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diff --git a/13414-0.txt b/13414-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5206a4f --- /dev/null +++ b/13414-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7579 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13414 *** + +THE TALES OF CHEKHOV + +VOLUME 13 + +LOVE AND OTHER STORIES + +BY + +ANTON TCHEKHOV + +Translated by CONSTANCE GARNETT + + + + +CONTENTS + + + LOVE + LIGHTS + A STORY WITHOUT AN END + MARI D'ELLE + A LIVING CHATTEL + THE DOCTOR + TOO EARLY! + THE COSSACK + ABORIGINES + AN INQUIRY + MARTYRS + THE LION AND THE SUN + A DAUGHTER OF ALBION + CHORISTERS + NERVES + A WORK OF ART + A JOKE + A COUNTRY COTTAGE + A BLUNDER + FAT AND THIN + THE DEATH OF A GOVERNMENT CLERK + A PINK STOCKING + AT A SUMMER VILLA + + + + +LOVE + +"THREE o'clock in the morning. The soft April night is looking in +at my windows and caressingly winking at me with its stars. I can't +sleep, I am so happy! + +"My whole being from head to heels is bursting with a strange, +incomprehensible feeling. I can't analyse it just now--I haven't +the time, I'm too lazy, and there--hang analysis! Why, is a man +likely to interpret his sensations when he is flying head foremost +from a belfry, or has just learned that he has won two hundred +thousand? Is he in a state to do it?" + +This was more or less how I began my love-letter to Sasha, a girl +of nineteen with whom I had fallen in love. I began it five times, +and as often tore up the sheets, scratched out whole pages, and +copied it all over again. I spent as long over the letter as if it +had been a novel I had to write to order. And it was not because I +tried to make it longer, more elaborate, and more fervent, but +because I wanted endlessly to prolong the process of this writing, +when one sits in the stillness of one's study and communes with +one's own day-dreams while the spring night looks in at one's window. +Between the lines I saw a beloved image, and it seemed to me that +there were, sitting at the same table writing with me, spirits as +naïvely happy, as foolish, and as blissfully smiling as I. I wrote +continually, looking at my hand, which still ached deliciously where +hers had lately pressed it, and if I turned my eyes away I had a +vision of the green trellis of the little gate. Through that trellis +Sasha gazed at me after I had said goodbye to her. When I was saying +good-bye to Sasha I was thinking of nothing and was simply admiring +her figure as every decent man admires a pretty woman; when I saw +through the trellis two big eyes, I suddenly, as though by inspiration, +knew that I was in love, that it was all settled between us, and +fully decided already, that I had nothing left to do but to carry +out certain formalities. + +It is a great delight also to seal up a love-letter, and, slowly +putting on one's hat and coat, to go softly out of the house and +to carry the treasure to the post. There are no stars in the sky +now: in their place there is a long whitish streak in the east, +broken here and there by clouds above the roofs of the dingy houses; +from that streak the whole sky is flooded with pale light. The town +is asleep, but already the water-carts have come out, and somewhere +in a far-away factory a whistle sounds to wake up the workpeople. +Beside the postbox, slightly moist with dew, you are sure to see +the clumsy figure of a house porter, wearing a bell-shaped sheepskin +and carrying a stick. He is in a condition akin to catalepsy: he +is not asleep or awake, but something between. + +If the boxes knew how often people resort to them for the decision +of their fate, they would not have such a humble air. I, anyway, +almost kissed my postbox, and as I gazed at it I reflected that the +post is the greatest of blessings. + +I beg anyone who has ever been in love to remember how one usually +hurries home after dropping the letter in the box, rapidly gets +into bed and pulls up the quilt in the full conviction that as soon +as one wakes up in the morning one will be overwhelmed with memories +of the previous day and look with rapture at the window, where the +daylight will be eagerly making its way through the folds of the +curtain. + +Well, to facts. . . . Next morning at midday, Sasha's maid brought +me the following answer: "I am delited be sure to come to us to day +please I shall expect you. Your S." + +Not a single comma. This lack of punctuation, and the misspelling +of the word "delighted," the whole letter, and even the long, narrow +envelope in which it was put filled my heart with tenderness. In +the sprawling but diffident handwriting I recognised Sasha's walk, +her way of raising her eyebrows when she laughed, the movement of +her lips. . . . But the contents of the letter did not satisfy me. +In the first place, poetical letters are not answered in that way, +and in the second, why should I go to Sasha's house to wait till +it should occur to her stout mamma, her brothers, and poor relations +to leave us alone together? It would never enter their heads, and +nothing is more hateful than to have to restrain one's raptures +simply because of the intrusion of some animate trumpery in the +shape of a half-deaf old woman or little girl pestering one with +questions. I sent an answer by the maid asking Sasha to select some +park or boulevard for a rendezvous. My suggestion was readily +accepted. I had struck the right chord, as the saying is. + +Between four and five o'clock in the afternoon I made my way to the +furthest and most overgrown part of the park. There was not a soul +in the park, and the tryst might have taken place somewhere nearer +in one of the avenues or arbours, but women don't like doing it by +halves in romantic affairs; in for a penny, in for a pound--if +you are in for a tryst, let it be in the furthest and most impenetrable +thicket, where one runs the risk of stumbling upon some rough or +drunken man. When I went up to Sasha she was standing with her back +to me, and in that back I could read a devilish lot of mystery. It +seemed as though that back and the nape of her neck, and the black +spots on her dress were saying: Hush! . . . The girl was wearing a +simple cotton dress over which she had thrown a light cape. To add +to the air of mysterious secrecy, her face was covered with a white +veil. Not to spoil the effect, I had to approach on tiptoe and speak +in a half whisper. + +From what I remember now, I was not so much the essential point of +the rendezvous as a detail of it. Sasha was not so much absorbed +in the interview itself as in its romantic mysteriousness, my kisses, +the silence of the gloomy trees, my vows. . . . There was not a +minute in which she forgot herself, was overcome, or let the +mysterious expression drop from her face, and really if there had +been any Ivan Sidoritch or Sidor Ivanitch in my place she would +have felt just as happy. How is one to make out in such circumstances +whether one is loved or not? Whether the love is "the real thing" +or not? + +From the park I took Sasha home with me. The presence of the beloved +woman in one's bachelor quarters affects one like wine and music. +Usually one begins to speak of the future, and the confidence and +self-reliance with which one does so is beyond bounds. You make +plans and projects, talk fervently of the rank of general though +you have not yet reached the rank of a lieutenant, and altogether +you fire off such high-flown nonsense that your listener must have +a great deal of love and ignorance of life to assent to it. Fortunately +for men, women in love are always blinded by their feelings and +never know anything of life. Far from not assenting, they actually +turn pale with holy awe, are full of reverence and hang greedily +on the maniac's words. Sasha listened to me with attention, but I +soon detected an absent-minded expression on her face, she did not +understand me. The future of which I talked interested her only in +its external aspect and I was wasting time in displaying my plans +and projects before her. She was keenly interested in knowing which +would be her room, what paper she would have in the room, why I had +an upright piano instead of a grand piano, and so on. She examined +carefully all the little things on my table, looked at the photographs, +sniffed at the bottles, peeled the old stamps off the envelopes, +saying she wanted them for something. + +"Please collect old stamps for me!" she said, making a grave face. +"Please do." + +Then she found a nut in the window, noisily cracked it and ate it. + +"Why don't you stick little labels on the backs of your books?" she +asked, taking a look at the bookcase. + +"What for?" + +"Oh, so that each book should have its number. And where am I to +put my books? I've got books too, you know." + +"What books have you got?" I asked. + +Sasha raised her eyebrows, thought a moment and said: + +"All sorts." + +And if it had entered my head to ask her what thoughts, what +convictions, what aims she had, she would no doubt have raised her +eyebrows, thought a minute, and have said in the same way: "All +sorts." + +Later I saw Sasha home and left her house regularly, officially +engaged, and was so reckoned till our wedding. If the reader will +allow me to judge merely from my personal experience, I maintain +that to be engaged is very dreary, far more so than to be a husband +or nothing at all. An engaged man is neither one thing nor the +other, he has left one side of the river and not reached the other, +he is not married and yet he can't be said to be a bachelor, but +is in something not unlike the condition of the porter whom I have +mentioned above. + +Every day as soon as I had a free moment I hastened to my fiancée. +As I went I usually bore within me a multitude of hopes, desires, +intentions, suggestions, phrases. I always fancied that as soon as +the maid opened the door I should, from feeling oppressed and +stifled, plunge at once up to my neck into a sea of refreshing +happiness. But it always turned out otherwise in fact. Every time +I went to see my fiancée I found all her family and other members +of the household busy over the silly trousseau. (And by the way, +they were hard at work sewing for two months and then they had less +than a hundred roubles' worth of things). There was a smell of +irons, candle grease and fumes. Bugles scrunched under one's feet. +The two most important rooms were piled up with billows of linen, +calico, and muslin and from among the billows peeped out Sasha's +little head with a thread between her teeth. All the sewing party +welcomed me with cries of delight but at once led me off into the +dining-room where I could not hinder them nor see what only husbands +are permitted to behold. In spite of my feelings, I had to sit in +the dining-room and converse with Pimenovna, one of the poor +relations. Sasha, looking worried and excited, kept running by me +with a thimble, a skein of wool or some other boring object. + +"Wait, wait, I shan't be a minute," she would say when I raised +imploring eyes to her. "Only fancy that wretch Stepanida has spoilt +the bodice of the barège dress!" + +And after waiting in vain for this grace, I lost my temper, went +out of the house and walked about the streets in the company of the +new cane I had bought. Or I would want to go for a walk or a drive +with my fiancée, would go round and find her already standing in +the hall with her mother, dressed to go out and playing with her +parasol. + +"Oh, we are going to the Arcade," she would say. "We have got to +buy some more cashmere and change the hat." + +My outing is knocked on the head. I join the ladies and go with +them to the Arcade. It is revoltingly dull to listen to women +shopping, haggling and trying to outdo the sharp shopman. I felt +ashamed when Sasha, after turning over masses of material and +knocking down the prices to a minimum, walked out of the shop without +buying anything, or else told the shopman to cut her some half +rouble's worth. + +When they came out of the shop, Sasha and her mamma with scared and +worried faces would discuss at length having made a mistake, having +bought the wrong thing, the flowers in the chintz being too dark, +and so on. + +Yes, it is a bore to be engaged! I'm glad it's over. + +Now I am married. It is evening. I am sitting in my study reading. +Behind me on the sofa Sasha is sitting munching something noisily. +I want a glass of beer. + +"Sasha, look for the corkscrew. . . ." I say. "It's lying about +somewhere." + +Sasha leaps up, rummages in a disorderly way among two or three +heaps of papers, drops the matches, and without finding the corkscrew, +sits down in silence. . . . Five minutes pass--ten. . . I begin +to be fretted both by thirst and vexation. + +"Sasha, do look for the corkscrew," I say. + +Sasha leaps up again and rummages among the papers near me. Her +munching and rustling of the papers affects me like the sound of +sharpening knives against each other. . . . I get up and begin +looking for the corkscrew myself. At last it is found and the beer +is uncorked. Sasha remains by the table and begins telling me +something at great length. + +"You'd better read something, Sasha," I say. + +She takes up a book, sits down facing me and begins moving her lips +. . . . I look at her little forehead, moving lips, and sink into +thought. + +"She is getting on for twenty. . . ." I reflect. "If one takes a +boy of the educated class and of that age and compares them, what +a difference! The boy would have knowledge and convictions and some +intelligence." + +But I forgive that difference just as the low forehead and moving +lips are forgiven. I remember in my old Lovelace days I have cast +off women for a stain on their stockings, or for one foolish word, +or for not cleaning their teeth, and now I forgive everything: the +munching, the muddling about after the corkscrew, the slovenliness, +the long talking about nothing that matters; I forgive it all almost +unconsciously, with no effort of will, as though Sasha's mistakes +were my mistakes, and many things which would have made me wince +in old days move me to tenderness and even rapture. The explanation +of this forgiveness of everything lies in my love for Sasha, but +what is the explanation of the love itself, I really don't know. + + +LIGHTS + +THE dog was barking excitedly outside. And Ananyev the engineer, +his assistant called Von Schtenberg, and I went out of the hut to +see at whom it was barking. I was the visitor, and might have +remained indoors, but I must confess my head was a little dizzy +from the wine I had drunk, and I was glad to get a breath of fresh +air. + +"There is nobody here," said Ananyev when we went out. "Why are you +telling stories, Azorka? You fool!" + +There was not a soul in sight. + +"The fool," Azorka, a black house-dog, probably conscious of his +guilt in barking for nothing and anxious to propitiate us, approached +us, diffidently wagging his tail. The engineer bent down and touched +him between his ears. + +"Why are you barking for nothing, creature?" he said in the tone +in which good-natured people talk to children and dogs. "Have you +had a bad dream or what? Here, doctor, let me commend to your +attention," he said, turning to me, "a wonderfully nervous subject! +Would you believe it, he can't endure solitude--he is always +having terrible dreams and suffering from nightmares; and when you +shout at him he has something like an attack of hysterics." + +"Yes, a dog of refined feelings," the student chimed in. + +Azorka must have understood that the conversation was concerning +him. He turned his head upwards and grinned plaintively, as though +to say, "Yes, at times I suffer unbearably, but please excuse it!" + +It was an August night, there were stars, but it was dark. Owing +to the fact that I had never in my life been in such exceptional +surroundings, as I had chanced to come into now, the starry night +seemed to me gloomy, inhospitable, and darker than it was in reality. +I was on a railway line which was still in process of construction. +The high, half-finished embankment, the mounds of sand, clay, and +rubble, the holes, the wheel-barrows standing here and there, the +flat tops of the mud huts in which the workmen lived--all this +muddle, coloured to one tint by the darkness, gave the earth a +strange, wild aspect that suggested the times of chaos. There was +so little order in all that lay before me that it was somehow strange +in the midst of the hideously excavated, grotesque-looking earth +to see the silhouettes of human beings and the slender telegraph +posts. Both spoiled the ensemble of the picture, and seemed to +belong to a different world. It was still, and the only sound came +from the telegraph wire droning its wearisome refrain somewhere +very high above our heads. + +We climbed up on the embankment and from its height looked down +upon the earth. A hundred yards away where the pits, holes, and +mounds melted into the darkness of the night, a dim light was +twinkling. Beyond it gleamed another light, beyond that a third, +then a hundred paces away two red eyes glowed side by side--probably +the windows of some hut--and a long series of such lights, +growing continually closer and dimmer, stretched along the line to +the very horizon, then turned in a semicircle to the left and +disappeared in the darkness of the distance. The lights were +motionless. There seemed to be something in common between them and +the stillness of the night and the disconsolate song of the telegraph +wire. It seemed as though some weighty secret were buried under the +embankment and only the lights, the night, and the wires knew of +it. + +"How glorious, O Lord!" sighed Ananyev; "such space and beauty that +one can't tear oneself away! And what an embankment! It's not an +embankment, my dear fellow, but a regular Mont Blanc. It's costing +millions. . . ." + +Going into ecstasies over the lights and the embankment that was +costing millions, intoxicated by the wine and his sentimental mood, +the engineer slapped Von Schtenberg on the shoulder and went on in +a jocose tone: + +"Well, Mihail Mihailitch, lost in reveries? No doubt it is pleasant +to look at the work of one's own hands, eh? Last year this very +spot was bare steppe, not a sight of human life, and now look: life +. . . civilisation. . . And how splendid it all is, upon my soul! +You and I are building a railway, and after we are gone, in another +century or two, good men will build a factory, a school, a hospital, +and things will begin to move! Eh!" + +The student stood motionless with his hands thrust in his pockets, +and did not take his eyes off the lights. He was not listening to +the engineer, but was thinking, and was apparently in the mood in +which one does not want to speak or to listen. After a prolonged +silence he turned to me and said quietly: + +"Do you know what those endless lights are like? They make me think +of something long dead, that lived thousands of years ago, something +like the camps of the Amalekites or the Philistines. It is as though +some people of the Old Testament had pitched their camp and were +waiting for morning to fight with Saul or David. All that is wanting +to complete the illusion is the blare of trumpets and sentries +calling to one another in some Ethiopian language." + +And, as though of design, the wind fluttered over the line and +brought a sound like the clank of weapons. A silence followed. I +don't know what the engineer and the student were thinking of, but +it seemed to me already that I actually saw before me something +long dead and even heard the sentry talking in an unknown tongue. +My imagination hastened to picture the tents, the strange people, +their clothes, their armour. + +"Yes," muttered the student pensively, "once Philistines and +Amalekites were living in this world, making wars, playing their +part, and now no trace of them remains. So it will be with us. Now +we are making a railway, are standing here philosophising, but two +thousand years will pass--and of this embankment and of all those +men, asleep after their hard work, not one grain of dust will remain. +In reality, it's awful!" + +"You must drop those thoughts . . ." said the engineer gravely and +admonishingly. + +"Why?" + +"Because. . . . Thoughts like that are for the end of life, not for +the beginning of it. You are too young for them." + +"Why so?" repeated the student. + +"All these thoughts of the transitoriness, the insignificance and +the aimlessness of life, of the inevitability of death, of the +shadows of the grave, and so on, all such lofty thoughts, I tell +you, my dear fellow, are good and natural in old age when they come +as the product of years of inner travail, and are won by suffering +and really are intellectual riches; for a youthful brain on the +threshold of real life they are simply a calamity! A calamity!" +Ananyev repeated with a wave of his hand. "To my mind it is better +at your age to have no head on your shoulders at all than to think +on these lines. I am speaking seriously, Baron. And I have been +meaning to speak to you about it for a long time, for I noticed +from the very first day of our acquaintance your partiality for +these damnable ideas!" + +"Good gracious, why are they damnable?" the student asked with a +smile, and from his voice and his face I could see that he asked +the question from simple politeness, and that the discussion raised +by the engineer did not interest him in the least. + +I could hardly keep my eyes open. I was dreaming that immediately +after our walk we should wish each other good-night and go to bed, +but my dream was not quickly realised. When we had returned to the +hut the engineer put away the empty bottles and took out of a large +wicker hamper two full ones, and uncorking them, sat down to his +work-table with the evident intention of going on drinking, talking, +and working. Sipping a little from his glass, he made pencil notes +on some plans and went on pointing out to the student that the +latter's way of thinking was not what it should be. The student sat +beside him checking accounts and saying nothing. He, like me, had +no inclination to speak or to listen. That I might not interfere +with their work, I sat away from the table on the engineer's +crooked-legged travelling bedstead, feeling bored and expecting +every moment that they would suggest I should go to bed. It was +going on for one o'clock. + +Having nothing to do, I watched my new acquaintances. I had never +seen Ananyev or the student before. I had only made their acquaintance +on the night I have described. Late in the evening I was returning +on horseback from a fair to the house of a landowner with whom I +was staying, had got on the wrong road in the dark and lost my way. +Going round and round by the railway line and seeing how dark the +night was becoming, I thought of the "barefoot railway roughs," who +lie in wait for travellers on foot and on horseback, was frightened, +and knocked at the first hut I came to. There I was cordially +received by Ananyev and the student. As is usually the case with +strangers casually brought together, we quickly became acquainted, +grew friendly and at first over the tea and afterward over the wine, +began to feel as though we had known each other for years. At the +end of an hour or so, I knew who they were and how fate had brought +them from town to the far-away steppe; and they knew who I was, +what my occupation and my way of thinking. + +Nikolay Anastasyevitch Ananyev, the engineer, was a broad-shouldered, +thick-set man, and, judging from his appearance, he had, like +Othello, begun the "descent into the vale of years," and was growing +rather too stout. He was just at that stage which old match-making +women mean when they speak of "a man in the prime of his age," that +is, he was neither young nor old, was fond of good fare, good liquor, +and praising the past, panted a little as he walked, snored loudly +when he was asleep, and in his manner with those surrounding him +displayed that calm imperturbable good humour which is always +acquired by decent people by the time they have reached the grade +of a staff officer and begun to grow stout. His hair and beard were +far from being grey, but already, with a condescension of which he +was unconscious, he addressed young men as "my dear boy" and felt +himself entitled to lecture them good-humouredly about their way +of thinking. His movements and his voice were calm, smooth, and +self-confident, as they are in a man who is thoroughly well aware +that he has got his feet firmly planted on the right road, that he +has definite work, a secure living, a settled outlook. . . . His +sunburnt, thicknosed face and muscular neck seemed to say: "I am +well fed, healthy, satisfied with myself, and the time will come +when you young people too, will be well-fed, healthy, and satisfied +with yourselves. . . ." He was dressed in a cotton shirt with the +collar awry and in full linen trousers thrust into his high boots. +From certain trifles, as for instance, from his coloured worsted +girdle, his embroidered collar, and the patch on his elbow, I was +able to guess that he was married and in all probability tenderly +loved by his wife. + +Baron Von Schtenberg, a student of the Institute of Transport, was +a young man of about three or four and twenty. Only his fair hair +and scanty beard, and, perhaps, a certain coarseness and frigidity +in his features showed traces of his descent from Barons of the +Baltic provinces; everything else--his name, Mihail Mihailovitch, +his religion, his ideas, his manners, and the expression of his +face were purely Russian. Wearing, like Ananyev, a cotton shirt and +high boots, with his round shoulders, his hair left uncut, and his +sunburnt face, he did not look like a student or a Baron, but like +an ordinary Russian workman. His words and gestures were few, he +drank reluctantly without relish, checked the accounts mechanically, +and seemed all the while to be thinking of something else. His +movements and voice were calm, and smooth too, but his calmness was +of a different kind from the engineer's. His sunburnt, slightly +ironical, dreamy face, his eyes which looked up from under his +brows, and his whole figure were expressive of spiritual +stagnatio--mental sloth. He looked as though it did not matter to him in +the least whether the light were burning before him or not, whether +the wine were nice or nasty, and whether the accounts he was checking +were correct or not. . . . And on his intelligent, calm face I read: +"I don't see so far any good in definite work, a secure living, and +a settled outlook. It's all nonsense. I was in Petersburg, now I +am sitting here in this hut, in the autumn I shall go back to +Petersburg, then in the spring here again. . . . What sense there +is in all that I don't know, and no one knows. . . . And so it's +no use talking about it. . . ." + +He listened to the engineer without interest, with the condescending +indifference with which cadets in the senior classes listen to an +effusive and good-natured old attendant. It seemed as though there +were nothing new to him in what the engineer said, and that if he +had not himself been too lazy to talk, he would have said something +newer and cleverer. Meanwhile Ananyev would not desist. He had by +now laid aside his good-humoured, jocose tone and spoke seriously, +even with a fervour which was quite out of keeping with his expression +of calmness. Apparently he had no distaste for abstract subjects, +was fond of them, indeed, but had neither skill nor practice in the +handling of them. And this lack of practice was so pronounced in +his talk that I did not always grasp his meaning at once. + +"I hate those ideas with all my heart!" he said, "I was infected +by them myself in my youth, I have not quite got rid of them even +now, and I tell you--perhaps because I am stupid and such thoughts +were not the right food for my mind--they did me nothing but harm. +That's easy to understand! Thoughts of the aimlessness of life, of +the insignificance and transitoriness of the visible world, Solomon's +'vanity of vanities' have been, and are to this day, the highest +and final stage in the realm of thought. The thinker reaches that +stage and--comes to a halt! There is nowhere further to go. The +activity of the normal brain is completed with this, and that is +natural and in the order of things. Our misfortune is that we begin +thinking at that end. What normal people end with we begin with. +From the first start, as soon as the brain begins working independently, +we mount to the very topmost, final step and refuse to know anything +about the steps below." + +"What harm is there in that?" said the student. + +"But you must understand that it's abnormal," shouted Ananyev, +looking at him almost wrathfully. "If we find means of mounting to +the topmost step without the help of the lower ones, then the whole +long ladder, that is the whole of life, with its colours, sounds, +and thoughts, loses all meaning for us. That at your age such +reflections are harmful and absurd, you can see from every step of +your rational independent life. Let us suppose you sit down this +minute to read Darwin or Shakespeare, you have scarcely read a page +before the poison shows itself; and your long life, and Shakespeare, +and Darwin, seem to you nonsense, absurdity, because you know you +will die, that Shakespeare and Darwin have died too, that their +thoughts have not saved them, nor the earth, nor you, and that if +life is deprived of meaning in that way, all science, poetry, and +exalted thoughts seem only useless diversions, the idle playthings +of grown up people; and you leave off reading at the second page. +Now, let us suppose that people come to you as an intelligent man +and ask your opinion about war, for instance: whether it is desirable, +whether it is morally justifiable or not. In answer to that terrible +question you merely shrug your shoulders and confine yourself to +some commonplace, because for you, with your way of thinking, it +makes absolutely no difference whether hundreds of thousands of +people die a violent death, or a natural one: the results are the +same--ashes and oblivion. You and I are building a railway line. +What's the use, one may ask, of our worrying our heads, inventing, +rising above the hackneyed thing, feeling for the workmen, stealing +or not stealing, when we know that this railway line will turn to +dust within two thousand years, and so on, and so on. . . . You +must admit that with such a disastrous way of looking at things +there can be no progress, no science, no art, nor even thought +itself. We fancy that we are cleverer than the crowd, and than +Shakespeare. In reality our thinking leads to nothing because we +have no inclination to go down to the lower steps and there is +nowhere higher to go, so our brain stands at the freezing point--neither +up nor down; I was in bondage to these ideas for six years, +and by all that is holy, I never read a sensible book all that time, +did not gain a ha'porth of wisdom, and did not raise my moral +standard an inch. Was not that disastrous? Moreover, besides being +corrupted ourselves, we bring poison into the lives of those +surrounding us. It would be all right if, with our pessimism, we +renounced life, went to live in a cave, or made haste to die, but, +as it is, in obedience to the universal law, we live, feel, love +women, bring up children, construct railways!" + +"Our thoughts make no one hot or cold," the student said reluctantly. + +"Ah! there you are again!--do stop it! You have not yet had a +good sniff at life. But when you have lived as long as I have you +will know a thing or two! Our theory of life is not so innocent as +you suppose. In practical life, in contact with human beings, it +leads to nothing but horrors and follies. It has been my lot to +pass through experiences which I would not wish a wicked Tatar to +endure." + +"For instance?" I asked. + +"For instance?" repeated the engineer. + +He thought a minute, smiled and said: + +"For instance, take this example. More correctly, it is not an +example, but a regular drama, with a plot and a dénouement. An +excellent lesson! Ah, what a lesson!" + +He poured out wine for himself and us, emptied his glass, stroked +his broad chest with his open hands, and went on, addressing himself +more to me than to the student. + +"It was in the year 187--, soon after the war, and when I had just +left the University. I was going to the Caucasus, and on the way +stopped for five days in the seaside town of N. I must tell you +that I was born and grew up in that town, and so there is nothing +odd in my thinking N. extraordinarily snug, cosy, and beautiful, +though for a man from Petersburg or Moscow, life in it would be as +dreary and comfortless as in any Tchuhloma or Kashira. With melancholy +I passed by the high school where I had been a pupil; with melancholy +I walked about the very familiar park, I made a melancholy attempt +to get a nearer look at people I had not seen for a long time--all +with the same melancholy. + +"Among other things, I drove out one evening to the so-called +Quarantine. It was a small mangy copse in which, at some forgotten +time of plague, there really had been a quarantine station, and +which was now the resort of summer visitors. It was a drive of three +miles from the town along a good soft road. As one drove along one +saw on the left the blue sea, on the right the unending gloomy +steppe; there was plenty of air to breathe, and wide views for the +eyes to rest on. The copse itself lay on the seashore. Dismissing +my cabman, I went in at the familiar gates and first turned along +an avenue leading to a little stone summer-house which I had been +fond of in my childhood. In my opinion that round, heavy summer-house +on its clumsy columns, which combined the romantic charm of an old +tomb with the ungainliness of a Sobakevitch,* was the most poetical +nook in the whole town. It stood at the edge above the cliff, and +from it there was a splendid view of the sea. + +*A character in Gogol's _Dead Souls.--Translator's Note._ + +"I sat down on the seat, and, bending over the parapet, looked down. +A path ran from the summer-house along the steep, almost overhanging +cliff, between the lumps of clay and tussocks of burdock. Where it +ended, far below on the sandy shore, low waves were languidly foaming +and softly purring. The sea was as majestic, as infinite, and as +forbidding as seven years before when I left the high school and +went from my native town to the capital; in the distance there was +a dark streak of smoke--a steamer was passing--and except for +this hardly visible and motionless streak and the sea-swallows that +flitted over the water, there was nothing to give life to the +monotonous view of sea and sky. To right and left of the summer-house +stretched uneven clay cliffs. + +"You know that when a man in a melancholy mood is left _tête-à-tête_ +with the sea, or any landscape which seems to him grandiose, there +is always, for some reason, mixed with melancholy, a conviction +that he will live and die in obscurity, and he reflectively snatches +up a pencil and hastens to write his name on the first thing that +comes handy. And that, I suppose, is why all convenient solitary +nooks like my summer-house are always scrawled over in pencil or +carved with penknives. I remember as though it were to-day; looking +at the parapet I read: 'Ivan Korolkov, May 16, 1876.' Beside Korolkov +some local dreamer had scribbled freely, adding: + + "'He stood on the desolate ocean's strand, + While his soul was filled with imaginings grand.' + +And his handwriting was dreamy, limp like wet silk. An individual +called Kross, probably an insignificant, little man, felt his +unimportance so deeply that he gave full licence to his penknife +and carved his name in deep letters an inch high. I took a pencil +out of my pocket mechanically, and I too scribbled on one of the +columns. All that is irrelevant, however. . . You must forgive +me--I don't know how to tell a story briefly. + +"I was sad and a little bored. Boredom, the stillness, and the +purring of the sea gradually brought me to the line of thought we +have been discussing. At that period, towards the end of the +'seventies, it had begun to be fashionable with the public, and +later, at the beginning of the 'eighties, it gradually passed from +the general public into literature, science, and politics. I was +no more than twenty-six at the time, but I knew perfectly well that +life was aimless and had no meaning, that everything was a deception +and an illusion, that in its essential nature and results a life +of penal servitude in Sahalin was not in any way different from a +life spent in Nice, that the difference between the brain of a Kant +and the brain of a fly was of no real significance, that no one in +this world is righteous or guilty, that everything was stuff and +nonsense and damn it all! I lived as though I were doing a favour +to some unseen power which compelled me to live, and to which I +seemed to say: 'Look, I don't care a straw for life, but I am +living!' I thought on one definite line, but in all sorts of keys, +and in that respect I was like the subtle gourmand who could prepare +a hundred appetising dishes from nothing but potatoes. There is no +doubt that I was one-sided and even to some extent narrow, but I +fancied at the time that my intellectual horizon had neither beginning +nor end, and that my thought was as boundless as the sea. Well, as +far as I can judge by myself, the philosophy of which we are speaking +has something alluring, narcotic in its nature, like tobacco or +morphia. It becomes a habit, a craving. You take advantage of every +minute of solitude to gloat over thoughts of the aimlessness of +life and the darkness of the grave. While I was sitting in the +summer-house, Greek children with long noses were decorously walking +about the avenues. I took advantage of the occasion and, looking +at them, began reflecting in this style: + +"'Why are these children born, and what are they living for? Is +there any sort of meaning in their existence? They grow up, without +themselves knowing what for; they will live in this God-forsaken, +comfortless hole for no sort of reason, and then they will die. . . .' + +"And I actually felt vexed with those children because they were +walking about decorously and talking with dignity, as though they +did not hold their little colourless lives so cheap and knew what +they were living for. . . . I remember that far away at the end of +an avenue three feminine figures came into sight. Three young ladies, +one in a pink dress, two in white, were walking arm-in-arm, talking +and laughing. Looking after them, I thought: + +"'It wouldn't be bad to have an affair with some woman for a couple +of days in this dull place.' + +"I recalled by the way that it was three weeks since I had visited +my Petersburg lady, and thought that a passing love affair would +come in very appropriately for me just now. The young lady in white +in the middle was rather younger and better looking than her +companions, and judging by her manners and her laugh, she was a +high-school girl in an upper form. I looked, not without impure +thoughts, at her bust, and at the same time reflected about her: +'She will be trained in music and manners, she will be married to +some Greek--God help us!--will lead a grey, stupid, comfortless +life, will bring into the world a crowd of children without knowing +why, and then will die. An absurd life!' + +"I must say that as a rule I was a great hand at combining my lofty +ideas with the lowest prose. + +"Thoughts of the darkness of the grave did not prevent me from +giving busts and legs their full due. Our dear Baron's exalted ideas +do not prevent him from going on Saturdays to Vukolovka on amatory +expeditions. To tell the honest truth, as far as I remember, my +attitude to women was most insulting. Now, when I think of that +high-school girl, I blush for my thoughts then, but at the time my +conscience was perfectly untroubled. I, the son of honourable +parents, a Christian, who had received a superior education, not +naturally wicked or stupid, felt not the slightest uneasiness when +I paid women _Blutgeld_, as the Germans call it, or when I followed +high-school girls with insulting looks. . . . The trouble is that +youth makes its demands, and our philosophy has nothing in principle +against those demands, whether they are good or whether they are +loathsome. One who knows that life is aimless and death inevitable +is not interested in the struggle against nature or the conception +of sin: whether you struggle or whether you don't, you will die and +rot just the same. . . . Secondly, my friends, our philosophy instils +even into very young people what is called reasonableness. The +predominance of reason over the heart is simply overwhelming amongst +us. Direct feeling, inspiration--everything is choked by petty +analysis. Where there is reasonableness there is coldness, and cold +people--it's no use to disguise it--know nothing of chastity. +That virtue is only known to those who are warm, affectionate, and +capable of love. Thirdly, our philosophy denies the significance +of each individual personality. It's easy to see that if I deny the +personality of some Natalya Stepanovna, it's absolutely nothing to +me whether she is insulted or not. To-day one insults her dignity +as a human being and pays her _Blutgeld_, and next day thinks no +more of her. + +"So I sat in the summer-house and watched the young ladies. Another +woman's figure appeared in the avenue, with fair hair, her head +uncovered and a white knitted shawl on her shoulders. She walked +along the avenue, then came into the summer-house, and taking hold +of the parapet, looked indifferently below and into the distance +over the sea. As she came in she paid no attention to me, as though +she did not notice me. I scrutinised her from foot to head (not +from head to foot, as one scrutinises men) and found that she was +young, not more than five-and-twenty, nice-looking, with a good +figure, in all probability married and belonging to the class of +respectable women. She was dressed as though she were at home, but +fashionably and with taste, as ladies are, as a rule, in N. + +"'This one would do nicely,' I thought, looking at her handsome +figure and her arms; 'she is all right. . . . She is probably the +wife of some doctor or schoolmaster. . . .' + +"But to make up to her--that is, to make her the heroine of one +of those impromptu affairs to which tourists are so prone--was +not easy and, indeed, hardly possible. I felt that as I gazed at +her face. The way she looked, and the expression of her face, +suggested that the sea, the smoke in the distance, and the sky had +bored her long, long ago, and wearied her sight. She seemed to be +tired, bored, and thinking about something dreary, and her face had +not even that fussy, affectedly indifferent expression which one +sees in the face of almost every woman when she is conscious of the +presence of an unknown man in her vicinity. + +"The fair-haired lady took a bored and passing glance at me, sat +down on a seat and sank into reverie, and from her face I saw that +she had no thoughts for me, and that I, with my Petersburg appearance, +did not arouse in her even simple curiosity. But yet I made up my +mind to speak to her, and asked: 'Madam, allow me to ask you at +what time do the waggonettes go from here to the town?' + +"'At ten or eleven, I believe. . . .'" + +"I thanked her. She glanced at me once or twice, and suddenly there +was a gleam of curiosity, then of something like wonder on her +passionless face. . . . I made haste to assume an indifferent +expression and to fall into a suitable attitude; she was catching +on! She suddenly jumped up from the seat, as though something had +bitten her, and examining me hurriedly, with a gentle smile, asked +timidly: + +"'Oh, aren't you Ananyev?' + +"'Yes, I am Ananyev,' I answered. + +"'And don't you recognise me? No?' + +"I was a little confused. I looked intently at her, and--would +you believe it?