The Complete Works of Count Tolstoy/Childhood/Chapter 14
XIV.
The Separation
On the day following the incidents described by me, at the twelfth hour, a carriage and a calash stood at the entrance. Nikoláy was dressed in travelling fashion; that is, his trousers were tucked into his boots and his coat was tightly girded by a belt. He was standing in the calash and arranging the ulsters and pillows on the seats; if they seemed too much puffed, he seated himself on the pillows, and, leaping up and down, pressed them into shape.
"For the Lord's sake, do us the favour, Nikoláy Dmíttrich, to see whether you can't put in the master's strong box," said papa's valet, breathlessly, as he stuck his head out of the carriage; "it is a small affair."
"You ought to have said so before, Mikhéy Iványch," answered Nikoláy hastily and in anger, throwing with all his might a bundle into the bottom of the calash. "Upon my word, my head is in a whirl as it is, and there you are bothering me with your strong boxes," he added, raising his cap, and wiping off large drops of perspiration from his sun-browned face.
The manorial peasants, in coats, caftans, and shirts, and without hats, the women in ticking skirts and striped kerchiefs, with babes in their arms, and the boys barefoot, stood around the veranda, examined the vehicles, and conversed with each other. One of the drivers, a stooping old man in a winter cap and a camel-hair coat, held in his hand the shaft of the carriage, moved it to and fro, and thoughtfully looked at the wheels; another, a fine-looking young lad, clad only in a white shirt with red Bukhara cotton gussets, and wearing a black lambskin cap shaped like a cylindrical buckwheat cake, which he, scratching his blond locks, poised now on one ear, now on the other, put his camel-hair coat on the coachman's box, threw the reins there also and, snapping his plaited whip, looked now at his boots, now at the coachmen who were greasing the calash. One of them, straining himself, was holding a jack; another, bending over the wheel, was carefully greasing the axle and the axle-box, and, not to lose the last bit of grease left on the brush, smeared it on the lower part of the rim.
Variously coloured, weak-kneed post-horses stood at the picket fence and switched the flies off with their tails. Some of them, spreading their shaggy, swollen legs, blinked their eyes and were dozing; others rubbed each other, from ennui, or nibbled at leaves or stalks of rough, dark-green ferns that grew near the veranda. A few greyhounds either breathed heavily, lying in the sun, or walked about in the shade under the carriage and calash, and licked the grease which oozed out of the axles. There was a dusty mist in the air, and the horizon was of grayish olive hue; but there was not a cloud to be seen in the whole sky. A strong westerly wind raised columns of dust from the roads and fields, bent the tops of the tall linden-trees and birches of the garden, and carried far away the falling yellow leaves. I was sitting near the window, and impatiently was waiting for the end of all the preparations.
When all had gathered in the sitting-room near the round table, in order to pass a few minutes together, for the last time, it did not occur to me what a sad moment awaited us. The most trifling thoughts were crossing my brain, I asked myself: which coachman will ride in the calash, and which one in the carriage? Who will travel with papa, and who with Karl Ivánovich? and why do they insist in wrapping me in a shawl and a wadded jacket?
"I am not as tender as that. Don't be afraid, I shall not freeze. If only there will soon be an end to it all! If we just could get seated, and be off!"
"To whom will you order me to give a note about the children's linen?" said Natálya Sávishna, who had entered with tearful eyes and carrying a note in her hand, as she turned to mamma.
"Give it to Nikoláy, and then come to tell the children good-bye!"
The old woman wanted to say something, but suddenly stopped, covered her face with her handkerchief, and, motioning with her hand, left the room. My heart was pinched when I saw her motion; but my impatience to travel was greater than my sympathy, and I continued to listen with complete indifference to the conversation between father and mother. They were evidently speaking about things that interested neither the one nor the other: what it was necessary to buy for the house; what to say to Princess Sophie and Madame Julie; and whether the road would be good.
Fóka entered, and in the same voice in which he announced "Dinner is served," he said, as he stopped on the threshold, "The horses are ready." I noticed how mamma shuddered and grew pale at this bit of news, as if it had been something unforeseen by her.
Fóka was ordered to close all the doors in the house. That amused me very much, "as if everybody were hiding from somebody."
