“If he were not my brother, but a stranger!…” she said to herself, as she hastily strove to suppress the shameful and yet alluring suggestion.
Then she remembered Novikoff and like a humble slave longed for his pardon and his love. She heard steps and looked round. Novikoff and Sanine came to her silently across the grass. She could not discern their faces in the dusk, yet she felt that the dreaded moment was at hand. She turned very pale, and it seemed as if life was about to end.
“There!” said Sanine, “I have brought Novikoff to you. He will tell you himself all that he has to tell. Stay here quietly, while I will go and get some tea.”
Turning on his heel, he walked swiftly away, and for a moment they watched his white shirt as he disappeared in the gloom. So great was the silence that they could hardly believe that he had gone farther than the shadow of the surrounding trees.
“Lidia Petrovna,” said Novikoff gently, in a voice so sad and touching that it went to her heart.
“Poor fellow,” she thought, “how good he is.”
“I know everything, Lidia Petrovna,” continued Novikoff, “but I love you just as much as ever. Perhaps some day you will learn to love me. Tell me, will you be my wife?”
“I had better not say too much about _that_,” he thought, “she must never know what a sacrifice I am making for her.”
Lida was silent. In such stillness one could hear the rippling of the stream.
“We are both unhappy,” said Novikoff, conscious that these words came from the depth of his heart. “Together perhaps we may find life easier.”
Lida’s eyes were filled with tears of gratitude as she turned towards him and murmured, “Perhaps.”
Yet her eyes said, God knows I will be a good wife to you, and love and respect you.
Novikoff read their message. He knelt down impetuously, and seizing her hand, kissed it passionately. Roused by such emotion, Lida forgot her shame.
“That’s over!” she thought, “and I shall be happy again! Dear, good fellow!” Weeping for joy, she gave him both her hands, and bending over his head she kissed his soft, silky hair which she had always admired. A vision rose before her of Sarudine, but it instantly vanished.
When Sanine returned, having given them enough time, as he thought, for a mutual explanation, he found them seated, hand in hand, engaged in quiet talk.