--I recognised her not from her face nor her figure, +but from her gentle, weary smile. It was Natalya Stepanovna, or, +as she was called, Kisotchka, the very girl I had been head over +ears in love with seven or eight years before, when I was wearing +the uniform of a high-school boy. The doings of far, vanished days, +the days of long ago. . . . I remember this Kisotchka, a thin little +high-school girl of fifteen or sixteen, when she was something just +for a schoolboy's taste, created by nature especially for Platonic +love. What a charming little girl she was! Pale, fragile, light--she +looked as though a breath would send her flying like a feather +to the skies--a gentle, perplexed face, little hands, soft long +hair to her belt, a waist as thin as a wasp's--altogether something +ethereal, transparent like moonlight--in fact, from the point of +view of a high-school boy a peerless beauty. . . . Wasn't I in love +with her! I did not sleep at night. I wrote verses. . . . Sometimes +in the evenings she would sit on a seat in the park while we +schoolboys crowded round her, gazing reverently; in response to our +compliments, our sighing, and attitudinising, she would shrink +nervously from the evening damp, screw up her eyes, and smile gently, +and at such times she was awfully like a pretty little kitten. As +we gazed at her every one of us had a desire to caress her and +stroke her like a cat, hence her nickname of Kisotchka. + +"In the course of the seven or eight years since we had met, Kisotchka +had greatly changed. She had grown more robust and stouter, and had +quite lost the resemblance to a soft, fluffy kitten. It was not +that her features looked old or faded, but they had somehow lost +their brilliance and looked sterner, her hair seemed shorter, she +looked taller, and her shoulders were quite twice as broad, and +what was most striking, there was already in her face the expression +of motherliness and resignation commonly seen in respectable women +of her age, and this, of course, I had never seen in her before. . . . +In short, of the school-girlish and the Platonic her face had +kept the gentle smile and nothing more. . . . + +"We got into conversation. Learning that I was already an engineer, +Kisotchka was immensely delighted. + +"'How good that is!' she said, looking joyfully into my face. 'Ah, +how good! And how splendid you all are! Of all who left with you, +not one has been a failure--they have all turned out well. One +an engineer, another a doctor, a third a teacher, another, they +say, is a celebrated singer in Petersburg. . . . You are all splendid, +all of you. . . . Ah, how good that is!' + +"Kisotchka's eyes shone with genuine goodwill and gladness. She was +admiring me like an elder sister or a former governess. 'While I +looked at her sweet face and thought, It wouldn't be bad to get +hold of her to-day!' + +"'Do you remember, Natalya Stepanovna,' I asked her, 'how I once +brought you in the park a bouquet with a note in it? You read my +note, and such a look of bewilderment came into your face. . . .' + +"'No, I don't remember that,' she said, laughing. 'But I remember +how you wanted to challenge Florens to a duel over me. . . .' + +"'Well, would you believe it, I don't remember that. . . .' + +"'Well, that's all over and done with . . .' sighed Kisotchka. 'At +one time I was your idol, and now it is my turn to look up to all +of you. . . .' + +"From further conversation I learned that two years after leaving +the high school, Kisotchka had been married to a resident in the +town who was half Greek, half Russian, had a post either in the +bank or in the insurance society, and also carried on a trade in +corn. He had a strange surname, something in the style of Populaki +or Skarandopulo. . . . Goodness only knows--I have forgotten. . . . +As a matter of fact, Kisotchka spoke little and with reluctance +about herself. The conversation was only about me. She asked me +about the College of Engineering, about my comrades, about Petersburg, +about my plans, and everything I said moved her to eager delight +and exclamations of, 'Oh, how good that is!' + +"We went down to the sea and walked over the sands; then when the +night air began to blow chill and damp from the sea we climbed up +again. All the while our talk was of me and of the past. We walked +about until the reflection of the sunset had died away from the +windows of the summer villas. + +"'Come in and have some tea,' Kisotchka suggested. 'The samovar +must have been on the table long ago. . . . I am alone at home,' +she said, as her villa came into sight through the green of the +acacias. 'My husband is always in the town and only comes home at +night, and not always then, and I must own that I am so dull that +it's simply deadly.' + +"I followed her in, admiring her back and shoulders. I was glad +that she was married. Married women are better material for temporary +love affairs than girls. I was also pleased that her husband was +not at home. At the same time I felt that the affair would not come +off. . . . + +"We went into the house. The rooms were smallish and had low ceilings, +and the furniture was typical of the summer villa (Russians like +having at their summer villas uncomfortable heavy, dingy furniture +which they are sorry to throw away and have nowhere to put), but +from certain details I could observe that Kisotchka and her husband +were not badly off, and must be spending five or six thousand roubles +a year. I remember that in the middle of the room which Kisotchka +called the dining-room there was a round table, supported for some +reason on six legs, and on it a samovar and cups. At the edge of +the table lay an open book, a pencil, and an exercise book. I glanced +at the book and recognised it as 'Malinin and Burenin's Arithmetical +Examples.' It was open, as I now remember, at the 'Rules of Compound +Interest.' + +"'To whom are you giving lessons?' I asked Kisotchka. + +"'Nobody,' she answered. 'I am just doing some. . . . I have nothing +to do, and am so bored that I think of the old days and do sums.' + +"'Have you any children?' + +"'I had a baby boy, but he only lived a week.' + +"We began drinking tea. Admiring me, Kisotchka said again how good +it was that I was an engineer, and how glad she was of my success. +And the more she talked and the more genuinely she smiled, the +stronger was my conviction that I should go away without having +gained my object. I was a connoisseur in love affairs in those days, +and could accurately gauge my chances of success. You can boldly +reckon on success if you are tracking down a fool or a woman as +much on the look out for new experiences and sensations as yourself, +or an adventuress to whom you are a stranger. If you come across a +sensible and serious woman, whose face has an expression of weary +submission and goodwill, who is genuinely delighted at your presence, +and, above all, respects you, you may as well turn back. To succeed +in that case needs longer than one day. + +"And by evening light Kisotchka seemed even more charming than by +day. She attracted me more and more, and apparently she liked me +too, and the surroundings were most appropriate: the husband not +at home, no servants visible, stillness around. . . . Though I had +little confidence in success, I made up my mind to begin the attack +anyway. First of all it was necessary to get into a familiar tone +and to change Kisotchka's lyrically earnest mood into a more frivolous +one. + +"'Let us change the conversation, Natalya Stepanovna,' I began. +'Let us talk of something amusing. First of all, allow me, for the +sake of old times, to call you Kisotchka.' + +"She allowed me. + +"'Tell me, please, Kisotchka,' I went on, 'what is the matter with +all the fair sex here. What has happened to them? In old days they +were all so moral and virtuous, and now, upon my word, if one asks +about anyone, one is told such things that one is quite shocked at +human nature. . . . One young lady has eloped with an officer; +another has run away and carried off a high-school boy with her; +another--a married woman--has run away from her husband with +an actor; a fourth has left her husband and gone off with an officer, +and so on and so on. It's a regular epidemic! If it goes on like +this there won't be a girl or a young woman left in your town!' + +"I spoke in a vulgar, playful tone. If Kisotchka had laughed in +response I should have gone on in this style: 'You had better look +out, Kisotchka, or some officer or actor will be carrying you off!' +She would have dropped her eyes and said: 'As though anyone would +care to carry me off; there are plenty younger and better looking +. . . .' And I should have said: 'Nonsense, Kisotchka--I for one +should be delighted!' And so on in that style, and it would all +have gone swimmingly. But Kisotchka did not laugh in response; on +the contrary, she looked grave and sighed. + +"'All you have been told is true,' she said. 'My cousin Sonya ran +away from her husband with an actor. Of course, it is wrong. . . . +Everyone ought to bear the lot that fate has laid on him, but I do +not condemn them or blame them. . . . Circumstances are sometimes +too strong for anyone!' + +"'That is so, Kisotchka, but what circumstances can produce a +regular epidemic?' + +"'It's very simple and easy to understand,' replied Kisotchka, +raising her eyebrows. 'There is absolutely nothing for us educated +girls and women to do with ourselves. Not everyone is able to go +to the University, to become a teacher, to live for ideas, in fact, +as men do. They have to be married. . . . And whom would you have +them marry? You boys leave the high-school and go away to the +University, never to return to your native town again, and you marry +in Petersburg or Moscow, while the girls remain. . . . To whom are +they to be married? Why, in the absence of decent cultured men, +goodness knows what sort of men they marry--stockbrokers and such +people of all kinds, who can do nothing but drink and get into rows +at the club. . . . A girl married like that, at random. . . . And +what is her life like afterwards? You can understand: a well-educated, +cultured woman is living with a stupid, boorish man; if she meets +a cultivated man, an officer, an actor, or a doctor--well, she +gets to love him, her life becomes unbearable to her, and she runs +away from her husband. And one can't condemn her!' + +"'If that is so, Kisotchka, why get married?' I asked. + +"'Yes, of course,' said Kisotchka with a sigh, 'but you know every +girl fancies that any husband is better than nothing. . . . Altogether +life is horrid here, Nikolay Anastasyevitch, very horrid! Life is +stifling for a girl and stifling when one is married. . . . Here +they laugh at Sonya for having run away from her husband, but if +they could see into her soul they would not laugh. . . .'" + +Azorka began barking outside again. He growled angrily at some one, +then howled miserably and dashed with all his force against the +wall of the hut. . . . Ananyev's face was puckered with pity; he +broke off his story and went out. For two minutes he could be heard +outside comforting his dog. "Good dog! poor dog!" + +"Our Nikolay Anastasyevitch is fond of talking," said Von Schtenberg, +laughing. "He is a good fellow," he added after a brief silence. + +Returning to the hut, the engineer filled up our glasses and, smiling +and stroking his chest, went on: + +"And so my attack was unsuccessful. There was nothing for it, I put +off my unclean thoughts to a more favourable occasion, resigned +myself to my failure and, as the saying is, waved my hand. What is +more, under the influence of Kisotchka's voice, the evening air, +and the stillness, I gradually myself fell into a quiet sentimental +mood. I remember I sat in an easy chair by the wide-open window and +glanced at the trees and darkened sky. The outlines of the acacias +and the lime trees were just the same as they had been eight years +before; just as then, in the days of my childhood, somewhere far +away there was the tinkling of a wretched piano, and the public had +just the same habit of sauntering to and fro along the avenues, but +the people were not the same. Along the avenues there walked now +not my comrades and I and the object of my adoration, but schoolboys +and young ladies who were strangers. And I felt melancholy. When +to my inquiries about acquaintances I five times received from +Kisotchka the answer, 'He is dead,' my melancholy changed into the +feeling one has at the funeral service of a good man. And sitting +there at the window, looking at the promenading public and listening +to the tinkling piano, I saw with my own eyes for the first time +in my life with what eagerness one generation hastens to replace +another, and what a momentous significance even some seven or eight +years may have in a man's life! + +"Kisotchka put a bottle of red wine on the table. I drank it off, +grew sentimental, and began telling a long story about something +or other. Kisotchka listened as before, admiring me and my cleverness. +And time passed. The sky was by now so dark that the outlines of +the acacias and lime trees melted into one, the public was no longer +walking up and down the avenues, the piano was silent and the only +sound was the even murmur of the sea. + +"Young people are all alike. Be friendly to a young man, make much +of him, regale him with wine, let him understand that he is attractive +and he will sit on and on, forget that it is time to go, and talk +and talk and talk. . . . His hosts cannot keep their eyes open, +it's past their bedtime, and he still stays and talks. That was +what I did. Once I chanced to look at the clock; it was half-past +ten. I began saying good-bye. + +"'Have another glass before your walk,' said Kisotchka. + +"I took another glass, again I began talking at length, forgot it +was time to go, and sat down. Then there came the sound of men's +voices, footsteps and the clank of spurs. + +"'I think my husband has come in . . . .' said Kisotchka listening. + +"The door creaked, two voices came now from the passage and I saw +two men pass the door that led into the dining-room: one a stout, +solid, dark man with a hooked nose, wearing a straw hat, and the +other a young officer in a white tunic. As they passed the door +they both glanced casually and indifferently at Kisotchka and me, +and I fancied both of them were drunk. + +"'She told you a lie then, and you believed her!' we heard a loud +voice with a marked nasal twang say a minute later. 'To begin with, +it wasn't at the big club but at the little one.' + +"'You are angry, Jupiter, so you are wrong . . . .' said another +voice, obviously the officer's, laughing and coughing. 'I say, can +I stay the night? Tell me honestly, shall I be in your way?' + +"'What a question! Not only you can, but you must. What will you +have, beer or wine?' + +"They were sitting two rooms away from us, talking loudly, and +apparently feeling no interest in Kisotchka or her visitor. A +perceptible change came over Kisotchka on her husband's arrival. +At first she flushed red, then her face wore a timid, guilty +expression; she seemed to be troubled by some anxiety, and I began +to fancy that she was ashamed to show me her husband and wanted me +to go. + +"I began taking leave. Kisotchka saw me to the front door. I remember +well her gentle mournful smile and kind patient eyes as she pressed +my hand and said: + +"'Most likely we shall never see each other again. Well, God give +you every blessing. Thank you!' + +"Not one sigh, not one fine phrase. As she said good-bye she was +holding the candle in her hand; patches of light danced over her +face and neck, as though chasing her mournful smile. I pictured to +myself the old Kisotchka whom one used to want to stroke like a +cat, I looked intently at the present Kisotchka, and for some reason +recalled her words: 'Everyone ought to bear the lot that fate has +laid on him.' And I had a pang at my heart. I instinctively guessed +how it was, and my conscience whispered to me that I, in my happiness +and indifference, was face to face with a good, warm-hearted, loving +creature, who was broken by suffering. + +"I said good-bye and went to the gate. By now it was quite dark. +In the south the evenings draw in early in July and it gets dark +rapidly. Towards ten o'clock it is so dark that you can't see an +inch before your nose. I lighted a couple of dozen matches before, +almost groping, I found my way to the gate. + +"'Cab!' I shouted, going out of the gate; not a sound, not a sigh +in answer. . . . 'Cab,' I repeated, 'hey, Cab!' + +"But there was no cab of any description. The silence of the grave. +I could hear nothing but the murmur of the drowsy sea and the beating +of my heart from the wine. Lifting my eyes to the sky I found not +a single star. It was dark and sullen. Evidently the sky was covered +with clouds. For some reason I shrugged my shoulders, smiling +foolishly, and once more, not quite so resolutely, shouted for a +cab. + +"The echo answered me. A walk of three miles across open country +and in the pitch dark was not an agreeable prospect. Before making +up my mind to walk, I spent a long time deliberating and shouting +for a cab; then, shrugging my shoulders, I walked lazily back to +the copse, with no definite object in my mind. It was dreadfully +dark in the copse. Here and there between the trees the windows of +the summer villas glowed a dull red. A raven, disturbed by my steps +and the matches with which I lighted my way to the summer-house, +flew from tree to tree and rustled among the leaves. I felt vexed +and ashamed, and the raven seemed to understand this, and croaked +'krrra!' I was vexed that I had to walk, and ashamed that I had +stayed on at Kisotchka's, chatting like a boy. + +"I made my way to the summer-house, felt for the seat and sat down. +Far below me, behind a veil of thick darkness, the sea kept up a +low angry growl. I remember that, as though I were blind, I could +see neither sky nor sea, nor even the summer-house in which I was +sitting. And it seemed to me as though the whole world consisted +only of the thoughts that were straying through my head, dizzy from +the wine, and of an unseen power murmuring monotonously somewhere +below. And afterwards, as I sank into a doze, it began to seem that +it was not the sea murmuring, but my thoughts, and that the whole +world consisted of nothing but me. And concentrating the whole world +in myself in this way, I thought no more of cabs, of the town, and +of Kisotchka, and abandoned myself to the sensation I was so fond +of: that is, the sensation of fearful isolation when you feel that +in the whole universe, dark and formless, you alone exist. It is a +proud, demoniac sensation, only possible to Russians whose thoughts +and sensations are as large, boundless, and gloomy as their plains, +their forests, and their snow. If I had been an artist I should +certainly have depicted the expression of a Russian's face when he +sits motionless and, with his legs under him and his head clasped +in his hands, abandons himself to this sensation. . . . And together +with this sensation come thoughts of the aimlessness of life, of +death, and of the darkness of the grave. . . . The thoughts are not +worth a brass farthing, but the expression of face must be fine. . . . + +"While I was sitting and dozing, unable to bring myself to get +up--I was warm and comfortable--all at once, against the even +monotonous murmur of the sea, as though upon a canvas, sounds began +to grow distinct which drew my attention from myself. . . . Someone +was coming hurriedly along the avenue. Reaching the summer-house +this someone stopped, gave a sob like a little girl, and said in +the voice of a weeping child: 'My God, when will it all end! Merciful +Heavens!' + +"Judging from the voice and the weeping I took it to be a little +girl of ten or twelve. She walked irresolutely into the summer-house, +sat down, and began half-praying, half-complaining aloud. . . . + +"'Merciful God!' she said, crying, 'it's unbearable. It's beyond +all endurance! I suffer in silence, but I want to live too. . . . +Oh, my God! My God!' + +"And so on in the same style. + +"I wanted to look at the child and speak to her. So as not to +frighten her I first gave a loud sigh and coughed, then cautiously +struck a match. . . . There was a flash of bright light in the +darkness, which lighted up the weeping figure. It was Kisotchka!" + +"Marvels upon marvels!" said Von Schtenberg with a sigh. "Black +night, the murmur of the sea; she in grief, he with a sensation of +world--solitude. . . . It's too much of a good thing. . . . You +only want Circassians with daggers to complete it." + +"I am not telling you a tale, but fact." + +"Well, even if it is a fact . . . it all proves nothing, and there +is nothing new in it. . . ." + +"Wait a little before you find fault! Let me finish," said Ananyev, +waving his hand with vexation; "don't interfere, please! I am not +telling you, but the doctor. . . . Well," he went on, addressing +me and glancing askance at the student who bent over his books and +seemed very well satisfied at having gibed at the engineer--"well, +Kisotchka was not surprised or frightened at seeing me. It seemed +as though she had known beforehand that she would find me in the +summer-house. She was breathing in gasps and trembling all over as +though in a fever, while her tear-stained face, so far as I could +distinguish it as I struck match after match, was not the intelligent, +submissive weary face I had seen before, but something different, +which I cannot understand to this day. It did not express pain, nor +anxiety, nor misery--nothing of what was expressed by her words +and her tears. . . . I must own that, probably because I did not +understand it, it looked to me senseless and as though she were +drunk. + +"'I can't bear it,' muttered Kisotchka in the voice of a crying +child. 'It's too much for me, Nikolay Anastasyitch. Forgive me, +Nikolav Anastasyitch. I can't go on living like this. . . . I am +going to the town to my mother's. . . . Take me there. . . . Take +me there, for God's sake!' + +"In the presence of tears I can neither speak nor be silent. I was +flustered and muttered some nonsense trying to comfort her. + +"'No, no; I will go to my mother's,' said Kisotchka resolutely, +getting up and clutching my arm convulsively (her hands and her +sleeves were wet with tears). 'Forgive me, Nikolay Anastasyitch, I +am going. . . . I can bear no more. . . .' + +"'Kisotchka, but there isn't a single cab,' I said. 'How can you +go?' + +"'No matter, I'll walk. . . . It's not far. I can't bear it. . . .' + +"I was embarrassed, but not touched. Kisotchka's tears, her trembling, +and the blank expression of her face suggested to me a trivial, +French or Little Russian melodrama, in which every ounce of cheap +shallow feeling is washed down with pints of tears. + +"I didn t understand her, and knew I did not understand her; I ought +to have been silent, but for some reason, most likely for fear my +silence might be taken for stupidity, I thought fit to try to +persuade her not to go to her mother's, but to stay at home. When +people cry, they don't like their tears to be seen. And I lighted +match after match and went on striking till the box was empty. What +I wanted with this ungenerous illumination, I can't conceive to +this day. Cold-hearted people are apt to be awkward, and even stupid. + +"In the end Kisotchka took my arm and we set off. Going out of the +gate, we turned to the right and sauntered slowly along the soft +dusty road. It was dark. As my eyes grew gradually accustomed to +the darkness, I began to distinguish the silhouettes of the old +gaunt oaks and lime trees which bordered the road. The jagged, +precipitous cliffs, intersected here and there by deep, narrow +ravines and creeks, soon showed indistinctly, a black streak on the +right. Low bushes nestled by the hollows, looking like sitting +figures. It was uncanny. I looked sideways suspiciously at the +cliffs, and the murmur of the sea and the stillness of the country +alarmed my imagination. Kisotchka did not speak. She was still +trembling, and before she had gone half a mile she was exhausted +with walking and was out of breath. I too was silent. + +"Three-quarters of a mile from the Quarantine Station there was a +deserted building of four storeys, with a very high chimney in which +there had once been a steam flour mill. It stood solitary on the +cliff, and by day it could be seen for a long distance, both by sea +and by land. Because it was deserted and no one lived in it, and +because there was an echo in it which distinctly repeated the steps +and voices of passers-by, it seemed mysterious. Picture me in the +dark night arm-in-arm with a woman who was running away from her +husband near this tall long monster which repeated the sound of +every step I took and stared at me fixedly with its hundred black +windows. A normal young man would have been moved to romantic +feelings in such surroundings, but I looked at the dark windows and +thought: 'All this is very impressive, but time will come when of +that building and of Kisotchka and her troubles and of me with my +thoughts, not one grain of dust will remain. . . . All is nonsense +and vanity. . . .' + +"When we reached the flour mill Kisotchka suddenly stopped, took +her arm out of mine, and said, no longer in a childish voice, but +in her own: + +"'Nikolay Anastasvitch, I know all this seems strange to you. But +I am terribly unhappy! And you cannot even imagine how unhappy! +It's impossible to imagine it! I don't tell you about it because +one can't talk about it. . . . Such a life, such a life! . . .' + +"Kisotchka did not finish. She clenched her teeth and moaned as +though she were doing her utmost not to scream with pain. + +"'Such a life!' she repeated with horror, with the cadence and the +southern, rather Ukrainian accent which particularly in women gives +to emotional speech the effect of singing. 'It is a life! Ah, my +God, my God! what does it mean? Oh, my God, my God!' + +"As though trying to solve the riddle of her fate, she shrugged her +shoulders in perplexity, shook her head, and clasped her hands. She +spoke as though she were singing, moved gracefully, and reminded +me of a celebrated Little Russian actress. + +"'Great God, it is as though I were in a pit,' she went on. 'If +one could live for one minute in happiness as other people live! +Oh, my God, my God! I have come to such disgrace that before a +stranger I am running away from my husband by night, like some +disreputable creature! Can I expect anything good after that?' + +"As I admired her movements and her voice, I began to feel annoyed +that she was not on good terms with her husband. 'It would be nice +to have got on into relations with her!' flitted through my mind; +and this pitiless thought stayed in my brain, haunted me all the +way and grew more and more alluring. + +"About a mile from the flour mill we had to turn to the left by the +cemetery. At the turning by the corner of the cemetery there stood +a stone windmill, and by it a little hut in which the miller lived. +We passed the mill and the hut, turned to the left and reached the +gates of the cemetery. There Kisotchka stopped and said: + +"'I am going back, Nikolay Anastasyitch! You go home, and God bless +you, but I am going back. I am not frightened.' + +"'Well, what next!' I said, disconcerted. 'If you are going, you +had better go!' + +"'I have been too hasty. . . . It was all about nothing that +mattered. You and your talk took me back to the past and put all +sort of ideas into my head. . . . I was sad and wanted to cry, and +my husband said rude things to me before that officer, and I could +not bear it. . . . And what's the good of my going to the town to +my mother's? Will that make me any happier? I must go back. . . . +But never mind . . . let us go on,' said Kisotchka, and she laughed. +'It makes no difference!' + +"I remembered that over the gate of the cemetery there was an +inscription: 'The hour will come wherein all they that lie in the +grave will hear the voice of the Son of God.' I knew very well that +sooner or later I and Kisotchka and her husband and the officer in +the white tunic would lie under the dark trees in the churchyard; +I knew that an unhappy and insulted fellow-creature was walking +beside me. All this I recognised distinctly, but at the same time +I was troubled by an oppressive and unpleasant dread that Kisotchka +would turn back, and that I should not manage to say to her what +had to be said. Never at any other time in my life have thoughts +of a higher order been so closely interwoven with the basest animal +prose as on that night. . . . It was horrible! + +"Not far from the cemetery we found a cab. When we reached the High +Street, where Kisotchka's mother lived, we dismissed the cab and +walked along the pavement. Kisotchka was silent all the while, while +I looked at her, and I raged at myself, 'Why don't you begin? Now's +the time!' About twenty paces from the hotel where I was staying, +Kisotchka stopped by the lamp-post and burst into tears. + +"'Nikolay Anastasyitch!' she said, crying and laughing and looking +at me with wet shining eyes, 'I shall never forget your sympathy +. . . . How good you are! All of you are so splendid--all of you! +Honest, great-hearted, kind, clever. . . . Ah, how good that is!' + +"She saw in me a highly educated man, advanced in every sense of +the word, and on her tear-stained laughing face, together with the +emotion and enthusiasm aroused by my personality, there was clearly +written regret that she so rarely saw such people, and that God had +not vouchsafed her the bliss of being the wife of one of them. She +muttered, 'Ah, how splendid it is!' The childish gladness on her +face, the tears, the gentle smile, the soft hair, which had escaped +from under the kerchief, and the kerchief itself thrown carelessly +over her head, in the light of the street lamp reminded me of the +old Kisotchka whom one had wanted to stroke like a kitten. + +"I could not restrain myself, and began stroking her hair, her +shoulders, and her hands. + +"'Kisotchka, what do you want?' I muttered. 'I'll go to the ends +of the earth with you if you like! I will take you out of this hole +and give you happiness. I love you. . . . Let us go, my sweet? Yes? +Will you?' + +"Kisotchka's face was flooded with bewilderment. She stepped back +from the street lamp and, completely overwhelmed, gazed at me with +wide-open eyes. I gripped her by the arm, began showering kisses +on her face, her neck, her shoulders, and went on making vows and +promises. In love affairs vows and promises are almost a physiological +necessity. There's no getting on without them. Sometimes you know +you are lying and that promises are not necessary, but still you +vow and protest. Kisotchka, utterly overwhelmed, kept staggering +back and gazing at me with round eyes. + +"'Please don't! Please don't!' she muttered, holding me off with +her hands. + +"I clasped her tightly in my arms. All at once she broke into +hysterical tears. And her face had the same senseless blank expression +that I had seen in the summer-house when I lighted the matches. +Without asking her consent, preventing her from speaking, I dragged +her forcibly towards my hotel. She seemed almost swooning and did +not walk, but I took her under the arms and almost carried her. . . . +I remember, as we were going up the stairs, some man with a red +band in his cap looked wonderingly at me and bowed to Kisotchka. . . ." + +Ananyev flushed crimson and paused. He walked up and down near the +table in silence, scratched the back of his head with an air of +vexation, and several times shrugged his shoulders and twitched his +shoulder-blades, while a shiver ran down his huge back. The memory +was painful and made him ashamed, and he was struggling with himself. + +"It's horrible!" he said, draining a glass of wine and shaking his +head. "I am told that in every introductory lecture on women's +diseases the medical students are admonished to remember that each +one of them has a mother, a sister, a fiancée, before undressing +and examining a female patient. . . . That advice would be very +good not only for medical students but for everyone who in one way +or another has to deal with a woman's life. Now that I have a wife +and a little daughter, oh, how well I understand that advice! How +I understand it, my God! You may as well hear the rest, though. . . . +As soon as she had become my mistress, Kisotchka's view of the +position was very different from mine. First of all she felt for +me a deep and passionate love. What was for me an ordinary amatory +episode was for her an absolute revolution in her life. I remember, +it seemed to me that she had gone out of her mind. Happy for the +first time in her life, looking five years younger, with an inspired +enthusiastic face, not knowing what to do with herself for happiness, +she laughed and cried and never ceased dreaming aloud how next day +we would set off for the Caucasus, then in the autumn to Petersburg; +how we would live afterwards. + +"'Don't worry yourself about my husband,' she said to reassure me. +'He is bound to give me a divorce. Everyone in the town knows that +he is living with the elder Kostovitch. We will get a divorce and +be married.' + +"When women love they become acclimatised and at home with people +very quickly, like cats. Kisotchka had only spent an hour and a +half in my room when she already felt as though she were at home +and was ready to treat my property as though it were her own. She +packed my things in my portmanteau, scolded me for not hanging my +new expensive overcoat on a peg instead of flinging it on a chair, +and so on. + +"I looked at her, listened, and felt weariness and vexation. I was +conscious of a slight twinge of horror at the thought that a +respectable, honest, and unhappy woman had so easily, after some +three or four hours, succumbed to the first man she met. As a +respectable man, you see, I didn't like it. Then, too, I was +unpleasantly impressed by the fact that women of Kisotchka's sort, +not deep or serious, are too much in love with life, and exalt what +is in reality such a trifle as love for a man to the level of bliss, +misery, a complete revolution in life. . . . Moreover, now that I +was satisfied, I was vexed with myself for having been so stupid +as to get entangled with a woman whom I should have to deceive. And +in spite of my disorderly life I must observe that I could not bear +telling lies. + +"I remember that Kisotchka sat down at my feet, laid her head on +my knees, and, looking at me with shining, loving eyes, asked: + +"'Kolya, do you love me? Very, very much?' + +"And she laughed with happiness. . . . This struck me as sentimental, +affected, and not clever; and meanwhile I was already inclined to +look for 'depth of thought' before everything. + +"'Kisotchka, you had better go home,' I said, or else your people +will be sure to miss you and will be looking for you all over the +town; and it would be awkward for you to go to your mother in the +morning.' + +"Kisotchka agreed. At parting we arranged to meet at midday next +morning in the park, and the day after to set off together to +Pyatigorsk. I went into the street to see her home, and I remember +that I caressed her with genuine tenderness on the way. There was +a minute when I felt unbearably sorry for her, for trusting me so +implicitly, and I made up my mind that I would really take her to +Pyatigorsk, but remembering that I had only six hundred roubles in +my portmanteau, and that it would be far more difficult to break +it off with her in the autumn than now, I made haste to suppress +my compassion. + +"We reached the house where Kisotchka's mother lived. I pulled at +the bell. When footsteps were heard at the other side of the door +Kisotchka suddenly looked grave, glanced upwards to the sky, made +the sign of the Cross over me several times and, clutching my hand, +pressed it to her lips. + +"'Till to-morrow,' she said, and disappeared into the house. + +"I crossed to the opposite pavement and from there looked at the +house. At first the windows were in darkness, then in one of the +windows there was the glimmer of the faint bluish flame of a newly +lighted candle; the flame grew, gave more light, and I saw shadows +moving about the rooms together with it. + +"'They did not expect her,' I thought. + +"Returning to my hotel room I undressed, drank off a glass of red +wine, ate some fresh caviare which I had bought that day in the +bazaar, went to bed in a leisurely way, and slept the sound, +untroubled sleep of a tourist. + +"In the morning I woke up with a headache and in a bad humour. +Something worried me. + +"'What's the matter?' I asked myself, trying to explain my uneasiness. +'What's upsetting me?' + +"And I put down my uneasiness to the dread that Kisotchka might +turn up any minute and prevent my going away, and that I should +have to tell lies and act a part before her. I hurriedly dressed, +packed my things, and left the hotel, giving instructions to the +porter to take my luggage to the station for the seven o'clock train +in the evening. I spent the whole day with a doctor friend and left +the town that evening. As you see, my philosophy did not prevent +me from taking to my heels in a mean and treacherous flight. . . . + +"All the while that I was at my friend's, and afterwards driving +to the station, I was tormented by anxiety. I fancied that I was +afraid of meeting with Kisotchka and a scene. In the station I +purposely remained in the toilet room till the second bell rang, +and while I was making my way to my compartment, I was oppressed +by a feeling as though I were covered all over with stolen things. +With what impatience and terror I waited for the third bell! + +"At last the third bell that brought my deliverance rang at last, +the train moved; we passed the prison, the barracks, came out into +the open country, and yet, to my surprise, the feeling of uneasiness +still persisted, and still I felt like a thief passionately longing +to escape. It was queer. To distract my mind and calm myself I +looked out of the window. The train ran along the coast. The sea +was smooth, and the turquoise sky, almost half covered with the +tender, golden crimson light of sunset, was gaily and serenely +mirrored in it. Here and there fishing boats and rafts made black +patches on its surface. The town, as clean and beautiful as a toy, +stood on the high cliff, and was already shrouded in the mist of +evening. The golden domes of its churches, the windows and the +greenery reflected the setting sun, glowing and melting like +shimmering gold. . . . The scent of the fields mingled with the +soft damp air from the sea. + +"The train flew rapidly along. I heard the laughter of passengers +and guards. Everyone was good-humoured and light-hearted, yet my +unaccountable uneasiness grew greater and greater. . . . I looked +at the white mist that covered the town and I imagined how a woman +with a senseless blank face was hurrying up and down in that mist +by the churches and the houses, looking for me and moaning, 'Oh, +my God! Oh, my God!' in the voice of a little girl or the cadences +of a Little Russian actress. I recalled her grave face and big +anxious eyes as she made the sign of the Cross over me, as though +I belonged to her, and mechanically I looked at the hand which she +had kissed the day before. + +"'Surely I am not in love?' I asked myself, scratching my hand. + +"Only as night came on when the passengers were asleep and I was +left _tête-à-tête_ with my conscience, I began to understand what +I had not been able to grasp before. In the twilight of the railway +carriage the image of Kisotchka rose before me, haunted me and I +recognised clearly that I had committed a crime as bad as murder. +My conscience tormented me. To stifle this unbearable feeling, I +assured myself that everything was nonsense and vanity, that Kisotchka +and I would die and decay, that her grief was nothing in comparison +with death, and so on and so on . . . and that if you come to that, +there is no such thing as freewill, and that therefore I was not +to blame. But all these arguments only irritated me and were +extraordinarily quickly crowded out by other thoughts. There was a +miserable feeling in the hand that Kisotchka had kissed. . . . I +kept lying down and getting up again, drank vodka at the stations, +forced myself to eat bread and butter, fell to assuring myself again +that life had no meaning, but nothing was of any use. A strange and +if you like absurd ferment was going on in my brain. The most +incongruous ideas crowded one after another in disorder, getting +more and more tangled, thwarting each other, and I, the thinker, +'with my brow bent on the earth,' could make out nothing and could +not find my bearings in this mass of essential and non-essential +ideas. It appeared that I, the thinker, had not mastered the technique +of thinking, and that I was no more capable of managing my own brain +than mending a watch. For the first time in my life I was really +thinking eagerly and intensely, and that seemed to me so monstrous +that I said to myself: 'I am going off my head.' A man whose brain +does not work at all times, but only at painful moments, is often +haunted by the thought of madness. + +"I spent a day and a night in this misery, then a second night, and +learning from experience how little my philosophy was to me, I came +to my senses and realised at last what sort of a creature I was. I +saw that my ideas were not worth a brass farthing, and that before +meeting Kisotchka I had not begun to think and had not even a +conception of what thinking in earnest meant; now through suffering +I realised that I had neither convictions nor a definite moral +standard, nor heart, nor reason; my whole intellectual and moral +wealth consisted of specialist knowledge, fragments, useless memories, +other people's ideas--and nothing else; and my mental processes +were as lacking in complexity, as useless and as rudimentary as a +Yakut's. . . . If I had disliked lying, had not stolen, had not +murdered, and, in fact, made obviously gross mistakes, that was not +owing to my convictions--I had none, but because I was in bondage, +hand and foot, to my nurse's fairy tales and to copy-book morals, +which had entered into my flesh and blood and without my noticing +it guided me in life, though I looked on them as absurd. . . . + +"I realised that I was not a thinker, not a philosopher, but simply +a dilettante. God had given me a strong healthy Russian brain with +promise of talent. And, only fancy, here was that brain at twenty-six, +undisciplined, completely free from principles, not weighed down +by any stores of knowledge, but only lightly sprinkled with information +of a sort in the engineering line; it was young and had a physiological +craving for exercise, it was on the look-out for it, when all at +once quite casually the fine juicy idea of the aimlessness of life +and the darkness beyond the tomb descends upon it. It greedily sucks +it in, puts its whole outlook at its disposal and begins playing +with it, like a cat with a mouse. There is neither learning nor +system in the brain, but that does not matter. It deals with the +great ideas with its own innate powers, like a self-educated man, +and before a month has passed the owner of the brain can turn a +potato into a hundred dainty dishes, and fancies himself a +philosopher . . . . + +"Our generation has carried this dilettantism, this playing with +serious ideas into science, into literature, into politics, and +into everything which it is not too lazy to go into, and with its +dilettantism has introduced, too, its coldness, its boredom, and +its one-sidedness and, as it seems to me, it has already succeeded +in developing in the masses a new hitherto non-existent attitude +to serious ideas. + +"I realised and appreciated my abnormality and utter ignorance, +thanks to a misfortune. My normal thinking, so it seems to me now, +dates from the day when I began again from the A, B, C, when my +conscience sent me flying back to N., when with no philosophical +subleties I repented, besought Kisotchka's forgiveness like a naughty +boy and wept with her. . . ." + +Ananyev briefly described his last interview with Kisotchka. + +"H'm. . . ." the student filtered through his teeth when the engineer +had finished. "That's the sort of thing that happens." + +His face still expressed mental inertia, and apparently Ananyev's +story had not touched him in the least. Only when the engineer after +a moment's pause, began expounding his view again and repeating +what he had said at first, the student frowned irritably, got up +from the table and walked away to his bed. He made his bed and began +undressing. + +"You look as though you have really convinced some one this time," +he said irritably. + +"Me convince anybody!" said the engineer. "My dear soul, do you +suppose I claim to do that? God bless you! To convince you is +impossible. You can reach conviction only by