Fathers and Children, Ivan Turgenev [best book reader .TXT] 📗

hand, and in confusion himself kissed her bent head on the parting of her hair. Fenitchka’s eye was soon well again, but the impression she had made on Nikolai Petrovitch did not pass away so quickly. He was forever haunted by that pure, delicate, timidly raised face; he felt on the palms of his hands that soft hair, and saw those innocent, slightly parted lips, through which pearly teeth gleamed with moist brilliance in the sunshine. He began to watch her with great attention in church, and tried to get into conversation with her. At first she was shy of him, and one day meeting him at the approach of evening in a narrow footpath through a field of rye, she ran into the tall thick rye, overgrown with cornflowers and wormwood, so as not to meet him face to face. He caught sight of her little head through a golden network of ears of rye, from which she was peeping out like a little animal, and called affectionately to her⁠—

“Good evening, Fenitchka! I don’t bite.”

“Good evening,” she whispered, not coming out of her ambush.

By degrees she began to be more at home with him, but was still shy in his presence, when suddenly her mother, Arina, died of cholera. What was to become of Fenitchka? She inherited from her mother a love for order, regularity, and respectability; but she was so young, so alone. Nikolai Petrovitch was himself so good and considerate.⁠ ⁠… It’s needless to relate the rest.⁠ ⁠…

“So my brother came in to see you?” Nikolai Petrovitch questioned her. “He knocked and came in?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that’s a good thing. Let me give Mitya a swing.”

And Nikolai Petrovitch began tossing him almost up to the ceiling, to the huge delight of the baby, and to the considerable uneasiness of the mother, who every time he flew up stretched her arms up towards his little bare legs.

Pavel Petrovitch went back to his artistic study, with its walls covered with handsome bluish-grey hangings, with weapons hanging upon a variegated Persian rug nailed to the wall; with walnut furniture, upholstered in dark green velveteen, with a renaissance bookcase of old black oak, with bronze statuettes on the magnificent writing-table, with an open hearth. He threw himself on the sofa, clasped his hands behind his head, and remained without moving, looking with a face almost of despair at the ceiling. Whether he wanted to hide from the very walls that which was reflected in his face, or for some other reason, he got up, drew the heavy window curtains, and again threw himself on the sofa.

IX

On the same day Bazarov made acquaintance with Fenitchka. He was walking with Arkady in the garden, and explaining to him why some of the trees, especially the oaks, had not done well.

“You ought to have planted silver poplars here by preference, and spruce firs, and perhaps limes, giving them some loam. The arbour there has done well,” he added, “because it’s acacia and lilac; they’re accommodating good fellows, those trees, they don’t want much care. But there’s someone in here.”

In the arbour was sitting Fenitchka, with Dunyasha and Mitya. Bazarov stood still, while Arkady nodded to Fenitchka like an old friend.

“Who’s that?” Bazarov asked him directly they had passed by. “What a pretty girl!”

“Whom are you speaking of?”

“You know; only one of them was pretty.”

Arkady, not without embarrassment, explained to him briefly who Fenitchka was.

“Aha!” commented Bazarov; “your father’s got good taste, one can see. I like him, your father, ay, ay! He’s a jolly fellow. We must make friends though,” he added, and turned back towards the arbour.

“Yevgeny!” Arkady cried after him in dismay; “mind what you are about, for mercy’s sake.”

“Don’t worry yourself,” said Bazarov; “I know how to behave myself⁠—I’m not a booby.”

Going up to Fenitchka, he took off his cap.

“Allow me to introduce myself,” he began, with a polite bow. “I’m a harmless person, and a friend of Arkady Nikolaevitch’s.”

Fenitchka got up from the garden seat and looked at him without speaking.

“What a splendid baby!” continued Bazarov; “don’t be uneasy, my praises have never brought ill-luck yet. Why is it his cheeks are so flushed? Is he cutting his teeth?”

“Yes,” said Fenitchka; “he has cut four teeth already, and now the gums are swollen again.”

“Show me, and don’t be afraid, I’m a doctor.”

Bazarov took the baby up in his arms, and to the great astonishment both of Fenitchka and Dunyasha the child made no resistance, and was not frightened.

“I see, I see.⁠ ⁠… It’s nothing, everything’s as it should be; he will have a good set of teeth. If anything goes wrong, tell me. And are you quite well yourself?”

“Quite, thank God.”

“Thank God, indeed⁠—that’s the great thing. And you?” he added, turning to Dunyasha.

Dunyasha, a girl very prim in the master’s house, and a romp outside the gates, only giggled in answer.

“Well, that’s all right. Here’s your gallant fellow.”

Fenitchka received the baby in her arms.

“How good he was with you!” she commented in an undertone.

“Children are always good with me.” answered Bazarov; “I have a way with them.”

“Children know who loves them,” remarked Dunyasha.

“Yes, they certainly do,” Fenitchka said. “Why, Mitya will not go to some people for anything.”

“Will he come to me?” asked Arkady, who, after standing in the distance for some time, had gone up to the arbour.

He tried to entice Mitya to come to him, but Mitya threw his head back and screamed, to Fenitchka’s great confusion.

“Another day, when he’s had time to get used to me,” said Arkady indulgently, and the two friends walked away.

“What’s her name?” asked Bazarov.

“Fenitchka⁠ ⁠… Fedosya,” answered Arkady.

“And her father’s name? One must know that too.”

“Nikolaevna.”

“Bene. What I like in her is that she’s not too embarrassed. Some people, I suppose, would think ill of her for it. What nonsense! What is there to embarrass her? She’s a mother⁠—she’s all right.”

“She’s all right,” observed Arkady⁠—“but my father.”

“And he’s right too,” put in Bazarov.

“Well, no, I don’t think so.”

“I suppose an extra heir’s