Doctor Zhivago (81 page)

"
But only on condition that you come with us,
"
broke in Lara.

"
It is as difficult for you as it is for me to think of our being separated, but perhaps we ought to put our feelings aside and make this sacrifice. Because there
'
s no question of my going.
"

"
But you haven
'
t heard anything yet, you don
'
t know…Listen to what Victor Ippolitovich says.… Tomorrow morning…Victor Ippolitovich.
"

"
Larisa Feodorovna is evidently thinking of the news I brought and have already told her. In the sidings at Yuriatin, an official train of the Far Eastern Government is standing under steam. It arrived yesterday from Moscow and is leaving for the East tomorrow. It belongs to our Ministry of Communications. Half the carriages are
wagons-lits
.

"
I have to go by this train. Several seats have been put at my disposal for my assistants. We could travel in great comfort. There won
'
t ever be another chance like this again. I realize that you are not in the habit of speaking lightly, you are not the man to go back on your decisions, and you have made up your mind not to go with us. But even so, shouldn
'
t you reconsider it for Larisa Feodorovna
'
s sake? You heard her say that she won
'
t go without you. Come with us, if not to Vladivostok, then at least as far as Yuriatin—and there we shall see. Only we must really hurry—there is not a moment to lose. I have a driver with me—I don
'
t drive myself—and there isn
'
t room for five of us in my sleigh. But I understand you have Samdeviatov
'
s horse—didn
'
t you say you had gone with it to get the wood? Is it still harnessed?
"

"
No, I have unharnessed it.
"

"
Well then, harness it again as quickly as you possibly can. My driver will help you.… Though, come to think of it, why bother—let
'
s forget about your sleigh, we
'
ll manage with mine, we
'
ll squeeze in somehow. Only let
'
s hurry, for heaven
'
s sake. You only need to pack the most essential things for the journey—whatever comes to hand first. There
'
s no time to fuss with packing when it
'
s a question of a child
'
s life.
"

"
I don
'
t understand you, Victor Ippolitovich. You talk as if I had agreed to come. Go and good luck to you, and let Lara go with you if she wishes. You needn
'
t worry about the house. I
'
ll clean it up and lock it after you
'
ve gone.
"

"
What are you talking about, Yura? What
'
s all this nonsense you don
'
t even believe yourself?
'
Lara
'
s wishes
'
indeed! As if you didn
'
t know perfectly well that I won
'
t go without you and I won
'
t make any decision on my own. So what
'
s all this talk about your locking up the house?
"

"
So you are quite adamant?
"
said Komarovsky.
"
In that case, with Larisa Feodorovna
'
s permission I should like to have a couple of words with you, if possible alone.
"

"
Certainly. We can go into the kitchen. You don
'
t mind, darling?
"

"
Strelnikov has been captured, condemned to death, and shot.
"

"
How horrible! Are you really sure?
"

"
It
'
s what I
'
ve been told, and I am convinced it
'
s true.
"

"
Don
'
t tell Lara. She would go out of her mind.
"

"
Of course I won
'
t. That
'
s why I asked to speak to you alone. Now that this has happened, she and her daughter are in imminent danger. You must help me to save them. Are you quite sure you won
'
t go with us?
"

"
Quite sure. I
'
ve told you already.
"

"
But she won
'
t go without you. I simply don
'
t know what to do. You
'
ll have to help me in a different way. You
'
ll have to pretend, let her think that you might be willing to change your mind, look as if you might allow yourself to be persuaded. I can
'
t see her saying goodbye and leaving you, either here or at the station at Yuriatin. We
'
ll have to make her think that you are coming after all, if not now, then later, when I
'
ve arranged another opportunity for you to come. You
'
ll have to pretend that you
'
ll be willing to do that. You
'
ll just have to convince her of this, even if you have to lie. Though this is no empty offer on my part—I swear to you on my honor that at the first sign you give me I
'
ll get you out to the East and I
'
ll arrange for you to go on from there anywhere you like. But Larisa Feodorovna must believe that you are at least coming to see us off. You
'
ll simply have to make her believe that. For instance, you might pretend that you are going to get your sleigh ready and urge us to start at once, without waiting for you, not to waste any time—say you
'
ll catch up with us as soon as you are ready.
"