way of personal +experience and suffering!" + +"And then--it's queer logic!" grumbled the student as he put on +his nightshirt. "The ideas which you so dislike, which are so ruinous +for the young are, according to you, the normal thing for the old; +it's as though it were a question of grey hairs. . . . Where do the +old get this privilege? What is it based upon? If these ideas are +poison, they are equally poisonous for all?" + +"Oh, no, my dear soul, don't say so!" said the engineer with a sly +wink. "Don't say so. In the first place, old men are not dilettanti. +Their pessimism comes to them not casually from outside, but from +the depths of their own brains, and only after they have exhaustively +studied the Hegels and Kants of all sorts, have suffered, have made +no end of mistakes, in fact--when they have climbed the whole +ladder from bottom to top. Their pessimism has both personal +experience and sound philosophic training behind it. Secondly, the +pessimism of old thinkers does not take the form of idle talk, as +it does with you and me, but of _Weltschmertz_, of suffering; it +rests in them on a Christian foundation because it is derived from +love for humanity and from thoughts about humanity, and is entirely +free from the egoism which is noticeable in dilettanti. You despise +life because its meaning and its object are hidden just from you, +and you are only afraid of your own death, while the real thinker +is unhappy because the truth is hidden from all and he is afraid +for all men. For instance, there is living not far from here the +Crown forester, Ivan Alexandritch. He is a nice old man. At one +time he was a teacher somewhere, and used to write something; the +devil only knows what he was, but anyway he is a remarkably clever +fellow and in philosophy he is A1. He has read a great deal and he +is continually reading now. Well, we came across him lately in the +Gruzovsky district. . . . They were laying the sleepers and rails +just at the time. It's not a difficult job, but Ivan Alexandritch, +not being a specialist, looked at it as though it were a conjuring +trick. It takes an experienced workman less than a minute to lay a +sleeper and fix a rail on it. The workmen were in good form and +really were working smartly and rapidly; one rascal in particular +brought his hammer down with exceptional smartness on the head of +the nail and drove it in at one blow, though the handle of the +hammer was two yards or more in length and each nail was a foot +long. Ivan Alexandritch watched the workmen a long time, was moved, +and said to me with tears in his eyes: + +"'What a pity that these splendid men will die!' Such pessimism I +understand." + +"All that proves nothing and explains nothing," said the student, +covering himself up with a sheet; "all that is simply pounding +liquid in a mortar. No one knows anything and nothing can be proved +by words." + +He peeped out from under the sheet, lifted up his head and, frowning +irritably, said quickly: + +"One must be very naïve to believe in human words and logic and to +ascribe any determining value to them. You can prove and disprove +anything you like with words, and people will soon perfect the +technique of language to such a point that they will prove with +mathematical certainty that twice two is seven. I am fond of reading +and listening, but as to believing, no thank you; I can't, and I +don't want to. I believe only in God, but as for you, if you talk +to me till the Second Coming and seduce another five hundred +Kisothchkas, I shall believe in you only when I go out of my mind +. . . . Goodnight." + +The student hid his head under the sheet and turned his face towards +the wall, meaning by this action to let us know that he did not +want to speak or listen. The argument ended at that. + +Before going to bed the engineer and I went out of the hut, and I +saw the lights once more. + +"We have tired you out with our chatter," said Ananyev, yawning and +looking at the sky. "Well, my good sir! The only pleasure we have +in this dull hole is drinking and philosophising. . . . What an +embankment, Lord have mercy on us!" he said admiringly, as we +approached the embankment; "it is more like Mount Ararat than an +embankment." + +He paused for a little, then said: "Those lights remind the Baron +of the Amalekites, but it seems to me that they are like the thoughts +of man. . . . You know the thoughts of each individual man are +scattered like that in disorder, stretch in a straight line towards +some goal in the midst of the darkness and, without shedding light +on anything, without lighting up the night, they vanish somewhere +far beyond old age. But enough philosophising! It's time to go +bye-bye." + +When we were back in the hut the engineer began begging me to take +his bed. + +"Oh please!" he said imploringly, pressing both hands on his heart. +"I entreat you, and don't worry about me! I can sleep anywhere, +and, besides, I am not going to bed just yet. Please do--it's a +favour!" + +I agreed, undressed, and went to bed, while he sat down to the table +and set to work on the plans. + +"We fellows have no time for sleep," he said in a low voice when I +had got into bed and shut my eyes. "When a man has a wife and two +children he can't think of sleep. One must think now of food and +clothes and saving for the future. And I have two of them, a little +son and a daughter. . . . The boy, little rascal, has a jolly little +face. He's not six yet, and already he shows remarkable abilities, +I assure you. . . . I have their photographs here, somewhere. . . . +Ah, my children, my children!" + +He rummaged among his papers, found their photographs, and began +looking at them. I fell asleep. + +I was awakened by the barking of Azorka and loud voices. Von +Schtenberg with bare feet and ruffled hair was standing in the +doorway dressed in his underclothes, talking loudly with some one +. . . . It was getting light. A gloomy dark blue dawn was peeping +in at the door, at the windows, and through the crevices in the hut +walls, and casting a faint light on my bed, on the table with the +papers, and on Ananyev. Stretched on the floor on a cloak, with a +leather pillow under his head, the engineer lay asleep with his +fleshy, hairy chest uppermost; he was snoring so loudly that I +pitied the student from the bottom of my heart for having to sleep +in the same room with him every night. + +"Why on earth are we to take them?" shouted Von Schtenberg. "It has +nothing to do with us! Go to Tchalisov! From whom do the cauldrons +come?" + +"From Nikitin . . ." a bass voice answered gruffly. + +"Well, then, take them to Tchalisov. . . . That's not in our +department. What the devil are you standing there for? Drive on!" + +"Your honour, we have been to Tchalisov already," said the bass +voice still more gruffly. "Yesterday we were the whole day looking +for him down the line, and were told at his hut that he had gone +to the Dymkovsky section. Please take them, your honour! How much +longer are we to go carting them about? We go carting them on and +on along the line, and see no end to it." + +"What is it?" Ananyev asked huskily, waking up and lifting his head +quickly. + +"They have brought some cauldrons from Nikitin's," said the student, +"and he is begging us to take them. And what business is it of ours +to take them?" + +"Do be so kind, your honour, and set things right! The horses have +been two days without food and the master, for sure, will be angry. +Are we to take them back, or what? The railway ordered the cauldrons, +so it ought to take them. . . ." + +"Can't you understand, you blockhead, that it has nothing to do +with us? Go on to Tchalisov!" + +"What is it? Who's there?" Ananyev asked huskily again. "Damnation +take them all," he said, getting up and going to the door. "What +is it?" + +I dressed, and two minutes later went out of the hut. Ananyev and +the student, both in their underclothes and barefooted, were angrily +and impatiently explaining to a peasant who was standing before +them bare-headed, with his whip in his hand, apparently not +understanding them. Both faces looked preoccupied with workaday +cares. + +"What use are your cauldrons to me," shouted Ananyev. "Am I to put +them on my head, or what? If you can't find Tchalisov, find his +assistant, and leave us in peace!" + +Seeing me, the student probably recalled the conversation of the +previous night. The workaday expression vanished from his sleepy +face and a look of mental inertia came into it. He waved the peasant +off and walked away absorbed in thought. + +It was a cloudy morning. On the line where the lights had been +gleaming the night before, the workmen, just roused from sleep, +were swarming. There was a sound of voices and the squeaking of +wheelbarrows. The working day was beginning. One poor little nag +harnessed with cord was already plodding towards the embankment, +tugging with its neck, and dragging along a cartful of sand. + +I began saying good-bye. . . . A great deal had been said in the +night, but I carried away with me no answer to any question, and +in the morning, of the whole conversation there remained in my +memory, as in a filter, only the lights and the image of Kisotchka. +As I got on the horse, I looked at the student and Ananyev for the +last time, at the hysterical dog with the lustreless, tipsy-looking +eyes, at the workmen flitting to and fro in the morning fog, at the +embankment, at the little nag straining with its neck, and thought: + +"There is no making out anything in this world." + +And when I lashed my horse and galloped along the line, and when a +little later I saw nothing before me but the endless gloomy plain +and the cold overcast sky, I recalled the questions which were +discussed in the night. I pondered while the sun-scorched plain, +the immense sky, the oak forest, dark on the horizon and the hazy +distance, seemed saying to me: + +"Yes, there's no understanding anything in this world!" + +The sun began to rise. . . . + + +A STORY WITHOUT AN END + +SOON after two o'clock one night, long ago, the cook, pale and +agitated, rushed unexpectedly into my study and informed me that +Madame Mimotih, the old woman who owned the house next door, was +sitting in her kitchen. + +"She begs you to go in to her, sir . . ." said the cook, panting. +"Something bad has happened about her lodger. . . . He has shot +himself or hanged himself. . . ." + +"What can I do?" said I. "Let her go for the doctor or for the +police!" + +"How is she to look for a doctor! She can hardly breathe, and she +has huddled under the stove, she is so frightened. . . . You had +better go round, sir." + +I put on my coat and hat and went to Madame Mimotih's house. The +gate towards which I directed my steps was open. After pausing +beside it, uncertain what to do, I went into the yard without feeling +for the porter's bell. In the dark and dilapidated porch the door +was not locked. I opened it and walked into the entry. Here there +was not a glimmer of light, it was pitch dark, and, moreover, there +was a marked smell of incense. Groping my way out of the entry I +knocked my elbow against something made of iron, and in the darkness +stumbled against a board of some sort which almost fell to the +floor. At last the door covered with torn baize was found, and I +went into a little hall. + +I am not at the moment writing a fairy tale, and am far from intending +to alarm the reader, but the picture I saw from the passage was +fantastic and could only have been drawn by death. Straight before +me was a door leading to a little drawing-room. Three five-kopeck +wax candles, standing in a row, threw a scanty light on the faded +slate-coloured wallpaper. A coffin was standing on two tables in +the middle of the little room. The two candles served only to light +up a swarthy yellow face with a half-open mouth and sharp nose. +Billows of muslin were mingled in disorder from the face to the +tips of the two shoes, and from among the billows peeped out two +pale motionless hands, holding a wax cross. The dark gloomy corners +of the little drawing-room, the ikons behind the coffin, the coffin +itself, everything except the softly glimmering lights, were still +as death, as the tomb itself. + +"How strange!" I thought, dumbfoundered by the unexpected panorama +of death. "Why this haste? The lodger has hardly had time to hang +himself, or shoot himself, and here is the coffin already!" + +I looked round. On the left there was a door with a glass panel; +on the right a lame hat-stand with a shabby fur coat on it. . . . + +"Water. . . ." I heard a moan. + +The moan came from the left, beyond the door with the glass panel. +I opened the door and walked into a little dark room with a solitary +window, through which there came a faint light from a street lamp +outside. + +"Is anyone here?" I asked. + +And without waiting for an answer I struck a match. This is what I +saw while it was burning. A man was sitting on the blood-stained +floor at my very feet. If my step had been a longer one I should +have trodden on him. With his legs thrust forward and his hands +pressed on the floor, he was making an effort to raise his handsome +face, which was deathly pale against his pitch-black beard. In the +big eyes which he lifted upon me, I read unutterable terror, pain, +and entreaty. A cold sweat trickled in big drops down his face. +That sweat, the expression of his face, the trembling of the hands +he leaned upon, his hard breathing and his clenched teeth, showed +that he was suffering beyond endurance. Near his right hand in a +pool of blood lay a revolver. + +"Don't go away," I heard a faint voice when the match had gone out. +"There's a candle on the table." + +I lighted the candle and stood still in the middle of the room not +knowing what to do next. I stood and looked at the man on the floor, +and it seemed to me that I had seen him before. + +"The pain is insufferable," he whispered, "and I haven't the strength +to shoot myself again. Incomprehensible lack of will." + +I flung off my overcoat and attended to the sick man. Lifting him +from the floor like a baby, I laid him on the American-leather +covered sofa and carefully undressed him. He was shivering and cold +when I took off his clothes; the wound which I saw was not in keeping +either with his shivering nor the expression on his face. It was a +trifling one. The bullet had passed between the fifth and sixth +ribs on the left side, only piercing the skin and the flesh. I found +the bullet itself in the folds of the coat-lining near the back +pocket. Stopping the bleeding as best I could and making a temporary +bandage of a pillow-case, a towel, and two handkerchiefs, I gave +the wounded man some water and covered him with a fur coat that was +hanging in the passage. We neither of us said a word while the +bandaging was being done. I did my work while he lay motionless +looking at me with his eyes screwed up as though he were ashamed +of his unsuccessful shot and the trouble he was giving me. + +"Now I must trouble you to lie still," I said, when I had finished +the bandaging, "while I run to the chemist and get something." + +"No need!" he muttered, clutching me by the sleeve and opening his +eyes wide. + +I read terror in his eyes. He was afraid of my going away. + +"No need! Stay another five minutes . . . ten. If it doesn't disgust +you, do stay, I entreat you." + +As he begged me he was trembling and his teeth were chattering. I +obeyed, and sat down on the edge of the sofa. Ten minutes passed +in silence. I sat silent, looking about the room into which fate +had brought me so unexpectedly. What poverty! This man who was the +possessor of a handsome, effeminate face and a luxuriant well-tended +beard, had surroundings which a humble working man would not have +envied. A sofa with its American-leather torn and peeling, a humble +greasy-looking chair, a table covered with a little of paper, and +a wretched oleograph on the wall, that was all I saw. Damp, gloomy, +and grey. + +"What a wind!" said the sick man, without opening his eyes, "How +it whistles!" + +"Yes," I said. "I say, I fancy I know you. Didn't you take part in +some private theatricals in General Luhatchev's villa last year?" + +"What of it?" he asked, quickly opening his eyes. + +A cloud seemed to pass over his face. + +"I certainly saw you there. Isn't your name Vassilyev?" + +"If it is, what of it? It makes it no better that you should know +me." + +"No, but I just asked you." + +Vassilyev closed his eyes and, as though offended, turned his face +to the back of the sofa. + +"I don't understand your curiosity," he muttered. "You'll be asking +me next what it was drove me to commit suicide!" + +Before a minute had passed, he turned round towards me again, opened +his eyes and said in a tearful voice: + +"Excuse me for taking such a tone, but you'll admit I'm right! To +ask a convict how he got into prison, or a suicide why he shot +himself is not generous . . . and indelicate. To think of gratifying +idle curiosity at the expense of another man's nerves!" + +"There is no need to excite yourself. . . . It never occurred to +me to question you about your motives." + +"You would have asked. . . . It's what people always do. Though it +would be no use to ask. If I told you, you would not believe or +understand. . . . I must own I don't understand it myself. . . . +There are phrases used in the police reports and newspapers such +as: 'unrequited love,' and 'hopeless poverty,' but the reasons are +not known. . . . They are not known to me, nor to you, nor to your +newspaper offices, where they have the impudence to write 'The diary +of a suicide.' God alone understands the state of a man's soul when +he takes his own life; but men know nothing about it." + +"That is all very nice," I said, "but you oughtn't to talk. . . ." + +But my suicide could not be stopped, he leaned his head on his fist, +and went on in the tone of some great professor: + +"Man will never understand the psychological subtleties of suicide! +How can one speak of reasons? To-day the reason makes one snatch +up a revolver, while to-morrow the same reason seems not worth a +rotten egg. It all depends most likely on the particular condition +of the individual at the given moment. . . . Take me for instance. +Half an hour ago, I had a passionate desire for death, now when the +candle is lighted, and you are sitting by me, I don't even think +of the hour of death. Explain that change if you can! Am I better +off, or has my wife risen from the dead? Is it the influence of the +light on me, or the presence of an outsider?" + +"The light certainly has an influence . . ." I muttered for the +sake of saying something. "The influence of light on the organism +. . . ." + +"The influence of light. . . . We admit it! But you know men do +shoot themselves by candle-light! And it would be ignominious indeed +for the heroes of your novels if such a trifling thing as a candle +were to change the course of the drama so abruptly. All this nonsense +can be explained perhaps, but not by us. It's useless to ask questions +or give explanations of what one does not understand. . . ." + +"Forgive me," I said, "but . . . judging by the expression of your +face, it seems to me that at this moment you . . . are posing." + +"Yes," Vassilyev said, startled. "It's very possible! I am naturally +vain and fatuous. Well, explain it, if you believe in your power +of reading faces! Half an hour ago I shot myself, and just now I +am posing. . . . Explain that if you can." + +These last words Vassilyev pronounced in a faint, failing voice. +He was exhausted, and sank into silence. A pause followed. I began +scrutinising his face. It was as pale as a dead man's. It seemed +as though life were almost extinct in him, and only the signs of +the suffering that the "vain and fatuous" man was feeling betrayed +that it was still alive. It was painful to look at that face, but +what must it have been for Vassilyev himself who yet had the strength +to argue and, if I were not mistaken, to pose? + +"You here--are you here?" he asked suddenly, raising himself on +his elbow. "My God, just listen!" + +I began listening. The rain was pattering angrily on the dark window, +never ceasing for a minute. The wind howled plaintively and +lugubriously. + +"'And I shall be whiter than snow, and my ears will hear gladness +and rejoicing.'" Madame Mimotih, who had returned, was reading in +the drawing-room in a languid, weary voice, neither raising nor +dropping the monotonous dreary key. + +"It is cheerful, isn't it?" whispered Vassilyev, turning his +frightened eyes towards me. "My God, the things a man has to see +and hear! If only one could set this chaos to music! As Hamlet says, +'it would-- + +"Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed, +The very faculties of eyes and ears." + +How well I should have understood that music then! How I should +have felt it! What time is it?" + +"Five minutes to three." + +"Morning is still far off. And in the morning there's the funeral. +A lovely prospect! One follows the coffin through the mud and rain. +One walks along, seeing nothing but the cloudy sky and the wretched +scenery. The muddy mutes, taverns, woodstacks. . . . One's trousers +drenched to the knees. The never-ending streets. The time dragging +out like eternity, the coarse people. And on the heart a stone, a +stone!" + +After a brief pause he suddenly asked: "Is it long since you saw +General Luhatchev?" + +"I haven't seen him since last summer." + +"He likes to be cock of the walk, but he is a nice little old chap. +And are you still writing?" + +"Yes, a little." + +"Ah. . . . Do you remember how I pranced about like a needle, like +an enthusiastic ass at those private theatricals when I was courting +Zina? It was stupid, but it was good, it was fun. . . . The very +memory of it brings back a whiff of spring. . . . And now! What a +cruel change of scene! There is a subject for you! Only don't you +go in for writing 'the diary of a suicide.' That's vulgar and +conventional. You make something humorous of it." + +"Again you are . . . posing," I said. "There's nothing humorous in +your position." + +"Nothing laughable? You say nothing laughable?" Vassilyev sat up, +and tears glistened in his eyes. An expression of bitter distress +came into his pale face. His chin quivered. + +"You laugh at the deceit of cheating clerks and faithless wives," +he said, "but no clerk, no faithless wife has cheated as my fate +has cheated me! I have been deceived as no bank depositor, no duped +husband has ever been deceived! Only realise what an absurd fool I +have been made! Last year before your eyes I did not know what to +do with myself for happiness. And now before your eyes. . . ." + +Vassilyev's head sank on the pillow and he laughed. + +"Nothing more absurd and stupid than such a change could possibly +be imagined. Chapter one: spring, love, honeymoon . . . honey, in +fact; chapter two: looking for a job, the pawnshop, pallor, the +chemist's shop, and . . . to-morrow's splashing through the mud to +the graveyard." + +He laughed again. I felt acutely uncomfortable and made up my mind +to go. + +"I tell you what," I said, "you lie down, and I will go to the +chemist's." + +He made no answer. I put on my great-coat and went out of his room. +As I crossed the passage I glanced at the coffin and Madame Mimotih +reading over it. I strained my eyes in vain, I could not recognise +in the swarthy, yellow face Zina, the lively, pretty _ingénue_ of +Luhatchev's company. + +"_Sic transit_," I thought. + +With that I went out, not forgetting to take the revolver, and made +my way to the chemist's. But I ought not to have gone away. When I +came back from the chemist's, Vassilyev lay on the sofa fainting. +The bandages had been roughly torn off, and blood was flowing from +the reopened wound. It was daylight before I succeeded in restoring +him to consciousness. He was raving in delirium, shivering, and +looking with unseeing eyes about the room till morning had come, +and we heard the booming voice of the priest as he read the service +over the dead. + +When Vassilyev's rooms were crowded with old women and mutes, when +the coffin had been moved and carried out of the yard, I advised +him to remain at home. But he would not obey me, in spite of the +pain and the grey, rainy morning. He walked bareheaded and in silence +behind the coffin all the way to the cemetery, hardly able to move +one leg after the other, and from time to time clutching convulsively +at his wounded side. His face expressed complete apathy. Only once +when I roused him from his lethargy by some insignificant question +he shifted his eyes over the pavement and the grey fence, and for +a moment there was a gleam of gloomy anger in them. + +"'Weelright,'" he read on a signboard. "Ignorant, illiterate +people, devil take them!" + +I led him home from the cemetery. + + ---- + +Only one year has passed since that night, and Vassilyev has hardly +had time to wear out the boots in which he tramped through the mud +behind his wife's coffin. + +At the present time as I finish this story, he is sitting in my +drawing-room and, playing on the piano, is showing the ladies how +provincial misses sing sentimental songs. The ladies are laughing, +and he is laughing too. He is enjoying himself. + +I call him into my study. Evidently not pleased at my taking him +from agreeable company, he comes to me and stands before me in the +attitude of a man who has no time to spare. I give him this story, +and ask him to read it. Always condescending about my authorship, +he stifles a sigh, the sigh of a lazy reader, sits down in an +armchair and begins upon it. + +"Hang it all, what horrors," he mutters with a smile. + +But the further he gets into the reading, the graver his face +becomes. At last, under the stress of painful memories, he turns +terribly pale, he gets up and goes on reading as he stands. When +he has finished he begins pacing from corner to corner. + +"How does it end?" I ask him. + +"How does it end? H'm. . . ." + +He looks at the room, at me, at himself. . . . He sees his new +fashionable suit, hears the ladies laughing and . . . sinking on a +chair, begins laughing as he laughed on that night. + +"Wasn't I right when I told you it was all absurd? My God! I have +had burdens to bear that would have broken an elephant's back; the +devil knows what I have suffered--no one could have suffered more, +I think, and where are the traces? It's astonishing. One would have +thought the imprint made on a man by his agonies would have been +everlasting, never to be effaced or eradicated. And yet that imprint +wears out as easily as a pair of cheap boots. There is nothing left, +not a scrap. It's as though I hadn't been suffering then, but had +been dancing a mazurka. Everything in the world is transitory, and +that transitoriness is absurd! A wide field for humorists! Tack on +a humorous end, my friend!" + +"Pyotr Nikolaevitch, are you coming soon?" The impatient ladies +call my hero. + +"This minute," answers the "vain and fatuous" man, setting his tie +straight. "It's absurd and pitiful, my friend, pitiful and absurd, +but what's to be done? _Homo sum_. . . . And I praise Mother Nature +all the same for her transmutation of substances. If we retained +an agonising memory of toothache and of all the terrors which every +one of us has had to experience, if all that were everlasting, we +poor mortals would have a bad time of it in this life." + +I look at his smiling face and I remember the despair and the horror +with which his eyes were filled a year ago when he looked at the +dark window. I see him, entering into his habitual rôle of intellectual +chatterer, prepare to show off his idle theories, such as the +transmutation of substances before me, and at the same time I recall +him sitting on the floor in a pool of blood with his sick imploring +eyes. + +"How will it end?" I ask myself aloud. + +Vassilyev, whistling and straightening his tie, walks off into the +drawing-room, and I look after him, and feel vexed. For some reason +I regret his past sufferings, I regret all that I felt myself on +that man's account on that terrible night. It is as though I had +lost something. . . . + + +MARI D'ELLE + +IT was a free night. Natalya Andreyevna Bronin (her married name +was Nikitin), the opera singer, is lying in her bedroom, her whole +being abandoned to repose. She lies, deliciously drowsy, thinking +of her little daughter who lives somewhere far away with her +grandmother or aunt. . . . The child is more precious to her than +the public, bouquets, notices in the papers, adorers . . . and she +would be glad to think about her till morning. She is happy, at +peace, and all she longs for is not to be prevented from lying +undisturbed, dozing and dreaming of her little girl. + +All at once the singer starts, and opens her eyes wide: there is a +harsh abrupt ring in the entry. Before ten seconds have passed the +bell tinkles a second time and a third time. The door is opened +noisily and some one walks into the entry stamping his feet like a +horse, snorting and puffing with the cold. + +"Damn it all, nowhere to hang one's coat!" the singer hears a husky +bass voice. "Celebrated singer, look at that! Makes five thousand +a year, and can't get a decent hat-stand!" + +"My husband!" thinks the singer, frowning. "And I believe he has +brought one of his friends to stay the night too. . . . Hateful!" + +No more peace. When the loud noise of some one blowing his nose and +putting off his goloshes dies away, the singer hears cautious +footsteps in her bedroom. . . . It is her husband, _mari d'elle_, +Denis Petrovitch Nikitin. He brings a whiff of cold air and a smell +of brandy. For a long while he walks about the bedroom, breathing +heavily, and, stumbling against the chairs in the dark, seems to +be looking for something. . . . + +"What do you want?" his wife moans, when she is sick of his fussing +about. "You have woken me." + +"I am looking for the matches, my love. You . . . you are not asleep +then? I have brought you a message. . . . Greetings from that . . . +what's-his-name? . . . red-headed fellow who is always sending +you bouquets. . . . Zagvozdkin. . . . I have just been to see him." + +"What did you go to him for?" + +"Oh, nothing particular. . . . We sat and talked and had a drink. +Say what you like, Nathalie, I dislike that individual--I dislike +him awfully! He is a rare blockhead. He is a wealthy man, a capitalist; +he has six hundred thousand, and you would never guess it. Money +is no more use to him than a radish to a dog. He does not eat it +himself nor give it to others. Money ought to circulate, but he +keeps tight hold of it, is afraid to part with it. . . . What's the +good of capital lying idle? Capital lying idle is no better than +grass." + +_Mari d'elle_ gropes his way to the edge of the bed and, puffing, +sits down at his wife's feet. + +"Capital lying idle is pernicious," he goes on. "Why has business +gone downhill in Russia? Because there is so much capital lying +idle among us; they are afraid to invest it. It's very different +in England. . . . There are no such queer fish as Zagvozdkin in +England, my girl. . . . There every farthing is in circulation +. . . . Yes. . . . They don't keep it locked up in chests there +. . . ." + +"Well, that's all right. I am sleepy." + +"Directly. . . . Whatever was it I was talking about? Yes. . . . +In these hard times hanging is too good for Zagvozdkin. . . . He +is a fool and a scoundrel. . . . No better than a fool. If I asked +him for a loan without security--why, a child could see that he +runs no risk whatever. He doesn't understand, the ass! For ten +thousand he would have got a hundred. In a year he would have another +hundred thousand. I asked, I talked . . . but he wouldn't give it +me, the blockhead." + +"I hope you did not ask him for a loan in my name." + +"H'm. . . . A queer question. . . ." _Mari d'elle_ is offended. +"Anyway he would sooner give me ten thousand than you. You are a +woman, and I am a man anyway, a business-like person. And what a +scheme I propose to him! Not a bubble, not some chimera, but a sound +thing, substantial! If one could hit on a man who would understand, +one might get twenty thousand for the idea alone! Even you would +understand if I were to tell you about it. Only you . . . don't +chatter about it . . . not a word . . . but I fancy I have talked +to you about it already. Have I talked to you about sausage-skins?" + +"M'm . . . by and by." + +"I believe I have. . . . Do you see the point of it? Now the provision +shops and the sausage-makers get their sausage-skins locally, and +pay a high price for them. Well, but if one were to bring sausage-skins +from the Caucasus where they are worth nothing, and where they are +thrown away, then . . . where do you suppose the sausage-makers +would buy their skins, here in the slaughterhouses or from me? From +me, of course! Why, I shall sell them ten times as cheap! Now let +us look at it like this: every year in Petersburg and Moscow and +in other centres these same skins would be bought to the . . . to +the sum of five hundred thousand, let us suppose. That's the minimum. +Well, and if. . . ." + +"You can tell me to-morrow . . . later on. . . ." + +"Yes, that's true. You are sleepy, _pardon_, I am just going . . . +say what you like, but with capital you can do good business +everywhere, wherever you go. . . . With capital even out of cigarette +ends one may make a million. . . . Take your theatrical business +now. Why, for example, did Lentovsky come to grief? It's very simple. +He did not go the right way to work from the very first. He had no +capital and he went headlong to the dogs. . . . He ought first to +have secured his capital, and then to have gone slowly and cautiously +. . . . Nowadays, one can easily make money by a theatre, whether it +is a private one or a people's one. . . . If one produces the right +plays, charges a low price for admission, and hits the public fancy, +one may put a hundred thousand in one's pocket the first year. . . . +You don't understand, but I am talking sense. . . . You see you +are fond of hoarding capital; you are no better than that fool +Zagvozdkin, you heap it up and don't know what for. . . . You won't +listen, you don't want to. . . . If you were to put it into +circulation, you wouldn't have to be rushing all over the place +. . . . You see for a private theatre, five thousand would be enough +for a beginning. . . . Not like Lentovsky, of course, but on a +modest scale in a small way. I have got a manager already, I have +looked at a suitable building. . . . It's only the money I haven't +got. . . . If only you understood things you would have parted with +your Five per cents . . . your Preference shares. . . ." + +"No, _merci_. . . . You have fleeced me enough already. . . . Let +me alone, I have been punished already. . . ." + +"If you are going to argue like a woman, then of course . . ." sighs +Nikitin, getting up. "Of course. . . ." + +"Let me alone. . . . Come, go away and don't keep me awake. . . . +I am sick of listening to your nonsense." + +"H'm. . . . To be sure . . . of course! Fleeced. . . plundered. . . . +What we give we remember, but we don't remember what we take." + +"I have never taken anything from you." + +"Is that so? But when we weren't a celebrated singer, at whose +expense did we live then? And who, allow me to ask, lifted you out +of beggary and secured your happiness? Don't you remember that?" + +"Come, go to bed. Go along and sleep it off." + +"Do you mean to say you think I am drunk? . . . if I am so low in +the eyes of such a grand lady. . . I can go away altogether." + +"Do. A good thing too." + +"I will, too. I have humbled myself enough. And I will go." + +"Oh, my God! Oh, do go, then! I shall be delighted!" + +"Very well, we shall see." + +Nikitin mutters something to himself, and, stumbling over the chairs, +goes out of the bedroom. Then sounds reach her from the entry of +whispering, the shuffling of goloshes and a door being shut. _Mari +d'elle_ has taken offence in earnest and gone out. + +"Thank God, he has gone!" thinks the singer. "Now I can sleep." + +And as she falls asleep she thinks of her _mari d'elle_, what sort +of a man he is, and how this affliction has come upon her. At one +time he used to live at Tchernigov, and had a situation there as a +book-keeper. As an ordinary obscure individual and not the _mari +d'elle_, he had been quite endurable: he used to go to his work and +take his salary, and all his whims and projects went no further +than a new guitar, fashionable trousers, and an amber cigarette-holder. +Since he had become "the husband of a celebrity" he was completely +transformed. The singer remembered that when first she told him she +was going on the stage he had made a fuss, been indignant, complained +to her parents, turned her out of the house. She had been obliged +to go on the stage without his permission. Afterwards, when he +learned from the papers and from various people that she was earning +big sums, he had 'forgiven her,' abandoned book-keeping, and become +her hanger-on. The singer was overcome with amazement when she +looked at her hanger-on: when and where had he managed to pick up +new tastes, polish, and airs and graces? Where had he learned the +taste of oysters and of different Burgundies? Who had taught him +to dress and do his hair in the fashion and call her 'Nathalie' +instead of Natasha?" + +"It's strange," thinks the singer. "In old days he used to get his +salary and put it away, but now a hundred roubles a day is not +enough for him. In old days he was afraid to talk before schoolboys +for fear of saying something silly, and now he is overfamiliar even +with princes . . . wretched, contemptible little creature!" + +But then the singer starts again; again there is the clang of the +bell in the entry. The housemaid, scolding and angrily flopping +with her slippers, goes to open the door. Again some one comes in +and stamps like a horse. + +"He has come back!" thinks the singer. "When shall I be left in +peace? It's revolting!" She is overcome by fury. + +"Wait a bit. . . . I'll teach you to get up these farces! You shall +go away. I'll make you go away!" + +The singer leaps up and runs barefoot into the little drawing-room +where her _mari_ usually sleeps. She comes at the moment when he +is undressing, and carefully folding his clothes on a chair. + +"You went away!" she says, looking at him with bright eyes full of +hatred. "What did you come back for?" + +Nikitin remains silent, and merely sniffs. + +"You went away! Kindly take yourself off this very minute! This +very minute! Do you hear?" + +_Mari d'elle_ coughs and, without looking at his wife, takes off +his braces. + +"If you don't go away, you insolent creature, I shall go," the +singer goes on, stamping her bare foot, and looking at him with +flashing eyes. "I shall go! Do you hear, insolent . . . worthless +wretch, flunkey, out you go!" + +"You might have some shame before outsiders," mutters her husband +. . . . + +The singer looks round and only then sees an unfamiliar countenance +that looks like an actor's. . . . The countenance, seeing the +singer's uncovered shoulders and bare feet, shows signs of +embarrassment, and looks ready to sink through the floor. + +"Let me introduce . . ." mutters Nikitin, "Bezbozhnikov, a provincial +manager." + +The singer utters a shriek, and runs off into her bedroom. + +"There, you see . . ." says _mari d'elle_, as he stretches himself +on the sofa, "it was all honey just now . . . my love, my dear, my +darling, kisses and embraces . . . but as soon as money is touched +upon, then. . . . As you see . . . money is the great thing. . . . +Good night!" + +A minute later there is a snore. + + +A LIVING CHATTEL + +GROHOLSKY embraced Liza, kept kissing one after another all her +little fingers with their bitten pink nails, and laid her on the +couch covered with cheap velvet. Liza crossed one foot over the +other, clasped her hands behind her head, and lay down. + +Groholsky sat down in a chair beside her and bent over. He was +entirely absorbed in contemplation of her. + +How pretty she seemed to him, lighted up by the rays of the setting +sun! + +There was a complete view from the window of the setting sun, golden, +lightly flecked with purple. + +The whole drawing-room, including Liza, was bathed by it with +brilliant light that did not hurt the eyes, and for a little while +covered with gold. + +Groholsky was lost in admiration. Liza was so incredibly beautiful. +It is true her little kittenish face with its brown eyes, and turn +up nose was fresh, and even piquant, his scanty hair was black as +soot and curly, her little figure was graceful, well proportioned +and mobile as the body of an electric eel, but on the whole. . . . +However my taste has nothing to do with it. Groholsky who was spoilt +by women, and who had been in love and out of love hundreds of times +in his life, saw her as a beauty. He loved her, and blind love finds +ideal beauty everywhere. + +"I say," he said, looking straight into her eyes, "I have come to +talk to you, my precious. Love cannot bear anything vague or +indefinite. . . . Indefinite relations, you know, I told you +yesterday, Liza . . . we will try to-day to settle the question we +raised yesterday. Come, let us decide together. . . ." + +"What are we to do?" + +Liza gave a yawn and scowling, drew her right arm from under her +head. + +"What are we to do?" she repeated hardly audibly after Groholsky. + +"Well, yes, what are we to do? Come, decide, wise little head . . . +I love you, and a man in love is not fond of sharing. He is more +than an egoist. It is too much for me to go shares with your husband. +I mentally tear him to pieces, when I remember that he loves you +too. In the second place you love me. . . . Perfect freedom is an +essential condition for love. . . . And are you free? Are you not +tortured by the thought that that man towers for ever over your +soul? A man whom you do not love, whom very likely and quite +naturally, you hate. . . . That's the second thing. . . . And +thirdly. . . . What is the third thing? Oh yes. . . . We are deceiving +him and that . . . is dishonourable. Truth before everything, Liza. +Let us have done with lying!" + +"Well, then, what are we to do?" + +"You can guess. . . . I think it necessary, obligatory, to inform +him of our relations and to leave him, to begin to live in freedom. +Both must be done as quickly as possible. . . . This very evening, +for instance. . . . It's time to make an end of it. Surely you must +be sick of loving like a thief?" + +"Tell! tell Vanya?" + +"Why, yes!" + +"That's impossible! I told you yesterday, Michel, that it is +impossible." + +"Why?" + +"He will be upset. He'll make a row, do all sorts of unpleasant +things. . . . Don't you know what he is like? God forbid! There's +no need to tell him. What an idea!" + +Groholsky passed his hand over his brow, and heaved a sigh. + +"Yes," he said, "he will be more than upset. I am robbing him of +his happiness. Does he love you?" + +"He does love me. Very much." + +"There's another complication! One does not know where to begin. +To conceal it from him is base, telling him would kill him. . . . +Goodness knows what's one to do. Well, how is it to be?" + +Groholsky pondered. His pale face wore a frown. + +"Let us go on always as we are now," said Liza. "Let him find out +for himself, if he wants to." + +"But you know that . . . is sinful, and besides the fact is you are +mine, and no one has the right to think that you do not belong to +me but to someone else! You are mine! I will not give way to anyone! +. . . I am sorry for him--God knows how sorry I am for him, Liza! +It hurts me to see him! But . . . it can't be helped after all. You +don't love him, do you? What's the good of your going on being +miserable with him? We must have it out! We will have it out with +him, and you will come to me. You are my wife, and not his. Let him +do what he likes. He'll get over his troubles somehow. . . . He is +not the first, and he won't be the last. . . . Will you run away? +Eh? Make haste and tell me! Will you run away?" + +Liza got up and looked inquiringly at Groholsky. + +"Run away?" + +"Yes. . . . To my estate. . . . Then to the Crimea. . . . We will +tell him by letter. . . . We can go at night. There is a train at +half past one. Well? Is that all right?" + +Liza scratched the bridge of her nose, and hesitated. + +"Very well," she said, and burst into tears. + +Patches of red came out of her cheeks, her eyes swelled, and tears +flowed down her kittenish face. . . . + +"What is it?" cried Groholsky in a flutter. "Liza! what's the matter? +Come! what are you crying for? What a girl! Come, what is it? +Darling! Little woman!" + +Liza held out her hands to Groholsky, and hung on his neck. There +was a sound of sobbing. + +"I am sorry for him . . ." muttered Liza. "Oh, I am so sorry for +him!" + +"Sorry for whom?" + +"Va--Vanya. . . ." + +"And do you suppose I'm not? But what's to be done? We are causing +him suffering. . . . He will be unhappy, will curse us . . . but +is it our fault that we love one another?" + +As he uttered the last word, Groholsky darted away from Liza as +though he had been stung and sat down in an easy chair. Liza sprang +away from his neck and rapidly--in one instant--dropped on the +lounge. + +They both turned fearfully red, dropped their eyes, and coughed. + +A tall, broad-shouldered man of thirty, in the uniform of a government +clerk, had walked into the drawing-room. He had walked in unnoticed. +Only the bang of a chair which he knocked in the doorway had warned +the lovers of his presence, and made them look round. It was the +husband. + +They had looked round too late. + +He had seen Groholsky's arm round Liza's waist, and had seen Liza +hanging on Groholsky's white and aristocratic neck. + +"He saw us!" Liza and Groholsky thought at the same moment, while +they did not know what to do with their heavy hands and embarrassed +eyes. . . . + +The petrified husband, rosy-faced, turned white. + +An agonising, strange, soul-revolting silence lasted for three +minutes. Oh, those three minutes! Groholsky remembers them to this +day. + +The first to move and break the silence was the husband. He stepped +up to Groholsky and, screwing his face into a senseless grimace +like a smile, gave him his hand. Groholsky shook the soft perspiring +hand and shuddered all over as though he had crushed a cold frog +in his fist. + +"Good evening," he muttered. + +"How are you?" the husband brought out in a faint husky, almost +inaudible voice, and he sat down opposite Groholsky, straightening +his collar at the back of his neck. + +Again, an agonising silence followed . . . but that silence was no +longer so stupid. . . . The first step, most difficult and colourless, +was over. + +All that was left now was for one of the two to depart in search +of matches or on some such trifling errand. Both longed intensely +to get away. They sat still, not looking at one another, and pulled +at their beards while they ransacked their troubled brains for some +means of escape from their horribly awkward position. Both were +perspiring. Both were unbearably miserable and both were devoured +by hatred. They longed to begin the tussle but how were they to +begin and which was to begin first? If only she would have gone +out! + +"I saw you yesterday at the Assembly Hall," muttered Bugrov (that +was the husband's name). + +"Yes, I was there . . . the ball . . . did you dance?" + +"M'm . . . yes . . . with that . . . with the younger Lyukovtsky +. . . . She dances heavily. . . . She dances impossibly. She is a +great chatterbox." (Pause.) "She is never tired of talking." + +"Yes. . . . It was slow. I saw you too. . ." + +Groholsky accidentally glanced at Bugrov. . . . He caught the +shifting eyes of the deceived husband and could not bear it. He got +up quickly, quickly seized Bugrov's hand, shook it, picked up his +hat, and walked towards the door, conscious of his own back. He +felt as though thousands of eyes were looking at his back. It is a +feeling known to the actor who has been hissed and is making his +exit from the stage, and to the young dandy who has received a blow +on the back of the head and is being led away in charge of a +policeman. + +As soon as the sound of Groholsky's steps had died away and the +door in the hall creaked, Bugrov leapt up, and after making two or +three rounds of the drawing-room, strolled up to his wife. The +kittenish face puckered up and began blinking its eyes as though +expecting a slap. Her husband went up to her, and with a pale, +distorted face, with arms, head, and shoulders shaking, stepped on +her dress and knocked her knees with his. + +"If, you wretched creature," he began in a hollow, wailing voice, +"you let him come here once again, I'll. . . . Don't let him dare +to set his foot. . . . I'll kill you. Do you understand? A-a-ah +. . . worthless creature, you shudder! Fil-thy woman!" + +Bugrov seized her by the elbow, shook her, and flung her like an +indiarubber ball towards the window. . . . + +"Wretched, vulgar woman! you have no shame!" + +She flew towards the window, hardly touching the floor with her +feet, and caught at the curtains with her hands. + +"Hold your tongue," shouted her husband, going up to her with +flashing eyes and stamping his foot. + +She did hold her tongue, she looked at the ceiling, and whimpered +while her face wore the expression of a little girl in disgrace +expecting to be punished. + +"So that's what you are like! Eh? Carrying on with a fop! Good! And +your promise before the altar? What are you? A nice wife and mother. +Hold your tongue!" + +And he struck her on her pretty supple shoulder. "Hold your tongue, +you wretched creature. I'll give you worse than that! If that +scoundrel dares to show himself here ever again, if I see +you--listen!