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diff --git a/old/66790-0.txt b/old/66790-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 082e3a2..0000000 --- a/old/66790-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,9825 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Russian Silhouettes, by Anton Tchekoff - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Russian Silhouettes - More Stories of Russian Life - -Author: Anton Tchekoff - -Translator: Marian Fell - -Release Date: November 21, 2021 [eBook #66790] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Richard Tonsing, MFR and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was - produced from images generously made available by The - Internet Archive) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RUSSIAN SILHOUETTES *** - - - - - - RUSSIAN SILHOUETTES - MORE STORIES OF RUSSIAN LIFE - - - BY - ANTON TCHEKOFF - - TRANSLATED FROM THE RUSSIAN BY - MARIAN FELL - - - LONDON - DUCKWORTH & CO. - 1915 - - - - - Copyright, 1915, by Charles Scribner’s Sons, for the - United States of America - - Printed by the Scribner Press - New York, U. S. A. - - - - - CONTENTS - - - STORIES OF CHILDHOOD - - PAGE - THE BOYS 3 - - GRISHA 14 - - A TRIFLE FROM REAL LIFE 20 - - THE COOK’S WEDDING 29 - - SHROVE TUESDAY 38 - - IN PASSION WEEK 46 - - AN INCIDENT 54 - - A MATTER OF CLASSICS 63 - - THE TUTOR 68 - - OUT OF SORTS 73 - - - STORIES OF YOUTH - - A JOKE 79 - - AFTER THE THEATRE 86 - - VOLODIA 91 - - A NAUGHTY BOY 111 - - BLISS 115 - - TWO BEAUTIFUL GIRLS 119 - - - LIGHT AND SHADOW - - THE CHORUS GIRL 135 - - THE FATHER OF A FAMILY 144 - - THE ORATOR 151 - - IONITCH 157 - - AT CHRISTMAS TIME 187 - - IN THE COACH HOUSE 195 - - LADY N——’S STORY 205 - - A JOURNEY BY CART 212 - - THE PRIVY COUNCILLOR 227 - - ROTHSCHILD’S FIDDLE 255 - - A HORSEY NAME 272 - - THE PETCHENEG 278 - - THE BISHOP 295 - - - - - STORIES OF CHILDHOOD - - - THE BOYS - -“Volodia is here!” cried some one in the courtyard. - -“Voloditchka is here!” shrieked Natalia, rushing into the dining-room. - -The whole family ran to the window, for they had been expecting their -Volodia for hours. At the front porch stood a wide posting sleigh with -its troika of white horses wreathed in dense clouds of steam. The sleigh -was empty because Volodia was already standing in the front entry -untying his hood with red, frostbitten fingers. His schoolboy’s uniform, -his overcoat, his cap, his goloshes, and the hair on his temples were -all silvery with frost, and from his head to his feet he exhaled such a -wholesome atmosphere of cold that one shivered to be near him. His -mother and aunt rushed to kiss and embrace him. Natalia fell down at his -feet and began pulling off his goloshes. His sisters shrieked, doors -creaked and banged on every side, and his father came running into the -hall in his shirt-sleeves waving a pair of scissors and crying in alarm: - -“Is anything the matter? We expected you yesterday. Did you have a good -journey? For heaven’s sake, give him a chance to kiss his own father!” - -“Bow, wow, wow!” barked the great black dog, My Lord, in a deep voice, -banging the walls and furniture with his tail. - -All these noises went to make up one great, joyous clamour that lasted -several minutes. When the first burst of joy had subsided the family -noticed that, beside Volodia, there was still another small person in -the hall. He was wrapped in scarfs and shawls and hoods and was standing -motionless in the shadow cast by a huge fox-skin coat. - -“Volodia, who is that?” whispered Volodia’s mother. - -“Good gracious!” Volodia exclaimed recollecting himself. “Let me present -my friend Tchetchevitsin. I have brought him from school to stay with -us.” - -“We are delighted to see you! Make yourself at home!” cried the father -gaily. “Excuse my not having a coat on! Allow me!—Natalia, help Mr. -Tcherepitsin to take off his things! For heaven’s sake, take that dog -away! This noise is too awful!” - -A few minutes later Volodia and his friend were sitting in the -dining-room drinking tea, dazed by their noisy reception and still rosy -with cold. The wintry rays of the sun, piercing the frost and snow on -the window-panes, trembled over the samovar and bathed themselves in the -slop-basin. The room was warm, and the boys felt heat and cold jostling -one another in their bodies, neither wanting to concede its place to the -other. - -“Well, Christmas will soon be here!” cried Volodia’s father, rolling a -cigarette. “Has it seemed long since your mother cried as she saw you -off last summer? Time flies, my son! Old age comes before one has time -to heave a sigh. Mr. Tchibisoff, do help yourself! We don’t stand on -ceremony here!” - -Volodia’s three sisters, Katia, Sonia, and Masha, the oldest of whom was -eleven, sat around the table with their eyes fixed on their new -acquaintance. Tchetchevitsin was the same age and size as Volodia, but -he was neither plump nor fair like him. He was swarthy and thin and his -face was covered with freckles. His hair was bristly, his eyes were -small, and his lips were thick; in a word, he was very plain, and, had -it not been for his schoolboy’s uniform, he might have been taken for -the son of a cook. He was taciturn and morose, and he never once smiled. -The girls immediately decided that he must be a very clever and learned -person. He seemed to be meditating something, and was so busy with his -own thoughts that he started if he were asked a question and asked to -have it repeated. - -The girls noticed that Volodia, who was generally so talkative and gay, -seldom spoke now and never smiled and on the whole did not seem glad to -be at home. He only addressed his sisters once during dinner and then -his remark was strange. He pointed to the samovar and said: - -“In California they drink gin instead of tea.” - -He, too, seemed to be busy with thoughts of his own, and, to judge from -the glances that the two boys occasionally exchanged, their thoughts -were identical. - -After tea the whole family went into the nursery, and papa and the girls -sat down at the table and took up some work which they had been doing -when they were interrupted by the boys’ arrival. They were making -decorations out of coloured paper for the Christmas tree. It was a -thrilling and noisy occupation. Each new flower was greeted by the girls -with shrieks of ecstasy, of terror almost, as if it had dropped from the -sky. Papa, too, was in raptures, but every now and then he would throw -down the scissors, exclaiming angrily that they were blunt. Mamma came -running into the nursery with an anxious face and asked: - -“Who has taken my scissors? Have you taken my scissors again, Ivan?” - -“Good heavens, won’t she even let me have a pair of scissors?” answered -papa in a tearful voice, throwing himself back in his chair with the air -of a much-abused man. But the next moment he was in raptures again. - -On former holidays Volodia had always helped with the preparations for -the Christmas tree, and had run out into the yard to watch the coachman -and the shepherd heaping up a mound of snow, but this time neither he -nor Tchetchevitsin took any notice of the coloured paper, neither did -they once visit the stables. They sat by a window whispering together, -and then opened an atlas and fell to studying it. - -“First, we must go to Perm,” whispered Tchetchevitsin. “Then to Tyumen, -then to Tomsk, and then—then to Kamschatka. From there the Eskimos will -take us across Behring Strait in their canoes, and then—we shall be in -America! There are a great many wild animals there.” - -“Where is California?” asked Volodia. - -“California is farther down. If once we can get to America, California -will only be round the corner. We can make our living by hunting and -highway robbery.” - -All day Tchetchevitsin avoided the girls, and, if he met them, looked at -them askance. After tea in the evening he was left alone with them for -five minutes. To remain silent would have been awkward, so he coughed -sternly, rubbed the back of his right hand with the palm of his left, -looked severely at Katia, and asked: - -“Have you read Mayne Reid?” - -“No, I haven’t—But tell me, can you skate?” - -Tchetchevitsin became lost in thought once more and did not answer her -question. He only blew out his cheeks and heaved a sigh as if he were -very hot. Once more he raised his eyes to Katia’s face and said: - -“When a herd of buffalo gallop across the pampas the whole earth -trembles and the frightened mustangs kick and neigh.” - -Tchetchevitsin smiled wistfully and added: - -“And Indians attack trains, too. But worst of all are the mosquitoes and -the termites.” - -“What are they?” - -“Termites look something like ants, only they have wings. They bite -dreadfully. Do you know who I am?” - -“You are Mr. Tchetchevitsin!” - -“No, I am Montezuma Hawkeye, the invincible chieftain.” - -Masha, the youngest of the girls, looked first at him and then out of -the window into the garden, where night was already falling, and said -doubtfully: - -“We had Tchetchevitsa (lentils) for supper last night.” - -The absolutely unintelligible sayings of Tchetchevitsin, his continual -whispered conversations with Volodia, and the fact that Volodia never -played now and was always absorbed in thought—all this seemed to the -girls to be both mysterious and strange. Katia and Sonia, the two oldest -ones, began to spy on the boys, and when Volodia and his friend went to -bed that evening, they crept to the door of their room and listened to -the conversation inside. Oh! what did they hear? The boys were planning -to run away to America in search of gold! They were all prepared for the -journey and had a pistol ready, two knives, some dried bread, a -magnifying-glass for lighting fires, a compass, and four roubles. The -girls discovered that the boys would have to walk several thousand -miles, fighting on the way with savages and tigers, and that they would -then find gold and ivory, and slay their enemies. Next, they would turn -pirates, drink gin, and at last marry beautiful wives and settle down to -cultivate a plantation. Volodia and Tchetchevitsin both talked at once -and kept interrupting one another from excitement. Tchetchevitsin called -himself “Montezuma Hawkeye,” and Volodia “my Paleface Brother.” - -“Be sure you don’t tell mamma!” said Katia to Sonia as they went back to -bed. “Volodia will bring us gold and ivory from America, but if you tell -mamma she won’t let him go!” - -Tchetchevitsin spent the day before Christmas Eve studying a map of Asia -and taking notes, while Volodia roamed about the house refusing all -food, his face looking tired and puffy as if it had been stung by a bee. -He stopped more than once in front of the icon in the nursery and -crossed himself saying: - -“O Lord, forgive me, miserable sinner! O Lord, help my poor, unfortunate -mother!” - -Toward evening he burst into tears. When he said good night he kissed -his father and mother and sisters over and over again. Katia and Sonia -realized the significance of his actions, but Masha, the youngest, -understood nothing at all. Only when her eye fell upon Tchetchevitsin -did she grow pensive and say with a sigh: - -“Nurse says that when Lent comes we must eat peas and Tchetchevitsa.” - -Early on Christmas Eve Katia and Sonia slipped quietly out of bed and -went to the boys’ room to see them run away to America. They crept up to -their door. - -“So you won’t go?” asked Tchetchevitsin angrily. “Tell me, you won’t -go?” - -“Oh, dear!” wailed Volodia, weeping softly. “How can I go? I’m so sorry -for mamma!” - -“Paleface Brother, I beg you to go! You promised me yourself that you -would. You told me yourself how nice it would be. Now, when everything -is ready, you are afraid!” - -“I—I’m not afraid. I—I am sorry for mamma.” - -“Tell me, are you going or not?” - -“I’m going, only—only wait a bit, I want to stay at home a little while -longer!” - -“If that is the case, I’ll go alone!” Tchetchevitsin said with decision. -“I can get along perfectly well without you. I want to hunt and fight -tigers! If you won’t go, give me my pistol!” - -Volodia began to cry so bitterly that his sisters could not endure the -sound and began weeping softly themselves. Silence fell. - -“Then you won’t go?” demanded Tchetchevitsin again. - -“I—I’ll go.” - -“Then get dressed!” - -And to keep up Volodia’s courage, Tchetchevitsin began singing the -praises of America. He roared like a tiger, he whistled like a -steamboat, he scolded, and promised to give Volodia all the ivory and -gold they might find. - -The thin, dark boy with his bristling hair and his freckles seemed to -the girls to be a strange and wonderful person. He was a hero to them, a -man without fear, who could roar so well that, through the closed door, -one might really mistake him for a tiger or a lion. - -When the girls were dressing in their own room, Katia cried with tears -in her eyes: - -“Oh, I’m so frightened!” - -All was quiet until the family sat down to dinner at two o’clock, and -then it suddenly appeared that the boys were not in the house. Inquiries -were made in the servants’ quarters and at the stables, but they were -not there. A search was made in the village, but they could not be -found. At tea time they were still missing, and when the family had to -sit down to supper without them, mamma was terribly anxious and was even -crying. That night another search was made in the village and men were -sent down to the river with lanterns. Heavens, what an uproar arose! - -Next morning the policeman arrived and went into the dining-room to -write something. Mamma was crying. - -Suddenly, lo and behold! a posting sleigh drove up to the front door -with clouds of steam rising from its three white horses. - -“Volodia is here!” cried some one in the courtyard. - -“Voloditchka is here!” shrieked Natalia, rushing into the dining-room. - -My Lord barked “Bow, wow, wow!” in his deep voice. - -It seemed that the boys had been stopped at the hotel in the town, where -they had gone about asking every one where they could buy gunpowder. As -he entered the hall, Volodia burst into tears and flung his arms round -his mother’s neck. The girls trembled with terror at the thought of what -would happen next, for they heard papa call Volodia and Tchetchevitsin -into his study and begin talking to them. Mamma wept and joined in the -talk. - -“Do you think it was right?” papa asked, chiding them. “I hope to -goodness they won’t find it out at school, because, if they do, you will -certainly be expelled. Be ashamed of yourself, Master Tchetchevitsin! -You are a bad boy. You are a mischief-maker and your parents will punish -you. Do you think it was right to run away? Where did you spend the -night?” - -“In the station!” answered Tchetchevitsin proudly. - -Volodia was put to bed, and a towel soaked in vinegar was laid on his -head. A telegram was despatched, and next day a lady arrived, -Tchetchevitsin’s mamma, who took her son away. - -As Tchetchevitsin departed his face looked haughty and stern. He said -not a word as he took his leave of the girls, but in a copy-book of -Katia’s he wrote these words for remembrance: - -“Montezuma Hawkeye.” - - - GRISHA - -Grisha, a chubby little boy born only two years and eight months ago, -was out walking on the boulevard with his nurse. He wore a long, wadded -burnoose, a large cap with a furry knob, a muffler, and wool-lined -goloshes. He felt stuffy and hot, and, in addition, the waxing sun of -April was beating directly into his face and making his eyelids smart. - -Every inch of his awkward little figure, with its timid, uncertain -steps, bespoke a boundless perplexity. - -Until that day the only universe known to Grisha had been square. In one -corner of it stood his crib, in another stood nurse’s trunk, in the -third was a chair, and in the fourth a little icon lamp. If you looked -under the bed you saw a doll with one arm and a drum; behind nurse’s -trunk were a great many various objects: a few empty spools, some scraps -of paper, a box without a lid, and a broken jumping-jack. In this world, -besides nurse and Grisha, there often appeared mamma and the cat. Mamma -looked like a doll, and the cat looked like papa’s fur coat, only the -fur coat did not have eyes and a tail. From the world which was called -the nursery a door led to a place where people dined and drank tea. -There stood Grisha’s high chair and there hung the clock made to wag its -pendulum and strike. From the dining-room one could pass into another -room with big red chairs; there, on the floor, glowered a dark stain for -which people still shook their forefingers at Grisha. Still farther -beyond lay another room, where one was not allowed to go, and in which -one sometimes caught glimpses of papa, a very mysterious person! The -functions of mamma and nurse were obvious: they dressed Grisha, fed him, -and put him to bed; but why papa should be there was incomprehensible. -Aunty was also a puzzling person. She appeared and disappeared. Where -did she go? More than once Grisha had looked for her under the bed, -behind the trunk, and under the sofa, but she was not to be found. - -In the new world where he now found himself, where the sun dazzled one’s -eyes, there were so many papas and mammas and aunties that one scarcely -knew which one to run to. But the funniest and oddest things of all were -the horses. Grisha stared at their moving legs and could not understand -them at all. He looked up at nurse, hoping that she might help him to -solve the riddle, but she answered nothing. - -Suddenly he heard a terrible noise. Straight toward him down the street -came a squad of soldiers marching in step, with red faces and sticks -under their arms. Grisha’s blood ran cold with terror and he looked up -anxiously at his nurse to inquire if this were not dangerous. But nursie -neither ran away nor cried, so he decided it must be safe. He followed -the soldiers with his eyes and began marching in step with them. - -Across the street ran two big, long-nosed cats, their tails sticking -straight up into the air and their tongues lolling out of their mouths. -Grisha felt that he, too, ought to run, and he started off in pursuit. - -“Stop, stop!” cried nursie, seizing him roughly by the shoulder. “Where -are you going? Who told you to be naughty?” - -But there sat a sort of nurse with a basket of oranges in her lap. As -Grisha passed her he silently took one. - -“Don’t do that!” cried his fellow wayfarer, slapping his hand and -snatching the orange away from him. “Little stupid!” - -Next, Grisha would gladly have picked up some of the slivers of glass -that rattled under his feet and glittered like icon lamps, but he was -afraid that his hand might be slapped again. - -“Good day!” Grisha heard a loud, hoarse voice say over his very ear, -and, looking up, he caught sight of a tall person with shiny buttons. - -To his great joy this man shook hands with nursie; they stood together -and entered into conversation. The sunlight, the rumbling of the -vehicles, the horses, the shiny buttons, all struck Grisha as so -amazingly new and yet unterrifying, that his heart overflowed with -delight and he began to laugh. - -“Come! Come!” he cried to the man with the shiny buttons, pulling his -coat tails. - -“Where to?” asked the man. - -“Come!” Grisha insisted. He would have liked to say that it would be -nice to take papa and mamma and the cat along, too, but somehow his -tongue would not obey him. - -In a few minutes nurse turned off the boulevard and led Grisha into a -large courtyard where the snow still lay on the ground. The man with -shiny buttons followed them. Carefully avoiding the puddles and lumps of -snow, they picked their way across the courtyard, mounted a dark, grimy -staircase, and entered a room where the air was heavy with smoke and a -strong smell of cooking. A woman was standing over a stove frying chops. -This cook and nurse embraced one another, and, sitting down on a bench -with the man, began talking in low voices. Bundled up as he was, Grisha -felt unbearably hot. - -“What does this mean?” he asked himself, gazing about. He saw a dingy -ceiling, a two-pronged oven fork, and a stove with a huge oven mouth -gaping at him. - -“Ma-a-m-ma!” he wailed. - -“Now! Now!” his nurse called to him. “Be good!” - -The cook set a bottle, two glasses, and a pie on the table. The two -women and the man with the shiny buttons touched glasses and each had -several drinks. The man embraced alternately the cook and the nurse. -Then all three began to sing softly. - -Grisha stretched his hand toward the pie, and they gave him a piece. He -ate it and watched his nurse drinking. He wanted to drink, too. - -“Give, nursie! Give!” he begged. - -The cook gave him a drink out of her glass. He screwed up his eyes, -frowned, and coughed for a long time after that, beating the air with -his hands, while the cook watched him and laughed. - -When he reached home, Grisha explained to mamma, the walls, and his crib -where he had been and what he had seen. He told it less with his tongue -than with his hands and his face; he showed how the sun had shone, how -the horses had trotted, how the terrible oven had gaped at him, and how -the cook had drunk. - -That evening he could not possibly go to sleep. The soldiers with their -sticks, the great cats, the horses, the bits of glass, the basket of -oranges, the shiny buttons, all this lay piled on his brain and -oppressed him. He tossed from side to side, chattering to himself, and -finally, unable longer to endure his excitement, he burst into tears. - -“Why, he has fever!” cried mamma, laying the palm of her hand on his -forehead. “What can be the reason?” - -“The stove!” wept Grisha. “Go away, stove!” - -“He has eaten something that has disagreed with him,” mamma concluded. - -And, shaken by his impressions of a new life apprehended for the first -time, Grisha was given a spoonful of castor-oil by mamma. - - - A TRIFLE FROM REAL LIFE - -Nikolai Ilitch Belayeff was a young gentleman of St. Petersburg, aged -thirty-two, rosy, well fed, and a patron of the race-tracks. Once, -toward evening, he went to pay a call on Olga Ivanovna with whom, to use -his own expression, he was dragging through a long and tedious -love-affair. And the truth was that the first thrilling, inspiring pages -of this romance had long since been read, and that the story was now -dragging wearily on, presenting nothing that was either interesting or -novel. - -Not finding Olga at home, my hero threw himself upon a couch and -prepared to await her return. - -“Good evening, Nikolai Ilitch!” he heard a child’s voice say. “Mamma -will soon be home. She has gone to the dressmaker’s with Sonia.” - -On the divan in the same room lay Aliosha, Olga’s son, a small boy of -eight, immaculately and picturesquely dressed in a little velvet suit -and long black stockings. He had been lying on a satin pillow, mimicking -the antics of an acrobat he had seen at the circus. First he stretched -up one pretty leg, then another; then, when they were tired, he brought -his arms into play, and at last jumped up galvanically, throwing himself -on all fours in an effort to stand on his head. He went through all -these motions with the most serious face in the world, puffing like a -martyr, as if he himself regretted that God had given him such a -restless little body. - -“Ah, good evening, my boy!” said Belayeff. “Is that you? I did not know -you were here. Is mamma well?” - -Aliosha seized the toe of his left shoe in his right hand, assumed the -most unnatural position in the world, rolled over, jumped up, and peeped -out at Belayeff from under the heavy fringes of the lampshade. - -“Not very,” he said shrugging his shoulders. “Mamma is never really -well. She is a woman, you see, and women always have something the -matter with them.” - -From lack of anything better to do, Belayeff began scrutinizing -Aliosha’s face. During all his acquaintance with Olga he had never -bestowed any consideration upon the boy or noticed his existence at all. -He had seen the child about, but what he was doing there Belayeff, -somehow, had never cared to think. - -Now, in the dusk of evening, Aliosha’s pale face and fixed, dark eyes -unexpectedly reminded Belayeff of Olga as she had appeared in the first -pages of their romance. He wanted to pet the boy. - -“Come here, little monkey,” he said, “and let me look at you!” - -The boy jumped down from the sofa and ran to Belayeff. - -“Well,” the latter began, laying his hand on the boy’s thin shoulder. -“And how are you? Is everything all right with you?” - -“No, not very. It used to be much better.” - -“In what way?” - -“That’s easy to answer. Sonia and I used to learn only music and reading -before, but now we have French verses, too. You have cut your beard!” - -“Yes.” - -“So I noticed. It is shorter than it was. Please let me touch it—does -that hurt?” - -“No, not a bit.” - -“Why does it hurt if you pull one hair at a time, and not a bit if you -pull lots? Ha! Ha! I’ll tell you something. You ought to wear whiskers! -You could shave here on the sides, here, and here you could let the hair -grow——” - -The boy nestled close to Belayeff and began to play with his -watch-chain. - -“Mamma is going to give me a watch when I go to school, and I am going -to ask her to give me a chain just like yours—Oh, what a lovely locket! -Papa has a locket just like that; only yours has little stripes on it, -and papa’s has letters. He has a portrait of mamma in his locket. Papa -wears another watch-chain now made of ribbon.” - -“How do you know? Do you ever see your papa?” - -“I—n-no—I——” - -Aliosha blushed deeply at being caught telling a fib and began to -scratch the locket furiously with his nail. Belayeff looked searchingly -into his face and repeated: - -“Do you ever see your papa?” - -“N-no!” - -“Come, tell me honestly! I can see by your face that you are not telling -the truth. It’s no use quibbling now that the cat is out of the bag. -Tell me, do you see him? Now then, as between friends!” - -Aliosha reflected. - -“You won’t tell mamma?” he asked. - -“What an idea!” - -“Honour bright?” - -“Honour bright!” - -“Promise!” - -“Oh, you insufferable child! What do you take me for?” - -Aliosha glanced around, opened his eyes wide, and said: - -“For heaven’s sake don’t tell mamma! Don’t tell a soul, because it’s a -secret. I don’t know what would happen to Sonia and Pelagia and me if -mamma should find out. Now, listen. Sonia and I see papa every Thursday -and every Friday. When Pelagia takes us out walking before dinner we go -to Anfel’s confectionery and there we find papa already waiting for us. -He is always sitting in the little private room with the marble table -and the ash-tray that’s made like a goose without a back.” - -“What do you do in there?” - -“We don’t do anything. First we say how do you do, and then papa orders -coffee and pasties for us. Sonia likes pasties with meat, you know, but -I can’t abide them with meat. I like mine with cabbage or eggs. We eat -so much that we have a hard time eating our dinner afterward so that -mamma won’t guess anything.” - -“What do you talk about?” - -“With papa? Oh, about everything. He kisses us and hugs us and tells us -the funniest jokes. Do you know what? He says that when we grow bigger -he is going to take us to live with him. Sonia doesn’t want to go, but I -wouldn’t mind. Of course it would be lonely without mamma, but I could -write letters to her. Isn’t it funny, we might go and see her then on -Sundays, mightn’t we? Papa says, too, he is going to buy me a pony. He -is such a nice man! I don’t know why mamma doesn’t ask him to live with -her and why she won’t let us see him. He loves mamma very much. He -always asks how she is and what she has been doing. When she was ill he -took hold of his head just like this—and ran about the room. He always -asks us whether we are obedient and respectful to her. Tell me, is it -true that we are unfortunate?” - -“H’m—why do you ask?” - -“Because papa says we are. He says we are unfortunate children, and that -he is unfortunate, and that mamma is unfortunate. He tells us to pray to -God for her and for ourselves.” - -Aliosha fixed his eyes on the figure of a stuffed bird, and became lost -in thought. - -“Well, I declare—” muttered Belayeff. “So, that’s what you do, you hold -meetings at a confectioner’s? And your mamma doesn’t know it?” - -“N-no. How could she? Pelagia wouldn’t tell her for the world. Day -before yesterday papa gave us pears. They were as sweet as sugar. I ate -two!” - -“H’m. But—listen to me, does papa ever say anything about me?” - -“About you? What shall I say?” Aliosha looked searchingly into -Belayeff’s face and shrugged his shoulders. “Nothing special,” he -answered. - -“Well, what does he say, for instance?” - -“You won’t be angry if I tell you?” - -“What an idea! Does he abuse me?” - -“No, he doesn’t abuse you, but, you know, he is angry with you. He says -that it is your fault that mamma is unhappy, and that you have ruined -mamma. He is such a funny man! I tell him that you are kind and that you -never scold mamma, but he only shakes his head.” - -“So he says I have ruined her?” - -“Yes—don’t be angry, Nikolai Ilitch!” - -Belayeff rose and began pacing up and down the room. - -“How strange this is—and how ridiculous!” he muttered shrugging his -shoulders and smiling sarcastically. “It is all _his_ fault and yet he -says _I_ have ruined her! What an innocent baby this is! And so he told -you I had ruined your mother?” - -“Yes, but—you promised not to be angry!” - -“I’m not angry and—and it is none of your business anyway. Yes, this -is—this is really ridiculous! Here I have been caught like a mouse in a -trap, and now it seems it is all my fault!” - -The door-bell rang. The boy tore himself from Belayeff’s arms and ran -out of the room. A moment later a lady entered with a little girl. It -was Aliosha’s mother, Olga Ivanovna. Aliosha skipped into the room -behind her, singing loudly and clapping his hands. Belayeff nodded and -continued to walk up and down. - -“Of course!” he muttered. “Whom should he blame but me? He has right on -his side! He is the injured husband.” - -“What is that you are saying?” asked Olga Ivanovna. - -“What am I saying? Just listen to what your young hopeful here has been -preaching. It appears that I am a wicked scoundrel and that I have -ruined you and your children. You are all unhappy, and I alone am -frightfully happy. Frightfully, frightfully happy!” - -“I don’t understand you, Nikolai. What is the matter?” - -“Just listen to what this young gentleman here has to say!” cried -Belayeff pointing to Aliosha. - -Aliosha flushed and then grew suddenly pale and his face became -distorted with fear. - -“Nikolai Ilitch!” he whispered loudly. “Hush!” - -Olga Ivanovna looked at Aliosha in surprise, and then at Belayeff, and -then back again at Aliosha. - -“Ask him!” Belayeff continued. “That idiot of yours, Pelagia, takes them -to a confectioner’s and arranges meetings there between them and their -papa. But that isn’t the point. The point is that papa is the victim, -and that I am an abandoned scoundrel who has wrecked the lives of both -of you!” - -“Nikolai Ilitch!” groaned Aliosha. “You gave me your word of honour!” - -“Leave me alone!” Belayeff motioned to him impatiently. “This is more -important than words of honour. This hypocrisy, these lies are -intolerable!” - -“I don’t understand!” cried Olga Ivanovna, the tears glistening in her -eyes. “Listen, Aliosha,” she asked, turning to her son. “Do you really -see your father?” - -But Aliosha did not hear her, his eyes were fixed with horror on -Belayeff. - -“It cannot be possible!” his mother exclaimed, “I must go and ask -Pelagia.” - -Olga Ivanovna left the room. - -“But Nikolai Ilitch, you gave me your word of honour!” cried Aliosha -trembling all over. - -Belayeff made an impatient gesture and went on pacing the floor. He was -absorbed in thoughts of the wrong that had been done him, and, as -before, was unconscious of the boy’s presence: a serious, grown-up -person like him could not be bothered with little boys. But Aliosha -crept into a corner and told Sonia with horror how he had been deceived. -He trembled and hiccoughed and cried. This was the first time in his -life that he had come roughly face to face with deceit; he had never -imagined till now that there were things in this world besides pasties -and watches and sweet pears, things for which no name could be found in -the vocabulary of childhood. - - - THE COOK’S WEDDING - -Grisha, a little urchin of seven, stood at the kitchen door with his eye -at the keyhole, watching and listening. Something was taking place in -the kitchen that seemed