The Complete Works of Leo Tolstoy (25+ Works with active table of contents) (584 page)

"Well, young cavalryman, how is my Rook behaving?" he asked. (Rook was a young horse Telyanin had sold to Rostov.)

The lieutenant never looked the man he was speaking to straight in the face; his eyes continually wandered from one object to another.

"I saw you riding this morning..." he added.

"Oh, he's all right, a good horse," answered Rostov, though the horse for which he had paid seven hundred rubbles was not worth half that sum. "He's begun to go a little lame on the left foreleg," he added.

"The hoof's cracked! That's nothing. I'll teach you what to do and show you what kind of rivet to use."

"Yes, please do," said Rostov.

"I'll show you, I'll show you! It's not a secret. And it's a horse you'll thank me for."

"Then I'll have it brought round," said Rostov wishing to avoid Telyanin, and he went out to give the order.

In the passage Denisov, with a pipe, was squatting on the threshold facing the quartermaster who was reporting to him. On seeing Rostov, Denisov screwed up his face and pointing over his shoulder with his thumb to the room where Telyanin was sitting, he frowned and gave a shudder of disgust.

"Ugh! I don't like that fellow," he said, regardless of the quartermaster's presence.

Rostov shrugged his shoulders as much as to say: "Nor do I, but what's one to do?" and, having given his order, he returned to Telyanin.

Telyanin was sitting in the same indolent pose in which Rostov had left him, rubbing his small white hands.

"Well there certainly are disgusting people," thought Rostov as he entered.

"Have you told them to bring the horse?" asked Telyanin, getting up and looking carelessly about him.

"I have."

"Let us go ourselves. I only came round to ask Denisov about yesterday's order. Have you got it, Denisov?"

"Not yet. But where are you off to?"

"I want to teach this young man how to shoe a horse," said Telyanin.

They went through the porch and into the stable. The lieutenant explained how to rivet the hoof and went away to his own quarters.

When Rostov went back there was a bottle of vodka and a sausage on the table. Denisov was sitting there scratching with his pen on a sheet of paper. He looked gloomily in Rostov's face and said: "I am witing to her."

He leaned his elbows on the table with his pen in his hand and, evidently glad of a chance to say quicker in words what he wanted to write, told Rostov the contents of his letter.

"You see, my fwiend," he said, "we sleep when we don't love. We are childwen of the dust... but one falls in love and one is a God, one is pua' as on the first day of cweation... Who's that now? Send him to the devil, I'm busy!" he shouted to Lavrushka, who went up to him not in the least abashed.

"Who should it be? You yourself told him to come. It's the quartermaster for the money."

Denisov frowned and was about to shout some reply but stopped.

"Wetched business," he muttered to himself. "How much is left in the puhse?" he asked, turning to Rostov.

"Seven new and three old imperials."

"Oh, it's wetched! Well, what are you standing there for, you sca'cwow? Call the quahtehmasteh," he shouted to Lavrushka.

"Please, Denisov, let me lend you some: I have some, you know," said Rostov, blushing.

"Don't like bowwowing from my own fellows, I don't," growled Denisov.

"But if you won't accept money from me like a comrade, you will offend me. Really I have some," Rostov repeated.

"No, I tell you."

And Denisov went to the bed to get the purse from under the pillow.

"Where have you put it, Wostov?"

"Under the lower pillow."

"It's not there."

Denisov threw both pillows on the floor. The purse was not there.

"That's a miwacle."

"Wait, haven't you dropped it?" said Rostov, picking up the pillows one at a time and shaking them.

He pulled off the quilt and shook it. The purse was not there.

"Dear me, can I have forgotten? No, I remember thinking that you kept it under your head like a treasure," said Rostov. "I put it just here. Where is it?" he asked, turning to Lavrushka.

"I haven't been in the room. It must be where you put it."

"But it isn't?..."

"You're always like that; you thwow a thing down anywhere and forget it. Feel in your pockets."

"No, if I hadn't thought of it being a treasure," said Rostov, "but I remember putting it there."

Lavrushka turned all the bedding over, looked under the bed and under the table, searched everywhere, and stood still in the middle of the room. Denisov silently watched Lavrushka's movements, and when the latter threw up his arms in surprise saying it was nowhere to be found Denisov glanced at Rostov.

"Wostov, you've not been playing schoolboy twicks..."

Rostov felt Denisov's gaze fixed on him, raised his eyes, and instantly dropped them again. All the blood which had seemed congested somewhere below his throat rushed to his face and eyes. He could not draw breath.

"And there hasn't been anyone in the room except the lieutenant and yourselves. It must be here somewhere," said Lavrushka.

"Now then, you devil's puppet, look alive and hunt for it!" shouted Denisov, suddenly, turning purple and rushing at the man with a threatening gesture. "If the purse isn't found I'll flog you, I'll flog you all."

Rostov, his eyes avoiding Denisov, began buttoning his coat, buckled on his saber, and put on his cap.

"I must have that purse, I tell you," shouted Denisov, shaking his orderly by the shoulders and knocking him against the wall.

"Denisov, let him alone, I know who has taken it," said Rostov, going toward the door without raising his eyes. Denisov paused, thought a moment, and, evidently understanding what Rostov hinted at, seized his arm.

"Nonsense!" he cried, and the veins on his forehead and neck stood out like cords. "You are mad, I tell you. I won't allow it. The purse is here! I'll flay this scoundwel alive, and it will be found."

"I know who has taken it," repeated Rostov in an unsteady voice, and went to the door.

