Free Doctor Zhivago by Boris Leonidovich Pasternak Page A

"
    But her mother could not understand. " It ' s always like this, " she sobbed. " Just when I can ' t think straight you come out with something that simply astounds me. People play a dirty trick on me, and you say it ' s all for my good. No, really, I must be out of my mind. "
    Rodia was at school. Lara and her mother wandered about aimlessly, alone in the empty house. The unlit street stared emptily into the rooms, and the rooms returned its stare.
    " Let ' s go to the hotel, Mother, before it gets dark, " Lara begged. " Do come, Mother. Don ' t put it off, let ' s go now. "
    " Filat, Filat, " they called the janitor. " Take us to the Montenegro, be a good boy. "
    " Very good, Madam. "
    " Take the bundles over. And keep an eye on the house, Filat, until things sort themselves out. And please don ' t forget the bird seed for Kirill Modestovich, and to change his water. And keep everything locked up. That ' s all, I think, and please keep in touch with us. "
    " Very well, Madam. "
    " Thank you, Filat. God keep you. Well, let ' s sit down [4] and then we must be off. "
    When they went out the fresh air seemed as unfamiliar as after weeks of illness. Noises, rounded, as if turned on a lathe, rolled echoing lightly through the crisp, frosty, nut-clean space. Shots and salvoes smacked, thudded, and plopped, flattening the distances into a pancake.
    However much Filat tried to convince them to the contrary, Lara and Amalia Karlovna insisted that the shots were blanks.
    " Don ' t be silly, Filat. Think it out for yourself. How could they be anything but blanks when you can ' t see anyone shooting? Who d ' you think is shooting, the Holy Ghost or what? Of course they ' re blanks. "
    At one of the crossroads they were stopped by a patrol of grinning Cossacks who searched them, insolently running their hands over them from head to foot. Their visorless caps with chin straps were tilted jauntily over one ear; it made all of them look one-eyed.
    " Wonderful, " thought Lara as she walked on. She would not see Komarovsky for as long as the district was cut off from the rest of the town. Because of her mother it was impossible for her to break with him. She could not say: " Mother, please stop seeing him. " If she did that, it would all come out. And what if it did? Why should that frighten her? Oh, God! Anything, anything, if only it would end! God! God! She would fall down in a faint with disgust. What was it she had just remembered? What was the name of that frightful picture? There was a fat Roman in it. It hung in the first of those private rooms, the one where it all began. " The Woman or the Vase " —yes, that was it. Of course. It was a famous picture. The woman or the vase. When she first saw it she was not yet a woman, she was not yet comparable to an expensive work of art. That came later. The table was splendidly set for a feast.
    " Where do you think you are running like that? I can ' t keep up with you, " panted Madame Guishar. Lara walked swiftly, some unknown force swept her on as though she were striding on air, carried along by this proud, quickening strength.
    " How splendid, " she thought, listening to the gun shots. " Blessed are the downtrodden. Blessed are the deceived. God speed you, bullets. You and I are of one mind. "
20
    The brothers Gromeko had a house at the corner of Sivtsev Vrazhok and another small street. Alexander Alexandrovich and Nikolai Alexandrovich Gromeko were professors of chemistry, the one at the Peter ' s Academy, the other at the University. Nikolai was unmarried. Alexander had a wife, Anna Ivanovna, N é e Krueger. Her father was an ironmaster; he owned an enormous estate in the Urals, near Yuriatin, on which there were several abandoned, unprofitable mines.
    The Gromekos ' house had two stories. On the top floor were the bedrooms, the schoolroom, Alexander Alexandrovich ' s study and his library, Anna Ivanovna ' s boudoir, and Tonia ' s and Yura ' s rooms. The ground floor was used for