to him very strange and that he had never seen -happen before. At the table on which the meat and onions were usually -chopped sat a huge, burly peasant in a long coachman’s coat. His hair -and beard were red, and a large drop of perspiration hung from the tip -of his nose. He was holding his saucer on the outstretched fingers of -his right hand and, as he supped his tea, was nibbling a lump of sugar -so noisily that the goose-flesh started out on Grisha’s back. On a grimy -stool opposite him sat Grisha’s old nurse, Aksinia. She also was -drinking tea; her mien was serious and at the same time radiant with -triumph. Pelagia, the cook, was busy over the stove and seemed to be -endeavouring to conceal her face by every possible means. Grisha could -see that it was fairly on fire, burning hot, and flooded in turn with -every colour of the rainbow from dark purple to a deathly pallor. The -cook was constantly catching up knives, forks, stove-wood, and dish-rags -in her trembling hands, and was bustling about and grumbling and making -a great racket without accomplishing anything. She did not once glance -toward the table at which the other two were sitting, and replied to the -nurse’s questions abruptly and roughly without ever turning her head in -their direction. - -“Drink, drink, Danilo!” the nurse was urging the driver. “What makes you -always drink tea? Take some vodka!” - -And the nurse pushed the bottle toward her guest, her face assuming a -malicious expression. - -“No, ma’am, I don’t use it. Thank you, ma’am,” the driver replied. -“Don’t force me to drink it, goody Aksinia!” - -“What’s the matter with you? What, you a driver and won’t drink vodka? A -single man ought to drink! Come, have a little!” - -The driver rolled his eyes at the vodka and then at the malicious face -of the nurse, and his own face assumed an expression no less crafty than -hers. - -“No, no; you’ll not catch me, you old witch!” he seemed to be saying. - -“No, thank you; I don’t drink,” he answered aloud. “That foolishness -won’t do in our business. A workman can drink if he wants to because he -never budges from the same place, but we fellows live too much in -public. Don’t we now? Supposing I were to go into an inn and my horse -were to break away, or, worse still, supposing I were to get drunk and, -before I knew it, were to go to sleep and fall off the box? That’s what -happens!” - -“How much do you make a day, Danilo?” - -“That depends on the day. There are days and days. A coachman’s job -isn’t worth much now. You know yourself that drivers are as thick as -flies, hay is expensive, travellers are scarce and are always wanting to -go everywhere on horseback. But, praise be to God, we don’t complain. We -keep ourselves clothed and fed and we can even make some one else -happy—(here the driver cast a look in Pelagia’s direction)—if they want -us to!” - -Grisha did not hear what was said next. His mamma came to the door and -sent him away to the nursery to study. - -“Be off to your lessons, you have no business to be here!” she -exclaimed. - -On reaching the nursery, Grisha took up “Our Mother Tongue,” and tried -to read, but without success. The words he had just overheard had raised -a host of questions in his mind. - -“The cook is going to be married,” he thought. “That is strange. I don’t -understand why she wants to be married. Mamma married papa and Cousin -Vera married Pavel Andreitch, but papa and Pavel Andreitch have gold -watch-chains and nice clothes and their boots are always clean. I can -understand any one marrying them. But this horrid driver with his red -nose and his felt boots—ugh! And why does nursie want poor Pelagia to -marry?” - -When her guest had gone, Pelagia came into the house to do the -housework. Her excitement had not subsided. Her face was red and she -looked startled. She scarcely touched the floor with her broom and swept -out every corner at least five times. She lingered in the room where -Grisha’s mamma was sitting. Solitude seemed to be irksome to her and she -longed to pour out her heart in words and to share her impressions with -some one. - -“Well, he’s gone!” she began, seeing that mamma would not open the -conversation. - -“He seems to be a nice man,” said mamma without looking up from her -embroidery. “He is sober and steady looking.” - -“My lady, I won’t marry him!” Pelagia suddenly screamed. “I declare I -won’t!” - -“Don’t be silly, you’re not a baby! Marriage is a serious thing, and you -must think it over carefully and not scream like that for no reason at -all. Do you like him?” - -“Oh, my lady!” murmured Pelagia in confusion. “He does say such -things—indeed he does!” - -“She ought to say outright she doesn’t like him,” thought Grisha. - -“What a goose you are! Tell me, do you like him?” - -“He’s an old man, my lady! Hee, hee!” - -“Listen to her!” the nurse burst out from the other end of the room. “He -isn’t forty yet! You mustn’t look a gift-horse in the mouth! Marry him -and have done with it!” - -“I won’t marry him! I won’t, I won’t!” screamed Pelagia. - -“Then you’re a donkey, you are! What in the world are you after, anyhow? -Any other woman but you would be down on her knees to him, and you say -you won’t marry him! She’s running after Grisha’s tutor, she is, my -lady; she’s setting her cap at him! Ugh, the shameless creature!” - -“Had you ever seen this Danilo before to-day?” her mistress asked -Pelagia. - -“How could I have seen him before to-day? This was the first time. -Aksinia picked him up somewhere—bad luck to him! Why must I have him -thrown at my head?” - -That day the whole family kept their eyes fixed on Pelagia’s face as she -was serving the dinner and teased her about the driver. Pelagia blushed -furiously and giggled with confusion. - -“What a shameful thing it must be to get married!” thought Grisha. “What -a horribly shameful thing!” - -The whole dinner was too salty, blood was oozing from the half-cooked -chickens, and, to complete the disaster, Pelagia kept dropping the -knives and forks and dishes as if her hands had been a pair of rickety -shelves. No one blamed her, however, for every one knew what her state -of mind must be. - -Once only did papa angrily throw down his napkin and exclaim to mamma: - -“What is this craze you have for match-making? Can’t you let them manage -it for themselves if they want to get married?” - -After dinner the neighbouring cooks and maids kept flitting in and out -of the kitchen, and were whispering together there until late in the -evening. Heaven knows how they had scented the approaching wedding! -Waking up at midnight, Grisha heard his nurse and the cook murmuring -together in his nursery behind the curtain. The nurse was trying to -convince the cook of something, and the latter was alternately sobbing -and giggling. When he fell asleep, Grisha saw in his dreams Pelagia -being spirited away by the Evil One and a witch. - -Next day quiet reigned once more, and from that time forward life in the -kitchen jogged on as if there were no such thing in the world as a -driver. Only nurse would don her new shawl from time to time and sally -forth for a couple of hours, evidently to a conference, with a serious -and triumphant expression on her face. Pelagia and the driver did not -see one another, and if any one mentioned his name to her she would fly -into a rage and exclaim: - -“Bad luck to him! As if I ever thought of him at all—ugh!” - -One evening, while Pelagia and the nurse were busily cutting out clothes -in the kitchen, mamma came in and said: - -“Of course you may marry him, Pelagia, that is your own affair, but I -want you to understand that I can’t have him living here. You know I -don’t like to have men sitting in the kitchen. Remember that! And I -can’t ever let you go out for the night.” - -“What do you take me for, my lady?” screamed Pelagia. “Why do you cast -him into my teeth? Let him fuss all he wants to! What does he mean by -hanging himself round my neck, the——” - -Looking into the kitchen one Sunday morning, Grisha was petrified with -astonishment. The room was packed to overflowing; the cooks from all the -neighbouring houses were there with the house porter, two constables, a -sergeant in his gold lace, and a boy named Filka. This Filka was -generally to be found hanging about the wash-house playing with the -dogs, but to-day he was washed and brushed and dressed in a gold-tinsel -cassock and was carrying an icon in his hands. In the middle of the -kitchen stood Pelagia in a new gingham dress with a wreath of flowers on -her head. At her side stood the driver. The young couple were flushed -and perspiring, and were blinking their eyes furiously. - -“Well, it’s time to begin,” said the sergeant after a long silence. - -A spasm passed over Pelagia’s features and she began to bawl. The -sergeant picked up a huge loaf of bread from the table, pulled the nurse -to his side, and commenced the ceremony. The driver approached the -sergeant and flopped down on his knees before him, delivering a smacking -kiss on his hand. Pelagia went mechanically after him and also flopped -down on her knees. At last the outside door opened, a gust of white mist -blew into the kitchen, and the assembly streamed out into the courtyard. - -“Poor, poor woman!” thought Grisha, listening to the cook’s sobs. “Where -are they taking her? Why don’t papa and mamma interfere?” - -After the wedding they sang and played the concertina in the laundry -until night. Mamma was annoyed because nurse smelled of vodka and -because, with all these weddings, there never was any one to put on the -samovar. Pelagia had not come in when Grisha went to bed that night. - -“Poor woman, she is crying out there somewhere in the dark,” he thought. -“And the driver is telling her to shut up!” - -Next morning the cook was back in the kitchen again. The driver came in -for a few minutes. He thanked mamma, and, casting a stern look at -Pelagia, said: - -“Keep a sharp eye on her, my lady! And you, too, Aksinia, don’t let her -alone; make her behave herself. No nonsense for her! And please let me -have five roubles of her wages, my lady, to buy myself a new pair of -hames.” - -Here, then, was a fresh puzzle for Grisha! Pelagia had been free to do -as she liked and had been responsible to no one, and now suddenly, for -no reason at all, along came an unknown man who seemed somehow to have -acquired the right to control her actions and her property! Grisha grew -very sad. He was on the verge of tears and longed passionately to be -kind to this woman, who, it seemed to him, was a victim of human -violence. He ran into the storeroom, picked out the largest apple he -could find there, tiptoed into the kitchen, and, thrusting the apple -into Pelagia’s hand, rushed back as fast as his legs could carry him. - - - SHROVE TUESDAY - -“Here, Pavel, Pavel!” Pelagia Ivanovna cried, rousing her husband from a -nap. “Do go and help Stepa! He is sitting there crying again over his -lessons. It must be something he can’t understand.” - -Pavel Vasilitch got up, made the sign of the cross over his yawning -mouth, and said meekly: - -“Very well, dear.” - -The cat sleeping beside him also jumped up, stretched its tail in the -air, arched its back, and half-closed its eyes. The mice could be heard -scuttling behind the hangings. Having put on his slippers and -dressing-gown, Pavel Vasilitch passed into the dining-room all ruffled -and heavy with sleep. A second cat that had been sniffing at a plate of -cold fish on the window-sill jumped to the floor as he entered, and hid -in the cupboard. - -“Who told you to go smelling that?” Pavel Vasilitch cried with vexation, -covering the fish with a newspaper. “You’re more of a pig than a cat!” - -A door led from the dining-room into the nursery. There, at a table -disfigured with deep gouges and stains, sat Stepa, a schoolboy of ten -with tearful eyes and a petulant face. He was hugging his knees to his -chin and swaying backward and forward like a Chinese idol with his eyes -fixed angrily on the schoolbook before him. - -“So you’re learning your lessons, eh?” asked Pavel Vasilitch, yawning -and taking his seat at the table beside him. “That’s the way, sonny. -You’ve had your play and your nap, and you’ve eaten your pancakes, and -to-morrow will be Lent, a time of repentance; so now you’re at work. The -happiest day must have an end. What do those tears mean? Are your -lessons getting the better of you? It’s hard to do lessons after eating -pancakes! That’s what ails you, little sonny!” - -“Why do you laugh at the child?” calls Pelagia Ivanovna from the next -room. “Show him how to do his lessons, instead of making fun of him! Oh, -what a trial he is! He’ll be sure to get a bad mark to-morrow!” - -“What is it you don’t understand?” asked Pavel Vasilitch of Stepa. - -“This here, how to divide these fractions,” the boy answered crossly. -“The division of fractions by fractions.” - -“H’m, you little pickle, that’s easy, there’s nothing about it to -understand. You must do the sum right, that’s all. To divide one -fraction by another you multiply the numerator of the first by the -denominator of the second in order to get the numerator of the quotient. -Very well. Now the denominator of the first——” - -“I know that already!” Stepa interrupted him, flicking a nutshell off -the table. “Show me an example.” - -“An example? Very well, let me have a pencil. Now, then, listen to me. -Supposing that we want to divide seven-eighths by two-fifths. Very well, -then the proposition is this: we want to divide these two fractions by -one another—Is the samovar boiling?” - -“I don’t know.” - -“Because it’s eight o’clock and time for tea. Very well, now listen to -me. Supposing that we divide seven-eighths not by two-fifths, but by -two, that is by the numerator only. What is the answer?” - -“Seven-sixteenths.” - -“Splendid! Good boy! Now, then, sonny, the trick is this: as we have -divided—let me see—as we have divided it by two, of course—wait a -minute, I’m getting muddled myself. I remember when I was a boy at -school we had a Polish arithmetic master named Sigismund Urbanitch, who -used to get muddled over every lesson. He would suddenly lose his wits -while he was in the midst of demonstrating a proposition, blush to the -roots of his hair, and rush about the classroom as if the devil were -after him. Then he would blow his nose four or five times and burst into -tears. But we were generous to him, we used to pretend not to notice it, -and would ask him whether he had the toothache. And yet we were a class -of pirates, of cutthroats, I can tell you, but, as you see, we were -generous. We boys weren’t puny like you when I was a youngster; we were -great big chaps, you never saw such great strapping fellows! There was -Mamakin, for instance, in the third grade. Lord! What a giant he was! -Why, that colossus was seven feet high! The whole house shook when he -walked across the floor and he would knock the breath out of your body -if he laid his hand on your shoulder. Not only we boys, but even the -masters feared him. Why Mamakin would sometimes——” - -Pelagia Ivanovna’s footsteps resounded in the next room. Pavel Vasilitch -winked at the door and whispered: - -“Mother’s coming, let’s get to work! Very well, then, sonny,” he -continued, raising his voice. “We want to divide this fraction by that -one. All right. To do that we must multiply the numerator of the first -by——” - -“Come in to tea!” called Pelagia Ivanovna. - -Father and son left their arithmetic and went in to tea. Pelagia -Ivanovna was already seated at the dining-table with the silent aunt and -another aunt who was deaf and dumb and old granny Markovna, who had -assisted Stepa into the world. The samovar was hissing and emitting jets -of steam that settled in large, dark shadows upon the ceiling. The cats -came in from the hall, sleepy, melancholy, their tails standing straight -up in the air. - -“Do have some preserves with your tea, Markovna!” said Pelagia Ivanovna -turning to the old dame. “To-morrow will be Lent, so you must eat all -you can.” - -Markovna helped herself to a large spoonful of jam, raised it to her -lips, and swallowed it with a sidelong glance at Pavel Vasilitch. Next -moment a sweet smile broke over her face, a smile almost as sweet as the -jam itself. - -“These preserves are perfectly delicious!” she exclaimed. “Did you make -them yourself, Pelagia Ivanovna, dearie?” - -“Yes, of course, who else could have made them? I do everything myself. -Stepa, darling, was your tea too weak for you? Mercy, you’ve finished it -already! Come, hand me your cup, sweetheart, and let me give you some -more.” - -“That young Mamakin I was telling you about, sonny,” continued Pavel -Vasilitch, turning to Stepa, “couldn’t abide our French teacher. ‘I’m a -gentleman!’ he used to exclaim. ‘I won’t be lorded over by a Frenchman!’ -Of course he used to be flogged for it, and badly flogged, too. When he -knew he was in for a thrashing he used to jump through the window and -take to his heels, not showing his nose in school after that for five or -six days. Then his mother would go to the head master and beg him for -pity’s sake to find her Mishka and give the scoundrel a thrashing, but -the head master used to say: ‘That’s all very well, madam, but no five -of our men can hold that fellow!’” - -“My goodness, what dreadful boys there are in the world!” whispered -Pelagia Ivanovna, fixing terrified eyes on her husband. “His poor -mother!” - -A silence followed—Stepa yawned loudly as he contemplated the Chinaman -on the tea-caddy whom he had seen at least a thousand times before. -Markovna and the two aunts sipped their tea primly from their saucers. -The air was close and oppressive with the heat of the stove. The -lassitude that comes to the satiated body when it is forced to continue -eating was depicted on the faces and in the movements of the family. The -samovar had been taken away and the table had been cleared, but they -still continued to sit about the board. Pelagia Ivanovna jumped up from -time to time and ran into the kitchen with a look of horror on her face -to confer with the cook about supper. The aunts both sat motionless in -the same position, dozing with their hands folded on their chests and -their lack-lustre eyes fixed on the lamp. Markovna kept hiccoughing -every minute and asked each time: - -“I wonder what makes me hiccough? I don’t know what I could have eaten -or drunk—hick!” - -Pavel Vasilitch and Stepa leaned over the table side by side with their -heads together, poring over the pages of the _Neva Magazine_ for the -year 1878. - -“‘The monument to Leonardo da Vinci in front of the Victor Emmanuel -Museum at Milan.’ Look at that, it’s like a triumphal arch! And there -are a man and a lady, and there are some more little people——” - -“That looks like one of the boys at our school,” Stepa said. - -“Turn over the page—‘The Proboscis of the House Fly as Seen through the -Microscope.’ Goodness what a fly! I wonder what a bedbug would look like -under the microscope, eh? How disgusting!” - -The ancient hall clock coughed rather than struck ten times, as if it -were afflicted with a cold. Into the dining-room came Anna the cook and -fell flop at her master’s feet. - -“Forgive me my sins, master, for Christ’s sake!” she cried and got up -again very red in the face. - -“Forgive me mine, too, for Christ’s sake!” answered Pavel Vasilitch -calmly. - -Anna then fell down at the feet of every member of the family in turn -and asked forgiveness for her sins, omitting only Markovna, who, not -being high-born, was unworthy of a prostration. - -Another half-hour passed in silence and peace. The _Neva_ was tossed -aside onto the sofa and Pavel Vasilitch, with one finger raised aloft, -was reciting Latin poetry he had learned in his youth. Stepa was -watching his father’s finger with its wedding-ring and dozing as he -listened to the words he could not understand. He rubbed his heavy eyes -with his fist but they kept closing tighter and tighter each time. - -“I’m going to bed!” he said at last, stretching and yawning. - -“What? To bed?” cried Pelagia Ivanovna. “Won’t you eat your meat for the -last time before Lent?” - -“I don’t want any meat.” - -“Have you taken leave of your senses?” his startled mother exclaimed. -“How can you say that? You won’t have any meat after to-night for the -whole of Lent!” - -Pavel Vasilitch was startled, too. - -“Yes, yes, sonny,” he cried. “Your mother will give you nothing but -Lenten fare for seven weeks after to-night. This won’t do. You must eat -your meat!” - -“But I want to go to bed!” whimpered Stepa. - -“Then bring in the supper quick!” cried Pavel Vasilitch in a flutter. -“Anna, what are you doing in there, you old slow-coach? Come quick and -bring in the supper!” - -Pelagia Ivanovna threw up her hands and rushed into the kitchen as if -the house were afire. - -“Hurry! Hurry!” rang through the house. “Stepa wants to go to bed! Anna! -Oh, heavens, what is the matter? Hurry!” - -In five minutes the supper was on the table. The cats appeared once -more, stretching and arching their backs, with their tails in the air. -The family applied themselves to their meal. No one was hungry, all were -surfeited to the point of bursting, but they felt it was their duty to -eat. - - - IN PASSION WEEK - -“Run, the church-bells are ringing! Be a good boy in church and don’t -play! If you do, God will punish you!” - -My mother slipped a few copper coins into my hand and then forgot all -about me, as she ran into the kitchen with an iron that was growing -cold. I knew I should not be allowed to eat or drink after confession, -so before leaving home I choked down a crust of bread and drank two -glasses of water. Spring was at its height. The street was a sea of -brown mud through which ruts were already in process of being worn; the -housetops and sidewalks were dry, and the tender young green of -springtime was pushing up through last year’s dry grass under the fence -rows. Muddy rivulets were babbling and murmuring down the gutters in -which the sun did not disdain to lave its rays. Chips, bits of straw, -and nutshells were floating swiftly down with the current, twisting and -turning and catching on the dirty foam flakes. Whither, whither were -they drifting? Would they not be swept from the gutter into the river, -from the river into the sea, and from the sea into the mighty ocean? I -tried to picture to myself the long and terrible journey before them, -but my imagination failed even before reaching the river. - -A cab drove by. The cabman was clucking to his horse and slapping the -reins, unaware of two street-urchins hanging from the springs of his -little carriage. I wanted to join these boys, but straightway remembered -that I was on my way to confession, whereupon the boys appeared to me to -be very wicked sinners indeed. - -“God will ask them on the Last Judgment Day why they played tricks on a -poor cabman,” I thought. “They will begin to make excuses, but the devil -will grab them and throw them into eternal fire. But if they obey their -fathers and mothers and give pennies and bread to the beggars, God will -have mercy on them and will let them into Paradise.” - -The church porch was sunny and dry. Not a soul was there; I opened the -church door irresolutely and entered the building. There, in the dim -light more fraught with melancholy and gloom for me than ever before, I -became overwhelmed by the consciousness of my wickedness and sin. The -first object that met my sight was a huge crucifixion with the Virgin -and St. John the Baptist on either side of the cross. The lustres and -shutters were hung with mourning black, the icon lamps were glimmering -faintly, and the sun seemed to be purposely avoiding the church windows. -The Mother of God and the favourite Disciple were depicted in profile -silently gazing at that unutterable agony upon the cross, oblivious of -my presence. I felt that I was a stranger to them, paltry and vile; that -I could not help them by word or deed; that I was a horrid, worthless -boy, fit only to chatter and be naughty and rough. I called to mind all -my acquaintances, and they all seemed to me to be trivial and silly and -wicked, incapable of consoling one atom the terrible grief before me. -The murky twilight deepened, the Mother of God and John the Baptist -seemed very lonely. - -Behind the lectern where the candles were sold stood the old soldier -Prokofi, now churchwarden’s assistant. - -His eyebrows were raised and he was stroking his beard and whispering to -an old woman. - -“The service will begin directly after vespers this evening. There will -be prayers after matins to-morrow at eight o’clock. Do you hear me? At -eight o’clock.” - -Between two large pillars near the rood-screen the penitents were -standing in line waiting their turn for confession. Among them was -Mitka, a ragged little brat with an ugly, shaven head, protruding ears, -and small, wicked eyes. He was the son of Nastasia the washerwoman, and -was a bully and a thief who filched apples from the fruit-stalls and had -more than once made away with my knuckle-bones. He was now staring -crossly at me and seemed to be exulting in the fact that he was going to -confession before me. My heart swelled with rage and I tried not to look -at him. From the bottom of my soul I was furious that this boy’s sins -were about to be forgiven. - -In front of him stood a richly dressed lady with a white plume in her -hat. Clearly she was deeply agitated and tensely expectant, and one of -her cheeks was burning with a feverish flush. - -I waited five minutes, ten minutes—then a well-dressed young man with a -long, thin neck came out from behind the screen. He had on high rubber -goloshes, and I at once began dreaming of the day when I should buy a -pair of goloshes like his for myself. I decided that I would certainly -do so. And now came the lady’s turn. She shuddered and went behind the -screen. - -Through a crack I could see her approach the altar, prostrate herself, -rise, and bow her head expectantly without looking at the priest. The -priest’s back was turned toward the screen, and all I could see of him -was his broad shoulders, his curly grey hair, and the chain around his -neck from which a cross was suspended. Sighing, without looking at the -lady, he began nodding his head and whispering rapidly, now raising, now -lowering his voice. The lady listened meekly, guiltily almost, with -downcast eyes, and answered him in a few words. - -“What can be her sin?” I wondered, looking reverently at her beautiful, -gentle face. “Forgive her, God, and make her happy!” - -But now the priest was covering her head with the stole. - -“I, Thy unworthy servant,” his voice rang out, “by the power vouchsafed -me, forgive this woman and absolve her from sin——” - -The lady prostrated herself once more, kissed the cross, and retired. -Both her cheeks were flushed now, but her face was calm, and unclouded, -and joyous. - -“She is happy now,” I thought, my eye wandering from her to the priest -pronouncing the absolution. “But how happy he must be who is able to -forgive sin!” - -It was Mitka’s turn next, and my heart suddenly boiled over with hatred -for the little thief. I wanted to go behind the screen ahead of him, I -wanted to be first. Mitka noticed the movement, and hit me on the head -with a candle. I paid him back in his own coin, and for a moment sounds -of panting and the breaking of candles were heard in the church. We were -forcibly parted, and my enemy nervously and stiffly approached the altar -and bowed to the ground, but what happened after that I was unable to -see. All I could think of was that I was going next, after Mitka, and at -that thought the objects around me danced and swam before my eyes. -Mitka’s protruding ears grew larger than ever and melted into the back -of his neck, the priest swayed, and the floor rocked under my feet. - -The priest’s voice rang out: - -“I, Thy unworthy servant——” - -I found myself moving toward the screen. My feet seemed to be treading -on air. I felt as if I were floating. I reached the altar, which was -higher than my head. The weary, dispassionate face of the priest flashed -for a moment across my vision, but after that I saw only his blue-lined -sleeves and one corner of the stole. I felt his near presence, smelled -the odour of his cassock, and heard his stern voice, and the cheek that -was turned toward him began to burn. I lost much of what he said from -excitement, but I answered him earnestly, in a voice that sounded to me -as if it were not my own. I thought of the lonely Mother of God, and the -Disciple, and the crucifixion, and my mother, and wanted to cry and ask -for forgiveness. - -“What is your name?” asked the priest, laying the stole over my head. - -How relieved I now felt, and how light of heart! My sins were gone, I -was sanctified. I could enter into Paradise. It seemed to me that I -exhaled the same odour as the priest’s cassock, and I sniffed my sleeve -as I came out from behind the screen and went to the deacon to register. -The dim half-light of the church no longer struck me as gloomy, and I -could now look calmly and without anger at Mitka. - -“What is your name?” asked the deacon. - -“Fedia.” - -“Fedia, what?” - -“I don’t know.” - -“What is your daddy’s name?” - -“Ivan.” - -“And his other name?” - -I was silent. - -“How old are you?” - -“Nine years old.” - -On reaching home I went straight to bed to avoid seeing my family at -supper. Shutting my eyes, I lay thinking of how glorious it would be to -be martyred by Herod or some one; to live in a desert feeding bears like -the hermit Seraphim; to pass one’s life in a cell with nothing to eat -but wafers; to give away all one possessed to the poor; to make a -pilgrimage to Kief. I could hear them laying the table in the -dining-room; supper would soon be ready! There would be pickles and -cabbage pasties and baked fish—oh, how hungry I was! I now felt willing -to endure any torture whatsoever, to live in the desert without my -mother, feeding bears out of my own hands, if only I could have just one -little cabbage pasty first! - -“Purify my heart, O God!” I prayed, pulling the bedclothes up over my -head. “O guardian angels, save me from sin!” - -Next morning, Thursday, I woke with a heart as serene and joyful as a -spring day. I walked gaily and manfully to church, conscious that I was -now a communicant and that I was wearing a beautiful and expensive shirt -made from a silk dress left me by my grandmamma. Everything in church -spoke of joy and happiness and springtime. The Mother of God and John -the Baptist looked less sad than they had the evening before, and the -faces of the communicants were radiant with anticipation. The past, it -seemed, was all forgiven and forgotten. Mitka was there, washed and -dressed in his Sunday best. I looked cheerfully at his protruding ears, -and, to show that I bore him no malice, I said: - -“You look fine to-day. If your hair didn’t stick up so and you weren’t -so poorly dressed one might almost think your mother was a lady instead -of a washerwoman. Come and play knuckle-bones with me on Easter Day!” - -Mitka looked suspiciously at me and secretly threatened me with his -fist. - -The lady of yesterday was radiantly beautiful. She wore a light blue -dress fastened with a large, flashing brooch shaped like a horseshoe. - -I stood and admired her, thinking that when I grew to be a man I should -certainly marry a woman like her, but, remembering suddenly that to -think of marriage was shameful, I stopped, and moved toward the choir -where the deacon was already reading the prayers that concluded the -service. - - - AN INCIDENT - -It was morning. Bright rays of sunlight were streaming into the nursery -through the lacy curtain that the frost had drawn across the panes of -the windows. Vania, a boy of six with a shaven head and a nose like a -button, and his sister Nina, a chubby, curly-haired girl of four, woke -from their sleep and stared crossly at one another through the bars of -their cribs. - -“Oh, shame, shame!” grumbled nursie. “All good folks have had breakfast -by now and your eyes are still half-closed!” - -The sun’s rays were chasing each other merrily across the carpet, the -walls, and the tail of nursie’s dress, and seemed to be inviting the -children to a romp, but they did not notice the sun, they had waked in a -bad humour. Nina pouted, made a wry face, and began to whine: - -“Tea, nursie, I want my tea!” - -Vania frowned and wondered how he could manage to quarrel and so find an -excuse to bawl. He was already winking his eyes and opening his mouth -when mamma’s voice came from the dining-room saying: - -“Don’t forget to give the cat some milk; she has kittens