But if his happiness should escape him now, at the last moment; if he frightens it away by some foolish, violent word!
On the other hand, if she says yes! His heart beats high. He builds the most fantastic air castles, and, charmed by his own fancies, he says to himself: "How beautiful, ah, how beautiful!"
And around him the spring dies and the blossoms fall--fall--they all fall!
XXI.
It is Sunday. In the midst of the little English Catholic chapel in Paris kneels Nita, her face in her hands. When mass is over, without waiting to greet any acquaintances, she returns home. She looks pale, has evidently slept badly. The shadow in her eyes is darker than ever. Sadly her eyes wander over the park. "Spring is dead," says she. And suddenly--she had thought it long past, but the conversation with Sonia revived the painful remembrance anew--she thinks of that time, six full years ago, when, in a sweet, dreamy May night, quite like yesterday, a sultry hurricane had killed the spring of her young, pure, sensitive life with all its poetic enthusiasm and Heaven-aspiring, jubilant exuberance.
And with this recollection, the old, never fully vanquished horror of life has again awakened in her, that terrible, all-consuming, all-degrading horror which must forever exclude her from every sweet, unconscious, surrendering inclination of the heart.
Wearily she mounts the broad stairs to her apartment. Sonia is not at home. Nita seats herself at her writing-table, as she does every Sunday, unwillingly, but punctually, to make up her weekly accounts.
Then there is a ring without. The maid announces: "Herr Lensky."
"Let him come in," says Nita, and as Nikolai enters, adds indifferently: "Take a seat and amuse yourself as you can. There is a book of Leech's caricatures. Sonia will be back soon; her father unexpectedly arrived, and she has gone to the exhibition with him; but they are to lunch with me. You are also cordially invited if you choose to accept. Meanwhile, permit me to finish my accounts." With pen in hand, she has led him from the drawing-room where the writing-table stands into the pretty little cosey corner, and now wishes to leave him and return to her work. With an imploring glance he withholds her.
"I am not in the mood to look at picture-books," says he. "If you cannot let your accounts wait, I will come another time."