Arms and the Man - 2

(ravenously). You’re an angel! (He gobbles the comfits.) Creams! Delicious! (He looks anxiously to see whether there are any more. There are none. He accepts the inevitable with pathetic goodhumor, and says, with grateful emotion) Bless you, dear lady. You can always tell an old soldier by the inside of his holsters and cartridge boxes. The young ones carry pistols and cartridges; the old ones, grub. Thank you. (He hands back the box. She snatches it contemptuously from him and throws it away. This impatient action is so sudden that he shies again.) Ugh! Don’t do things so suddenly, gracious lady. Don’t revenge yourself because I frightened you just now.
RAINA.
(superbly). Frighten me! Do you know, sir, that though I am only a woman, I think I am at heart as brave as you.
MAN.
I should think so. You haven’t been under fire for three days as I have. I can stand two days without shewing it much; but no man can stand three days: I’m as nervous as a mouse. (He sits down on the ottoman, and takes his head in his hands.) Would you like to see me cry?
RAINA.
(quickly). No.
MAN.
If you would, all you have to do is to scold me just as if I were a little boy and you my nurse. If I were in camp now they’d play all sorts of tricks on me.
RAINA.
(a little moved). I’m sorry. I won’t scold you. (Touched by the sympathy in her tone, he raises his head and looks gratefully at her: she immediately draws back and says stiffly) You must excuse me: our soldiers are not like that. (She moves away from the ottoman.)
MAN.
Oh, yes, they are. There are only two sorts of soldiers: old ones and young ones. I’ve served fourteen years: half of your fellows never smelt powder before. Why, how is it that you’ve just beaten us? Sheer ignorance of the art of war, nothing else. (Indignantly.) I never saw anything so unprofessional.
RAINA.
(ironically). Oh, was it unprofessional to beat you?
MAN.
Well, come, is it professional to throw a regiment of cavalry on a battery of machine guns, with the dead certainty that if the guns go off not a horse or man will ever get within fifty yards of the fire? I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw it.
RAINA.
(eagerly turning to him, as all her enthusiasm and her dream of glory rush back on her). Did you see the great cavalry charge? Oh, tell me about it. Describe it to me.
MAN.
You never saw a cavalry charge, did you?
RAINA.
How could I?
MAN.
Ah, perhaps not—of course. Well, it’s a funny sight. It’s like slinging a handful of peas against a window pane: first one comes; then two or three close behind him; and then all the rest in a lump.
RAINA.
(her eyes dilating as she raises her clasped hands ecstatically). Yes, first One!—the bravest of the brave!
MAN.
(prosaically). Hm! you should see the poor devil pulling at his horse.
RAINA.
Why should he pull at his horse?
MAN.
(impatient of so stupid a question). It’s running away with him, of course: do you suppose the fellow wants to get there before the others and be killed? Then they all come. You can tell the young ones by their wildness and their slashing. The old ones come bunched up under the number one guard: they know that they are mere projectiles, and that it’s no use trying to fight. The wounds are mostly broken knees, from the horses cannoning together.
RAINA.
Ugh! But I don’t believe the first man is a coward. I believe he is a hero!
MAN.
(goodhumoredly). That’s what you’d have said if you’d seen the first man in the charge to-day.
RAINA.
(breathless). Ah, I knew it! Tell me—tell me about him.
MAN.
He did it like an operatic tenor—a regular handsome fellow, with flashing eyes and lovely moustache, shouting a war-cry and charging like Don Quixote at the windmills. We nearly burst with laughter at him; but when the sergeant ran up as white as a sheet, and told us they’d sent us the wrong cartridges, and that we couldn’t fire a shot for the next ten minutes, we laughed at the other side of our mouths. I never felt so sick in my life, though I’ve been in one or two very tight places. And I hadn’t even a revolver cartridge—nothing but chocolate. We’d no bayonets—nothing. Of course, they just cut us to bits. And there was Don Quixote flourishing like a drum major, thinking he’d done the cleverest thing ever known, whereas he ought to be courtmartialled for it. Of all the fools ever let loose on a field of battle, that man must be the very maddest. He and his regiment simply committed suicide—only the pistol missed fire, that’s all.
RAINA.
(deeply wounded, but steadfastly loyal to her ideals). Indeed! Would you know him again if you saw him?
MAN.
Shall I ever forget him. (She again goes to the chest of drawers. He watches her with a vague hope that she may have something else for him to eat. She takes the portrait from its stand and brings it to him.)