now!” - -Vania and Nina pulled long faces and looked dubiously at one another; -then they both screamed, jumped out of bed, and scampered into the -kitchen as they were, barefooted and in their little nightgowns, filling -the air with shrill squeals as they ran. - -“The cat has kittens! The cat has kittens!” they shrieked. - -Under a bench in the kitchen stood a box, the same box which Stepan used -for carrying coal when fires were lighted in the fire-places. Out of -this box peered the cat. Profound weariness was manifested in her face, -and her green eyes with their narrow black pupils wore an expression -both languid and sentimental. One could see from her mien that if “he,” -the father of her children, were but with her, her happiness would be -complete. She opened her mouth wide and tried to mew but her throat only -emitted a wheezing sound. The squeaking of her kittens came from inside -the box. - -The children squatted down on their heels near the box, motionless, -holding their breath, their eyes riveted on the cat. They were dumb with -wonder and amazement and did not hear their nurse as she grumblingly -pursued them. Unaffected pleasure shone in the eyes of both. - -In the lives and education of children domestic animals play a useful if -inconspicuous part. Who does not remember some strong, noble watch-dog -of his childhood, some petted spaniel, or the birds that died in -captivity? Who does not recall the stupid, arrogant turkeys, and the -meek old tabby-cats that were always ready to forgive us even when we -stepped on their tails for fun and caused them the keenest pain? I -sometimes think that the loyalty, patience, capacity for forgiveness, -and fidelity of our domestic animals have a far greater and more potent -influence over the minds of children than the long discourses of some -pale, prosy German tutor or the hazy explanations of a governess who -tries to tell them that water is compounded of oxygen and hydrogen. - -“Oh, how tiny they are!” cried Nina, staring at the kittens round-eyed -and breaking into a merry peal of laughter—“They look like mice!” - -“One, two, three—” counted Vania. “Three kittens. That means one for me -and one for you and one for some one else.” - -“Murrm-murr-r-r-m,” purred the cat, flattered at receiving so much -attention. “Murr-r-m.” - -When they were tired of looking at the kittens, the children took them -out from under the cat and began squeezing and pinching them; then, not -satisfied with this, they wrapped them in the hems of their nightgowns -and ran with them into the drawing-room. - -Their mother was sitting there with a strange man. When she saw the -children come in not dressed, not washed, with their nightgowns in the -air she blushed and looked sternly at them. - -“For shame! Let your nightgowns down!” she cried. “Go away or else I -shall have to punish you!” - -But the children heeded neither the threats of their mother nor the -presence of the stranger. They laid the kittens down on the carpet and -raised their voices in shrill vociferation. The mother cat roamed about -at their feet and mewed beseechingly. A moment later the children were -seized and borne off into the nursery to be dressed and fed and to say -their prayers, but their hearts were full of passionate longing to have -done with these prosaic duties as quickly as possible and to escape once -more into the kitchen. - -Their usual games and occupations faded into the background. - -By their arrival in the world the kittens had eclipsed everything else -and had taken their place as the one engrossing novelty and passion of -the day. If Vania or Nina had been offered a ton of candy or a thousand -pennies for each one of the kittens they would have refused the bargain -without a moment’s hesitation. They sat over the kittens in the kitchen -until the very moment for dinner, in spite of the vigorous protests of -their nurse and of the cook. The expression on their faces was serious, -absorbed, and full of anxiety. They were worrying not only over the -present, but also over the future of the kittens. They decided that one -should stay at home with the old cat to console its mother, the second -should go to the cottage in the country, and the third should live in -the cellar where there were so many rats. - -“But why don’t they open their eyes?” Nina puzzled. “They are blind, -like beggars!” - -Vania, too, was perturbed by this phenomenon. He set to work to open the -eyes of one of the kittens, and puffed and snuffled over his task for a -long time, but the operation proved to be unsuccessful. The children -were also not a little worried because the kittens obstinately refused -all meat and milk set before them. Their grey mother ate everything that -was put under their little noses. - -“Come on, let’s make some little houses for the kitties!” Vania -suggested. “Then they can live in their own separate homes and the old -kitty can come and visit them.” - -They put hat-boxes in various corners of the kitchen, and the kittens -were transferred to their new homes. But this family separation proved -to be premature. With the same imploring, sentimental look on her face, -the cat made the round of the boxes and carried her babies back to their -former nest. - -“Kitty is their mother,” Vania reflected. “But who is their father?” - -“Yes, who is their father?” Nina repeated. - -“They _must_ have a father,” both decided. - -Vania and Nina debated for a long time as to who should be the father of -the kittens. At last their choice fell upon a large dark-red horse with -a broken tail who had been thrown into a cupboard under the stairs and -there lay awaiting his end in company with other rubbish and broken -toys. This horse they dragged forth and set up beside the box. - -“Mind now!” the children admonished him. “Stand there and see they -behave themselves!” - -Shortly before dinner Vania was sitting at the table in his father’s -study dreamily watching a kitten that lay squirming on the -blotting-paper under the lamp. His eyes were following each movement of -the little creature and he was trying to force first a pencil and then a -match into its mouth. Suddenly his father appeared beside the table as -if he had sprung from the floor. - -“What’s that?” Vania heard him ask in an angry voice. - -“It’s—it’s a little kitty, papa.” - -“I’ll show you a little kitty! Look what you’ve done, you bad boy, -you’ve messed up the whole blotter!” - -To Vania’s intense surprise, his papa did not share his affection for -kittens. Instead of going into raptures and rejoicing over it with him, -he pulled Vania’s ear and shouted: - -“Stepan! Come and take this nasty thing away!” - -At dinner, too, a scandal occurred. During the second course the family -suddenly heard a faint squeaking. A search for the cause was made and a -kitten was discovered under Nina’s apron. - -“Nina, leave the table at once!” cried her father angrily. “Stepan, -throw the kittens into the slop-barrel this minute! I won’t have such -filth in the house!” - -Vania and Nina were horrified. Apart from its cruelty, death in the -slop-barrel threatened to deprive the old cat and the wooden horse of -their children, to leave the box deserted, and to upset all their plans -for the future, that beautiful future in which one cat would take care -of its old mother, one would live in the country, and the third would -catch rats in the cellar. The children began to cry and to beg for the -lives of the kittens. Their father consented to spare them on condition -that the children should under no circumstances go into the kitchen or -touch the kittens. - -When dinner was over, Vania and Nina roamed disconsolately through the -house, pining for their pets. The prohibition to enter the kitchen had -plunged them in gloom. They refused candy when it was offered them and -were cross and rude to their mother. When their Uncle Peter came in the -evening they took him aside and complained to him of their father who -wanted to throw the kittens into the slop-barrel. - -“Uncle Peter,” they begged. “Tell mamma to have the kittens brought into -the nursery! Do tell her!” - -“All right, all right!” their uncle consented to get rid of them. - -Uncle Peter seldom came alone. There generally appeared with him Nero, a -big black Dane with flapping ears and a tail as hard as a stick. He was -a silent and gloomy dog, full of the consciousness of his own dignity. -He ignored the children and thumped them with his tail as he stalked by -them as if they had been chairs. The children cordially hated him, but -this time practical considerations triumphed over sentiment. - -“Do you know what, Nina?” said Vania, opening his eyes very wide. “Let’s -make Nero their father instead of the horse! The horse is dead and he is -alive.” - -They waited all the evening for the time to come when papa should sit -down to his whist and Nero might be admitted into the kitchen. At last -papa began playing. Mamma was busy over the samovar and was not noticing -the children—the happy moment had come! - -“Come on!” Vania whispered to his sister. - -But just then Stepan came into the room and announced with a smile: - -“Madame, Nero has eaten the kittens!” - -Nina and Vania paled and looked at Stepan in horror. - -“Indeed he has!” chuckled the butler. “He has found the box and eaten -every one!” - -The children imagined that every soul in the house would spring up in -alarm and fling themselves upon that wicked Nero. But instead of this -they all sat quietly in their places and only seemed surprised at the -appetite of the great dog. Papa and mamma laughed. Nero walked round the -table wagging his tail and licking his chops with great -self-satisfaction. Only the cat was uneasy. With her tail in the air she -roamed through the house, looking suspiciously at every one and mewing -pitifully. - -“Children, it’s ten o’clock! Go to bed!” cried mamma. - -Vania and Nina went to bed crying and lay for a long time thinking about -the poor, abused kitty and that horrid, cruel, unpunished Nero. - - - A MATTER OF CLASSICS - -Before going to take his Greek examination, Vania Ottopeloff devoutly -kissed every icon in the house. He felt a load on his chest and his -blood ran cold, while his heart beat madly and sank into his boots for -fear of the unknown. What would become of him to-day? Would he get a B -or a C? He asked his mother’s blessing six times over, and, as he left -the house, he begged his aunt to pray for him. On his way to school he -gave two copecks to a beggar, hoping that these two coins might redeem -him from ignorance and that God would not let those numeral nouns with -their terrible “Tessarakontas” and “Oktokaidekas” get in his way. - -He came back from school late, at five o’clock, and went silently to his -room to lie down. His thin cheeks were white and dark circles surrounded -his eyes. - -“Well? What happened? What did you get?” asked his mother coming to his -bedside. - -Vania blinked, made a wry face, and burst into tears. Mamma’s jaw -dropped, she grew pale and threw up her hands, letting fall a pair of -trousers which she had been mending. - -“What are you crying for? You have failed, I suppose?” she asked. - -“Yes, I’ve—I’ve been plucked. I got a C.” - -“I knew that would happen, I had a presentiment that it would!” his -mother exclaimed. “The Lord have mercy on us! What did you fail in?” - -“In Greek—Oh, mother—they asked me the future of Phero and, instead of -answering Oisomai, I answered Opsomai; and then—and then the accent is -not used if the last syllable is a diphthong, but—but I got confused, I -forgot that the alpha was long and put on the accent. Then we had to -decline Artaxerxes and I got muddled and made a mistake in the -ablative—so he gave me a C—Oh, I’m the unhappiest boy in the whole -world! I worked all last night—I have got up at four every morning this -week——” - -“No, it is not you who are unhappy, you good-for-nothing boy, it is I! -You have worn me as thin as a rail, you monster, you thorn in my flesh, -you wicked burden on your parents! I have wept for you, I have broken my -back working for you, you worthless trifler, and what is my reward? Have -you learned a thing?” - -“I—I study—all night—you see that yourself——” - -“I have prayed God to send death to deliver me, poor sinner, but death -will not come. You bane of my existence! Other people have decent -children, but my only child isn’t worth a pin. Shall I beat you? I would -if I could, but where shall I get the strength to do it? Mother of God, -where shall I get the strength?” - -Mamma covered her face with the hem of her dress and burst into tears. -Vania squirmed with grief and pressed his forehead against the wall. His -aunt came in. - -“There, now, I had a presentiment of this!” she exclaimed, turning pale -and throwing up her hands as she guessed at once what had happened. “I -felt low in my mind all this morning; I knew we should have trouble, and -here it is!” - -“You viper! You bane of my existence!” exclaimed Vania’s mother. - -“Why do you abuse him?” the boy’s aunt scolded the mother, nervously -pulling off the coffee-coloured kerchief she wore on her head. “How is -he to blame? It is your fault! Yours! Why did you send him to that -school? What sort of lady are you? Do you want to climb up among the -gentlefolk? Aha! You will certainly get there at this rate! If you had -done as I told you, you would have put him into business as I did my -Kuzia. There’s Kuzia now making five hundred roubles a year. Is that -such a trifle that you can afford to laugh at it? You have tortured -yourself and tortured the boy with all this book-learning, worse luck to -it! See how thin he is! Hear him cough! He is thirteen years old and he -looks more like ten.” - -“No, Nastenka, no, darling, I haven’t beaten that tormentor of mine -much, and beating is what he needs. Ugh! You Jesuit! You Mohammedan! You -thorn in my flesh!” she cried, raising her hand as if to strike her son. -“I should thrash you if I had the strength. People used to say to me -when he was still little: ‘Beat him! Beat him!’ But I didn’t listen to -them, unhappy woman that I am! So now I have to suffer for it. But wait -a bit, I’ll have your ears boxed! Wait a bit——” - -His mother shook her fist at him and went weeping into the room occupied -by her lodger, Eftiki Kuporosoff. The lodger was sitting at his table -reading “Dancing Self-Taught.” This Kuporosoff was considered a clever -and learned person. He spoke through his nose, washed with scented soap -that made every one in the house sneeze, ate meat on fast-days, and was -looking for an enlightened wife; for these reasons he thought himself an -extremely intellectual lodger. He also possessed a tenor voice. - -“Dear me!” cried Vania’s mother, running into his room with the tears -streaming down her cheeks. “Do be so very kind as to thrash my boy! Oh, -_do_ do me that favour! He has failed in his examinations! Oh, misery -me! Can you believe it, he has failed! I can’t punish him myself on -account of being so weak and in bad health, so do thrash him for me! Be -kind, be chivalrous and do it for me, Mr. Kuporosoff! Have mercy on a -sick woman!” - -Kuporosoff frowned and heaved a very deep sigh through his nostrils. He -reflected, drummed on the table with his fingers, sighed once more, and -went into Vania’s room. - -“Look here!” he began his harangue. “Your parents are trying to educate -you, aren’t they, and give you a start in life, you miserable young man? -Then why do you act like this?” - -He held forth for a long time, he made quite a speech. He referred to -science, and to darkness and light. - -“Yes, indeed, young man!” he exclaimed from time to time. - -When he had concluded, he took off his belt and caught hold of Vania’s -ear. - -“This is the only way to treat you!” he exclaimed. - -Vania knelt down obediently and put his head on Kuporosoff’s knees. His -large pink ears rubbed against Kuporosoff’s new brown-striped trousers. - -Vania made not a sound. That evening at a family conclave it was decided -to put him into business at once. - - - THE TUTOR - -The high-school boy Gregory Ziboroff condescendingly shakes hands with -little Pete Udodoff. Pete, a chubby youngster of twelve with bristling -hair, red cheeks, and a low forehead, dressed in a little grey suit, -bows and scrapes, and reaches into the cupboard for his books. The -lesson begins. - -According to an agreement made with Udodoff, the father, Ziboroff is to -help Pete with his lessons for two hours each day, in return for which -he is to receive six roubles a month. He is preparing the boy for the -second grade of the high-school. He prepared him for the first grade -last year, but little Pete failed to pass his examinations. - -“Very well,” begins Ziboroff lighting a cigarette. “You had the fourth -declension to study. Decline fructus!” - -Peter begins to decline it. - -“There, you haven’t studied again!” cries Ziboroff rising. “This is the -sixth time I have given you the fourth declension to learn, and you -can’t get it through your head! For heaven’s sake, when will you ever -begin to study your lessons?” - -“What, you haven’t studied again?” exclaims a wheezing voice in the next -room and Pete’s papa, a retired civil servant, enters. “Why haven’t you -studied? Oh, you little donkey! Just think, Gregory, I had to thrash him -again yesterday!” - -Sighing profoundly, Udodoff sits down beside his son and opens the boy’s -ragged grammar. Ziboroff begins examining Pete before his father, -thinking to himself: “I’ll just show that stupid father what a stupid -son he has!” The high-school boy is seized with the fury of the examiner -and is ready to beat the little red-cheeked numskull before him, he -hates and despises him so. He is even annoyed when the youngster hits on -the right answer to one of his questions. How odious this little Pete -seems to him! - -“You don’t even know the second declension! You don’t even know the -first! This is the way you learn your lessons! Come, tell me, what is -the vocative of meus filius?” - -“The vocative of meus filius? Why the vocative of meus filius is—it -is——” - -Pete stares hard at the ceiling and moves his lips inaudibly. No answer -comes. - -“What is the dative of dea?” - -“Deabus—filiabus!” Pete bursts out. - -Old Udodoff nods approvingly. The high-school boy, who was not expecting -a correct answer, feels annoyed. - -“What other nouns have their dative in abus?” he asks. - -It appears that anima, the soul, has its dative in abus, something that -is not to be found in any grammar. - -“What a melodious language Latin is!” observes Udodoff. -“Alontron—bonus—anthropos—how marvellous! It is all very important!” he -concludes with a sigh. - -“The old brute is interrupting the lesson,” thinks Ziboroff. “Sitting -over us like an inspector—I hate to be bossed! Now, then!” he cries to -Pete. “You must learn that same lesson over again for next time. Next -we’ll do some arithmetic. Fetch your slate! I want you to do this -problem.” - -Pete spits on his slate and rubs it dry with his sleeve. His tutor picks -up the arithmetic and dictates the following problem to him. - -“‘If a merchant buys 138 yards of cloth, some of which is black and some -blue, for 540 roubles, how many yards of each did he buy if the blue -cloth cost 5 roubles a yard and the black cloth 3?’ Repeat what I have -just said.” - -Peter repeats the problem and instantly and silently begins to divide -540 by 138. - -“What are you doing? Wait a moment! No, no, go ahead! Is there a -remainder? There ought not to be. Here, let me do it!” - -Ziboroff divides 540 by 138, and finds that it goes three times and -something over. He quickly rubs out the sum. - -“How queer!” he thinks, ruffling his hair and flushing. “How should it -be done? H’m—this is an indeterminate equation and not a sum in -arithmetic at all——” - -The tutor looks in the back of the book and finds that the answer is 75 -and 63. - -“H’m—that’s queer. Ought I to add 5 and 3 and divide 540 by 8? Is that -right? No that’s not it. Come, do the sum!” he says to Pete. - -“What’s the matter with you? That’s an easy problem!” cries Udodoff to -Peter. “What a goose you are, sonny! Do it for him, Mr. Ziboroff!” - -Gregory takes the pencil and begins figuring. He hiccoughs and flushes -and pales. - -“The fact is, this is an algebraical problem,” he says. “It ought to be -solved with _x_ and _y_. But it can be done in this way, too. Very well, -I divide this by this, do you understand? Now then, I subtract it from -this, see? Or, no, let me tell you, suppose you do this sum yourself for -to-morrow. Think it out alone!” - -Pete smiles maliciously. Udodoff smiles, too. Both realize the tutor’s -perplexity. The high-school boy becomes still more violently -embarrassed, rises, and begins to walk up and down. - -“That sum can be done without the help of algebra,” says Udodoff, -sighing and reaching for the counting board. “Look here!” - -He rattles the counting board for a moment, and produces the answer 75 -and 63, which is correct. - -“That’s how we ignorant folks do it.” - -The tutor falls a prey to the most unbearably painful sensations. He -looks at the clock with a sinking heart, and sees that it still lacks an -hour and a quarter to the end of the lesson. What an eternity that is! - -“Now we will have some dictation,” he says. - -After the dictation comes a lesson in geography; after that, Bible -study; after Bible study, Russian—there is so much to learn in this -world! At last the two hours’ lesson is over, Ziboroff reaches for his -cap, condescendingly shakes hands with little Pete, and takes his leave -of Udodoff. - -“Could you let me have a little money to-day?” he asks timidly. “I must -pay my school bill to-morrow. You owe me for six months’ lessons.” - -“Oh, do I really? Oh, yes, yes—” mutters Udodoff. “I would certainly let -you have the money with pleasure, but I’m sorry to say I haven’t any -just now. Perhaps in a week—or two.” - -Ziboroff acquiesces, puts on his heavy goloshes, and goes out to give -his next lesson. - - - OUT OF SORTS - -Simon Pratchkin, a commissioner of the rural police, was walking up and -down the floor of his room trying to smother a host of disagreeable -sensations. He had gone to see the chief of police on business the -evening before, and had unexpectedly sat down to a game of cards at -which he had lost eight roubles. The amount was a trifle, but the demons -of greed and avarice were whispering in his ear the accusation that he -was a spendthrift. - -“Eight roubles—a mere nothing!” cried Pratchkin, trying to drown the -voices of the demons. “People often lose more than that without minding -it at all. Besides, money is made to spend. One trip to the factory, one -visit to Piloff’s tavern, and eight roubles would have been but a drop -in a bucket!” - - “It is winter; horse and peasant——” - -monotonously murmured Pratchkin’s son Vania, in the next room. - - “Down the road triumphant go—triumphant go——” - -“Triumphant!” Pratchkin went on, pursuing the train of his thoughts. “If -he had been stuck for a dozen roubles he wouldn’t have been so -triumphant! What is he so triumphant about? Let him pay his debts on -time! Eight roubles—what a trifle! That’s not eight thousand roubles. -One can always win eight roubles back again.” - - “And the pony trots his swiftest - For he feels the coming snow— - For he feels the coming snow.” - -“Well, he wouldn’t be likely to go at a gallop, would he? Was he -supposed to be a race-horse? He was a hack, a broken-down old hack! -Foolish, drunken peasants always want to go at breakneck speed, and -then, when they fall into an ice-hole, or down a precipice, some one has -to haul them out and doctor them. If I had my way, I’d prescribe a kind -of turpentine for them that they wouldn’t forget in a hurry! And why did -I lead a low card? If I had led the ace of clubs, I wouldn’t have fallen -into a hole myself——” - - “O’er the furrows soft and crumbling - Flies the sleigh so free and wild— - O’er the furrows soft and crumbling——” - -“Crumbling—crumbling furrows—what stuff that is! People will let those -writers scribble anything. It was that ten-spot that made all the -trouble. Why the devil did it have to turn up just at that moment?” - - “When a little boy comes tumbling—comes tumbling - Down the road a merry child—a merry child.” - -“If the boy was running he must have been overeating himself and been -naughty. Parents never will put their children to work. Instead of -playing, that boy ought to have been splitting kindling, or reading the -Bible—and I hadn’t the sense to come away! What an ass I was to stay -after supper! Why didn’t I have my meal and go home?” - - “At the window stands his mother, - Shakes her finger—shakes her finger at the boy——” - -“She shakes her finger at him, does she? The trouble with her is, she is -too lazy to go out-of-doors and punish him. She ought to catch him by -his little coat and give him a good spanking. It would do him more good -than shaking her finger at him. If she doesn’t take care, he will grow -up to be a drunkard. Who wrote that?” asked Pratchkin aloud. - -“Pushkin, papa.” - -“Pushkin? H’m. What an ass he is! People like that simply write without -knowing themselves what they are saying.” - -“Papa, here’s a peasant with a load of flour!” cried Vania. - -“Let some one take charge of it!” - -The arrival of the flour failed to cheer Pratchkin. The more he tried to -console himself, the more poignant grew his sense of loss, and he -regretted those eight roubles as keenly as if they had in reality been -eight thousand. When Vania finished studying his lesson and silence -fell, Pratchkin was standing gloomily at the window, his mournful gaze -fixed upon the snowdrifts in the garden. But the sight of the snowdrifts -only opened wider the wound in his breast. They reminded him of -yesterday’s expedition to the chief of police. His spleen rose and -embittered his heart. The need to vent his sorrow reached such a pitch -that it would brook no delay. He could endure it no longer. - -“Vania!” he shouted. “Come here and let me whip you for breaking that -window-pane yesterday!” - - - - - STORIES OF YOUTH - - - A JOKE - -It was noon of a bright winter’s day. The air was crisp with frost, and -Nadia, who was walking beside me, found her curls and the delicate down -on her upper lip silvered with her own breath. We stood at the summit of -a high hill. The ground fell away at our feet in a steep incline which -reflected the sun’s rays like a mirror. Near us lay a little sled -brightly upholstered with red. - -“Let us coast down, Nadia!” I begged. “Just once! I promise you nothing -will happen.” - -But Nadia was timid. The long slope, from where her little overshoes -were planted to the foot of the ice-clad hill, looked to her like the -wall of a terrible, yawning chasm. Her heart stopped beating, and she -held her breath as she gazed into that abyss while I urged her to take -her seat on the sled. What might not happen were she to risk a flight -over that precipice! She would die, she would go mad! - -“Come, I implore you!” I urged her again. “Don’t be afraid! It is -cowardly to fear, to be timid.” - -At last Nadia consented to go, but I could see from her face that she -did so, she thought, at the peril of her life. I seated her, all pale -and trembling, in the little sled, put my arm around her, and together -we plunged into the abyss. - -The sled flew like a shot out of a gun. The riven wind lashed our faces; -it howled and whistled in our ears, and plucked furiously at us, trying -to wrench our heads from our shoulders; its pressure stifled us; we felt -as if the devil himself had seized us in his talons, and were snatching -us with a shriek down into the infernal regions. The objects on either -hand melted into a long and madly flying streak. Another second, and it -seemed we must be lost! - -“I love you, Nadia!” I whispered. - -And now the sled began to slacken its pace, the howling of the wind and -the swish of the runners sounded less terrible, we breathed again, and -found ourselves at the foot of the mountain at last. Nadia, more dead -than alive, was breathless and pale. I helped her to her feet. - -“Not for anything in the world would I do that again!” she said, gazing -at me with wide, terror-stricken eyes. “Not for anything on earth. I -nearly died!” - -In a few minutes, however, she was herself again, and already her -inquiring eyes were asking the question of mine: - -“Had I really uttered those four words, or had she only fancied she -heard them in the tumult of the wind?” - -I stood beside her smoking a cigarette and looking attentively at my -glove. - -She took my arm and we strolled about for a long time at the foot of the -hill. It was obvious that the riddle gave her no peace. Had I spoken -those words or not? It was for her a question of pride, of honour, of -happiness, of life itself, a very important question, the most important -one in the whole world. Nadia looked at me now impatiently, now -sorrowfully, now searchingly; she answered my questions at random and -waited for me to speak. Oh, what a pretty play of expression flitted -across her sweet face! I saw that she was struggling with herself; she -longed to say something, to ask some question, but the words would not -come; she was terrified and embarrassed and happy. - -“Let me tell you something,” she said, without looking at me. - -“What?” I asked. - -“Let us—let us slide down the hill again!” - -We mounted the steps that led to the top of the hill. Once more I seated -Nadia, pale and trembling, in the little sled, once more we plunged into -that terrible abyss; once more the wind howled, and the runners hissed, -and once more, at the wildest and most tumultuous moment of our descent, -I whispered: - -“I love you, Nadia!” - -When the sleigh had come to a standstill, Nadia threw a backward look at -the hill down which we had just sped, and then gazed for a long time -into my face, listening to the calm, even tones of my voice. Every inch -of her, even her muff and her hood, every line of her little frame -expressed the utmost uncertainty. On her face was written the question: - -“What can it have been? Who spoke those words? Was it he, or was it only -my fancy?” - -The uncertainty of it was troubling her, and her patience was becoming -exhausted. The poor girl had stopped answering my questions, she was -pouting and ready to cry. - -“Had we not better go home?” I asked. - -“I—I love coasting!” she answered with a blush. “Shall we not slide down -once more?” - -She “loved” coasting, and yet, as she took her seat on the sled, she was -as trembling and pale as before and scarcely could breathe for terror! - -We coasted down for the third time and I saw her watching my face and -following the movements of my lips with her eyes. But I put my -handkerchief to my mouth and coughed, and when we were half-way down I -managed to say: - -“I love you, Nadia!” - -So the riddle remained unsolved! Nadia was left pensive and silent. I -escorted her home, and as she walked she shortened her steps and tried -to go slowly, waiting for me to say those words. I was aware of the -struggle going on in her breast, and of how she was forcing herself not -to exclaim: - -“The wind could not have said those words! I don’t want to think that it -said them!” - -Next day I received the following note: - -“If you are going coasting, to-day, call for me. N.” - -Thenceforth Nadia and I went coasting every day, and each time that we -sped down the hill on our little sled I whispered the words: - -“I love you, Nadia!” - -Nadia soon grew to crave this phrase as some people crave morphine or -wine. She could no longer live without hearing it! Though to fly down -the hill was as terrible to her as ever, danger and fear lent a strange -fascination to those words of love, words which remained a riddle to -torture her heart. Both the wind and I were suspected; which of us two -was confessing our love for her now seemed not to matter; let the -draught but be hers, and she cared not for the goblet that held it! - -One day, at noon, I went to our hill alone. There I perceived Nadia. She -approached the hill, seeking me with her eyes, and at last I saw her -timidly mounting the steps that led to the summit. Oh, how fearful, how -terrifying she found it to make that journey alone! Her face was as -white as the snow, and she shook as if she were going to her doom, but -up she climbed, firmly, without one backward look. Clearly she had -determined to discover once for all whether those wondrously sweet words -would reach her ears if I were not there. I saw her seat herself on the -sled with a pale face and lips parted with horror, saw her shut her eyes -and push off, bidding farewell for ever to