Short Fiction, Vladimir Korolenko [finding audrey TXT] 📗

with his faded eyes, even looking after me in a way which made me feel uncomfortable. His lower jaw trembled as though he wanted to say something, and his eyes protruded as though he was making up his mind to stop me and reprove me sternly for being young, for being a student, for having “views,” and probably not respecting generals as much as I ought to do.

This half-shattered figure appeared in the park all the summer through, accompanied by an old footman of most forbidding aspect, and gained a certain notoriety among the students. Somebody nicknamed him “General Ferapontyev,” and the appellation stuck. Although, apparently, the name itself implied nothing insulting, it was always used with a certain suggestion of irony. It expressed the silent antagonism between the decrepit general and the heedless academic youth.

And now for some time there had appeared, walking arm-in-arm with General Ferapontyev, a pretty young woman. The very notoriety of the general, helped to whet our curiosity touching his fair companion. But apart from this circumstance, there was something in the young woman’s face and figure which attracted our attention, and marked her out from the motley crowd of summer visitors.

VI

I have no gift for describing the detail of ladies’ dress, but it has always seemed to me that every “fashion” has its peculiar expression. It is worth while to observe how the expression of faces themselves alters with a change in fashion. To bold, open faces with high foreheads and direct glances, bespeaking a desire for independence and contempt of generally accepted prejudices, succeeded low foreheads covered with fringes, and eyes with painted lids and a helplessly naive, even foolish, gaze, with a look in them which suggested that they were begging for mercy. As for low cut bodices, and absurdly narrow dresses, I dare not affirm it positively, but I have heard from most trustworthy sources that many ladies tied cords round their legs under their gowns a little below the knee, in order that no full and free movement might disturb the general appearance of helpless innocence⁠—yielding passively for better or worse which their wearers affected.

Men of fashion at this time assumed conquering and insolent airs. The same low foreheads and protruding eyes; shirt-collars wide open, showing the throat, and with turned-back points sticking up to the ears. With this went loose coats, hands in waistcoat pockets and a careless and swaggering gait. The general effect was that of an impudent coxcomb who has flung off all prejudices, cares for nobody, and gives no quarter.

Such was the outward expression of fashion in those days, and it was lucidly explained to me by a very native boarding-school girl. To some critical remark of mine on the question of dress, she replied, with the unconscious logic of a young girl of the period, “Why, how can you say that? Forward girls used to be the fashion, but now retiring ones are coming into vogue.” On this I burst out laughing; but I see now that it was a piece of fine observation.

The young lady who walked with General Ferapontyev had a way of her own about clothes, although she dressed well, and even richly. If she followed any fashion at all it was evidently not ours. Everything she wore was simple, elegant, and easy. Her little feet, in their high kid boots with broad low heels, showed freely beneath her short skirt. I remember how firmly and evenly her heels struck the stone pavements and the steps of the garden stairs. Altogether, her walk was remarkable for a peculiar firmness and boldness which, in combination with her small figure, produced a very original impression.

The first time I succeeded in seeing her closely, I could not make up my mind whether she pleased me or not. I was walking with Urmánov along the principal avenue, when the General and the lady came towards us. As we met, Urmánov raised his hat. The old gentleman turned round, and his jaw trembled more than usual. The lady looked at us in perplexity, and the gaze of her large eyes, steady, cold and unabashed, so distracted my attention that I failed to observe the general character of her face.

“I suppose she did not recognize me,” said Urménov, somewhat confused. “I met her in Moscow, but there were a lot of people there. Do you like her?” he asked suddenly, with unexpected vivacity.

“Her face strikes me as cold. I don’t like such cold faces,” I replied.

“She’s an American,” said Urmánov half to himself, as if in defence of the lady, and glanced back.

American! That was quite another matter. Now her face appeared to me exquisite, and its cold expression quite becoming. It fully corresponded with the restrained and somewhat dim look with which my fancy had invested the half-American hero of my future novel.

“What is she doing here?” I asked.

“She is on a visit to her father. She’s the daughter of that⁠—Ferapontyev.”

Ferapontyev’s daughter! Who would have thought it of the old General? He has an American daughter then! For her sake I forgave the General his green shade, and his trembling jaw, and his forbidding looks. A general who has for daughter an American must needs be freer from old-fashioned prejudices than other generals.

But Urmánov instantly smashed the General’s reputation, and this time finally.

“He is a fearful tyrant, this Ferapontyev,” he remarked, kicking away a pebble in the road.

“Ah! then, what is she doing here? Why did she come from America?”

“Well, you see,⁠ ⁠… that is a whole history.”

A shade passed over Urmánov’s expressive face. I put it down to indignation against the old general.

“She went to America with the man she loved. You understand⁠ ⁠… without a marriage ceremony. He set up some business in Boston.⁠ ⁠… What their purpose was⁠—the deuce knows! But that is not the question. At first they got on capitally then some troubles⁠—about business, I think.⁠ ⁠… Everything will be lost if she cannot get some money. Well, you must know, she