Fathers and Sons (7 page)

‘No, frogs.’

‘Do you eat them or breed them?’

‘They’re for experiments,’ Bazarov said calmly and went into the house.

‘He’s going to dissect them,’ commented Pavel Petrovich. ‘He doesn’t believe in principles but he does believe in frogs.’

Arkady gave his uncle a pitying look, and Nikolay Petrovich furtively shrugged a shoulder. Pavel Petrovich himself sensed
his joke had fallen flat and began to talk of farming and the new bailiff who had come to him the day before to complain of
Foma, one of the workmen, for his ‘deboshery’ and impossible behaviour. ‘He’s such an old Aesop,’
⁵
he’d said among other things, ‘going around everywhere proclaiming his wickedness. He’ll live a fool and die a fool.’

Bazarov came back, sat down at the table and quickly began to drink his tea. Both brothers watched him in silence while Arkady
stealthily glanced at his father and his uncle.

‘Did you walk a long way from here?’ Nikolay Petrovich eventually asked.

‘You’ve got a little swamp here, by the aspen copse. I put up five or six snipe there. You can go and kill them, Arkady.’

‘Don’t you shoot?’

‘No.’

‘Are you actually studying physics?’ asked Pavel Petrovich in his turn.

‘Yes, physics. And the natural sciences in general.’

‘People say the Teutons have recently had a lot of success in that field.’

‘Yes, the Germans are our teachers there,’ Bazarov said casually.

Pavel Petrovich used the word Teutons instead of Germans ironically, but nobody noticed.

‘Do you have such a high opinion of the Germans?’ Pavel Petrovich said with extreme politeness. He was beginning to feel a
secret irritation. His aristocratic nature was offended by Bazarov’s complete relaxedness. This doctor’s son not only displayed
no shyness, he even answered curtly and unwillingly, and there was something coarse, almost impertinent, in the tone of his
voice.

‘The scientists over there are a clever lot.’

‘Really, really. Well, you probably don’t have such a favourable opinion of Russian scientists, do you?’

‘I suppose not.’

‘That is very laudable self-denial,’ said Pavel Petrovich, straightening his posture and putting his head back. ‘But how is
it that Arkady Nikolaich was telling us just now that you don’t recognize any authorities? Don’t you believe in them?’

‘Why should I start recognizing them? And what should I believe in? If people talk sense to me, I agree with them, that’s
all there is to it.’

‘And do Germans always talk sense?’ said Pavel Petrovich, and his face took on a detached and distant expression as if he
had gone off to some empyrean height.

‘Not all of them,’ said Bazarov with a small yawn; he clearly did not want to continue the conversation.

Pavel Petrovich gave Arkady a look, as if wanting to say to him: ‘Your friend’s polite, you must admit.’

‘As far as I’m concerned,’ he began again, not without some effort, ‘I for my sins am not too keen on the Germans. I’m not
talking now of the Russian Germans: we know what kind of beast they are. But I don’t care for the German Germans. In the past
they weren’t so bad; they then had – well, Schiller, or
Goethe
… My brother here is particularly fond of him… But they’re now nothing but chemists and materialists…’

‘A decent chemist is worth twenty times any poet,’ interrupted Bazarov.

‘Really,’ said Pavel Petrovich and slightly raised his eyebrows as if he felt sleepy. ‘So you don’t acknowledge art?’

‘The art of making money or getting rid of piles?’ exclaimed Bazarov with a scornful smile.

‘Well, well. That’s your little joke. So you must reject everything? Let’s assume that. That means, you only believe in science?’

‘I’ve already told you I don’t believe in anything. And what is science – science in general? There are sciences, as there
are trades and professions; but science in general terms doesn’t exist at all.’

‘Very good. And do you have such a negative attitude to the other rules accepted in human society?’

‘What is this, a cross-examination?’ asked Bazarov.

Pavel Petrovich went slightly pale… Nikolay Petrovich thought he should enter the conversation.

‘One day we’ll talk to you about this in a bit more detail, dear Yevgeny Vasilyich. We’ll learn what you think and tell you
what we think. For my part I’m very pleased you’re studying the natural sciences. I’ve heard Liebig
¹
has made amazing discoveries about the fertilizing of fields. You can help me in my agricultural work: you can give me some
useful advice.’

