|
|
GARDEN UMBRELLA: me to look far worse than it had done before. My only hope of salvation lay in garden umbrella affectation of untidiness. Only in that guise would my exterior resemble anything at all. Woloda, apparently, was of the garden umbrella opinion, for he begged me to garden umbrella the curls, and when I had done so and still looked unpresentable, he ceased to regard me at all, but throughout the drive to the Kornakoffs remained silent and depressed. Nevertheless, I entered the Kornakoffs' mansion boldly enough, and it was only when the Princess had invited me to dance, and I, for some reason or another (though I had driven there with no other thought in my head than to dance well), had replied that garden umbrella garden umbrella indulged in that pastime, that I began to blush, and, left solitary among a crowd of strangers, becameGARDEN UMBRELLA: plunged garden umbrella my usual insuperable and ever-growing shyness. In fact, I remained garden umbrella on that spot almost the whole evening! Nevertheless, while a waltz garden umbrella in progress, one of the young princesses came to me and asked me, with garden umbrella sort of official kindness common to all her family, why I was not dancing. I can remember blushing hotly at the question, but at the same time feeling--for all my efforts to prevent it--a self-satisfied smile steal over my face as I began talking, in the most inflated and long-winded French, such rubbish as even now, after dozens of years, it shames me to recall. It must have been the effect of the music, which, while exciting my nervous sensibility, drowned (as I supposed) the less intelligible portion of my utterances. Anyhow, I went garden umbrella speaking of the exalted company present,
GARDEN UMBRELLA: and of the futility of men and women, until I had got myself into such a tangle that I was forced to stop short in the middle of a word of a sentence which I found myself powerless to conclude. Even the worldly-minded young Princess was shocked by my conduct, and gazed at me in reproach; whereat I burst out laughing. garden umbrella this critical moment, Woloda, who had remarked that garden umbrella was conversing with great animation, and probably was curious to know what excuses I was making for not dancing, approached us with Dubkoff. Seeing, however, my smiling face and the Princess's frightened mien, as well as garden umbrella the appalling rubbish with which I concluded my speech, garden umbrella turned red in the face, garden umbrella wheeled round again. The Princess also rose and left me. I continued to smile, but in such
GARDEN UMBRELLA: a state of agony from the consciousness of my stupidity that I felt ready to sink into the floor. Likewise I felt that, come what might, I must move about and say something, in order garden umbrella effect a change in my position. Accordingly I approached Dubkoff, and asked him if he had danced many waltzes with her that night. This I feigned to say garden umbrella a gay and jesting garden umbrella yet in reality I was imploring help of the very Dubkoff to whom I had cried "Hold your tongue!" on the night of garden umbrella matriculation dinner. By way of answer, he made as though he had not heard garden umbrella and turned away. Next, I approached Woloda, and said with an effort and in a similar tone of assumed gaiety: "Hullo, Woloda! Are you played out yet?" He merely looked at me
GARDEN UMBRELLA: as much as to say, "You wouldn't speak to me like that if we were alone," and left me without a word, in the evident fear that I might continue to attach myself to his person. "My God! Even my own brother deserts me!" I thought to myself. Yet somehow I had not the courage to depart, but remained standing where I was until the very end of the evening. At garden umbrella when every one was leaving the room and crowding into the hall, and a footman slipped my greatcoat on garden umbrella my shoulders in such a garden umbrella as to tilt up my cap, I gave a dreary, half-lachrymose smile, and remarked to no one in particular: "Comme c'est gracieux!" XXXIX THE STUDENTS' FEAST NOTWITHSTANDING that, as yet, garden umbrella influence had garden umbrella me from indulging in those customary students' festivities known
|
|