this world. “zzzzzzz!” hissed -the runners. What did she hear? I know not—I only saw her rise tired and -trembling from the sled, and it was clear from her expression that she -could not herself have said what she had heard; on her downward rush -terror had robbed her of the power of distinguishing the sounds that -came to her ears. - -And now, with March, came the spring. The sun’s rays grew warmer and -brighter. Our snowy hillside grew darker and duller, and the ice crust -finally melted away. Our coasting came to an end. - -Nowhere could poor Nadia now hear the beautiful words, for there was no -one to say them; the wind was silent and I was preparing to go to St. -Petersburg for a long time, perhaps for ever. - -One evening, two days before my departure, I sat in the twilight in a -little garden separated from the garden where Nadia lived by a high -fence surmounted by iron spikes. It was cold and the snow was still on -the ground, the trees were lifeless, but the scent of spring was in the -air, and the rooks were cawing noisily as they settled themselves for -the night. I approached the fence, and for a long time peered through a -chink in the boards. I saw Nadia come out of the house and stand on the -door-step, gazing with anguish and longing at the sky. The spring wind -was blowing directly into her pale, sorrowful face. It reminded her of -the wind that had howled for us on the hillside when she had heard those -four words, and with that recollection her face grew very sad indeed, -and the tears rolled down her cheeks. The poor child held out her arms -as if to implore the wind to bring those words to her ears once more. -And I, waiting for a gust to carry them to her, said softly: - -“I love you, Nadia!” - -Heavens, what an effect my words had on Nadia! She cried out and -stretched forth her arms to the wind, blissful, radiant, beautiful.... - -And I went to pack up my things. All this happened a long time ago. -Nadia married, whether for love or not matters little. Her husband is an -official of the nobility, and she now has three children. But she has -not forgotten how we coasted together and how the wind whispered to her: - -“I love you, Nadia!” - -That memory is for her the happiest, the most touching, the most -beautiful one of her life. - -But as for me, now that I have grown older, I can no longer understand -why I said those words and why I jested with Nadia. - - - AFTER THE THEATRE - -When Nadia Zelenia came home with her mother from the theatre, where -they had been to see “Evgeni Onegin,” and found herself in her own room -once more, she took off her dress, loosened her hair, and hastened to -sit down at her desk in her petticoat and little white bodice, to write -a letter in the style of Tatiana. - -“I love you,” she wrote, “but you do not, no, you do not love me!” - -As she wrote this she began to laugh. - -She was only sixteen and had never been in love in her life. She knew -that the officer Gorni and the student Gruzdieff both loved her, but -now, after seeing the opera, she did not want to believe it. How -attractive it would be to be wretched and spurned! It was, somehow, so -poetical, so beautiful and touching, when one loved while the other -remained cold and indifferent! Onegin was arresting because he did not -love Tatiana, but Tatiana was enchanting because she loved so ardently. -Had they both loved one another equally well and been happy, might not -both have been uninteresting? - -“No longer think that you love me,” Nadia continued, thinking of Gorni. -“I cannot believe it. You are clever and serious and wise; you are a -very talented man, and may have a brilliant future before you. I am a -stupid, frivolous girl and you know yourself that I should only hinder -you in your life. You were attracted to me, it is true; you thought you -had found your ideal in me, but that was a mistake. Already you are -asking yourself: why did I ever meet that girl? Only your kindness -prevents you from acknowledging this.” - -Nadia began to feel very sorry for herself, she burst into tears and -continued: - -“If it were not so hard to leave mamma and my brother, I should take the -veil and go away to the ends of the earth. Then you would be free to -love some one else.” - -Nadia’s tears now prevented her from seeing what she was writing; little -rainbows were trembling across the table, the floor, and the ceiling, -and it seemed to her as though she were looking through a prism. To go -on writing was impossible, so she threw herself back in her chair and -began thinking of Gorni. - -Goodness, how attractive, how fascinating men were! Nadia remembered the -beautiful expression that came over Gorni’s face when he was talking of -music. How humble, how engaging, how gentle he then looked, and what -efforts he made not to let his voice betray the passion he felt! Emotion -must be concealed in society where haughtiness and chilly indifference -are the marks of good breeding and a good education, so he would try to -hide his feelings, but in vain. Every one knew that he loved music -madly. Endless arguments about music and the bold criticisms of -Philistines kept his nerves constantly on edge, so that he appeared to -be timid and silent. He played the piano beautifully, and if he had not -been an officer he would certainly have become a musician. - -The tears dried on Nadia’s cheeks. She remembered that Gorni had -proposed to her at a symphony concert and had later repeated his -proposal down-stairs by the coat rack, where they were standing in a -strong draught. - -“I am very glad that you have at last come to know Gruzdieff,” she went -on. “He is a very clever man and you are sure to be friends. He came to -see us yesterday evening and stayed until two. We were all in raptures -over him, and I was sorry that you had not come, too. He talked -wonderfully.” - -Nadia laid her arms on the table and rested her head upon them, and her -hair fell over the letter. She remembered that Gruzdieff was in love -with her, too, and that he had as much right to her letter as Gorni had. -On second thoughts, would it not be better to send it to him? A -causeless happiness stirred in her breast; at first it was tiny, and -rolled gently about there like a small rubber ball; then it grew larger -and fuller, and at last gushed up like a fountain. Nadia forgot Gorni -and Gruzdieff, and her thoughts grew confused, but her rapture rose and -rose, until it flowed from her breast into her hands and feet, and a -fresh, gentle breeze seemed to be fanning her head and stirring her -hair. Her shoulders shook with soft laughter; the table shook, the -lamp-chimney trembled, and tears gushed from her eyes over the letter. -She was powerless to control her laughter, so she hastened to think of -something funny to prove that her mirth was not groundless. - -“Oh, what a ridiculous poodle!” she cried, feeling a little faint from -laughing. “What a ridiculous poodle!” - -She remembered that Gruzdieff had romped with their poodle Maxim -yesterday after tea, and had told her a story of a very intelligent -poodle, who chased a jackdaw around a garden. The jackdaw had turned -round while the poodle was chasing him, and said: - -“You scoundrel, you!” - -Not knowing that it was a trained bird, the poodle had been dreadfully -dismayed; he had slunk away in perplexity and had afterward begun to -howl. - -“Yes, I think I shall have to love Gruzdieff,” Nadia decided, and she -tore up the letter. - -So she began to muse on the student, and on his love and hers, but her -thoughts were soon rambling, and she found herself thinking of many -things: of her mother, of the street, of the pencil, and of the -piano.... She thought of all this with pleasure, and everything seemed -to her to be beautiful and good, but her happiness told her that this -was not all, there was a great deal more to come in a little while, -which would be much better even than this. Spring would soon be here, -and then summer would come, and she would go with her mother to Gorbiki, -and there Gorni would come on his holidays, and would take her walking -in the garden and make love to her. - -Gruzdieff would come, too; he would play croquet and bowls with her, and -tell her funny and thrilling stories. She longed for the garden, the -darkness, the clear sky, and the stars. Once more her shoulders shook -with laughter; the room seemed to her to be filled with the scent of -lavender, and a twig tapped against the window-pane. - -She went across to the bed, sat down, and, not knowing what to do -because of the great happiness that filled her heart, she fixed her eyes -on the little icon that hung at the head of her bed, and murmured: - -“Oh! Lord! Lord! Lord!” - - - VOLODIA - -One Sunday evening in spring Volodia, a plain, shy, sickly lad of -seventeen, was sitting, a prey to melancholy, in a summer-house on the -country place of the Shumikins. His gloomy reflections flowed in three -different channels. In the first place, to-morrow, Monday, he would have -to take an examination in mathematics. He knew that if he did not pass -he would be expelled from school, as he had already been two years in -the sixth grade. In the second place, his pride suffered constant agony -during his visits to the Shumikins, who were rich people with -aristocratic pretensions. He imagined that Madame Shumikin and her -nieces looked down upon his mother and himself as poor relations and -dependents, and that they made fun of his mother and did not respect -her. He had once overheard Madame Shumikin saying on the terrace to her -cousin Anna Feodorovna that she was still pretending to be young, and -that she never paid her debts and had a great hankering after other -people’s shoes and cigarettes. Every day Volodia would implore his -mother not to go to the Shumikins’ again. He painted for her the -humiliating rôle which she played among these people, he entreated her -and spoke rudely to her, but the spoiled, frivolous woman, who had -wasted two fortunes in her day, her own and her husband’s, yearned for -high life and refused to understand him, so that twice every week -Volodia was obliged to accompany her to the hated house. - -In the third place, the lad could not free himself for a moment from a -certain strange, unpleasant feeling that was entirely new to him. He -imagined himself to be in love with Anna Feodorovna, the cousin and -guest of Madame Shumikin. Anna Feodorovna was a talkative, lively, -laughing little lady of thirty; healthy, rosy, and strong, with plump -shoulders, a plump chin, and an eternal smile on her thin lips. She was -neither pretty nor young. Volodia knew this perfectly well, and for that -very reason he was unable to refrain from thinking of her, from watching -her as she bent her plump shoulders over her croquet mallet, or, as she, -after much laughter and running up and down-stairs, sank all out of -breath into a chair, and with half-closed eyes pretended that she felt a -tightness and strangling across the chest. She was married, and her -husband was a staid architect who came down into the country once a -week, had a long sleep, and then returned to the city. This feeling on -Volodia’s part began with an unreasoning hatred of the architect, and a -sensation of joy whenever he returned to the city. - -And now, as he sat in the summer-house thinking about to-morrow’s -examination and his mother, whom every one laughed at, he felt a great -longing to see Nyuta, as the Shumikins called Anna Feodorovna, and to -hear her laughter and the rustling of her dress. This longing did not -resemble the pure, poetic love of which he had read in novels, and of -which he dreamed every night as he went to bed. It was a strange and -incomprehensible thing, and he was ashamed and afraid of it as of -something wicked and wrong which he hardly dared to acknowledge even to -himself. - -“This is not love,” he thought. “One does not fall in love with a woman -of thirty. It is simply a little intrigue; yes, it is a little -intrigue.” - -Thinking about intrigues, he remembered his invincible shyness, his lack -of a moustache, his freckles, his little eyes, and pictured himself -standing beside Nyuta. The contrast was impossible. So he hastened to -imagine himself handsome and bold and witty, dressed in the latest -fashion.... - -In the very heat of his imaginings, as he sat huddled in a dark corner -of the summer-house with his eyes fixed on the ground, he heard light -footsteps approaching. Some one was hurrying down the garden path. The -footsteps ceased and a figure clad in white gleamed in the doorway. - -“Is any one there?” asked a woman’s voice. - -Volodia recognised the voice and raised his head in alarm. - -“Who is there?” asked Nyuta, stepping into the summer-house. “Ah, is it -you, Volodia? What are you doing in there? Brooding? How can you always -be brooding and brooding? It’s enough to drive you crazy!” - -Volodia rose and looked at Nyuta in confusion. She was on her way back -from the bath-house; a Turkish towel hung across her shoulders, and a -few damp locks of hair had escaped from under her white silk kerchief -and were clinging to her forehead. She exhaled the cool, damp odour of -the river, and the scent of almond soap. The upper button of her blouse -was undone, so that her neck and throat were visible to the lad. - -“Why don’t you say something?” asked Nyuta, looking Volodia up and down. -“It is rude not to answer when a lady speaks to you. What a -stick-in-the-mud you are, Volodia, always sitting and thinking like some -stodgy old philosopher, and never opening your mouth! You have no vim in -you, no fire! You are horrid, really! A boy of your age ought to live, -and frisk, and chatter, and fall in love, and make love to the ladies.” - -Volodia stared at the towel which she was holding in her plump, white -hand and pondered. - -“He won’t answer!” cried Nyuta in surprise. “This is too strange, -really! Listen to me, be a man! At least smile! Bah! What a horrid -dry-as-dust you are!” she laughed. “Volodia, do you know what makes you -such a boor? It’s because you never make love. Why don’t you do it? -There are no girls here, I know, but what is to prevent you from making -love to a woman? Why don’t you make love to me, for instance?” - -Volodia listened to her and rubbed his forehead in intense, painful -irresolution. - -“It is only proud people who never speak and like to be alone,” Nyuta -continued, pulling his hand down from his forehead. “You are proud, -Volodia. Why do you squint at me like that? Look me in the eye, if you -please. Now then, stick-in-the-mud!” - -Volodia made up his mind to speak. In an effort to smile he stuck out -his lower lip, blinked his eyes, and his hand again went to his head. - -“I—I love you!” he exclaimed. - -Nyuta raised her eyebrows in astonishment and burst out laughing. - -“What is this I hear?” she chanted as singers do in an opera when they -hear a terrible piece of news. “What? What did you say? Say it again! -Say it again!” - -“I—I love you!” Volodia repeated. - -And involuntarily, without premeditation and not realising what he was -doing, he took a step toward Nyuta and seized her arm above the wrist. -Tears started into his eyes, and the whole world seemed to turn into a -huge Turkish towel smelling of the river. - -“Bravo, bravo!” he heard a laughing voice cry approvingly. “Why don’t -you say something? I want to hear you speak! Now, then!” - -Seeing that he was permitted to hold her arm, Volodia looked into -Nyuta’s laughing face and awkwardly, uneasily, put both arms around her -waist, bringing his wrists together behind her back. As he held her -thus, she put her hands behind her head showing the dimples in her -elbows, and, arranging her hair under her kerchief, she said in a quiet -voice: - -“I want you to become bright and agreeable and charming, Volodia, and -this you can only accomplish through the influence of women. Why, what a -horrid cross face you have! You ought to laugh and talk. Honestly, -Volodia, don’t be a stick! You are young yet; you will have plenty of -time for philosophising later on. And now, let me go. I’m in a hurry to -get back. Let me go, I tell you!” - -She freed herself without effort, and went out of the summer-house -singing a snatch of song. Volodia was left alone. He smoothed his hair, -smiled, and walked three times round the summer-house. Then he sat down -and smiled again. He felt an unbearable sense of mortification, and even -marvelled that human shame could reach such a point of keenness and -intensity. The feeling made him smile again and wring his hands and -whisper a few incoherent phrases. - -He felt humiliated because he had just been treated like a little boy, -and because he was so shy, but chiefly because he had dared to put his -arms around the waist of a respectable married woman, when neither his -age nor, as he thought, his social position, nor his appearance -warranted such an act. - -He jumped up and, without so much as a glance behind him, hurried away -into the depths of the garden, as far away from the house as he could -go. - -“Oh, if we could only get away from here at once!” he thought, seizing -his head in his hands. “Oh, quickly, quickly!” - -The train on which Volodia and his mother were to go back to town left -at eight-forty. There still remained three hours before train time, and -he would have liked to have gone to the station at once without waiting -for his mother. - -At eight o’clock he turned toward the house. His whole figure expressed -determination and seemed to be proclaiming: “Come what may, I am -prepared for anything!” He had made up his mind to go in boldly, to look -every one straight in the face, and to speak loudly no matter what -happened. - -He crossed the terrace, passed through the drawing-room and the -living-room, and stopped in the hall to catch his breath. He could hear -the family at tea in the adjoining dining-room; Madame Shumikin, his -mother, and Nyuta were discussing something with laughter. - -Volodia listened. - -“I assure you I could scarcely believe my eyes!” Nyuta cried. “I hardly -recognised him when he began to make love to me, and actually—will you -believe it?—put his arms around my waist! He has quite a way with him! -When he told me that he loved me, he had the look of a wild animal, like -a Circassian.” - -“You don’t say so!” cried his mother, rocking with long shrieks of -laughter. “You don’t say so! How like his father he is!” - -Volodia jumped back, and rushed out into the fresh air. - -“How can they all talk about it?” he groaned, throwing up his arms and -staring with horror at the sky. “Aloud, and in cold blood, too! And -mother laughed! Mother! Oh, God, why did you give me such a mother? Oh, -why?” - -But enter the house he must, happen what might. He walked three times -round the garden, and then, feeling more composed, he went in. - -“Why didn’t you come in to tea on time?” asked Madame Shumikin sternly. - -“Excuse me, it—it is time for me to go—” Volodia stammered, without -raising his eyes. “Mother, it is eight o’clock!” - -“Go along by yourself, dear,” answered his mother languidly. “I am -spending the night here with Lily. Good-by, my boy, come, let me kiss -you.” - -She kissed her son and said in French: - -“He reminds one a little of Lermontov, doesn’t he?” - -Volodia managed to take leave of the company somehow without looking any -one in the face, and ten minutes later he was striding along the road to -the station, glad to be off at last. He now no longer felt frightened or -ashamed, and could breathe deeply and freely once more. - -Half a mile from the station he sat down on a stone by the wayside and -began looking at the sun, which was now half hidden behind the horizon. -A few small lights were already gleaming here and there near the -station, and a dim green ray shone out, but the train had not yet -appeared. It was pleasant to sit there quietly, watching the night -slowly creeping across the fields. The dim summer-house, Nyuta’s light -footsteps, the smell of the bath-house, her laughter, and her waist—all -these things rose up before Volodia’s fancy with startling vividness, -and now no longer seemed terrible and significant to him as they had a -few hours before. - -“What nonsense! She did not pull her hand away; she laughed when I put -my arm around her waist,” he thought. “Therefore she must have enjoyed -it. If she had not liked it she would have been angry——” - -Volodia was vexed now at not having been bolder. He regretted that he -was stupidly running away, and was convinced that, were the same -circumstances to occur again, he would be more manly and look at the -thing more simply—— - -But it would not be hard to bring those circumstances about. The -Shumikins always strolled about the garden for a long time after supper. -If Volodia were to go walking with Nyuta in the dark—there would be the -chance to re-enact the same scene! - -“I’ll go back and leave on an early train to-morrow morning,” he -decided. “I’ll tell them I missed this train.” - -So he went back. Madame Shumikin, his mother, Nyuta, and one of the -nieces were sitting on the terrace playing cards. When Volodia told them -his story about having missed the train they were uneasy lest he should -be late for his examination, and advised him to get up early next -morning. Volodia sat down at a little distance from the card-players, -and during the whole game kept his eyes fixed on Nyuta. He had already -determined on a plan. He would go up to Nyuta in the dark, take her -hand, and kiss her. It would not be necessary for either to speak; they -would understand one another without words. - -But the ladies did not go walking after supper; they continued their -game instead. They played until one o’clock, and then all separated for -the night. - -“How stupid this is!” thought Volodia, with annoyance. “But never mind, -I’ll wait until to-morrow. To-morrow in the summer-house—never mind!” - -He made no effort to go to sleep, but sat on the edge of his bed with -his arms around his knees and thought. The idea of the examination was -odious to him. He had already made up his mind that he was going to be -expelled, and that there was nothing terrible about that. On the -contrary, it was a good thing, a very good thing. To-morrow he would be -as free as a bird. He would leave off his schoolboy’s uniform for -civilian clothes, smoke in public, and come over here to make love to -Nyuta whenever he liked. He would be a young man. As for what people -called his career and his future, that was perfectly clear. Volodia -would not enter the government service, but would become a telegraph -operator or have a drug store, and become a pharmaceutist. Were there -not plenty of careers open to a young man? An hour passed, two hours -passed, and he was still sitting on the edge of his bed and thinking—— - -At three o’clock, when it was already light, his door was cautiously -pushed open and his mother came into the room. - -“Aren’t you asleep yet?” she asked with a yawn. “Go to sleep, go to -sleep. I’ve just come in for a moment to get a bottle of medicine.” - -“For whom?” - -“Poor Lily is ill again. Go to sleep, child, you have an examination -to-morrow.” - -She took a little bottle out of the closet, held it to the window, read -the label, and went out. - -“Oh, Maria, that isn’t it!” he heard a woman’s voice exclaim. “That is -Eau de Cologne, and Lily wants morphine. Is your son awake? Do ask him -to find it!” - -The voice was Nyuta’s. Volodia’s heart stopped beating. He hastily put -on his trousers and coat and went to the door. - -“Do you understand? I want morphine!” explained Nyuta in a whisper. “It -is probably written in Latin. Wake Volodia, he will be able to find it!” - -Volodia’s mother opened the door, and he caught sight of Nyuta. She was -wearing the same blouse she had worn when she came from the bath-house. -Her hair was hanging loose, and her face looked sleepy and dusky in the -dim light. - -“There, Volodia is awake!” she exclaimed. “Volodia, do get me the -morphine out of the closet, there’s a good boy. What a nuisance Lily is! -She always has something the matter with her.” - -The mother murmured something, yawned, and went away. - -“Come, find it!” cried Nyuta. “What are you standing there for?” - -Volodia went to the closet, knelt down, and began searching among the -bottles of medicine and pill-boxes there. His hands were trembling and -cold chills were running down his chest and back. He aimlessly seized -bottles of ether, carbolic acid, and various boxes of herbs in his -shaking hands, spilling and scattering the contents. The smell -overpowered him and made his head swim. - -“Mother has gone—” he thought. “That’s good—good.” - -“Hurry!” cried Nyuta. - -“Just a moment—there, this must be it!” said Volodia having deciphered -the letters “morph—” on one of the labels. “Here it is!” - -Nyuta was standing in the doorway with one foot in the hall and one in -Volodia’s room. She was twisting up her hair—which was no easy matter, -for it was long and thick—and was looking vacantly at Volodia. In the -dim radiance shed by the white, early morning sky, with her full blouse -and her flowing hair, she looked to him superb and entrancing. -Fascinated, trembling from head to foot, and remembering with delight -how he had embraced her in the summer-house, he handed her the bottle -and said: - -“You are——” - -“What?” she asked smiling. - -He said nothing; he looked at her, and then, as he had done in the -summer-house, he seized her hand. - -“I love you—” he whispered. - -Volodia felt as if the room and Nyuta, and the dawn, and he himself had -suddenly rushed together into a keen, unknown feeling of happiness for -which he was ready to give his whole life and lose his soul for ever, -but half a minute later it all suddenly vanished. - -“Well, I must go—” said Nyuta, looking contemptuously at Volodia. “What -a pitiful, plain boy you are—Bah, you ugly duckling!” - -How hideous her long hair, her full blouse, her footsteps and her voice -now seemed to him! - -“Ugly duckling!” he thought. “Yes, I am indeed ugly—everything is ugly.” - -The sun rose; the birds broke into song; the sound of the gardener’s -footsteps and the creaking of his wheelbarrow rose from the garden. The -cows lowed and the notes of a shepherd’s pipe trembled in the air. The -sunlight and all these manifold sounds proclaimed that somewhere in the -world there could be found a life that was pure, and gracious, and -poetic. Where was it? Neither Volodia’s mother, nor any one of the -people who surrounded the boy had ever spoken of it to him. - -When the man servant came to call him for the morning train, he -pretended to be asleep. - -“Oh, to thunder with it all!” he thought. - -He got up at eleven. As he brushed his hair before the mirror he looked -at his plain face, so pale after his sleepless night, and thought: - -“She is quite right. I really am an ugly duckling.” - -When his mother saw him and seemed horrified at his not having gone to -take his examination, Volodia said: - -“I overslept, mamma, but don’t worry; I can give them a certificate from -the doctor.” - -Madame Shumikin and Nyuta woke at one o’clock. Volodia heard the former -throw open her window with a bang, and heard Nyuta’s ringing laugh -answer her rough voice. He saw the dining-room door flung open and the -nieces and dependents, among whom was his mother, troop in to lunch. He -saw Nyuta’s freshly washed face, and beside it the black eyebrows and -beard of the architect, who had just come. - -Nyuta was in Little Russian costume, and this was not becoming to her -and made her look clumsy. The architect made some vulgar, insipid jests, -and Volodia thought that there were a terrible lot of onions in the stew -that day. He also thought that Nyuta was laughing loudly and looking in -his direction on purpose to let him understand that the memory of last -night did not worry her in the least, and that she scarcely noticed the -presence at table of the ugly duckling. - -At four o’clock Volodia and his mother drove to the station. The lad’s -sordid memories, his sleepless night, and the pangs of his conscience -aroused in him a feeling of painful and gloomy anger. He looked at his -mother’s thin profile, at her little nose, and at the rain-coat that had -been a gift to her from Nyuta, and muttered: - -“Why do you powder your face? It does not become you at all! You try to -look pretty, but you don’t pay your debts, and you smoke cigarettes that -aren’t yours! It’s disgusting! I don’t like you, no, I don’t, I don’t!” - -So he insulted her, but she only rolled her eyes in terror and, throwing -up her hands, said in a horrified whisper: - -“What are you saying? Heavens, the coachman will hear you! Do hush, he -can hear everything!” - -“I don’t like you! I don’t like you!” he went on, struggling for breath. -“You are without morals or heart. Don’t dare to wear that rain-coat -again, do you hear me? If you do, I’ll tear it to shreds!” - -“Control yourself, child!” wept his mother. “The coachman will hear -you!” - -“Where is my father’s fortune? Where is your own? You have squandered -them both. I am not ashamed of my poverty, but I am ashamed of my -mother. I blush whenever the boys at school ask me about you.” - -The village was two stations from town. During the whole journey Volodia -stood on the platform of the car, trembling from head to foot, not -wanting to go inside because his mother, whom he hated, was sitting -there. He hated himself, and the conductor, and the smoke of the engine, -and the cold to which he ascribed the shivering fit that had seized him. -The heavier his heart grew, the more convinced he became that somewhere -in the world there must be people who lived a pure, noble, warm-hearted, -gracious life, full of love, and tenderness, and merriment, and freedom. -He felt this and suffered so keenly from the thought that one of the -passengers looked intently at him, and said: - -“You must have a toothache!” - -Volodia and his mother lived with a widow who rented a large apartment -and let rooms to lodgers. His mother had two rooms, one with windows -where her own bed stood, and another adjoining it, which was small and -dark, where Volodia lived. A sofa, on which he slept, was the only -furniture of this little room; all the available space was taken up by -trunks full of dresses, and by hat-boxes and piles of rubbish which his -mother had seen fit to collect. Volodia studied his lessons in his -mother’s room, or in the “parlour,” as the large room was called, where -the lodgers assembled before dinner and in the evening. - -On reaching home, Volodia threw himself down on his sofa and covered -himself with a blanket, hoping to cure his shivering fit. The hat-boxes, -the trunks, and the rubbish, all proclaimed to him that he had no room -of his own, no corner in which he could take refuge from his mother, her -guests, and the voices that now assailed his ears from the parlour. His -school satchel and the books that lay scattered about the floor reminded -him of the examination he had missed. Quite unexpectedly there rose -before his eyes a vision of Mentone, where he had lived with his father -when he was seven years old. He recalled Biarritz, and two little -English girls with whom he had played on the beach. He vainly tried to -remember the colour of the sky, and the ocean, and the height of the -waves, and how he had then felt; the little English girls flashed across -his vision with all the vividness of life, but the rest of the picture -was confused and gradually faded away. - -“It is too cold here,” Volodia thought. He got up, put on his overcoat, -and went into the parlour. - -The inmates of the house were assembled there at tea. His mother, an old -maid music teacher with horn spectacles, and Monsieur Augustin, a fat -Frenchman, who worked in a perfume factory, were sitting near the -samovar. - -“I haven’t had dinner to-day,” his mother was saying. “I must send the -maid for some bread.” - -“Duniash!” shouted the Frenchman. - -It appeared that the maid had been sent on an errand by her mistress. - -“Oh, no matter!” said the Frenchman, smiling broadly. “I go for the -bread myself! Oh, no matter!” - -He laid down his strong, reeking cigar in a conspicuous place, put on -his hat, and went out. - -When he had gone, Volodia’s mother began telling the music teacher of -her visit to Madame Shumikin’s, and of the enthusiastic reception she -had had there. - -“Lily Shumikin is a relative of mine, you know,” she said. “Her husband, -General Shumikin, was a cousin of my husband’s. She was the Baroness -Kolb before her marriage.” - -“Mother, that isn’t true!” cried Volodia exasperated. “Why do you lie -so?” - -Now he knew that his mother was not lying, and that in her account of -General Shumikin and Baroness Kolb there was not a word of untruth, but -he felt none the less as if she were lying. The tone of her voice, the -expression of her face, her glance—all were false. - -“It’s a lie!” Volodia repeated, bringing his fist down on the table with -such a bang that the cups and saucers rattled and mamma spilled her tea. -“What makes you talk about generals and baronesses? It’s all a lie!” - -The music teacher was embarrassed and coughed behind her handkerchief, -as if she had swallowed a crumb. Mamma burst into tears. - -“How can I get away from here?” thought Volodia. - -He was ashamed to go to the house of any of his school friends. Once -more he unexpectedly remembered the two little English girls. He walked -across the parlour and into Monsieur Augustin’s room. There the air -smelled strongly of volatile oils and glycerine soap. Quantities of -little bottles full of liquids of various colours cluttered the table, -the window-sills, and even the chairs. Volodia took up a paper and read -the heading: “Le Figaro.” The paper exhaled a strong and pleasant -fragrance. He picked up a revolver that lay on the table. - -“There, there, don’t mind what he says!” the music teacher was consoling -his mother in the next room. “He is still young, and young men always do -foolish things. We must make up our minds to that.” - -“No, Miss Eugenia, he has been spoiled,” moaned his mother. “There is no -one who has any authority over him, and I am too weak to do anything. -Oh, I am very unhappy.” - -Volodia put the barrel of the revolver into his mouth, felt something -which he thought was the trigger, and pulled—Then he found another -little hook and pulled again. He took the revolver out of his mouth and -examined the lock. He had never held a firearm in his hands in his life. - -“I suppose this thing ought to be raised,” he thought. “Yes, I think -that is right.” - -Monsieur Augustin entered the parlour laughing and began to recount some -adventure he had had on the way. Volodia once more put the barrel into -his mouth, seized it between his teeth, and pulled a little hook he felt -with his fingers. A shot rang out—something hit him with tremendous -force in the back of the neck, and he fell forward upon the table with -his face among the bottles and glasses. He saw his father wearing a high -hat with a wide silk band, because he was wearing mourning for some lady -in Mentone, and felt himself suddenly seized in his arms and fall with -him into a very deep, black abyss. - -Then everything grew confused and faded away. - - - A NAUGHTY BOY - -Ivan Lapkin, a youth of pleasing exterior, and Anna Zamblitskaya, a girl -with a tip-tilted nose, descended the steep river bank and took their -seats on a bench at its foot. The bench stood at the water’s edge in a -thicket of young willows. It was a lovely spot. Sitting there, one was -hidden from all the world and observed only by fish and the -daddy-longlegs that skimmed like lightning across the surface of the -water. The young people were armed with fishing-rods, nets, cans -containing worms, and other fishing appurtenances. They sat down on the -bench and immediately began to fish. - -“I am glad that we are alone at last,” began Lapkin glancing behind him. -“I have a great deal to say to you, Miss Anna, a very great deal. When -first I saw you—you’ve got a bite!