Saturday, 4 November 1876 (23 October)

I ought to have foreseen that my father would seize every occasion, great and small, to take revenge on his wife. I told myself so vaguely, but I believed in the goodness of God.

Mamma is not to blame; one cannot live with such a man. He has suddenly revealed himself. I can judge now.

And I expected to find a father’s heart, a support, a protector!! And I find a venomous earthworm, full of rancour against his wife, towards whom he is in the wrong from head to foot. You saw it in the preface, and the coward takes his revenge on his wife through me. How fine, how noble, how admirable!

I spent the morning between my family and Domenica; when she had left, we tried to have things out with Paul, but he apes his father, and gets it all wrong. He will not do anything. What will become of this unhappy creature? His father has abandoned him like a servant or a foundling; Étienne offers him a certificate with which he could enter the service, and the wretched boy refuses!

And then Gedanoff and Michel, Michel and Gedanoff.

At the notary’s I signed a power of attorney in favour of Vinogradoff, to carry on... we shall see afterwards.

Alexandre comes back from town saying: I have found the key to the riddle.

It seems that, at a notary’s too, he met the sister-in-law and the niece of Mme Miloradovitch; these ladies spoke to him of me and said they would so much have liked to know me, they who have always been on good terms with Mamma...

— Her dearest wish was to see her mother’s old friends, said Alexandre.

— How can you say so, monsieur, when she has called on everyone except my aunt.

And so on and so forth; Alexandre talked to me about it at length; besides, I do not need his words to repeat what I have already said. One must read Mamma’s letters on the subject; you would think she was here.

How is my father’s conduct to be explained? Is it out of stupidity or out of spite that he created this business with Miloradovitch?

The two hours in the carriage passed like twenty minutes.

It has been snowing since the morning; the ground is white and the trees all covered with hoarfrost, which towards evening gives deliciously hazy tints. One would like to plunge into that greyish mist of the forest; it seems... another world.

But the gentle rocking of the carriage, the delicious scent of the first snow, the haze, the evening, all those soothing powers did nothing to lessen my spasms of indignation at the memory of what Antonelli did, a memory that hunts me like a wild beast and does not give me a moment’s peace.

I met my father again on the tenderest terms, but no sooner were we in the drawing room than he began to throw his barbs, and at last, seeing that I said nothing, he cried out:

— Your mother tells me I shall end my days with her, in the country! And what a country house, bought by Romanoff!

At last! He has dared to insult me! To answer would have meant leaving that very instant. One more sacrifice, I thought, and at least I shall have done everything; I shall have nothing to reproach myself with. I remained seated and did not say a word; only I shall long remember that minute: all my blood stood still, and my heart stopped beating for an instant, then fluttered like a bird in its death throes.

I sat down to table, still mute and with a determined air.

My father understood his mistake and began to find fault with everything, to scold the servants ostentatiously, so as to be able to plead irritation afterwards. Suddenly he sat down on the edge of my armchair and put his arms around me. I freed myself at once.

— Oh! no, I said, in a firm voice that this time had no whimpering note in it.

— What!

— No, no, Monsieur.

— Ah! so that is how it is — and he ran after me, trying to catch hold of me and laughing a forced laugh.

— Very well, I said coldly, by force, yes; otherwise, no.

I sat down again and he came back beside me.

— No, I do not want to sit beside you.

— Oh, but you will, you will.

And he tried to turn it into a joke; I got up, he caught hold of my dress, I tore it away and flung myself to the far end of the room.

— But why, why will you not?

— Because I have no wish to sit beside you.

— But it is I who ought to be angry!

— And so I am not angry at all.

— You want to be angry? Very well.

I made no answer, and shortly afterwards he withdrew, and, as on the other evening, I was left with Pacha. I had teasingly promised him a revelation about himself.

— You have committed a little meanness there, I told him. But I believe it was more from ignorance of certain rules of honourable conduct than from meanness.

He begged me to say what it was; I said nothing and only told him that I had seen with my own eyes my father unsealing a letter from his sister.

— Well, I know something... he said enough to pique my curiosity horribly, and I begged him to say what.

Every seduction a woman can display in pleading was displayed; the green man nearly fainted and told me nothing, which does not sadden me in the least, because the man does it neither to tease nor to pose, but truly, as he says, because he has given his word of honour not to tell.

So much for my white dress, my white arms, my white hands threaded with little blue veins, my loose hair and my soft voice: all that outlay for nothing.

I put on such unhappy airs, such oppressed poses, that I almost regret it. Why put that good fellow to the torture? He loves me and I take advantage of it; I tyrannise him in the guise of the tyrannised.

But he is a strong man all the same.

— You would have too poor an opinion of me if I gave in.

And I made no reply to this irresistible argument; I only put my hands on his shoulders and murmured: I beg you.

If I describe myself like this, you must not conclude that I was play-acting, but simply that I speak of it as though it had been someone other than me.

Here is something which proves either that I did not love Antonelli or that I love this one; but as that is an absurdity, I conclude that I did not love the other.

I will tell you quite bluntly that if the green man had wanted to, he could have kissed my hand and even my face.

But he is the pearl of honest men; besides, it could not occur to him even in a dream that the ideal Mousse, the haughty, the capricious, the mad one, might be treated like other women.

He could hardly breathe and kept his distance as though he were afraid of touching even my clothes, even by accident. And seeing this reserve (it is very fine, but he will get over it), or rather this respect, I held him by the button of his frock coat or else by the collar (it is my favourite way) and insisted.

I set him on fire and he leaves me cold.

I was speaking of the wickedness of men.

— And today, I said, there turned out to be a kind soul who spoke well of me.

— And who repeated it to you?

— Another kind soul.

— That makes two.

— Yes, but so much ill is spoken of me that it counts.

— There are many such kind souls.

— Really, I do not think so.

— But everyone praises you.

— Bah!

— Certainly; everyone who has seen you speaks well of you.

If you could form an idea of Pacha’s uprightness and of his fairness, you would understand all the pleasure that sentence gave me.

Alexandre claims that Lisaveta Ivanowna, offended by my rudeness, has forbidden Gritz to come. Perhaps it is true. I paid those wretched calls ten days after Gritz left, and when he came back from Vienna he did not come to us again until the other day, with Count Miloradovitch.