Chapter 26

I SHOW OFF

AT tea time the reading came to an end, and the ladies began to
talk among themselves of persons and things unknown to me. This I
conceived them to be doing on purpose to make me conscious (for
all their kind demeanour) of the difference which years and
position in the world had set between them and myself. In general
discussions, however, in which I could take part I sought to
atone for my late silence by exhibiting that extraordinary
cleverness and originality to which I felt compelled by my
University uniform. For instance, when the conversation turned
upon country houses, I said that Prince Ivan Ivanovitch had a
villa near Moscow which people came to see even from London and
Paris, and that it contained balustrading which had cost 380,000
roubles. Likewise, I remarked that the Prince was a very near
relation of mine, and that, when lunching with him the same day,
he had invited me to go and spend the entire summer with him at
that villa, but that I had declined, since I knew the villa well,
and had stayed in it more than once, and that all those
balustradings and bridges did not interest me, since I could not
bear ornamental work, especially in the country, where I liked
everything to be wholly countrified. After delivering myself of
this extraordinary and complicated romance, I grew confused, and
blushed so much that every one must have seen that I was lying.
Both Varenika, who was handing me a cup of tea, and Sophia
Ivanovna, who had been gazing at me throughout, turned their
heads away, and began to talk of something else with an
expression which I afterwards learnt that good-natured people
assume when a very young man has told them a manifest string of
lies--an expression which says, "Yes, we know he is lying, and
why he is doing it, the poor young fellow!"

What I had said about Prince Ivan Ivanovitch having a country
villa, I had related simply because I could find no other pretext
for mentioning both my relationship to the Prince and the fact
that I had been to luncheon with him that day; yet why I had said
all I had about the balustrading costing 380,000 roubles, and
about my having several times visited the Prince at that villa (I
had never once been there--more especially since the Prince
possessed no residences save in Moscow and Naples, as the
Nechludoffs very well knew), I could not possibly tell you.
Neither in childhood nor in adolescence nor in riper years did I
ever remark in myself the vice of falsehood--on the contrary, I
was, if anything, too outspoken and truthful. Yet, during this
first stage of my manhood, I often found myself seized with a
strange and unreasonable tendency to lie in the most desperate
fashion. I say advisedly "in the most desperate fashion," for the
reason that I lied in matters in which it was the easiest thing
in the world to detect me. On the whole I think that a vain-
glorious desire to appear different from what I was, combined
with an impossible hope that the lie would never be found out,
was the chief cause of this extraordinary impulse.

After tea, since the rain had stopped and the after-glow of
sunset was calm and clear, the Princess proposed that we should
go and stroll in the lower garden, and admire her favourite spots
there. Following my rule to be always original, and conceiving
that clever people like myself and the Princess must surely be
above the banalities of politeness, I replied that I could not
bear a walk with no object in view, and that, if I DID walk, I
liked to walk alone. I had no idea that this speech was simply
rude; all I thought was that, even as nothing could be more
futile than empty compliments, so nothing could be more pleasing
and original than a little frank brusquerie. However, though much
pleased with my answer, I set out with the rest of the company.

The Princess's favourite spot of all was at the very bottom of
the lower garden, where a little bridge spanned a narrow piece of
swamp. The view there was very restricted, yet very intimate and
pleasing. We are so accustomed to confound art with nature that,
often enough, phenomena of nature which are never to be met with
in pictures seem to us unreal, and give us the impression that
nature is unnatural, or vice versa; whereas phenomena of nature
which occur with too much frequency in pictures seem to us
hackneyed, and views which are to be met with in real life, but
which appear to us too penetrated with a single idea or a single
sentiment, seem to us arabesques. The view from the Princess's
favourite spot was as follows. On the further side of a small
lake, over-grown with weeds round its edges, rose a steep ascent
covered with bushes and with huge old trees of many shades of
green, while, overhanging the lake at the foot of the ascent,
stood an ancient birch tree which, though partly supported by
stout roots implanted in the marshy bank of the lake, rested its
crown upon a tall, straight poplar, and dangled its curved
branches over the smooth surface of the pond--both branches and
the surrounding greenery being reflected therein as in a mirror.

"How lovely!" said the Princess with a nod of her head, and
addressing no one in particular.

"Yes, marvellous!" I replied in my desire to show that had an
opinion of my own on every subject. "Yet somehow it all looks to
me so terribly like a scheme of decoration."

The Princess went on gazing at the scene as though she had not
heard me, and turning to her sister and Lubov Sergievna at
intervals, in order to point out to them its details--especially
a curved, pendent bough, with its reflection in the water, which
particularly pleased her. Sophia Ivanovna observed to me that it
was all very beautiful, and that she and her sister would
sometimes spend hours together at this spot; yet it was clear
that her remarks were meant merely to please the Princess. I have
noticed that people who are gifted with the faculty of loving are
seldom receptive to the beauties of nature. Lubov Sergievna also
seemed enraptured, and asked (among other things), "How does that
birch tree manage to support itself? Has it stood there long?"
Yet the next moment she became absorbed in contemplation of her
little dog Susetka, which, with its stumpy paws pattering to and
fro upon the bridge in a mincing fashion, seemed to say by the
expression of its face that this was the first time it had ever
found itself out of doors. As for Dimitri, he fell to discoursing
very logically to his mother on the subject of how no view can be
beautiful of which the horizon is limited. Varenika alone said
nothing. Glancing at her, I saw that she was leaning over the
parapet of the bridge, her profile turned towards me, and gazing
straight in front of her. Something seemed to be interesting her
deeply, or even affecting her, since it was clear that she was
oblivious to her surroundings, and thinking neither of herself
nor of the fact that any one might be regarding her. In the
expression of her large eyes there was nothing but wrapt
attention and quiet, concentrated thought, while her whole
attitude seemed so unconstrained and, for all her shortness, so
dignified that once more some recollection or another touched me
and once more I asked myself, "Is IT, then, beginning?" Yet again
I assured myself that I was already in love with Sonetchka, and
that Varenika was only an ordinary girl, the sister of my friend.
Though she pleased me at that moment, I somehow felt a vague
desire to show her, by word or deed, some small unfriendliness.

"I tell you what, Dimitri," I said to my friend as I moved nearer
to Varenika, so that she might overhear what I was going to say,
"it seems to me that, even if there had been no mosquitos here,
there would have been nothing to commend this spot; whereas "--
and here I slapped my cheek, and in very truth annihilated one of
those insects--"it is simply awful."

"Then you do not care for nature?" said Varenika without turning
her head.

"I think it a foolish, futile pursuit," I replied, well satisfied
that I had said something to annoy her, as well as something
original. Varenika only raised her eyebrows a little, with an
expression of pity, and went on gazing in front of her as calmly
as before.

I felt vexed with her. Yet, for all that, the rusty, paint-
blistered parapet on which she was leaning, the way in which the
dark waters of the pond reflected the drooping branch of the
overhanging birch tree (it almost seemed to me as though branch
and its reflection met), the rising odour of the swamp, the
feeling of crushed mosquito on my cheek, and her absorbed look
and statuesque pose--many times afterwards did these things
recur with unexpected vividness to my recollection.