RAINA.
That is a photograph of the gentleman—the patriot and hero—to whom I am betrothed.
MAN.
(looking at it). I’m really very sorry. (Looking at her.) Was it fair to lead me on? (He looks at the portrait again.) Yes: that’s him: not a doubt of it. (He stifles a laugh.)
RAINA.
(quickly). Why do you laugh?
MAN.
(shamefacedly, but still greatly tickled). I didn’t laugh, I assure you. At least I didn’t mean to. But when I think of him charging the windmills and thinking he was doing the finest thing—(chokes with suppressed laughter).
RAINA.
(sternly). Give me back the portrait, sir.
MAN.
(with sincere remorse). Of course. Certainly. I’m really very sorry. (She deliberately kisses it, and looks him straight in the face, before returning to the chest of drawers to replace it. He follows her, apologizing.) Perhaps I’m quite wrong, you know: no doubt I am. Most likely he had got wind of the cartridge business somehow, and knew it was a safe job.
RAINA.
That is to say, he was a pretender and a coward! You did not dare say that before.
MAN.
(with a comic gesture of despair). It’s no use, dear lady: I can’t make you see it from the professional point of view. (As he turns away to get back to the ottoman, the firing begins again in the distance.)
RAINA.
(sternly, as she sees him listening to the shots). So much the better for you.
MAN.
(turning). How?
RAINA.
You are my enemy; and you are at my mercy. What would I do if I were a professional soldier?
MAN.
Ah, true, dear young lady: you’re always right. I know how good you have been to me: to my last hour I shall remember those three chocolate creams. It was unsoldierly; but it was angelic.
RAINA.
(coldly). Thank you. And now I will do a soldierly thing. You cannot stay here after what you have just said about my future husband; but I will go out on the balcony and see whether it is safe for you to climb down into the street. (She turns to the window.)
MAN.
(changing countenance). Down that waterpipe! Stop! Wait! I can’t! I daren’t! The very thought of it makes me giddy. I came up it fast enough with death behind me. But to face it now in cold blood!—(He sinks on the ottoman.) It’s no use: I give up: I’m beaten. Give the alarm. (He drops his head in his hands in the deepest dejection.)
RAINA.
(disarmed by pity). Come, don’t be disheartened. (She stoops over him almost maternally: he shakes his head.) Oh, you are a very poor soldier—a chocolate cream soldier. Come, cheer up: it takes less courage to climb down than to face capture—remember that.
MAN.
(dreamily, lulled by her voice). No, capture only means death; and death is sleep—oh, sleep, sleep, sleep, undisturbed sleep! Climbing down the pipe means doing something—exerting myself—thinking! Death ten times over first.
RAINA.
(softly and wonderingly, catching the rhythm of his weariness). Are you so sleepy as that?
MAN.
I’ve not had two hours’ undisturbed sleep since the war began. I’m on the staff: you don’t know what that means. I haven’t closed my eyes for thirty-six hours.
RAINA.
(desperately). But what am I to do with you.
MAN.
(staggering up). Of course I must do something. (He shakes himself; pulls himself together; and speaks with rallied vigour and courage.) You see, sleep or no sleep, hunger or no hunger, tired or not tired, you can always do a thing when you know it must be done. Well, that pipe must be got down—(He hits himself on the chest, and adds)—Do you hear that, you chocolate cream soldier? (He turns to the window.)
RAINA.
(anxiously). But if you fall?
MAN.
I shall sleep as if the stones were a feather bed. Good-bye. (He makes boldly for the window, and his hand is on the shutter when there is a terrible burst of firing in the street beneath.)
RAINA.
(rushing to him). Stop! (She catches him by the shoulder, and turns him quite round.) They’ll kill you.
MAN.
(coolly, but attentively). Never mind: this sort of thing is all in my day’s work. I’m bound to take my chance. (Decisively.) Now do what I tell you. Put out the candles, so that they shan’t see the light when I open the shutters. And keep away from the window, whatever you do. If they see me, they’re sure to have a shot at me.
RAINA.
(clinging to him). They’re sure to see you: it’s bright moonlight. I’ll save you—oh, how can you be so indifferent? You want me to save you, don’t you?
MAN.
I really don’t want to be troublesome. (She shakes him in her impatience.) I am not indifferent, dear young lady, I assure you. But how is it to be done?
RAINA.
Come away from the window—please. (She coaxes him back to the middle of the room. He submits humbly. She releases him, and addresses him patronizingly.) Now listen. You must trust to our hospitality. You do not yet know in whose house you are. I am a Petkoff.
