Читать книгу Anna Karenina - 2 Classic Unabridged Translations in one eBook (Garnett and Maude translations) - Leo Tolstoy - Страница 85

AT the end of May, when the house was more or less in order, Dolly received from her husband an answer to her letter of complaint. He wrote asking her to forgive his not having seen to everything, and saying that he would come as soon as possible. That possibility, however, had not been fulfilled, and up to the beginning of June Dolly was still living without him in the country.

On the Sunday before St Peter’s Day Dolly took all her children to Communion. When talking intimately with her mother and sister Dolly often astonished them by her freedom of thought on religious matters. She had a strange religion of her own, firmly believing in the transmigration of souls, and not caring about Church dogmas. But in her family she fulfilled (not merely to set an example, but with her whole heart) all that the Church demanded, and was very uneasy because for about a year the children had not received Communion. So now, with the entire approval of Matrena Filimonovna, she resolved that this ceremony should be performed.

Several days previously she decided how all the children should be dressed. New frocks were made, old ones altered, hems and frills let down, buttons sewn on, and ribbons got ready. One of the frocks, which the English governess had undertaken to alter, was the cause of much bad blood. The governess put the bodice darts in the wrong places, cut out the arm-holes too big, and nearly spoilt the dress. It fitted so tight round Tanya’s shoulders that it was painful to see her; but Matrena Filimonovna was inspired to insert wedge-shaped pieces and to make a fichu to cover the defect. The frock was put right, but it very nearly caused a quarrel with the governess. However, in the morning everything was right; and toward nine o’clock — the hour till which the priest had been asked to defer mass — the children, beaming with joy, stood in all their finery by the carriage at the porch, waiting for their mother.

Instead of the restive Raven, the steward’s Brownie had been harnessed to the carriage on Matrena Filimonovna’s authority, and Dolly, who had been detained by the cares of her own toilet, came out in a white muslin dress and took her seat in the carriage.

Dolly, somewhat excited, had dressed and done her hair with care. At one time she used to dress for her own sake, in order to look well and be attractive; later on as she grew older dressing became less and less agreeable to her, because it made the loss of her good, looks more apparent; but now it again gave her pleasure and excited her. She was not dressing for her own sake, not for her own beauty, but in order, as the mother of all those charming children, not to spoil the general effect. She gave her mirror a last glance and was satisfied with herself. She looked well: not in the way she had wished to look when going to a ball, but well for the object she had in view at present.

There was no one in church except peasants, innkeepers and their womenfolk; but Dolly saw, or thought she saw, the rapture produced in them by her children and herself. The children were not only beautiful in their fine clothes but were also very sweet in their behaviour. It’s true Alesha did not stand very well: he kept turning round to see the back of his jacket; but nevertheless he was wonderfully sweet. Tanya stood like a grown-up person and looked after the little ones. Little Lily was charming in her naïve wonder at everything around, and it was difficult to repress a smile when, having swallowed the bread and wine, she said in English, ‘More, please!’

On the way home the children were very quiet, feeling that something solemn had taken place.

At home also all went well, only at lunch Grisha began whistling and — what was still worse — would not obey the governess and had to go without his pudding. Dolly would not have sanctioned any punishment on such a day had she been present, but she was obliged to support the governess and so confirmed the sentence that Grisha was not to have pudding. This rather spoilt the general joyfulness.

Grisha cried and said he was being punished although it was Nikolenka that had whistled, and that he was not crying about the pudding (he didn’t mind that!) but because of the injustice. This was too sad, and Dolly decided to speak to the governess and get her to forgive Grisha, and went off to find her. But as she was passing through the dancing-room she saw a scene which filled her heart with such joy that tears came to her eyes and she pardoned the little culprit herself.

The little fellow was sitting on the ledge of the corner window of the dancing-room, and beside him stood Tanya with a plate. On the plea of giving her dolls some dinner she had obtained leave from the governess to take her plateful of pudding to the nursery, but had brought it to her brother instead. Still crying over the injustice done him, he ate the pudding, muttering between sobs: ‘Eat some yourself … let us both eat … together!’

Tanya, affected first by pity for Grisha and then by the consciousness of her own virtuous action, also had tears in her eyes, but did not decline to eat her share of the pudding.

When they saw their mother they were frightened, but glancing at her face they knew they were acting rightly and, with their mouths full of pudding, began to laugh and wipe their smiling lips with their hands, smearing their beaming faces with tears and jam.

‘Dear me! Your nice white frock! Tanya! … Grisha!’ cried their mother, trying to save the frock, but smiling a blissful, rapturous smile.

The new clothes were taken off, the little girls had their overalls and the boys their old jackets, and orders were given to harness (to the steward’s chagrin) his Brownie again, to take the whole family mushroom-hunting, and later to the bathing-house. The sound of rapturous squealing filled the nursery, and did not cease till they started on their drive.

They gathered a basketful of mushrooms; even Lily found one. Previously Miss Hull used to find one and point it out to her; but this time Lily herself found a fine big one and there was a general shout of delight: ‘Lily has found a mushroom!’

After that they drove to the river, left the horses under the birch trees, and entered the bathing-house. Terenty the coachman tied to a tree the horses, that were swishing their tails to drive away the flies, stretched himself full length in the shade, pressing down the high grass, and smoked his pipe, while from the bathing-house came the sound of the incessant merry squealing of the children.

Although it was troublesome to look after all the children and keep them out of mischief and difficult to remember whose were all those little stockings and drawers, not to mix up the shoes of all those different feet, to untie, unbutton, and then fasten up again all the tapes and buttons, yet Dolly, who had always been fond of bathing and considered it good for the children, knew no greater pleasure than bathing them. To hold in her hands all those plump little legs, to draw on their stockings, to take the naked little bodies in her arms and dip them in the water, to hear them shrieking now with fear and now with delight, and to see her cherubs gasping and splashing, with their frightened yet merry eyes, was a great joy.

When half the children were dressed again, some smartly-dressed peasant women who had been gathering herbs came up and halted shyly by the bathing-house. Matrena Filimonovna called to one of these to ask her to dry a bath-sheet and a chemise that had fallen into the water, and Dolly entered into conversation with them. The peasant women, who had begun by laughing behind their hands without comprehending her questions, soon became bolder and more talkative, and at once captivated Dolly by their frank admiration of her children.

‘Just look at the little beauty, as white as sugar!’ said one, gazing admiringly at Tanya and stroking her head. ‘But she’s thin.’

‘Yes, she’s been ill.’

‘Why, you seem to have been bathing that one too!’ said the other woman, looking at the baby.

‘No, she is only three months old,’ Dolly answered proudly.

‘Dear me!’

‘And have you any children?’

‘I had four; two are left, a boy and a girl. I weaned her in the spring.’

‘How old is she?’

‘In her second year.’

‘Why did you nurse her so long?’

‘It’s our custom.’

And the conversation turned upon the topic that interested Dolly more than any other: confinements, children’s illnesses, husbands’ whereabouts, and whether they came home often.

Dolly did not want to part from the peasant women; their conversation pleased her so much because their interests were exactly similar to hers. What pleased Dolly most was the women’s evident admiration for the great number of children she had, and their loveliness.

The women amused her and offended the English governess, who noticed that she was the object of their laughter, which she did not understand. One of the young women was watching the governess, who was dressing after all the others, and seeing her put on a third petticoat could not refrain from remarking:

‘Look at her! She’s wrapping herself up and wrapping herself up, and hasn’t got enough round her yet!’ and all the women burst out laughing.