--with that blackguard ever again, don't ask for mercy! +I'll kill you, if I go to Siberia for it! And him too. I shouldn't +think twice about it! You can go, I don't want to see you!" + +Bugrov wiped his eyes and his brow with his sleeve and strode about +the drawing-room, Liza sobbing more and more loudly, twitching her +shoulders and her little turned up nose, became absorbed in examining +the lace on the curtain. + +"You are crazy," her husband shouted. "Your silly head is full of +nonsense! Nothing but whims! I won't allow it, Elizaveta, my girl! +You had better be careful with me! I don't like it! If you want to +behave like a pig, then . . . then out you go, there is no place +in my house for you! Out you pack if. . . . You are a wife, so you +must forget these dandies, put them out of your silly head! It's +all foolishness! Don't let it happen again! You try defending +yourself! Love your husband! You have been given to your husband, +so you must love him. Yes, indeed! Is one not enough? Go away till +. . . . Torturers!" + +Bugrov paused; then shouted: + +"Go away I tell you, go to the nursery! Why are you blubbering, it +is your own fault, and you blubber! What a woman! Last year you +were after Petka Totchkov, now you are after this devil. Lord forgive +us! . . . Tfoo, it's time you understood what you are! A wife! A +mother! Last year there were unpleasantnesses, and now there will +be unpleasantnesses. . . . Tfoo!" + +Bugrov heaved a loud sigh, and the air was filled with the smell +of sherry. He had come back from dining and was slightly drunk +. . . . + +"Don't you know your duty? No! . . . you must be taught, you've not +been taught so far! Your mamma was a gad-about, and you . . . you +can blubber. Yes! blubber away. . . ." + +Bugrov went up to his wife and drew the curtain out of her hands. + +"Don't stand by the window, people will see you blubbering. . . . +Don't let it happen again. You'll go from embracing to worse trouble. +You'll come to grief. Do you suppose I like to be made a fool of? +And you will make a fool of me if you carry on with them, the low +brutes. . . . Come, that's enough. . . . Don't you. . . . Another +time. . . . Of course I . . Liza . . . stay. . . ." + +Bugrov heaved a sigh and enveloped Liza in the fumes of sherry. + +"You are young and silly, you don't understand anything. . . . I +am never at home. . . . And they take advantage of it. You must be +sensible, prudent. They will deceive you. And then I won't endure +it. . . . Then I may do anything. . . . Of course! Then you can +just lie down, and die. I . . . I am capable of doing anything if +you deceive me, my good girl. I might beat you to death. . . . And +. . . I shall turn you out of the house, and then you can go to +your rascals." + +And Bugrov (_horribile dictu_) wiped the wet, tearful face of the +traitress Liza with his big soft hand. He treated his twenty-year-old +wife as though she were a child. + +"Come, that's enough. . . . I forgive you. Only God forbid it should +happen again! I forgive you for the fifth time, but I shall not +forgive you for the sixth, as God is holy. God does not forgive +such as you for such things." + +Bugrov bent down and put out his shining lips towards Liza's little +head. But the kiss did not follow. The doors of the hall, of the +dining-room, of the parlour, and of the drawing-room all slammed, +and Groholsky flew into the drawing-room like a whirlwind. He was +pale and trembling. He was flourishing his arms and crushing his +expensive hat in his hands. His coat fluttered upon him as though +it were on a peg. He was the incarnation of acute fever. When Bugrov +saw him he moved away from his wife and began looking out of the +other window. Groholsky flew up to him, and waving his arms and +breathing heavily and looking at no one, he began in a shaking +voice: + +"Ivan Petrovitch! Let us leave off keeping up this farce with one +another! We have deceived each other long enough! It's too much! I +cannot stand it. You must do as you like, but I cannot! It's hateful +and mean, it's revolting! Do you understand that it is revolting?" + +Groholsky spluttered and gasped for breath. + +"It's against my principles. And you are an honest man. I love her! +I love her more than anything on earth! You have noticed it and +. . . it's my duty to say this!" + +"What am I to say to him?" Ivan Petrovitch wondered. + +"We must make an end of it. This farce cannot drag on much longer! +It must be settled somehow." + +Groholsky drew a breath and went on: + +"I cannot live without her; she feels the same. You are an educated +man, you will understand that in such circumstances your family +life is impossible. This woman is not yours, so . . . in short, I +beg you to look at the matter from an indulgent humane point of +view. . . . Ivan Petrovitch, you must understand at last that I +love her--love her more than myself, more than anything in the +world, and to struggle against that love is beyond my power!" + +"And she?" Bugrov asked in a sullen, somewhat ironical tone. + +"Ask her; come now, ask her! For her to live with a man she does +not love, to live with you is . . . is a misery!" + +"And she?" Bugrov repeated, this time not in an ironical tone. + +"She . . . she loves me! We love each other, Ivan Petrovitch! Kill +us, despise us, pursue us, do as you will, but we can no longer +conceal it from you. We are standing face to face--you may judge +us with all the severity of a man whom we . . . whom fate has robbed +of happiness!" + +Bugrov turned as red as a boiled crab, and looked out of one eye +at Liza. He began blinking. His fingers, his lips, and his eyelids +twitched. Poor fellow! The eyes of his weeping wife told him that +Groholsky was right, that it was a serious matter. + +"Well!" he muttered. "If you. . . . In these days. . . . You are +always. . . ." + +"As God is above," Groholsky shrilled in his high tenor, "we +understand you. Do you suppose we have no sense, no feeling? I know +what agonies I am causing you, as God's above! But be indulgent, I +beseech you! We are not to blame. Love is not a crime. No will can +struggle against it. . . . Give her up to me, Ivan Petrovitch! Let +her go with me! Take from me what you will for your sufferings. +Take my life, but give me Liza. I am ready to do anything. . . . +Come, tell me how I can do something to make up in part at least! +To make up for that lost happiness, I can give you other happiness. +I can, Ivan Petrovitch; I am ready to do anything! It would be base +on my part to leave you without satisfaction. . . . I understand +you at this moment." + +Bugrov waved his hand as though to say, 'For God's sake, go away.' +His eyes began to be dimmed by a treacherous moisture--in a moment +they would see him crying like a child. + +"I understand you, Ivan Petrovitch. I will give you another happiness, +such as hitherto you have not known. What would you like? I have +money, my father is an influential man. . . . Will you? Come, how +much do you want?" + +Bugrov's heart suddenly began throbbing. . . . He clutched at the +window curtains with both hands. . . . + +"Will you have fifty thousand? Ivan Petrovitch, I entreat you. . . . +It's not a bribe, not a bargain. . . . I only want by a sacrifice +on my part to atone a little for your inevitable loss. Would you +like a hundred thousand? I am willing. A hundred thousand?" + +My God! Two immense hammers began beating on the perspiring temples +of the unhappy Ivan Petrovitch. Russian sledges with tinkling bells +began racing in his ears. . . . + +"Accept this sacrifice from me," Groholsky went on, "I entreat you! +You will take a load off my conscience. . . . I implore you!" + +My God! A smart carriage rolled along the road wet from a May shower, +passed the window through which Bugrov's wet eyes were looking. The +horses were fine, spirited, well-trained beasts. People in straw +hats, with contented faces, were sitting in the carriage with long +fishing-rods and bags. . . . A schoolboy in a white cap was holding +a gun. They were driving out into the country to catch fish, to +shoot, to walk about and have tea in the open air. They were driving +to that region of bliss in which Bugrov as a boy--the barefoot, +sunburnt, but infinitely happy son of a village deacon--had once +raced about the meadows, the woods, and the river banks. Oh, how +fiendishly seductive was that May! How happy those who can take off +their heavy uniforms, get into a carriage and fly off to the country +where the quails are calling and there is the scent of fresh hay. +Bugrov's heart ached with a sweet thrill that made him shiver. A +hundred thousand! With the carriage there floated before him all +the secret dreams over which he had gloated, through the long years +of his life as a government clerk as he sat in the office of his +department or in his wretched little study. . . . A river, deep, +with fish, a wide garden with narrow avenues, little fountains, +shade, flowers, arbours, a luxurious villa with terraces and turrets +with an Aeolian harp and little silver bells (he had heard of the +existence of an Aeolian harp from German romances); a cloudless +blue sky; pure limpid air fragrant with the scents that recall his +hungry, barefoot, crushed childhood. . . . To get up at five, to +go to bed at nine; to spend the day catching fish, talking with the +peasants. . . . What happiness! + +"Ivan Petrovitch, do not torture me! Will you take a hundred +thousand?" + +"H'm . . . a hundred and fifty thousand!" muttered Bugrov in a +hollow voice, the voice of a husky bull. He muttered it, and bowed +his head, ashamed of his words, and awaiting the answer. + +"Good," said Groholsky, "I agree. I thank you, Ivan Petrovitch +. . . . In a minute. . . . I will not keep you waiting. . . ." + +Groholsky jumped up, put on his hat, and staggering backwards, ran +out of the drawing-room. + +Bugrov clutched the window curtains more tightly than ever. . . . +He was ashamed . . . . There was a nasty, stupid feeling in his +soul, but, on the other hand, what fair shining hopes swarmed between +his throbbing temples! He was rich! + +Liza, who had grasped nothing of what was happening, darted through +the half-opened door trembling all over and afraid that he would +come to her window and fling her away from it. She went into the +nursery, laid herself down on the nurse's bed, and curled herself +up. She was shivering with fever. + +Bugrov was left alone. He felt stifled, and he opened the window. +What glorious air breathed fragrance on his face and neck! It would +be good to breathe such air lolling on the cushions of a carriage +. . . . Out there, far beyond the town, among the villages and the +summer villas, the air was sweeter still. . . . Bugrov actually +smiled as he dreamed of the air that would be about him when he +would go out on the verandah of his villa and admire the view. A +long while he dreamed. . . . The sun had set, and still he stood +and dreamed, trying his utmost to cast out of his mind the image +of Liza which obstinately pursued him in all his dreams. + +"I have brought it, Ivan Petrovitch!" Groholsky, re-entering, +whispered above his ear. "I have brought it--take it. . . . Here +in this roll there are forty thousand. . . . With this cheque will +you kindly get twenty the day after to-morrow from Valentinov? . . . + Here is a bill of exchange . . . a cheque. . . . The remaining +thirty thousand in a day or two. . . . My steward will bring it to +you." + +Groholsky, pink and excited, with all his limbs in motion, laid +before Bugrov a heap of rolls of notes and bundles of papers. The +heap was big, and of all sorts of hues and tints. Never in the +course of his life had Bugrov seen such a heap. He spread out his +fat fingers and, not looking at Groholsky, fell to going through +the bundles of notes and bonds. . . . + +Groholsky spread out all the money, and moved restlessly about the +room, looking for the Dulcinea who had been bought and sold. + +Filling his pockets and his pocket-book, Bugrov thrust the securities +into the table drawer, and, drinking off half a decanter full of +water, dashed out into the street. + +"Cab!" he shouted in a frantic voice. + +At half-past eleven that night he drove up to the entrance of the +Paris Hotel. He went noisily upstairs and knocked at the door of +Groholsky's apartments. He was admitted. Groholsky was packing his +things in a portmanteau, Liza was sitting at the table trying on +bracelets. They were both frightened when Bugrov went in to them. +They fancied that he had come for Liza and had brought back the +money which he had taken in haste without reflection. But Bugrov +had not come for Liza. Ashamed of his new get-up and feeling +frightfully awkward in it, he bowed and stood at the door in the +attitude of a flunkey. The get-up was superb. Bugrov was unrecognisable. +His huge person, which had never hitherto worn anything but a +uniform, was clothed in a fresh, brand-new suit of fine French cloth +and of the most fashionable cut. On his feet spats shone with +sparkling buckles. He stood ashamed of his new get-up, and with his +right hand covered the watch-chain for which he had, an hour before, +paid three hundred roubles. + +"I have come about something," he began. "A business agreement is +beyond price. I am not going to give up Mishutka. . . ." + +"What Mishutka?" asked Groholsky. + +"My son." + +Groholsky and Liza looked at each other. Liza's eyes bulged, her +cheeks flushed, and her lips twitched. . . . + +"Very well," she said. + +She thought of Mishutka's warm little cot. It would be cruel to +exchange that warm little cot for a chilly sofa in the hotel, and +she consented. + +"I shall see him," she said. + +Bugrov bowed, walked out, and flew down the stairs in his splendour, +cleaving the air with his expensive cane. . . . + +"Home," he said to the cabman. "I am starting at five o'clock +to-morrow morning. . . . You will come; if I am asleep, you will +wake me. We are driving out of town." + +II + +It was a lovely August evening. The sun, set in a golden background +lightly flecked with purple, stood above the western horizon on the +point of sinking behind the far-away tumuli. In the garden, shadows +and half-shadows had vanished, and the air had grown damp, but the +golden light was still playing on the tree-tops. . . . It was warm. +. . . Rain had just fallen, and made the fresh, transparent fragrant +air still fresher. + +I am not describing the August of Petersburg or Moscow, foggy, +tearful, and dark, with its cold, incredibly damp sunsets. God +forbid! I am not describing our cruel northern August. I ask the +reader to move with me to the Crimea, to one of its shores, not far +from Feodosia, the spot where stands the villa of one of our heroes. +It is a pretty, neat villa surrounded by flower-beds and clipped +bushes. A hundred paces behind it is an orchard in which its inmates +walk. . . . Groholsky pays a high rent for that villa, a thousand +roubles a year, I believe. . . . The villa is not worth that rent, +but it is pretty. . . . Tall, with delicate walls and very delicate +parapets, fragile, slender, painted a pale blue colour, hung with +curtains, _portières_, draperies, it suggests a charming, fragile +Chinese lady. . . . + +On the evening described above, Groholsky and Liza were sitting on +the verandah of this villa. Groholsky was reading _Novoye Vremya_ +and drinking milk out of a green mug. A syphon of Seltzer water was +standing on the table before him. Groholsky imagined that he was +suffering from catarrh of the lungs, and by the advice of Dr. +Dmitriev consumed an immense quantity of grapes, milk, and Seltzer +water. Liza was sitting in a soft easy chair some distance from the +table. With her elbows on the parapet, and her little face propped +on her little fists, she was gazing at the villa opposite. . . . +The sun was playing upon the windows of the villa opposite, the +glittering panes reflected the dazzling light. . . . Beyond the +little garden and the few trees that surrounded the villa there was +a glimpse of the sea with its waves, its dark blue colour, its +immensity, its white masts. . . . It was so delightful! Groholsky +was reading an article by Anonymous, and after every dozen lines +he raised his blue eyes to Liza's back. . . . The same passionate, +fervent love was shining in those eyes still. . . . He was infinitely +happy in spite of his imaginary catarrh of the lungs. . . . Liza +was conscious of his eyes upon her back, and was thinking of +Mishutka's brilliant future, and she felt so comfortable, so serene +. . . . + +She was not so much interested by the sea, and the glittering +reflection on the windows of the villa opposite as by the waggons +which were trailing up to that villa one after another. + +The waggons were full of furniture and all sorts of domestic articles. +Liza watched the trellis gates and big glass doors of the villa +being opened and the men bustling about the furniture and wrangling +incessantly. Big armchairs and a sofa covered with dark raspberry +coloured velvet, tables for the hall, the drawing-room and the +dining-room, a big double bed and a child's cot were carried in by +the glass doors; something big, wrapped up in sacking, was carried +in too. A grand piano, thought Liza, and her heart throbbed. + +It was long since she had heard the piano, and she was so fond of +it. They had not a single musical instrument in their villa. Groholsky +and she were musicians only in soul, no more. There were a great +many boxes and packages with the words: "with care" upon them carried +in after the piano. + +They were boxes of looking-glasses and crockery. A gorgeous and +luxurious carriage was dragged in, at the gate, and two white horses +were led in looking like swans. + +"My goodness, what riches!" thought Liza, remembering her old pony +which Groholsky, who did not care for riding, had bought her for a +hundred roubles. Compared with those swan-like steeds, her pony +seemed to her no better than a bug. Groholsky, who was afraid of +riding fast, had purposely bought Liza a poor horse. + +"What wealth!" Liza thought and murmured as she gazed at the noisy +carriers. + +The sun hid behind the tumuli, the air began to lose its dryness +and limpidity, and still the furniture was being driven up and +hauled into the house. At last it was so dark that Groholsky left +off reading the newspaper while Liza still gazed and gazed. + +"Shouldn't we light the lamp?" said Groholsky, afraid that a fly +might drop into his milk and be swallowed in the darkness. + +"Liza! shouldn't we light the lamp? Shall we sit in darkness, my +angel?" + +Liza did not answer. She was interested in a chaise which had driven +up to the villa opposite. . . . What a charming little mare was in +that chaise. Of medium size, not large, but graceful. . . . A +gentleman in a top hat was sitting in the chaise, a child about +three, apparently a boy, was sitting on his knees waving his little +hands. . . . He was waving his little hands and shouting with +delight. + +Liza suddenly uttered a shriek, rose from her seat and lurched +forward. + +"What is the matter?" asked Groholsky. + +"Nothing. . . I only . . . I fancied. . . ." + +The tall, broad-shouldered gentleman in the top hat jumped out of +the chaise, lifted the boy down, and with a skip and a hop ran gaily +in at the glass door. The door opened noisily and he vanished into +the darkness of the villa apartments. + +Two smart footmen ran up to the horse in the chaise, and most +respectfully led it to the gate. Soon the villa opposite was lighted +up, and the clatter of plates, knives, and forks was audible. The +gentleman in the top hat was having his supper, and judging by the +duration of the clatter of crockery, his supper lasted long. Liza +fancied she could smell chicken soup and roast duck. After supper +discordant sounds of the piano floated across from the villa. In +all probability the gentleman in the top hat was trying to amuse +the child in some way, and allowing it to strum on it. + +Groholsky went up to Liza and put his arm round her waist. + +"What wonderful weather!" he said. "What air! Do you feel it? I am +very happy, Liza, very happy indeed. My happiness is so great that +I am really afraid of its destruction. The greatest things are +usually destroyed, and do you know, Liza, in spite of all my +happiness, I am not absolutely . . . at peace. . . . One haunting +thought torments me . . . it torments me horribly. It gives me no +peace by day or by night. . . ." + +"What thought?" + +"An awful thought, my love. I am tortured by the thought of your +husband. I have been silent hitherto. I have feared to trouble your +inner peace, but I cannot go on being silent. Where is he? What has +happened to him? What has become of him with his money? It is awful! +Every night I see his face, exhausted, suffering, imploring. . . . +Why, only think, my angel--can the money he so generously accepted +make up to him for you? He loved you very much, didn't he?" + +"Very much!" + +"There you see! He has either taken to drink now, or . . . I am +anxious about him! Ah, how anxious I am! Should we write to him, +do you think? We ought to comfort him . . . a kind word, you know." + +Groholsky heaved a deep sigh, shook his head, and sank into an easy +chair exhausted by painful reflection. Leaning his head on his fists +he fell to musing. Judging from his face, his musings were painful. + +"I am going to bed," said Liza; "it's time." + +Liza went to her own room, undressed, and dived under the bedclothes. +She used to go to bed at ten o'clock and get up at ten. She was +fond of her comfort. + +She was soon in the arms of Morpheus. Throughout the whole night +she had the most fascinating dreams. . . . She dreamed whole romances, +novels, Arabian Nights. . . . The hero of all these dreams was the +gentleman in the top hat, who had caused her to utter a shriek that +evening. + +The gentleman in the top hat was carrying her off from Groholsky, +was singing, was beating Groholsky and her, was flogging the boy +under the window, was declaring his love, and driving her off in +the chaise. . . . Oh, dreams! In one night, lying with one's eyes +shut, one may sometimes live through more than ten years of happiness +. . . . That night Liza lived through a great variety of experiences, +and very happy ones, even in spite of the beating. + +Waking up between six and seven, she flung on her clothes, hurriedly +did her hair, and without even putting on her Tatar slippers with +pointed toes, ran impulsively on to the verandah. Shading her eyes +from the sun with one hand, and with the other holding up her +slipping clothes, she gazed at the villa opposite. Her face beamed +. . . . There could be no further doubt it was he. + +On the verandah in the villa opposite there was a table in front +of the glass door. A tea service was shining and glistening on the +table with a silver samovar at the head. Ivan Petrovitch was sitting +at the table. He had in his hand a glass in a silver holder, and +was drinking tea. He was drinking it with great relish. That fact +could be deduced from the smacking of his lips, the sound of which +reached Liza's ears. He was wearing a brown dressing-gown with black +flowers on it. Massive tassels fell down to the ground. It was the +first time in her life Liza had seen her husband in a dressing-gown, +and such an expensive-looking one. + +Mishutka was sitting on one of his knees, and hindering him from +drinking his tea. The child jumped up and down and tried to clutch +his papa's shining lip. After every three or four sips the father +bent down to his son and kissed him on the head. A grey cat with +its tail in the air was rubbing itself against one of the table +legs, and with a plaintive mew proclaiming its desire for food. +Liza hid behind the verandah curtain, and fastened her eyes upon +the members of her former family; her face was radiant with joy. + +"Misha!" she murmured, "Misha! Are you really here, Misha? The +darling! And how he loves Vanya! Heavens!" + +And Liza went off into a giggle when Mishutka stirred his father's +tea with a spoon. "And how Vanya loves Misha! My darlings!" + +Liza's heart throbbed, and her head went round with joy and happiness. +She sank into an armchair and went on observing them, sitting down. + +"How did they come here?" she wondered as she sent airy kisses to +Mishutka. "Who gave them the idea of coming here? Heavens! Can all +that wealth belong to them? Can those swan-like horses that were +led in at the gate belong to Ivan Petrovitch? Ah!" + +When he had finished his tea, Ivan Petrovitch went into the house. +Ten minutes later, he appeared on the steps and Liza was astounded +. . . . He, who in his youth only seven years ago had been called +Vanushka and Vanka and had been ready to punch a man in the face +and turn the house upside down over twenty kopecks, was dressed +devilishly well. He had on a broad-brimmed straw hat, exquisite +brilliant boots, a piqué waistcoat. . . . Thousands of suns, big +and little, glistened on his watch-chain. With much _chic_ he held +in his right hand his gloves and cane. + +And what swagger, what style there was in his heavy figure when, +with a graceful motion of his hand, he bade the footman bring the +horse round. + +He got into the chaise with dignity, and told the footmen standing +round the chaise to give him Mishutka and the fishing tackle they +had brought. Setting Mishutka beside him, and putting his left arm +round him, he held the reins and drove off. + +"Ge-ee up!" shouted Mishutka. + +Liza, unaware of what she was doing, waved her handkerchief after +them. If she had looked in the glass she would have been surprised +at her flushed, laughing, and, at the same time, tear-stained face. +She was vexed that she was not beside her gleeful boy, and that she +could not for some reason shower kisses on him at once. + +For some reason! . . . Away with all your petty delicacies! + +"Grisha! Grisha!" Liza ran into Groholsky's bedroom and set to work +to wake him. "Get up, they have come! The darling!" + +"Who has come?" asked Groholsky, waking up. + +"Our people . . . Vanya and Misha, they have come, they are in the +villa opposite. . . . I looked out, and there they were drinking +tea. . . . And Misha too. . . . What a little angel our Misha has +grown! If only you had seen him! Mother of God!" + +"Seen whom? Why, you are. . . . Who has come? Come where?" + +"Vanya and Misha. . . . I have been looking at the villa opposite, +while they were sitting drinking tea. Misha can drink his tea by +himself now. . . . Didn't you see them moving in yesterday, it was +they who arrived!" + +Groholsky rubbed his forehead and turned pale. + +"Arrived? Your husband?" he asked. + +"Why, yes." + +"What for?" + +"Most likely he is going to live here. They don't know we are here. +If they did, they would have looked at our villa, but they drank +their tea and took no notice." + +"Where is he now? But for God's sake do talk sense! Oh, where is +he?" + +"He has gone fishing with Misha in the chaise. Did you see the +horses yesterday? Those are their horses . . . Vanya's . . . Vanya +drives with them. Do you know what, Grisha? We will have Misha to +stay with us. . . . We will, won't we? He is such a pretty boy. +Such an exquisite boy!" + +Groholsky pondered, while Liza went on talking and talking. + +"This is an unexpected meeting," said Groholsky, after prolonged +and, as usual, harrassing reflection. "Well, who could have expected +that we should meet here? Well. . . There it is. . . . So be it. +It seems that it is fated. I can imagine the awkwardness of his +position when he meets us." + +"Shall we have Misha to stay with us?" + +"Yes, we will. . . . It will be awkward meeting him. . . . Why, +what can I say to him? What can I talk of? It will be awkward for +him and awkward for me. . . . We ought not to meet. We will carry +on communications, if necessary, through the servants. . . . My +head does ache so, Lizotchka. My arms and legs too, I ache all over. +Is my head feverish?" + +Liza put her hand on his forehead and found that his head was hot. + +"I had dreadful dreams all night . . . I shan't get up to-day. I +shall stay in bed . . . I must take some quinine. Send me my breakfast +here, little woman." + +Groholsky took quinine and lay in bed the whole day. He drank warm +water, moaned, had the sheets and pillowcase changed, whimpered, +and induced an agonising boredom in all surrounding him. + +He was insupportable when he imagined he had caught a chill. Liza +had continually to interrupt her inquisitive observations and run +from the verandah to his room. At dinner-time she had to put on +mustard plasters. How boring all this would have been, O reader, +if the villa opposite had not been at the service of my heroine! +Liza watched that villa all day long and was gasping with happiness. + +At ten o'clock Ivan Petrovitch and Mishutka came back from fishing +and had breakfast. At two o'clock they had dinner, and at four +o'clock they drove off somewhere in a carriage. The white horses +bore them away with the swiftness of lightning. At seven o'clock +visitors came to see them--all of them men. They were playing +cards on two tables in the verandah till midnight. One of the men +played superbly on the piano. The visitors played, ate, drank, and +laughed. Ivan Petrovitch guffawing loudly, told them an anecdote +of Armenian life at the top of his voice, so that all the villas +round could hear. It was very gay and Mishutka sat up with them +till midnight. + +"Misha is merry, he is not crying," thought Liza, "so he does not +remember his mamma. So he has forgotten me!" + +And there was a horrible bitter feeling in Liza's soul. She spent +the whole night crying. She was fretted by her little conscience, +and by vexation and misery, and the desire to talk to Mishutka and +kiss him. . . . In the morning she got up with a headache and +tear-stained eyes. Her tears Groholsky put down to his own account. + +"Do not weep, darling," he said to her, "I am all right to-day, my +chest is a little painful, but that is nothing." + +While they were having tea, lunch was being served at the villa +opposite. Ivan Petrovitch was looking at his plate, and seeing +nothing but a morsel of goose dripping with fat. + +"I am very glad," said Groholsky, looking askance at Bugrov, "very +glad that his life is so tolerable! I hope that decent surroundings +anyway may help to stifle his grief. Keep out of sight, Liza! They +will see you . . . I am not disposed to talk to him just now . . . +God be with him! Why trouble his peace?" + +But the dinner did not pass off so quietly. During dinner precisely +that "awkward position" which Groholsky so dreaded occurred. Just +when the partridges, Groholsky's favorite dish, had been put on the +table, Liza was suddenly overcome with confusion, and Groholsky +began wiping his face with his dinner napkin. On the verandah of +the villa opposite they saw Bugrov. He was standing with his arms +leaning on the parapet, and staring straight at them, with his eyes +starting out of his head. + +"Go in, Liza, go in," Groholsky whispered. "I said we must have +dinner indoors! What a girl you are, really. . . ." + +Bugrov stared and stared, and suddenly began shouting. Groholsky +looked at him and saw a face full of astonishment. . . . + +"Is that you?" bawled Ivan Petrovitch, "you! Are you here too?" + +Groholsky passed his fingers from one shoulder to another, as though +to say, "My chest is weak, and so I can't shout across such a +distance." Liza's heart began throbbing, and everything turned round +before her eyes. Bugrov ran from his verandah, ran across the road, +and a few seconds later was standing under the verandah on which +Groholsky and Liza were dining. Alas for the partridges! + +"How are you?" he began, flushing crimson, and stuffing his big +hands in his pockets. "Are you here? Are you here too?" + +"Yes, we are here too. . . ." + +"How did you get here?" + +"Why, how did you?" + +"I? It's a long story, a regular romance, my good friend! But don't +put yourselves out--eat your dinner! I've been living, you know, +ever since then . . . in the Oryol province. I rented an estate. A +splendid estate! But do eat your dinner! I stayed there from the +end of May, but now I have given it up. . . . It was cold there, +and--well, the doctor advised me to go to the Crimea. . . ." + +"Are you ill, then?" inquired Groholsky. + +"Oh, well. . . . There always seems, as it were . . . something +gurgling here. . . ." + +And at the word "here" Ivan Petrovitch passed his open hand from +his neck down to the middle of his stomach. + +"So you are here too. . . . Yes . . . that's very pleasant. Have +you been here long?" + +"Since July." + +"Oh, and you, Liza, how are you? Quite well?" + +"Quite well," answered Liza, and was embarrassed. + +"You miss Mishutka, I'll be bound. Eh? Well, he's here with me. . . . +I'll send him over to you directly with Nikifor. This is very +nice. Well, good-bye! I have to go off directly. . . . I made the +acquaintance of Prince Ter-Haimazov yesterday; delightful man, +though he is an Armenian. So he has a croquet party to-day; we are +going to play croquet. . . . Good-bye! The carriage is waiting +. . . ." + +Ivan Petrovitch whirled round, tossed his head, and, waving adieu +to them, ran home. + +"Unhappy man," said Groholsky, heaving a deep sigh as he watched +him go off. + +"In what way is he unhappy?" asked Liza. + +"To see you and not have the right to call you his!" + +"Fool!" Liza was so bold to think. "Idiot!" + +Before evening Liza was hugging and kissing Mishutka. At first the +boy howled, but when he was offered jam, he was all friendly smiles. + +For three days Groholsky and Liza did not see Bugrov. He had +disappeared somewhere, and was only at home at night. On the fourth +day he visited them again at dinner-time. He came in, shook hands +with both of them, and sat down to the table. His face was serious. + +"I have come to you on business," he said. "Read this." And he +handed Groholsky a letter. "Read it! Read it aloud!" + +Groholsky read as follows: + +"My beloved and consoling, never-forgotten son Ioann! I have received +the respectful and loving letter in which you invite your aged +father to the mild and salubrious Crimea, to breathe the fragrant +air, and behold strange lands. To that letter I reply that on taking +my holiday, I will come to you, but not for long. My colleague, +Father Gerasim, is a frail and delicate man, and cannot be left +alone for long. I am very sensible of your not forgetting your +parents, your father and your mother. . . . You rejoice your father +with your affection, and you remember your mother in your prayers, +and so it is fitting to do. Meet me at Feodosia. What sort of town +is Feodosia--what is it like? It will be very agreeable to see +it. Your godmother, who took you from the font, is called Feodosia. +You write that God has been graciously pleased that you should win +two hundred thousand roubles. That is gratifying to me. But I cannot +approve of your having left the service while still of a grade of +little importance; even a rich man ought to be in the service. I +bless you always, now and hereafter. Ilya and Seryozhka Andronov +send you their greetings. You might send them ten roubles +each--they are badly off! + + "Your loving Father, + + "Pyotr Bugrov, _Priest._" + +Groholsky read this letter aloud, and he and Liza both looked +inquiringly at Bugrov. + +"You see what it is," Ivan Petrovitch began hesitatingly. "I should +like to ask you, Liza, not to let him see you, to keep out of his +sight while he is here. I have written to him that you are ill and +gone to the Caucasus for a cure. If you meet him. . . You see +yourself. . . . It's awkward. . . H'm. . . ." + +"Very well," said Liza. + +"We can do that," thought Groholsky, "since he makes sacrifices, +why shouldn't we?" + +"Please do. . . . If he sees you there will be trouble. . . . My +father is a man of strict principles. He would curse me in seven +churches. Don't go out of doors, Liza, that is all. He won't be +here long. Don't be afraid." + +Father Pyotr did not long keep them waiting. One fine morning Ivan +Petrovitch ran in and hissed in a mysterious tone: + +"He has come! He is asleep now, so please be careful." + +And Liza was shut up within four walls. She did not venture to go +out into the yard or on to the verandah. She could only see the sky +from behind the window curtain. Unluckily for her, Ivan Petrovitch's +papa spent his whole time in the open air, and even slept on the +verandah. Usually Father Pyotr, a little parish priest, in a brown +cassock and a top hat with a curly brim, walked slowly round the +villas and gazed with curiosity at the "strange lands" through his +grandfatherly spectacles. Ivan Petrovitch with the Stanislav on a +little ribbon accompanied him. He did not wear a decoration as a +rule, but before his own people he liked to show off. In their +society he always wore the Stanislav. + +Liza was bored to death. Groholsky suffered too. He had to go for +his walks alone without a companion. He almost shed tears, but . . . +had to submit to his fate. And to make things worse, Bugrov would +run across every morning and in a hissing whisper would give some +quite unnecessary bulletin concerning the health of Father Pyotr. +He bored them with those bulletins. + +"He slept well," he informed them. "Yesterday he was put out because +I had no salted cucumbers. . . He has taken to Mishutka; he keeps +patting him on the head." + +At last, a fortnight later, little Father Pyotr walked for the last +time round the villas and, to Groholsky's immense relief, departed. +He had enjoyed himself, and went off very well satisfied. Liza and +Groholsky fell back into their old manner of life. Groholsky once +more blessed his fate. But his happiness did not last for long. A +new trouble worse than Father Pyotr followed. Ivan Petrovitch took +to coming to see them every day. Ivan Petrovitch, to be frank, +though a capital fellow, was a very tedious person. He came at +dinner-time, dined with them and stayed a very long time. That would +not have mattered. But they had to buy vodka, which Groholsky could +not endure, for his dinner. He would drink five glasses and talk +the whole dinner-time. That, too, would not have mattered. . . . +But he would sit on till two o'clock in the morning, and not let +them get to bed, and, worse still, he permitted himself to talk of +things about which he should have been silent. When towards two +o'clock in the morning he had drunk too much vodka and champagne, +he would take Mishutka in his arms, and weeping, say to him, before +Groholsky and Liza: + +"Mihail, my son, what am I? I . . . am a scoundrel. I have sold +your mother! Sold her for thirty pieces of silver, may the Lord +punish me! Mihail Ivanitch, little sucking pig, where is your mother? +Lost! Gone! Sold into slavery! Well, I am a scoundrel." + +These tears and these words turned Groholsky's soul inside out. He +would look timidly at Liza's pale face and wring his hands. + +"Go to bed, Ivan Petrovitch," he would say timidly. + +"I am going. . . . Come along, Mishutka. . . . The Lord be our +judge! I cannot think of sleep while I know that my wife is a slave +. . . . But it is not Groholsky's fault. . . . The goods were mine, +the money his. . . . Freedom for the free and Heaven for the saved." + +By day Ivan Petrovitch was no less insufferable to