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Semyon Matveitch was ten years younger than Ivan Matveitch, and his whole life had taken a completely different turn. He was a government official in Petersburg, filling an important position.... He had married and been left early a widower; he had one son.
I began, as before, to be a frequent visitor at the house of the Ozhogins. Kirilla Matveitch received me with more effusiveness and affability than he had ever done. I have even ground for believing that he would at that time have cheerfully given me his daughter, though I was certainly not a match to be coveted.
On such days Ivan Matveitch had been in the habit of going in to the peasants in the hall or on the balcony, with a rose in his buttonhole, and putting his lips to a silver goblet of vodka, he would make them a speech something like this: 'You are content with my actions, even as I am content with your zeal, whereat I rejoice truly.
'To be sure, to be sure, she said at last; 'Ardalion Matveitch did say something, certainly; my son Vassinka's art you were wanting.... But we can't be sure, my dear sir.... 'Oh, why so? I interposed. 'As far as I'm concerned, you may feel perfectly easy.... I'm not an informer. 'Oh, mercy on us, the old woman caught me up hurriedly, 'what do you mean?
The arrival of Semyon Matveitch gave another turn to my thoughts. No one had expected him. It turned out that he was retiring in unpleasant circumstances; he had hoped to receive the Alexander ribbon, and they had presented him with a snuff-box.
Leur fondateur, l'instigateur de cette secte, ce La Reveillere Lepeaux etait un bonnet rouge! 'Non, non, said Ivan Matveitch, smiling and rolling together a pinch of snuff: 'des fleurs, des jeunes vierges, le culte de la Nature... ils out eu du bon, ils out eu du bon!...I was always surprised at the extent of Ivan Matveitch's knowledge, and at the uselessness of his knowledge to himself.
We are all brothers; at our birth we are equal; I drink your health! He bowed to them, and the peasants bowed to him, but only from the waist, no prostrating themselves to the ground, that was strictly forbidden. The peasants were entertained with good cheer as before, but Ivan Matveitch no longer showed himself to his subjects.
Here are my earliest recollections; I was living in the Tambov province, in the country house of a rich landowner, Ivan Matveitch Koltovsky, in a small room on the second storey.
Semyon Matveitch, I am bound to own, showed me a certain respect, but in the man there was, I felt it, something that repelled and alarmed me. And that 'something' showed itself not in words, but in his eyes, in those wicked eyes, and in his laugh.
He never failed to get up though with difficulty from his chair when I came in, conducted me to the door, supporting me with his hand under my elbow, and instead of Suzon began to call me sometimes, 'ma chere demoiselle, sometimes, 'mon Antigone. M. le Commandeur died two years after my mother's death; his death seemed to affect Ivan Matveitch far more deeply.
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