Oblomov - Ivan Goncharov [168]
‘My brother isn’t at home,’ she said monotonously. ‘I don’t know why he isn’t back yet.’ She looked out into the street. ‘He usually walks past the windows and one can see him as he comes along, but he isn’t here!’
‘I’m afraid I must go,’ said Oblomov.
‘And what am I to tell my brother when he comes? When are you moving in?’ she asked, getting up from the sofa.
‘Tell him what I have asked you,’ Oblomov said. ‘Owing to my changed circumstances – –’
‘You had better come to-morrow and talk to him yourself,’ she repeated.
‘I’m sorry, I can’t come to-morrow.’
‘Well, the day after to-morrow, then, on Sunday. We usually have vodka and snacks after Mass. And Mr Tarantyev comes, too.’
‘Does he?’
‘Yes, indeed, he does,’ she said.
‘I’m afraid the day after to-morrow I can’t come either,’ Oblomov pleaded impatiently.
‘Next week, then,’ she said. ‘And when are you going to move in?’ she asked. ‘I’d have the floors scrubbed and the rooms dusted.’
‘I’m not going to move in,’ he said.
‘You aren’t? But what shall we do with your things?’
‘Will you kindly tell your brother,’ Oblomov began slowly, fixing his eyes straight on her bosom, ‘that owing to changed circumstances – –’
‘He’s very late to-day, I’m afraid, I can’t see him,’ she said monotonously, looking at the fence which divided the yard from the street. ‘I know his footsteps: I can recognize anyone walking along the wooden pavement. Not many people walk here….’
‘So you will tell him what I said, won’t you?’ Oblomov said, bowing and walking to the door.
‘I’m sure he’ll be here himself in half an hour,’ the landlady said with an agitation which was quite unusual for her, as though trying to detain Oblomov with her voice.
‘I’m sorry, but I can’t wait any longer,’ he declared, opening the front door.
Seeing him on the steps, the dog began barking and trying to break its chain again. The driver, who had fallen asleep leaning on his elbow, began to back the horses; the hens again scattered in all directions in alarm; several heads peeped out of the windows.
‘So I’ll tell my brother that you called,’ the landlady said anxiously when Oblomov had sat down in the carriage.
‘Yes, and please tell him that because of changed circumstances I cannot keep the flat and that I’ll pass it on to somebody else or perhaps he might look for – –’
‘He usually comes home at this time,’ she said, listening absent-mindedly to him. ‘I’ll tell him that you intend to call again.’
‘Yes,’ said Oblomov, ‘I’ll call again in a few days.’
The carriage drove out of the yard to the accompaniment of the desperate barking of the dog and went swaying over the dried-up mounds of mud in the unpaved street. A middle-aged man in a shabby overcoat appeared at the end of it, with a big paper parcel under his arm, a thick stick in his hands, and rubber shoes on his feet in spite of the dry, hot day. He walked quickly, looking from side to side and stepping as heavily as though he meant to break through the wooden pavement. Oblomov turned round to look at him, and saw that he turned in at the gate of Mrs Pshenitzyn’s house.
‘That, I suppose, is her brother coming back,’ he concluded. ‘But to hell with him! I’d have had to spend an hour talking to him, and I’m hungry, and it’s so hot! Besides, Olga is waiting for me – another time.
‘Go on, faster!’ he said to the driver.
‘And what about going in search of another flat?’ he suddenly remembered, as he looked at the fences on either side of the road. ‘I must go back to Morskaya or Konyushennaya – another time!’ he decided.
‘Faster, driver, faster!’
3
AT the end of August it began to rain, and smoke came out of the chimneys of the summer cottages that had stoves, and the people in those that had not went about with kerchiefs tied round their heads; at last, all the summer cottages were gradually deserted.
Oblomov had not been to town again, and one morning the Ilyinskys’ furniture