However, our hero replied carelessly, their agreeable phrases being as much wasted as though they had been cast into the water. He was even so impolite that he speedily deserted them, and went away to another part of the room, being desirous of seeing where the governor’s wife had gone with her daughter. But the ladies, it appeared, were not willing to release him so quickly. Each one of them inwardly resolved to employ all those feminine weapons which are so dangerous to our hearts, and to set all their best devices in motion. Each of them took an inward vow that she would be as fascinating as possible in the dance, and show off her best points in all their brilliancy. The postmaster’s wife, as she waltzed, drooped her head on one side in a very languishing way, as though she really were listening to something supernatural. One extremely charming woman, who had not come with any intention of dancing—being precluded, as she herself expressed it, by a little incommodity in the shape of a small corn on her right foot, in consequence of which she had even been forced to don soft shoes—could not resist, however, but took a few turns in her cloth foot-gear, simply to prevent the postmaster’s wife from getting too many conceited ideas into her head.
However all this by no means produced upon Tchitchikoff the effect which the women had relied upon. He did not even glance at the circle thus formed; but, rising incessantly on tip-toe, he gazed over their heads, in endeavour to see where the fascinating blonde had gone. He also bent down, and stared between their backs and shoulders; and at length he caught sight of his charmer, sitting beside her mother, over whom something in the nature of an Oriental turban with a feather was waving very grandly. Then it seemed as though our hero wanted to take his beauty by storm. Either the spring weather was taking effect upon him, or someone pushed him from behind; at all events, he made his way forward with great decision, and paying no heed to anyone. The farmer of the brandy revenues received such a thrust from him that he tottered, and barely held his own on one foot; indeed, had it not been for this, he would most assuredly have knocked down a whole row of people. The postmaster also stepped back, and stared at our friend in amazement, mingled with delicate irony; but Tchitchikoff never glanced at him: he only saw the little blonde, pulling on a long glove, in the distance, and doubtless burning with a wish to launch her flight over the waxed floor. Four couples had already begun the mazurka in one corner: their heels tapped the floor; and a staff-captain was toiling with mind and body, with arms and legs, executing such steps as no one else ever executed, even in a dream. Tchitchikoff slipped past the mazurka, almost on the dancers’ very heels, and made straight for the spot where sat the governor’s wife and her daughter. Still he finally approached them very timidly, and became confused, exhibiting a certain awkwardness in all his movements.
It is impossible to say with certainty whether the sentiment of love had been awakened in our hero: it is even a matter of doubt whether gentlemen of that description—that is to say, gentlemen who are neither fat nor thin—are capable of loving. Nevertheless, there was something strange about this—something which he could not very well explain to himself: it seemed to him, as he afterwards confessed to himself, that the whole ball, with all its chatter and noise, had, for several minutes, retreated far into the distance; the fiddles and horns had sounded from somewhere beyond the mountains; and all was covered with a misty veil, like a carelessly painted field in a picture; and from out of this misty and negligently sketched background there stood out, clear and well defined, the delicate features of the charming blonde: her little oval face; her slender, very slender form—such as girls retain for the first few months after they are released from school; her white and almost plain gown, which clothed her slight, shapely young limbs so lightly and gracefully, defining them in pure outlines. She seemed to him like some admirable toy cleverly turned from ivory; she alone stood out white, transparent, and bright from amid the troublous opaque throng.
Evidently, this is the way things go on in the world; evidently, even Tchitchikoffs are converted into poets for a few minutes in the course of their lives. Perhaps, though, the word poet is too strong. At all events, he felt himself like something in the nature of a young man—almost a hussar. Perceiving an empty chair beside the young beauty, he desired to take possession of it. The conversation did not make much progress at first, but afterwards it went very well; and he even began to produce an effect. In fact, the little blonde actually began to yawn while our hero was telling his tales. He did not notice it in the least, however; but he related a number of agreeable things, which he had already told on similar occasions, in various places.