Read Online The Naked Year by Boris Pilnyak - Free Book Online Page A

Princess will reduce it, they’ll strike a bargain (a bargain has to be struck), the Tatars, habitually-adroitly, will wrap up their purchases in flamboyant parcels, pay thousands from bulky wallets and one-by-one (it has to be one by one!) they’ll go out the back way down the hill, their nice new galoshes gleaming in the sun. And the Princess will cry in the lumber room, recalling the discovered trinket, and everything connected with it.
    In the attic, in the maids’ quarters, live the daughters–this has been the custom with the Popkovs and Ordinins for generations. The ceilings are low here, and it is light here–the walls are white and the square windows open. As a girl of eighteen Lidia had married the landowner Polunin right here in Ordinin–and soon left him, exchanging him for Moscow, for Paris (in Paris Ksenya was born), she met and went to live with a Cavalry officer, and parted with him, and immediately after this she met an artist from the Moscow Imperial Bolshoi Theater–and entered Bohemia forever–she began to study singing, and her singing was successful–at twenty-seven she entered the same theater as an actress; where her new husband was in the cast. This new husband she also ditched, but she never left the stage and rushed hither and thither according to the will of God and the entrepreneurs until– –Now she is back at her mother’s. Her younger sister Natalya, following in her footsteps, went to Moscow as a girl, but organized her life differently: she attended medical school under Guerier and completed it:–and she had her first foolish love affair, the one which burns all boats, but if Lidia exchanged love affair for love affair–Natalya decided never to love again and stayed on to become a doctor, as is written on her diploma–and to keep silent.
    And again Marfusha walks through all the rooms and says indifferently:
    â€œThe samovar’s on the table, Mother has returned… Mother is swearing!”
    Following Marfusha at a distance comes Yelena Yermilovna, silently and without being asked she opens doors (and with her the following conversations occur:–“Are you drawing, Gleb Yevgrafovich, sir?”–“I am, Yelena Yermilovna.”–“Well, draw till your heart’s content, and the Lord keep you!…”–“I am reading, smoking, getting dressed, walking, getting angry, going to bed,”–they say to her, and she answers them all:–“Well, read, smoke, get dressed, walk, get angry, go to bed–till your heart’s content, Lord keep you!…”)Yelena Yermilovna silently thrusts her head into Lidia’s room.
    â€œAre you getting dressed, ma’am?”
    â€œYelena Yermilovna, how many times must I tell you it’s just not done to enter without knocking! Go away! I don’t allow you in here. Go away!”
    Yelena Yermilovna silently disappears behind the door.
    â€œShe’s like a house-rat,” says Lidia Yevgrafovna is disgust.
    Katerina, the youngest, helps her to get dressed. Lidia Yevgrafovna in just a white lace night gown and black stockings which cling to her shapely legs as far as the thigh, is half-lying in a low armchair. The night gown has slipped off her shoulders, her round shoulders are visible and her large, still beautiful bust with matt nipples. Katerina is combing her abundant red hair. Lidia Yevgrafovna has brown eyes, slender is her Roman nose, and she is rapaciously beautiful. Katerina, plump and indolent, is wearing a slovenly-looking dressing gown, but her hair–also red and abundant–is beautiful.
    â€œAa-a!” Lidia runs through her scales, to try out her voice, and says:
    â€œYou’ll have to go and see Natalya, or somebody else… When did you notice?”
    â€œAbout a month ago, I think,” says Katerina indolently.
    â€œWell, if it’s a month, there’s no rush.