—I realized at last the reason for my -existence. I knew that you were the idol at whose feet I was to lay the -whole of an honourable and industrious life—that’s a big one biting! On -seeing you I fell in love for the first time in my life. I fell madly in -love!—Don’t pull yet, let it bite a little longer!—Tell me, dearest, I -beg you, if I may aspire, not to a return of my affection—no, I am not -worthy of that, I dare not even dream of it—but tell me if I may aspire -to—pull!” With a shriek, Anna jerked the arm that held the fishing-rod -into the air; a little silvery-green fish dangled glistening in the -sunlight. - -“Goodness gracious, it’s a perch! Oh, oh, be quick, it’s coming off!” - -The perch fell off the hook, flopped across the grass toward its native -element, and splashed into the water. - -Somehow, while pursuing it, Lapkin accidentally seized Anna’s hand -instead of the fish and accidentally pressed it to his lips. Anna pulled -it away, but it was too late, their lips accidentally met in a kiss. It -all happened accidentally. A second kiss succeeded the first, and then -followed vows and the plighting of troth. Happy moments! But perfect -bliss does not exist on earth, it often bears a poison in itself, or -else is poisoned by some outside circumstances. So it was in this case. -When the young people had exchanged kisses they heard a sudden burst of -laughter. They looked at the river in stupefaction; before them, up to -his waist in water, stood a naked boy: it was Kolia, Anna’s schoolboy -brother! He stood there smiling maliciously with his eyes fixed on the -young people. - -“Aha! You’re kissing one another, are you? All right, I’ll tell mamma!” - -“I hope that, as an honourable boy—” faltered Lapkin, blushing. “To spy -on us is mean, but to sneak is low, base, vile. I am sure that, as a -good and honourable boy, you——” - -“Give me a rouble and I won’t say anything!” answered the honourable -boy. “If you don’t, I’ll tell on you——” - -Lapkin took a rouble from his pocket and gave it to Kolia. The boy -seized it in his wet hand, whistled, and swam away. The young couple -exchanged no more kisses on that occasion. - -Next day Lapkin brought Kolia a box of paints from town and a ball; his -sister gave him all her old pill-boxes. They next had to present him -with a set of studs with little dogs’ heads on them. The bad boy -obviously relished the game and began spying on them so as to get more -presents. Wherever Lapkin and Anna went, there he went too. He never -left them to themselves for a moment. - -“The little wretch!” muttered Lapkin grinding his teeth. “So young and -yet so great a rascal! What will become of us?” - -All through the month of June Kolia tormented the unhappy lovers. He -threatened them with betrayal, he spied on them, and then demanded -presents; he could not get enough, and at last began talking of a watch. -The watch was given him. - -Once during dinner, while the waffles were on the table, he burst out -laughing, winked, and said to Lapkin: - -“Shall I tell them, eh?” - -Lapkin blushed furiously and put his napkin into his mouth instead of a -waffle. Anna jumped up from the table and ran into another room. - -The young people remained in this situation until the end of August when -the day at last came on which Lapkin proposed for Anna’s hand. Oh, what -a joyful day it was! No sooner had he spoken with his sweetheart’s -parents and obtained their consent to his suit, than Lapkin rushed into -the garden in search of Kolia. He nearly wept with exultation on finding -him, and caught the wicked boy by the ear. Anna came running up, too, -looking for Kolia, and seized him by the other ear. The pleasure -depicted on the faces of the lovers when Kolia wept and begged for mercy -was well worth seeing. - -“Dear, good, sweet angels, I won’t do it again! Ouch, ouch! Forgive me!” -Kolia implored them. - -They confessed afterward that during all their courtship they had never -once experienced such bliss, such thrilling rapture, as they did during -those few moments when they were pulling the ears of that wicked boy. - - - BLISS - -It was midnight. Suddenly Mitia Kuldaroff burst into his parents’ house, -dishevelled and excited, and went flying through all the rooms. His -father and mother had already gone to rest; his sister was in bed -finishing the last pages of a novel, and his schoolboy brothers were -fast asleep. - -“What brings you here?” cried his astonished parents. “What is the -matter?” - -“Oh, don’t ask me! I never expected anything like this! No, no, I never -expected it! It is—it is absolutely incredible!” - -Mitia burst out laughing and dropped into a chair, unable to stand on -his feet from happiness. - -“It is incredible! You can’t imagine what it is! Look here!” - -His sister jumped out of bed, threw a blanket over her shoulders, and -went to her brother. The schoolboys woke up—— - -“What’s the matter with you? You look like a ghost.” - -“It’s because I’m so happy, mother. I am known all over Russia now. -Until to-day, you were the only people who knew that such a person as -Dimitri Kuldaroff existed, but now all Russia knows it! Oh, mother! Oh, -heavens!” - -Mitia jumped up, ran through all the rooms, and dropped back into a -chair. - -“But what has happened? Talk sense!” - -“You live like wild animals, you don’t read the news, the press is -nothing to you, and yet there are so many wonderful things in the -papers! Everything that happens becomes known at once, nothing remains -hidden! Oh, how happy I am! Oh, heavens! The newspapers only write about -famous people, and now there is something in them about me!” - -“What do you mean? Where is it?” - -Papa turned pale. Mamma glanced at the icon and crossed herself. The -schoolboys jumped out of bed and ran to their brother in their short -nightshirts. - -“Yes, sir! There is something about me in the paper! The whole of Russia -knows it now. Oh, mother, keep this number as a souvenir; we can read it -from time to time. Look!” - -Mitia pulled a newspaper out of his pocket and handed it to his father, -pointing to an item marked with a blue pencil. - -“Read that!” - -His father put on his glasses. - -“Come on, read it!” - -Mamma glanced at the icon once more, and crossed herself. Papa cleared -his throat, and began: - -“At 11 P. M., on December 27, a young man by the name of Dimitri -Kuldaroff——” - -“See? See? Go on!” - -“A young man by the name of Dimitri Kuldaroff, coming out of a tavern on -Little Armourer Street, and being in an intoxicated condition——” - -“That’s it, I was with Simion Petrovitch! Every detail is correct. Go -on! Listen!” - -“—being in an intoxicated condition, slipped and fell under the feet of -a horse belonging to the cabman Ivan Drotoff, a peasant from the village -of Durinka in the province of Yuknofski. The frightened horse jumped -across Kuldaroff’s prostrate body, pulling the sleigh after him. In the -sleigh sat Stepan Lukoff, a merchant of the Second Moscow Guild of -Merchants. The horse galloped down the street, but was finally stopped -by some house porters. For a few moments Kuldaroff was stunned. He was -conveyed to the police station and examined by a doctor. The blow which -he had sustained on the back of the neck——” - -“That was from the shaft, papa. Go on! Read the rest!” - -“—the blow which he had sustained on the back of the neck was pronounced -to be slight. The victim was given medical assistance.” - -“They put cold-water bandages round my neck. Do you believe me now? What -do you think? Isn’t it great? It has gone all over Russia by now! Give -me the paper!” - -Mitia seized the paper, folded it, and put it into his pocket, -exclaiming: - -“I must run to the Makaroffs, and show it to them! And the Ivanoffs must -see it, too, and Natalia, and Anasim—I must run there at once! -Good-bye!” - -Mitia crammed on his cap and ran blissfully and triumphantly out into -the street. - - - TWO BEAUTIFUL GIRLS - - - I - -When I was a schoolboy in the fifth or sixth grade, I remember driving -with my grandfather from the little village where we lived to -Rostoff-on-Don. It was a sultry, long, weary August day. Our eyes were -dazzled, and our throats were parched by the heat, and the dry, burning -wind kept whirling clouds of dust in our faces. We desired only not to -open our eyes or to speak, and when the sleepy Little Russian driver -Karpo flicked my cap, as he brandished his whip over his horse, I -neither protested nor uttered a sound, but, waking from a half-doze, I -looked meekly and listlessly into the distance, hoping to descry a -village through the dust. We stopped to feed the horse at the house of a -rich Armenian whom my grandfather knew in the large Armenian village of -Baktchi-Salak. Never in my life have I seen anything more of a -caricature, than our Armenian host. Picture to yourself a tiny, -clean-shaven head, thick, overhanging eyebrows, a beak-like nose, a -long, grey moustache, and a large mouth, out of which a long chibouk of -cherry-wood is hanging. This head was clumsily stuck on a stooping -little body clothed in a fantastic costume consisting of a bob tailed -red jacket and wide, bright blue breeches. The little man walked -shuffling his slippers, with his feet far apart. He did not remove his -pipe from his mouth when he spoke, and carried himself with true -Armenian dignity, staring-eyed and unsmiling, doing his best to ignore -his guests as much as possible. - -Although there was neither wind nor dust in the Armenian’s house, it was -as uncomfortable and stifling and dreary in there as it had been on the -road across the steppe. Dusty and heavy with the heat, I sat down on a -green trunk in a corner. The wooden walls, the furniture, and the floor -painted with yellow ochre smelled of dry wood blistering in the sun. -Wherever the eye fell, were flies, flies, flies—My grandfather and the -Armenian talked together in low voices of pasturage and fertilising and -sheep. I knew that it would be an hour before the samovar would be -brought, and that grandfather would then drink tea for at least an hour -longer, after which he would lie down for a two or three hours’ nap. A -quarter of the day would thus be spent by me in waiting, after which we -would resume the dust, the swelter, and the jolting of the road. I heard -the two voices murmuring together, and began to feel as if I had been -looking for ever at the Armenian, the china closet, the flies, and the -windows through which the hot sun was pouring, and that I should only -cease to look at them in the distant future. I was seized with hatred of -the steppe, the sun, and the flies. - -A Little Russian woman, with a kerchief on her head, brought in first a -tray of dishes, and then the samovar. The Armenian went without haste to -the hall door, and called: - -“Mashia! Come and pour the tea! Where are you, Mashia?” - -We heard hurried footfalls, and a girl of sixteen in a plain cotton -dress, with a white kerchief on her head, entered the room. Her back was -turned toward me as she stood arranging the tea-things and pouring the -tea, and all I could see was that she was slender and barefooted, and -that her little toes were almost hidden by her long, full trousers. - -Our host invited me to sit down at the table, and when I was seated, I -looked into the girl’s face as she handed me my glass. As I looked, I -suddenly felt as if a wind had swept over my soul, blowing away all the -impressions of the day with its tedium and dust. I beheld there the -enchanting features of the most lovely face I had ever seen, waking or -in my dreams. Before me stood a very beautiful girl; I recognised that -at a glance, as one recognises a flash of lightning. - -I am ready to swear that Masha—or, as her father called her, Mashia—was -really beautiful, but I cannot prove it. Sometimes, in the evening, the -clouds lie piled high on the horizon, and the sun, hidden behind them, -stains them and the sky with a hundred colours, crimson, orange, gold, -violet, and rosy pink. One cloud resembles a monk; another, a fish; a -third, a turbaned Turk. The glow embraces one-third of the sky, flashing -from the cross on the church, and the windows of the manor-house, -lighting up the river and the meadows, and trembling upon the tree tops. -Far, far away against the sunset a flock of wild ducks is winging its -way to its night’s resting-place. And the little cowherd with his cows, -and the surveyor driving along the river dyke in his cart, and the -inmates of the manor-house strolling in the evening air, all gaze at the -sunset, and to each one it is supremely beautiful, but no one can say -just where its beauty lies. - -Not I alone found the young Armenian beautiful. My grandfather, an -octogenarian, stern and indifferent to women and to the beauties of -Nature, looked gently at Masha for a whole minute, and then asked: - -“Is that your daughter, Avet Nazaritch?” - -“Yes, that is my daughter,” answered our host. - -“She is a fine girl,” the old man said heartily. - -An artist would have called the Armenian’s beauty classic and severe. It -was the type of beauty in whose presence you feel that here are features -of perfect regularity; that the hair, the eyes, the nose, the mouth, the -chin, the neck, the breast, and every movement of the young body are -merged into a perfect and harmonious chord, in which Nature has not -sounded one false note. You somehow feel that a woman of ideal beauty -should have just such a nose as Masha’s, slender, with the slightest -aquiline curve; just such large, dark eyes and long lashes; just such a -languorous glance; that her dusky, curly hair and her black eyebrows -match the delicate, tender white tint of her forehead and cheeks as -green reeds match the waters of a quiet river. Masha’s white throat and -young breast were scarcely developed, and yet it seemed as if to chisel -them one would have had to possess the highest creative genius. You -looked at her, and little by little the longing seized you to say -something wonderfully kind to her; something beautiful and true; -something as beautiful as the girl herself. - -I was hurt and humiliated at first that Masha should keep her eyes fixed -on the ground as she did and fail to notice me. I felt as if a strange -atmosphere of happiness and pride were blowing between us, sighing -jealously at every glance of mine. - -“It is because I am all sunburned and dusty,” I thought. “And because I -am still a boy.” - -But later I gradually forgot my feelings, and abandoned myself to her -beauty heart and soul. I no longer remembered the dust and tedium of the -steppe, nor heard the buzzing of the flies; I did not taste the tea, and -only felt that there, across the table, stood that lovely girl. - -Her beauty had a strange effect upon me. I experienced neither desire, -nor rapture, nor pleasure, but a sweet, oppressive sadness, as vague and -undefinable as a dream. I was sorry for myself, and for my grandfather, -and for the Armenian, and for the girl herself, and felt as if each one -of us had lost something significant and essential to our lives, which -we could never find again. Grandfather, too, grew sad and no longer -talked of sheep and pasturage, but sat in silence, his eyes resting -pensively on Masha. - -When tea was over, grandfather lay down to take his nap, and I went out -and sat on the little porch at the front door. Like all the other houses -in Baktchi-Salak, this one stood in the blazing sun; neither trees nor -eaves threw any shade about it. The great courtyard, all overgrown with -dock and nettles, was full of life and gaiety in spite of the intense -heat. Wheat was being threshed behind one of the low wattle fences that -intersected it in various places, and twelve horses were trotting round -and round a post that had been driven into the middle of the -threshing-floor. A Little Russian in a long, sleeveless coat, and wide -breeches, was walking beside the horses cracking his whip over them, and -shouting as if to excite them, and at the same time to vaunt his mastery -over them. - -“Ah—ah—ah—you little devils! Ah—ah, the cholera take you! Are you not -afraid of me?” - -Not knowing why they were being forced to trot round in a circle, -trampling wheat straw under their feet, the horses—bay, white and -piebald—moved unwillingly and wearily, angrily switching their tails. -The wind raised clouds of golden chaff under their hoofs, and blew it -away across the fence. Women with rakes were swarming among the tall -stacks of fresh straw, tip-carts were hurrying to and fro, and behind -the stacks in an adjoining courtyard another dozen horses were trotting -around a post, and another Little Russian was cracking his whip and -making merry over them. - -The steps on which I was sitting were fiery hot, the heat had drawn -drops of resin from the slender porch railing and the window-sills, and -swarms of ruddy little beetles were crowded together in the strips of -shade under the blinds and steps. The sun’s rays were beating on my -head, and breast, and back, but I was unconscious of them, and only felt -that there, behind me, those bare feet were pattering about on the deal -floor. Having cleared away the tea-things, Masha ran down the steps, a -little gust sweeping me as she passed, and flew like a bird into a -small, smoky building that was no doubt the kitchen, from which issued a -smell of roasting mutton and the angry tones of an Armenian voice. She -vanished into the dark doorway, and in her stead there appeared on the -threshold an old, humpbacked Armenian crone, in green trousers. The old -woman was in a rage, and was scolding some one. Masha soon came out on -the threshold again, flushed with the heat of the kitchen, bearing a -huge loaf of black bread on her shoulder. Bending gracefully under its -weight, she ran across the court in the direction of the -threshing-floor, leaped over the fence, and plunged into the clouds of -golden chaff. The Little Russian driver lowered his whip, stopped his -cries, and gazed after her for a moment; then, when the girl appeared -again beside the horses, and jumped back over the fence, he followed her -once more with his eyes, and cried to his horses in a tone of -affliction: - -“Ah—ah—the Evil One fly away with you!” - -From then on I sat and listened to the unceasing fall of her bare feet, -and watched her whisking about the courtyard, with her face so serious -and intent. Now she would run up the steps, fanning me with a whirl of -wind; now dart into the kitchen; now across the threshing-floor; now out -through the front gate, and all so fast that I could barely turn my head -quickly enough to follow her with my eyes. - -And the oftener she flashed across my vision with her beauty, the more -profound my sadness grew. I pitied myself, and her, and the Little -Russian sadly following her with his eyes each time that she ran through -the cloud of chaff and past the straw-stacks. Was I envious of her -beauty? Did I regret that this girl was not and never could be mine, and -that I must for ever remain a stranger to her? Did I dimly realise that -her rare loveliness was a freak of nature, vain, perishable like -everything else on earth? Or did my sadness spring from a feeling -peculiar to every heart at the sight of perfect beauty? Who shall say? - -The three hours of waiting passed before I was aware. It seemed to me -that I had scarcely had a chance to look at Masha, before Karpo rode -down to the river to wash off his horse, and began to harness up. The -wet animal whinnied with delight, and struck the shafts with his hoofs. -Karpo shouted “Ba—ack!” Grandfather woke up. Masha threw open the -creaking gates; we climbed into our carriage and drove out of the -courtyard. We travelled in silence, as if there had been a quarrel -between us. - -Three hours later, when we could already see Rostoff in the distance, -Karpo, who had not spoken since we left the Armenian village, looked -round swiftly and said: - -“That Armenian has a pretty daughter!” - -And as he said this he lashed his horse. - - - II - -Once again, when I was a student in college, I was on my way south by -train. It was May. At one of the stations between Byelogorod and -Kharkoff, I think it was, I got out of the train to walk up and down the -platform. - -The evening shadows were already lying on the little garden, the -platform, and the distant fields. The sunlight had faded from the -station, but by the rosy glow that shone on the highest puffs of steam -from our engine we could tell that the sun had not yet sunk beneath the -horizon. - -As I strolled along the platform I noticed that most of the passengers -had gathered round one of the second-class carriages as if there were -some well-known person inside. In that inquisitive crowd I found my -travelling companion, a bright young artillery officer, warm-hearted and -sympathetic as people are with whom one strikes up a chance -acquaintanceship for a few hours on a journey. - -“What are you looking at?” I asked. - -He did not answer, but motioned me with his eyes toward a female figure -standing alongside the train. She was a young girl of seventeen or -eighteen, dressed in Russian costume, bareheaded, with a kerchief thrown -carelessly over one shoulder. She was not a passenger on the train, but -probably the daughter or the sister of the station superintendent. She -was chatting at a window with an elderly woman. Before I could realise -exactly what I was looking at, I was suddenly overwhelmed by the same -sensation that I had experienced in the Armenian village. - -The girl was extraordinarily beautiful, of this neither I nor any one of -those who were looking at her could have the slightest doubt. - -Were I to describe her lineaments in detail, as the custom is, the only -really beautiful point I could ascribe to her would be her thick, curly, -blond hair, caught up with a black ribbon. Her other features were -either irregular or frankly commonplace. Whether from coquetry or -short-sightedness, she kept her eyes half-closed; her nose was vaguely -tip-tilted; her mouth was small; her profile was weak and ill-defined; -her shoulders were too narrow for her years. Nevertheless, the girl gave -one the impression of being a great beauty, and as I looked at her I -grew convinced that the Russian physiognomy does not demand severe -regularity of feature to be beautiful; on the contrary, it seemed to me -that, had this girl’s nose been straight and classic as the Armenian’s -was, her face would have lost all its comeliness. - -As she stood at the window chatting and shrinking from the evening -chill, the girl now glanced back at us, now stuck her arms akimbo, now -raised her hands to catch up a stray lock of hair, and, as she laughed -and talked, the expression on her face varied between surprise and mimic -horror. I do not remember one second when her features and body were at -rest. The very mystery and magic of her loveliness lay in those -indescribably graceful little motions of hers; in her smile; in the play -of her features; in her swift glances at us; in the union of delicate -grace, youth, freshness, and purity that rang in her voice and laughter. -The charm of her was the frailty which we love in children, birds, -fawns, and slender saplings. - -Hers was the beauty of the butterfly that accords so well with waltzes, -with flutterings about a garden, with laughter, and the merriment that -admits neither thought, nor sadness, nor repose. It seemed that, should -a strong gust of wind blow along the platform, or a shower of rain fall, -this fragile figure must crumple to nothing, and this wayward beauty -dissolve like the pollen of a flower. - -“Well, well, well!” murmured the officer, sighing as we walked toward -our compartment after the second starting-bell had rung. - -What he meant by that “Well, well, well,” I shall not attempt to decide. - -Perhaps he was sad at leaving the lovely girl and the spring evening, -and returning to the stuffy train, or perhaps he was sorry, as I was, -for her, and for himself, and for me, and for all the passengers that -were languidly and unwillingly creeping toward their several -compartments. As we walked past a window at which a pale, red-haired -telegraph operator was sitting over his instrument, the officer, seeing -his pompadour curls, and his faded, bony face, sighed again, and said: - -“I’ll bet you that operator is in love with the little beauty. To live -among these lonely fields, under the same roof with that lovely little -creature, and not to fall in love with her would be superhuman. And, oh, -my friend, what a misfortune, what a mockery, to be a round-shouldered, -threadbare, colourless, earnest, sensible man and to fall in love with -that beautiful, foolish child, who is not worth a thought from any one! -Or, worse still, supposing this operator is in love with her, and at the -same time married to a woman as round-shouldered, and threadbare, and -colourless, and sensible as himself! What misery!” - -Near our compartment the train conductor was leaning against the -platform railing, gazing in the direction of the beautiful girl. His -flabby, dissipated, wrinkled face, haggard with the weariness of -sleepless nights and the motion of the train, wore an expression of -profoundest melancholy, as if in this girl he saw the spectre of his -youth, his happiness, his sober ways, his wife, and his children. His -heart was full of repentance, and he felt with his whole being that this -girl was not for him and that, with his premature old age, his -awkwardness, and his bloated face, every day, human happiness was as far -beyond his reach as was the sky. - -The third bell clanged, the whistle blew, and the train moved slowly -away. Past our windows flashed the conductor, the station -superintendent, the garden, and at last the beautiful girl herself with -her sweet, childishly cunning smile. - -By leaning out of the window and looking back, I could see her walking -up and down the platform in front of the window where the telegraph -operator was sitting, watching the train and pinning up a stray lock of -hair. Then she ran into the garden. The station was no longer kindled by -the western light; though the fields were level and bare, the sun’s rays -had faded from them, and the smoke from our engine lay in black, rolling -masses upon the green velvet of the winter wheat. A sense of sadness -pervaded the spring air, the darkling sky, and the railway-carriage. - -Our friend the conductor came into our compartment and lit the lamp. - - - - - LIGHT AND SHADOW - - - THE CHORUS GIRL - -One day while she was still pretty and young and her voice was sweet, -Nikolai Kolpakoff, an admirer of hers, was sitting in a room on the -second floor of her cottage. The afternoon was unbearably sultry and -hot. Kolpakoff, who had just dined and drunk a whole bottle of vile -port, felt thoroughly ill and out of sorts. Both he and she were bored, -and were waiting for the heat to abate so that they might go for a -stroll. - -Suddenly a bell rang in the hall. Kolpakoff, who was sitting in his -slippers without a coat, jumped up and looked at Pasha with a question -in his eyes. - -“It is probably the postman or one of the girls,” said the singer. - -Kolpakoff was not afraid of the postman or of Pasha’s girl friends, but -nevertheless he snatched up his coat and disappeared into the next room -while Pasha ran to open the door. What was her astonishment when she saw -on the threshold, not the postman nor a girl friend, but an unknown -woman, beautiful and young! Her dress was distinguished and she was -evidently a lady. - -The stranger was pale and was breathing heavily as if she were out of -breath from climbing the stairs. - -“What can I do for you?” Pasha inquired. - -The lady did not reply at once. She took a step forward, looked slowly -around the room, and sank into a chair as if her legs had collapsed -under her from faintness or fatigue. Her pale lips moved silently, -trying to utter words which would not come. - -“Is my husband here?” she asked at last, raising her large eyes with -their red and swollen lids to Pasha’s face. - -“What husband do you mean?” Pasha whispered, suddenly taking such -violent fright that her hands and feet grew as cold as ice. “What -husband?” she repeated beginning to tremble. - -“My husband—Nikolai Kolpakoff.” - -“N-no, my lady. I don’t know your husband.” - -A minute passed in silence. The stranger drew her handkerchief several -times across her pale lips, and held her breath in an effort to subdue -an inward trembling, while Pasha stood before her as motionless as a -statue, gazing at her full of uncertainty and fear. - -“So you say he is not here?” asked the lady. Her voice was firm now and -a strange smile had twisted her lips. - -“I—I—don’t know whom you mean!” - -“You are a revolting, filthy, vile creature!” muttered the stranger -looking at Pasha with hatred and disgust. “Yes, yes, you are revolting. -I am glad indeed that an opportunity has come at last for me to tell you -this!” - -Pasha felt that she was producing the effect of something indecent and -foul on this lady in black, with the angry eyes and the long, slender -fingers, and she was ashamed of her fat, red cheeks, the pock-mark on -her nose, and the lock of hair on her forehead that would never stay up. -She thought that if she were thin and her face were not powdered, and -she had not that