MAN.
What’s that?
RAINA.
(rather indignantly). I mean that I belong to the family of the Petkoffs, the richest and best known in our country.
MAN.
Oh, yes, of course. I beg your pardon. The Petkoffs, to be sure. How stupid of me!
RAINA.
You know you never heard of them until this minute. How can you stoop to pretend?
MAN.
Forgive me: I’m too tired to think; and the change of subject was too much for me. Don’t scold me.
RAINA.
I forgot. It might make you cry. (He nods, quite seriously. She pouts and then resumes her patronizing tone.) I must tell you that my father holds the highest command of any Bulgarian in our army. He is (proudly) a Major.
MAN.
(pretending to be deeply impressed). A Major! Bless me! Think of that!
RAINA.
You shewed great ignorance in thinking that it was necessary to climb up to the balcony, because ours is the only private house that has two rows of windows. There is a flight of stairs inside to get up and down by.
MAN.
Stairs! How grand! You live in great luxury indeed, dear young lady.
RAINA.
Do you know what a library is?
MAN.
A library? A roomful of books.
RAINA.
Yes, we have one, the only one in Bulgaria.
MAN.
Actually a real library! I should like to see that.
RAINA.
(affectedly). I tell you these things to shew you that you are not in the house of ignorant country folk who would kill you the moment they saw your Servian uniform, but among civilized people. We go to Bucharest every year for the opera season; and I have spent a whole month in Vienna.
MAN.
I saw that, dear young lady. I saw at once that you knew the world.
RAINA.
Have you ever seen the opera of Ernani?
MAN.
Is that the one with the devil in it in red velvet, and a soldier’s chorus?
RAINA.
(contemptuously). No!
MAN.
(stifling a heavy sigh of weariness). Then I don’t know it.
RAINA.
I thought you might have remembered the great scene where Ernani, flying from his foes just as you are tonight, takes refuge in the castle of his bitterest enemy, an old Castilian noble. The noble refuses to give him up. His guest is sacred to him.
MAN.
(quickly waking up a little). Have your people got that notion?
RAINA.
(with dignity). My mother and I can understand that notion, as you call it. And if instead of threatening me with your pistol as you did, you had simply thrown yourself as a fugitive on our hospitality, you would have been as safe as in your father’s house.
MAN.
Quite sure?
RAINA.
(turning her back on him in disgust.) Oh, it is useless to try and make you understand.
MAN.
Don’t be angry: you see how awkward it would be for me if there was any mistake. My father is a very hospitable man: he keeps six hotels; but I couldn’t trust him as far as that. What about YOUR father?
RAINA.
He is away at Slivnitza fighting for his country. I answer for your safety. There is my hand in pledge of it. Will that reassure you? (She offers him her hand.)
MAN.
(looking dubiously at his own hand). Better not touch my hand, dear young lady. I must have a wash first.
RAINA.
(touched). That is very nice of you. I see that you are a gentleman.
MAN.
(puzzled). Eh?
RAINA.
You must not think I am surprised. Bulgarians of really good standing—people in OUR position—wash their hands nearly every day. But I appreciate your delicacy. You may take my hand. (She offers it again.)
MAN.
(kissing it with his hands behind his back). Thanks, gracious young lady: I feel safe at last. And now would you mind breaking the news to your mother? I had better not stay here secretly longer than is necessary.
RAINA.
If you will be so good as to keep perfectly still whilst I am away.
MAN.
Certainly. (He sits down on the ottoman.)
(Raina goes to the bed and wraps herself in the fur cloak. His eyes close. She goes to the door, but on turning for a last look at him, sees that he is dropping of to sleep.)
RAINA.
(at the door). You are not going asleep, are you? (He murmurs inarticulately: she runs to him and shakes him.) Do you hear? Wake up: you are falling asleep.
MAN.
Eh? Falling aslee—? Oh, no, not the least in the world: I was only thinking. It’s all right: I’m wide awake.
RAINA.
(severely). Will you please stand up while I am away. (He rises reluctantly.) All the time, mind.
MAN.
(standing unsteadily). Certainly—certainly: you may depend on me.
(Raina looks doubtfully at him. He smiles foolishly. She goes reluctantly, turning again at the door, and almost catching him in the act of yawning. She goes out.)
MAN.
