Chapter 45 Chapter 07

The road seems endless to me.We finally arrived, and I walked in with trepidation to see my two old people.I don't know how I will get out of their house, but I know that when I come out, I must ask for forgiveness from the old man anyway. Forgiveness and reconciliation with the daughter. It's past three o'clock.The two old men sat alone as usual.Nikolai Sergeyitch was in a bad mood and sick, stretched out his legs, half lying in his easy chair, pale and exhausted, with a handkerchief wrapped around his head .Anna Andreyevna was sitting beside him, rubbing vinegar on both temples now and then, and at the same time gazing constantly at his face with an inquisitive and painful air, which disturbed the old man. , even annoyed.he shut up

Mouth, without saying a word, she dared not speak.Our sudden arrival startled them both.When Anna Andreevna saw Nellie and me, she suddenly became frightened for some reason, and she looked at us as soon as we entered, as if It was as if I suddenly felt that I had done something wrong and I was sorry for us. "I've sent you my Nellie," I said, as I entered the door. "She's changed her mind, and now she's willing to come to your house herself. Please accept her well, and love her well..." The old man looked at me suspiciously, and it was clear from his eyes that he knew everything, that Natasha was now alone, abandoned, neglected, and perhaps humiliated.He's very keen to see where we're coming from

Secret, so I looked at Nellie and me suspiciously.Nellie was trembling all over, clutching my arm tightly with her small hands, looking at the ground, and only occasionally casting a frightened glance around her, like a small wild animal in captivity.but anna ander Lyevna soon understood what was going on: she hurried up to Nellie, kissed her, caressed her, even wept, and made Nellie sit on the table affectionately. Beside him, he touched her little hand and did not let go.Nellie is curious and He squinted his eyes in a little surprise, and looked at her. But after the old lady had sat Nellie beside her affectionately, she no longer knew what to do, and began to look up at me with a kind of naive anticipation.The old man frowned, almost not guessing why I brought Nellie here.

Seeing that I was paying attention to his dissatisfied expression and frowning brow, he raised his hand and touched his head, and said without thinking: "Headache, Vanya." We sat in silence as before; and I was thinking how to begin, when the rumble of thunder came again from a distance. "The thunder came early this spring," the old man said. "Remember, in 1937, it came earlier in our area." Anna Andreyevna sighed. "Would you like a samovar?" she asked timidly; but she was ignored, and she turned back to Nellie. "What's your name, my darling?" she asked her.

Nellie said her name in a feeble voice, and dropped her head still lower.The old man looked at her intently. "It's Yelena, right?" The old lady became active and continued. "Yes," Nellie replied, and there was another minute of silence. "Her aunt, Praskovya Andreyevna, has a niece also named Yelena," said Nikolai Sergeyitch, "also named Nellie. I remember." "What's the matter with you, darling, have no family, no father, no mother?" Anna Andreyevna asked again. "No," Nellie whispered curtly and timidly. "Well, I've heard about it, I've heard about it. Your mother died a lot?"

"Not long ago." "My darling, child without father and mother," continued the old lady, looking at her with pity.Nikolai Sergeyitch tapped impatiently with his fingers on the table. "Your mother is a foreigner? Ivan Petrovitch, you told me so?" the old lady continued timidly. Nellie gave me a quick glance with her dark eyes, as if asking for help, and she was breathing heavily, a little out of breath. "Anna Andreyevna, whose mother is of half-breed, was the daughter of an English man and a Russian woman, so she would rather be Russian; Nellie was born abroad."

"How did her mother go abroad with her husband?" Nellie flushed suddenly.The old lady suddenly realized that she had made a slip of the tongue, and shivered under the old man's angry gaze.He looked at her sternly, then turned to the window. "Her mother was cheated by a villain and a villain," he said, turning suddenly to Anna Andreevna. "She ran off with her father, and gave her father's money to the lover; the bastard cheated He cheated her of the money, took her abroad, ransacked her and dumped her.There was a good man who didn't leave her alone and helped her until he died.After he died, that is, two years ago, she returned to her father's residence.Ten thousand

Nia, you seem to be saying that, right? " he asked eagerly. Nellie got up from her seat in great excitement, and started towards the door. "Come here, Nellie," said the old man, holding out his hand to her at last, "sit here, sit beside me, right here—sit!" He bent his head, kissed her forehead, and began gently caressing her little head.Nellie jerked She shivered all over...but she restrained herself.Anna Andreiguana was very excited, and she watched with joyful hope that Nikolai Sergeyitch finally felt sorry for the fatherless child. "Nellie, I know your mother was ruined by a villain, who was wicked and immoral, but I also know that your mother loves and respects her father," said the old man excitedly, Continuing to stroke Nellie's little head,

