I
I must begin with my boyish enthusiasms.
I was nineteen years old in those days, and a student at the Petrovsky Academy.
Of course, that is a good age to be at; and then and early days of college life, and the academy out in the suburbs, by the lake, among the green parks; the young college friends, and students’ meetings, and work, and discussions;—all this made it seem as if we were going to accomplish something something quite grand and out of the common, which would make everybody happy—and that we ourselves should be perfectly happy ever afterwards.
Nothing less—happy! I dreamt of great deeds, of struggle, of sacrifice; but in strife, and action, and struggle, even in sacrifice, there was ever the idea of happiness—bright, complete, all-pervading happiness.
And besides that, there was she.
At the time I speak of, however, she was away. She had gone to the Volga in the spring to serve as cashier on a steamboat.
Theoretically, steamer cashiers are always men—naturally. But that is a mere bit of red tape, and not only had she succeeded in obtaining the post she had done much more—kept it for two summers. We all considered this a very important matter. There are plenty of cashiers in the world, yet none of them seemed to me to be doing anything worth doing: they just hand out tickets, and receive a wretched little salary. But of female cashiers at least female steamer cashiers—there was only one, and her work seemed to me not work merely but a kind of mission. I was enraptured by the energy of this girl—still little more than a child who by her strenuous courage and resolution had gained for herself the right of independent labor, and succeeded through all difficulties in keeping the place which she had won. On first making her acquaintance, I felt that I had found something which I had long been seeking in my vague daydreams, and there awakened within me quite a peculiar sensation which irradiated with its brightness all my other hopes and ecstasies. For the rest, I never breathed a word about love either to her or in my own mind.
She went away; but I knew that, so soon as the navigation should stop for the winter, she would come back and stand again in a corner of the room at our students’ meetings with her fair face, so expressive and full of life, thrown into strong relief by her dark dress. And again, her eyes would light up with childlike curiosity at our discussions, and flash with joyous approval when I happened to voice her own unspoken thought—and her cheeks would glow with the bright color brought from the health-giving Volga.
When she was present, whatever questions we discussed interested and enlivened me; but even without her, life was very bright. We had just finished the practical part of the academy course, and were having a vacation before the lectures began. We spent our time amusing ourselves, reading and talking.