Part 28

“That’s all right. We can stay the night at your place, Sergai Mihailovitch, I suppose?”

“Of course you may!”

“Good. I shall be ready in a minute. I’ll just make myself a little more presentable.”

“And how are things at your factory?” Nejdanov asked significantly.

Solomin looked away.

“We can talk things over thoroughly,” he remarked a second time. “Please excuse me a moment.... I’ll be back directly.... I’ve forgotten something.”

He went out. Had he not already produced a good impression on Nejdanov, the latter would have thought that he was backing out, but such an idea did not occur to him.

An hour later, when from every story, every staircase and door of the enormous building, a noisy crowd of workpeople came streaming out, the carriage containing Markelov, Nejdanov, and Solomin drove out of the gates on to the road.

“Vassily Fedotitch! Is it to be done?” Pavel shouted after Solomin, whom he had accompanied to the gate.

“No, not now,” Solomin replied. “He wanted to know about some night work,” he explained, turning to his companions.

When they reached Borsionkov they had some supper, merely for the sake of politeness, and afterwards lighted cigars and began a discussion, one of those interminable, midnight Russian discussions which in degree and length are only peculiar to Russians and unequalled by people of any other nationality. During the discussion, too, Solomin did not come up to Nejdanov’s expectation. He spoke little—so little that one might almost have said that he was quite silent. But he listened attentively, and whenever he made any remark or gave an opinion, did so briefly, seriously, showing a considerable amount of common-sense. Solomin did not believe that the Russian revolution was so near at hand, but not wishing to act as a wet blanket on others, he did not intrude his opinions or hinder others from making attempts. He looked on from a distance as it were, but was still a comrade by their side. He knew the St. Petersburg revolutionists and agreed with their ideas up to a certain point. He himself belonged to the people, and fully realised that the great bulk of them, without whom one can do nothing, were still quite indifferent, that they must first be prepared, by quite different means and for entirely different ends than the upper classes. So he held aloof, not from a sense of superiority, but as an ordinary man with a few independent ideas, who did not wish to ruin himself or others in vain. But as for listening, there was no harm in that.

Solomin was the only son of a deacon and had five sisters, who were all married to priests or deacons. He was also destined for the church, but with his father’s consent threw it up and began to study mathematics, as he had taken a special liking to mechanics. He entered a factory of which the owner was an Englishman, who got to love him like his own son. This man supplied him with the means of going to Manchester, where he stayed for two years, acquiring an excellent knowledge of the English language. With the Moscow merchant he had fallen in but a short time ago. He was exacting with his subordinates, a manner he had acquired in England, but they liked him nevertheless, and treated him as one of themselves. His father was very proud of him, and used to speak of him as a steady sort of man, but was very grieved that he did not marry and settle down.

During the discussion, as we have already said, Solomin sat silent the whole time; but when Markelov began enlarging upon the hopes they put on the factory workers, Solomin remarked, in his usual laconic way, that they must not depend too much on them, as factory workers in Russia were not what they were abroad. “They are an extremely mild set of people here.”

“And what about the peasants?”

“The peasants? There are a good many sweaters and money-lenders among them now, and there are likely to be more in time. This kind only look to their own interests, and as for the others, they are as ignorant as sheep.”

“Then where are we to turn to?” Solomin smiled.

“Seek and ye shall find.”

There was a constant smile on his lips, but the smile was as full of meaning as the man himself. With Nejdanov he behaved in a very peculiar manner. He was attracted to the young student and felt an almost tender sympathy for him. At one part of the discussion, where Nejdanov broke out into a perfect torrent of words, Solomin got up quietly, moved across the room with long strides, and shut a window that was standing open just above Nejdanov’s head.

“You might catch cold,” he observed, in answer to the orator’s look of amazement.

Nejdanov began to question him about his factory, asking if any cooperative experiments had been made, if anything had been done so that the workers might come in for a share of the profits.

“My dear fellow!” Solomin exclaimed, “I instituted a school and a tiny hospital, and even then the owner struggled like a bear!”

Solomin lost his temper once in real earnest on hearing of some legal injustice about the suppression of a workman’s association. He banged his powerful fist on the table so that everything on it trembled, including a forty-pound weight, which happened to be lying near the ink pot.

When Markelov and Nejdanov began discussing ways and means of executing their plans, Solomin listened with respectful curiosity, but did not pronounce a single word. Their talk lasted until four o’clock in the morning, when they had touched upon almost everything under the sun. Markelov again spoke mysteriously of Kisliakov’s untiring journeys and his letters, which were becoming more interesting than ever. He promised to show them to Nejdanov, saying that he would probably have to take them away with him, as they were rather lengthy and written in an illegible handwriting. He assured him that there was a great deal of learning in them and even poetry, not of the frivolous kind, but poetry with a socialistic tendency!

From Kisliakov, Markelov went on to the military, to adjutants, Germans, even got so far as his articles on the shortcomings of the artillery, whilst Nejdanov spoke about the antagonism between Heine and Borne, Proudhon, and realism in art. Solomin alone sat listening and reflecting, the smile never leaving his lips. Without having uttered a single word, he seemed to understand better than the others where the essential difficulty lay.

The hour struck four. Nejdanov and Markelov could scarcely stand on their legs from exhaustion, while Solomin was as fresh as could be. They parted for the night, having agreed to go to town the next day to see the merchant Golushkin, an Old Believer, who was said to be very zealous and promised proselytes.

Solomin doubted whether it was worth while going, but agreed to go in the end.

XVII

Markelov’s guests were still asleep when a messenger with a letter came to him from his sister, Madame Sipiagina. In this letter Valentina Mihailovna spoke about various little domestic details, asked him to return a book he had borrowed, and added, by the way, in a postscript, the very “amusing” piece of news that his old flame Mariana was in love with the tutor Nejdanov and he with her. This was not merely gossip, but she, Valentina Mihailovna, had seen with her own eyes and heard with her own ears. Markelov’s face grew blacker than night, but he did not utter a word. He ordered the book to be returned, and when he caught sight of Nejdanov coming downstairs, greeted him just as usual and did not even forget to give him the promised packet of Kisliakov’s letters. He did not stay with him however, but went out to see to the farm.