Orloff

“ The bearer, who had been helping him to carry the stretcher, turned round, looked at the corpse attentively, and then said angrily to Orloff—
"What nonsense you are talking! Don't you understand that he is getting himself ready for his coffin? Don't you see how the cholera has twisted him up?... He can't lie in the coffin in that position!... Come! Let's get on again!"
"But just look; he is still moving!" protested Orloff, trembling with horror.
"Hurry up now! Catch hold, you fool!... Don't you understand what I say, then?... He has to move in order to relax his limbs! ”

“ Whom does it annoy? People, not you: you have even begun to live better because it made its appearance."
Orlóff suddenly burst out laughing.
"Why, that's so, certainly!—I am better off, that's true, isn't it? Akh, you shrewd creature,—make the most of it! People die, and I live better in consequence, hey?—That's what life is like! Pshaw!"
He rose, and went away, laughing, to his duty. As he was walking along the corridor, he suddenly felt regret that no one except himself had heard Matréna's speech. "She spoke cleverly! A woman, a woman, and yet she understands something, too." ”

“ More than any body else in the world.'
'I took Miss Brentnall's poor, parched hand, but could not answer. 'Orloff—kind as you are to me—in the bottom of your heart, you know that I have the most repulsive face you ever saw. Say yes, Orloff. You do know it. I have been sure of it, since I was a little girl, six years old, thirty-four years ago, yesterday. I was never sorry for it, more than a moment at a time, until a year ago. And now you may tell me you see it, without hurting me at all. Pride is past. Say that my face is the most unlovely in the world. ”

“ The Count and Countess Orloff employ their fortune in receiving strangers with equal facility and magnificence; you are at your ease with them, as in a country retreat, and you enjoy there all the luxury of cities. Count Orloff is one of the most learned noblemen to be met with in Russia, and his love of his country bears a profound character, with which it is impossible to help being affected. ”

“ But half-an-hour afterwards they had forgotten all his instructions in the noisy rush of work in the Infirmary.
People in white clothes ran up against them; commands which were carried out with lightning speed by the attendants, sounded in their ears; the patients groaned, sobbed and sighed; water flowed splashing and hissing from the taps; and this blending of sounds seemed to fill the air, which was already saturated with sharp unpleasant smells that irritated the nose; and it seemed to Orloff that every word of the doctors, every sigh of the patients, was impregnated with the same smell. ”

“ Will you have a glass of schnapps?"
"Why not?" replied Orloff.
"I have got a drop in the corner there, ready for use on these sort of occasions. What do you say; shall we have a go at it?" They went off accordingly towards a quiet corner of the Infirmary, and pulled themselves together with a small glass of spirits. Then Pronim dropped some essence of peppermint on to a piece of sugar, and handed it to Orloff.
"Take it; otherwise they will smell that we have been drinking. They are very particular here about vodka; they say it is bad for one." ”

“ For was not Orloff the man whose strong hands had strangled her husband and placed the crown on her head; also her most devoted slave? He was, it is true, the biggest scoundrel (as he was also one of the handsomest men) in Europe, a man ready to stoop to any infamy, and thus the best possible tool for such an infamous purpose ”

“ Wouldn't the man suddenly spring up and shout? And he remembered that he seemed to have heard someone tell: that one day, somewhere or other, people who had died of the cholera leaped out of their coffins and ran away.
[Pg 52]
As Orlóff ran to and fro in the barracks, now rubbing one patient, now placing another in the bath-tub, he felt exactly as though gruel were boiling in his brain. He recalled his wife: how was she getting on yonder? Sometimes with this recollection mingled a transitory desire to steal a minute to have a look at Matréna. ”

“ Count Orloff made him drink still more, and then he fell asleep and was laid on a bed.
The gaiety of the meal gave me some idea of Russian wit. I did not understand the language, so M. Zinowieff translated the curious sallies to me while the applause they had raised was still resounding.
Melissino rose to his feet, holding a large goblet full of Hungarian wine in his hand. There was a general silence to listen to him. He drank the health of General Orloff in these words:
“May you die when you become rich.” ”