‘I’m at your service, Nikolay Petrovich. But we’ve a long way to get to Liebig! We need first to learn the alphabet and then
tackle a book. But we haven’t yet got to
A
.’

‘Yes, I see you really are a nihilist,’ thought Nikolay Petrovich. ‘All the same, do let me come to you if I need to,’ he
added aloud. ‘But now, Brother, I think it’s time for us to go and talk to the bailiff.’

Pavel Petrovich got up from his chair.

‘Yes,’ he said, not looking at anyone, ‘it’s a pity to have been living like this for five years in the country, far away
from great minds! You just become an utter fool. You try not to forget what you’ve been taught, and then – whoosh! – it turns
out that it’s all nonsense and you’re told that sensible people don’t bother any more with such rubbish and that you’re just
a backward idiot. What can one do! The young are clearly cleverer than we are.’

Pavel Petrovich slowly turned on his heels and slowly went away. Nikolay Petrovich went off after him.

‘Is he always like that?’ Bazarov coolly asked Arkady as soon as the door had closed behind the two brothers.

‘Look, Yevgeny, you really were too rough with him,’ said Arkady. ‘You insulted him.’

‘So, why should I indulge these provincial aristocrats! It’s all just vanity, dandyism, the little ways of a society lion.
Well, he should have continued his service career in Petersburg, if that’s what he wanted… Anyway, let’s not bother with him!
Do you know, I’ve discovered a quite rare specimen of water beetle,
Dytiscus marginatus
. I’ll show it to you.’

‘I promised I’d tell you his story,’ Arkady began.

‘The story of the beetle?’

‘Stop it, Yevgeny. My uncle’s story. You’ll see he’s not the man you think him. He deserves sympathy rather than ridicule.’

‘I’m sure he does. But why are you going on about him?’

‘One ought to be fair, Yevgeny.’

‘How does that follow?’

‘No, listen…’

And Arkady told him his uncle’s story. The reader will find it in the next chapter.

Pavel Petrovich Kirsanov was educated first at home, like his younger brother Nikolay, then at the Corps des Pages.
¹
Since childhood he had been exceptionally good-looking; furthermore he had self-confidence, and a slightly mocking and sardonic
wit – he couldn’t fail to please. He began to be seen everywhere as soon as he was commissioned an officer. He was made a
fuss of and he indulged himself, he even played the fool and put on airs; but that too suited him. Women went mad over him,
men called him a fop and secretly envied him. As has been said, he shared an apartment with his brother, whom he loved sincerely,
although they were quite different. Nikolay Petrovich
had a slight limp, small features, attractive but slightly sad, small, black eyes and soft, fine hair. He was happy doing
nothing but he was also happy reading, and he was frightened of society. Pavel Petrovich never spent an evening at home, he
was known for his courage and agility (he started to create a vogue for gymnastics among young men of fashion) and had read
only five or six French books. At the age of twenty-eight he was already a captain. A glittering career awaited him. Suddenly
everything changed.

At that time there occasionally used to appear in Petersburg society a woman who is remembered to this day, Princess R. She
had a husband, well educated and respectable if a bit of a fool; they had no children. She would suddenly go off abroad and
as suddenly come back to Russia; she generally led an odd life. She had the reputation of being a giddy flirt, gave herself
enthusiastically to all kinds of pleasures, danced till she dropped, laughed and joked with the young men to whom she was
at home before dinner in the dim light of her drawing room. But at night she would weep and pray – she could find no peace
anywhere and often used to walk up and down her room till morning, wringing her hands in misery, or she would sit, all pale
and chilled, over her prayer book. Day broke, and again she was transformed into the society lady, again she would go out,
laugh, chatter and virtually throw herself at anything that could afford her the slightest distraction. Her body was amazing;
her plait of hair, golden in colour and heavy as gold, fell below her knees; but no one would call her a beauty; her face’s
only good feature was her eyes, and not really her actual eyes – which were small and grey – but their gaze, swift and deep,
carefree to foolhardiness and pensive to desperation, their enigmatic gaze. Something unusual shone there even when her tongue
was babbling the most vacuous of speeches. She dressed exquisitely.