Groholsky. To +Groholsky's intense horror, he was always at Liza's side. He went +fishing with her, told her stories, walked with her, and even on +one occasion, taking advantage of Groholsky's having a cold, carried +her off in his carriage, goodness knows where, and did not bring +her back till night! + +"It's outrageous, inhuman," thought Groholsky, biting his lips. + +Groholsky liked to be continually kissing Liza. He could not exist +without those honeyed kisses, and it was awkward to kiss her before +Ivan Petrovitch. It was agony. The poor fellow felt forlorn, but +fate soon had compassion on him. Ivan Petrovitch suddenly went off +somewhere for a whole week. Visitors had come and carried him off +with them . . . And Mishutka was taken too. + +One fine morning Groholsky came home from a walk good-humoured and +beaming. + +"He has come," he said to Liza, rubbing his hands. "I am very glad +he has come. Ha-ha-ha!" + +"What are you laughing at?" + +"There are women with him." + +"What women?" + +"I don't know. . . . It's a good thing he has got women. . . . A +capital thing, in fact. . . . He is still young and fresh. Come +here! Look!" + +Groholsky led Liza on to the verandah, and pointed to the villa +opposite. They both held their sides, and roared with laughter. It +was funny. Ivan Petrovitch was standing on the verandah of the villa +opposite, smiling. Two dark-haired ladies and Mishutka were standing +below, under the verandah. The ladies were laughing, and loudly +talking French. + +"French women," observed Groholsky. "The one nearest us isn't at +all bad-looking. Lively damsels, but that's no matter. There are +good women to be found even among such. . . . But they really do +go too far." + +What was funny was that Ivan Petrovitch bent across the verandah, +and stretching with his long arms, put them round the shoulders of +one of the French girls, lifted her in the air, and set her giggling +on the verandah. After lifting up both ladies on to the verandah, +he lifted up Mishutka too. The ladies ran down and the proceedings +were repeated. + +"Powerful muscles, I must say," muttered Groholsky looking at this +scene. The operation was repeated some six times, the ladies were +so amiable as to show no embarrassment whatever when the boisterous +wind disposed of their inflated skirts as it willed while they were +being lifted. Groholsky dropped his eyes in a shamefaced way when +the ladies flung their legs over the parapet as they reached the +verandah. But Liza watched and laughed! What did she care? It was +not a case of men misbehaving themselves, which would have put her, +as a woman, to shame, but of ladies. + +In the evening, Ivan Petrovitch flew over, and with some embarrassment +announced that he was now a man with a household to look after . . . . + +"You mustn't imagine they are just anybody," he said. "It is true +they are French. They shout at the top of their voices, and drink +. . . but we all know! The French are brought up to be like that! +It can't be helped. . . . The prince," Ivan Petrovitch added, "let +me have them almost for nothing. . . . He said: 'take them, take +them. . . .' I must introduce you to the prince sometime. A man of +culture! He's for ever writing, writing. . . . And do you know what +their names are? One is Fanny, the other Isabella. . . . There's +Europe, ha-ha-ha! . . . The west! Good-bye!" + +Ivan Petrovitch left Liza and Groholsky in peace, and devoted himself +to his ladies. All day long sound of talk, laughter, and the clatter +of crockery came from his villa. . . . The lights were not put out +till far into the night. . . . Groholsky was in bliss. . . . At +last, after a prolonged interval of agony, he felt happy and at +peace again. Ivan Petrovitch with his two ladies had no such happiness +as he had with one. But alas, destiny has no heart. She plays with +the Groholskys, the Lizas, the Ivans, and the Mishutkas as with +pawns. . . . Groholsky lost his peace again. . . . + +One morning, about ten days afterwards, on waking up late, he went +out on to the verandah and saw a spectacle which shocked him, +revolted him, and moved him to intense indignation. Under the +verandah of the villa opposite stood the French women, and between +them Liza. She was talking and looking askance at her own villa as +though to see whether that tyrant, that despot were awake (so +Groholsky interpreted those looks). Ivan Petrovitch standing on the +verandah with his sleeves tucked up, lifted Isabella into the air, +then Fanny, and then Liza. When he was lifting Liza it seemed to +Groholsky that he pressed her to himself. . . . Liza too flung one +leg over the parapet. . . . Oh these women! All sphinxes, every one +of them! + +When Liza returned home from her husband's villa and went into the +bedroom on tip-toe, as though nothing had happened, Groholsky, pale, +with hectic flushes on his cheeks, was lying in the attitude of a +man at his last gasp and moaning. + +On seeing Liza, he sprang out of bed, and began pacing about the +bedroom. + +"So that's what you are like, is it?" he shrieked in a high tenor. +"So that's it! Very much obliged to you! It's revolting, madam! +Immoral, in fact! Let me tell you that!" + +Liza turned pale, and of course burst into tears. When women feel +that they are in the right, they scold and shed tears; when they +are conscious of being in fault, they shed tears only. + +"On a level with those depraved creatures! It's . . . it's . . . +it's . . . lower than any impropriety! Why, do you know what they +are? They are kept women! Cocottes! And you a respectable woman go +rushing off where they are. . . And he . . . He! What does he want? +What more does he want of me? I don't understand it! I have given +him half of my property--I have given him more! You know it +yourself! I have given him what I have not myself. . . . I have +given him almost all. . . . And he! I've put up with your calling +him Vanya, though he has no right whatever to such intimacy. I have +put up with your walks, kisses after dinner. . . . I have put up +with everything, but this I will not put up with. . . . Either he +or I! Let him go away, or I go away! I'm not equal to living like +this any longer, no! You can see that for yourself! . . . Either +he or I. . . . Enough! The cup is brimming over. . . . I have +suffered a great deal as it is. . . . I am going to talk to him at +once--this minute! What is he, after all? What has he to be proud +of? No, indeed. . . . He has no reason to think so much of himself +. . . ." + +Groholsky said a great many more valiant and stinging things, but +did not "go at once"; he felt timid and abashed. . . . He went to +Ivan Petrovitch three days later. + +When he went into his apartment, he gaped with astonishment. He was +amazed at the wealth and luxury with which Bugrov had surrounded +himself. Velvet hangings, fearfully expensive chairs. . . . One was +positively ashamed to step on the carpet. Groholsky had seen many +rich men in his day, but he had never seen such frenzied luxury. . . . +And the higgledy-piggledy muddle he saw when, with an inexplicable +tremor, he walked into the drawing-room--plates with bits of bread +on them were lying about on the grand piano, a glass was standing +on a chair, under the table there was a basket with a filthy rag +in it. . . . Nut shells were strewn about in the windows. Bugrov +himself was not quite in his usual trim when Groholsky walked in +. . . . With a red face and uncombed locks he was pacing about the +room in deshabille, talking to himself, apparently much agitated. +Mishutka was sitting on the sofa there in the drawing-room, and was +making the air vibrate with a piercing scream. + +"It's awful, Grigory Vassilyevitch!" Bugrov began on seeing Groholsky, +"such disorder . . . such disorder . . . Please sit down. You must +excuse my being in the costume of Adam and Eve. . . . It's of no +consequence. . . . Horrible disorderliness! I don't understand how +people can exist here, I don't understand it! The servants won't +do what they are told, the climate is horrible, everything is +expensive. . . . Stop your noise," Bugrov shouted, suddenly coming +to a halt before Mishutka; "stop it, I tell you! Little beast, won't +you stop it?" + +And Bugrov pulled Mishutka's ear. + +"That's revolting, Ivan Petrovitch," said Groholsky in a tearful +voice. "How can you treat a tiny child like that? You really are. . ." + +"Let him stop yelling then. . . . Be quiet--I'll whip you!" + +"Don't cry, Misha darling. . . . Papa won't touch you again. Don't +beat him, Ivan Petrovitch; why, he is hardly more than a baby. . . . +There, there. . . . Would you like a little horse? I'll send you +a little horse. . . . You really are hard-hearted. . . ." + +Groholsky paused, and then asked: + +"And how are your ladies getting on, Ivan Petrovitch?" + +"Not at all. I've turned them out without ceremony. I might have +gone on keeping them, but it's awkward. . . . The boy will grow up +. . . . A father's example. . . . If I were alone, then it would be +a different thing. . . . Besides, what's the use of my keeping them? +Poof . . . it's a regular farce! I talk to them in Russian, and +they answer me in French. They don't understand a thing--you can't +knock anything into their heads." + +"I've come to you about something, Ivan Petrovitch, to talk things +over. . . . H'm. . . . It's nothing very particular. But just . . . +two or three words. . . . In reality, I have a favour to ask of +you." + +"What's that?" + +"Would you think it possible, Ivan Petrovitch, to go away? We are +delighted that you are here; it's very agreeable for us, but it's +inconvenient, don't you know. . . . You will understand me. It's +awkward in a way. . . . Such indefinite relations, such continual +awkwardness in regard to one another. . . . We must part. . . . +It's essential in fact. Excuse my saying so, but . . . you must see +for yourself, of course, that in such circumstances to be living +side by side leads to . . . reflections . . . that is . . . not to +reflections, but there is a certain awkward feeling. . . ." + +"Yes. . . . That is so, I have thought of it myself. Very good, I +will go away." + +"We shall be very grateful to you. . . . Believe me, Ivan Petrovitch, +we shall preserve the most flattering memory of you. The sacrifice +which you. . ." + +"Very good. . . . Only what am I to do with all this? I say, you +buy this furniture of mine! What do you say? It's not expensive, +eight thousand . . . ten. . . . The furniture, the carriage, the +grand piano. . . ." + +"Very good. . . . I will give you ten thousand. . . ." + +"Well, that is capital! I will set off to-morrow. I shall go to +Moscow. It's impossible to live here. Everything is so dear! Awfully +dear! The money fairly flies. . . . You can't take a step without +spending a thousand! I can't go on like that. I have a child to +bring up. . . . Well, thank God that you will buy my furniture. . . . +That will be a little more in hand, or I should have been +regularly bankrupt. . . ." + +Groholsky got up, took leave of Bugrov, and went home rejoicing. +In the evening he sent him ten thousand roubles. + +Early next morning Bugrov and Mishutka were already at Feodosia. + +III + +Several months had passed; spring had come. With spring, fine bright +days had come too. Life was not so dull and hateful, and the earth +was more fair to look upon. . . . There was a warm breeze from the +sea and the open country. . . . The earth was covered with fresh +grass, fresh leaves were green upon the trees. Nature had sprung +into new life, and had put on new array. + +It might be thought that new hopes and new desires would surge up +in man when everything in nature is renewed, and young and fresh +. . . but it is hard for man to renew life. . . . + +Groholsky was still living in the same villa. His hopes and desires, +small and unexacting, were still concentrated on the same Liza, on +her alone, and on nothing else! As before, he could not take his +eyes off her, and gloated over the thought: how happy I am! The +poor fellow really did feel awfully happy. Liza sat as before on +the verandah, and unaccountably stared with bored eyes at the villa +opposite and the trees near it through which there was a peep at +the dark blue sea. . . . As before, she spent her days for the most +part in silence, often in tears and from time to time in putting +mustard plasters on Groholsky. She might be congratulated on one +new sensation, however. There was a worm gnawing at her vitals. . . . +That worm was misery. . . . She was fearfully miserable, pining +for her son, for her old, her cheerful manner of life. Her life in +the past had not been particularly cheerful, but still it was +livelier than her present existence. When she lived with her husband +she used from time to time to go to a theatre, to an entertainment, +to visit acquaintances. But here with Groholsky it was all quietness +and emptiness. . . . Besides, here there was one man, and he with +his ailments and his continual mawkish kisses, was like an old +grandfather for ever shedding tears of joy. + +It was boring! Here she had not Mihey Sergeyitch who used to be +fond of dancing the mazurka with her. She had not Spiridon Nikolaitch, +the son of the editor of the _Provincial News_. Spiridon Nikolaitch +sang well and recited poetry. Here she had not a table set with +lunch for visitors. She had not Gerasimovna, the old nurse who used +to be continually grumbling at her for eating too much jam. . . . +She had no one! There was simply nothing for her but to lie down +and die of depression. Groholsky rejoiced in his solitude, but . . . +he was wrong to rejoice in it. All too soon he paid for his egoism. +At the beginning of May when the very air seemed to be in love and +faint with happiness, Groholsky lost everything; the woman he loved +and. . . + +That year Bugrov, too, visited the Crimea. He did not take the villa +opposite, but pottered about, going from one town to another with +Mishutka. He spent his time eating, drinking, sleeping, and playing +cards. He had lost all relish for fishing, shooting and the French +women, who, between ourselves, had robbed him a bit. He had grown +thin, lost his broad and beaming smiles, and had taken to dressing +in canvas. Ivan Petrovitch from time to time visited Groholsky's +villa. He brought Liza jam, sweets, and fruit, and seemed trying +to dispel her ennui. Groholsky was not troubled by these visits, +especially as they were brief and infrequent, and were apparently +paid on account of Mishutka, who could not under any circumstances +have been altogether deprived of the privilege of seeing his mother. +Bugrov came, unpacked his presents, and after saying a few words, +departed. And those few words he said not to Liza but to Groholsky +. . . . With Liza he was silent and Groholsky's mind was at rest; but +there is a Russian proverb which he would have done well to remember: +"Don't fear the dog that barks, but fear the dog that's quiet. . . ." +A fiendish proverb, but in practical life sometimes indispensable. + +As he was walking in the garden one day, Groholsky heard two voices +in conversation. One voice was a man's, the other was a woman's. +One belonged to Bugrov, the other to Liza. Groholsky listened, and +turning white as death, turned softly towards the speakers. He +halted behind a lilac bush, and proceeded to watch and listen. His +arms and legs turned cold. A cold sweat came out upon his brow. He +clutched several branches of the lilac that he might not stagger +and fall down. All was over! + +Bugrov had his arm round Liza's waist, and was saying to her: + +"My darling! what are we to do? It seems it was God's will. . . . +I am a scoundrel. . . . I sold you. I was seduced by that Herod's +money, plague take him, and what good have I had from the money? +Nothing but anxiety and display! No peace, no happiness, no position +. . . . One sits like a fat invalid at the same spot, and never a +step forwarder. . . . Have you heard that Andrushka Markuzin has +been made a head clerk? Andrushka, that fool! While I stagnate. . . . +Good heavens! I have lost you, I have lost my happiness. I am +a scoundrel, a blackguard, how do you think I shall feel at the +dread day of judgment?" + +"Let us go away, Vanya," wailed Liza. "I am dull. . . . I am dying +of depression." + +"We cannot, the money has been taken. . . ." + +"Well, give it back again." + +"I should be glad to, but . . . wait a minute. I have spent it all. +We must submit, my girl. God is chastising us. Me for my covetousness +and you for your frivolity. Well, let us be tortured. . . . It will +be the better for us in the next world." + +And in an access of religious feeling, Bugrov turned up his eyes +to heaven. + +"But I cannot go on living here; I am miserable." + +"Well, there is no help for it. I'm miserable too. Do you suppose +I am happy without you? I am pining and wasting away! And my chest +has begun to be bad! . . . You are my lawful wife, flesh of my flesh +. . . one flesh. . . . You must live and bear it! While I . . . +will drive over . . . visit you." + +And bending down to Liza, Bugrov whispered, loudly enough, however, +to be heard several yards away: + +"I will come to you at night, Lizanka. . . . Don't worry. . . . I +am staying at Feodosia close by. . . . I will live here near you +till I have run through everything . . . and I soon shall be at my +last farthing! A-a-ah, what a life it is! Dreariness, ill . . . my +chest is bad, and my stomach is bad." + +Bugrov ceased speaking, and then it was Liza's turn. . . . My God, +the cruelty of that woman! She began weeping, complaining, enumerating +all the defects of her lover and her own sufferings. Groholsky as +he listened to her, felt that he was a villain, a miscreant, a +murderer. + +"He makes me miserable. . . ." Liza said in conclusion. + +After kissing Liza at parting, and going out at the garden gate, +Bugrov came upon Groholsky, who was standing at the gate waiting +for him. + +"Ivan Petrovitch," said Groholsky in the tone of a dying man, "I +have seen and heard it all. . . It's not honourable on your part, +but I do not blame you. . . . You love her too, but you must +understand that she is mine. Mine! I cannot live without her! How +is it you don't understand that? Granted that you love her, that +you are miserable. . . . Have I not paid you, in part at least, for +your sufferings? For God's sake, go away! For God's sake, go away! +Go away from here for ever, I implore you, or you will kill me. . . ." + +"I have nowhere to go," Bugrov said thickly. + +"H'm, you have squandered everything. . . . You are an impulsive +man. Very well. . . . Go to my estate in the province of Tchernigov. +If you like I will make you a present of the property. It's a small +estate, but a good one. . . . On my honour, it's a good one!" + +Bugrov gave a broad grin. He suddenly felt himself in the seventh +heaven. + +"I will give it you. . . . This very day I will write to my steward +and send him an authorisation for completing the purchase. You must +tell everyone you have bought it. . . . Go away, I entreat you." + +"Very good, I will go. I understand." + +"Let us go to a notary . . . at once," said Groholsky, greatly +cheered, and he went to order the carriage. + +On the following evening, when Liza was sitting on the garden seat +where her rendezvous with Ivan Petrovitch usually took place, +Groholsky went quietly to her. He sat down beside her, and took her +hand. + +"Are you dull, Lizotchka?" he said, after a brief silence. "Are you +depressed? Why shouldn't we go away somewhere? Why is it we always +stay at home? We want to go about, to enjoy ourselves, to make +acquaintances. . . . Don't we?" + +"I want nothing," said Liza, and turned her pale, thin face towards +the path by which Bugrov used to come to her. + +Groholsky pondered. He knew who it was she expected, who it was she +wanted. + +"Let us go home, Liza," he said, "it is damp here. . . ." + +"You go; I'll come directly." + +Groholsky pondered again. + +"You are expecting him?" he asked, and made a wry face as though +his heart had been gripped with red-hot pincers. + +"Yes. . . . I want to give him the socks for Misha. . . ." + +"He will not come." + +"How do you know?" + +"He has gone away. . . ." + +Liza opened her eyes wide. . . . + +"He has gone away, gone to the Tchernigov province. I have given +him my estate. . . ." + +Liza turned fearfully pale, and caught at Groholsky's shoulder to +save herself from falling. + +"I saw him off at the steamer at three o'clock." + +Liza suddenly clutched at her head, made a movement, and falling +on the seat, began shaking all over. + +"Vanya," she wailed, "Vanya! I will go to Vanya. . . . Darling!" + +She had a fit of hysterics. . . . + +And from that evening, right up to July, two shadows could be seen +in the park in which the summer visitors took their walks. The +shadows wandered about from morning till evening, and made the +summer visitors feel dismal. . . . After Liza's shadow invariably +walked the shadow of Groholsky. . . . I call them shadows because +they had both lost their natural appearance. They had grown thin +and pale and shrunken, and looked more like shadows than living +people. . . . Both were pining away like fleas in the classic +anecdote of the Jew who sold insect powder. + +At the beginning of July, Liza ran away from Groholsky, leaving a +note in which she wrote that she was going for a time to "her son" +. . . For a time! She ran away by night when Groholsky was asleep +. . . . After reading her letter Groholsky spent a whole week wandering +round about the villa as though he were mad, and neither ate nor +slept. In August, he had an attack of recurrent fever, and in +September he went abroad. There he took to drink. . . . He hoped +in drink and dissipation to find comfort. . . . He squandered all +his fortune, but did not succeed, poor fellow, in driving out of +his brain the image of the beloved woman with the kittenish face +. . . . Men do not die of happiness, nor do they die of misery. +Groholsky's hair went grey, but he did not die: he is alive to this +day. . . . He came back from abroad to have "just a peep" at Liza +. . . . Bugrov met him with open arms, and made him stay for an +indefinite period. He is staying with Bugrov to this day. + +This year I happened to be passing through Groholyovka, Bugrov's +estate. I found the master and the mistress of the house having +supper. . . . Ivan Petrovitch was highly delighted to see me, and +fell to pressing good things upon me. . . . He had grown rather +stout, and his face was a trifle puffy, though it was still rosy +and looked sleek and well-nourished. . . . He was not bald. Liza, +too, had grown fatter. Plumpness did not suit her. Her face was +beginning to lose the kittenish look, and was, alas! more suggestive +of the seal. Her cheeks were spreading upwards, outwards, and to +both sides. The Bugrovs were living in first-rate style. They had +plenty of everything. The house was overflowing with servants and +edibles. . . . + +When we had finished supper we got into conversation. Forgetting +that Liza did not play, I asked her to play us something on the +piano. + +"She does not play," said Bugrov; "she is no musician. . . . Hey, +you there! Ivan! call Grigory Vassilyevitch here! What's he doing +there?" And turning to me, Bugrov added, "Our musician will come +directly; he plays the guitar. We keep the piano for Mishutka--we +are having him taught. . . ." + +Five minutes later, Groholsky walked into the room--sleepy, +unkempt, and unshaven. . . . He walked in, bowed to me, and sat +down on one side. + +"Why, whoever goes to bed so early?" said Bugrov, addressing him. +"What a fellow you are really! He's always asleep, always asleep +. . . The sleepy head! Come, play us something lively. . . ." + +Groholsky turned the guitar, touched the strings, and began singing: + + "Yesterday I waited for my dear one. . . ." + +I listened to the singing, looked at Bugrov's well-fed countenance, +and thought: "Nasty brute!" I felt like crying. . . . When he had +finished singing, Groholsky bowed to us, and went out. + +"And what am I to do with him?" Bugrov said when he had gone away. +"I do have trouble with him! In the day he is always brooding and +brooding. . . . And at night he moans. . . . He sleeps, but he sighs +and moans in his sleep. . . . It is a sort of illness. . . . What +am I to do with him, I can't think! He won't let us sleep. . . . I +am afraid that he will go out of his mind. People think he is badly +treated here. . . . In what way is he badly treated? He eats with +us, and he drinks with us. . . . Only we won't give him money. If +we were to give him any he would spend it on drink or waste it +. . . . That's another trouble for me! Lord forgive me, a sinner!" + +They made me stay the night. When I woke next morning, Bugrov was +giving some one a lecture in the adjoining room. . . . + +"Set a fool to say his prayers, and he will crack his skull on the +floor! Why, who paints oars green! Do think, blockhead! Use your +sense! Why don't you speak?" + +"I . . . I . . . made a mistake," said a husky tenor apologetically. + +The tenor belonged to Groholsky. + +Groholsky saw me to the station. + +"He is a despot, a tyrant," he kept whispering to me all the way. +"He is a generous man, but a tyrant! Neither heart nor brain are +developed in him. . . . He tortures me! If it were not for that +noble woman, I should have gone away long ago. I am sorry to leave +her. It's somehow easier to endure together." + +Groholsky heaved a sigh, and went on: + +"She is with child. . . . You notice it? It is really my child. . . . +Mine. . . . She soon saw her mistake, and gave herself to me +again. She cannot endure him. . . ." + +"You are a rag," I could not refrain from saying to Groholsky. + +"Yes, I am a man of weak character. . . . That is quite true. I was +born so. Do you know how I came into the world? My late papa cruelly +oppressed a certain little clerk--it was awful how he treated +him! He poisoned his life. Well . . . and my late mama was +tender-hearted. She came from the people, she was of the working +class. . . . She took that little clerk to her heart from pity. . . . +Well . . . and so I came into the world. . . . The son of the +ill-treated clerk. How could I have a strong will? Where was I to +get it from? But that's the second bell. . . . Good-bye. Come and +see us again, but don't tell Ivan Petrovitch what I have said about +him." + +I pressed Groholsky's hand, and got into the train. He bowed towards +the carriage, and went to the water-barrel--I suppose he was +thirsty! + + +THE DOCTOR + +IT was still in the drawing-room, so still that a house-fly that +had flown in from outside could be distinctly heard brushing against +the ceiling. Olga Ivanovna, the lady of the villa, was standing by +the window, looking out at the flower-beds and thinking. Dr. +Tsvyetkov, who was her doctor as well as an old friend, and had +been sent for to treat her son Misha, was sitting in an easy chair +and swinging his hat, which he held in both hands, and he too was +thinking. Except them, there was not a soul in the drawing-room or +in the adjoining rooms. The sun had set, and the shades of evening +began settling in the corners under the furniture and on the cornices. + +The silence was broken by Olga Ivanovna. + +"No misfortune more terrible can be imagined," she said, without +turning from the window. "You know that life has no value for me +whatever apart from the boy." + +"Yes, I know that," said the doctor. + +"No value whatever," said Olga Ivanovna, and her voice quivered. +"He is everything to me. He is my joy, my happiness, my wealth. And +if, as you say, I cease to be a mother, if he . . . dies, there +will be nothing left of me but a shadow. I cannot survive it." + +Wringing her hands, Olga Ivanovna walked from one window to the +other and went on: + +"When he was born, I wanted to send him away to the Foundling +Hospital, you remember that, but, my God, how can that time be +compared with now? Then I was vulgar, stupid, feather-headed, but +now I am a mother, do you understand? I am a mother, and that's all +I care to know. Between the present and the past there is an +impassable gulf." + +Silence followed again. The doctor shifted his seat from the chair +to the sofa and impatiently playing with his hat, kept his eyes +fixed upon Olga Ivanovna. From his face it could be seen that he +wanted to speak, and was waiting for a fitting moment. + +"You are silent, but still I do not give up hope," said the lady, +turning round. "Why are you silent?" + +"I should be as glad of any hope as you, Olga, but there is none," +Tsvyetkov answered, "we must look the hideous truth in the face. +The boy has a tumour on the brain, and we must try to prepare +ourselves for his death, for such cases never recover." + +"Nikolay, are you certain you are not mistaken?" + +"Such questions lead to nothing. I am ready to answer as many as +you like, but it will make it no better for us." + +Olga Ivanovna pressed her face into the window curtains, and began +weeping bitterly. The doctor got up and walked several times up and +down the drawing-room, then went to the weeping woman, and lightly +touched her arm. Judging from his uncertain movements, from the +expression of his gloomy face, which looked dark in the dusk of the +evening, he wanted to say something. + +"Listen, Olga," he began. "Spare me a minute's attention; there is +something I must ask you. You can't attend to me now, though. I'll +come later, afterwards. . . ." He sat down again, and sank into +thought. The bitter, imploring weeping, like the weeping of a little +girl, continued. Without waiting for it to end, Tsvyetkov heaved a +sigh and walked out of the drawing-room. He went into the nursery +to Misha. The boy was lying on his back as before, staring at one +point as though he were listening. The doctor sat down on his bed +and felt his pulse. + +"Misha, does your head ache?" he asked. + +Misha answered, not at once: "Yes. I keep dreaming." + +"What do you dream?" + +"All sorts of things. . . ." + +The doctor, who did not know how to talk with weeping women or with +children, stroked his burning head, and muttered: + +"Never mind, poor boy, never mind. . . . One can't go through life +without illness. . . . Misha, who am I--do you know me?" + +Misha did not answer. + +"Does your head ache very badly?" + +"Ve-ery. I keep dreaming." + +After examining him and putting a few questions to the maid who was +looking after the sick child, the doctor went slowly back to the +drawing-room. There it was by now dark, and Olga Ivanovna, standing +by the window, looked like a silhouette. + +"Shall I light up?" asked Tsvyetkov. + +No answer followed. The house-fly was still brushing against the +ceiling. Not a sound floated in from outside as though the whole +world, like the doctor, were thinking, and could not bring itself +to speak. Olga Ivanovna was not weeping now, but as before, staring +at the flower-bed in profound silence. When Tsvyetkov went up to +her, and through the twilight glanced at her pale face, exhausted +with grief, her expression was such as he had seen before during +her attacks of acute, stupefying, sick headache. + +"Nikolay Trofimitch!" she addressed him, "and what do you think +about a consultation?" + +"Very good; I'll arrange it to-morrow." + +From the doctor's tone it could be easily seen that he put little +faith in the benefit of a consultation. Olga Ivanovna would have +asked him something else, but her sobs prevented her. Again she +pressed her face into the window curtain. At that moment, the strains +of a band playing at the club floated in distinctly. They could +hear not only the wind instruments, but even the violins and the +flutes. + +"If he is in pain, why is he silent?" asked Olga Ivanovna. "All day +long, not a sound, he never complains, and never cries. I know God +will take the poor boy from us because we have not known how to +prize him. Such a treasure!" + +The band finished the march, and a minute later began playing a +lively waltz for the opening of the ball. + +"Good God, can nothing really be done?" moaned Olga Ivanovna. +"Nikolay, you are a doctor and ought to know what to do! You must +understand that I can't bear the loss of him! I can't survive it." + +The doctor, who did not know how to talk to weeping women, heaved +a sigh, and paced slowly about the drawing-room. There followed a +succession of oppressive pauses interspersed with weeping and the +questions which lead to nothing. The band had already played a +quadrille, a polka, and another quadrille. It got quite dark. In +the adjoining room, the maid lighted the lamp; and all the while +the doctor kept his hat in his hands, and seemed trying to say +something. Several times Olga Ivanovna went off to her son, sat by +him for half an hour, and came back again into the drawing-room; +she was continually breaking into tears and lamentations. The time +dragged agonisingly, and it seemed as though the evening had no +end. + +At midnight, when the band had played the cotillion and ceased +altogether, the doctor got ready to go. + +"I will come again to-morrow," he said, pressing the mother's cold +hand. "You go to bed." + +After putting on his greatcoat in the passage and picking up his +walking-stick, he stopped, thought a minute, and went back into the +drawing-room. + +"I'll come to-morrow, Olga," he repeated in a quivering voice. "Do +you hear?" + +She did not answer, and it seemed as though grief had robbed her +of all power of speech. In his greatcoat and with his stick still +in his hand, the doctor sat down beside her, and began in a soft, +tender half-whisper, which was utterly out of keeping with his +heavy, dignified figure: + +"Olga! For the sake of your sorrow which I share. . . . Now, when +falsehood is criminal, I beseech you to tell me the truth. You have +always declared that the boy is my son. Is that the truth?" + +Olga Ivanovna was silent. + +"You have been the one attachment in my life," the doctor went on, +"and you cannot imagine how deeply my feeling is wounded by falsehood +. . . . Come, I entreat you, Olga, for once in your life, tell me the +truth. . . . At these moments one cannot lie. Tell me that Misha +is not my son. I am waiting." + +"He is." + +Olga Ivanovna's face could not be seen, but in her voice the doctor +could hear hesitation. He sighed. + +"Even at such moments you can bring yourself to tell a lie," he +said in his ordinary voice. "There is nothing sacred to you! Do +listen, do understand me. . . . You have been the one only attachment +in my life. Yes, you were depraved, vulgar, but I have loved no one +else but you in my life. That trivial love, now that I am growing +old, is the one solitary bright spot in my memories. Why do you +darken it with deception? What is it for?" + +"I don't understand you." + +"Oh my God!" cried Tsvyetkov. "You are lying, you understand very +well!" he cried more loudly, and he began pacing about the drawing-room, +angrily waving his stick. "Or have you forgotten? Then I will remind +you! A father's rights to the boy are equally shared with me by +Petrov and Kurovsky the lawyer, who still make you an allowance for +their son's education, just as I do! Yes, indeed! I know all that +quite well! I forgive your lying in the past, what does it matter? +But now when you have grown older, at this moment when the boy is +dying, your lying stifles me! How sorry I am that I cannot speak, +how sorry I am!" + +The doctor unbuttoned his overcoat, and still pacing about, said: + +"Wretched woman! Even such moments have no effect on her! Even now +she lies as freely as nine years ago in the Hermitage Restaurant! +She is afraid if she tells me the truth I shall leave off giving +her money, she thinks that if she did not lie I should not love the +boy! You are lying! It's contemptible!" + +The doctor rapped the floor with his stick, and cried: + +"It's loathsome. Warped, corrupted creature! I must despise you, +and I ought to be ashamed of my feeling. Yes! Your lying has stuck +in my throat these nine years, I have endured it, but now it's too +much--too much." + +From the dark corner where Olga Ivanovna was sitting there came the +sound of weeping. The doctor ceased speaking and cleared his throat. +A silence followed. The doctor slowly buttoned up his over-coat, +and began looking for his hat which he had dropped as he walked +about. + +"I lost my temper," he muttered, bending down to the floor. "I quite +lost sight of the fact that you cannot attend to me now. . . . God +knows what I have said. . . . Don't take any notice of it, Olga." + +He found his hat and went towards the dark corner. + +"I have wounded you," he said in a soft, tender half-whisper, "but +once more I entreat you, tell me the truth; there should not be +lying between us. . . . I blurted it out, and now you know that +Petrov and Kurovsky are no secret to me. So now it is easy for you +to tell me the truth." + +Olga Ivanovna thought a moment, and with perceptible hesitation, +said: + +"Nikolay, I am not lying--Misha is your child." + +"My God," moaned the doctor, "then I will tell you something more: +I have kept your letter to Petrov in which you call him Misha's +father! Olga, I know the truth, but I want to hear it from you! Do +you hear?" + +Olga Ivanovna made no reply, but went on weeping. After waiting for +an answer the doctor shrugged his shoulders and went out. + +"I will come to-morrow," he called from the passage. + +All the way home, as he sat in his carriage, he was shrugging his +shoulders and muttering: + +"What a pity that I don't know how to speak! I haven't the gift of +persuading and convincing. It's evident she does not understand me +since she lies! It's evident! How can I make her see? How?" + + +TOO EARLY! + +THE bells are ringing for service in the village of Shalmovo. The +sun is already kissing the earth on the horizon; it has turned +crimson and will soon disappear. In Semyon's pothouse, which has +lately changed its name and become a restaurant--a title quite +out of keeping with the wretched little hut with its thatch torn +off its roof, and its couple of dingy windows--two peasant sportsmen +are sitting. One of them is called Filimon Slyunka; he is an old +man of sixty, formerly a house-serf, belonging to the Counts Zavalin, +by trade a carpenter. He has at one time been employed in a nail +factory, has been turned off for drunkenness and idleness, and now +lives upon his old wife, who begs for alms. He is thin and weak, +with a mangy-looking little beard, speaks with a hissing sound, and +after every word twitches the right side of his face and jerkily +shrugs his right shoulder. The other, Ignat Ryabov, a sturdy, +broad-shouldered peasant who never does anything and is everlastingly +silent, is sitting in the corner under a big string of bread rings. +The door, opening inwards, throws a thick shadow upon him, so that +Slyunka and Semyon the publican can see nothing but his patched +knees, his long fleshy nose, and a big tuft of hair which has escaped +from the thick uncombed tangle covering his head. Semyon, a sickly +little man, with a pale face and a long sinewy neck, stands behind +his counter, looks mournfully at the string of bread rings, and +coughs meekly. + +"You think it over now, if you have any sense," Slyunka says to +him, twitching his cheek. "You have the thing lying by unused and +get no sort of benefit from it. While we need it. A sportsman without +a gun is like a sacristan without a voice. You ought to understand +that, but I see you don't understand it, so you can have no real +sense. . . . Hand it over!" + +"You left the gun in pledge, you know!" says Semyon in a thin +womanish little voice, sighing deeply, and not taking his eyes off +the string of bread rings. "Hand over the rouble you borrowed, and +then take your gun." + +"I haven't got a rouble. I swear to you, Semyon Mitritch, as God +sees me: you give me the gun and I will go to-day with Ignashka and +bring it you back again. I'll bring it back, strike me dead. May I +have happiness neither in this world nor the next, if I don't." + +"Semyon Mitritch, do give it," Ignat Ryabov says in his bass, and +his voice betrays a passionate desire to get what he asks for. + +"But what do you want the gun for?" sighs Semyon, sadly shaking his +head. "What sort of shooting is there now? It's still winter outside, +and no game at all but crows and jackdaws." + +"Winter, indeed," says Slyunka, hooing the ash out of his pipe with +his finger, "it is early yet of course, but you never can tell with +the snipe. The snipe's a bird that wants watching. If you are +unlucky, you may sit waiting at home, and miss his flying over, and +then you must wait till autumn. . . . It is a business! The snipe +is not a rook. . . . Last year he was flying the week before Easter, +while the year before we had to wait till the week after Easter! +Come, do us a favour, Semyon Mitritch, give us the gun. Make us +pray for you for ever. As ill-luck would have it, Ignashka has +pledged his gun for drink too. Ah, when you drink you feel nothing, +but now . . . ah, I wish I had never looked at it, the cursed vodka! +Truly it is the blood of Satan! Give it us, Semyon Mitritch!" + +"I won't give it you," says Semyon, clasping his yellow hands on +his breast as though he were going to pray. "You must act fairly, +Filimonushka. . . . A thing is not taken out of pawn just anyhow; +you must pay the money. . . . Besides, what do you want to kill +birds for? What's the use? It's Lent now--you are not going to +eat them." + +Slyunka exchanges glances with Ryabov in embarrassment, sighs, and +says: "We would only go stand-shooting." + +"And what for? It's all foolishness. You are not the sort of man +to spend your time in foolishness. . . . Ignashka, to be sure, is +a man of no understanding, God has afflicted him, but you, thank +the Lord, are an old man. It's time to prepare for your end. Here, +you ought to go to the midnight service." + +The allusion to his age visibly stings Slyunka. He clears his throat, +wrinkles up his forehead, and remains silent for a full minute. + +"I say, Semyon Mitritch," he says hotly, getting up and twitching +not only in his right cheek but all over his face. "It's God's +truth. . . . May the Almighty strike me dead, after Easter I shall +get something from Stepan Kuzmitch for an axle, and I will pay you +not one rouble but two! May the Lord chastise me! Before the holy +image, I tell you, only give me the gun!" + +"Gi-ive it," Ryabov says in his growling bass; they can hear him +breathing hard, and it seems that he would like to say a great deal, +but cannot find the words. "Gi-ive it." + +"No, brothers, and don't ask," sighs Semyon, shaking his head +mournfully. "Don't lead me into sin. I won't give you the gun. It's +not the fashion for a thing to be taken out of pawn and no money +paid. Besides--why this indulgence? Go your way and God bless +you!" + +Slyunka rubs his perspiring face with his sleeve and begins hotly +swearing and entreating. He crosses himself, holds out his hands +to the ikon, calls his deceased father and mother to bear witness, +but Semyon sighs and meekly looks as before at the string of bread +rings. In the end Ignashka Ryabov, hitherto motionless, gets up +impulsively and bows down to the ground before the innkeeper, but +even that has no effect on him. + +"May you choke with my gun, you devil," says Slyunka, with his face +twitching, and his shoulders, shrugging. "May you choke, you plague, +you scoundrelly soul." + +Swearing and shaking his fists, he goes out of the tavern with +Ryabov and stands still in the middle of the road. + +"He won't give it, the damned brute," he says, in a weeping voice, +looking into Ryabov's face with an injured air. + +"He won't give it," booms Ryabov. + +The windows of the furthest huts, the starling cote on the tavern, +the tops of the poplars, and the cross on the church are all gleaming +with a bright golden flame. Now they can see only half of the sun, +which, as it goes to its night's rest, is winking, shedding a crimson +light, and seems laughing gleefully. Slyunka and Ryabov can see the +forest lying, a dark blur, to the right of the sun, a mile and a +half from the village, and tiny clouds flitting over the clear sky, +and they feel that the evening will be fine and still. + +"Now is just the time," says Slyunka, with his face twitching. "It +would be nice to stand for an hour or two. He won't give it us, the +damned brute. May he . . ." + +"For stand-shooting, now is the very time . . ." Ryabov articulated, +as though with an effort, stammering. + +After standing still for a little they walk out