“ The two noble ladies were too much occupied with Orloff's fine eyes to be able to fix their attention wholly upon the game, whilst Orloff was so lucky in love that it would have been the greatest injustice on earth if he had been equally successful at play. ”

“ After a time Orloff followed him. As soon as he had left, there issues from the cellar a short, plump woman's form. A handkerchief is bound tightly round her head, allowing only one eye and a piece of her cheek to be seen; she walks with tottering steps, leaning for support against the wall, crosses the courtyard, going straight to the place where a short time before her husband had sat, and sits down precisely in the same spot No one is surprised at her appearance, they are all accustomed to it, and they know she will sit there till Grischka, drunk and repentant, returns from the dram-shop. ”

“ I should like to advise you, my good woman, to wash it out more often, and to place chloride of lime in the corners of the room. That will purify the air, and it's a very good remedy against the damp. And you, my fine fellow—why do you look so upset?" He turned towards Orloff, seized his hand suddenly, and felt his pulse. The quick assured manner of the medical student impressed the Orloffs to such a degree that they seemed at first to be struck dumb. Matrona smiled constrainedly and watched him in silence, whilst Grigori seemed as if refreshed by the sight of the open fair young face. ”

“ He had never in his life seen men work as did these doctors and medical students, and more than once he thought, as he looked into their drawn faces, that they indeed more than earned their salaries.
As soon as Orloff was off duty he went, though he could hardly keep on his legs, into the courtyard of the Infirmary, and lay down close to the wall, under the window of the dispensary. ”

“ I would prefer if he were a little more deliberate. Then he could accomplish more."
"Why are you looking so gloomy?" Gregor demanded of the spooky looking Orloff who was staring into the corner absentmindedly. ”

“ And with a serious expression on his face, he began to tell the Orloffs about the cholera, and the means to be taken to counteract it; trying to express himself as clearly and as simply as possible. Whilst talking, he was busily examining the room, feeling the walls with his hands, looking behind the door, stooping down to peep into the stove, and sniffing about everywhere with his nose. His voice, which had not yet completely changed, alternated between bass and treble, and the simple forms of words which he used impressed themselves unconsciously on the minds of his audience. ”

“ Orlóff and Tchízhik should give themselves a good washing.
They formed a group, which was soon joined by Matréna, smiling timidly. After her came the cook, wiping her wet eyes on her dirty apron. In a short time, several persons from among the spectators approached this group, as cautiously as cats approach sparrows. A small, dense ring of men, about ten in number, formed around the student, and this inspired him. ”

“ I have already sent a letter to the Count Alexis, and a short manifesto.”
[36]
“A manifesto! but what about?”
“If Orloff decides on taking my part, I advise him then to proclaim my manifesto to the fleet, take me on board, and stand up for my rights.”
“But that is impossible. Excuse me,” I tried to answer; “your actions are bold, but you have not reflected enough.”
“Why do you think so?” asked the Princess, astonished. “The malcontents are seeking revenge, the forgotten recompense for their well-known services. To Orloff alone—and that every one knows—to him alone Ekaterina owes her throne.” ”

“ Give it back, Uncle Grigori.... The accordion-player had a sister.... Ah!... A ... ah!"
His whole body shook and twisted with violent cramps. All they could do was done for the little lad, but the weakened body was unable to guard the spark of life. That same evening Orloff carried Tschischik's body to the mortuary. He felt as if he had himself received a blow or an injury. He tried to straighten out the little body, but could not succeed in doing so. ”

“ The sight of the ambulance-van, and the rough voice of the driver, both helped to calm the excited feelings of the onlookers, and many of them left their posts of observation. Close behind the driver was to be seen the medical student, who had the day before visited the Orloffs. His hat was on the back of his head, big drops of perspiration stood out on his forehead. He wore a long, dazzlingly white coat, in front of which a big hole had been burnt out with some strong acid.
"Now then, Orloff! Where's the sick man?" ”

