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Why, before we can look round, he'll be in a decline, or dying outright, maybe. 'It's not my fault, Onisim Sergeitch. 'Not your fault! God knows. Why, he's lost his heart to you. And you, God forgive you, treated him as if he were one of yourselves. Don't come, says you, I'm sick of you. Why, though he's not much to boast of, he's a gentleman anyway.
'Beat 'em! he growled hoarsely, coughing and choking with laughter; 'flog 'em, don't spare 'em! beat, beat, beat the monsters, my oppressors! That's it! That's it! On the day before his death he greatly alarmed and astonished Alexey Sergeitch.
In my wife's name. . . . She behaved tactlessly, I admit it as a gentleman. . . ." Nikolay Sergeitch walked about the room, heaved a sigh, and went on: "Then you want me to have it rankling here, under my heart. . . . You want my conscience to torment me. . . ." "I know it's not your fault, Nikolay Sergeitch," said Mashenka, looking him full in the face with her big tear-stained eyes.
That evening at eight o'clock, the guests began to arrive. Madame Perekatov with great affability received and 'entertained' the ladies, Mashenka the girls; Sergei Sergeitch talked about the crops with the gentlemen and continually glanced towards his wife.
'A great ravine starts from a little rift, Alexey Sergeitch said to me once in this connection: 'a wound a yard wide may heal; but once cut off even a finger nail, it will not grow again. I fancy the daughters were ashamed of their eccentric old parents. A month later and Malania Pavlovna too passed away.
She liked feasting the peasant-women, too, on holidays; they would dance, and she would tap with her heels and throw herself into attitudes. Alexey Sergeitch was well aware that his wife was a fool; but almost from the first year of his marriage he had schooled himself to keep up the fiction that she was very witty and fond of saying cutting things.
'Malania, my dear, shall we meet again in the next world? 'I will pray God for it, Alexis, and the old woman burst into tears. 'Come, don't cry, silly; maybe the Lord God will make us young again then and again we shall be a fine pair! 'He will make us young, Alexis! 'With the Lord all things are possible, observed Alexey Sergeitch.
How can I make a fight for it? It was true; on my last visit I found Alexey Sergeitch greatly aged; even the centres of his eyes had that milky colour that babies' eyes have, and his lips wore not his old conscious smile, but that unnatural, mawkish, unconscious grin, which never, even in sleep, leaves the faces of very decrepit old people. I told Ivan of Alexey Sergeitch's decision.
Nenila Makarievna was sitting on the sofa, gazing in silence at the floor. 'Did you send an invitation to the regiment at Kirilovo, Sergei Sergeitch? she asked her husband. 'For this evening? 'There are positively no gentlemen, pursued Nenila Makarievna. 'Nobody for the girls to dance with. Her husband sighed, as though crushed by the absence of partners.
'What should I come for? you wouldn't give me a cup of tea, no fear. 'Yes, I would, Onisim Sergeitch, I would. You come and see. Rum in it, too. Onisim slowly relaxed into a smile. 'Well, I don't mind if I do, then. 'When, then when? 'When ... well, you are ... 'To-day this evening, if you like. Drop in.
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