned to the proximity of the intoxicated boy, captured his blue gaze with the slumbrous fire of her Oriental eyes, and then laughed at him—and laughed—and musically laughed, till the fire from his brain leaped to his fingertips. Suddenly, commanding her, he flung his canvas on the easel, seized his charcoal, and, completely misconstruing his own sensations, began to draw her as she stood.
The work of that hour was inspirational. In it, he accomplished more than was done in the succeeding month. In the very beginning he managed, unconsciously, to make Irina respect his talent. She saw all the best of him, the finest of his power: which never before had flamed so high, and was never to flame so high again. But Irina, filled from top to toe with the tempérament that comprehends every vagary and something of genius, watched the illumination of his face and eyes till she was beset with high desire: till her present life, with its hollow luxury, its spiceless ease, its savorless pretence, had become abominable to her. Her heart was in the room wherein she stood, set all upon the man for whom she posed: whose eye, as yet, looked upon her not as man but as workman, who sought only the secret message in her written for his brush.
Through the first two hours, during which she alternately posed and rested, the two of them spoke scarce one word. In the beginning, their sensations were crudely formulative. But they rose, by degrees, till, at the end, each was beset by a force so powerful that action had become an impossibility. Their farewell ran thus:
"When do you wish me again, Monsieur?"
"When you can come, Madame."
"In two days?"