Forty Stories - Anton Chekhov [112]
There followed long-winded paragraphs—“whereas,” “in the measure of,” “in view of the aforesaid”—and all the time poor Pyotr Leontyich suffered agonies of humiliation and an intense craving for a drink.
When the boys came to visit Anna, usually in broken boots and threadbare trousers, they too had to listen to his sermons.
“Everyone has a duty to perform!” Modest Alexeich would say.
He never gave them any money. But he gave Anna rings, bracelets, and brooches, explaining that they would come in usefully on a rainy day. Often he would open her chest of drawers for a formal inspection: to see whether they were still safe.
II
Meanwhile winter was coming on. Long before Christmas there was an announcement in the local newspaper to the effect that on December 29 the usual winter ball would be held in the Hall of Nobles. In excited whispers Modest Alexeich would confer with the wives of his colleagues after the evening game of cards. He would glance anxiously at Anna, and then for a long time he would pace across the room, sunk in thought. At last, late one evening, he stood quite still in front of Anna and said: “You really must have a ball dress made. Do you understand me? Only please consult Marya Grigoryevna and Natalya Kuzminishna.”
He gave her a hundred rubles. She took the money, but when ordering the gown she consulted no one, and spoke only with her father, and she tried to imagine how her mother would have dressed for a ball. Her lamented mother had always dressed her in the latest fashion, taking trouble over her clothes, dressing her daintily like a doll, teaching her to speak French and to dance the mazurka superbly. (She had been a governess for five years before her marriage.) Like her mother, Anna could make a new dress out of an old one, clean gloves with benzine, and rent jewels. Like her mother, she knew how to squint, speak with a lisp, assume ravishing poses, and whenever it was necessary she could get wildly enthusiastic or look mysterious and melancholy. From her father she had inherited her dark hair and dark eyes, her nervous temperament, and her habit of always appearing at her best.
Half an hour before leaving for the ball Modest Alexeich came into her bedroom, coatless. He wanted to put his order round his neck in front of her mirror. He was so dazzled by her beauty and by the splendor of her fresh, gossamer-like gown that he complacently stroked his side whiskers and said: “So that’s what my wife looks like.… Look at you, Anyuta!” Suddenly assuming a solemn tone, he went on: “Anna, my dear, I have given you happiness, and today you have the opportunity to give me happiness. I am begging you to obtain an introduction to the wife of His Excellency! For God’s sake do this for me! Through her I may be able to get the post of senior reporter!”
They drove to the ball. There was a uniformed doorman in the lobby of the Hall of Nobles. The vestibule was a sea of fur coats, hatstands, hurrying lackeys, and décolleté ladies hiding behind their fans to avoid the drafts: the place smelled of illuminating gas and soldiers. Walking up the stairs on her husband’s arm, Anna heard music and caught a glimpse of herself in an immense mirror in the glow of innumerable lamps, and there came a rush of joy to her heart and she knew the same presentiment of happiness which had come to her on a moonlit night at the railway station. She walked proudly, sure of herself, and for the first time felt she was no longer a girl, but a lady, and unconsciously she found herself imitating her mother in her walk and in her manner. For the first time in her life she felt rich