(drowsily). Sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, slee—(The words trail off into a murmur. He wakes again with a shock on the point of falling.) Where am I? That’s what I want to know: where am I? Must keep awake. Nothing keeps me awake except danger—remember that—(intently) danger, danger, danger, dan— Where’s danger? Must find it. (He starts of vaguely around the room in search of it.) What am I looking for? Sleep—danger—don’t know. (He stumbles against the bed.) Ah, yes: now I know. All right now. I’m to go to bed, but not to sleep—be sure not to sleep—because of danger. Not to lie down, either, only sit down. (He sits on the bed. A blissful expression comes into his face.) Ah! (With a happy sigh he sinks back at full length; lifts his boots into the bed with a final effort; and falls fast asleep instantly.)
(Catherine comes in, followed by Raina.)
RAINA.
(looking at the ottoman). He’s gone! I left him here.
CATHERINE.
Here! Then he must have climbed down from the—
RAINA.
(seeing him). Oh! (She points.)
CATHERINE.
(scandalized). Well! (She strides to the left side of the bed, Raina following and standing opposite her on the right.) He’s fast asleep. The brute!
RAINA.
(anxiously). Sh!
CATHERINE.
(shaking him). Sir! (Shaking him again, harder.) Sir!! (Vehemently shaking very bard.) Sir!!!
RAINA.
(catching her arm). Don’t, mamma: the poor dear is worn out. Let him sleep.
CATHERINE.
(letting him go and turning amazed to Raina). The poor dear! Raina!!! (She looks sternly at her daughter. The man sleeps profoundly.)
ACT II
The sixth of March, 1886. In the garden of major Petkoff’s house. It is a fine spring morning; and the garden looks fresh and pretty. Beyond the paling the tops of a couple of minarets can be seen, shewing that there is a valley there, with the little town in it. A few miles further the Balkan mountains rise and shut in the view. Within the garden the side of the house is seen on the right, with a garden door reached by a little flight of steps. On the left the stable yard, with its gateway, encroaches on the garden. There are fruit bushes along the paling and house, covered with washing hung out to dry. A path runs by the house, and rises by two steps at the corner where it turns out of the right along the front. In the middle a small table, with two bent wood chairs at it, is laid for breakfast with Turkish coffee pot, cups, rolls, etc.; but the cups have been used and the bread broken. There is a wooden garden seat against the wall on the left.
Louka, smoking a cigaret, is standing between the table and the house, turning her back with angry disdain on a man-servant who is lecturing her. He is a middle-aged man of cool temperament and low but clear and keen intelligence, with the complacency of the servant who values himself on his rank in servility, and the imperturbability of the accurate calculator who has no illusions. He wears a white Bulgarian costume jacket with decorated border, sash, wide knickerbockers, and decorated gaiters. His head is shaved up to the crown, giving him a high Japanese forehead. His name is Nicola.
NICOLA.
Be warned in time, Louka: mend your manners. I know the mistress. She is so grand that she never dreams that any servant could dare to be disrespectful to her; but if she once suspects that you are defying her, out you go.
LOUKA.
I do defy her. I will defy her. What do I care for her?
NICOLA.
If you quarrel with the family, I never can marry you. It’s the same as if you quarrelled with me!
LOUKA.
You take her part against me, do you?
NICOLA.
(sedately). I shall always be dependent on the good will of the family. When I leave their service and start a shop in Sofia, their custom will be half my capital: their bad word would ruin me.
LOUKA.
You have no spirit. I should like to see them dare say a word against me!
NICOLA.
(pityingly). I should have expected more sense from you, Louka. But you’re young, you’re young!
LOUKA.
Yes; and you like me the better for it, don’t you? But I know some family secrets they wouldn’t care to have told, young as I am. Let them quarrel with me if they dare!
NICOLA.
(with compassionate superiority). Do you know what they would do if they heard you talk like that?
LOUKA.
What could they do?
NICOLA.
Discharge you for untruthfulness. Who would believe any stories you told after that? Who would give you another situation? Who in this house would dare be seen speaking to you ever again? How long would your father be left on his little farm? (She impatiently throws away the end of her cigaret, and stamps on it.) Child, you don’t know the power such high people have over the like of you and me when we try to rise out of our poverty against them. (He goes close to her and lowers his voice.) Look at me, ten years in their service. Do you think I know no secrets? I know things about the mistress that she wouldn’t have the master know for a thousand levas. I know things about him that she wouldn’t let him hear the last of for six months if I blabbed them to her. I know things about Raina that would break off her match with Sergius if—
LOUKA.