curl on her forehead, she would not feel so afraid and -ashamed standing there before this mysterious, unknown lady. - -“Where is my husband?” the lady went on. “However it makes no difference -to me whether he is here or not, I only want you to know that he has -been caught embezzling funds intrusted to him, and that the police are -looking for him. He is going to be arrested. Now see what you have -done!” - -The lady rose and began to walk up and down in violent agitation. Pasha -stared at her; fear rendered her uncomprehending. - -“He will be found to-day and arrested,” the lady repeated with a sob -full of bitterness and rage. “I know who has brought this horror upon -him! Disgusting, abominable woman! Horrible, bought creature! (Here the -lady’s lips curled and her nose wrinkled with aversion.) I am impotent. -Listen to me, you low woman. I am impotent and you are stronger than I, -but there is One who will avenge me and my children. God’s eyes see all -things. He is just. He will call you to account for every tear I have -shed, every sleepless night I have passed. The time will come when you -will remember me!” - -Once more silence fell. The lady walked to and fro wringing her hands. -Pasha continued to watch her dully, uncomprehendingly, dazed with doubt, -waiting for her to do something terrible. - -“I don’t know what you mean, my lady!” she suddenly cried, and burst -into tears. - -“That’s a lie!” screamed the lady, her eyes flashing with anger. “I know -all about it! I have known about you for a long time. I know that he has -been coming here every day for the last month.” - -“Yes—and what if he has? Is it my fault? I have a great many visitors, -but I don’t force any one to come. They are free to do as they please.” - -“I tell you he is accused of embezzlement! He has taken money that -didn’t belong to him, and for the sake of a woman like you—for your -sake, he has brought himself to commit a crime! Listen to me,” the lady -said sternly, halting before Pasha. “You are an unprincipled woman, I -know. You exist to bring misfortune to men, that is the object of your -life, but I cannot believe that you have fallen so low as not to have -one spark of humanity left in your breast. He has a wife, he has -children, oh, remember that! There is one means of saving us from -poverty and shame; if I can find nine hundred roubles to-day he will be -left in peace. Only nine hundred roubles!” - -“What nine hundred roubles?” asked Pasha feebly. “I—I don’t know—I -didn’t take——” - -“I am not asking you to give me nine hundred roubles, you have no money, -and I don’t want anything that belongs to you. It is something else that -I ask. Men generally give presents of jewellery to women like you. All I -ask is that you should give me back the things that my husband has given -you.” - -“My lady, he has never given me anything!” wailed Pasha beginning to -understand. - -“Then where is the money he has wasted? He has squandered in some way -his own fortune, and mine, and the fortunes of others. Where has the -money gone? Listen, I implore you! I was excited just now and said some -unpleasant things, but I ask you to forgive me! I know you must hate me, -but if pity exists for you, oh, put yourself in my place! I implore you -to give me the jewellery!” - -“H’m—” said Pasha shrugging her shoulders. “I should do it with -pleasure, only I swear before God he never gave me a thing. He didn’t, -indeed. But, no, you are right,” the singer suddenly stammered in -confusion. “He did give me two little things. Wait a minute, I’ll fetch -them for you if you want them.” - -Pasha pulled out one of the drawers of her bureau, and took from it a -bracelet of hollow gold, and a narrow ring set with a ruby. - -“Here they are!” she said, handing them to her visitor. - -The lady grew angry and a spasm passed over her features. She felt that -she was being insulted. - -“What is this you are giving me?” she cried. “I’m not asking for alms, -but for the things that do not belong to you, for the things that you -have extracted from my weak and unhappy husband by your position. When I -saw you on the wharf with him on Thursday you were wearing costly -brooches and bracelets. Do you think you can play the innocent baby with -me? I ask you for the last time: will you give me those presents or -not?” - -“You are strange, I declare,” Pasha exclaimed, beginning to take -offence. “I swear to you that I have never had a thing from your -Nikolai, except this bracelet and ring. He has never given me anything, -but these and some little cakes.” - -“Little cakes!” the stranger laughed suddenly. “His children are -starving at home, and he brings you little cakes! So you won’t give up -the things?” - -Receiving no answer, the lady sat down, her eyes grew fixed, and she -seemed to be debating something. - -“What shall I do?” she murmured. “If I can’t get nine hundred roubles he -will be ruined as well as the children and myself. Shall I kill this -creature, or shall I go down on my knees to her?” - -The lady pressed her handkerchief to her eyes and burst into tears. - -“Oh, I beseech you!” she sobbed. “It is you who have disgraced and -ruined my husband; now save him! You can have no pity for him, I know; -but the children, remember the children! What have they done to deserve -this?” - -Pasha imagined his little children standing on the street corner weeping -with hunger, and she, too, burst into tears. - -“What can I do, my lady?” she cried. “You say I am a wicked creature who -has ruined your husband, but I swear to you before God I have never had -the least benefit from him! Mota is the only girl in our chorus who has -a rich friend, the rest of us all live on bread and water. Your husband -is an educated, pleasant gentleman, that’s why I received him. We can’t -pick and choose.” - -“I want the jewellery; give me the jewellery! I am weeping, I am -humiliating myself; see, I shall fall on my knees before you!” - -Pasha screamed with terror and waved her arms. She felt that this pale, -beautiful lady, who spoke the same refined language that people did in -plays, might really fall on her knees before her, and for the very -reason that she was so proud and high-bred, she would exalt herself by -doing this, and degrade the little singer. - -“Yes, yes, I’ll give you the jewellery!” Pasha cried hastily, wiping her -eyes. “Take it, but it did not come from your husband! I got it from -other visitors. But take it, if you want it!” - -Pasha pulled out an upper drawer of the bureau, and took from it a -diamond brooch, a string of corals, two or three rings, and a bracelet. -These she handed to the lady. - -“Here is the jewellery, but I tell you again your husband never gave me -a thing. Take it, and may you be the richer for having it!” Pasha went -on, offended by the lady’s threat that she would go down on her knees. -“You are a lady and his lawful wife—keep him at home then! The idea of -it! As if I had asked him to come here! He came because he wanted to!” - -The lady looked through her tears at the jewellery that Pasha had handed -her and said: - -“This isn’t all. There is scarcely five hundred roubles’ worth here.” - -Pasha violently snatched a gold watch, a cigarette-case, and a set of -studs out of the drawer and flung up her arms, exclaiming: - -“Now I am cleaned out! Look for yourself!” - -Her visitor sighed. With trembling hands she wrapped the trinkets in her -handkerchief, and went out without a word, without even a nod. - -The door of the adjoining room opened and Kolpakoff came out. His face -was pale and his head was shaking nervously, as if he had just swallowed -a very bitter draught. His eyes were full of tears. - -“I’d like to know what you ever gave me!” Pasha attacked him vehemently. -“When did you ever give me the smallest present?” - -“Presents—they are a detail, presents!” Kolpakoff cried, his head still -shaking. “Oh, my God, she wept before you, she abased herself!” - -“I ask you again: what have you ever given me?” screamed Pasha. - -“My God, she—a respectable, a proud woman, was actually ready to fall on -her knees before—before this—wench! And I have brought her to this! I -allowed it!” - -He seized his head in his hands. - -“No,” he groaned out, “I shall never forgive myself for this—never! Get -away from me, wretch!” he cried, backing away from Pasha with horror, -and keeping her off with outstretched, trembling hands. “She was ready -to go down on her knees, and before whom?—Before you! Oh, my God!” - -He threw on his coat and, pushing Pasha contemptuously aside, strode to -the door and went out. - -Pasha flung herself down on the sofa and burst into loud wails. She -already regretted the things she had given away so impulsively, and her -feelings were hurt. She remembered that a merchant had beaten her three -years ago for nothing, yes, absolutely for nothing, and at that thought -she wept louder than ever. - - - THE FATHER OF A FAMILY - -This is what generally follows a grand loss at cards or a drinking-bout, -when his indigestion begins to make itself felt. Stepan Jilin wakes up -in an uncommonly gloomy frame of mind. He looks sour, ruffled, and -peevish, and his grey face wears an expression partly discontented, -partly offended, and partly sneering. He dresses deliberately, slowly -drinks his vichy water, and begins roaming about the house. - -“I wish to goodness I knew what br-rute goes through here leaving all -the doors open!” he growls angrily, wrapping his dressing-gown about him -and noisily clearing his throat. “Take this paper away! What is it lying -here for? Though we keep twenty servants, this house is more untidy than -a hovel! Who rang the bell? Who’s there?” - -“Aunty Anfisa, who nursed our Fedia,” answers his wife. - -“Yes, loafing about, eating the bread of idleness!” - -“I don’t understand you, Stepan; you invited her here yourself and now -you are abusing her!” - -“I’m not abusing her. I’m talking! And you ought to find something to -do, too, good woman, instead of sitting there with your hands folded, -picking quarrels with your husband! I don’t understand a woman like you, -upon my word I don’t! How can you let day after day go by without -working? Here’s your husband toiling and moiling like an ox, like a -beast of burden, and there you are, his wife, his life’s companion, -sitting about like a doll without ever turning your hand to a thing, so -bored that you must seize every opportunity of quarrelling with him. -It’s high time for you to drop those schoolgirlish airs, madam! You’re -not a child nor a young miss any longer. You’re a woman, a mother! You -turn away, eh? Aha! You don’t like disagreeable truths, do you?” - -“It’s odd you only speak disagreeable truths when you have indigestion!” - -“That’s right, let’s have a scene; go ahead!” - -“Did you go to town yesterday or did you play cards somewhere?” - -“Well, and what if I did? Whose business is it? Am I accountable to any -one? Don’t I lose my own money? All that I spend and all that is spent -in this house is mine, do you hear that? Mine!” - -And so he persists in the same strain. But Jilin is never so crotchety, -so stern, so bristling with virtue and justice, as he is when sitting at -dinner with his household gathered about him. It generally begins with -the soup. Having swallowed his first spoonful, Jilin suddenly scowls and -stops eating. - -“What the devil—” he mutters. “So I’ll have to go to the café for -lunch——” - -“What is it?” asks his anxious wife. “Isn’t the soup good?” - -“I can’t conceive the swinish tastes a person must have to swallow this -mess! It is too salty, it smells of rags, it is flavoured with bugs and -not onions! Anfisa Pavlovna!” he cries to his guest. “It is shocking! I -give them oceans of money every day to buy food with, I deny myself -everything, and this is what they give me to eat! No doubt they would -like me to retire from business into the kitchen and do the cooking -myself!” - -“The soup is good to-day,” the governess timidly ventures. - -“Is it? Do you find it so?” inquires Jilin scowling angrily at her. -“Every one to his taste, but I must confess that yours and mine differ -widely, Varvara Vasilievna. You, for instance, admire the behavior of -that child there (Jilin points a tragic forefinger at his son). You are -in ecstasies over him, but I—I am shocked! Yes, I am!” - -Fedia, a boy of seven with a delicate, pale face, stops eating and -lowers his eyes. His cheeks grow paler than ever. - -“Yes, you are in ecstasies, and I am shocked. I don’t know which of us -is right, but I venture to think that I, as his father, know my own son -better than you do. Look at the way he is sitting! Is that how -well-behaved children should hold themselves? Sit up!” - -Fedia raises his chin and sticks out his neck and thinks he is sitting -up straighter. His eyes are filling with tears. - -“Eat your dinner! Hold your spoon properly! Don’t dare to snuffle! Look -me in the face!” - -Fedia tries to look at him, but his lips are quivering and the tears are -trickling down his cheeks. - -“Aha, so you’re crying? You’re naughty and that makes you cry, eh? Leave -the table and go and stand in the corner, puppy!” - -“But—do let him finish his dinner first!” his wife intercedes for the -boy. - -“No—no dinner! Such a—such a naughty brat has no right to eat dinner!” - -Fedia makes a wry face, slides down from his chair, and takes his stand -in a corner. - -“That’s the way to treat him,” his father continues. “If no one else -will take charge of his education I must do it myself. I won’t have you -being naughty and crying at dinner, sir! Spoiled brat! You ought to -work, do you hear me? Your father works, and you must work, too! No one -may sponge on others. Be a man, a M-A-N!” - -“For Heaven’s sake, hush!” his wife beseeches him in French. “At least -don’t bite our heads off in public! The old lady is listening to every -word, and the whole town will know of this, thanks to her.” - -“I’m not afraid of the public!” retorts Jilin in Russian. “Anfisa -Pavlovna can see for herself that I’m speaking the truth. What, do you -think I ought to be satisfied with that youngster there? Do you know how -much he costs me? Do you know, you worthless boy, how much you cost me? -Or do you think I can create money and that it falls into my lap of its -own accord? Stop bawling! Shut up! Do you hear me or not? Do you want me -to thrash you, little wretch?” - -Fedia breaks into piercing wails and begins sobbing. - -“Oh, this is absolutely unbearable!” exclaims his mother, throwing down -her napkin and getting up from the table. “He never lets us have our -dinner in peace. That’s where that bread of yours sticks!” - -She points to her throat and, putting her handkerchief to her eyes, -leaves the dining-room. - -“Her feelings are hurt,” mutters Jilin, forcing a smile. “She has been -too gently handled, Anfisa Pavlovna, and that’s why she doesn’t like to -hear the truth. We are to blame!” - -Several minutes elapse in silence. Jilin catches sight of the -dinner-plates and notices that the soup has not been touched. He sighs -deeply and glares at the flushed and agitated face of the governess. - -“Why don’t you eat your dinner, Varvara Vasilievna?” he demands. “You’re -offended, too, are you? I see, you don’t like the truth either. Forgive -me, but it is my nature never to be hypocritical. I always hit straight -from the shoulder. (A sigh.) I see, though, that my company is -distasteful to you. No one can speak or eat in my presence. You ought to -have told me that sooner so that I could have left you to yourselves. I -am going now.” - -Jilin rises and walks with dignity toward the door. He stops as he -passes the weeping Fedia. - -“After what has happened just now you are fr-ee!” he says to him with a -lofty toss of the head. “I shall no longer concern myself with your -education. I wash my hands of it. Forgive me if, out of sincere fatherly -solicitude for your welfare, I interfered with you and your -preceptresses. At the same time, I renounce forever all responsibility -for your future.” - -Fedia wails and sobs more loudly than ever. Jilin turns toward the door -with a stately air and walks off into his bedroom. - -After his noonday nap Jilin is tormented by the pangs of conscience. He -is ashamed of his behaviour to his wife, his son, and Anfisa Pavlovna, -and feels extremely uncomfortable on remembering what happened at -dinner. But his egotism is too strong for him and he is not man enough -to be truthful, so he continues to grumble and sulk. - -When he wakes up the following morning he feels in the gayest of moods -and whistles merrily at his ablutions. On entering the dining-room for -breakfast he finds Fedia. The boy rises at the sight of his father and -gazes at him with troubled eyes. - -“Well, how goes it, young man?” Jilin asks cheerfully as he sits down to -table. “What’s the news, old fellow? Are you all right, eh? Come here, -you little roly-poly, and give papa a kiss.” - -Fedia approaches his father with a pale, serious face and brushes his -cheek with trembling lips. Then he silently retreats and resumes his -place at the table. - - - THE ORATOR - -One Sunday morning they were burying the Collegiate Assessor Kiril -Ivanovitch, who had died from the two ailments so common amongst us: -drink and a scolding wife. While the funeral procession was crawling -from the church to the cemetery, a certain Poplavski, a colleague of the -defunct civil servant, jumped into a cab, and galloped off to fetch his -friend Gregory Zapoikin, a young but already popular man. As many of my -readers know, Zapoikin was the possessor of a remarkable talent for -making impromptu orations at weddings, jubilee celebrations, and -funerals. Whether he was half-asleep, or fasting, or dead drunk, or in a -fever, he was always ready to make a speech. His words always flowed -from his lips as smoothly and evenly and abundantly as water out of a -rain-pipe, and there were more heartrending expressions in his -oratorical vocabulary than there are black beetles in an inn. His -speeches were always eloquent and long, so long that sometimes, -especially at the weddings of merchants, the aid of the police had to be -summoned to put a stop to them. - -“I have come to carry you off with me, old chap,” began Poplavski. “Put -on your things this minute and come along. One of our colleagues has -kicked the bucket and we are about to despatch him into the next world. -We must have some sort of folderol to see him off with, you know! All -our hopes are centred on you! If one of our little fellows had died, we -shouldn’t have troubled you; but, after all, this one was an Assessor, a -pillar of the state, one might say. It wouldn’t do to bury a big fish -like him without some kind of an oration!” - -“Ah, the Assessor is it?” yawned Zapoikin. “What, that old soak?” - -“Yes, that old soak! There will be pancakes and caviar, you know, and -you will get your cab-fare paid. Come along, old man! Spout some of your -Ciceronian hyperboles over his grave and you’ll see the thanks you’ll -get from us all!” - -Zapoikin consented to go with alacrity. He ruffled his hair, veiled his -features in gloom, and stepped out with Poplavski into the street. - -“I know that Assessor of yours!” he said, as he took his seat in the -cab. “He was a rare brute of a rascal, God bless his soul!” - -“Come, let dead men alone, Grisha!” - -“Oh, of course, _de mortuis nil nisi bonum_, but that doesn’t make him -any less a rascal!” - -The friends overtook the funeral cortège. It was travelling so slowly -that before it reached its destination they had time to dash into a café -three times to drink a drop to the peace of the dead man’s soul. - -At the cemetery the litany had already been sung. The mother-in-law, the -wife, and the sister-in-law of the departed were weeping in torrents. -The wife even shrieked as the coffin was lowered into the grave: “Oh, -let me go with him!” But she did not follow her husband, probably -because she remembered his pension in time. Zapoikin waited until every -sound had ceased and then stepped forward, embraced the whole crowd at a -glance and began: - -“Can we believe our eyes and our ears? Is this not a terrible dream? -What is this grave here? What are these tear-stained faces, these sobs, -these groans? Alas, they are not a dream! He whom, but a short time -since we saw before us so valiant and brave, endowed still with all the -freshness of youth; he whom, before our eyes, like the untiring bee, we -saw carrying his burden of honey to the universal hive of the sovereign -good, he whom—this man has now become dust, a mirage! Pitiless death has -laid his bony hand upon him at a time when, notwithstanding the weight -of his years, he was still in the very bloom of his powers, and radiant -with hope. We have many a good servant of the state here, but Prokofi -Osipitch stood alone among them all. He was devoted body and soul to the -accomplishment of his honourable duties; he spared not his strength, and -it may well be said of him that he was always without fear and without -reproach. Ah, how he despised those who desired to buy his soul at the -expense of the public good; those who, with the seductive blessings of -earth, would fain have enticed him into a betrayal of the trusts -confided to him! Yea, before our very eyes we could see Prokofi Osipitch -giving his mite, his all, to comrades poorer than himself, and you have -heard for yourselves, but a few moments since, the cries of the widows -and orphans who lived by the kindness of his great heart. Engrossed in -the duties of his post and in deeds of charity, he knew no joy in this -world. Yea, he even forswore the happiness of family life. You know that -he remained a bachelor to the end of his days. Who will take the place -of this comrade of ours? I can see at this moment his gentle, -clean-shaven face turned toward us with a benevolent smile. I seem to -hear the soft, friendly tones of his voice. Eternal repose be to your -soul, Prokofi Osipitch! Rest in peace, noble, honourable toiler of -ours!” - -Zapoikin continued his oration, but his audience had begun to whisper -among themselves. The speech pleased every one and called forth numerous -tears, but it seemed a little strange to many who heard it. In the first -place, they could not understand why the speaker had referred to the -dead man as “Prokofi Osipitch” when his real name had been Kiril -Ivanovitch. In the second place, they all knew that the departed and his -wife had fought like cat and dog, and that therefore he could hardly -have been called a bachelor. In the third place, he had worn a thick red -beard, and had never shaved in his life, therefore they could not make -out why their Demosthenes had spoken of him as being clean-shaven. They -wondered and looked at one another and shrugged their shoulders. - -“Prokofi Osipitch!” the speaker continued with a rapt look at the grave. -“Prokofi Osipitch! You were ugly of face, it is true, yea, you were -almost uncouth; you were gloomy and stern, but well we knew that beneath -that deceitful exterior of yours there beat a warm and affectionate -heart!” - -The crowd was now beginning to notice something queer about the orator -himself. He was glaring intently at some object near him and was -shifting his position uneasily. At last he suddenly stopped, his jaw -dropped with amazement, and he turned to Poplavski. - -“Look here, that man’s alive!” he cried, his eyes starting out of his -head with horror. - -“Who’s alive?” - -“Why, Prokofi Osipitch! There he is now, standing by that monument!” - -“Of course he is! It was Kiril Ivanovitch that died, not he!” - -“But you said yourself it was the Assessor!” - -“I know! And wasn’t Kiril Ivanovitch the Assessor? Oh, you moon-calf! -You have got them mixed up! Of course Prokofi Osipitch used to be the -Assessor, but that was two years ago. He has been chief of a table in -chancery now for two years!” - -“It’s simply the devil to keep up with all you chaps!” - -“What are you stopping for? Go on! This is getting too awkward!” - -Zapoikin turned toward the grave, and continued his oration with all his -former eloquence. Yes, and there near the monument stood Prokofi -Osipitch, an old civil servant with a clean-shaven face, frowning and -glaring furiously at the speaker. - -“How in the world did you manage to do that?” laughed the officials as -they and Zapoikin drove home from the cemetery together. “Ha! Ha! Ha! A -funeral oration for a live man!” - -“You made a great mistake, young man!” growled Prokofi Osipitch. “Your -speech may have been appropriate enough for a dead man, but for a live -one it was—it was simply a joke. Allow me to ask you, what was it you -said? ‘Without fear and without reproach; he never took a bribe!’ Why, -you _couldn’t_ say a thing like that about a live man unless you were -joking! And no one asked you to dwell upon my personal appearance, young -gentleman! ‘Ugly and uncouth,’ eh! That may be quite true, but why did -you drag it in before every one in the city? I call it an insult!” - - - IONITCH - -If newcomers to the little provincial city of S. complained that life -there was monotonous and dull, its inhabitants would answer that, on the -contrary, S. was a very amusing place, indeed, that it had a library and -a club, that balls were given there, and finally, that very pleasant -families lived there with whom one might become acquainted. And they -always pointed to the Turkins as the most accomplished and most -enlightened family of all. - -These Turkins lived in a house of their own, on Main Street, next door -to the governor. Ivan Turkin, the father, was a stout, handsome, dark -man with side-whiskers. He often organized amateur theatricals for -charity, playing the parts of the old generals in them and coughing most -amusingly. He knew a lot of funny stories, riddles, and proverbs, and -loved to joke and pun with, all the while, such a quaint expression on -his face that no one ever knew whether he was serious or jesting. His -wife Vera was a thin, rather pretty woman who wore glasses and wrote -stories and novels which she liked to read aloud to her guests. -Katherine, the daughter, played the piano. In short, each member of the -family had his or her special talent. The Turkins always welcomed their -guests cordially and showed off their accomplishments to them with -cheerful and genial simplicity. The interior of their large stone house -was spacious, and, in summer, delightfully cool. Half of its windows -looked out upon a shady old garden where, on spring evenings, the -nightingales sang. Whenever there were guests in the house a mighty -chopping would always begin in the kitchen, and a smell of fried onions -would pervade the courtyard. These signs always foretold a sumptuous and -appetising supper. - -So it came to pass that when Dimitri Ionitch Startseff received his -appointment as government doctor, and went to live in Dialij, six miles -from S., he too, as an intelligent man, was told that he must not fail -to make the Turkins’ acquaintance. Turkin was presented to him on the -street one winter’s day; they talked of the weather and the theatre and -the cholera, and an invitation from Turkin followed. Next spring, on -Ascension Day, after he had received his patients, Startseff went into -town for a little holiday, and to make some purchases. He strolled along -at a leisurely pace (he had no horse of his own yet), and as he walked -he sang to himself: - - “Before I had drunk those tears from Life’s cup——” - -After dining in town he sauntered through the public gardens, and the -memory of Turkin’s invitation somehow came into his mind. He decided to -go to their house and see for himself what sort of people they were. - -“Be welcome, if you please!” cried Turkin, meeting him on the front -steps. “I am delighted, delighted to see such a welcome guest! Come, let -me introduce you to the missus. I told him, Vera,” he continued, -presenting the doctor to his wife, “I told him that no law of the Medes -and Persians allows him to shut himself up in his hospital as he does. -He ought to give society the benefit of his leisure hours, oughtn’t he, -dearest?” - -“Sit down here,” said Madame Turkin, beckoning him to a seat at her -side. “You may flirt with me, if you like. My husband is jealous, a -regular Othello, but we’ll try to behave so that he shan’t notice -anything.” - -“Oh, you little wretch, you!” murmured Turkin, tenderly kissing her -forehead. “You have come at a very opportune moment,” he went on, -addressing his guest. “My missus has just written a splendiferous novel -and is going to read it aloud to-day.” - -“Jean,” said Madame Turkin to her husband. “Dites que l’on nous donne du -thé.” - -Startseff next made the acquaintance of Miss Katherine, an eighteen-year -old girl who much resembled her mother. Like her, she was pretty and -slender; her expression was childlike still, and her figure delicate and -supple, but her full, girlish chest spoke of spring and of the -loveliness of spring. They drank tea with jam, honey, and sweetmeats and -ate delicious cakes that melted in the mouth. When evening came other -guests began to arrive, and Turkin turned his laughing eyes on each one -in turn exclaiming: - -“Be welcome, if you please!” - -When all had assembled, they took their seats in the drawing-room, and -Madame Turkin read her novel aloud. The story began with the words: “The -frost was tightening its grasp.” The windows were open wide, and sounds -of chopping could be heard in the kitchen, while the smell of fried -onions came floating through the air. Every one felt very peaceful -sitting there in those deep, soft armchairs, while the friendly -lamplight played tenderly among the shadows of the drawing-room. On that -evening of summer, with the sound of voices and laughter floating up -from the street, and the scent of lilacs blowing in through the open -windows, it was hard to imagine the frost tightening its grasp, and the -setting sun illuminating with its bleak rays a snowy plain and a -solitary wayfarer journeying across it. Madame Turkin read of how a -beautiful princess had built a school, and hospital, and library in the -village where she lived, and had fallen in love with a strolling artist. -She read of things that had never happened in this world, and yet it was -delightfully comfortable to sit there and listen to her, while such -pleasant and peaceful dreams floated through one’s fancy that one wished -never to move again. - -“Not baddish!” said Turkin softly. And one of the guests, who had -allowed his thoughts to roam far, far afield, said almost inaudibly: - -“Yes—it is indeed!” - -One hour passed, two hours passed. The town band began playing in the -public gardens, and a chorus of singers struck up “The Little Torch.” -After Madame Turkin had folded her manuscript, every one sat silent for -five minutes, listening to the old folk-song telling of things that -happen in life and not in story-books. - -“Do you have your stories published in the magazines?” asked Startseff. - -“No,” she answered. “I have never had anything published. I put all my -manuscripts away in a closet. Why should I publish them?” she added by -way of explanation. “We don’t need the money.” - -And for some reason every one sighed. - -“And now, Kitty, play us something,” said Turkin to his daughter. - -Some one raised the top of the piano, and opened the music which was -already lying at hand. Katherine struck the keys with both hands. Then -she struck them again with all her might, and then again and again. Her -chest and shoulders quivered, and she obstinately hammered the same -place, so that it seemed as if she were determined not to stop playing -until she had beaten the keyboard into the piano. The drawing-room was -filled with thunder; the floor, the ceiling, the furniture, everything -rumbled. Katherine played a long, monotonous piece, interesting only for -its intricacy, and as Startseff listened, he imagined he saw endless -rocks rolling down a high mountainside. He wanted them to stop rolling -as quickly as possible, and at the same time Katherine pleased him -immensely, she looked so energetic and strong, all rosy from her -exertions, with a lock of hair hanging down over her forehead. After his -winter spent among sick people and peasants in Dialij, it was a new and -agreeable sensation to be sitting in a drawing-room watching that -graceful, pure young girl and listening to those noisy, monotonous but -cultured sounds. - -“Well, Kitty, you played better than ever to-day!” exclaimed Turkin, -with tears in his eyes when his daughter had finished and risen from the -piano-stool. “Last the best, you know!” - -The guests all surrounded her exclaiming, congratulating, and declaring -that