of the village, +without saying a word to each other, and look towards the dark +streak of the forest. The whole sky above the forest is studded +with moving black spots, the rooks flying home to roost. The snow, +lying white here and there on the dark brown plough-land, is lightly +flecked with gold by the sun. + +"This time last year I went stand-shooting in Zhivki," says Slyunka, +after a long silence. "I brought back three snipe." + +Again there follows a silence. Both stand a long time and look +towards the forest, and then lazily move and walk along the muddy +road from the village. + +"It's most likely the snipe haven't come yet," says Slyunka, "but +may be they are here." + +"Kostka says they are not here yet." + +"Maybe they are not, who can tell; one year is not like another. +But what mud!" + +"But we ought to stand." + +"To be sure we ought--why not?" + +"We can stand and watch; it wouldn't be amiss to go to the forest +and have a look. If they are there we will tell Kostka, or maybe +get a gun ourselves and come to-morrow. What a misfortune, God +forgive me. It was the devil put it in my mind to take my gun to +the pothouse! I am more sorry than I can tell you, Ignashka." + +Conversing thus, the sportsmen approach the forest. The sun has set +and left behind it a red streak like the glow of a fire, scattered +here and there with clouds; there is no catching the colours of +those clouds: their edges are red, but they themselves are one +minute grey, at the next lilac, at the next ashen. + +In the forest, among the thick branches of fir-trees and under the +birch bushes, it is dark, and only the outermost twigs on the side +of the sun, with their fat buds and shining bark, stand out clearly +in the air. There is a smell of thawing snow and rotting leaves. +It is still; nothing stirs. From the distance comes the subsiding +caw of the rooks. + +"We ought to be standing in Zhivki now," whispers Slyunka, looking +with awe at Ryabov; "there's good stand-shooting there." + +Ryabov too looks with awe at Slyunka, with unblinking eyes and open +mouth. + +"A lovely time," Slyunka says in a trembling whisper. "The Lord is +sending a fine spring . . . and I should think the snipe are here +by now. . . . Why not? The days are warm now. . . . The cranes were +flying in the morning, lots and lots of them." + +Slyunka and Ryabov, splashing cautiously through the melting snow +and sticking in the mud, walk two hundred paces along the edge of +the forest and there halt. Their faces wear a look of alarm and +expectation of something terrible and extraordinary. They stand +like posts, do not speak nor stir, and their hands gradually fall +into an attitude as though they were holding a gun at the cock. . . . + +A big shadow creeps from the left and envelops the earth. The dusk +of evening comes on. If one looks to the right, through the bushes +and tree trunks, there can be seen crimson patches of the after-glow. +It is still and damp. . . . + +"There's no sound of them," whispers Slyunka, shrugging with the +cold and sniffing with his chilly nose. + +But frightened by his own whisper, he holds his finger up at some +one, opens his eyes wide, and purses up his lips. There is a sound +of a light snapping. The sportsmen look at each other significantly, +and tell each other with their eyes that it is nothing. It is the +snapping of a dry twig or a bit of bark. The shadows of evening +keep growing and growing, the patches of crimson gradually grow +dim, and the dampness becomes unpleasant. + +The sportsmen remain standing a long time, but they see and hear +nothing. Every instant they expect to see a delicate leaf float +through the air, to hear a hurried call like the husky cough of a +child, and the flutter of wings. + +"No, not a sound," Slyunka says aloud, dropping his hands and +beginning to blink. "So they have not come yet." + +"It's early!" + +"You are right there." + +The sportsmen cannot see each other's faces, it is getting rapidly +dark. + +"We must wait another five days," says Slyunka, as he comes out +from behind a bush with Ryabov. "It's too early!" + +They go homewards, and are silent all the way. + + +THE COSSACK + +MAXIM TORTCHAKOV, a farmer in southern Russia, was driving home +from church with his young wife and bringing back an Easter cake +which had just been blessed. The sun had not yet risen, but the +east was all tinged with red and gold and had dissipated the haze +which usually, in the early morning, screens the blue of the sky +from the eyes. It was quiet. . . . The birds were hardly yet awake +. . . . The corncrake uttered its clear note, and far away above a +little tumulus, a sleepy kite floated, heavily flapping its wings, +and no other living creature could be seen all over the steppe. + +Tortchakov drove on and thought that there was no better nor happier +holiday than the Feast of Christ's Resurrection. He had only lately +been married, and was now keeping his first Easter with his wife. +Whatever he looked at, whatever he thought about, it all seemed to +him bright, joyous, and happy. He thought about his farming, and +thought that it was all going well, that the furnishing of his house +was all the heart could desire--there was enough of everything +and all of it good; he looked at his wife, and she seemed to him +lovely, kind, and gentle. He was delighted by the glow in the east, +and the young grass, and his squeaking chaise, and the kite. . . . +And when on the way, he ran into a tavern to light his cigarette +and drank a glass, he felt happier still. + +"It is said, 'Great is the day,'" he chattered. "Yes, it is great! +Wait a bit, Lizaveta, the sun will begin to dance. It dances every +Easter. So it rejoices too!" + +"It is not alive," said his wife. + +"But there are people on it!" exclaimed Tortchakov, "there are +really! Ivan Stepanitch told me that there are people on all the +planets--on the sun, and on the moon! Truly . . . but maybe the +learned men tell lies--the devil only knows! Stay, surely that's +not a horse? Yes, it is!" + +At the Crooked Ravine, which was just half-way on the journey home, +Tortchakov and his wife saw a saddled horse standing motionless, +and sniffing last year's dry grass. On a hillock beside the roadside +a red-haired Cossack was sitting doubled up, looking at his feet. + +"Christ is risen!" Maxim shouted to him. "Wo-o-o!" + +"Truly He is risen," answered the Cossack, without raising his head. + +"Where are you going?" + +"Home on leave." + +"Why are you sitting here, then?" + +"Why . . . I have fallen ill . . . I haven't the strength to go +on." + +"What is wrong?" + +"I ache all over." + +"H'm. What a misfortune! People are keeping holiday, and you fall +sick! But you should ride on to a village or an inn, what's the use +of sitting here!" + +The Cossack raised his head, and with big, exhausted eyes, scanned +Maxim, his wife, and the horse. + +"Have you come from church?" he asked. + +"Yes." + +"The holiday found me on the high road. It was not God's will for +me to reach home. I'd get on my horse at once and ride off, but I +haven't the strength. . . . You might, good Christians, give a +wayfarer some Easter cake to break his fast!" + +"Easter cake?" Tortchakov repeated, "That we can, to be sure. . . . +Stay, I'll. . . ." + +Maxim fumbled quickly in his pockets, glanced at his wife, and said: + +"I haven't a knife, nothing to cut it with. And I don't like to +break it, it would spoil the whole cake. There's a problem! You +look and see if you haven't a knife?" + +The Cossack got up groaning, and went to his saddle to get a knife. + +"What an idea," said Tortchakov's wife angrily. "I won't let you +slice up the Easter cake! What should I look like, taking it home +already cut! Ride on to the peasants in the village, and break your +fast there!" + +The wife took the napkin with the Easter cake in it out of her +husband's hands and said: + +"I won't allow it! One must do things properly; it's not a loaf, +but a holy Easter cake. And it's a sin to cut it just anyhow." + +"Well, Cossack, don't be angry," laughed Tortchakov. "The wife +forbids it! Good-bye. Good luck on your journey!" + +Maxim shook the reins, clicked to his horse, and the chaise rolled +on squeaking. For some time his wife went on grumbling, and declaring +that to cut the Easter cake before reaching home was a sin and not +the proper thing. In the east the first rays of the rising sun shone +out, cutting their way through the feathery clouds, and the song +of the lark was heard in the sky. Now not one but three kites were +hovering over the steppe at a respectful distance from one another. +Grasshoppers began churring in the young grass. + +When they had driven three-quarters of a mile from the Crooked +Ravine, Tortchakov looked round and stared intently into the distance. + +"I can't see the Cossack," he said. "Poor, dear fellow, to take it +into his head to fall ill on the road. There couldn't be a worse +misfortune, to have to travel and not have the strength. . . . I +shouldn't wonder if he dies by the roadside. We didn't give him any +Easter cake, Lizaveta, and we ought to have given it. I'll be bound +he wants to break his fast too." + +The sun had risen, but whether it was dancing or not Tortchakov did +not see. He remained silent all the way home, thinking and keeping +his eyes fixed on the horse's black tail. For some unknown reason +he felt overcome by depression, and not a trace of the holiday +gladness was left in his heart. When he had arrived home and said, +"Christ is risen" to his workmen, he grew cheerful again and began +talking, but when he had sat down to break the fast and had taken +a bite from his piece of Easter cake, he looked regretfully at his +wife, and said: + +"It wasn't right of us, Lizaveta, not to give that Cossack something +to eat." + +"You are a queer one, upon my word," said Lizaveta, shrugging her +shoulders in surprise. "Where did you pick up such a fashion as +giving away the holy Easter cake on the high road? Is it an ordinary +loaf? Now that it is cut and lying on the table, let anyone eat it +that likes--your Cossack too! Do you suppose I grudge it?" + +"That's all right, but we ought to have given the Cossack some. . . . +Why, he was worse off than a beggar or an orphan. On the road, +and far from home, and sick too." + +Tortchakov drank half a glass of tea, and neither ate nor drank +anything more. He had no appetite, the tea seemed to choke him, and +he felt depressed again. After breaking their fast, his wife and +he lay down to sleep. When Lizaveta woke two hours later, he was +standing by the window, looking into the yard. + +"Are you up already?" asked his wife. + +"I somehow can't sleep. . . . Ah, Lizaveta," he sighed. "We were +unkind, you and I, to that Cossack!" + +"Talking about that Cossack again!" yawned his wife. "You have got +him on the brain." + +"He has served his Tsar, shed his blood maybe, and we treated him +as though he were a pig. We ought to have brought the sick man home +and fed him, and we did not even give him a morsel of bread." + +"Catch me letting you spoil the Easter cake for nothing! And one +that has been blessed too! You would have cut it on the road, and +shouldn't I have looked a fool when I got home?" + +Without saying anything to his wife, Maxim went into the kitchen, +wrapped a piece of cake up in a napkin, together with half a dozen +eggs, and went to the labourers in the barn. + +"Kuzma, put down your concertina," he said to one of them. "Saddle +the bay, or Ivantchik, and ride briskly to the Crooked Ravine. There +you will see a sick Cossack with a horse, so give him this. Maybe +he hasn't ridden away yet." + +Maxim felt cheerful again, but after waiting for Kuzma for some +hours, he could bear it no longer, so he saddled a horse and went +off to meet him. He met him just at the Ravine. + +"Well, have you seen the Cossack?" + +"I can't find him anywhere, he must have ridden on." + +"H'm . . . a queer business." + +Tortchakov took the bundle from Kuzma, and galloped on farther. +When he reached Shustrovo he asked the peasants: + +"Friends, have you seen a sick Cossack with a horse? Didn't he ride +by here? A red-headed fellow on a bay horse." + +The peasants looked at one another, and said they had not seen the +Cossack. + +"The returning postman drove by, it's true, but as for a Cossack +or anyone else, there has been no such." + +Maxim got home at dinner time. + +"I can't get that Cossack out of my head, do what you will!" he +said to his wife. "He gives me no peace. I keep thinking: what if +God meant to try us, and sent some saint or angel in the form of a +Cossack? It does happen, you know. It's bad, Lizaveta; we were +unkind to the man!" + +"What do you keep pestering me with that Cossack for?" cried Lizaveta, +losing patience at last. "You stick to it like tar!" + +"You are not kind, you know . . ." said Maxim, looking into his +wife's face. + +And for the first time since his marriage he perceived that he wife +was not kind. + +"I may be unkind," cried Lizaveta, tapping angrily with her spoon, +"but I am not going to give away the holy Easter cake to every +drunken man in the road." + +"The Cossack wasn't drunk!" + +"He was drunk!" + +"Well, you are a fool then!" + +Maxim got up from the table and began reproaching his young wife +for hard-heartedness and stupidity. She, getting angry too, answered +his reproaches with reproaches, burst into tears, and went away +into their bedroom, declaring she would go home to her father's. +This was the first matrimonial squabble that had happened in the +Tortchakov's married life. He walked about the yard till the evening, +picturing his wife's face, and it seemed to him now spiteful and +ugly. And as though to torment him the Cossack haunted his brain, +and Maxim seemed to see now his sick eyes, now his unsteady walk. + +"Ah, we were unkind to the man," he muttered. + +When it got dark, he was overcome by an insufferable depression +such as he had never felt before. Feeling so dreary, and being angry +with his wife, he got drunk, as he had sometimes done before he was +married. In his drunkenness he used bad language and shouted to his +wife that she had a spiteful, ugly face, and that next day he would +send her packing to her father's. On the morning of Easter Monday, +he drank some more to sober himself, and got drunk again. + +And with that his downfall began. + +His horses, cows, sheep, and hives disappeared one by one from the +yard; Maxim was more and more often drunk, debts mounted up, he +felt an aversion for his wife. Maxim put down all his misfortunes +to the fact that he had an unkind wife, and above all, that God was +angry with him on account of the sick Cossack. + +Lizaveta saw their ruin, but who was to blame for it she did not +understand. + + +ABORIGINES + +BETWEEN nine and ten in the morning. Ivan Lyashkevsky, a lieutenant +of Polish origin, who has at some time or other been wounded in the +head, and now lives on his pension in a town in one of the southern +provinces, is sitting in his lodgings at the open window talking +to Franz Stepanitch Finks, the town architect, who has come in to +see him for a minute. Both have thrust their heads out of the window, +and are looking in the direction of the gate near which Lyashkevsky's +landlord, a plump little native with pendulous perspiring cheeks, +in full, blue trousers, is sitting on a bench with his waistcoat +unbuttoned. The native is plunged in deep thought, and is absent-mindedly +prodding the toe of his boot with a stick. + +"Extraordinary people, I tell you," grumbled Lyashkevsky, looking +angrily at the native, "here he has sat down on the bench, and so +he will sit, damn the fellow, with his hands folded till evening. +They do absolutely nothing. The wastrels and loafers! It would be +all right, you scoundrel, if you had money lying in the bank, or +had a farm of your own where others would be working for you, but +here you have not a penny to your name, you eat the bread of others, +you are in debt all round, and you starve your family--devil take +you! You wouldn't believe me, Franz Stepanitch, sometimes it makes +me so cross that I could jump out of the window and give the low +fellow a good horse-whipping. Come, why don't you work? What are +you sitting there for?" + +The native looks indifferently at Lyashkevsky, tries to say something +but cannot; sloth and the sultry heat have paralysed his conversational +faculties. . . . Yawning lazily, he makes the sign of the cross +over his mouth, and turns his eyes up towards the sky where pigeons +fly, bathing in the hot air. + +"You must not be too severe in your judgments, honoured friend," +sighs Finks, mopping his big bald head with his handkerchief. "Put +yourself in their place: business is slack now, there's unemployment +all round, a bad harvest, stagnation in trade." + +"Good gracious, how you talk!" cries Lyashkevsky in indignation, +angrily wrapping his dressing gown round him. "Supposing he has no +job and no trade, why doesn't he work in his own home, the devil +flay him! I say! Is there no work for you at home? Just look, you +brute! Your steps have come to pieces, the plankway is falling into +the ditch, the fence is rotten; you had better set to and mend it +all, or if you don't know how, go into the kitchen and help your +wife. Your wife is running out every minute to fetch water or carry +out the slops. Why shouldn't you run instead, you rascal? And then +you must remember, Franz Stepanitch, that he has six acres of garden, +that he has pigsties and poultry houses, but it is all wasted and +no use. The flower garden is overgrown with weeds and almost baked +dry, while the boys play ball in the kitchen garden. Isn't he a +lazy brute? I assure you, though I have only the use of an acre and +a half with my lodgings, you will always find radishes, and salad, +and fennel, and onions, while that blackguard buys everything at +the market." + +"He is a Russian, there is no doing anything with him," said Finks +with a condescending smile; "it's in the Russian blood. . . . They +are a very lazy people! If all property were given to Germans or +Poles, in a year's time you would not recognise the town." + +The native in the blue trousers beckons a girl with a sieve, buys +a kopeck's worth of sunflower seeds from her and begins cracking +them. + +"A race of curs!" says Lyashkevsky angrily. "That's their only +occupation, they crack sunflower seeds and they talk politics! The +devil take them!" + +Staring wrathfully at the blue trousers, Lyashkevsky is gradually +roused to fury, and gets so excited that he actually foams at the +mouth. He speaks with a Polish accent, rapping out each syllable +venomously, till at last the little bags under his eyes swell, and +he abandons the Russian "scoundrels, blackguards, and rascals," and +rolling his eyes, begins pouring out a shower of Polish oaths, +coughing from his efforts. "Lazy dogs, race of curs. May the devil +take them!" + +The native hears this abuse distinctly, but, judging from the +appearance of his crumpled little figure, it does not affect him. +Apparently he has long ago grown as used to it as to the buzzing +of the flies, and feels it superfluous to protest. At every visit +Finks has to listen to a tirade on the subject of the lazy +good-for-nothing aborigines, and every time exactly the same one. + +"But . . . I must be going," he says, remembering that he has no +time to spare. "Good-bye!" + +"Where are you off to?" + +"I only looked in on you for a minute. The wall of the cellar has +cracked in the girls' high school, so they asked me to go round at +once to look at it. I must go." + +"H'm. . . . I have told Varvara to get the samovar," says Lyashkevsky, +surprised. "Stay a little, we will have some tea; then you shall +go." + +Finks obediently puts down his hat on the table and remains to drink +tea. Over their tea Lyashkevsky maintains that the natives are +hopelessly ruined, that there is only one thing to do, to take them +all indiscriminately and send them under strict escort to hard +labour. + +"Why, upon my word," he says, getting hot, "you may ask what does +that goose sitting there live upon! He lets me lodgings in his house +for seven roubles a month, and he goes to name-day parties, that's +all that he has to live on, the knave, may the devil take him! He +has neither earnings nor an income. They are not merely sluggards +and wastrels, they are swindlers too, they are continually borrowing +money from the town bank, and what do they do with it? They plunge +into some scheme such as sending bulls to Moscow, or building oil +presses on a new system; but to send bulls to Moscow or to press +oil you want to have a head on your shoulders, and these rascals +have pumpkins on theirs! Of course all their schemes end in smoke +. . . . They waste their money, get into a mess, and then snap their +fingers at the bank. What can you get out of them? Their houses are +mortgaged over and over again, they have no other property--it's +all been drunk and eaten up long ago. Nine-tenths of them are +swindlers, the scoundrels! To borrow money and not return it is +their rule. Thanks to them the town bank is going smash!" + +"I was at Yegorov's yesterday," Finks interrupts the Pole, anxious +to change the conversation, "and only fancy, I won six roubles and +a half from him at picquet." + +"I believe I still owe you something at picquet," Lyashkevsky +recollects, "I ought to win it back. Wouldn't you like one game?" + +"Perhaps just one," Finks assents. "I must make haste to the high +school, you know." + +Lyashkevsky and Finks sit down at the open window and begin a game +of picquet. The native in the blue trousers stretches with relish, +and husks of sunflower seeds fall in showers from all over him on +to the ground. At that moment from the gate opposite appears another +native with a long beard, wearing a crumpled yellowish-grey cotton +coat. He screws up his eyes affectionately at the blue trousers and +shouts: + +"Good-morning, Semyon Nikolaitch, I have the honour to congratulate +you on the Thursday." + +"And the same to you, Kapiton Petrovitch!" + +"Come to my seat! It's cool here!" + +The blue trousers, with much sighing and groaning and waddling from +side to side like a duck, cross the street. + +"Tierce major . . ." mutters Lyashkevsky, "from the queen. . . . +Five and fifteen. . . . The rascals are talking of politics. . . . +Do you hear? They have begun about England. I have six hearts." + +"I have the seven spades. My point." + +"Yes, it's yours. Do you hear? They are abusing Beaconsfield. They +don't know, the swine, that Beaconsfield has been dead for ever so +long. So I have twenty-nine. . . . Your lead." + +"Eight . . . nine . . . ten . . . . Yes, amazing people, these +Russians! Eleven . . . twelve. . . . The Russian inertia is unique +on the terrestrial globe." + +"Thirty . . . Thirty-one. . . . One ought to take a good whip, you +know. Go out and give them Beaconsfield. I say, how their tongues +are wagging! It's easier to babble than to work. I suppose you threw +away the queen of clubs and I didn't realise it." + +"Thirteen . . . Fourteen. . . . It's unbearably hot! One must be +made of iron to sit in such heat on a seat in the full sun! Fifteen." + +The first game is followed by a second, the second by a third. . . . +Finks loses, and by degrees works himself up into a gambling fever +and forgets all about the cracking walls of the high school cellar. +As Lyashkevsky plays he keeps looking at the aborigines. He sees +them, entertaining each other with conversation, go to the open +gate, cross the filthy yard and sit down on a scanty patch of shade +under an aspen tree. Between twelve and one o'clock the fat cook +with brown legs spreads before them something like a baby's sheet +with brown stains upon it, and gives them their dinner. They eat +with wooden spoons, keep brushing away the flies, and go on talking. + +"The devil, it is beyond everything," cries Lyashkevsky, revolted. +"I am very glad I have not a gun or a revolver or I should have a +shot at those cattle. I have four knaves--fourteen. . . . Your +point. . . . It really gives me a twitching in my legs. I can't see +those ruffians without being upset." + +"Don't excite yourself, it is bad for you." + +"But upon my word, it is enough to try the patience of a stone!" + +When he has finished dinner the native in blue trousers, worn out +and exhausted, staggering with laziness and repletion, crosses the +street to his own house and sinks feebly on to his bench. He is +struggling with drowsiness and the gnats, and is looking about him +as dejectedly as though he were every minute expecting his end. His +helpless air drives Lyashkevsky out of all patience. The Pole pokes +his head out of the window and shouts at him, spluttering: + +"Been gorging? Ah, the old woman! The sweet darling. He has been +stuffing himself, and now he doesn't know what to do with his tummy! +Get out of my sight, you confounded fellow! Plague take you!" + +The native looks sourly at him, and merely twiddles his fingers +instead of answering. A school-boy of his acquaintance passes by +him with his satchel on his back. Stopping him the native ponders +a long time what to say to him, and asks: + +"Well, what now?" + +"Nothing." + +"How, nothing?" + +"Why, just nothing." + +"H'm. . . . And which subject is the hardest?" + +"That's according." The school-boy shrugs his shoulders. + +"I see--er . . . What is the Latin for tree?" + +"Arbor." + +"Aha. . . . And so one has to know all that," sighs the blue trousers. +"You have to go into it all. . . . It's hard work, hard work. . . . +Is your dear Mamma well?" + +"She is all right, thank you." + +"Ah. . . . Well, run along." + +After losing two roubles Finks remembers the high school and is +horrified. + +"Holy Saints, why it's three o'clock already. How I have been staying +on. Good-bye, I must run. . . ." + +"Have dinner with me, and then go," says Lyashkevsky. "You have +plenty of time." + +Finks stays, but only on condition that dinner shall last no more +than ten minutes. After dining he sits for some five minutes on the +sofa and thinks of the cracked wall, then resolutely lays his head +on the cushion and fills the room with a shrill whistling through +his nose. While he is asleep, Lyashkevsky, who does not approve of +an afternoon nap, sits at the window, stares at the dozing native, +and grumbles: + +"Race of curs! I wonder you don't choke with laziness. No work, no +intellectual or moral interests, nothing but vegetating . . . . +disgusting. Tfoo!" + +At six o'clock Finks wakes up. + +"It's too late to go to the high school now," he says, stretching. +"I shall have to go to-morrow, and now. . . . How about my revenge? +Let's have one more game. . . ." + +After seeing his visitor off, between nine and ten, Lyashkevsky +looks after him for some time, and says: + +"Damn the fellow, staying here the whole day and doing absolutely +nothing. . . . Simply get their salary and do no work; the devil +take them! . . . The German pig. . . ." + +He looks out of the window, but the native is no longer there. He +has gone to bed. There is no one to grumble at, and for the first +time in the day he keeps his mouth shut, but ten minutes passes and +he cannot restrain the depression that overpowers him, and begins +to grumble, shoving the old shabby armchair: + +"You only take up room, rubbishly old thing! You ought to have been +burnt long ago, but I keep forgetting to tell them to chop you up. +It's a disgrace!" + +And as he gets into bed he presses his hand on a spring of the +mattress, frowns and says peevishly: + +"The con--found--ed spring! It will cut my side all night. I will +tell them to rip up the mattress to-morrow and get you out, you +useless thing." + +He falls asleep at midnight, and dreams that he is pouring boiling +water over the natives, Finks, and the old armchair. + + +AN INQUIRY + +IT was midday. Voldyrev, a tall, thick-set country gentleman with +a cropped head and prominent eyes, took off his overcoat, mopped +his brow with his silk handkerchief, and somewhat diffidently went +into the government office. There they were scratching away. . . . + +"Where can I make an inquiry here?" he said, addressing a porter +who was bringing a trayful of glasses from the furthest recesses +of the office. "I have to make an inquiry here and to take a copy +of a resolution of the Council." + +"That way please! To that one sitting near the window!" said the +porter, indicating with the tray the furthest window. Voldyrev +coughed and went towards the window; there, at a green table spotted +like typhus, was sitting a young man with his hair standing up in +four tufts on his head, with a long pimply nose, and a long faded +uniform. He was writing, thrusting his long nose into the papers. +A fly was walking about near his right nostril, and he was continually +stretching out his lower lip and blowing under his nose, which gave +his face an extremely care-worn expression. + +"May I make an inquiry about my case here . . . of you? My name is +Voldyrev. and, by the way, I have to take a copy of the resolution +of the Council of the second of March." + +The clerk dipped his pen in the ink and looked to see if he had got +too much on it. Having satisfied himself that the pen would not +make a blot, he began scribbling away. His lip was thrust out, but +it was no longer necessary to blow: the fly had settled on his ear. + +"Can I make an inquiry here?" Voldyrev repeated a minute later, "my +name is Voldyrev, I am a landowner. . . ." + +"Ivan Alexeitch!" the clerk shouted into the air as though he had +not observed Voldyrev, "will you tell the merchant Yalikov when he +comes to sign the copy of the complaint lodged with the police! +I've told him a thousand times!" + +"I have come in reference to my lawsuit with the heirs of Princess +Gugulin," muttered Voldyrev. "The case is well known. I earnestly +beg you to attend to me." + +Still failing to observe Voldyrev, the clerk caught the fly on his +lip, looked at it attentively and flung it away. The country gentleman +coughed and blew his nose loudly on his checked pocket handkerchief. +But this was no use either. He was still unheard. The silence lasted +for two minutes. Voldyrev took a rouble note from his pocket and +laid it on an open book before the clerk. The clerk wrinkled up his +forehead, drew the book towards him with an anxious air and closed +it. + +"A little inquiry. . . . I want only to find out on what grounds +the heirs of Princess Gugulin. . . . May I trouble you?" + +The clerk, absorbed in his own thoughts, got up and, scratching his +elbow, went to a cupboard for something. Returning a minute later +to his table he became absorbed in the book again: another rouble +note was lying upon it. + +"I will trouble you for one minute only. . . . I have only to make +an inquiry." + +The clerk did not hear, he had begun copying something. + +Voldyrev frowned and looked hopelessly at the whole scribbling +brotherhood. + +"They write!" he thought, sighing. "They write, the devil take them +entirely!" + +He walked away from the table and stopped in the middle of the room, +his hands hanging hopelessly at his sides. The porter, passing again +with glasses, probably noticed the helpless expression of his face, +for he went close up to him and asked him in a low voice: + +"Well? Have you inquired?" + +"I've inquired, but he wouldn't speak to me." + +"You give him three roubles," whispered the porter. + +"I've given him two already." + +"Give him another." + +Voldyrev went back to the table and laid a green note on the open +book. + +The clerk drew the book towards him again and began turning over +the leaves, and all at once, as though by chance, lifted his eyes +to Voldyrev. His nose began to shine, turned red, and wrinkled up +in a grin. + +"Ah . . . what do you want?" he asked. + +"I want to make an inquiry in reference to my case. . . . My name +is Voldyrev." + +"With pleasure! The Gugulin case, isn't it? Very good. What is it +then exactly?" + +Voldyrev explained his business. + +The clerk became as lively as though he were whirled round by a +hurricane. He gave the necessary information, arranged for a copy +to be made, gave the petitioner a chair, and all in one instant. +He even spoke about the weather and asked after the harvest. And +when Voldyrev went away he accompanied him down the stairs, smiling +affably and respectfully, and looking as though he were ready any +minute to fall on his face before the gentleman. Voldyrev for some +reason felt uncomfortable, and in obedience to some inward impulse +he took a rouble out of his pocket and gave it to the clerk. And +the latter kept bowing and smiling, and took the rouble like a +conjuror, so that it seemed to flash through the air. + +"Well, what people!" thought the country gentleman as he went out +into the street, and he stopped and mopped his brow with his +handkerchief. + + +MARTYRS + +LIZOTCHKA KUDRINSKY, a young married lady who had many admirers, +was suddenly taken ill, and so seriously that her husband did not +go to his office, and a telegram was sent to her mamma at Tver. +This is how she told the story of her illness: + +"I went to Lyesnoe to auntie's. I stayed there a week and then I +went with all the rest to cousin Varya's. Varya's husband is a surly +brute and a despot (I'd shoot a husband like that), but we had a +very jolly time there. To begin with I took part in some private +theatricals. It was _A Scandal in a Respectable Family_. Hrustalev +acted marvellously! Between the acts I drank some cold, awfully +cold, lemon squash, with the tiniest nip of brandy in it. Lemon +squash with brandy in it is very much like champagne. . . . I drank +it and I felt nothing. Next day after the performance I rode out +on horseback with that Adolf Ivanitch. It was rather damp and there +was a strong wind. It was most likely then that I caught cold. Three +days later I came home to see how my dear, good Vassya was getting +on, and while here to get my silk dress, the one that has little +flowers on it. Vassya, of course, I did not find at home. I went +into the kitchen to tell Praskovya to set the samovar, and there I +saw on the table some pretty little carrots and turnips like +playthings. I ate one little carrot and well, a turnip too. I ate +very little, but only fancy, I began having a sharp pain at +once--spasms . . . spasms . . . spasms . . . ah, I am dying. Vassya +runs from the office. Naturally he clutches at his hair and turns +white. They run for the doctor. . . . Do you understand, I am dying, +dying." + +The spasms began at midday, before three o'clock the doctor came, +and at six Lizotchka fell asleep and slept soundly till two o'clock +in the morning. + +It strikes two. . . . The light of the little night lamp filters +scantily through the pale blue shade. Lizotchka is lying in bed, +her white lace cap stands out sharply against the dark background +of the red cushion. Shadows from the blue lamp-shade lie in patterns +on her pale face and her round plump shoulders. Vassily Stepanovitch +is sitting at her feet. The poor fellow is happy that his wife is +at home at last, and at the same time he is terribly alarmed by her +illness. + +"Well, how do you feel, Lizotchka?" he asks in a whisper, noticing +that she is awake. + +"I am better," moans Lizotchka. "I don't feel the spasms now, but +there is no sleeping. . . . I can't get to sleep!" + +"Isn't it time to change the compress, my angel?" + +Lizotchka sits up slowly with the expression of a martyr and +gracefully turns her head on one side. Vassily Stepanovitch with +reverent awe, scarcely touching her hot body with his fingers, +changes the compress. Lizotchka shrinks, laughs at the cold water +which tickles her, and lies down again. + +"You are getting no sleep, poor boy!" she moans. + +"As though I could sleep!" + +"It's my nerves, Vassya, I am a very nervous woman. The doctor has +prescribed for stomach trouble, but I feel that he doesn't understand +my illness. It's nerves and not the stomach, I swear that it is my +nerves. There is only one thing I am afraid of, that my illness may +take a bad turn." + +"No, Lizotchka, no, to-morrow you will be all right!" + +"Hardly likely! I am not afraid for myself. . . . I don't care, +indeed, I shall be glad to die, but I am sorry for you! You'll be +a widower and left all alone." + +Vassitchka rarely enjoys his wife's society, and has long been used +to solitude, but Lizotchka's words agitate him. + +"Goodness knows what you are saying, little woman! Why these gloomy +thoughts?" + +"Well, you will cry and grieve, and then you will get used to it. +You'll even get married again." + +The husband clutches his head. + +"There, there, I won't!" Lizotchka soothes him, "only you ought to +be prepared for anything." + +"And all of a sudden I shall die," she thinks, shutting her eyes. + +And Lizotchka draws a mental picture of her own death, how her +mother, her husband, her cousin Varya with her husband, her relations, +the admirers of her "talent" press round her death bed, as she +whispers her last farewell. All are weeping. Then when she is dead +they dress her, interestingly pale and dark-haired, in a pink dress +(it suits her) and lay her in a very expensive coffin on gold legs, +full of flowers. There is a smell of incense, the candles splutter. +Her husband never leaves the coffin, while the admirers of her +talent cannot take their eyes off her, and say: "As though living! +She is lovely in her coffin!" The whole town is talking of the life +cut short so prematurely. But now they are carrying her to the +church. The bearers are Ivan Petrovitch, Adolf Ivanitch, Varya's +husband, Nikolay Semyonitch, and the black-eyed student who had +taught her to drink lemon squash with brandy. It's only a pity +there's no music playing. After the burial service comes the +leave-taking. The church is full of sobs, they bring the lid with +tassels, and . . . Lizotchka is shut off from the light of day for +ever, there is the sound of hammering nails. Knock, knock, knock. + +Lizotchka shudders and opens her eyes. + +"Vassya, are you here?" she asks. "I have such gloomy thoughts. +Goodness, why am I so unlucky as not to sleep. Vassya, have pity, +do tell me something!" + +"What shall I tell you?" + +"Something about love," Lizotchka says languidly. "Or some anecdote +about Jews. . . ." + +Vassily Stepanovitch, ready for anything if only his wife will be +cheerful and not talk about death, combs locks of hair over his +ears, makes an absurd face, and goes up to Lizotchka. + +"Does your vatch vant mending?" he asks. + +"It does, it does," giggles Lizotchka, and hands him her gold watch +from the little table. "Mend it." + +Vassya takes the watch, examines the mechanism for a long time, and +wriggling and shrugging, says: "She can not be mended . . . in vun +veel two cogs are vanting. . . ." + +This is the whole performance. Lizotchka laughs and claps her hands. + +"Capital," she exclaims. "Wonderful. Do you know, Vassya, it's +awfully stupid of you not to take part in amateur theatricals! You +have a remarkable talent! You are much better than Sysunov. There +was an amateur called Sysunov who played with us in _It's My +Birthday_. A first-class comic talent, only fancy: a nose as thick +as a parsnip, green eyes, and he walks like a crane. . . . We all +roared; stay, I will show you how he walks." + +Lizotchka springs out of bed and begins pacing about the floor, +barefooted and without her cap. + +"A very good day to you!" she says in a bass, imitating a man's +voice. "Anything pretty? Anything new under the moon? Ha, ha, ha!" +she laughs. + +"Ha, ha, ha!" Vassya seconds her. And the young pair, roaring with +laughter, forgetting the illness, chase one another about the room. +The race ends in Vassya's catching his wife by her nightgown and +eagerly showering kisses upon her. After one particularly passionate +embrace Lizotchka suddenly remembers that she is seriously ill. . . . + +"What silliness!" she says, making a serious face and covering +herself with the quilt. "I suppose you have forgotten that I am +ill! Clever, I must say!" + +"Sorry . . ." falters her husband in confusion. + +"If my illness takes a bad turn it will be your fault. Not kind! +not good!" + +Lizotchka closes her eyes and is silent. Her former languor and +expression of martyrdom return again, there is a sound of gentle +moans. Vassya changes the compress, and glad that his wife is at +home and not gadding off to her aunt's, sits meekly at her feet. +He does not sleep all night. At ten o'clock the doctor comes. + +"Well, how are we feeling?" he asks as he takes her pulse. "Have +you slept?" + +"Badly," Lizotchka's husband answers for her, "very badly." + +The doctor walks away to the window and stares at a passing +chimney-sweep. + +"Doctor, may I have coffee to-day?" asks Lizotchka. + +"You may." + +"And may I get up?" + +"You might, perhaps, but . . . you had better lie in bed another +day." + +"She is awfully depressed," Vassya whispers in his ear, "such gloomy +thoughts, such pessimism. I am dreadfully uneasy about her." + +The doctor sits down to the little table, and rubbing his forehead, +prescribes bromide of potassium for Lizotchka, then makes his bow, +and promising to look in again in the evening, departs. Vassya does +not go to the office, but sits all day at his wife's feet. + +At midday the admirers of her talent arrive in a crowd. They are +agitated and alarmed, they bring masses of flowers and French novels. +Lizotchka, in a snow-white cap and a light dressing jacket, lies +in bed with an enigmatic look, as though she did not believe in her +own recovery. The admirers of her talent see her husband, but readily +forgive his presence: they and he are united by one calamity at +that bedside! + +At six o'clock in the evening Lizotchka falls asleep, and again +sleeps till two o'clock in the morning. Vassya as before sits at +her feet, struggles with drowsiness, changes her compress, plays +at being a Jew, and in the morning after a second night of suffering, +Liza is prinking before the looking-glass and putting on her hat. + +"Wherever are you going, my dear?" asks Vassya, with an imploring +look at her. + +"What?" says Lizotchka in wonder, assuming a scared expression, +"don't you know that there is a rehearsal to-day at Marya Lvovna's?" + +After escorting her there, Vassya having nothing to do to while +away his boredom, takes his portfolio and goes to the office. His +head aches so violently from his sleepless nights that his left eye +shuts of itself and refuses to open. . . . + +"What's the matter with you, my good sir?" his chief asks him. "What +is it?" + +Vassya waves his hand and sits down. + +"Don't ask me, your Excellency," he says with a sigh. "What I have +suffered in these two days, what I have suffered! Liza has been +ill!" + +"Good heavens," cried his chief in alarm. "Lizaveta Pavlovna, what +is wrong with her?" + +Vassily Stepanovitch merely throws up his hands and raises his eyes +to the ceiling, as though he would say: "It's the will of Providence." + +"Ah, my boy, I can sympathise with you with all my heart!" sighs +his chief, rolling his eyes. "I've lost my wife, my dear, I understand. +That is a loss, it is a loss! It's awful, awful! I hope Lizaveta +Pavlovna is better now! What doctor is attending her?" + +"Von Schterk." + +"Von Schterk! But you would have been better to have called in +Magnus or Semandritsky. But how very pale your face is. You are ill +yourself! This is awful!" + +"Yes, your Excellency, I haven't slept. What I have suffered, what +I have been through!" + +"And yet you came! Why you came I can't understand? One can't force +oneself like that! One mustn't do oneself harm like that. Go home +and stay there till you are well again! Go home, I command you! +Zeal is a very fine thing in a young official, but you mustn't +forget as the Romans used to say: 'mens sana in corpore sano,' that +is, a healthy brain in a healthy body." + +Vassya agrees, puts his papers back in his portfolio, and, taking +leave of his chief, goes home to bed. + + +THE LION AND THE SUN + +IN one of the towns lying on this side of the Urals a rumour was +afloat that a Persian magnate, called Rahat-Helam, was staying for +a few days in the town and putting up at the "Japan Hotel." This +rumour made no impression whatever upon the inhabitants; a Persian +had arrived, well, so be it. Only Stepan Ivanovitch Kutsyn, the +mayor of the town, hearing of the arrival of the oriental gentleman +from the secretary of the Town Hall, grew thoughtful and inquired: + +"Where is he going?" + +"To Paris or to London, I believe." + +"H'm. . . . Then he is a big-wig, I suppose?" + +"The devil only knows." + +As