(turning on him quickly). How do you know? I never told you!
NICOLA.
(opening his eyes cunningly). So that’s your little secret, is it? I thought it might be something like that. Well, you take my advice, and be respectful; and make the mistress feel that no matter what you know or don’t know, they can depend on you to hold your tongue and serve the family faithfully. That’s what they like; and that’s how you’ll make most out of them.
LOUKA.
(with searching scorn). You have the soul of a servant, Nicola.
NICOLA.
(complacently). Yes: that’s the secret of success in service.
(A loud knocking with a whip handle on a wooden door, outside on the left, is heard.)
MALE VOICE OUTSIDE.
Hollo! Hollo there! Nicola!
LOUKA.
Master! back from the war!
NICOLA.
(quickly). My word for it, Louka, the war’s over. Off with you and get some fresh coffee. (He runs out into the stable yard.)
LOUKA.
(as she puts the coffee pot and the cups upon the tray, and carries it into the house). You’ll never put the soul of a servant into me.
(Major Petkoff comes from the stable yard, followed by Nicola. He is a cheerful, excitable, insignificant, unpolished man of about 50, naturally unambitious except as to his income and his importance in local society, but just now greatly pleased with the military rank which the war has thrust on him as a man of consequence in his town. The fever of plucky patriotism which the Servian attack roused in all the Bulgarians has pulled him through the war; but he is obviously glad to be home again.)
PETKOFF.
(pointing to the table with his whip). Breakfast out here, eh?
NICOLA.
Yes, sir. The mistress and Miss Raina have just gone in.
PETKOFF.
(fitting down and taking a roll). Go in and say I’ve come; and get me some fresh coffee.
NICOLA.
It’s coming, sir. (He goes to the house door. Louka, with fresh coffee, a clean cup, and a brandy bottle on her tray meets him.) Have you told the mistress?
LOUKA.
Yes: she’s coming.
(Nicola goes into the house. Louka brings the coffee to the table.)
PETKOFF.
Well, the Servians haven’t run away with you, have they?
LOUKA.
No, sir.
PETKOFF.
That’s right. Have you brought me some cognac?
LOUKA.
(putting the bottle on the table). Here, sir.
PETKOFF.
That’s right. (He pours some into his coffee.)
(Catherine who has at this early hour made only a very perfunctory toilet, and wears a Bulgarian apron over a once brilliant, but now half worn out red dressing gown, and a colored handkerchief tied over her thick black hair, with Turkish slippers on her bare feet, comes from the house, looking astonishingly handsome and stately under all the circumstances. Louka goes into the house.)
CATHERINE.
My dear Paul, what a surprise for us. (She stoops over the back of his chair to kiss him.) Have they brought you fresh coffee?
PETKOFF.
Yes, Louka’s been looking after me. The war’s over. The treaty was signed three days ago at Bucharest; and the decree for our army to demobilize was issued yesterday.
CATHERINE.
(springing erect, with flashing eyes). The war over! Paul: have you let the Austrians force you to make peace?
PETKOFF.
(submissively). My dear: they didn’t consult me. What could I do? (She sits down and turns away from him.) But of course we saw to it that the treaty was an honorable one. It declares peace—
CATHERINE.
(outraged). Peace!
PETKOFF.
(appeasing her).—but not friendly relations: remember that. They wanted to put that in; but I insisted on its being struck out. What more could I do?
CATHERINE.
You could have annexed Servia and made Prince Alexander Emperor of the Balkans. That’s what I would have done.
PETKOFF.
I don’t doubt it in the least, my dear. But I should have had to subdue the whole Austrian Empire first; and that would have kept me too long away from you. I missed you greatly.
CATHERINE.
(relenting). Ah! (Stretches her hand affectionately across the table to squeeze his.)
PETKOFF.
And how have you been, my dear?
CATHERINE.
Oh, my usual sore throats, that’s all.
PETKOFF.
(with conviction). That comes from washing your neck every day. I’ve often told you so.
CATHERINE.
Nonsense, Paul!
PETKOFF.
(over his coffee and cigaret). I don’t believe in going too far with these modern customs. All this washing can’t be good for the health: it’s not natural. There was an Englishman at Phillipopolis who used to wet himself all over with cold water every morning when he got up. Disgusting! It all comes from the English: their climate makes them so dirty that they have to be perpetually washing themselves. Look at my father: he never had a bath in his life; and he lived to be ninety-eight, the healthiest man in Bulgaria. I don’t mind a good wash once a week to keep up my position; but once a day is carrying the thing to a ridiculous extreme.
