Fifty-Two Stories

In sight of the city gates, the troika slowed its pace, houses and people flashed by, and Sofya Lvovna quieted down, pressed herself to her husband, and gave herself up to her thoughts. Little Volodya sat facing her. Now her happy, bright thoughts already began to mingle with gloomy ones. She thought: This man who sits facing her was aware that she had loved him, and of course he believed the gossip that she had married the colonel par dépit. She had never once confessed her love to him, and did not want him to know, and she hid her feeling, but by his face it could be seen that he understood her perfectly—and her vanity suffered. The most humiliating thing about her position was that after the wedding this little Volodya suddenly started paying attention to her, which had never happened before. He would sit with her for long hours silently, or chatting about trifles, and now, in the sledge, he did not talk to her, but only stepped lightly on her foot, or pressed her hand. Obviously, all he had needed was that she get married; and it was obvious that he despised her, and that she aroused in him only an interest of a certain kind, as a bad and dishonorable woman. And when triumph and love for her husband mingled in her soul with a feeling of humiliation and offended pride, she became defiant and wanted to sit on the box and shout, whistle…

Just as they were driving past a convent, they heard the stroke of the big twenty-ton bell. Rita crossed herself.

“Our Olya is in this convent,” Sofya Lvovna said, also crossing herself and shuddering.

“Why did she go to the convent?” asked the colonel.

“Par dépit,” Rita replied angrily, obviously alluding to the marriage of Sofya Lvovna and Yagich. “This par dépit is fashionable nowadays. A challenge to the whole world. She loved to laugh, was a desperate flirt, only liked balls and her cavaliers, and suddenly—there, take that! Surprise!”

“That’s not true,” said little Volodya, turning down the collar of his fur coat and showing his handsome face. “There’s no par dépit in it, but sheer horror, if you wish. Her brother Dmitri was sent to hard labor and now nobody knows where he is. And her mother died of grief.”

He turned up his collar again.

“And Olya did well,” he added hollowly. “To live in the position of a ward, and with such a treasure as Sofya Lvovna—give that some thought!”

Sofya Lvovna heard the contemptuous tone of his voice and wanted to say something insolent to him, but she kept silent. She again became defiant; she got to her feet and shouted in a tearful voice:

“I want to go to matins! Coachman, turn back! I want to see Olya!”

They turned back. The ringing of the convent bell was deep, and, as it seemed to Sofya Lvovna, there was something in it reminiscent of Olya and her life. Bells were ringing in the other churches as well. When the coachman reined in the troika, Sofya Lvovna jumped out of the sledge and alone, without escort, quickly walked to the gateway.

“Hurry up, please!” called her husband. “It’s already late.”

She walked through the dark gateway, then down the avenue that led from the gates to the main church, and the snow crunched under her feet, and the ringing now came from right over her head and seemed to penetrate her whole being. Here was the church door, three steps down, then the vestibule with icons of saints on both sides, a smell of juniper and incense, another door, and a dark little figure opened it and bowed low, very low…Inside the church, the service had not begun yet. One nun was walking around the iconostasis lighting candles on the stands, another was lighting the big chandelier. Here and there, close to the columns and to the side chapels, dark figures stood motionless. “The way they’re standing now, it means they won’t budge till morning,” Sofya Lvovna thought, and to her the place seemed dark, cold, boring—more boring than at the cemetery. With a feeling of boredom she looked at the motionless, frozen figures, and suddenly her heart was wrung. Somehow in one of the nuns, small, with narrow shoulders and a black headcloth, she recognized Olya, though Olya, when she left for the convent, had been plump and had seemed taller. Hesitantly, extremely agitated for some reason, Sofya Lvovna went up to the novice, looked over her shoulder, and saw it was Olya.

“Olya!” she said and clasped her hands, and could no longer speak from agitation. “Olya!”

The nun recognized her at once, raised her eyebrows in surprise, and her pale, recently washed, clean face, and even, as it seemed, her white coif, which could be seen under the headcloth, brightened with joy.

“This is a God-sent miracle,” she said, and also clasped her thin, pale hands.

Sofya Lvovna embraced her tightly and kissed her, fearing as she did so that she smelled of drink.

“We were just driving by and remembered about you,” she said, breathless as if from walking quickly. “Lord, you’re so pale! I…I’m very glad to see you. Well, so? How is it? Do you miss us?”