Laces of Love by Olga Kryuchkova

Author:Olga Kryuchkova
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Babelcube Inc.
Published: 2019-03-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 2

Time inexorably flew forward. Arina was growing. She learned how to sit, then walk, and finally speak. The little girl was talking incessantly in some bird language, which only Natalia could understand. Natalia, accustomed to living in a rather poor way, barely making ends meet, used her old clothes for stitching dresses for Arinushka. Although there were only a few of those, as her own clothes were worn out almost to holes.

The young mistress, first of all, was doing her best for her husband: he should not work in the gymnasium and wear a jacket with patched sleeves. The financial situation of the family did not change, Innokentiy could not even dream of his salary increase, and truly speaking, he was a timid man, unable to stand up for himself.

Natalia, understanding her husband’s problems, never let slip a word how hard her life had been. Yelensky, no matter how egoistic he was, could not help but notice that his wife managed to keep the house in order even with his meager salary. Zhizdra was a small town with not more than ten thousand inhabitants. There were two male gymnasiums in the town and one boarding house for noble maidens, where the daughters of neighboring landowners and local nearly bankrupted nobles were brought up in strictness. Therefore, it was almost impossible to change the duty station without the patronage of someone mighty.

For many years, Yelensky had been in correspondence with his childhood friend Aristarkh Matveyev, who had successfully moved to Moscow and received the rank of a collegiate assessor [19]from one of the Moscow's philanthropists.

The philanthropist was looking after male urban gymnasiums and had his own private school. Aristarkh wrote to Yelensky many times, inviting him to Moscow and promising all possible assistance, but, alas, Innokentiy did not want to leave his long-occupied place, although he understood perfectly well that he would never find a decent well-paid job in Zhizdra.

After receiving another letter from his friend, who already knew about Innokentiy's marriage, and once again offered moving to Moscow, Yelensky thought, why not? Maybe he should accept the offered opportunity and get a position of a literature teacher in a private school of the philanthropist?

“Natasha, I have received another letter from Aristarkh: he invites me to Moscow and promises to help me with the lucrative job.”

Natalia shuddered: she did not dare to start this conversation first, thus she had been waiting for a long time until her husband would finally touch on this point. Arisha was sitting at the table and drawing a creature similar to a camel with colored pencils.

“Keshenka, it is wonderful. Moscow, a great job opportunity... And Arisha is growing up... What kind of life will she have in Zhizdra?”

“Yes, you are right, she will not have a decent life here,” the spouse agreed.

“You go, get settled, and we would join you then.”

So, that day, the spouses had made a decision: Innokentiy would go to Moscow, and Natalia would be waiting for his letter.

No sooner said than done.

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