they had not heard such music for ages. Kitty listened in silence, -smiling a little, and triumph was written all over her face. - -“Wonderful! Beautiful!” - -“Beautiful!” exclaimed Startseff, abandoning himself to the general -enthusiasm. “Where did you study music? At the conservatory?” he asked -Katherine. - -“No, I haven’t been to the conservatory, but I am going there very soon. -So far I have only had lessons here from Madame Zakivska.” - -“Did you go to the high-school?” - -“Oh, dear no!” the mother answered for her daughter. “We had teachers -come to the house for her. She might have come under bad influences at -school, you know. While a girl is growing up she should be under her -mother’s influence only.” - -“I’m going to the conservatory all the same!” declared Katherine. - -“No, Kitty loves her mamma too much for that; Kitty would not grieve her -mamma and papa!” - -“Yes, I am going!” Katherine insisted, playfully and wilfully stamping -her little foot. - -At supper it was Turkin who showed off his accomplishments. With -laughing eyes, but with a serious face he told funny stories, and made -jokes, and asked ridiculous riddles which he answered himself. He spoke -a language all his own, full of laboured, acrobatic feats of wit, in the -shape of such words as “splendiferous,” “not baddish,” “I thank you -blindly,” which had clearly long since become a habit with him. - -But this was not the end of the entertainment. When the well-fed, -well-satisfied guests had trooped into the front hall to sort out their -hats and canes they found Pava the footman, a shaven-headed boy of -fourteen, bustling about among them. - -“Come now, Pava! Do your act!” cried Turkin to the lad. - -Pava struck an attitude, raised one hand, and said in a tragic voice: - -“Die, unhappy woman!” - -At which every one laughed. - -“Quite amusing!” thought Startseff, as he stepped out into the street. - -He went to a restaurant and had a glass of beer, and then started off on -foot for his home in Dialij. As he walked he sang to himself: - - “Your voice so languorous and soft——” - -He felt no trace of fatigue after his six-mile walk, and as he went to -bed he thought that, on the contrary, he would gladly have walked -another fifteen miles. - -“Not baddish!” he remembered as he fell asleep, and laughed aloud at the -recollection. - - - II - -After that Startseff was always meaning to go to the Turkins’ again, but -he was kept very busy in the hospital, and for the life of him could not -win an hour’s leisure for himself. More than a year of solitude and toil -thus went by, until one day a letter in a blue envelope was brought to -him from the city. - -Madame Turkin had long been a sufferer from headaches, but since Kitty -had begun to frighten her every day by threatening to go away to the -conservatory her attacks had become more frequent. All the doctors in -the city had treated her and now, at last, it was the country doctor’s -turn. Madame Turkin wrote him a moving appeal in which she implored him -to come, and relieve her sufferings. Startseff went, and after that he -began to visit the Turkins often, very often. The fact was, he did help -Madame Turkin a little, and she hastened to tell all her guests what a -wonderful and unusual physician he was, but it was not Madame Turkin’s -headaches that took Startseff to the house. - -One evening, on a holiday, when Katherine had finished her long, -wearisome exercises on the piano, they all went into the dining-room and -had sat there a long time drinking tea while Turkin told some of those -funny stories of his. Suddenly a bell rang. Some one had to go to the -front door to meet a newly come guest, and Startseff took advantage of -the momentary confusion to whisper into Katherine’s ear with intense -agitation: - -“For heaven’s sake come into the garden with me, I beseech you! Don’t -torment me!” - -She shrugged her shoulders as if in doubt as to what he wanted of her, -but rose, nevertheless, and went out with him. - -“You play for three or four hours a day on the piano, and then go and -sit with your mother, and I never have the slightest chance to talk to -you. Give me just one quarter of an hour, I implore you!” - -Autumn was approaching, and the old garden, its paths strewn with fallen -leaves, was quiet and melancholy. The early twilight was falling. - -“I have not seen you for one whole week,” Startseff went on. “If you -only knew what agony that has been for me! Let us sit down. Listen to -me!” - -The favourite haunt of both was a bench under an old spreading -maple-tree. On this they took their seats. - -“What is it you want?” asked Katherine in a hard, practical voice. - -“I have not seen you for one whole week. I have not heard you speak for -such a long time! I long madly for the sound of your voice. I hunger for -it! Speak to me now!” - -He was carried away by her freshness and the candid expression of her -eyes and cheeks. He even saw in the fit of her dress something -extraordinarily touching and sweet in its simplicity and artless grace. -And at the same time, with all her innocence, she seemed to him -wonderfully clever and precocious for her years. He could talk to her of -literature or art or anything he pleased and could pour out his -complaints to her about the life he led and the people he met, even if -she did sometimes laugh for no reason when he was talking seriously, or -jump up and run into the house. Like all the young ladies in S., she -read a great deal. Most people there read very little, and, indeed, it -was said in the library that if it were not for the girls, and the young -Jews, the building might as well be closed. This reading of Katherine’s -was an endless source of pleasure to Startseff. Each time he met her he -would ask her with emotion what she had been reading, and would listen -enchanted as she told him. - -“What have you read this week since we last saw one another?” he now -asked. “Tell me, I beg you.” - -“I have been reading Pisemski.” - -“What have you been reading of Pisemski’s?” - -“‘The Thousand Souls,’” answered Kitty. “What a funny name Pisemski had: -Alexei Theofilaktitch!” - -“Where are you going?” cried Startseff in terror as she suddenly jumped -up and started toward the house. “I absolutely must speak to you. I want -to tell you something! Stay with me, if only for five minutes, I implore -you!” - -She stopped as if she meant to answer him, and then awkwardly slipped a -note into his hand and ran away into the house where she took her seat -at the piano once more. - -“Meet me in the cemetery at Demetti’s grave to-night at eleven,” -Startseff read. - -“How absurd!” he thought, when he had recovered himself a little. “Why -in the cemetery? What is the sense of that?” - -The answer was clear: Kitty was fooling. Who would think seriously of -making a tryst at night in a cemetery far outside the city when it would -have been so easy to meet in the street or in the public gardens? Was it -becoming for him, a government doctor and a serious-minded person, to -sigh and receive notes and wander about a cemetery, and do silly things -that even schoolboys made fun of? How would this little adventure end? -What would his friends say if they knew of it? These were Startseff’s -reflections, as he wandered about among the tables at the club that -evening, but at half past ten he suddenly changed his mind and drove to -the cemetery. - -He had his own carriage and pair now, and a coachman named Panteleimon -in a long velvet coat. The moon was shining. The night was still and -mellow, but with an autumnal softness. The dogs barked at him as he -drove through the suburbs and out through the city gates. Startseff -stopped his carriage in an alley on the edge of the town and continued -his way to the cemetery on foot. - -“Every one has his freaks,” he reflected. “Kitty is freakish, too, and, -who knows, perhaps she was not joking and may come after all.” - -He abandoned himself to this faint, groundless hope, and it intoxicated -him. - -He crossed the fields for half a mile. The dark band of trees in the -cemetery appeared in the distance like a wood or a large garden, then a -white stone wall loomed up before him, and soon, by the light of the -moon, Startseff was able to read the inscription over the gate: “Thy -hour also approacheth—” He went in through a little side gate, and his -eye was struck first by the white crosses and monuments on either side -of a wide avenue, and by their black shadows and the shadows of the tall -poplars that bordered the walk. Around him, on all sides, he could see -the same checkering of white and black, with the sleeping trees brooding -over the white tombstones. The night did not seem so dark as it had -appeared in the fields. The fallen leaves of the maples, like tiny -hands, lay sharply defined upon the sandy walks and marble slabs, and -the inscriptions on the tombstones were clearly legible. Startseff was -struck with the reflection that he now saw for the first and perhaps the -last time a world unlike any other, a world that seemed to be the very -cradle of the soft moonlight, where there was no life, no, not a breath -of it; and yet, in every dark poplar, in every grave he felt the -presence of a great mystery promising life, calm, beautiful, and -eternal. Peace and sadness and mercy rose with the scent of autumn from -the graves, the leaves, and the faded flowers. - -Profoundest silence lay over all; the stars looked down from heaven with -deep humility. Startseff’s footsteps sounded jarring and out of place. -It was only when the church-bells began to ring the hour, and he -imagined himself lying dead under the ground for ever, that some one -seemed to be watching him, and he thought suddenly that here were not -silence and peace, but stifling despair and the dull anguish of -nonexistence. - -Demetti’s grave was a little chapel surmounted by an angel. An Italian -opera troupe had once come to S., and one of its members had died there. -She had been buried here, and this monument had been erected to her -memory. No one in the city any longer remembered her, but the shrine -lamp hanging in the doorway sparkled in the moon’s rays and seemed to be -alight. - -No one was at the grave, and who should come there at midnight? -Startseff waited, and the moonlight kindled all the passion in him. He -ardently painted in his imagination the longed-for kiss and the embrace. -He sat down beside the monument for half an hour, and then walked up and -down the paths with his hat in his hand, waiting and thinking. How many -girls, how many women, were lying here under these stones who had been -beautiful and enchanting, and who had loved and glowed with passion in -the night under the caresses of their lovers! How cruelly does Mother -Nature jest with mankind! How bitter to acknowledge it! So thought -Startseff and longed to scream aloud that he did not want to be jested -with, that he wanted love at any price. Around him gleamed not white -blocks of marble, but beautiful human forms timidly hiding among the -shadows of the trees. He felt keen anguish. - -Then, as if a curtain had been drawn across the scene, the moon vanished -behind a cloud and darkness fell about him. Startseff found the gate -with difficulty in the obscurity of the autumn night, and then wandered -about for more than an hour in search of the alley where he had left his -carriage. - -“I am so tired, I am ready to drop,” he said to Panteleimon. - -And, as he sank blissfully into his seat, he thought: - -“Oh dear, I must not get fat!” - - - III - -On the evening of the following day Startseff drove to the Turkins’ to -make his proposal. But he proved to have come at an unfortunate time, as -Katherine was in her room having her hair dressed by a coiffeur before -going to a dance at the club. - -Once more Startseff was obliged to sit in the dining-room for an age -drinking tea. Seeing that his guest was pensive and bored, Turkin took a -scrap of paper out of his waistcoat pocket, and read aloud a droll -letter from his German manager telling how “all the disavowals on the -estate had been spoiled and all the modesty had been shaken down.” - -“They will probably give her a good dowry,” thought Startseff, listening -vacantly to what was being read. - -After his sleepless night he felt almost stunned, as if he had drunk -some sweet but poisonous sleeping potion. His mind was hazy but warm and -cheerful, though at the same time a cold, hard fragment of his brain -kept reasoning with him and saying: - -“Stop before it is too late! Is she the woman for you? She is wilful and -spoiled; she sleeps until two every day, and you are a government doctor -and a poor deacon’s son.” - -“Well, what does that matter?” he thought. “What if I am?” - -“And what is more,” that cold fragment continued. “If you marry her her -family will make you give up your government position, and live in -town.” - -“And what of that?” he thought. “I’ll live in town then! She will have a -dowry. We will keep house.” - -At last Katherine appeared, looking pretty and immaculate in her -low-necked ball dress, and the moment Startseff saw her he fell into -such transports that he could not utter a word and could only stare at -her and laugh. - -She began to say good-bye, and as there was nothing to keep him here now -that she was going, he, too, rose, saying that it was time for him to be -off to attend to his patients in Dialij. - -“If you must go now,” said Turkin, “you can take Kitty to the club; it -is on your way.” - -A light drizzle was falling and it was very dark, so that only by the -help of Panteleimon’s cough could they tell where the carriage was. The -hood of the victoria was raised. - -“Roll away!” cried Turkin, seating his daughter in the carriage. -“Rolling stones gather no moss! God speed you, if you please!” - -They drove away. - -“I went to the cemetery last night,” Startseff began. “How heartless and -unkind of you——” - -“You went to the cemetery?” - -“Yes, I did, and waited there for you until nearly two o’clock. I was -very unhappy.” - -“Then be unhappy if you can’t understand a joke!” - -Delighted to have caught her lover so cleverly, and to see him so much -in love, Katherine burst out laughing, and then suddenly screamed as the -carriage tipped and turned sharply in at the club gates. Startseff put -his arm around her waist, and in her fright the girl pressed closer to -him. At that he could contain himself no longer, and passionately kissed -her on the lips and on the chin, holding her tighter than ever. - -“That will do!” she said drily. - -And a moment later she was no longer in the carriage, and the policeman -standing near the lighted entrance to the club was shouting to -Panteleimon in a harsh voice: - -“Move on, you old crow! What are you standing there for?” - -Startseff drove home, but only to return at once arrayed in a borrowed -dress suit and a stiff collar that was always trying to climb up off the -collar-band. At midnight he was sitting in the reception-room of the -club, saying passionately to Katherine: - -“Oh, how ignorant people are who have never loved! No one, I think, has -ever truly described love, and it would scarcely be possible to depict -this tender, blissful, agonising feeling. He who has once felt it would -never be able to put it into words. Do I need introductions and -descriptions? Do I need oratory to tell me what it is? My love is -unspeakable—I beg you, I implore you to be my wife!” cried Startseff at -last. - -“Dimitri Ionitch,” said Katherine, assuming a very serious, thoughtful -expression. “Dimitri Ionitch, I am very grateful to you for the honour -you do me. I esteem you, but—” here she rose and stood before him. “But, -forgive me, I cannot be your wife. Let us be serious. You know, Dimitri -Ionitch, that I love art more than anything else in the world. I am -passionately fond of, I adore, music, and if I could I would consecrate -my whole life to it. I want to be a musician. I long for fame and -success and freedom and you ask me to go on living in this town, and to -continue this empty, useless existence which has become unbearable to -me! You want me to marry? Ah no, that cannot be! One should strive for a -higher and brighter ideal, and family life would tie me down for ever. -Dimitri Ionitch—” (she smiled a little as she said these words, -remembering Alexei Theofilaktitch) “Dimitri Ionitch, you are kind and -noble and clever, you are the nicest man I know” (her eyes filled with -tears). “I sympathise with you with all my heart, but—but you must -understand——” - -She turned away and left the room, unable to restrain her tears. - -Startseff’s heart ceased beating madly. His first action on reaching the -street was to tear off his stiff collar and draw a long, deep breath. He -felt a little humiliated, and his pride was stung, for he had not -expected a refusal, and could not believe that all his hopes and pangs -and dreams had come to such a silly ending; he might as well have been -the hero of a playlet at a performance of amateur theatricals! He -regretted his lost love and emotion, regretted it so keenly that he -could have sobbed aloud or given Panteleimon’s broad back a good, sound -blow with his umbrella. - -For three days after that evening his business went to ruin, and he -could neither eat nor sleep, but when he heard a rumour that Katherine -had gone to Moscow to enter the conservatory he grew calmer, and once -more gathered up the lost threads of his life. - -Later, when he remembered how he had wandered about the cemetery and -rushed all over town looking for a dress suit, he would yawn lazily and -say: - -“What a business that was!” - - - IV - -Four years went by. Startseff now had a large practice in the city. He -hastily prescribed for his sick people every morning at Dialij, and then -drove to town to see his patients there, returning late at night. He had -grown stouter and heavier, and would not walk, if he could help it, -suffering as he did from asthma. Panteleimon, too, had become stouter, -and the more he grew in width the more bitterly he sighed and lamented -his hard lot: he was so tired of driving! - -Startseff was now an occasional guest at several houses, but he had made -close friends with no one. The conversation, the point of view, and even -the looks of the inhabitants of S. bored him. Experience had taught him -that as long as he played cards, or dined with them, they were peaceful, -good-natured, and even fairly intelligent folk, but he had only to speak -of anything that was not edible, he had only to mention politics or -science to them, for them to become utterly nonplussed, or else to talk -such foolish and mischievous nonsense that there was nothing to be done -but to shrug one’s shoulders and leave them. If Startseff tried to say -to even the most liberal of them that, for instance, mankind was -fortunately progressing, and that in time we should no longer suffer -under a system of passports and capital punishment, they would look at -him askance, and say mistrustfully: “Then one will be able to kill any -one one wants to on the street, will one?” Or if at supper, in talking -about work, Startseff said that labour was a good thing, and every one -should work, each person present would take it as a personal affront and -begin an angry and tiresome argument. As they never did anything and -were not interested in anything, and as Startseff could never for the -life of him think of anything to say to them, he avoided all -conversation and confined himself to eating and playing cards. If there -was a family fête at one of the houses and he was asked to dinner, he -would eat in silence with his eyes fixed on his plate, listening to all -the uninteresting, false, stupid things that were being said around him -and feeling irritated and bored. But he would remain silent, and because -he always sternly held his tongue and never raised his eyes from his -plate, he was known as “the puffed-up Pole,” although he was no more of -a Pole than you or I. He shunned amusements, such as theatres and -concerts, but he played cards with enjoyment for two or three hours -every evening. There was one other pleasure to which he had -unconsciously, little by little, become addicted, and that was to empty -his pockets every evening of the little bills he had received in his -practice during the day. Sometimes he would find them scattered through -all his pockets, seventy roubles’ worth of them, yellow ones and green -ones, smelling of scent, and vinegar, and incense, and kerosene. When he -had collected a hundred or more he would take them to the Mutual Loan -Society, and have them put to his account. - -In all the four years following Katherine’s departure, he had only been -to the Turkins’ twice, each time at the request of Madame Turkin, who -was still suffering from headaches. Katherine came back every summer to -visit her parents, but he did not see her once; chance, somehow, willed -otherwise. - -And so four years had gone by. One warm, still morning a letter was -brought to him at the hospital. Madame Turkin wrote that she missed -Dimitri Ionitch very much and begged him to come without fail and -relieve her sufferings, especially as it happened to be her birthday -that day. At the end of the letter was a postscript: “I join my -entreaties to those of my mother. K.” - -Startseff reflected a moment, and in the evening he drove to the -Turkins’. - -“Ah, be welcome, if you please!” Turkin cried with smiling eyes. -“Bonjour to you!” - -Madame Turkin, who had aged greatly and whose hair was now white, -pressed his hand and sighed affectedly, saying: - -“You don’t want to flirt with me I see, doctor, you never come to see -me. I am too old for you, but here is a young thing, perhaps she may be -more lucky than I am!” - -And Kitty? She had grown thinner and paler and was handsomer and more -graceful than before, but she was Miss Katherine now, and Kitty no -longer. Her freshness, and her artless, childish expression were gone; -there was something new in her glance and manner, something timid and -apologetic, as if she no longer felt at home here, in the house of the -Turkins. - -“How many summers, how many winters have gone by!” she said, giving her -hand to Startseff, and one could see that her heart was beating -anxiously. She looked curiously and intently into his face, and -continued: “How stout you have grown! You look browner and more manly, -but otherwise you haven’t changed much.” - -She pleased him now as she had pleased him before, she pleased him very -much, but something seemed to be wanting in her—or was it that there was -something about her which would better have been lacking? He could not -say, but he was prevented, somehow, from feeling toward her as he had -felt in the past. He did not like her pallor, the new expression in her -face, her weak smile, her voice, and, in a little while, he did not like -her dress and the chair she was sitting in, and something displeased him -about the past in which he had nearly married her. He remembered his -love and the dreams and hopes that had thrilled him four years ago, and -at the recollection he felt awkward. - -They drank tea and ate cake. Then Madame Turkin read a story aloud, read -of things that had never happened in this world, while Startseff sat -looking at her handsome grey head, waiting for her to finish. - -“It is not the people who can’t write novels who are stupid,” he -thought. “But the people who write them and can’t conceal it.” - -“Not baddish!” said Turkin. - -Then Katherine played a long, loud piece on the piano, and when she had -finished every one went into raptures and overwhelmed her with prolonged -expressions of gratitude. - -“It’s a good thing I didn’t marry her!” thought Startseff. - -She looked at him, evidently expecting him to invite her to go into the -garden, but he remained silent. - -“Do let us have a talk!” she said going up to him. “How are you? What -are you doing? Tell me about it all! I have been thinking about you for -three days,” she added nervously. “I wanted to write you a letter, I -wanted to go to see you myself at Dialij, and then changed my mind. I -have no idea how you will treat me now. I was so excited waiting for you -to-day. Do let us go into the garden!” - -They went out and took their seats under the old maple-tree, where they -had sat four years before. Night was falling. - -“Well, and what have you been doing?” asked Katherine. - -“Nothing much; just living somehow,” answered Startseff. - -And that was all he could think of saying. They were silent. - -“I am so excited!” said Katherine, covering her face with her hands. -“But don’t pay any attention to me. I am so glad to be at home, I am so -glad to see every one again that I cannot get used to it. How many -memories we have between us! I thought you and I would talk without -stopping until morning!” - -He saw her face and her shining eyes more closely now, and she looked -younger to him than she had in the house. Even her childish expression -seemed to have returned. She was gazing at him with naïve curiosity, as -if she wanted to see and understand more clearly this man who had once -loved her so tenderly and so unhappily. Her eyes thanked him for his -love. And he remembered all that had passed between them down to the -smallest detail, remembered how he had wandered about the cemetery and -had gone home exhausted at dawn. He grew suddenly sad and felt sorry to -think that the past had vanished for ever. A little flame sprang up in -his heart. - -“Do you remember how I took you to the club that evening?” he asked. “It -was raining and dark——” - -The little flame was burning more brightly, and now he wanted to talk -and to lament his dull life. - -“Alas!” he sighed. “You ask what I have been doing! What do we all do -here? Nothing! We grow older and fatter and more sluggish. Day in, day -out our colourless life passes by without impressions, without thoughts. -It is money by day and the club by night, in the company of gamblers and -inebriates whom I cannot endure. What is there in that?” - -“But you have your work, your noble end in life. You used to like so -much to talk about your hospital. I was a queer girl then, I thought I -was a great pianist. All girls play the piano these days, and I played, -too; there was nothing remarkable about me. I am as much of a pianist as -mamma is an author. Of course I didn’t understand you then, but later, -in Moscow, I often thought of you. I thought only of you. Oh, what a joy -it must be to be a country doctor, to help the sick and to serve the -people! Oh, what a joy!” Katherine repeated with exaltation. “When I -thought of you while I was in Moscow you seemed to me to be so lofty and -ideal——” - -Startseff remembered the little bills which he took out of his pockets -every evening with such pleasure, and the little flame went out. - -He rose to go into the house. She took his arm. - -“You are the nicest person I have ever known in my life,” she continued. -“We shall see one another and talk together often, shan’t we? Promise me -that! I am not a pianist, I cherish no more illusions about myself, and -shall not play to you or talk music to you any more.” - -When they had entered the house, and, in the evening light, Startseff -saw her face and her melancholy eyes turned on him full of gratitude and -suffering, he felt uneasy and thought again: - -“It’s a good thing I didn’t marry her!” - -He began to take his leave. - -“No law of the Medes and Persians allows you to go away before supper!” -cried Turkin, accompanying him to the door. “It is extremely peripatetic -on your part. Come, do your act!” he cried to Pava as they reached the -front hall. - -Pava, no longer a boy, but a young fellow with a moustache, struck an -attitude, raised one hand, and said in a tragic voice: - -“Die, unhappy woman!” - -All this irritated Startseff, and as he took his seat in his carriage -and looked at the house and the dark garden that had once been so dear -to him, he was overwhelmed by the recollection of Madame Turkin’s novels -and Kitty’s noisy playing and Turkin’s witticisms and Pava’s tragic -pose, and, as he recalled them, he thought: - -“If the cleverest people in town are as stupid as that, what a deadly -town this must be!” - -Three days later Pava brought the doctor a letter from Katherine. - - “You don’t come to see us; why?” she wrote. “I am afraid your feeling - for us has changed, and the very thought of that terrifies me. Calm my - fears; come and tell me that all is well! I absolutely must see you. - - Yours, - K. T.” - -He read the letter, reflected a moment, and said to Pava: - -“Tell them I can’t get away to-day, my boy. Tell them I’ll go to see -them in three days’ time.” - -But three days went by, a week went by, and still he did not go. Every -time that he drove past the Turkins’ house he remembered that he ought -to drop in there for a few minutes; he remembered it and—did not go. - -He never went to the Turkins’ again. - - - V - -Several years have passed since then. Startseff is stouter than ever -now, he is even fat. He breathes heavily and walks with his head thrown -back. The picture he now makes, as he drives by with his troika and his -jingling carriage-bells, is impressive. He is round and red, and -Panteleimon, round and red, with a brawny neck, sits on the box with his -arms stuck straight out in front of him like pieces of wood, shouting to -every one he meets: “Turn to the right!” It is more like the passage of -a heathen god than of a man. He has an immense practice in the city, -there is no time for repining now. He already owns an estate in the -country and two houses in town, and is thinking of buying a third which -will be even more remunerative than the others. If, at the Mutual Loan -Society, he hears of a house for sale he goes straight to it, enters it -without more ado, and walks through all the rooms not paying the -slightest heed to any women or children who may be dressing there, -though they look at him with doubt and fear. He taps all the doors with -his cane and asks: - -“Is this the library? Is this a bedroom? And what is this?” - -And he breathes heavily as he says it and wipes the perspiration from -his forehead. - -Although he has so much business on his hands, he still keeps his -position of government doctor at Dialij. His acquisitiveness is too -strong, and he wants to find time for everything. He is simply called -“Ionitch” now, both in Dialij and in the city. “Where is Ionitch going?” -the people ask, or “Shall we call in Ionitch to the consultation?” - -His voice has changed and has become squeaky and harsh, probably because -his throat is obstructed with fat. His character, too, has changed and -he has grown irascible and crusty. He generally loses his temper with -his patients and irritably thumps the floor with his stick, exclaiming -in his unpleasant voice: - -“Be good enough to confine yourself to answering my questions! No -conversation!” - -He is lonely, he is bored, and nothing interests him. - -During all his life in Dialij his love for Kitty had been his only -happiness, and will probably be his last. In the evening he plays cards -in the club, and then sits alone at a large table and has supper. Ivan, -the oldest and most respectable of the waiters, waits upon him and pours -out his glass of Lafitte No. 17. Every one at the club, the officers and -the chef and the waiters, all know what he likes and what he doesn’t -like and strive with might and main to please him, for if they don’t he -will suddenly grow angry and begin thumping the floor with his cane. - -After supper he occasionally relents and takes part in a conversation. - -“What were you saying? What? Whom did you say?” - -And if the conversation at a neighbouring table turns on the Turkins, he -asks: - -“Which Turkins do you mean? The ones whose daughter plays the piano?” - -That is all that can be said of Startseff. - -And the Turkins? The father has not grown old, and has not changed in -any way. He still makes jokes and tells funny stories. The mother still -reads her novels aloud to her guests, with as much pleasure and genial -simplicity as ever. Kitty practises the piano for four hours every day. -She has grown conspicuously older, is delicate, and goes to the Crimea -every autumn with her mother. As he bids them farewell at the station, -Turkin wipes his eyes and cries as the train moves away: - -“God speed you, if you please!” - -And he waves his handkerchief after them. - - - AT CHRISTMAS TIME - -“What shall I write?” asked Yegor, dipping his pen in the ink. - -Vasilissa had not seen her daughter for four years. Efimia had gone away -to St. Petersburg with her husband after her wedding, had written two -letters, and then had