CATHERINE.
You are a barbarian at heart still, Paul. I hope you behaved yourself before all those Russian officers.
PETKOFF.
I did my best. I took care to let them know that we had a library.
CATHERINE.
Ah; but you didn’t tell them that we have an electric bell in it? I have had one put up.
PETKOFF.
What’s an electric bell?
CATHERINE.
You touch a button; something tinkles in the kitchen; and then Nicola comes up.
PETKOFF.
Why not shout for him?
CATHERINE.
Civilized people never shout for their servants. I’ve learnt that while you were away.
PETKOFF.
Well, I’ll tell you something I’ve learnt, too. Civilized people don’t hang out their washing to dry where visitors can see it; so you’d better have all that (indicating the clothes on the bushes) put somewhere else.
CATHERINE.
Oh, that’s absurd, Paul: I don’t believe really refined people notice such things.
(Someone is heard knocking at the stable gates.)
PETKOFF.
There’s Sergius. (Shouting.) Hollo, Nicola!
CATHERINE.
Oh, don’t shout, Paul: it really isn’t nice.
PETKOFF.
Bosh! (He shouts louder than before.) Nicola!
NICOLA.
(appearing at the house door). Yes, sir.
PETKOFF.
If that is Major Saranoff, bring him round this way. (He pronounces the name with the stress on the second syllable—Sarah-noff.)
NICOLA.
Yes, sir. (He goes into the stable yard.)
PETKOFF.
You must talk to him, my dear, until Raina takes him off our hands. He bores my life out about our not promoting him—over my head, mind you.
CATHERINE.
He certainly ought to be promoted when he marries Raina. Besides, the country should insist on having at least one native general.
PETKOFF.
Yes, so that he could throw away whole brigades instead of regiments. It’s no use, my dear: he has not the slightest chance of promotion until we are quite sure that the peace will be a lasting one.
NICOLA.
(at the gate, announcing). Major Sergius Saranoff! (He goes into the house and returns presently with a third chair, which he places at the table. He then withdraws.)
(Major Sergius Saranoff, the original of the portrait in Raina’s room, is a tall, romantically handsome man, with the physical hardihood, the high spirit, and the susceptible imagination of an untamed mountaineer chieftain. But his remarkable personal distinction is of a characteristically civilized type. The ridges of his eyebrows, curving with a ram’s-horn twist round the marked projections at the outer corners, his jealously observant eye, his nose, thin, keen, and apprehensive in spite of the pugnacious high bridge and large nostril, his assertive chin, would not be out of place in a Paris salon. In short, the clever, imaginative barbarian has an acute critical faculty which has been thrown into intense activity by the arrival of western civilization in the Balkans; and the result is precisely what the advent of nineteenth-century thought first produced in England: to-wit, Byronism. By his brooding on the perpetual failure, not only of others, but of himself, to live up to his imaginative ideals, his consequent cynical scorn for humanity, the jejune credulity as to the absolute validity of his ideals and the unworthiness of the world in disregarding them, his wincings and mockeries under the sting of the petty disillusions which every hour spent among men brings to his infallibly quick observation, he has acquired the half tragic, half ironic air, the mysterious moodiness, the suggestion of a strange and terrible history that has left him nothing but undying remorse, by which Childe Harold fascinated the grandmothers of his English contemporaries. Altogether it is clear that here or nowhere is Raina’s ideal hero. Catherine is hardly less enthusiastic, and much less reserved in shewing her enthusiasm. As he enters from the stable gate, she rises effusively to greet him. Petkoff is distinctly less disposed to make a fuss about him.)
PETKOFF.
Here already, Sergius. Glad to see you!
CATHERINE.
My dear Sergius!(She holds out both her hands.)
SERGIUS.
(kissing them with scrupulous gallantry). My dear mother, if I may call you so.
PETKOFF.
(drily). Mother-in-law, Sergius; mother-in-law! Sit down, and have some coffee.
SERGIUS.
Thank you, none for me. (He gets away from the table with a certain distaste for Petkoff’s enjoyment of it, and posts himself with conscious grace against the rail of the steps leading to the house.)
CATHERINE.
You look superb—splendid. The campaign has improved you. Everybody here is mad about you. We were all wild with enthusiasm about that magnificent cavalry charge.
SERGIUS.
(with grave irony). Madam: it was the cradle and the grave of my military reputation.
CATHERINE.
How so?
SERGIUS.