"And I tell you, don't you dahe to do it!" shouted Denisov, rushing at the cadet to restrain him.

But Rostov pulled away his arm and, with as much anger as though Denisov were his worst enemy, firmly fixed his eyes directly on his face.

"Do you understand what you're saying?" he said in a trembling voice. "There was no one else in the room except myself. So that if it is not so, then..."

He could not finish, and ran out of the room.

"Ah, may the devil take you and evewybody," were the last words Rostov heard.

Rostov went to Telyanin's quarters.

"The master is not in, he's gone to headquarters," said Telyanin's orderly. "Has something happened?" he added, surprised at the cadet's troubled face.

"No, nothing."

"You've only just missed him," said the orderly.

The headquarters were situated two miles away from Salzeneck, and Rostov, without returning home, took a horse and rode there. There was an inn in the village which the officers frequented. Rostov rode up to it and saw Telyanin's horse at the porch.

In the second room of the inn the lieutenant was sitting over a dish of sausages and a bottle of wine.

"Ah, you've come here too, young man!" he said, smiling and raising his eyebrows.

"Yes," said Rostov as if it cost him a great deal to utter the word; and he sat down at the nearest table.

Both were silent. There were two Germans and a Russian officer in the room. No one spoke and the only sounds heard were the clatter of knives and the munching of the lieutenant.

When Telyanin had finished his lunch he took out of his pocket a double purse and, drawing its rings aside with his small, white, turned-up fingers, drew out a gold imperial, and lifting his eyebrows gave it to the waiter.

"Please be quick," he said.

The coin was a new one. Rostov rose and went up to Telyanin.

"Allow me to look at your purse," he said in a low, almost inaudible, voice.

With shifting eyes but eyebrows still raised, Telyanin handed him the purse.

"Yes, it's a nice purse. Yes, yes," he said, growing suddenly pale, and added, "Look at it, young man."

Rostov took the purse in his hand, examined it and the money in it, and looked at Telyanin. The lieutenant was looking about in his usual way and suddenly seemed to grow very merry.

"If we get to Vienna I'll get rid of it there but in these wretched little towns there's nowhere to spend it," said he. "Well, let me have it, young man, I'm going."

Rostov did not speak.

"And you? Are you going to have lunch too? They feed you quite decently here," continued Telyanin. "Now then, let me have it."

He stretched out his hand to take hold of the purse. Rostov let go of it. Telyanin took the purse and began carelessly slipping it into the pocket of his riding breeches, with his eyebrows lifted and his mouth slightly open, as if to say, "Yes, yes, I am putting my purse in my pocket and that's quite simple and is no else's business."

"Well, young man?" he said with a sigh, and from under his lifted brows he glanced into Rostov's eyes.

Some flash as of an electric spark shot from Telyanin's eyes to Rostov's and back, and back again and again in an instant.

"Come here," said Rostov, catching hold of Telyanin's arm and almost dragging him to the window. "That money is Denisov's; you took it..." he whispered just above Telyanin's ear.

"What? What? How dare you? What?" said Telyanin.

But these words came like a piteous, despairing cry and an entreaty for pardon. As soon as Rostov heard them, an enormous load of doubt fell from him. He was glad, and at the same instant began to pity the miserable man who stood before him, but the task he had begun had to be completed.

"Heaven only knows what the people here may imagine," muttered Telyanin, taking up his cap and moving toward a small empty room. "We must have an explanation..."

"I know it and shall prove it," said Rostov.

"I..."

Every muscle of Telyanin's pale, terrified face began to quiver, his eyes still shifted from side to side but with a downward look not rising to Rostov's face, and his sobs were audible.

"Count!... Don't ruin a young fellow... here is this wretched money, take it..." He threw it on the table. "I have an old father and mother!..."

Rostov took the money, avoiding Telyanin's eyes, and went out of the room without a word. But at the door he stopped and then retraced his steps. "O God," he said with tears in his eyes, "how could you do it?"

"Count..." said Telyanin drawing nearer to him.

"Don't touch me," said Rostov, drawing back. "If you need it, take the money," and he threw the purse to him and ran out of the inn.

CHAPTER V

That same evening there was an animated discussion among the squadron's officers in Denisov's quarters.

"And I tell you, Rostov, that you must apologize to the colonel!" said a tall, grizzly-haired staff captain, with enormous mustaches and many wrinkles on his large features, to Rostov who was crimson with excitement.

The staff captain, Kirsten, had twice been reduced to the ranks for affairs of honor and had twice regained his commission.

"I will allow no one to call me a liar!" cried Rostov. "He told me I lied, and I told him he lied. And there it rests. He may keep me on duty every day, or may place me under arrest, but no one can make me apologize, because if he, as commander of this regiment, thinks it beneath his dignity to give me satisfaction, then..."

"You just wait a moment, my dear fellow, and listen," interrupted the staff captain in his deep bass, calmly stroking his long mustache. "You tell the colonel in the presence of other officers that an officer has stolen..."

"I'm not to blame that the conversation began in the presence of other officers. Perhaps I ought not to have spoken before them, but I am not a diplomatist. That's why I joined the hussars, thinking that here one would not need finesse; and he tells me that I am lying--so let him give me satisfaction..."

"That's all right. No one thinks you a coward, but that's not the point. Ask Denisov whether it is not out of the question for a cadet to demand satisfaction of his regimental commander?"

Denisov sat gloomily biting his mustache and listening to the conversation, evidently with no wish to take part in it. He answered the staff captain's question by a disapproving shake of his head.