When all seated themselves, — Fóka, too, sat down on the edge of a chair, — but the moment he did that, the door creaked, and everybody looked round. Natálya rapidly entered the room, and, without raising her eyes, seated herself at the door on the same chair with Fókа. I see clearly the bald, wrinkled face of Fókа and the bent, kindly figure in the cap, underneath which gray hair peeped out. They are both pressing together on one chair, and they both feel uncomfortable.
I continued to be careless and impatient. The ten seconds during which we sat with closed doors appeared to me a whole hour. Finally all arose, made the sign of the cross, and began to take leave. Papa embraced mamma, and kissed her several times.
"That will do, my dear!" said papa; "we are not departing for an age."
"It is sad, nevertheless!" said mamma, in a voice trembling with tears.
When I heard that voice and saw her quivering lips and eyes full of tears, I forgot everything, and I felt so sad, so pained, and so utterly wretched, that I wanted rather to run away than to bid her farewell. I understood at that moment that when she embraced father, she really was bidding us farewell.
She began so many times to kiss Volódya and to make the sign of the cross over him that, supposing she was going to turn to me, I pushed myself forward, but she again and again blessed him and pressed him to her breast. At last, I embraced her and, clinging to her, wept and wept, thinking of nothing but my sorrow.
When we went out to seat ourselves in the vehicles, the annoying manorial servants followed to bid us goodbye. Their "Please, your hand, sir," their smacking kisses on the shoulder, and the odour of lard from their heads provoked in me a feeling very much akin to disgust. Under the influence of that feeling I very coldly kissed Natálya Sávishna's cap, while she, all in tears, bade me farewell.
It is strange, but I see all the faces of the servants as if it had happened to-day, and I could paint them with their minutest details, but mamma's face and location have absolutely escaped from my imagination, — perhaps, because at that time I could not gather courage to take one good look at her. It then seemed to me that if I were to do so, my grief and hers would reach impossible limits.
I rushed before the others to the carriage and seated myself in the back seat. As the top was raised, I could not see anything, but a certain instinct told me that mamma was still there.
"Shall I take one more glance at her, or not? Well, for the last time!" said I to myself, and put my head out of the carriage toward the veranda. Just at that time, mamma, with the same thought, had come up from the opposite side to the carriage, and was calling me by name. When I heard her voice behind me, I turned toward her, but did it so rapidly that we knocked our heads together: she smiled sadly, and for the last time gave me a tight embrace and a kiss.
When we had moved away a few fathoms, I decided to look at her. The wind had raised the blue kerchief with which her head was tied; dropping her head and covering her face with her hands, she slowly walked up the veranda. Fóka was sustaining her.
Papa was seated by my side, but he did not say anything. I choked with tears, and something so compressed my throat that I was afraid I would strangle. When we drove out on the highway, we saw a white handkerchief which some one on the balcony was waving. I began to wave mine, and this motion calmed me a little. I continued to sob, and the thought that my tears were a proof of my sensitiveness gave me pleasure and joy.
When we had travelled about a verst, I sat down more calmly, and I began to look with stubborn attention at the nearest object before my eyes, — the hind part of the side horse that ran on my side. I watched that dappled horse flapping his tail, and striking one leg against another, which made the driver crack his plaited whip at him, and then his legs began to move more evenly. I saw the harness leaping about, and the rings upon it, and I kept on looking at the harness until it became lathered at the tail. I began to look around me: at the waving fields of ripe rye; at the dark fallow field on which here and there a plow, a peasant, and a mare with her colt could be seen; at the verst posts, and even at the coachman's box, in order to see who the driver was. My face was not yet dry from its tears, when my thoughts were far away from my mother, whom I had left, perhaps, for ever. But every reminiscence led my thoughts to her. I recalled the mushroom which I had found the day before in the avenue of birches; I recalled how Lyúbochka and Kátenka disputed who was to pluck it, and I recalled how they wept when they bade us farewell.
"I am sorry to leave them, and I am sorry for Natálya Sávishna, and for the birch avenue, and for Fóka! I am sorry to leave even growling Mimi. I am sorry for everything, for everything! And poor mamma!" And tears again stood in my eyes, but not for long.