He couldn't help but issue this challenge to us at this time.A faint blush shaded his pale cheeks; he tried not to look up at us. "My mother loved grandpa more than grandpa loved her," said Nellie timidly, but firmly; and she tried not to look at anyone. "How do you know?" asked the old man sharply, as impatient as a child, and at the same time ashamed of his own impatience. "I know," replied Nellie stiffly, "he didn't want mother, and . . . drove her away . . . I saw that Nikolai Sergeyitch was about to say something, to object, that it was right for the old man not to want her, but he looked at us and said nothing.

"How did you two live and where did you live when grandpa didn't want you?" asked Anna Andreevna, who suddenly had a persistent desire to continue the subject. "We've been looking for grandpa for a long time since we came here," Nellie replied, "but we couldn't find any. My mother told me at the time that grandpa used to be very rich and wanted to start a factory, and she said He is very poor now, because with his mother The man my mother eloped with took all of my grandfather's money from her and refused to return it to her.This is what she told me herself. "

"Hmm..." the old man said vaguely. "And she told me," continued Nellie, becoming more and more agitated, as if to refute Nikolai Sergeyitch, but only to Anna Andreyevna. Said, "She told me that Grandpa was very angry with her and She said it was all her fault, she was sorry for her grandpa, now she has no relatives in the whole world except grandpa.Whenever she told me that, she used to cry... 'He won't forgive me,' when we first started here, She just said, 'But maybe he will like you when he sees you, and maybe he will forgive me because of you. 'Mum loves me very much, and always kisses me when she says that, but she's never going to see Grandpa.she taught me how to pray for grandpa , She herself prayed for Grandpa, and she also said many things to me, telling me how she lived with Grandpa in the past, and how Grandpa loved her very, very much, more than anyone else.Every night, she plays the piano for grandpa, reads books for him, while grandpa kissed her and gave her lots of things...everything, so once, on mother's name day, they had a quarrel; because grandpa thought mother didn't know What kind of gift did you give her? In fact, mom I already knew what it was.My mother wanted a pair of earrings, but my grandfather lied to her deliberately, saying that what I gave her was not an earring, but a brooch; later, he took out the earrings, and saw that my mother already knew that what I wanted to give her was earrings, not a brooch. when, Grandpa was actually very angry, just because Mom already knew, he didn't talk to Mom for a long time, until later he walked over and kissed her, asking her to forgive..." Nellie spoke with such interest that even her little pale, sickly face came into two flushes. You could tell her mother had told her little Nellie more than once about her happy past, sitting where she lived, in the basement, hugging and kissing her beloved daughter (that's all she left Joy of life), kissing and crying, while At the same time, there is no doubt that these stories she told will produce a strong reaction in the sensitive and sick precocious mind of the sick child. But Nellie, who was speaking with gusto, seemed to have suddenly recalled it, looked around in disbelief, and shut her mouth abruptly.The old man frowned and knocked on the table again; Anna Andreyevna silently spoke with tears in her eyes. Silently wiping away tears with a handkerchief. "Mum was very ill when she came here," added Nellie in a low voice, "and her breasts were very ill. We looked for Grandpa, but we couldn't find him for a long time. I rented a place in the corner." "In a corner, and sick!" cried Anna Andreyevna. "Yes, in a corner..." Nellie replied, "Because my mother was poor, and my mother said to me," she added, getting excited again, "It's not a sin to be poor, it's a sin to be rich and bully others, ...she also said that God is punishing she. " "Is the place you rented on Vasilievsky Island? Is it in the Brenova apartment?" The old man asked me instead, trying to pretend that he was just asking casually.The reason why he asked this question seemed to be awkward for him to sit silently. "No, it wasn't her house . . . it was in Bourgeois Street at first," Nellie replied. "It was dark and damp," she went on after a moment's silence. I do the laundry for her, she just looks at me and cries .There was also an old lady living there, a captain's wife, and a retired petty official. Every time he came back, he was drunk and yelled and screamed every night.I am very afraid of him.Mom took me to her bed, hugged me, and she I often trembled with fright, while the little official shouted and cursed.Once he even wanted to beat Mrs. Captain, she was a very old lady with a cane.Mother took pity on her, so she stood up and said a few words for her; the officer beat her mother, I also beat that officer..." Nellie paused at this point, moved by the memory; her eyes glistened with tears. "Lord, my God!" cried Anna Andreevna, who had been watching her with great interest in the story Nellie