“ The doctor gazed intently and in surprise at the agitated face of his hospital orderly, and smiled also.
"You're a queer fellow! However, never mind,—you'll turn out splendidly ... genuine. Go ahead, and do your best; it will not be for me, but for the patients. We must wrest a man from the disease, tear him out of its paws,—do you understand me? Well, then, go ahead and try your best to conquer the disease. And, in the mean-while—go and sleep!"
Orlóff was soon lying on his cot, and fell asleep with a pleasing sensation of warmth in his bowels. ”

“ Life flowed by somewhere, far, far away out there and above; here, in this hole only vague, dull sounds found an entrance, and blending with the dust of th? court, pressed in on the senses of the Orloffs in formless and colourless waves. Opposite the stove stood, behind a brown curtain with a pattern of roses, a great wooden double bedstead; over against the bed, and near the other wall stood a table, at which the Orloffs drank their tea and ate their dinner, and between the bed and the opposite wall, in a sort of frame formed by two rays of light, the couple sat and worked. ”

“ In one of the countless chap-books which dishonour his fame, he is unjustly accused of relying for his effects upon an elaborate apparatus, half knife, half scissors, wherewith to rip the pockets of his victims. The mere backbiting of envy! An artistic triumph was never won save by legitimate means; and the hero who plundered the Dulce of L—r at Ranelagh, who emptied the pockets of his acquaintance without fear of exposure, who all but carried off the priceless snuff-box of Count Orloff, most assuredly followed his craft in full simplicity and with a proper scorn of clumsy artifice. ”

“ Grigóry gazed at him with dull terror in his heart: The day before yesterday he had seen that policeman at his post, and had even sworn at him as he went past—they had some little accounts to settle between them. And now, here was this man, so healthy and malicious, lying dead, all disfigured, drawn up with convulsions.
[Pg 49]
Orlóff felt that this was not right,—why should a man be born into the world at all, if he must die, in one day, of such a dirty disease? He gazed down upon the policeman from above, and pitied him. What would become of his children ... three in all? ”

“ Bloom up, little man. Here’s where the most nerveless of the white races smite the most nervous of the yellow—and on horses!”
“I’m bloomin’ on one foot,” said Finacune.
Kuropatkin, apprised of Orloff’s error, was thundering his divisions up the railroad at double-time toward the Collieries, but, despairing to reach the blundering Orloff in time, had ordered his cavalry railway-guards to charge the enemy.... They came on now with mediæval grandeur, a dream of chivalry, breaking through gaps of Orloff’s disordered infantry—to turn the point of the Japanese flanker. Splendid squadrons!... ”

“ He would remain for a long time motionless, glowering darkly at the wall of the opposite house, where the plaster was crumbling away, and where a variety of colours had been smeared on by the house-painter Soutchkoff's apprentices, who had the habit, when they left off work, of cleaning their brushes on this part of the wall.
The cobbler Orloff was about thirty years old. His dark, nervous, finely-cut face was adorned with a black moustache, under which showed full red lips. Above a prominent nose thick black eyebrows were drawn close together ”

“ Mark had attended a masked ball at the Berlin Palace and was asked what he thought of William Hohenzollern dressed up as Frederick the Great. "He reminded me of the little speech addressed by a Cossack Chief to Orloff, the lover of Catherine of Russia. Orloff visited the chief wearing a French court costume. The Cossack began to laugh.
"'What is there to laugh at?' demanded Orloff in a rage.
"'I laugh because you shaved your face to look young and put flour in your hair to look old—both things at the same time,' replied the Barbarian. ”

“ The power and the influence of the Orloffs have greatly fallen; their sworn and hidden foes, the Pânins, [14] are now in the ascendency. The empress’s favourite, Gregory Orloff, allow me to tell you, has been already replaced by another; he, in his anger, broke off the negotiations begun with the Sultan, and flew from the banks of the Danube to Petersburg. But he was not received at court, but exiled to Revel. Ah! you are astonished. Well, learn still further. Your chief, Count Alexis Orloff, his feelings as a brother insulted, no longer hides his opinions: he is ripe for revenge ”