he went home from the Town Hall and had his dinner, the mayor +sank into thought again, and this time he went on thinking till the +evening. The arrival of the distinguished Persian greatly intrigued +him. It seemed to him that fate itself had sent him this Rahat-Helam, +and that a favourable opportunity had come at last for realising +his passionate, secretly cherished dream. Kutsyn had already two +medals, and the Stanislav of the third degree, the badge of the Red +Cross, and the badge of the Society of Saving from Drowning, and +in addition to these he had made himself a little gold gun crossed +by a guitar, and this ornament, hung from a buttonhole in his +uniform, looked in the distance like something special, and +delightfully resembled a badge of distinction. It is well known +that the more orders and medals you have the more you want--and +the mayor had long been desirous of receiving the Persian order of +The Lion and the Sun; he desired it passionately, madly. He knew +very well that there was no need to fight, or to subscribe to an +asylum, or to serve on committees to obtain this order; all that +was needed was a favourable opportunity. And now it seemed to him +that this opportunity had come. + +At noon on the following day he put on his chain and all his badges +of distinction and went to the 'Japan.' Destiny favoured him. When +he entered the distinguished Persian's apartment the latter was +alone and doing nothing. Rahat-Helam, an enormous Asiatic, with a +long nose like the beak of a snipe, with prominent eyes, and with +a fez on his head, was sitting on the floor rummaging in his +portmanteau. + +"I beg you to excuse my disturbing you," began Kutsyn, smiling. "I +have the honour to introduce myself, the hereditary, honourable +citizen and cavalier, Stepan Ivanovitch Kutsyn, mayor of this town. +I regard it as my duty to honour, in the person of your Highness, +so to say, the representative of a friendly and neighbourly state." + +The Persian turned and muttered something in very bad French, that +sounded like tapping a board with a piece of wood. + +"The frontiers of Persia"--Kutsyn continued the greeting he had +previously learned by heart--"are in close contact with the borders +of our spacious fatherland, and therefore mutual sympathies impel +me, so to speak, to express my solidarity with you." + +The illustrious Persian got up and again muttered something in a +wooden tongue. Kutsyn, who knew no foreign language, shook his head +to show that he did not understand. + +"Well, how am I to talk to him?" he thought. "It would be a good +thing to send for an interpreter at once, but it is a delicate +matter, I can't talk before witnesses. The interpreter would be +chattering all over the town afterwards." + +And Kutsyn tried to recall the foreign words he had picked up from +the newspapers. + +"I am the mayor of the town," he muttered. "That is the _lord mayor_ +. . . _municipalais_ . . . Vwee? Kompreney?" + +He wanted to express his social position in words or in gesture, +and did not know how. A picture hanging on the wall with an inscription +in large letters, "The Town of Venice," helped him out of his +difficulties. He pointed with his finger at the town, then at his +own head, and in that way obtained, as he imagined, the phrase: "I +am the head of the town." The Persian did not understand, but he +gave a smile, and said: + +"Goot, monsieur . . . goot . . . . ." Half-an-hour later the mayor +was slapping the Persian, first on the knee and then on the shoulder, +and saying: + +"Kompreney? Vwee? As _lord mayor_ and _municipalais_ I suggest that +you should take a little _promenage . . . kompreney? Promenage._" + +Kutsyn pointed at Venice, and with two fingers represented walking +legs. Rahat-Helam who kept his eyes fixed on his medals, and was +apparently guessing that this was the most important person in the +town, understood the word _promenage_ and grinned politely. Then +they both put on their coats and went out of the room. Downstairs +near the door leading to the restaurant of the 'Japan,' Kutsyn +reflected that it would not be amiss to entertain the Persian. He +stopped and indicating the tables, said: + +"By Russian custom it wouldn't be amiss . . . _puree, entrekot_, +champagne and so on, kompreney." + +The illustrious visitor understood, and a little later they were +both sitting in the very best room of the restaurant, eating, and +drinking champagne. + +"Let us drink to the prosperity of Persia!" said Kutsyn. "We Russians +love the Persians. Though we are of another faith, yet there are +common interests, mutual, so to say, sympathies . . . progress . . . +Asiatic markets. . . . The campaigns of peace so to say. . . ." + +The illustrious Persian ate and drank with an excellent appetite, +he stuck his fork into a slice of smoked sturgeon, and wagging his +head, enthusiastically said: "_Goot, bien._" + +"You like it?" said the mayor delighted. "_Bien_, that's capital." +And turning to the waiter he said: "Luka, my lad, see that two +pieces of smoked sturgeon, the best you have, are sent up to his +Highness's room!" + +Then the mayor and the Persian magnate went to look at the menagerie. +The townspeople saw their Stepan Ivanovitch, flushed with champagne, +gay and very well pleased, leading the Persian about the principal +streets and the bazaar, showing him the points of interest of the +town, and even taking him to the fire tower. + +Among other things the townspeople saw him stop near some stone +gates with lions on it, and point out to the Persian first the lion, +then the sun overhead, and then his own breast; then again he pointed +to the lion and to the sun while the Persian nodded his head as +though in sign of assent, and smiling showed his white teeth. In +the evening they were sitting in the London Hotel listening to the +harp-players, and where they spent the night is not known. + +Next day the mayor was at the Town Hall in the morning; the officials +there apparently already knew something and were making their +conjectures, for the secretary went up to him and said with an +ironical smile: + +"It is the custom of the Persians when an illustrious visitor comes +to visit you, you must slaughter a sheep with your own hands." + +And a little later an envelope that had come by post was handed to +him. The mayor tore it open and saw a caricature in it. It was a +drawing of Rahat-Helam with the mayor on his knees before him, +stretching out his hands and saying: + + "To prove our Russian friendship + For Persia's mighty realm, + And show respect for you, her envoy, + Myself I'd slaughter like a lamb, + But, pardon me, for I'm a--donkey!" + +The mayor was conscious of an unpleasant feeling like a gnawing in +the pit of the stomach, but not for long. By midday he was again +with the illustrious Persian, again he was regaling him and showing +him the points of interest in the town. Again he led him to the +stone gates, and again pointed to the lion, to the sun and to his +own breast. They dined at the 'Japan'; after dinner, with cigars +in their teeth, both, flushed and blissful, again mounted the fire +tower, and the mayor, evidently wishing to entertain the visitor +with an unusual spectacle, shouted from the top to a sentry walking +below: + +"Sound the alarm!" + +But the alarm was not sounded as the firemen were at the baths at +the moment. + +They supped at the 'London' and, after supper, the Persian departed. +When he saw him off, Stepan Ivanovitch kissed him three times after +the Russian fashion, and even grew tearful. And when the train +started, he shouted: + +"Give our greeting to Persia! Tell her that we love her!" + +A year and four months had passed. There was a bitter frost, +thirty-five degrees, and a piercing wind was blowing. Stepan +Ivanovitch was walking along the street with his fur coat thrown +open over his chest, and he was annoyed that he met no one to see +the Lion and the Sun upon his breast. He walked about like this +till evening with his fur coat open, was chilled to the bone, and +at night tossed from side to side and could not get to sleep. + +He felt heavy at heart. + +There was a burning sensation inside him, and his heart throbbed +uneasily; he had a longing now to get a Serbian order. It was a +painful, passionate longing. + + +A DAUGHTER OF ALBION + +A FINE carriage with rubber tyres, a fat coachman, and velvet on +the seats, rolled up to the house of a landowner called Gryabov. +Fyodor Andreitch Otsov, the district Marshal of Nobility, jumped +out of the carriage. A drowsy footman met him in the hall. + +"Are the family at home?" asked the Marshal. + +"No, sir. The mistress and the children are gone out paying visits, +while the master and mademoiselle are catching fish. Fishing all +the morning, sir." + +Otsov stood a little, thought a little, and then went to the river +to look for Gryabov. Going down to the river he found him a mile +and a half from the house. Looking down from the steep bank and +catching sight of Gryabov, Otsov gushed with laughter. . . . Gryabov, +a large stout man, with a very big head, was sitting on the sand, +angling, with his legs tucked under him like a Turk. His hat was +on the back of his head and his cravat had slipped on one side. +Beside him stood a tall thin Englishwoman, with prominent eyes like +a crab's, and a big bird-like nose more like a hook than a nose. +She was dressed in a white muslin gown through which her scraggy +yellow shoulders were very distinctly apparent. On her gold belt +hung a little gold watch. She too was angling. The stillness of the +grave reigned about them both. Both were motionless, as the river +upon which their floats were swimming. + +"A desperate passion, but deadly dull!" laughed Otsov. "Good-day, +Ivan Kuzmitch." + +"Ah . . . is that you?" asked Gryabov, not taking his eyes off the +water. "Have you come?" + +"As you see . . . . And you are still taken up with your crazy +nonsense! Not given it up yet?" + +"The devil's in it. . . . I begin in the morning and fish all day +. . . . The fishing is not up to much to-day. I've caught nothing and +this dummy hasn't either. We sit on and on and not a devil of a +fish! I could scream!" + +"Well, chuck it up then. Let's go and have some vodka!" + +"Wait a little, maybe we shall catch something. Towards evening the +fish bite better . . . . I've been sitting here, my boy, ever since +the morning! I can't tell you how fearfully boring it is. It was +the devil drove me to take to this fishing! I know that it is rotten +idiocy for me to sit here. I sit here like some scoundrel, like a +convict, and I stare at the water like a fool. I ought to go to the +haymaking, but here I sit catching fish. Yesterday His Holiness +held a service at Haponyevo, but I didn't go. I spent the day here +with this . . . with this she-devil." + +"But . . . have you taken leave of your senses?" asked Otsov, +glancing in embarrassment at the Englishwoman. "Using such language +before a lady and she . . . ." + +"Oh, confound her, it doesn't matter, she doesn't understand a +syllable of Russian, whether you praise her or blame her, it is all +the same to her! Just look at her nose! Her nose alone is enough +to make one faint. We sit here for whole days together and not a +single word! She stands like a stuffed image and rolls the whites +of her eyes at the water." + +The Englishwoman gave a yawn, put a new worm on, and dropped the +hook into the water. + +"I wonder at her not a little," Gryabov went on, "the great stupid +has been living in Russia for ten years and not a word of Russian! +. . . Any little aristocrat among us goes to them and learns to +babble away in their lingo, while they . . . there's no making them +out. Just look at her nose, do look at her nose!" + +"Come, drop it . . . it's uncomfortable. Why attack a woman?" + +"She's not a woman, but a maiden lady. . . . I bet she's dreaming +of suitors. The ugly doll. And she smells of something decaying +. . . . I've got a loathing for her, my boy! I can't look at her with +indifference. When she turns her ugly eyes on me it sends a twinge +all through me as though I had knocked my elbow on the parapet. She +likes fishing too. Watch her: she fishes as though it were a holy +rite! She looks upon everything with disdain . . . . She stands +there, the wretch, and is conscious that she is a human being, and +that therefore she is the monarch of nature. And do you know what +her name is? Wilka Charlesovna Fyce! Tfoo! There is no getting it +out!" + +The Englishwoman, hearing her name, deliberately turned her nose +in Gryabov's direction and scanned him with a disdainful glance; +she raised her eyes from Gryabov to Otsov and steeped him in disdain. +And all this in silence, with dignity and deliberation. + +"Did you see?" said Gryabov chuckling. "As though to say 'take +that.' Ah, you monster! It's only for the children's sake that I +keep that triton. If it weren't for the children, I wouldn't let +her come within ten miles of my estate. . . . She has got a nose +like a hawk's . . . and her figure! That doll makes me think of a +long nail, so I could take her, and knock her into the ground, you +know. Stay, I believe I have got a bite. . . ." + +Gryabov jumped up and raised his rod. The line drew taut. . . . +Gryabov tugged again, but could not pull out the hook. + +"It has caught," he said, frowning, "on a stone I expect . . . +damnation take it . . . ." + +There was a look of distress on Gryabov's face. Sighing, moving +uneasily, and muttering oaths, he began tugging at the line. + +"What a pity; I shall have to go into the water." + +"Oh, chuck it!" + +"I can't. . . . There's always good fishing in the evening. . . . +What a nuisance. Lord, forgive us, I shall have to wade into the +water, I must! And if only you knew, I have no inclination to +undress. I shall have to get rid of the Englishwoman. . . . It's +awkward to undress before her. After all, she is a lady, you know!" + +Gryabov flung off his hat, and his cravat. + +"Meess . . . er, er . . ." he said, addressing the Englishwoman, +"Meess Fyce, je voo pree . . . ? Well, what am I to say to her? How +am I to tell you so that you can understand? I say . . . over there! +Go away over there! Do you hear?" + +Miss Fyce enveloped Gryabov in disdain, and uttered a nasal sound. + +"What? Don't you understand? Go away from here, I tell you! I must +undress, you devil's doll! Go over there! Over there!" + +Gryabov pulled the lady by her sleeve, pointed her towards the +bushes, and made as though he would sit down, as much as to say: +Go behind the bushes and hide yourself there. . . . The Englishwoman, +moving her eyebrows vigorously, uttered rapidly a long sentence in +English. The gentlemen gushed with laughter. + +"It's the first time in my life I've heard her voice. There's no +denying, it is a voice! She does not understand! Well, what am I +to do with her?" + +"Chuck it, let's go and have a drink of vodka!" + +"I can't. Now's the time to fish, the evening. . . . It's evening +. . . . Come, what would you have me do? It is a nuisance! I shall +have to undress before her. . . ." + +Gryabov flung off his coat and his waistcoat and sat on the sand +to take off his boots. + +"I say, Ivan Kuzmitch," said the marshal, chuckling behind his hand. +"It's really outrageous, an insult." + +"Nobody asks her not to understand! It's a lesson for these +foreigners!" + +Gryabov took off his boots and his trousers, flung off his undergarments +and remained in the costume of Adam. Otsov held his sides, he turned +crimson both from laughter and embarrassment. The Englishwoman +twitched her brows and blinked . . . . A haughty, disdainful smile +passed over her yellow face. + +"I must cool off," said Gryabov, slapping himself on the ribs. "Tell +me if you please, Fyodor Andreitch, why I have a rash on my chest +every summer." + +"Oh, do get into the water quickly or cover yourself with something, +you beast." + +"And if only she were confused, the nasty thing," said Gryabov, +crossing himself as he waded into the water. "Brrrr . . . the water's +cold. . . . Look how she moves her eyebrows! She doesn't go away +. . . she is far above the crowd! He, he, he . . . . and she doesn't +reckon us as human beings." + +Wading knee deep in the water and drawing his huge figure up to its +full height, he gave a wink and said: + +"This isn't England, you see!" + +Miss Fyce coolly put on another worm, gave a yawn, and dropped the +hook in. Otsov turned away, Gryabov released his hook, ducked into +the water and, spluttering, waded out. Two minutes later he was +sitting on the sand and angling as before. + + +CHORISTERS + +THE Justice of the Peace, who had received a letter from Petersburg, +had set the news going that the owner of Yefremovo, Count Vladimir +Ivanovitch, would soon be arriving. When he would arrive--there +was no saying. + +"Like a thief in the night," said Father Kuzma, a grey-headed little +priest in a lilac cassock. "And when he does come the place will +be crowded with the nobility and other high gentry. All the neighbours +will flock here. Mind now, do your best, Alexey Alexeitch. . . . I +beg you most earnestly." + +"You need not trouble about me," said Alexey Alexeitch, frowning. +"I know my business. If only my enemy intones the litany in the +right key. He may . . . out of sheer spite. . . ." + +"There, there. . . . I'll persuade the deacon. . . I'll persuade +him." + +Alexey Alexeitch was the sacristan of the Yefremovo church. He also +taught the schoolboys church and secular singing, for which he +received sixty roubles a year from the revenues of the Count's +estate. The schoolboys were bound to sing in church in return for +their teaching. Alexey Alexeitch was a tall, thick-set man of +dignified deportment, with a fat, clean-shaven face that reminded +one of a cow's udder. His imposing figure and double chin made him +look like a man occupying an important position in the secular +hierarchy rather than a sacristan. It was strange to see him, so +dignified and imposing, flop to the ground before the bishop and, +on one occasion, after too loud a squabble with the deacon Yevlampy +Avdiessov, remain on his knees for two hours by order of the head +priest of the district. Grandeur was more in keeping with his figure +than humiliation. + +On account of the rumours of the Count's approaching visit he had +a choir practice every day, morning and evening. The choir practice +was held at the school. It did not interfere much with the school +work. During the practice the schoolmaster, Sergey Makaritch, set +the children writing copies while he joined the tenors as an amateur. + +This is how the choir practice was conducted. Alexey Alexeitch would +come into the school-room, slamming the door and blowing his nose. +The trebles and altos extricated themselves noisily from the +school-tables. The tenors and basses, who had been waiting for some +time in the yard, came in, tramping like horses. They all took their +places. Alexey Alexeitch drew himself up, made a sign to enforce +silence, and struck a note with the tuning fork. + +"To-to-li-to-tom . . . Do-mi-sol-do!" + +"Adagio, adagio. . . . Once more." + +After the "Amen" there followed "Lord have mercy upon us" from the +Great Litany. All this had been learned long ago, sung a thousand +times and thoroughly digested, and it was gone through simply as a +formality. It was sung indolently, unconsciously. Alexey Alexeitch +waved his arms calmly and chimed in now in a tenor, now in a bass +voice. It was all slow, there was nothing interesting. . . . But +before the "Cherubim" hymn the whole choir suddenly began blowing +their noses, coughing and zealously turning the pages of their +music. The sacristan turned his back on the choir and with a +mysterious expression on his face began tuning his violin. The +preparations lasted a couple of minutes. + +"Take your places. Look at your music carefully. . . . Basses, don't +overdo it . . . rather softly." + +Bortnyansky's "Cherubim" hymn, No. 7, was selected. At a given +signal silence prevailed. All eyes were fastened on the music, the +trebles opened their mouths. Alexey Alexeitch softly lowered his +arm. + +"Piano . . . piano. . . . You see 'piano' is written there. . . . +More lightly, more lightly." + +When they had to sing "piano" an expression of benevolence and +amiability overspread Alexey Alexeitch's face, as though he was +dreaming of a dainty morsel. + +"Forte . . . forte! Hold it!" + +And when they had to sing "forte" the sacristan's fat face expressed +alarm and even horror. + +The "Cherubim" hymn was sung well, so well that the school-children +abandoned their copies and fell to watching the movements of Alexey +Alexeitch. People stood under the windows. The schoolwatchman, +Vassily, came in wearing an apron and carrying a dinner-knife in +his hand and stood listening. Father Kuzma, with an anxious face +appeared suddenly as though he had sprung from out of the earth. . . . +After 'Let us lay aside all earthly cares' Alexey Alexeitch +wiped the sweat off his brow and went up to Father Kuzma in excitement. + +"It puzzles me, Father Kuzma," he said, shrugging his shoulders, +"why is it that the Russian people have no understanding? It puzzles +me, may the Lord chastise me! Such an uncultured people that you +really cannot tell whether they have a windpipe in their throats +or some other sort of internal arrangement. Were you choking, or +what?" he asked, addressing the bass Gennady Semitchov, the innkeeper's +brother. + +"Why?" + +"What is your voice like? It rattles like a saucepan. I bet you +were boozing yesterday! That's what it is! Your breath smells like +a tavern. . . . E-ech! You are a clodhopper, brother! You are a +lout! How can you be a chorister if you keep company with peasants +in the tavern? Ech, you are an ass, brother!" + +"It's a sin, it's a sin, brother," muttered Father Kuzma. "God sees +everything . . . through and through . . . ." + +"That's why you have no idea of singing--because you care more +for vodka than for godliness, you fool." + +"Don't work yourself up," said Father Kuzma. "Don't be cross. . . . +I will persuade him." + +Father Kuzma went up to Gennady Semitchov and began "persuading" +him: "What do you do it for? Try and put your mind to it. A man who +sings ought to restrain himself, because his throat is . . . er . . +tender." + +Gennady scratched his neck and looked sideways towards the window +as though the words did not apply to him. + +After the "Cherubim" hymn they sang the Creed, then "It is meet and +right"; they sang smoothly and with feeling, and so right on to +"Our Father." + +"To my mind, Father Kuzma," said the sacristan, "the old 'Our Father' +is better than the modern. That's what we ought to sing before the +Count." + +"No, no. . . . Sing the modern one. For the Count hears nothing but +modern music when he goes to Mass in Petersburg or Moscow. . . . +In the churches there, I imagine . . . there's very different sort +of music there, brother!" + +After "Our Father" there was again a great blowing of noses, coughing +and turning over of pages. The most difficult part of the performance +came next: the "concert." Alexey Alexeitch was practising two pieces, +"Who is the God of glory" and "Universal Praise." Whichever the +choir learned best would be sung before the Count. During the +"concert" the sacristan rose to a pitch of enthusiasm. The expression +of benevolence was continually alternating with one of alarm. + +"Forte!" he muttered. "Andante! let yourselves go! Sing, you image! +Tenors, you don't bring it off! To-to-ti-to-tom. . . . Sol . . . +si . . . sol, I tell you, you blockhead! Glory! Basses, glo . . . +o . . . ry." + +His bow travelled over the heads and shoulders of the erring trebles +and altos. His left hand was continually pulling the ears of the +young singers. On one occasion, carried away by his feelings he +flipped the bass Gennady under the chin with his bent thumb. But +the choristers were not moved to tears or to anger at his blows: +they realised the full gravity of their task. + +After the "concert" came a minute of silence. Alexey Alexeitch, +red, perspiring and exhausted, sat down on the window-sill, and +turned upon the company lustreless, wearied, but triumphant eyes. +In the listening crowd he observed to his immense annoyance the +deacon Avdiessov. The deacon, a tall thick-set man with a red +pock-marked face, and straw in his hair, stood leaning against the +stove and grinning contemptuously. + +"That's right, sing away! Perform your music!" he muttered in a +deep bass. "Much the Count will care for your singing! He doesn't +care whether you sing with music or without. . . . For he is an +atheist." + +Father Kuzma looked round in a scared way and twiddled his fingers. + +"Come, come," he muttered. "Hush, deacon, I beg." + +After the "concert" they sang "May our lips be filled with praise," +and the choir practice was over. The choir broke up to reassemble +in the evening for another practice. And so it went on every day. + +One month passed and then a second. . . . The steward, too, had by +then received a notice that the Count would soon be coming. At last +the dusty sun-blinds were taken off the windows of the big house, +and Yefremovo heard the strains of the broken-down, out-of-tune +piano. Father Kuzma was pining, though he could not himself have +said why, or whether it was from delight or alarm. . . . The deacon +went about grinning. + +The following Saturday evening Father Kuzma went to the sacristan's +lodgings. His face was pale, his shoulders drooped, the lilac of +his cassock looked faded. + +"I have just been at his Excellency's," he said to the sacristan, +stammering. "He is a cultivated gentleman with refined ideas. But +. . . er . . . it's mortifying, brother. . . . 'At what o'clock, +your Excellency, do you desire us to ring for Mass to-morrow?' And +he said: 'As you think best. Only, couldn't it be as short and quick +as possible without a choir.' Without a choir! Er . . . do you +understand, without, without a choir. . . ." + +Alexey Alexeitch turned crimson. He would rather have spent two +hours on his knees again than have heard those words! He did not +sleep all night. He was not so much mortified at the waste of his +labours as at the fact that the deacon would give him no peace now +with his jeers. The deacon was delighted at his discomfiture. Next +day all through the service he was casting disdainful glances towards +the choir where Alexey Alexeitch was booming responses in solitude. +When he passed by the choir with the censer he muttered: + +"Perform your music! Do your utmost! The Count will give a ten-rouble +note to the choir!" + +After the service the sacristan went home, crushed and ill with +mortification. At the gate he was overtaken by the red-faced deacon. + +"Stop a minute, Alyosha!" said the deacon. "Stop a minute, silly, +don't be cross! You are not the only one, I am in for it too! +Immediately after the Mass Father Kuzma went up to the Count and +asked: 'And what did you think of the deacon's voice, your Excellency. +He has a deep bass, hasn't he?' And the Count--do you know what +he answered by way of compliment? 'Anyone can bawl,' he said. 'A +man's voice is not as important as his brains.' A learned gentleman +from Petersburg! An atheist is an atheist, and that's all about it! +Come, brother in misfortune, let us go and have a drop to drown our +troubles!" + +And the enemies went out of the gate arm-in-arm. + + +NERVES + +DMITRI OSIPOVITCH VAXIN, the architect, returned from town to his +holiday cottage greatly impressed by the spiritualistic séance at +which he had been present. As he undressed and got into his solitary +bed (Madame Vaxin had gone to an all-night service) he could not +help remembering all he had seen and heard. It had not, properly +speaking, been a séance at all, but the whole evening had been spent +in terrifying conversation. A young lady had begun it by talking, +apropos of nothing, about thought-reading. From thought-reading +they had passed imperceptibly to spirits, and from spirits to ghosts, +from ghosts to people buried alive. . . . A gentleman had read a +horrible story of a corpse turning round in the coffin. Vaxin himself +had asked for a saucer and shown the young ladies how to converse +with spirits. He had called up among others the spirit of his +deceased uncle, Klavdy Mironitch, and had mentally asked him: + +"Has not the time come for me to transfer the ownership of our house +to my wife?" + +To which his uncle's spirit had replied: + +"All things are good in their season." + +"There is a great deal in nature that is mysterious and . . . +terrible . . ." thought Vaxin, as he got into bed. "It's not the +dead but the unknown that's so horrible." + +It struck one o'clock. Vaxin turned over on the other side and +peeped out from beneath the bedclothes at the blue light of the +lamp burning before the holy ikon. The flame flickered and cast a +faint light on the ikon-stand and the big portrait of Uncle Klavdy +that hung facing his bed. + +"And what if the ghost of Uncle Klavdy should appear this minute?" +flashed through Vaxin's mind. "But, of course, that's impossible." + +Ghosts are, we all know, a superstition, the offspring of undeveloped +intelligence, but Vaxin, nevertheless, pulled the bed-clothes over +his head, and shut his eyes very tight. The corpse that turned round +in its coffin came back to his mind, and the figures of his deceased +mother-in-law, of a colleague who had hanged himself, and of a girl +who had drowned herself, rose before his imagination. . . . Vaxin +began trying to dispel these gloomy ideas, but the more he tried +to drive them away the more haunting the figures and fearful fancies +became. He began to feel frightened. + +"Hang it all!" he thought. "Here I am afraid in the dark like a +child! Idiotic!" + +Tick . . . tick . . . tick . . . he heard the clock in the next +room. The church-bell chimed the hour in the churchyard close by. +The bell tolled slowly, depressingly, mournfully. . . . A cold chill +ran down Vaxin's neck and spine. He fancied he heard someone breathing +heavily over his head, as though Uncle Klavdy had stepped out of +his frame and was bending over his nephew. . . . Vaxin felt unbearably +frightened. He clenched his teeth and held his breath in terror. + +At last, when a cockchafer flew in at the open window and began +buzzing over his bed, he could bear it no longer and gave a violent +tug at the bellrope. + +"Dmitri Osipitch, _was wollen Sie?_" he heard the voice of the +German governess at his door a moment later. + +"Ah, it's you, Rosalia Karlovna!" Vaxin cried, delighted. "Why do +you trouble? Gavrila might just . . ." + +"Yourself Gavrila to the town sent. And Glafira is somewhere all +the evening gone. . . . There's nobody in the house. . . . _Was +wollen Sie doch?_" + +"Well, what I wanted . . . it's . . . but, please, come in . . . +you needn't mind! . . . it's dark." + +Rosalia Karlovna, a stout red-cheeked person, came in to the bedroom +and stood in an expectant attitude at the door. + +"Sit down, please . . . you see, it's like this. . . . What on earth +am I to ask her for?" he wondered, stealing a glance at Uncle +Klavdy's portrait and feeling his soul gradually returning to +tranquility. + +"What I really wanted to ask you was . . . Oh, when the man goes +to town, don't forget to tell him to . . . er . . . er . . . to get +some cigarette-papers. . . . But do, please sit down." + +"Cigarette-papers? good. . . . _Was wollen Sie noch?_" + +"_Ich will_ . . . there's nothing I will, but. . . But do sit down! +I shall think of something else in a minute." + +"It is shocking for a maiden in a man's room to remain. . . . Mr. +Vaxin, you are, I see, a naughty man. . . . I understand. . . . To +order cigarette-papers one does not a person wake. . . . I understand +you. . . ." + +Rosalia Karlovna turned and went out of the room. + +Somewhat reassured by his conversation with her and ashamed of his +cowardice, Vaxin pulled the bedclothes over his head and shut his +eyes. For about ten minutes he felt fairly comfortable, then the +same nonsense came creeping back into his mind. . . . He swore to +himself, felt for the matches, and without opening his eyes lighted +a candle. + +But even the light was no use. To Vaxin' s excited imagination it +seemed as though someone were peeping round the corner and that his +uncle's eyes were moving. + +"I'll ring her up again . . . damn the woman!" he decided. "I'll +tell her I'm unwell and ask for some drops." + +Vaxin rang. There was no response. He rang again, and as though +answering his ring, he heard the church-bell toll the hour. + +Overcome with terror, cold all over, he jumped out of bed, ran +headlong out of his bedroom, and making the sign of the cross and +cursing himself for his cowardice, he fled barefoot in his night-shirt +to the governess's room. + +"Rosalia Karlovna!" he began in a shaking voice as he knocked at +her door, "Rosalia Karlovna! . . . Are you asleep? . . . I feel +. . . so . . . er . . . er . . . unwell. . . . Drops! . . ." + +There was no answer. Silence reigned. + +"I beg you . . . do you understand? I beg you! Why this squeamishness, +I can't understand . . . especially when a man . . . is ill . . . +How absurdly _zierlich manierlich_ you are really . . . at your +age. . . ." + +"I to your wife shall tell. . . . Will not leave an honest maiden +in peace. . . . When I was at Baron Anzig's, and the baron try to +come to me for matches, I understand at once what his matches mean +and tell to the baroness. . . . I am an honest maiden." + +"Hang your honesty! I am ill I tell you . . . and asking you for +drops. Do you understand? I'm ill!" + +"Your wife is an honest, good woman, and you ought her to love! +_Ja!_ She is noble! . . . I will not be her foe!" + +"You are a fool! simply a fool! Do you understand, a fool?" + +Vaxin leaned against the door-post, folded his arms and waited for +his panic to pass off. To return to his room where the lamp flickered +and his uncle stared at him from his frame was more than he could +face, and to stand at the governess's door in nothing but his +night-shirt was inconvenient from every point of view. What could +he do? + +It struck two o'clock and his terror had not left him. There was +no light in the passage and something dark seemed to be peeping out +from every corner. Vaxin turned so as to face the door-post, but +at that instant it seemed as though somebody tweaked his night-shirt +from behind and touched him on the shoulder. + +"Damnation! . . . Rosalia Karlovna!" + +No answer. Vaxin hesitatingly opened the door and peeped into the +room. The virtuous German was sweetly slumbering. The tiny flame +of a night-light threw her solid buxom person into relief. Vaxin +stepped into the room and sat down on a wickerwork trunk near the +door. He felt better in the presence of a living creature, even +though that creature was asleep. + +"Let the German idiot sleep," he thought, "I'll sit here, and when +it gets light I'll go back. . . . It's daylight early now." + +Vaxin curled up on the trunk and put his arm under his head to await +the coming of dawn. + +"What a thing it is to have nerves!" he reflected. "An educated, +intelligent man! . . . Hang it all! . . . It's a perfect disgrace!" + +As he listened to the gentle, even breathing of Rosalia Karlovna, +he soon recovered himself completely. + +At six o'clock, Vaxin's wife returned from the all-night service, +and not finding her husband in their bedroom, went to the governess +to ask her for some change for the cabman. + +On entering the German's room, a strange sight met her eyes. + +On the bed lay stretched Rosalia Karlovna fast asleep, and a couple +of yards from her was her husband curled up on the trunk sleeping +the sleep of the just and snoring loudly. + +What she said to her husband, and how he looked when he woke, I +leave to others to describe. It is beyond my powers. + + +A WORK OF ART + +SASHA SMIRNOV, the only son of his mother, holding under his arm, +something wrapped up in No. 223 of the _Financial News_, assumed a +sentimental expression, and went into Dr. Koshelkov's consulting-room. + +"Ah, dear lad!" was how the doctor greeted him. "Well! how are we +feeling? What good news have you for me?" + +Sasha blinked, laid his hand on his heart and said in an agitated +voice: "Mamma sends her greetings to you, Ivan Nikolaevitch, and +told me to thank you. . . . I am the only son of my mother and you +have saved my life . . . you have brought me through a dangerous +illness and . . . we do not know how to thank you." + +"Nonsense, lad!" said the doctor, highly delighted. "I only did +what anyone else would have done in my place." + +"I am the only son of my mother . . . we are poor people and cannot +of course repay you, and we are quite ashamed, doctor, although, +however, mamma and I . . . the only son of my mother, earnestly beg +you to accept in token of our gratitude . . . this object, which +. . . An object of great value, an antique bronze. . . . A rare work +of art." + +"You shouldn't!" said the doctor, frowning. "What's this for!" + +"No, please do not refuse," Sasha went on muttering as he unpacked +the parcel. "You will wound mamma and me by refusing. . . . It's a +fine thing . . . an antique bronze. . . . It was left us by my +deceased father and we have kept it as a precious souvenir. My +father used to buy antique bronzes and sell them to connoisseurs +. . . Mamma and I keep on the business now." + +Sasha undid the object and put it solemnly on the table. It was a +not very tall candelabra of old bronze and artistic workmanship. +It consisted of a group: on the pedestal stood two female figures +in the costume of Eve and in attitudes for the description of which +I have neither the courage nor the fitting temperament. The figures +were smiling coquettishly and altogether looked as though, had it +not been for the necessity of supporting the candlestick, they would +have skipped off the pedestal and have indulged in an orgy such as +is improper for the reader even to imagine. + +Looking at the present, the doctor slowly scratched behind his ear, +cleared his throat and blew his nose irresolutely. + +"Yes, it certainly is a fine thing," he muttered, "but . . . how +shall I express it? . . . it's . . . h'm . . . it's not quite for +family reading. It's not simply decolleté but beyond anything, dash +it all. . . ." + +"How do you mean?" + +"The serpent-tempter himself could not have invented anything worse +. . . . Why, to put such a phantasmagoria on the table would be +defiling the whole flat." + +"What a strange way of looking at art, doctor!" said Sasha, offended. +"Why, it is an artistic thing, look at it! There is so much beauty +and elegance that it fills one's soul with a feeling of reverence +and brings a lump into one's throat! When one sees anything so +beautiful one forgets everything earthly. . . . Only look, how much +movement, what an atmosphere, what expression!" + +"I understand all that very well, my dear boy," the doctor interposed, +"but you know I am a family man, my children run in here, ladies +come in." + +"Of course if you look at it from the point of view of the crowd," +said Sasha, "then this exquisitely artistic work may appear in a +certain light. . . . But, doctor, rise superior to the crowd, +especially as you will wound mamma and me by refusing it. I am the +only son of my mother, you have saved my life. . . . We are giving +you the thing most precious to us and . . . and I only regret that +I have not the pair to present to you. . . ." + +"Thank you, my dear fellow, I am very grateful . . . Give my respects +to your mother but really consider, my children run in here, ladies +come. . . . However, let it remain! I see there's no arguing with +you." + +"And there is nothing to argue about," said Sasha, relieved. "Put +the candlestick here, by this vase. What a pity we have not the +pair to it! It is a pity! Well, good-bye, doctor." + +After Sasha's departure the doctor looked for a long time at the +candelabra, scratched behind his ear and meditated. + +"It's a superb thing, there's no denying it," he thought, "and it +would be a pity to throw it away. . . . But it's impossible for me +to keep it. . . . H'm! . . . Here's a problem! To whom can I make +a present of it, or to what charity can I give it?" + +After long meditation he thought of his good friend, the lawyer +Uhov, to whom he was indebted for the management of legal business. + +"Excellent," the doctor decided, "it would be awkward for him as a +friend to take money from me, and it will be very suitable for me +to present him with this. I will take him the devilish thing! Luckily +he is a bachelor and easy-going." + +Without further procrastination the doctor put on his hat and coat, +took the candelabra and went off to Uhov's. + +"How are you, friend!" he said, finding the lawyer at home. "I've +come to see you . . . to thank you for your efforts. . . . You won't +take money so you must at least accept this thing here. . . . See, +my dear fellow. . . . The thing is magnificent!" + +On seeing the bronze the lawyer was moved to indescribable delight. + +"What a specimen!" he chuckled. "Ah, deuce take it, to think of +them imagining such a thing, the devils! Exquisite! Ravishing! Where +did you get hold of such a delightful thing?" + +After pouring out his ecstasies the lawyer looked timidly towards +the door and said: "Only you must carry off your present, my boy +. . . . I can't take it. . . ." + +"Why?" cried the doctor, disconcerted. + +"Why . . . because my mother is here at times, my clients . . . +besides I should be ashamed for my servants to see it." + +"Nonsense! Nonsense! Don't you dare to refuse!" said the doctor, +gesticulating. "It's piggish of you! It's a work of art! . . . What +movement . . . what expression! I won't even talk of it! You will +offend me!" + +"If one could plaster it over or stick on fig-leaves . . ." + +But the doctor gesticulated more violently than before, and dashing +out of the flat went home, glad that he had succeeded in getting +the present off his hands. + +When he had gone away the lawyer examined the candelabra, fingered +it all over, and then, like the doctor, racked his brains over the +question what to do with the present. + +"It's a fine thing," he mused, "and it would be a pity to throw it +away and improper to keep it. The very best thing would be to make +a present of it to someone. . . . I know what! I'll take it this +evening to Shashkin, the comedian. The rascal is fond of such things, +and by the way it is his benefit tonight." + +No sooner said than done. In the evening the candelabra, carefully +wrapped up, was duly carried to Shashkin's. The whole evening the +comic actor's dressing-room was besieged by men coming to admire +the present; the dressing-room was filled with the hum of enthusiasm +and laughter like the neighing of horses. If one of the actresses +approached the door and asked: "May I come in?" the comedian's husky +voice was heard at once: "No, no, my dear, I am not dressed!" + +After the performance the comedian shrugged his shoulders, flung +up his hands and said: "Well what am I to do with the horrid thing? +Why, I live in a private flat! Actresses come and see me! It's not +a photograph that you can put in a drawer!" + +"You had better sell it, sir," the hairdresser who was disrobing +the actor advised him. "There's an old woman living about here who +buys antique bronzes. Go and enquire for Madame Smirnov . . . +everyone knows her." + +The actor followed his advice. . . . Two days later the doctor was +sitting in his consulting-room, and with his finger to his brow was +meditating on the acids of the bile. All at once the door opened +and Sasha Smirnov flew into the room. He was smiling, beaming, and +his whole figure was radiant with happiness. In his hands he held +something wrapped up in newspaper. + +"Doctor!" he began breathlessly, "imagine my delight! Happily for +you we have succeeded in picking up the pair to your candelabra! +Mamma is so happy. . . . I am the only son of my mother, you saved +my life. . . ." + +And Sasha, all of a tremor with gratitude, set the candelabra before +the doctor. The doctor opened his mouth, tried to say something, +but said nothing: he could not speak. + + +A JOKE + +IT was a bright winter midday. . . . There was a sharp snapping +frost and the curls on Nadenka's temples and the down on her upper +lip were covered with silvery frost. She was holding my arm and we +were standing on a high hill. From where we stood to the ground +below there stretched a smooth sloping descent in which the sun was +reflected as in a looking-glass. Beside us was a little sledge lined +with bright red cloth. + +"Let us go down, Nadyezhda Petrovna!" I besought her. "Only once! +I assure you we shall be all right and not hurt." + +But Nadenka was afraid. The slope from her little goloshes to the +bottom of the ice hill seemed to her a terrible, immensely deep +abyss. Her spirit failed her, and she held her breath as she looked +down, when I merely suggested her getting into the sledge, but what +would it be if she were to risk flying into the abyss! She would +die, she would go out of her mind. + +"I entreat you!" I said. "You mustn't be afraid! You know it's +poor-spirited, it's cowardly!" + +Nadenka gave way at last, and from her face I saw that she gave way +in mortal dread. I sat her in the sledge, pale and trembling, put +my arm round her and with her cast myself down the precipice. + +The sledge flew like a bullet. The air cleft by our flight beat in +our faces, roared, whistled in our ears, tore at us, nipped us +cruelly in its anger, tried to tear our heads off our shoulders. +We had hardly strength to breathe from the pressure of the wind. +It seemed as though the devil himself had caught us in his claws +and was dragging us with a roar to hell. Surrounding objects melted +into one long furiously racing streak . . . another moment and it +seemed we should perish. + +"I love you, Nadya!" I said in a low voice. + +The sledge began moving more and more slowly, the roar of the wind +and the whirr of the runners was no longer so terrible, it was +easier to breathe, and at last we were at the bottom. Nadenka was +more dead than alive. She was pale and scarcely breathing. . . . I +helped her to get up. + +"Nothing would induce me to go again," she said, looking at me with +wide eyes full of horror. "Nothing in the world! I almost died!" + +A little later she recovered herself and looked enquiringly into +my eyes, wondering had I really uttered those four words or had she +fancied them in the roar of the hurricane. And I stood beside her +smoking and looking attentively at my glove. + +She took my arm and we spent a long while walking near the ice-hill. +The riddle evidently would not let her rest. . . . Had those words +been uttered or not? . . . Yes or no? Yes or no? It was the question +of pride, or honour, of life--a very important question, the most +important question in the world. Nadenka kept impatiently, sorrowfully +looking into my face with a penetrating glance; she answered at +random, waiting to see whether I would not speak. Oh, the play of +feeling on that sweet face! I saw that she was struggling with +herself, that she wanted to say something, to ask some question, +but she could not find the words; she felt awkward and frightened +and troubled by her joy. . . . + +"Do you know what," she said without looking at me. + +"Well?" I asked. + +"Let us . . . slide down again." + +We clambered up the ice-hill by the steps again. I sat Nadenka, +pale and trembling, in the sledge; again we flew into the terrible +abyss, again the wind roared and the runners whirred, and again +when the flight of our sledge was at its swiftest and noisiest, I +said in a low voice: + +"I love you, Nadenka!" + +When the sledge stopped, Nadenka flung a glance at the hill down +which we had both slid, then bent a long look upon my face, listened +to my voice which was unconcerned and passionless, and the whole +of her little figure, every bit of it, even her muff and her hood +expressed the utmost bewilderment, and on her face was written: +"What does it mean? Who uttered _those_ words? Did he, or did I +only fancy it?" + +The uncertainty worried her and drove her out of all patience. The +poor girl did not answer my questions, frowned, and was on the point +of tears. + +"Hadn't we better go home?" I asked. + +"Well, I . . . I like this tobogganning," she said, flushing. "Shall +we go down once more?" + +She "liked" the tobogganning, and yet as she got into the sledge +she was, as both times before, pale, trembling, hardly able to +breathe for terror. + +We went down for the third time, and I saw she was looking at my +face and watching my lips. But I put my handkerchief to my lips, +coughed, and when we reached the middle of the hill I succeeded in +bringing out: + +"I love you, Nadya!" + +And the mystery remained a mystery! Nadenka was silent, pondering +on something. . . . I saw her home, she tried to walk slowly, +slackened her pace and kept waiting to see whether I would not say +those words to her, and I saw how her soul was suffering, what +effort she was making not to say to herself: + +"It cannot be that the wind said them! And I don't want it to be +the wind that said them!" + +Next morning I got a little note: + +"If you are tobogganning to-day, come for me.