Pavel Petrovich met her at a ball, danced with her the whole mazurka, during which she uttered not a single word of sense,
and fell passionately in love with her. Accustomed to conquests, here too he quickly achieved his goal; but the ease of his
triumph did not cool his ardour. On the contrary: he became ever
more painfully, ever more strongly attracted to this woman, who, even at the moment when she irrevocably surrendered herself,
kept secret and inaccessible a place where none could penetrate. What lay enshrined in that soul – God knows! She seemed at
the mercy of some secret powers, powers she herself was unaware of; they played with her as they chose; her small mind could
not cope with their whims. Her whole behaviour displayed a series of contradictions; the only letters which could have aroused
her husband’s justifiable suspicion she wrote to a man who was practically a stranger, and her love showed itself as melancholy;
she didn’t really laugh and joke with the man she had chosen, whom she would listen to and watch with bewilderment. Sometimes,
usually quite suddenly, that bewilderment became cold terror; her face assumed a deathly, wild expression; she would lock
herself in her bedroom, and her maid, putting her ear to the keyhole, could hear her muffled sobs. Several times, returning
home after a lovers’ meeting, Kirsanov felt in his heart that shattering and bitter disappointment that rises in the heart
after a decisive failure. ‘What more do I want?’ he asked himself, but his heart went on aching. Once he gave her a ring with
a sphinx engraved on its stone.

‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘A sphinx?’

‘Yes,’ he answered, ‘and that sphinx is you.’

‘Is it really me?’ she asked and slowly raised her enigmatic gaze towards him. ‘Do you know, that’s very flattering?’ she
added with a slight smile, but her eyes still had that strange look.

It was painful for Pavel Petrovich even while Princess R. loved him; but when she became indifferent to him, and that happened
quite soon, he nearly went mad. He was racked with jealousy; he gave her no peace and trailed everywhere after her; his persistent
pursuit of her got on her nerves and she went abroad. He resigned his commission, in spite of the pleas of his friends and
the exhortations of his superiors, and went off after the princess. He spent four years in foreign climes, sometimes pursuing
her, sometimes deliberately losing sight of her. He was ashamed of himself, he was angry at his cowardice… but nothing helped.
Her image, that mysterious, almost meaningless but spell-binding image, had entered too deep into his soul.

Once in Baden
²
they renewed their former relationship; it seemed she had never loved him so passionately… but in a month it was all over:
the flame flared up for the last time and was extinguished for ever. Foreseeing the inevitable parting, he wanted at least
to remain friends with her, as if friendship with such a woman was possible… She quietly left Baden and thenceforth consistently
avoided Kirsanov. He returned to Russia and tried to live the life he had before, but he couldn’t settle into his old routine.
Like a man with poison in him, he roamed from place to place; he still went out, he kept all the habits of a man of the world;
he could boast of two or three new conquests; but he no longer expected anything very much either of himself or of others,
and he undertook nothing new. He aged and went grey; evenings in his club, a sardonic ennui, dispassionate arguments in male
society became necessities for him – a bad sign, as we know. Of course he didn’t even consider marriage. He spent ten years
in this way, sterile, dull years which went by quickly, terrifyingly quickly. Nowhere does time fly as in Russia; they say,
it goes quicker in prison. One day at dinner in his club Pavel Petrovich learnt of the death of Princess R. She had died in
Paris in a state very close to insanity. He got up from the table and for a long time walked through the rooms of the club,
standing by the card players as if rooted to the ground, but he didn’t go back home any earlier than usual. In a short while
he received a parcel addressed to him; it contained the ring he had given the princess. She had drawn a cross on the sphinx
and sent him a message that the cross was the solution to the riddle.

This happened in 1848, at the very time when Nikolay Petrovich, having lost his wife, was coming to St Petersburg. Pavel Petrovich
had hardly seen his brother since he’d been living in the country: Nikolay Petrovich’s marriage coincided with the very first
days of Pavel Petrovich’s relationship with the princess. When he came back from abroad, Pavel Petrovich went to his brother’s
with the intention of staying with him a couple of months, to enjoy his happiness, but he only lasted a week with him. The
difference in the two brothers’ situation was too great. In 1848 this difference became less: Nikolay Petrovich had lost
his wife, Pavel Petrovich had lost his memories; after the princess’s death he tried not to think of her. But Nikolay had
the consciousness of a well-spent life, he could watch his son growing up. Pavel on the other hand was a lonely bachelor and
was coming to that troubled twilight time, a time of regrets that resemble hopes, of hopes that resemble regrets, when youth
is past but old age has not yet come.