Dark Avenues / Темные аллеи. Книга для чтения на английском языке

“I grew up with gentlefolk, after all, so how could I fail to know how to keep myself respectable, Nikolai Alexeyevich?”

He straightened up quickly, opened his eyes wide and blushed.

“Nadezhda! Is it you?” he said hurriedly.

“It’s me, Nikolai Alexeyevich,” she replied.

“My God, my God!” he said, sitting down on a bench and staring straight at her. “Who could have thought it! How many years since we last saw one another? About thirty-five?”

“Thirty, Nikolai Alexeyevich.

“Something like that… My God, how strange!”

“What’s strange, sir?”

“But everything, everything… How can you not understand!”

His weariness and absent-mindedness had vanished; he stood up and began walking decisively around the room, gazing at the floor. Then he stopped and, blushing through his grey hair, began to speak:

“I know nothing about you from that time on.

“Soon after you, my owners gave me my freedom.”

“And where did you live afterwards?”

“It’s a long story, sir.”

“You weren’t married, you say?”

“No, I wasn’t.”

“Why? With the sort of beauty that you had?”

“I couldn’t do it.”

“Why not? What do you mean?”

“What is there to explain? You probably remember how I loved you.”

He blushed to the point of tears and, with a frown, again began his pacing.

“Everything passes, my friend,” he began mumbling. “Love, youth – everything, everything. The ordinary, vulgar story. Everything passes with the years. How does the Book of Job put it? вЂ?Thou shalt remember it as waters that pass away[8 - Thou shalt remember… away: “Because thou shalt forget thy misery, and remember it as waters that pass away.” Job 11:16. (РїСЂРёРј. перев.) «Тогда забудешь РіРѕСЂРµ: как Рѕ РІРѕРґРµ протекшей будешь вспоминать Рѕ нем» (РљРЅРёРіР° Р?РѕРІР°).

“God treats people differently, Nikolai Alexeyevich. Youth passes for everyone, but love’s a different matter.”

He raised his head and, stopping, gave a painful grin:

“But I mean, you couldn’t have loved me all your life!”

“But I could. However much time passed, I kept on living for the one thing.