me all his canvases. In his sketches there was a good deal of life and truth, a certain breadth and freedom; but not one of them was finished, and the drawing struck me as careless and incorrect. I gave candid expression to my opinion.
«Yes, yes,» he assented, with a sigh; «you’re right; it’s all very poor and crude; what’s to be done? I haven’t had the training I ought to have had; besides, one’s cursed Slavonic slackness gets the better of one. While one dreams of work, one soars away in eagle flight; one fancies one’s going to shake the earth out of its place—but when it comes to doing anything, one’s weak and weary directly.»
I began trying to cheer him up, but he waved me off, and bundling his sketches up together, threw them on the sofa.
«If I’ve patience, something may be made of me,» he muttered; «if I haven’t, I shall remain a half-baked noble amateur. Come, we’d better be looking for Acia.»
We went out. IV
THE road to the ruin went twisting down the steep incline into a narrow wooded valley; at the bottom ran a stream, noisily threading its way through the pebbles, as though in haste to flow into the great river, peacefully shining beyond the dark ridge of the deep indented mountain crest. Gagin called my attention to some places where the light fell specially finely; one could see in his words that, even if not a painter, he was undoubtedly an artist. The ruin soon came into sight. On the very summit of the naked rock rose a square tower, black all over, still strong, but, as it were, cleft in two by a longitudinal crack. Mossy walls adjoined the tower; here and there ivy clung about it; wind-twisted bushes hung down from the grey battlements and crumbling arches. A stray path led up to the gates, still standing entire. We had just reached them, when suddenly a girl’s figure darted up in front of us, ran swiftly over a heap of debris, and stood on the projecting part of the wall, right over the precipice.
«Why, it’s Acia!» cried Gagin; «the mad thing.» We went through the gates and found ourselves in a small courtyard, half overgrown with crab-apple trees and nettles. On the projecting ledge, Acia actually was sitting. She turned and faced us, laughing, but did not move. Gagin shook his finger at her, while I loudly reproached her for her recklessness.
«That’s enough,» Gagin said to me in a whisper; «don’t tease her; you don’t know what she is; she’d very likely climb right up on to the tower. Look, you’d better be admiring the intelligence of the people of these parts!»
I looked round. In a corner, ensconced in a tiny, wooden hut, an old woman was knitting a stocking, and looking at us through her spectacles. She sold beer, gingerbread, and seltzer water to tourists. We seated ourselves on a bench, and began drinking some fairly cold beer out of heavy pewter pots. Acia still sat without moving, with her feet tucked under her, and a muslin scarf wrapped round her head; her graceful figure stood out distinctly and finely against the clear sky; but I looked at her with a feeling of hostility. The evening before I had detected something forced, something not quite natural about her. . . . «She’s trying to impress us,» I thought; «whatever for? What a childish trick.» As though guessing my thoughts, she suddenly turned a rapid, searching glance upon me, laughed again, leaped in two bounds from the wall, and going up to the old woman, asked her for a glass of water.
«Do you think I am thirsty?» she said, addressing her brother; «no; there are some flowers on the walls, which must be watered.»
Gagin made her no reply; and with the glass in her hand, she began scrambling over the ruins, now and then stopping, bending down, and with comic solemnity pouring a few drops of water, which sparkled brightly in the sun. Her movements were very charming, but I felt, as before, angry with her, even while I could not help admiring her lightness and agility. At one dangerous place she purposely screamed, and then laughed. . . . I felt still more annoyed with her.
«Why, she climbs like a goat,» the old woman mumbled, turning for an instant from her stocking.
At last, Acia had emptied the glass, and with a saucy swing she walked back to us. A queer smile was faintly twitching at her eyebrows, nostrils, and lips; her dark eyes were screwed up with a half insolent, half merry look.
«You consider my behaviour improper,» her face seemed to say; «all the same, I know you’re admiring me.»
«Well done, Acia, well done,» Gagin said in a low voice.
She seemed all at once overcome with shame, she dropped her long eyelashes, and sat down beside us with a guilty air. At that moment I got for the first time a good look at her face, the most changeable face I had ever seen. A few instants later it had turned quite pale, and wore an intense, almost mournful expression, its very features seemed larger, sterner, simpler. She completely subsided. We walked round the ruins (Acia followed us), and admired the views. Meanwhile it was getting near dinner-time. As he paid the old woman, Gagin asked for another mug of beer, and turning to me, cried with a sly face—
«To the health of the lady of your heart.»
«Why, has he—have you such a lady?» Acia asked suddenly.
«Why, who hasn’t?» retorted Gagin.
Acia seemed pensive for an instant; then her face changed, the challenging, almost insolent smile came back once more.
On the way home she kept laughing, and was more mischievous again. She broke off a long branch, put it on her shoulder, like a gun, and tied her scarf round her head. I remember we met a numerous family of light-haired affected English people; they all, as though at a word of command, looked Acia up and down with their glassy eyes in chilly amazement, while she started singing aloud, as though in defiance of them. When she reached home, she went straight to her own room, and only appeared when dinner was on the table. She was dressed in her best clothes, had carefully arranged her hair, laced herself in at the waist, and put on gloves. At dinner she behaved very decorously, almost affectedly, hardly tasting anything, and drinking water out of a wine- glass. She obviously wanted to show herself in a new character before me—the character of a well-bred, refined young lady. Gagin did not check her; one could see that it was his habit to humour her in everything. He merely glanced at me good-humouredly now and then and slightly shrugged his shoulders, as though he would say—«She’s a baby; don’t be hard on her.» Directly dinner was over, Acia got up, made us a curtsey, and putting on her hat, asked Gagin if she might go to see Frau Luise.
«Since when do you ask leave,» he answered with his invariable smile, a rather embarrassed smile this time; «are you bored with us?»
«No; but I promised Frau Luise yesterday to go and see her; besides, I thought you would like better being alone. Mr. N. (she indicated me) will tell you something more about himself.»
She went out.
«Frau Luise,» Gagin began, trying to avoid meeting my eyes, «is the widow of a former burgomaster here, a good-natured, but silly old woman. She has taken a great fancy to Acia. Acia has a passion for making friends with people of a lower class; I’ve noticed, it’s always pride that’s at the root of that. She’s pretty well spoilt with me, as you see,» he went on after a brief pause: «but what would you have me do? I can’t be exacting with any one, and with her less than any one else. I am bound not to be hard on her.»
I was silent. Gagin changed the conversation. The more I saw of him, the more strongly was I attracted by him. I soon understood him. His was a typically Russian nature, truthful, honest, simple; but, unhappily, without energy, lacking tenacity and inward fire. Youth was not boiling over within him, but shone with a subdued light. He was very sweet and clever, but I could not picture to myself what he would become in ripe manhood. An artist . . . without intense, incessant toil, there is no being an artist . and as for toil, I mused, watching his soft features, listening to his slow deliberate talk, «no, you’ll never toil, you don’t know how to put pressure on yourself.» But not to love him was an impossibility; one’s heart was simply drawn to him. We spent four hours together, sometimes sitting on the sofa, sometimes walking slowly up and down before the house; and in those four hours we became intimate friends.
The sun was setting, and it was time for me to go home. Acia had not yet come back.
«What a reckless thing she is,» said Gagin. «Shall I come along with you? We’ll turn in at Frau Luise’s on the way. I’ll ask whether she’s there. It’s not far out of the way.»
We went down into the town, and turning off into a narrow, crooked little by-street, stopped before a house four storeys high, and with two windows abreast in each storey. The second storey projected beyond the first, the third and fourth stood out still further than the second; the whole house, with its crumbling
