“When he wakes up, please God, you shall see for yourself. Then when I
do like this, he simply beams on me, the darling! Simply beams like a
sunny day!” said Agafea Mihalovna.
“Well, well; then we shall see,” whispered Kitty. “But now go away, he’s
going to sleep.”
Chapter 7
Agafea Mihalovna went out on tiptoe; the nurse let down the blind,
chased a fly out from under the muslin canopy of the crib, and a bumblebee
struggling on the window-frame, and sat down waving a faded branch of
birch over the mother and the baby.
“How hot it is! if God would send a drop of rain,” she said.
“Yes, yes, sh—sh—sh——” was all Kitty answered, rocking a little, and
tenderly squeezing the plump little arm, with rolls of fat at the wrist, which
Mitya still waved feebly as he opened and shut his eyes. That hand worried
Kitty; she longed to kiss the little hand, but was afraid to for fear of waking
the baby. At last the little hand ceased waving, and the eyes closed. Only
from time to time, as he went on sucking, the baby raised his long, curly
eyelashes and peeped at his mother with wet eyes, that looked black in the
twilight. The nurse had left off fanning, and was dozing. From above came
the peals of the old prince’s voice, and the chuckle of Katavasov.
“They have got into talk without me,” thought Kitty, “but still it’s vexing
that Kostya’s out. He’s sure to have gone to the bee-house again. Though
it’s a pity he’s there so often, still I’m glad. It distracts his mind. He’s
become altogether happier and better now than in the spring. He used to be
so gloomy and worried that I felt frightened for him. And how absurd he
is!” she whispered, smiling.
She knew what worried her husband. It was his unbelief. Although, if she
had been asked whether she supposed that in the future life, if he did not
believe, he would be damned, she would have had to admit that he would
be damned, his unbelief did not cause her unhappiness. And she, confessing
that for an unbeliever there can be no salvation, and loving her husband’s
soul more than anything in the world, thought with a smile of his unbelief,
and told herself that he was absurd.
“What does he keep reading philosophy of some sort for all this year?”
she wondered. “If it’s all written in those books, he can understand them. If
it’s all wrong, why does he read them? He says himself that he would like
to believe. Then why is it he doesn’t believe? Surely from his thinking so
much? And he thinks so much from being solitary. He’s always alone,
alone. He can’t talk about it all to us. I fancy he’ll be glad of these visitors,
especially Katavasov. He likes discussions with them,” she thought, and
passed instantly to the consideration of where it would be more convenient
to put Katavasov, to sleep alone or to share Sergey Ivanovitch’s room. And
then an idea suddenly struck her, which made her shudder and even disturb
Mitya, who glanced severely at her. “I do believe the laundress hasn’t sent
the washing yet, and all the best sheets are in use. If I don’t see to it, Agafea
Mihalovna will give Sergey Ivanovitch the wrong sheets,” and at the very
idea of this the blood rushed to Kitty’s face.
“Yes, I will arrange it,” she decided, and going back to her former
thoughts, she remembered that some spiritual question of importance had
been interrupted, and she began to recall what. “Yes, Kostya, an
unbeliever,” she thought again with a smile.
“Well, an unbeliever then! Better let him always be one than like
Madame Stahl, or what I tried to be in those days abroad. No, he won’t ever
sham anything.”
And a recent instance of his goodness rose vividly to her mind. A
fortnight ago a penitent letter had come from Stepan Arkadyevitch to Dolly.
He besought her to save his honor, to sell her estate to pay his debts. Dolly
was in despair, she detested her husband, despised him, pitied him, resolved
on a separation, resolved to refuse, but ended by agreeing to sell part of her
property. After that, with an irrepressible smile of tenderness, Kitty recalled
her husband’s shamefaced embarrassment, his repeated awkward efforts to
approach the subject, and how at last, having thought of the one means of
helping Dolly without wounding her pride, he had suggested to Kitty—what
had not occurred to her before—that she should give up her share of the
property.
“He an unbeliever indeed! With his heart, his dread of offending anyone,
even a child! Everything for others, nothing for himself. Sergey Ivanovitch
