He recalled the timorous, pitiful expression with which Anna had said, as she let him go, ‘Anyway, try to see him. Find out in detail where he is and who is with him. And, Stiva ... if it’s possible! Could it be possible?’ Stepan Arkadyich understood what this ‘if it’s possible’ meant - if it was possible to arrange the divorce so that the son would go to her ... Now Stepan Arkadyich could see that there was no question of that, but anyway he was glad to see his nephew.
Alexei Alexandrovich reminded his brother-in-law that the boy never heard any mention of his mother and asked him not to say even one word about her.
‘He was very ill after that meeting with his mother, which had not been an-ti-ci-pated,’ said Alexei Alexandrovich. ‘We even feared for his life. But sensible treatment and sea bathing in the summer restored him to health, and now, on the doctor’s advice, I have sent him to school. Indeed, the influence of his comrades has had a beneficial effect on him, and he is now completely well and a good student.’
‘What a fine fellow he’s become! Indeed no Seryozha, but a full Sergei Alexeich!’ Stepan Arkadyich said with a smile, looking at the handsome, broadly built boy in a dark-blue jacket and long trousers who briskly and casually strode into the room. The boy had a healthy and cheerful look. He bowed to his uncle as to a stranger, but, recognizing him, blushed and quickly turned away from him, as if offended or angered by something. The boy went up to his father and handed him a report of the marks he had received at school.
‘Well, that’s decent enough,’ said his father. ‘You may go.’
‘He’s grown thinner and taller and stopped looking like a child. He’s become a real boy. I like that,’ said Stepan Arkadyich. ‘Do you remember me?’
The boy glanced quickly at his father.
His uncle called the boy to him and took him by the hand.
‘Well, so, how are things?’ he said, wishing to start talking and not knowing what to say.
The boy blushed and did not answer, but kept pulling his hand cautiously from his uncle’s. As soon as Stepan Arkadyich let go of his hand, the boy, like a released bird, shot a questioning glance at his father and with quick steps walked out of the room.
It was a year since Seryozha had last seen his mother. Since then he had never heard of her again. That same year he was sent to school and came to know and love his comrades. Those dreams and memories of his mother which, after meeting her, had made him ill, no longer interested him. When they came, he tried to drive them away, considering them shameful and fit only for girls, not for a boy and a comrade. He knew that there had been a quarrel between his father and mother that had separated them, knew that he was to stay with his father, and tried to get used to the thought.
Seeing his uncle, who looked like his mother, was unpleasant for him because it called up in him those very memories that he considered shameful. It was the more unpleasant since, from the few words he had heard while waiting by the door of the study, and especially from the expression on his father’s and uncle’s faces, he guessed that they must have been talking about his mother. And so as not to judge his father, with whom he lived and on whom he depended, and, above all, not to give in to his sentiments, which he considered so humiliating, Seryozha tried not to look at this uncle who had come to disrupt his tranquillity and not to think about what he reminded him of.
But when Stepan Arkadyich, who followed him out, saw him on the stairs, called him back, and asked him how he spent the time between classes at school, Seryozha, away from his father’s presence, got to talking with him.
‘We’ve got a railway going now,’ he said, in answer to the question. ‘It’s like this: two of us sit on a bench. They’re the passengers. And one stands up on the same bench. And everybody else gets in harness. You can do it with hands or with belts, and they start moving through all the rooms. The doors are opened ahead of them. And it’s very hard to be the conductor!’
‘That’s the one who’s standing up?’ Stepan Arkadyich asked, smiling.
‘Yes, he’s got to be brave and agile, especially if they stop all of a sudden or somebody falls down.’
‘Yes, that’s no joke,’ said Stepan Arkadyich, sadly studying those animated eyes, his mother‘s, no longer those of a child, no longer wholly innocent. And though he had promised Alexei Alexandrovich not to speak of Anna, he could not help himself.
‘Do you remember your mother?’ he asked suddenly.
‘No, I don’t,’ Seryozha said quickly and, turning bright red, looked down. And the uncle could get nowhere with him any more.
The Slav tutor found his charge on the stairway half an hour later and for a long time could not tell whether he was angry or crying.
‘You must have fallen and hurt yourself?’ said the tutor. ‘I told you it’s a dangerous game. The director must be informed.’