was telling, and which was mainly told to her. of. "Then Mum went out," Nellie continued, "and took me with her. It happened during the day. We walked up and down the street until night, and Mum kept crying and she pulled my hand, keep walking and walking. I'm so tired; We didn't eat anything that day.My mother was always talking to herself, and kept saying to me: 'Nellie, you're going to be a poor man, and when I'm dead, don't listen to anyone, don't listen to anything they say.Don't ask anyone; just live alone, be a The poor, but they have to work. If they can’t find work, they beg for food. Don’t beg them. ’ until it was almost dark, and we were crossing a great avenue; suddenly my mother called out: ‘Azorka!Azorka! '—Suddenly a big dog, Mao It was gone, and ran towards mother, it whimpered and jumped on her, mother was frightened, her face turned pale, she yelled, she ran over and knelt down at the feet of a tall old man—the old man hung Walking forward with a stick, looking at the ground.This The tall old man was my grandfather, and he was very thin and poorly dressed.That's when I saw my grandfather for the first time.Grandpa saw his mother lying at his feet, hugging his leg, he was startled too, his face was pale—he broke his leg free, pushed his mother away, After knocking on the stone floor with a walking stick, he left us and walked away quickly.Azorka was still with us, howling and licking her mother, and then she ran to grandpa, bit his skirt and pulled him back, but grandpa The father raised his walking stick and knocked on it.Azorka wanted to run towards us again, but his grandfather called out to him, so he had to run after him, whining all the time.The mother was lying on the ground like a dead person, surrounded by a large crowd , the police came.I kept yelling at my mother to get her up.She finally stood up, looked around, and followed me.I led her home.Everyone looked at us for a long time, shaking their heads..." Nellie paused and took a breath, trying to calm herself down.She was very pale, but her eyes shone with a determination.It was evident that she had made up her mind to tell everything.when her face He even showed a challenge on his face. "So what," said Nikolai Sergeyitch in a disturbed voice, with an indignant biting tone, "so what, your mother insulted her father, and he She should break off the relationship..." "Mum told me the same thing," Nellie added stiffly, "and we went home and she kept saying: This is your grandfather, Nellie, and I'm sorry for him, that's why he cursed me, and for that, Now God has come to punish me too, this whole That evening, and for several days afterward, she repeated these words over and over again.When she said this, it seemed that she couldn't help herself, the sadness came from it, and she couldn't control herself..." The old man was silent. "Then how did you move elsewhere?" Anna Andreyevna, still weeping. "Mother fell ill that night, and Mrs. Captain found a house with Bubnova, so we moved there on the third day, and Mrs. Captain also moved with us; after we left, my mother fell ill completely , lay three weeks, I waited on her all the time.We ran out of money, but we were helped by the captain's wife and Ivan Alexandritch. " "It's the coffin shop owner," I explained. "Mum told me stories about Azorka as soon as she was able to get out of bed and walk." Having said this, Nellie stopped again.The old man seemed pleased to hear that the conversation had turned to Azorka. "What did she say to you about Azorka?" he asked, sitting down in his easy chair, bending even lower, as if to make his face darker, and draw his eyes toward her. look down. "She used to tell me about my grandfather," Nellie answered, "and when she was sick she kept talking about it, even when she was talking nonsense. But when she was on the verge of recovering, she told me about her past. life... that's when she talked about the Zorka.Because once, by the river outside the city, some boys were leading Azorka by a rope and trying to drown him, and my mother gave them some money and bought Azorka.Grandpa laughed at Azorka as soon as he saw it. But Azorka ran away, and mother began to cry; grandfather was frightened, and offered a reward of one hundred rubles to whoever would bring Azorka back.Someone brought it back on the third day; my grandfather gave the man a hundred rubles and fell in love with him ever since. Azorka.Mom liked it so much that she even hugged it to her bed.She told me that Azorka used to be a street performer with some monkey performers, and he could do many things, he could run with a monkey on his back, he could carry a gun, and he could do many, many things ... When mother left grandpa, grandpa kept Azorka by his side and carried it everywhere, so when mother saw Azorka on the street, she immediately guessed that grandpa was nearby..." The old man obviously didn't want to hear these things about Azorka, so he frowned more and more.From then on, he didn't say a word and didn't ask anything. "Well, have you never seen your grandfather again?" asked Anna Andreyevna. "No, my mother gradually recovered from her illness, and I met my grandfather again. I went to a small shop to buy bread, and