The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov Read Free Page B

his voice shimmered again, “but your pining, compared to mine, my tempestuous, turbulent pining, is but the even breathing of one who is asleep. And think about it: not one of our Tribe is there left in Rus’. Some of us swirled away like wisps of fog, others scattered over the world. Our native rivers are melancholy, there is no frisky hand to splash up the moon-gleams. Silent are the orphaned bluebells that remain, by chance, unmown, the pale-blue
gusli
that once served my rival, the ethereal Field-Sprite, for his songs. The shaggy, friendly, household spirit, in tears, has forsaken your besmirched, humiliated home, and the groves have withered, the pathetically luminous, magically somber groves.…
    “It was we, Rus’, who were your inspiration, your unfathomable beauty, your agelong enchantment! And we are all gone, gone, driven into exile by a crazed surveyor.
    “My friend, soon I shall die, say something to me, tell me that you love me, a homeless phantom, come sit closer, give me your hand.…”
    The candle sputtered and went out. Cold fingers touched my palm. The familiar melancholy laugh pealed and fell still.
    When I turned on the light there was no one in the armchair.… No one!… Nothing was left but a wondrously subtle scent in the room, of birch, of humid moss.…

RUSSIAN SPOKEN HERE
    M ARTIN MARTINICH’S tobacco shop is located in a corner building. No wonder tobacco shops have a predilection for corners, for Martin’s business is booming. The window is of modest size, but well arranged. Small mirrors make the display come alive. At the bottom, amid the hollows of hilly azure velvet, nestles a motley of cigarette boxes with names couched in the glossy international dialect that serves for hotel names as well; higher up, rows of cigars grin in their lightweight boxes.
    In his day Martin was a well-off landowner. He is famed in my childhood recollections for a remarkable tractor, while his son Petya and I succumbed simultaneously to Meyn Ried and scarlet fever, so that now, after fifteen years chock-full of all kinds of things, I enjoyed stopping by the tobacco shop on that lively corner where Martin sold his wares.
    Since last year, moreover, we have more than reminiscences in common. Martin has a secret, and I have been made party to that secret. “So, everything as usual?” I ask in a whisper, and he, glancing over his shoulder, replies just as softly, “Yes, thank heaven, all is quiet.” The secret is a quite extraordinary one. I recall how I was leaving for Paris and stayed at Martin’s till evening the day before. A man’s soul can be compared to a department store and his eyes to twin display windows. Judging by Martin’s eyes, warm, brown tints were in fashion. Judging by those eyes, the merchandise inside his soul was of superb quality. And what a luxuriant beard, fairly glistening with robust Russian gray. And his shoulders, his stature, his mien.… At one time they used to say he could slit a handkerchief with a sword—one of the exploits of Richard Coeur de Lion. Now a fellow émigré would say with envy, “The man did not give in!”
    His wife was a puffy, gentle old woman with a mole by her left nostril.Ever since the time of revolutionary ordeals her face had had a touching tic: she would give quick sidewise glances skyward. Petya had the same imposing physique as his father. I was fond of his mild-mannered glumness and unexpected humor. He had a large, flaccid face (about which his father used to say, “What a mug—three days would not suffice to circumnavigate it”) and reddish-brown, permanently tousled hair. Petya owned a tiny cinema in a sparsely populated part of town, which brought a very modest income. And there we have the whole family.
    I spent that day before my departure sitting by the counter and watching Martin receive his customers—first he would lean lightly, with two fingers, on the countertop, then step to the shelves, produce a box with a flourish, and