第97章

The Prince returned thinner, with the skin hanging in loose bags on his cheeks, but in the most cheerful frame of mind. His good humor was even greater when he saw Kitty completely recovered. The news of Kitty's friendship with Madame Stahl and Varenka, and the reports the Princess gave him of some kind of change she had noticed in Kitty, troubled the Prince and aroused his habitual feeling of jealousy of everything that drew his daughter away from him, and a dread that his daughter might have got out of the reach of his influence into regions inaccessible to him.

But this unpleasant news was all drowned in the sea of kindliness and good humor which was always within him, and more so than ever since his course of Carlsbad waters.

The day after his arrival the Prince, in his long overcoat, with his Russian wrinkles and baggy cheeks propped up by a starched collar, set off with his daughter to the spring in the greatest good humor.

It was a lovely morning: the tidy, cheerful houses with their little gardens, the sight of the red-faced, red-armed, beer-drinking German waitresses, working away merrily, and bright sun did one's heart good.

But the nearer they got to the springs the oftener they met sick people;and their appearance seemed more pitiable than ever among the everyday conditions of prosperous German life. Kitty was no longer struck by this contrast. The bright sun, the brilliant green of the foliage, the strains of the music were for her the natural setting of all these familiar faces, with their changes to greater emaciation or to convalescence, for which she watched. But to the Prince the brightness and gaiety of the June morning, and the sound of the orchestra playing a gay waltz then in fashion, and above all, the appearance of the robust waitresses, seemed something unseemly and monstrous, in conjunction with these slowly moving cadavers gathered together from all parts of Europe.

In spite of his feeling of pride and, as it were, of the return of youth, when he walked with his favorite daughter on his arm, he felt awkward, and almost ashamed of his vigorous step and his sturdy, stout and fat limbs. He felt almost like a man not dressed in a crowd.

`Present, present me to your new friends,' he said to his daughter, squeezing her hand with his elbow. `I like even your horrid Soden for making you so well again. Only it's melancholy, very melancholy here. Who's that?'

Kitty mentioned the names of all the people they met, of some with whom she was acquainted, and some with whom she was not. At the very entrance of the garden they met the blind lady, Madame Berthe, with her guide, and the Prince was delighted to see the old Frenchwoman's face light up when she heard Kitty's voice. She at once began talking to him with the exaggerated politeness of the French, applauding him for having such a delightful daughter, extolling Kitty to the skies before her face, and calling her a treasure, a pearl and a consoling angel.

`Well, she's the second angel, then,' said the Prince, smiling.

`She calls Mademoiselle Varenka angel number one.'

`Oh! Mademoiselle Varenka - she's a real angel, allez ,'

Madame Berthe assented.

In the arcade they met Varenka herself. She was walking rapidly toward them, carrying an elegant red bag.

`Here is papa come,' Kitty said to her.

Varenka made - simply and naturally as she did everything - a movement between a bow and curtsy, and immediately began talking to the Prince, without shyness, naturally, as she talked to everyone.

`Of course I know you; I know you very well,' the Prince said to her with a smile, in which Kitty detected with joy that her father liked her friend. `Where are you off to in such haste?'

`Maman's here,' she said, turning to Kitty. `She has not slept all night, and the doctor advised her to go out. I'm taking her her work.'

`So that's angel number one?' said the Prince when Varenka had gone on.

Kitty saw that her father had meant to make fun of Varenka, but that he could not do it because he liked her.

`Come, so we shall see all your friends,' he went on, `even Madame Stahl, if she deigns to recognize me.'

`Why, did you know her, papa?' Kitty asked apprehensively, catching the gleam of irony that kindled in the Prince's eyes at the mention of Madame Stahl.

`I used to know her husband, and her too a little, before she'd joined the Pietists.'

`What is a Pietist, papa?' asked Kitty, dismayed to find that what she prized so highly in Madame Stahl had a name.

`I don't quite know myself. I only know that she thanks God for everything, for every misfortune, and thanks God too that her husband died.

And that's rather droll, as they didn't get on together. Who's that? What a piteous face!' he asked, noticing a sick man of medium height sitting on a bench, wearing a brown overcoat and white trousers that fell in strange folds about his long, fleshless legs. This man lifted his straw hat, showed his scanty curly hair and high forehead, painfully reddened by the pressure of the hat.

`That's Petrov, an artist,' answered Kitty blushing. `And that's his wife,' she added, indicating Anna Pavlovna, who, as though on purpose, at the very instant they approached, walked away after a child that had run off along a path.

`Poor fellow! And what a fine face he has!' said the Prince. `Why don't you go up to him? He wanted to speak to you.'

`Well, let us go, then,' said Kitty, turning round resolutely.

`How are you feeling today?' she asked Petrov.

Petrov got up, leaning on his stick, and looked shyly at the Prince.

`This is my daughter,' said the Prince. `Let me introduce myself.'

The painter bowed and smiled, showing his strangely dazzling white teeth.

`We expected you yesterday, Princess,' he said to Kitty.

He staggered as he said this, and then repeated the motion, trying to make it seem as if it had been intentional.

`I meant to come, but Varenka said that Anna Pavlovna sent word you were not going.'