suddenly I saw a man carrying Azorka. I looked and recognized my grandfather, and I hid aside. , close to the base of the wall. Grandpa looked at me and saw For a long time, he looked so terrible, I was very afraid of him, then he passed by; Azorka recognized me, jumped up and down beside me, and started licking my hands.I hurried home, looked back, and grandpa also walked into the shop. son.At this time, I thought: He must have gone to inquire about our situation, so I became even more scared. After returning home, I didn't say anything to my mother, for fear that she would fall ill again.I didn't go to that small shop again the next day, saying I had a headache; when I went on the third day, I met no one, and I was so frightened that I ran as fast as I could.Another day passed, and I had just turned the corner when I suddenly saw my grandfather in front of me, and Azorka.I ran away, turned into another street, and entered the shop by another door; but Suddenly I almost bumped into him again. I was so scared that I stopped and couldn't walk.Grandpa stood in front of me, looked at me for a long time, then patted my head, took my hand, and led me away, with Azorka following us face, wagging its tail.Only then did I realize that my grandfather couldn't even walk, he was always leaning on a walking stick, and his hands were shaking all the time, very violently.He led me to a peddler who was sitting on a street corner selling treacle cakes and apples.Grandpa bought it for me A honey rooster and a honey fish, a piece of sugar and an apple, and when he took money out of his purse, his hands trembled so much that a five-copeck piece fell, and I picked it up for him stand up.He gave me the copper coin and the treacle cake Touched me, touched my head, but left me without saying a word and went home. "After I went back to see my mother, I told her everything about my grandfather, and said, how I was afraid of him at first, and how I avoided him. At first, my mother didn't believe my words, but then she became happy and asked her all night. Kiss me again It's crying. After I told her everything, she took care of me not to be afraid of grandpa again. Since he deliberately came to find me, it can be seen that he likes me.She told me that when I saw my grandfather in the future, I should make out with him and talk to him.the next day Early in the morning, she urged me to go out several times, although I told her that my grandfather only came out before evening every time.She also followed me from a distance, hiding behind the street corner, and the next day too, but grandpa didn't come, and it rained all those days, because She was always going out with me, so she caught a bad cold and fell ill. "Grandpa didn't go out for a week, bought me another honey fish and an apple, and said nothing. When he walked away from me, I followed him quietly, because I I've thought about it a long time ago, let's find out where my grandfather lives. where, and then go back and tell mom.I followed him across the street at a distance so that Grandpa couldn't see me.He lived far away, not where he later lived and died, but on Pea Street, also in a large apartment, on the fourth floor.I put After inquiring all this clearly, I returned home very late.Mom was very scared because she didn't know where I was going.After I told her, my mother was very happy again, and she was going to see grandpa immediately the next day; but on the second day, after thinking about it, she became afraid again, I was always afraid, and I was afraid for three whole days; I still couldn't go, and then she called me over, and said, "Well, Nellie, I'm sick now, so I can't go, I wrote a letter to your grandfather, you go Find him and give him the letter.Nellie, you have to watch what he thinks letter, what to say and what to do; and then you go and kneel down, kiss him, and ask him to forgive your mother... Mother cried very sadly, kept kissing me, crossing me, wishing me all the best this time Yes, she prayed to God and made me kneel before her Beside her, kneeling in front of the icon, although she was very ill, she still came out and saw me off at the gate. I looked back several times, but she was always standing there, looking at me, watching me walk... "I went to my grandfather's and opened the door, but the door was not hooked. My grandfather was sitting at the table eating bread and potatoes, and Azorka was standing in front of him, wagging her tail, watching him eat. In the room where my grandfather lived, the windows were also very low, and It was very dark and there was only one table and one chair.He lives there, alone.After I went in, he was startled. His face was pale and he was shaking.I was terrified too, and without saying a word, I just went to the table and put the letter on the table.outside As soon as the gentleman saw the letter, he lost his temper, jumped up, grabbed the walking stick, and swung it at me, but he didn't hit me, but just drove me to the outhouse, and pushed me out.Before I could go down the first flight of stairs, he opened the door again and left the unopened The letter was thrown out and thrown to me.I told everything when I got home.Mom immediately fell ill again..."