It was a bright April day. On the broad lagoon
which separates Venice from the narrow strip of accumulated
sea sand, called the Lido, a gondola was gliding—swaying
rhythmically at every push made by the gondolier as
he leaned on the big pole. Under its low awning,
on soft leather cushions, were sitting Elena and Insarov.
Elena’s features had not changed much since
the day of her departure from Moscow, but their expression
was different; it was more thoughtful and more severe,
and her eyes had a bolder look. Her whole figure
had grown finer and more mature, and the hair seemed
to lie in greater thickness and luxuriance along her
white brow and her fresh cheeks. Only about her
lips, when she was not smiling, a scarcely perceptible
line showed the presence of a hidden constant anxiety.
In Insarov’s face, on the contrary, the expression
had remained the same, but his features had undergone
a cruel change. He had grown thin, old, pale
and bent; he was constantly coughing a short dry cough,
and his sunken eyes shone with a strange brilliance.
On the way from Russia, Insarov had lain ill for almost
two months at Vienna, and only at the end of March
had he been able to come with his wife to Venice; from
there he was hoping to make his way through Zara to
Servia, to Bulgaria; the other roads were closed.
The war was now at its height about the Danube; England
and France had declared war on Russia, all the Slavonic
countries were roused and were preparing for an uprising.
The gondola put in to the inner shore of the Lido.
Elena and Insarov walked along the narrow sandy road
planted with sickly trees (every year they plant them
and every year they die) to the outer shore of the
Lido, to the sea.
They walked along the beach. The Adriatic rolled
its muddy-blue waves before them; they raced into
the shore, foaming and hissing, and drew back again,
leaving fine shells and fragments of seaweed on the
beach.
‘What a desolate place!’ observed Elena
’I’m afraid it’s too cold for you
here, but I guess why you wanted to come here.’
‘Cold!’ rejoined Insarov with a rapid
and bitter smile, ’I shall be a fine soldier,
if I’m to be afraid of the cold. I came
here ... I will tell you why. I look across
that sea, and I feel as though here, I am nearer my
country. It is there, you know,’ he added,
stretching out his hand to the East, ‘the wind
blows from there.’
‘Will not this wind bring the ship you are expecting?’
said Elena. ‘See, there is a white sail,
is not that it?’
Insarov gazed seaward into the distance to where Elena
was pointing.
‘Renditch promised to arrange everything for
us within a week,’ he said, ‘we can rely
on him, I think. . . . Did you hear, Elena,’
he added with sudden animation, ’they say the
poor Dalmatian fishermen have sacrificed their dredging
weights—you know the leads they weigh their
nets with for letting them down to the bottom—to
make bullets! They have no money, they only just
live by fishing; but they have joyfully given up their
last property, and now are starving. What a nation!’