--N." + +And from that time I began going every day tobogganning with Nadenka, +and as we flew down in the sledge, every time I pronounced in a low +voice the same words: "I love you, Nadya!" + +Soon Nadenka grew used to that phrase as to alcohol or morphia. She +could not live without it. It is true that flying down the ice-hill +terrified her as before, but now the terror and danger gave a +peculiar fascination to words of love--words which as before were +a mystery and tantalized the soul. The same two--the wind and I +were still suspected. . . . Which of the two was making love to her +she did not know, but apparently by now she did not care; from which +goblet one drinks matters little if only the beverage is intoxicating. + +It happened I went to the skating-ground alone at midday; mingling +with the crowd I saw Nadenka go up to the ice-hill and look about +for me . . . then she timidly mounted the steps. . . . She was +frightened of going alone--oh, how frightened! She was white as +the snow, she was trembling, she went as though to the scaffold, +but she went, she went without looking back, resolutely. She had +evidently determined to put it to the test at last: would those +sweet amazing words be heard when I was not there? I saw her, pale, +her lips parted with horror, get into the sledge, shut her eyes and +saying good-bye for ever to the earth, set off. . . . "Whrrr!" +whirred the runners. Whether Nadenka heard those words I do not +know. I only saw her getting up from the sledge looking faint and +exhausted. And one could tell from her face that she could not tell +herself whether she had heard anything or not. Her terror while she +had been flying down had deprived of her all power of hearing, of +discriminating sounds, of understanding. + +But then the month of March arrived . . . the spring sunshine was +more kindly. . . . Our ice-hill turned dark, lost its brilliance +and finally melted. We gave up tobogganning. There was nowhere now +where poor Nadenka could hear those words, and indeed no one to +utter them, since there was no wind and I was going to +Petersburg--for long, perhaps for ever. + +It happened two days before my departure I was sitting in the dusk +in the little garden which was separated from the yard of Nadenka's +house by a high fence with nails in it. . . . It was still pretty +cold, there was still snow by the manure heap, the trees looked +dead but there was already the scent of spring and the rooks were +cawing loudly as they settled for their night's rest. I went up to +the fence and stood for a long while peeping through a chink. I saw +Nadenka come out into the porch and fix a mournful yearning gaze +on the sky. . . . The spring wind was blowing straight into her +pale dejected face. . . . It reminded her of the wind which roared +at us on the ice-hill when she heard those four words, and her face +became very, very sorrowful, a tear trickled down her cheek, and +the poor child held out both arms as though begging the wind to +bring her those words once more. And waiting for the wind I said +in a low voice: + +"I love you, Nadya!" + +Mercy! The change that came over Nadenka! She uttered a cry, smiled +all over her face and looking joyful, happy and beautiful, held out +her arms to meet the wind. + +And I went off to pack up. . . . + +That was long ago. Now Nadenka is married; she married--whether +of her own choice or not does not matter--a secretary of the +Nobility Wardenship and now she has three children. That we once +went tobogganning together, and that the wind brought her the words +"I love you, Nadenka," is not forgotten; it is for her now the +happiest, most touching, and beautiful memory in her life. . . . + +But now that I am older I cannot understand why I uttered those +words, what was my motive in that joke. . . . + + +A COUNTRY COTTAGE + +Two young people who had not long been married were walking up and +down the platform of a little country station. His arm was round +her waist, her head was almost on his shoulder, and both were happy. + +The moon peeped up from the drifting cloudlets and frowned, as it +seemed, envying their happiness and regretting her tedious and +utterly superfluous virginity. The still air was heavy with the +fragrance of lilac and wild cherry. Somewhere in the distance beyond +the line a corncrake was calling. + +"How beautiful it is, Sasha, how beautiful!" murmured the young +wife. "It all seems like a dream. See, how sweet and inviting that +little copse looks! How nice those solid, silent telegraph posts +are! They add a special note to the landscape, suggesting humanity, +civilization in the distance. . . . Don't you think it's lovely +when the wind brings the rushing sound of a train?" + +"Yes. . . . But what hot little hands you've got. . . That's because +you're excited, Varya. . . . What have you got for our supper +to-night?" + +"Chicken and salad. . . . It's a chicken just big enough for two +. . . . Then there is the salmon and sardines that were sent from +town." + +The moon as though she had taken a pinch of snuff hid her face +behind a cloud. Human happiness reminded her of her own loneliness, +of her solitary couch beyond the hills and dales. + +"The train is coming!" said Varya, "how jolly!" + +Three eyes of fire could be seen in the distance. The stationmaster +came out on the platform. Signal lights flashed here and there on +the line. + +"Let's see the train in and go home," said Sasha, yawning. "What a +splendid time we are having together, Varya, it's so splendid, one +can hardly believe it's true!" + +The dark monster crept noiselessly alongside the platform and came +to a standstill. They caught glimpses of sleepy faces, of hats and +shoulders at the dimly lighted windows. + +"Look! look!" they heard from one of the carriages. "Varya and Sasha +have come to meet us! There they are! . . . Varya! . . . Varya. . . . +Look!" + +Two little girls skipped out of the train and hung on Varya's neck. +They were followed by a stout, middle-aged lady, and a tall, lanky +gentleman with grey whiskers; behind them came two schoolboys, laden +with bags, and after the schoolboys, the governess, after the +governess the grandmother. + +"Here we are, here we are, dear boy!" began the whiskered gentleman, +squeezing Sasha's hand. "Sick of waiting for us, I expect! You have +been pitching into your old uncle for not coming down all this time, +I daresay! Kolya, Kostya, Nina, Fifa . . . children! Kiss your +cousin Sasha! We're all here, the whole troop of us, just for three +or four days. . . . I hope we shan't be too many for you? You mustn't +let us put you out!" + +At the sight of their uncle and his family, the young couple were +horror-stricken. While his uncle talked and kissed them, Sasha had +a vision of their little cottage: he and Varya giving up their three +little rooms, all the pillows and bedding to their guests; the +salmon, the sardines, the chicken all devoured in a single instant; +the cousins plucking the flowers in their little garden, spilling +the ink, filled the cottage with noise and confusion; his aunt +talking continually about her ailments and her papa's having been +Baron von Fintich. . . . + +And Sasha looked almost with hatred at his young wife, and whispered: + +"It's you they've come to see! . . . Damn them!" + +"No, it's you," answered Varya, pale with anger. "They're your +relations! they're not mine!" + +And turning to her visitors, she said with a smile of welcome: +"Welcome to the cottage!" + +The moon came out again. She seemed to smile, as though she were +glad she had no relations. Sasha, turning his head away to hide his +angry despairing face, struggled to give a note of cordial welcome +to his voice as he said: + +"It is jolly of you! Welcome to the cottage!" + + +A BLUNDER + +ILYA SERGEITCH PEPLOV and his wife Kleopatra Petrovna were standing +at the door, listening greedily. On the other side in the little +drawing-room a love scene was apparently taking place between two +persons: their daughter Natashenka and a teacher of the district +school, called Shchupkin. + +"He's rising!" whispered Peplov, quivering with impatience and +rubbing his hands. "Now, Kleopatra, mind; as soon as they begin +talking of their feelings, take down the ikon from the wall and +we'll go in and bless them. . . . We'll catch him. . . . A blessing +with an ikon is sacred and binding. . . He couldn't get out of it, +if he brought it into court." + +On the other side of the door this was the conversation: + +"Don't go on like that!" said Shchupkin, striking a match against +his checked trousers. "I never wrote you any letters!" + +"I like that! As though I didn't know your writing!" giggled the +girl with an affected shriek, continually peeping at herself in the +glass. "I knew it at once! And what a queer man you are! You are a +writing master, and you write like a spider! How can you teach +writing if you write so badly yourself?" + +"H'm! . . . That means nothing. The great thing in writing lessons +is not the hand one writes, but keeping the boys in order. You hit +one on the head with a ruler, make another kneel down. . . . Besides, +there's nothing in handwriting! Nekrassov was an author, but his +handwriting's a disgrace, there's a specimen of it in his collected +works." + +"You are not Nekrassov. . . ." (A sigh). "I should love to marry +an author. He'd always be writing poems to me." + +"I can write you a poem, too, if you like." + +"What can you write about?" + +"Love--passion--your eyes. You'll be crazy when you read it. +It would draw a tear from a stone! And if I write you a real poem, +will you let me kiss your hand?" + +"That's nothing much! You can kiss it now if you like." + +Shchupkin jumped up, and making sheepish eyes, bent over the fat +little hand that smelt of egg soap. + +"Take down the ikon," Peplov whispered in a fluster, pale with +excitement, and buttoning his coat as he prodded his wife with his +elbow. "Come along, now!" + +And without a second's delay Peplov flung open the door. + +"Children," he muttered, lifting up his arms and blinking tearfully, +"the Lord bless you, my children. May you live--be fruitful--and +multiply." + +"And--and I bless you, too," the mamma brought out, crying with +happiness. "May you be happy, my dear ones! Oh, you are taking from +me my only treasure!" she said to Shchupkin. "Love my girl, be good +to her. . . ." + +Shchupkin's mouth fell open with amazement and alarm. The parents' +attack was so bold and unexpected that he could not utter a single +word. + +"I'm in for it! I'm spliced!" he thought, going limp with horror. +"It's all over with you now, my boy! There's no escape!" + +And he bowed his head submissively, as though to say, "Take me, I'm +vanquished." + +"Ble-blessings on you," the papa went on, and he, too, shed tears. +"Natashenka, my daughter, stand by his side. Kleopatra, give me the +ikon." + +But at this point the father suddenly left off weeping, and his +face was contorted with anger. + +"You ninny!" he said angrily to his wife. "You are an idiot! Is +that the ikon?" + +"Ach, saints alive!" + +What had happened? The writing master raised himself and saw that +he was saved; in her flutter the mamma had snatched from the wall +the portrait of Lazhetchnikov, the author, in mistake for the ikon. +Old Peplov and his wife stood disconcerted in the middle of the +room, holding the portrait aloft, not knowing what to do or what +to say. The writing master took advantage of the general confusion +and slipped away. + + +FAT AND THIN + +Two friends--one a fat man and the other a thin man--met at the +Nikolaevsky station. The fat man had just dined in the station and +his greasy lips shone like ripe cherries. He smelt of sherry and +_fleur d'orange_. The thin man had just slipped out of the train +and was laden with portmanteaus, bundles, and bandboxes. He smelt +of ham and coffee grounds. A thin woman with a long chin, his wife, +and a tall schoolboy with one eye screwed up came into view behind +his back. + +"Porfiry," cried the fat man on seeing the thin man. "Is it you? +My dear fellow! How many summers, how many winters!" + +"Holy saints!" cried the thin man in amazement. "Misha! The friend +of my childhood! Where have you dropped from?" + +The friends kissed each other three times, and gazed at each other +with eyes full of tears. Both were agreeably astounded. + +"My dear boy!" began the thin man after the kissing. "This is +unexpected! This is a surprise! Come have a good look at me! Just +as handsome as I used to be! Just as great a darling and a dandy! +Good gracious me! Well, and how are you? Made your fortune? Married? +I am married as you see. . . . This is my wife Luise, her maiden +name was Vantsenbach . . . of the Lutheran persuasion. . . . And +this is my son Nafanail, a schoolboy in the third class. This is +the friend of my childhood, Nafanya. We were boys at school together!" + +Nafanail thought a little and took off his cap. + +"We were boys at school together," the thin man went on. "Do you +remember how they used to tease you? You were nicknamed Herostratus +because you burned a hole in a schoolbook with a cigarette, and I +was nicknamed Ephialtes because I was fond of telling tales. Ho--ho! +. . . we were children! . . . Don't be shy, Nafanya. Go nearer to +him. And this is my wife, her maiden name was Vantsenbach, of the +Lutheran persuasion. . . ." + +Nafanail thought a little and took refuge behind his father's back. + +"Well, how are you doing my friend?" the fat man asked, looking +enthusiastically at his friend. "Are you in the service? What grade +have you reached?" + +"I am, dear boy! I have been a collegiate assessor for the last two +years and I have the Stanislav. The salary is poor, but that's no +great matter! The wife gives music lessons, and I go in for carving +wooden cigarette cases in a private way. Capital cigarette cases! +I sell them for a rouble each. If any one takes ten or more I make +a reduction of course. We get along somehow. I served as a clerk, +you know, and now I have been transferred here as a head clerk in +the same department. I am going to serve here. And what about you? +I bet you are a civil councillor by now? Eh?" + +"No dear boy, go higher than that," said the fat man. "I have risen +to privy councillor already . . . I have two stars." + +The thin man turned pale and rigid all at once, but soon his face +twisted in all directions in the broadest smile; it seemed as though +sparks were flashing from his face and eyes. He squirmed, he doubled +together, crumpled up. . . . His portmanteaus, bundles and cardboard +boxes seemed to shrink and crumple up too. . . . His wife's long +chin grew longer still; Nafanail drew himself up to attention and +fastened all the buttons of his uniform. + +"Your Excellency, I . . . delighted! The friend, one may say, of +childhood and to have turned into such a great man! He--he!" + +"Come, come!" the fat man frowned. "What's this tone for? You and +I were friends as boys, and there is no need of this official +obsequiousness!" + +"Merciful heavens, your Excellency! What are you saying. . . ?" +sniggered the thin man, wriggling more than ever. "Your Excellency's +gracious attention is like refreshing manna. . . . This, your +Excellency, is my son Nafanail, . . . my wife Luise, a Lutheran in +a certain sense." + +The fat man was about to make some protest, but the face of the +thin man wore an expression of such reverence, sugariness, and +mawkish respectfulness that the privy councillor was sickened. He +turned away from the thin man, giving him his hand at parting. + +The thin man pressed three fingers, bowed his whole body and sniggered +like a Chinaman: "He--he--he!" His wife smiled. Nafanail scraped +with his foot and dropped his cap. All three were agreeably +overwhelmed. + + +THE DEATH OF A GOVERNMENT CLERK + +ONE fine evening, a no less fine government clerk called Ivan +Dmitritch Tchervyakov was sitting in the second row of the stalls, +gazing through an opera glass at the _Cloches de Corneville_. He +gazed and felt at the acme of bliss. But suddenly. . . . In stories +one so often meets with this "But suddenly." The authors are right: +life is so full of surprises! But suddenly his face puckered up, +his eyes disappeared, his breathing was arrested . . . he took the +opera glass from his eyes, bent over and . . . "Aptchee!!" he sneezed +as you perceive. It is not reprehensible for anyone to sneeze +anywhere. Peasants sneeze and so do police superintendents, and +sometimes even privy councillors. All men sneeze. Tchervyakov was +not in the least confused, he wiped his face with his handkerchief, +and like a polite man, looked round to see whether he had disturbed +any one by his sneezing. But then he was overcome with confusion. +He saw that an old gentleman sitting in front of him in the first +row of the stalls was carefully wiping his bald head and his neck +with his glove and muttering something to himself. In the old +gentleman, Tchervyakov recognised Brizzhalov, a civilian general +serving in the Department of Transport. + +"I have spattered him," thought Tchervyakov, "he is not the head +of my department, but still it is awkward. I must apologise." + +Tchervyakov gave a cough, bent his whole person forward, and whispered +in the general's ear. + +"Pardon, your Excellency, I spattered you accidentally. . . ." + +"Never mind, never mind." + +"For goodness sake excuse me, I . . . I did not mean to." + +"Oh, please, sit down! let me listen!" + +Tchervyakov was embarrassed, he smiled stupidly and fell to gazing +at the stage. He gazed at it but was no longer feeling bliss. He +began to be troubled by uneasiness. In the interval, he went up to +Brizzhalov, walked beside him, and overcoming his shyness, muttered: + +"I spattered you, your Excellency, forgive me . . . you see . . . +I didn't do it to . . . ." + +"Oh, that's enough . . . I'd forgotten it, and you keep on about +it!" said the general, moving his lower lip impatiently. + +"He has forgotten, but there is a fiendish light in his eye," thought +Tchervyakov, looking suspiciously at the general. "And he doesn't +want to talk. I ought to explain to him . . . that I really didn't +intend . . . that it is the law of nature or else he will think I +meant to spit on him. He doesn't think so now, but he will think +so later!" + +On getting home, Tchervyakov told his wife of his breach of good +manners. It struck him that his wife took too frivolous a view of +the incident; she was a little frightened, but when she learned +that Brizzhalov was in a different department, she was reassured. + +"Still, you had better go and apologise," she said, "or he will +think you don't know how to behave in public." + +"That's just it! I did apologise, but he took it somehow queerly +. . . he didn't say a word of sense. There wasn't time to talk +properly." + +Next day Tchervyakov put on a new uniform, had his hair cut and +went to Brizzhalov's to explain; going into the general's reception +room he saw there a number of petitioners and among them the general +himself, who was beginning to interview them. After questioning +several petitioners the general raised his eyes and looked at +Tchervyakov. + +"Yesterday at the _Arcadia_, if you recollect, your Excellency," +the latter began, "I sneezed and . . . accidentally spattered . . . +Exc. . . ." + +"What nonsense. . . . It's beyond anything! What can I do for you," +said the general addressing the next petitioner. + +"He won't speak," thought Tchervyakov, turning pale; "that means +that he is angry. . . . No, it can't be left like this. . . . I +will explain to him." + +When the general had finished his conversation with the last of the +petitioners and was turning towards his inner apartments, Tchervyakov +took a step towards him and muttered: + +"Your Excellency! If I venture to trouble your Excellency, it is +simply from a feeling I may say of regret! . . . It was not intentional +if you will graciously believe me." + +The general made a lachrymose face, and waved his hand. + +"Why, you are simply making fun of me, sir," he said as he closed +the door behind him. + +"Where's the making fun in it?" thought Tchervyakov, "there is +nothing of the sort! He is a general, but he can't understand. If +that is how it is I am not going to apologise to that _fanfaron_ +any more! The devil take him. I'll write a letter to him, but I +won't go. By Jove, I won't." + +So thought Tchervyakov as he walked home; he did not write a letter +to the general, he pondered and pondered and could not make up that +letter. He had to go next day to explain in person. + +"I ventured to disturb your Excellency yesterday," he muttered, +when the general lifted enquiring eyes upon him, "not to make fun +as you were pleased to say. I was apologising for having spattered +you in sneezing. . . . And I did not dream of making fun of you. +Should I dare to make fun of you, if we should take to making fun, +then there would be no respect for persons, there would be. . . ." + +"Be off!" yelled the general, turning suddenly purple, and shaking +all over. + +"What?" asked Tchervyakov, in a whisper turning numb with horror. + +"Be off!" repeated the general, stamping. + +Something seemed to give way in Tchervyakov's stomach. Seeing nothing +and hearing nothing he reeled to the door, went out into the street, +and went staggering along. . . . Reaching home mechanically, without +taking off his uniform, he lay down on the sofa and died. + + +A PINK STOCKING + +A DULL, rainy day. The sky is completely covered with heavy clouds, +and there is no prospect of the rain ceasing. Outside sleet, puddles, +and drenched jackdaws. Indoors it is half dark, and so cold that +one wants the stove heated. + +Pavel Petrovitch Somov is pacing up and down his study, grumbling +at the weather. The tears of rain on the windows and the darkness +of the room make him depressed. He is insufferably bored and has +nothing to do. . . . The newspapers have not been brought yet; +shooting is out of the question, and it is not nearly dinner-time +. . . . + +Somov is not alone in his study. Madame Somov, a pretty little lady +in a light blouse and pink stockings, is sitting at his writing +table. She is eagerly scribbling a letter. Every time he passes her +as he strides up and down, Ivan Petrovitch looks over her shoulder +at what she is writing. He sees big sprawling letters, thin and +narrow, with all sorts of tails and flourishes. There are numbers +of blots, smears, and finger-marks. Madame Somov does not like ruled +paper, and every line runs downhill with horrid wriggles as it +reaches the margin. . . . + +"Lidotchka, who is it you are writing such a lot to?" Somov inquires, +seeing that his wife is just beginning to scribble the sixth page. + +"To sister Varya." + +"Hm . . . it's a long letter! I'm so bored--let me read it!" + +"Here, you may read it, but there's nothing interesting in it." + +Somov takes the written pages and, still pacing up and down, begins +reading. Lidotchka leans her elbows on the back of her chair and +watches the expression of his face. . . . After the first page his +face lengthens and an expression of something almost like panic +comes into it. . . . At the third page Somov frowns and scratches +the back of his head. At the fourth he pauses, looks with a scared +face at his wife, and seems to ponder. After thinking a little, he +takes up the letter again with a sigh. . . . His face betrays +perplexity and even alarm. . . ." + +"Well, this is beyond anything!" he mutters, as he finishes reading +the letter and flings the sheets on the table, "It's positively +incredible!" + +"What's the matter?" asks Lidotchka, flustered. + +"What's the matter! You've covered six pages, wasted a good two +hours scribbling, and there's nothing in it at all! If there were +one tiny idea! One reads on and on, and one's brain is as muddled +as though one were deciphering the Chinese wriggles on tea chests! +Ough!" + +"Yes, that's true, Vanya, . . ." says Lidotchka, reddening. "I wrote +it carelessly. . . ." + +"Queer sort of carelessness! In a careless letter there is some +meaning and style--there is sense in it--while yours . . . +excuse me, but I don't know what to call it! It's absolute twaddle! +There are words and sentences, but not the slightest sense in them. +Your whole letter is exactly like the conversation of two boys: 'We +had pancakes to-day! And we had a soldier come to see us!' You say +the same thing over and over again! You drag it out, repeat yourself +. . . . The wretched ideas dance about like devils: there's no making +out where anything begins, where anything ends. . . . How can you +write like that?" + +"If I had been writing carefully," Lidotchka says in self defence, +"then there would not have been mistakes. . . ." + +"Oh, I'm not talking about mistakes! The awful grammatical howlers! +There's not a line that's not a personal insult to grammar! No stops +nor commas--and the spelling . . . brrr! 'Earth' has an _a_ in +it!! And the writing! It's desperate! I'm not joking, Lida. . . . +I'm surprised and appalled at your letter. . . . You mustn't be +angry, darling, but, really, I had no idea you were such a duffer +at grammar. . . . And yet you belong to a cultivated, well-educated +circle: you are the wife of a University man, and the daughter of +a general! Tell me, did you ever go to school?" + +"What next! I finished at the Von Mebke's boarding school. . . ." + +Somov shrugs his shoulders and continues to pace up and down, +sighing. Lidotchka, conscious of her ignorance and ashamed of it, +sighs too and casts down her eyes. . . . Ten minutes pass in silence. + +"You know, Lidotchka, it really is awful!" says Somov, suddenly +halting in front of her and looking into her face with horror. "You +are a mother . . . do you understand? A mother! How can you teach +your children if you know nothing yourself? You have a good brain, +but what's the use of it if you have never mastered the very rudiments +of knowledge? There--never mind about knowledge . . . the children +will get that at school, but, you know, you are very shaky on the +moral side too! You sometimes use such language that it makes my +ears tingle!" + +Somov shrugs his shoulders again, wraps himself in the folds of his +dressing-gown and continues his pacing. . . . He feels vexed and +injured, and at the same time sorry for Lidotchka, who does not +protest, but merely blinks. . . . Both feel oppressed and miserable +. . . . Absorbed in their woes, they do not notice how time is passing +and the dinner hour is approaching. + +Sitting down to dinner, Somov, who is fond of good eating and of +eating in peace, drinks a large glass of vodka and begins talking +about something else. Lidotchka listens and assents, but suddenly +over the soup her eyes fill with tears and she begins whimpering. + +"It's all mother's fault!" she says, wiping away her tears with her +dinner napkin. "Everyone advised her to send me to the high school, +and from the high school I should have been sure to go on to the +University!" + +"University . . . high school," mutters Somov. "That's running to +extremes, my girl! What's the good of being a blue stocking! A blue +stocking is the very deuce! Neither man nor woman, but just something +midway: neither one thing nor another. . . I hate blue stockings! +I would never have married a learned woman. . . ." + +"There's no making you out . . .", says Lidotchka. "You are angry +because I am not learned, and at the same time you hate learned +women; you are annoyed because I have no ideas in my letter, and +yet you yourself are opposed to my studying. . . ." + +"You do catch me up at a word, my dear," yawns Somov, pouring out +a second glass of vodka in his boredom. + +Under the influence of vodka and a good dinner, Somov grows more +good-humoured, lively, and soft. . . . He watches his pretty wife +making the salad with an anxious face and a rush of affection for +her, of indulgence and forgiveness comes over him. + +"It was stupid of me to depress her, poor girl . . . ," he thought. +"Why did I say such a lot of dreadful things? She is silly, that's +true, uncivilised and narrow; but . . . there are two sides to the +question, and _audiatur et altera pars_. . . . Perhaps people are +perfectly right when they say that woman's shallowness rests on her +very vocation. Granted that it is her vocation to love her husband, +to bear children, and to mix salad, what the devil does she want +with learning? No, indeed!" + +At that point he remembers that learned women are usually tedious, +that they are exacting, strict, and unyielding; and, on the other +hand, how easy it is to get on with silly Lidotchka, who never pokes +her nose into anything, does not understand so much, and never +obtrudes her criticism. There is peace and comfort with Lidotchka, +and no risk of being interfered with. + +"Confound them, those clever and learned women! It's better and +easier to live with simple ones," he thinks, as he takes a plate +of chicken from Lidotchka. + +He recollects that a civilised man sometimes feels a desire to talk +and share his thoughts with a clever and well-educated woman. "What +of it?" thinks Somov. "If I want to talk of intellectual subjects, +I'll go to Natalya Andreyevna . . . or to Marya Frantsovna. . . . +It's very simple! But no, I shan't go. One can discuss intellectual +subjects with men," he finally decides. + + +AT A SUMMER VILLA + +"I LOVE YOU. You are my life, my happiness--everything to me! Forgive +the avowal, but I have not the strength to suffer and be silent. I +ask not for love in return, but for sympathy. Be at the old arbour +at eight o'clock this evening. . . . To sign my name is unnecessary +I think, but do not be uneasy at my being anonymous. I am young, +nice-looking . . . what more do you want?" + +When Pavel Ivanitch Vyhodtsev, a practical married man who was +spending his holidays at a summer villa, read this letter, he +shrugged his shoulders and scratched his forehead in perplexity. + +"What devilry is this?" he thought. "I'm a married man, and to send +me such a queer . . . silly letter! Who wrote it?" + +Pavel Ivanitch turned the letter over and over before his eyes, +read it through again, and spat with disgust. + +"'I love you'" . . . he said jeeringly. "A nice boy she has pitched +on! So I'm to run off to meet you in the arbour! . . . I got over +all such romances and _fleurs d'amour_ years ago, my girl. . . . +Hm! She must be some reckless, immoral creature. . . . Well, these +women are a set! What a whirligig--God forgive us!--she must be to +write a letter like that to a stranger, and a married man, too! +It's real demoralisation!" + +In the course of his eight years of married life Pavel Ivanitch had +completely got over all sentimental feeling, and he had received +no letters from ladies except letters of congratulation, and so, +although he tried to carry it off with disdain, the letter quoted +above greatly intrigued and agitated him. + +An hour after receiving it, he was lying on his sofa, thinking: + +"Of course I am not a silly boy, and I am not going to rush off to +this idiotic rendezvous; but yet it would be interesting to know +who wrote it! Hm. . . . It is certainly a woman's writing. . . . +The letter is written with genuine feeling, and so it can hardly +be a joke. . . . Most likely it's some neurotic girl, or perhaps a +widow . . . widows are frivolous and eccentric as a rule. Hm. . . . +Who could it be?" + +What made it the more difficult to decide the question was that +Pavel Ivanitch had not one feminine acquaintance among all the +summer visitors, except his wife. + +"It is queer . . ." he mused. "'I love you!'. . . When did she +manage to fall in love? Amazing woman! To fall in love like this, +apropos of nothing, without making any acquaintance and finding out +what sort of man I am. . . . She must be extremely young and romantic +if she is capable of falling in love after two or three looks at +me. . . . But . . . who is she?" + +Pavel Ivanitch suddenly recalled that when he had been walking among +the summer villas the day before, and the day before that, he had +several times been met by a fair young lady with a light blue hat +and a turn-up nose. The fair charmer had kept looking at him, and +when he sat down on a seat she had sat down beside him. . . . + +"Can it be she?" Vyhodtsev wondered. "It can't be! Could a delicate +ephemeral creature like that fall in love with a worn-out old eel +like me? No, it's impossible!" + +At dinner Pavel Ivanitch looked blankly at his wife while he +meditated: + +"She writes that she is young and nice-looking. . . . So she's not +old. . . . Hm. . . . To tell the truth, honestly I am not so old +and plain that no one could fall in love with me. My wife loves me! +Besides, love is blind, we all know. . . ." + +"What are you thinking about?" his wife asked him. + +"Oh. . . my head aches a little. . ." Pavel Ivanitch said, quite +untruly. + +He made up his mind that it was stupid to pay attention to such a +nonsensical thing as a love-letter, and laughed at it and at its +authoress, but--alas!--powerful is the "dacha" enemy of mankind! +After dinner, Pavel Ivanitch lay down on his bed, and instead of +going to sleep, reflected: + +"But there, I daresay she is expecting me to come! What a silly! I +can just imagine what a nervous fidget she'll be in and how her +_tournure_ will quiver when she does not find me in the arbour! I +shan't go, though. . . . Bother her!" + +But, I repeat, powerful is the enemy of mankind. + +"Though I might, perhaps, just out of curiosity . . ." he was musing, +half an hour later. "I might go and look from a distance what sort +of a creature she is. . . . It would be interesting to have a look +at her! It would be fun, and that's all! After all, why shouldn't +I have a little fun since such a chance has turned up?" + +Pavel Ivanitch got up from his bed and began dressing. "What are +you getting yourself up so smartly for?" his wife asked, noticing +that he was putting on a clean shirt and a fashionable tie. + +"Oh, nothing. . . . I must have a walk. . . . My head aches. . . . +Hm." + +Pavel Ivanitch dressed in his best, and waiting till eight o'clock, +went out of the house. When the figures of gaily dressed summer +visitors of both sexes began passing before his eyes against the +bright green background, his heart throbbed. + +"Which of them is it? . . ." he wondered, advancing irresolutely. +"Come, what am I afraid of? Why, I am not going to the rendezvous! +What . . . a fool! Go forward boldly! And what if I go into the +arbour? Well, well . . . there is no reason I should." + +Pavel Ivanitch's heart beat still more violently. . . . Involuntarily, +with no desire to do so, he suddenly pictured to himself the +half-darkness of the arbour. . . . A graceful fair girl with a +little blue hat and a turn-up nose rose before his imagination. He +saw her, abashed by her love and trembling all over, timidly approach +him, breathing excitedly, and . . . suddenly clasping him in her +arms. + +"If I weren't married it would be all right . . ." he mused, driving +sinful ideas out of his head. "Though . . . for once in my life, +it would do no harm to have the experience, or else one will die +without knowing what. . . . And my wife, what will it matter to +her? Thank God, for eight years I've never moved one step away from +her. . . . Eight years of irreproachable duty! Enough of her. . . . +It's positively vexatious. . . . I'm ready to go to spite her!" + +Trembling all over and holding his breath, Pavel Ivanitch went up +to the arbour, wreathed with ivy and wild vine, and peeped into it +. . . . A smell of dampness and mildew reached him. . . . + +"I believe there's nobody . . ." he thought, going into the arbour, +and at once saw a human silhouette in the corner. + +The silhouette was that of a man. . . . Looking more closely, Pavel +Ivanitch recognised his wife's brother, Mitya, a student, who was +staying with them at the villa. + +"Oh, it's you . . ." he growled discontentedly, as he took off his +hat and sat down. + +"Yes, it's I" . . . answered Mitya. + +Two minutes passed in silence. + +"Excuse me, Pavel Ivanitch," began Mitya: "but might I ask you to +leave me alone?? . . . I am thinking over the dissertation for my +degree and . . . and the presence of anybody else prevents my +thinking." + +"You had better go somewhere in a dark avenue. . ." Pavel Ivanitch +observed mildly. "It's easier to think in the open air, and, besides, +. . . er . . . I should like to have a little sleep here on this +seat. . . It's not so hot here. . . ." + +"You want to sleep, but it's a question of my dissertation . . ." +Mitya grumbled. "The dissertation is more important." + +Again there was a silence. Pavel Ivanitch, who had given the rein +to his imagination and was continually hearing footsteps, suddenly +leaped up and said in a plaintive voice: + +"Come, I beg you, Mitya! You are younger and ought to consider me +. . . . I am unwell and . . . I need sleep. . . . Go away!" + +"That's egoism. . . . Why must you be here and not I? I won't go +as a matter of principle." + +"Come, I ask you to! Suppose I am an egoist, a despot and a fool +. . . but I ask you to go! For once in my life I ask you a favour! +Show some consideration!" + +Mitya shook his head. + +"What a beast! . . ." thought Pavel Ivanitch. "That can't be a +rendezvous with him here! It's impossible with him here!" + +"I say, Mitya," he said, "I ask you for the last time. . . . Show +that you are a sensible, humane, and cultivated man!" + +"I don't know why you keep on so!" . . . said Mitya, shrugging his +shoulders. "I've said I won't go, and I won't. I shall stay here +as a matter of principle. . . ." + +At that moment a woman's face with a turn-up nose peeped into the +arbour. . . . + +Seeing Mitya and Pavel Ivanitch, it frowned and vanished. + +"She is gone!" thought Pavel Ivanitch, looking angrily at Mitya. +"She saw that blackguard and fled! It's all spoilt!" + +After waiting a little longer, he got up, put on his hat and said: + +"You're a beast, a low brute and a blackguard! Yes! A beast! It's +mean . . . and silly! Everything is at an end between us!" + +"Delighted to hear it!" muttered Mitya, also getting up and putting +on his hat. "Let me tell you that by being here just now you've +played me such a dirty trick that I'll never forgive you as long +as I live." + +Pavel Ivanitch went out of the arbour, and beside himself with rage, +strode rapidly to his villa. Even the sight of the table laid for +supper did not soothe him. + +"Once in a lifetime such a chance has turned up," he thought in +agitation; "and then it's been prevented! Now she is offended . . . +crushed!" + +At supper Pavel Ivanitch and Mitya kept their eyes on their plates +and maintained a sullen silence. . . . They were hating each other +from the bottom of their hearts. + +"What are you smiling at?" asked Pavel Ivanitch, pouncing on his +wife. "It's only silly fools who laugh for nothing!" + +His wife looked at her husband's angry face, and went off into a +peal of laughter. + +"What was that letter you got this morning?" she asked. + +"I? . . . I didn't get one. . . ." Pavel Ivanitch was overcome with +confusion. "You are inventing . . . imagination." + +"Oh, come, tell us! Own up, you did! Why, it was I sent you that +letter! Honour bright, I did! Ha ha!" + +Pavel Ivanitch turned crimson and bent over his plate. "Silly jokes," +he growled. + +"But what could I do? Tell me that. . . . We had to scrub the rooms +out this evening, and how could we get you out of the house? There +was no other way of getting you out. . . . But don't be angry, +stupid. . . . I didn't want you to be dull in the arbour, so I sent +the same letter to Mitya too! Mitya, have you been to the arbour?" + +Mitya grinned and left off glaring with hatred at his rival. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Love and Other Stories, +by Anton Chekhov + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13414 *** |