"
I am so shaken by the news about Strelnikov that I cannot collect my wits. I have hardly taken in all you
'
ve said. But you are right. Now that they
'
ve settled accounts with him, we must conclude, things being as they are, that Larisa Feodorovna and Katia
'
s lives are also threatened. Either she or I will certainly be arrested, so we
'
ll be parted anyway. It
'
s better that it should be you who separate us and take them off, as far away as possible. I am saying this, but it doesn
'
t make much difference—things are already going your way. Probably in the end I
'
ll break down completely, and swallow my pride and my self-respect and crawl to you, and ask you for her, for my life, and for a sea passage to my family, and for my own salvation, and accept it all from your hands. But you must give me time to think about it. I am stunned by the news. I am so distressed that I can
'
t think or reason properly. Perhaps, by putting myself in your hands, I am making a disastrous mistake and it will appall me all the rest of my life. But I am so dazed and overcome that all I can do at the moment is to agree with you blindly and obey you helplessly.… Very well, then, for her sake I
'
ll go out now and tell her that I
'
ll get the sleigh ready and catch up with you, but in fact I shall stay behind.… There
'
s one thing, though. How can you go now, when it will soon be dark? The road runs through woods, and there are wolves. Watch out.
"

"
I know. Don
'
t worry. I
'
ve got a gun and a revolver. I
'
ve brought a bit of liquor too, by the way, to keep out the cold. Would you like some? I
'
ve got enough.
"

"
What have I done? What have I done? I
'
ve given her up, renounced her, given her away. I must run after them. Lara! Lara!

"
They can
'
t hear. The wind is against me and they are probably shouting at each other. She has every reason to feel happy, reassured. She has no idea of the trick I
'
ve played on her.

"
She is thinking: It
'
s wonderful that things have gone so well, they couldn
'
t be better. Her absurd, obstinate Yurochka has relented at last, thank heaven, we are going to a nice, safe place, where people are more sensible than we are, where you can be sure of law and order. Suppose even, just to be annoying, he doesn
'
t come on tomorrow
'
s train, Komarovsky will send another to bring him, and he
'
ll join us in no time at all. And at the moment, of course, he
'
s in the stable, hurrying, excited, fumbling with the harness, and he
'
ll rush after us full tilt and catch up with us before we get into the forest.

"
That
'
s what she must be thinking. And we didn
'
t even say goodbye properly, I just waved to her and turned back, trying to swallow my pain as if it were a piece of apple stuck in my throat, choking me.
"

He stood on the veranda, his coat over one shoulder. With his free hand he was clutching the slender wooden pillar just under the roof as if he meant to strangle it. His whole attention was concentrated on a point in the distance. There a short stretch of the road could be seen climbing uphill, bordered by a few sparse birches. The low rays of the setting sun fell on this open space, and there the sleigh now hidden by a shallow dip would appear at any moment.

"
Farewell, farewell,
"
he said over and over again in anticipation of that moment; his words were breathed almost soundlessly into the cold afternoon air.
"
Farewell, my only love, my love forever lost.

"
They
'
re coming, they
'
re coming,
"
he whispered through dry, blenched lips as the sleigh shot like an arrow out of the dip, swept past the birches one after another, gradually slowing down, and—oh, joy!—stopped before the last of them.

His heart thumped with such a wild excitement that his knees shook and he felt weak and faint, the whole of his body soft as cloth, like the coat slipping from his shoulder.
"
O God, is it Thy will to give her back to me? What can have happened? What is going on out there near the sunset? What can be the meaning of it? Why are they standing still? No. It
'
s finished. They
'
ve moved. They
'
re off. She must have stopped for a last look at the house. Or perhaps to make sure that I had left? That I was chasing after them? They
'
ve gone.
"

With luck, if the sun didn
'
t go down first (he wouldn
'
t see them in the dark) they would flash past once again, for the last time, on the other side of the ravine, across the field where the wolves had stood two nights before.

And now this moment also had come and gone. The dark red sun was still round as a ball above the blue snowdrifts along the horizon, flooding the plain with a juicy pineapple-colored light that the snow greedily sucked in, when the sleigh swept into sight and vanished.
"
Farewell, Lara, until we meet in the next world, farewell, my love, my inexhaustible, everlasting joy. I
'
ll never see you again, I
'
ll never, never see you again.
"

It was getting dark. Swiftly the bronze-red patches of sunset scattered on the snow died down and went out. The soft, ashy distance filled with a lilac dusk that turned to deep mauve, its smoky haze smudging the fine lacework of the roadside birches lightly traced on the pink sky, pale as though it had suddenly grown shallow.

Grief had sharpened Yurii Andreievich
'
s senses and quickened his perception a hundredfold. The very air surrounding him was rare, unique. The winter evening was alive with sympathy, like a friendly witness. It was as if there had never been such a dusk before and night were falling now for the first time in order to console him in his loneliness and bereavement; as if the valley were not always girded by a panorama of wooded hills on the horizon but the trees had only taken up their places now, rising out of the ground in order to comfort him with their presence.