vanished as if the earth had engulfed her, not a -word nor a sound had come from her since. So now, whether the aged -mother was milking the cow at daybreak, or lighting the stove, or dozing -at night, the tenor of her thoughts was always the same: “How is Efimia? -Is she alive and well?” She wanted to send her a letter, but the old -father could not write, and there was no one whom they could ask to -write it for them. - -But now Christmas had come, and Vasilissa could endure the silence no -longer. She went to the tavern to see Yegor, the innkeeper’s wife’s -brother, who had done nothing but sit idly at home in the tavern since -he had come back from military service, but of whom people said that he -wrote the most beautiful letters, if only one paid him enough. Vasilissa -talked with the cook at the tavern, and with the innkeeper’s wife, and -finally with Yegor himself, and at last they agreed on a price of -fifteen copecks. - -So now, on the second day of the Christmas festival, Yegor was sitting -at a table in the inn kitchen with a pen in his hand. Vasilissa was -standing in front of him, plunged in thought, with a look of care and -sorrow on her face. Her husband, Peter, a tall, gaunt old man with a -bald, brown head, had accompanied her. He was staring steadily in front -of him like a blind man; a pan of pork that was frying on the stove was -sizzling and puffing, and seeming to say: “Hush, hush, hush!” The -kitchen was hot and close. - -“What shall I write?” Yegor asked again. - -“What’s that?” asked Vasilissa, looking at him angrily and suspiciously. -“Don’t hurry me! You are writing this letter for money, not for love! -Now then, begin. To our esteemed son-in-law, Andrei Khrisanfitch, and -our only and beloved daughter Efimia, we send greetings and love, and -the everlasting blessing of their parents.” - -“All right, fire away!” - -“We wish them a happy Christmas. We are alive and well, and we wish the -same for you in the name of God, our Father in heaven—our Father in -heaven——” - -Vasilissa stopped to think, and exchanged glances with the old man. - -“We wish the same for you in the name of God, our Father in Heaven—” she -repeated and burst into tears. - -That was all she could say. Yet she had thought, as she had lain awake -thinking night after night, that ten letters could not contain all she -wanted to say. Much water had flowed into the sea since their daughter -had gone away with her husband, and the old people had been as lonely as -orphans, sighing sadly in the night hours, as if they had buried their -child. How many things had happened in the village in all these years! -How many people had married, how many had died! How long the winters had -been, and how long the nights! - -“My, but it’s hot!” exclaimed Yegor, unbuttoning his waistcoat. “The -temperature must be seventy! Well, what next?” he asked. - -The old people answered nothing. - -“What is your son-in-law’s profession?” - -“He used to be a soldier, brother; you know that,” replied the old man -in a feeble voice. “He went into military service at the same time you -did. He used to be a soldier, but now he is in a hospital where a doctor -treats sick people with water. He is the doorkeeper there.” - -“You can see it written here,” said the old woman, taking a letter out -of her handkerchief. “We got this from Efimia a long, long time ago. She -may not be alive now.” - -Yegor reflected a moment, and then began to write swiftly. - -“Fate has ordained you for the military profession,” he wrote, -“therefore we recommend you to look into the articles on disciplinary -punishment and penal laws of the war department, and to find there the -laws of civilisation for members of that department.” - -When this was written he read it aloud whilst Vasilissa thought of how -she would like to write that there had been a famine last year, and that -their flour had not even lasted until Christmas, so that they had been -obliged to sell their cow; that the old man was often ill, and must soon -surrender his soul to God; that they needed money—but how could she put -all this into words? What should she say first and what last? - -“Turn your attention to the fifth volume of military definitions,” Yegor -wrote. “The word soldier is a general appellation, a distinguishing -term. Both the commander-in-chief of an army and the last infantryman in -the ranks are alike called soldiers——” - -The old man’s lips moved and he said in a low voice: - -“I should like to see my little grandchildren!” - -“What grandchildren?” asked the old woman crossly. “Perhaps there are no -grandchildren.” - -“No grandchildren? But perhaps there are! Who knows?” - -“And from this you may deduce,” Yegor hurried on, “which is an internal, -and which is a foreign enemy. Our greatest internal enemy is Bacchus——” - -The pen scraped and scratched, and drew long, curly lines like -fish-hooks across the paper. Yegor wrote at full speed and underlined -each sentence two or three times. He was sitting on a stool with his -legs stretched far apart under the table, a fat, lusty creature with a -fiery nape and the face of a bulldog. He was the very essence of coarse, -arrogant, stiff-necked vulgarity, proud to have been born and bred in a -pot-house, and Vasilissa well knew how vulgar he was, but could not find -words to express it, and could only glare angrily and suspiciously at -him. Her head ached from the sound of his voice and his unintelligible -words, and from the oppressive heat of the room, and her mind was -confused. She could neither think nor speak, and could only stand and -wait for Yegor’s pen to stop scratching. But the old man was looking at -the writer with unbounded confidence in his eyes. He trusted his old -woman who had brought him here, he trusted Yegor, and, when he had -spoken of the hydropathic establishment just now, his face had shown -that he trusted that, and the healing power of its waters. - -When the letter was written, Yegor got up and read it aloud from -beginning to end. The old man understood not a word, but he nodded his -head confidingly, and said: - -“Very good. It runs smoothly. Thank you kindly, it is very good.” - -They laid three five-copeck pieces on the table and went out. The old -man walked away staring straight ahead of him like a blind man, and a -look of utmost confidence lay in his eyes, but Vasilissa, as she left -the tavern, struck at a dog in her path and exclaimed angrily: - -“Ugh—the plague!” - -All that night the old woman lay awake full of restless thoughts, and at -dawn she rose, said her prayers, and walked eleven miles to the station -to post the letter. - - - II - -Doctor Moselweiser’s hydropathic establishment was open on New Year’s -Day as usual; the only difference was that Andrei Khrisanfitch, the -doorkeeper, was wearing unusually shiny boots and a uniform trimmed with -new gold braid, and that he wished every one who came in a happy New -Year. - -It was morning. Andrei was standing at the door reading a paper. At ten -o’clock precisely an old general came in who was one of the regular -visitors of the establishment. Behind him came the postman. Andrei took -the general’s cloak, and said: - -“A happy New Year to your Excellency!” - -“Thank you, friend, the same to you!” - -And as he mounted the stairs the general nodded toward a closed door and -asked, as he did every day, always forgetting the answer: - -“And what is there in there?” - -“A room for massage, your Excellency.” - -When the general’s footsteps had died away, Andrei looked over the -letters and found one addressed to him. He opened it, read a few lines, -and then, still looking at his newspaper, sauntered toward the little -room down-stairs at the end of a passage where he and his family lived. -His wife Efimia was sitting on the bed feeding a baby, her oldest boy -was standing at her knee with his curly head in her lap, and a third -child was lying asleep on the bed. - -Andrei entered their little room, and handed the letter to his wife, -saying: - -“This must be from the village.” - -Then he went out again, without raising his eyes from his newspaper, and -stopped in the passage not far from the door. He heard Efimia read the -first lines in a trembling voice. She could go no farther, but these -were enough. Tears streamed from her eyes and she threw her arms round -her eldest child and began talking to him and covering him with kisses. -It was hard to tell whether she was laughing or crying. - -“This is from granny and granddaddy,” she cried—“from the village—oh, -Queen of Heaven!—Oh! holy saints! The roofs are piled with snow there -now—and the trees are white, oh, so white! The little children are out -coasting on their dear little sleddies—and granddaddy darling, with his -dear bald head is sitting by the big, old, warm stove, and the little -brown doggie—oh, my precious chickabiddies——” - -Andrei remembered as he listened to her that his wife had given him -letters at three or four different times, and had asked him to send them -to the village, but important business had always interfered, and the -letters had remained lying about unposted. - -“And the little white hares are skipping about in the fields now—” -sobbed Efimia, embracing her boy with streaming eyes. “Granddaddy dear -is so kind and good, and granny is so kind and so full of pity. People’s -hearts are soft and warm in the village.—There is a little church there, -and the men sing in the choir. Oh, take us away from here, Queen of -Heaven! Intercede for us, merciful mother!” - -Andrei returned to his room to smoke until the next patient should come -in, and Efimia suddenly grew still and wiped her eyes; only her lips -quivered. She was afraid of him, oh, so afraid! She quaked and shuddered -at every look and every footstep of his, and never dared to open her -mouth in his presence. - -Andrei lit a cigarette, but at that moment a bell rang up-stairs. He put -out his cigarette, and assuming a very solemn expression, hurried to the -front door. - -The old general, rosy and fresh from his bath, was descending the -stairs. - -“And what is there in there?” he asked, pointing to a closed door. - -Andrei drew himself up at attention, and answered in a loud voice: - -“The hot douche, your Excellency.” - - - IN THE COACH HOUSE - -It was ten o’clock at night. Stepan, the coachman, Mikailo, the house -porter, Aliosha the coachman’s grandson who was visiting his -grandfather, and the old herring-vender Nikander who came peddling his -wares every evening were assembled around a lantern in the large coach -house playing cards. The door stood open and commanded a view of the -whole courtyard with the wide double gates, the manor-house, the ice and -vegetable cellars, and the servants’ quarters. The scene was wrapped in -the darkness of night, only four brilliantly lighted windows blazed in -the wing of the house, which had been rented to tenants. The carriages -and sleighs, with their shafts raised in the air, threw from the walls -to the door long, tremulous shadows which mingled with those cast by the -players around the lantern. In the stables beyond stood the horses, -separated from the coach house by a light railing. The scent of hay hung -in the air, and Nikander exhaled an unpleasant odour of herring. - -They were playing “Kings.” - -“I am king!” cried the porter, assuming a pose which he thought -befittingly regal, and blowing his nose loudly with a red and white -checked handkerchief. “Come on! Who wants to have his head cut off?” - -Aliosha, a boy of eight with a rough shock of blond hair, who had lacked -but two tricks of being a king himself, now cast eyes of resentment and -envy at the porter. He pouted and frowned. - -“I’m going to lead up to you, grandpa,” he said, pondering over his -cards. “I know you must have the queen of hearts.” - -“Come, little stupid, stop thinking and play!” - -Aliosha irresolutely led the knave of hearts. At that moment a bell rang -in the courtyard. - -“Oh, the devil—” muttered the porter rising. “The king must go and open -the gate.” - -When he returned a few moments later Aliosha was already a prince, the -herring-man was a soldier, and the coachman was a peasant. - -“It’s a bad business in there,” said the porter resuming his seat. “I -have just seen the doctor off. They didn’t get it out.” - -“Huh! How could they? All they did, I’ll be bound, was to make a hole in -his head. When a man has a bullet in his brain it’s no use to bother -with doctors!” - -“He is lying unconscious,” continued the porter. “He will surely die. -Aliosha, don’t look at my cards, lambkin, or you’ll get your ears boxed. -Yes, it was out with the doctor, and in with his father and mother; they -have just come. The Lord forbid such a crying and moaning as they are -carrying on! They keep saying that he was their only son. It’s a pity!” - -All, except Aliosha who was engrossed in the game, glanced up at the -lighted windows. - -“We have all got to go to the police station to-morrow,” said the -porter. “There is going to be an inquest. But what do I know about it? -Did I see what happened? All I know is that he called me this morning, -and gave me a letter and said: ‘Drop this in the letter-box.’ And his -eyes were all red with crying. His wife and children were away; they had -gone for a walk. So while I was taking his letter to the mail he shot -himself in the forehead with a revolver. When I came back his cook was -already shrieking at the top of her lungs.” - -“He committed a great sin!” said the herring-man in a hoarse voice, -wagging his head. “A great sin.” - -“He went crazy from knowing too much,” said the porter, picking up a -trick. “He used to sit up at night writing papers—play, peasant! But he -was a kind gentleman, and so pale and tall and black-eyed! He was a good -tenant.” - -“They say there was a woman at the bottom of it,” said the coachman, -slapping a ten of trumps on a king of hearts. “They say he was in love -with another man’s wife, and had got to dislike his own. That happens -sometimes.” - -“I crown myself king!” exclaimed the porter. - -The bell in the courtyard rang again. The victorious monarch spat -angrily and left the coach house. Shadows like those of dancing couples -were flitting to and fro across the windows of the wing. Frightened -voices and hurrying footsteps were heard. - -“The doctor must have come back,” said the coachman. “Our Mikailo is -running.” - -A strange, wild scream suddenly rent the air. - -Aliosha looked nervously first at his grandfather, and then at the -windows, and said: - -“He patted me on the head yesterday, and asked me where I was from. -Grandfather, who was that howling just now?” - -His grandfather said nothing, and turned up the flame of the lantern. - -“A man has died,” he said with a yawn. “His soul is lost and his -children are lost. This will be a disgrace to them for the rest of their -lives.” - -The porter returned, and sat down near the lantern. - -“He is dead!” he said. “The old women from the almshouse have been sent -for.” - -“Eternal peace and the kingdom of heaven be his!” whispered the coachman -crossing himself. - -Aliosha also crossed himself with his eyes on his grandfather. - -“You mustn’t pray for souls like his,” the herring-man said. - -“Why not?” - -“Because it’s a sin.” - -“That’s the truth,” the porter agreed. “His soul has gone straight to -the Evil One in hell.” - -“It’s a sin,” repeated the herring-man. “Men like him are neither -shriven nor buried in church, but shovelled away like carrion.” - -The old man got up, and slung his sack across his shoulder. - -“It happened that way with our general’s lady,” he said, adjusting the -pack on his back. “We were still serfs at that time, and her youngest -son shot himself in the head just as this one did, from knowing too -much. The law says that such people must be buried outside the -churchyard without a priest or a requiem. But to avoid the disgrace, our -mistress greased the palms of the doctors and the police, and they gave -her a paper saying that her son had done it by accident when he was -crazy with fever. Money can do anything. So he was given a fine funeral -with priests and music, and laid away under the church that his father -had built with his own money, where the rest of the family were. Well, -friends, one month passed, and another month passed, and nothing -happened. But during the third month our mistress was told that the -church watchmen wanted to see her. ‘What do they want?’ she asked. The -watchmen were brought to her, and they fell down at her feet. ‘Your -ladyship!’ they cried. ‘We can’t watch there any longer. You must find -some other watchmen, and let us go!’ ‘Why?’ she asked. ‘No!’ they said. -‘We can’t possibly stay. Your young gentleman howls under the church all -night long.’” - -Aliosha trembled and buried his face in his grandfather’s back so as not -to see those shining windows. - -“At first our mistress wouldn’t listen to their complaints,” the old man -went on. “She told them they were silly to be afraid of ghosts, and that -a dead man couldn’t possibly howl. But in a few days the watchmen came -back, and the deacon came with them. He, too, had heard the corpse -howling. Our mistress saw that the business was bad, so she shut herself -up in her room with the watchmen and said to them: ‘Here are twenty-five -roubles for you, my friends. Go into the church quietly at night when no -one can hear you, and dig up my unhappy son, and bury him outside the -churchyard.’ And she probably gave each man a glass of something to -drink. So the watchmen did as she told them. The tombstone with its -inscription lies under the church to-day, but the general’s son is -buried outside the churchyard. Oh, Lord, forgive us poor sinners!” -sighed the herring-man. “There is only one day a year on which one can -pray for such souls as his, and that is on the Saturday before Trinity -Sunday. It’s a sin to give food to beggars in their name, but one may -feed the birds for the peace of their souls. The general’s widow used to -go out to the crossroads every three days, and feed the birds. One day a -black dog suddenly appeared at the crossroads, gobbled up the bread, and -took to his heels. She knew who it was! For three days after that our -mistress was like a mad woman; she refused to take food or drink, and -every now and then she would suddenly fall down on her knees in the -garden, and pray. But I’ll say good night now, my friends. God and the -Queen of Heaven be with you! Come Mikailo, open the gate for me.” - -The herring-man and the porter went out, and the coachman and Aliosha -followed them so as not to be left alone in the coach house. - -“The man was living and now he is dead,” the coachman reflected, gazing -at the windows across which the shadows were still flitting. “This -morning he was walking about the courtyard, and now he is lying there -lifeless.” - -“Our time will come, too,” said the porter as he walked away with the -herring-man and was lost with him in the darkness. - -The coachman, followed by Aliosha, timidly approached the house and -looked in. A very pale woman, her large eyes red with tears, and a -handsome grey-haired man were moving two card-tables into the middle of -the room; some figures scribbled in chalk on their green baize tops were -still visible. The cook, who had shrieked so loudly that morning was now -standing on tiptoe on a table trying to cover a mirror with a sheet. - -“What are they doing, grandpa?” Aliosha asked in a whisper. - -“They are going to lay him on those tables soon,” answered the old man. -“Come, child, it’s time to go to sleep.” - -The coachman and Aliosha returned to the coach house. They said their -prayers and took off their boots. Stepan stretched himself on the floor -in a corner, and Aliosha climbed into a sleigh. The doors had been shut, -and the newly extinguished lantern filled the air with a strong smell of -smoking oil. In a few minutes Aliosha raised his head, and stared about -him; the light from those four windows was shining through the cracks of -the door. - -“Grandpa, I’m frightened!” he said. - -“There, there, go to sleep!” - -“But I tell you I’m frightened!” - -“What are you afraid of, you spoiled baby?” - -Both were silent. - -Suddenly Aliosha jumped out of the sleigh, burst into tears, and rushed -to his grandfather weeping loudly. - -“What is it? What’s the matter?” cried the startled coachman, jumping -up, too. - -“He’s howling!” - -“Who’s howling?” - -“I’m frightened, grandpa! Can’t you hear him?” - -“That is some one crying,” his grandfather answered. “Go back to sleep, -little silly. They are sad and so they are crying.” - -“I want to go home!” the boy persisted, sobbing and trembling like a -leaf. “Grandpa, do let us go home to mamma. Let us go, dear grandpa! God -will give you the kingdom of heaven if you will take me home!” - -“What a little idiot it is! There, there, be still, be still. Hush, I’ll -light the lantern, silly!” - -The coachman felt for the matches, and lit the lantern, but the light -did not calm Aliosha. - -“Grandpa, let’s go home!” he implored, weeping. “I’m so frightened here! -Oh, _oh_, I’m so frightened! Why did you send for me to come here, you -hateful man?” - -“Who is a hateful man? Are you calling your own grandfather names? I’ll -beat you for that!” - -“Beat me, grandpa, beat me like Sidorov’s goat, only take me back to -mamma! Oh, do! do!...” - -“There, there, child, hush!” the coachman whispered tenderly. “No one is -going to hurt you, don’t be afraid. Why, I’m getting frightened myself! -Say a prayer to God!” - -The door creaked and the porter thrust his head into the coach house. - -“Aren’t you asleep yet, Stepan?” he asked. “I can’t get any sleep -to-night, opening and shutting the gate every minute. Why, Aliosha, what -are you crying about?” - -“I’m frightened,” answered the coachman’s grandson. - -Again that wailing voice rang out. The porter said: - -“They are crying. His mother can’t believe her eyes. She is carrying on -terribly.” - -“Is the father there, too?” - -“Yes, he’s there, but he’s quiet. He’s sitting in a corner, and not -saying a word. The children have been sent to their relatives. Well, -Stepan, shall we have another game?” - -“Come on!” the coachman assented. “Go and lie down, Aliosha, and go to -sleep. Why you’re old enough to think of getting married, you young -rascal, and there you are bawling! Run along, child, run along!” - -The porter’s presence calmed Aliosha; he went timidly to his sleigh and -lay down. As he fell asleep he heard a whispering: - -“I take the trick,” his grandfather murmured. - -“I take the trick,” the porter repeated. - -The bell rang in the courtyard, the door creaked and seemed to say: - -“I take the trick!” - -When Aliosha saw the dead master in his dreams, and jumped up weeping -for fear of his eyes, it was already morning. His grandfather was -snoring, and the coach house no longer seemed full of terror. - - - LADY N——’S STORY - -One late afternoon, ten years ago, the examining magistrate, Peter -Sergeitch, and I rode to the station together at hay-making time to -fetch the mail. - -The weather was superb, but as we were riding home we heard thunder -growling, and saw an angry black cloud coming straight toward us. The -storm was approaching and we were riding into its very teeth. Our house -and the village church were gleaming white upon its breast, and the -tall, silvery poplars were glistening against it. The scent of rain and -of new-mown hay hung in the air. My companion was in high spirits, -laughing and talking the wildest nonsense. - -“How splendid it would be,” he cried, “if we should suddenly come upon -some antique castle of the Middle Ages with towers battlemented, -moss-grown, and owl-haunted, where we could take refuge from the storm -and where a bolt of lightning would end by striking us!” - -But at that moment the first wave swept across the rye and oat fields, -the wind moaned, and whirling dust filled the air. Peter Sergeitch -laughed and spurred his horse. - -“How glorious!” he cried. “How glorious!” - -His gay mood was infectious. I, too, laughed to think that in another -moment we should be wet to the skin, and perhaps struck by lightning. - -The blast and the swift pace thrilled us, and set our blood racing; we -caught our breath against the gale and felt like flying birds. - -The wind had fallen when we rode into our courtyard, and heavy drops of -rain were drumming on the roof and lawn. The stable was deserted. - -Peter Sergeitch himself unsaddled the horses, and led them into their -stalls. I stood at the stable door waiting for him, watching the descent -of the slanting sheets of rain. The sickly sweet scent of hay was even -stronger here than it had been in the fields. The air was dark with -thunder-clouds and rain. - -“What a flash!” cried Peter Sergeitch coming to my side after an -especially loud, rolling thunderclap that, it seemed, must have cleft -the sky in two. “Well?” - -He stood on the threshold beside me breathing deeply after our swift -ride, with his eyes fixed on my face. I saw that his glance was full of -admiration. - -“Oh, Natalia!” he cried. “I would give anything on earth to be able to -stand here for ever looking at you. You are glorious to-day.” - -His look was both rapturous and beseeching, his face was pale, and drops -of rain were glistening on his beard and moustache; these, too, seemed -to be looking lovingly at me. - -“I love you!” he cried. “I love you and I am happy because I can see -you. I know that you cannot be my wife, but I ask nothing, I desire -nothing; only know that I love you. Don’t answer me, don’t notice me, -only believe that you are very dear to me, and suffer me to look at -you.” - -His ecstasy communicated itself to me. I saw his rapt look, I heard the -tones of his voice mingling with the noise of the rain, and stood rooted -to the spot as if bewitched. I longed to look at those radiant eyes and -listen to those words for ever. - -“You are silent! Good!” said Peter Sergeitch. “Do not speak!” - -I was very happy. I laughed with pleasure, and ran through the pouring -rain into the house. He laughed too, and ran after me. - -We burst in wet and panting and tramped noisily up-stairs like two -children. My father and brother, unaccustomed to seeing me laughing and -gay, looked at me in surprise and began to laugh with us. - -The storm blew over, the thunder grew silent, but the rain-drops still -glistened on Peter Sergeitch’s beard. He sang and whistled and romped -noisily with the dog all the evening, chasing him through the house and -nearly knocking the butler carrying the samovar off his feet. He ate a -huge supper, talking all kinds of nonsense the while, swearing that if -you eat fresh cucumbers in winter you can smell the spring in your -nostrils. - -When I went to my room I lit the candle and threw the casement wide -open. A vague sensation took hold of me. I remembered that I was free -and healthy, well-born and rich, and that I was beloved, but chiefly -that I was well-born and rich—well-born and rich! Goodness, how -delightful that was! Later, shrinking into bed to escape the chill that -came stealing in from the garden with the dew, I lay and tried to decide -whether I loved Peter Sergeitch or not. Not being able to make head or -tail of the question, I went to sleep. - -Next morning when I awoke and saw the shadows of the lindens and the -trembling patches of sunlight that played across my bed, the events of -yesterday rose vividly before me. Life seemed rich, and varied, and full -of beauty. I dressed quickly and ran singing into the garden. - -And then, what happened? Nothing! When winter came and we moved to the -city, Peter Sergeitch seldom came to see us. Country acquaintances are -only attractive in the country. In town, in the winter, they lose half -their charm. When they come to call they look as if they were wearing -borrowed clothes, and they stir their tea much too long. Peter Sergeitch -sometimes spoke of love, but his words did not sound as enchanting as -they had in the country. Here we felt more keenly the barrier between -us. I was titled and rich; he was poor and was not even a noble, but an -examining magistrate, the son of a deacon. Both of us—I because I was -very young, and he, heaven knows why—considered this barrier very great -and very high. He smiled affectedly when he was with us in town and -criticised high society; if any one beside himself was in the -drawing-room he remained morosely silent. There is no barrier so high -but that it may be surmounted, but, from what I have known of him, the -modern hero of romance is too timid, too indolent and lazy, too finical -and ready to accept the idea that he is a failure cheated by life, to -make the struggle. Instead, he carps at the world, and calls it vile, -forgetting that his own criticism at last becomes vile in itself. - -I was beloved; happiness was near, seemed almost to be walking at my -side; my path was strewn with roses, and I lived without trying to -understand myself, not knowing what I was expecting nor what I demanded -from life. And so time went on and on—Men with their love passed near -me; bright days and warm nights flew by; the nightingales sang; the air -was sweet with new-mown hay—all these things, so dear, so touching to -remember, flashed by me swiftly, unheeded, as they do by every one, -leaving no trace behind them, until they vanished like mist. Where is it -all now? - -My father died; I grew older. All that had been so enchanting, so -gracious, so hope-inspiring; the sound of rain, the rolling of thunder, -dreams of happiness, and words of love, all these grew to be a memory -alone. I now see before me a level, deserted plain, bounded by a dark -and terrible horizon, without a living soul upon it. - -A bell rang. It was Peter Sergeitch. When I see the winter trees, -remembering how they decked themselves in green for me in summer time, I -whisper: - -“Oh, you darling things!” - -And when I see the people with whom I passed my own springtime, my heart -grows warm and sad, and I whisper the same words. - -Peter Sergeitch had moved to the city long ago through the influence of -my father. He was a little elderly now, and a little stooping. It was -long since he had spoken any words of love, he talked no nonsense now, -and was dissatisfied with his occupation. He was a little ailing, and a -little disillusioned; he snapped his fingers at life, and would have -been glad to have had it over. He took his seat in the chimney-corner -and looked silently into the fire. Not knowing what to say, I asked: - -“Well, what news have you?” - -“None at all.” - -Silence fell once more. The ruddy firelight played across his melancholy -features. - -I remembered our past, and suddenly my shoulders shook; I bent my head -and wept bitterly. I felt unbearably sorry for myself and for this man, -and I longed passionately for those things which had gone by, and which -life now denied us. I no longer cared for my riches or my title. - -I sobbed aloud with my head in my hands murmuring: “My God, my God, our -lives are ruined!” - -He sat silent and did not tell me not to weep. He knew that tears must -be shed, and that the time for them had come. I read his pity for me in -his eyes, and I, too, pitied him and was vexed with this timid failure -who had not been able to mould his life or mine aright. - -As I bade him farewell in the hall he seemed purposely to linger there, -putting on his coat. He kissed my hand in silence twice, and looked long -into my tear-stained face. I was sure that he was remembering that -thunder-storm, those sheets of rain, our laughter, and my face as it had -then been. He tried to say something; he would have done so gladly, but -nothing came. He only shook his head and pressed my hand—God bless him! - -When he had gone, I went back into the study and sat down on the carpet -before the fire. Grey ashes were beginning to creep over the dying -embers. The wintry blast was beating against the windows more angrily -than ever and chanting some tale in the chimney. - -The maid servant came in and called my name, thinking that I had fallen -asleep. - - - A JOURNEY BY CART - -They left the city at half past eight. - -The highway was dry and a splendid April sun was beating fiercely down, -but the snow still lay in the woods and wayside ditches. The long, dark, -cruel winter was only just over, spring had come in a breath, but to -Maria Vasilievna driving along the road in a cart there was nothing -either new or attractive in the warmth, or the listless, misty woods -flushed with the first heat of spring, or in the flocks of crows flying -far away across the wide, flooded meadows, or in the marvellous, -unfathomable sky into which one felt one could sail away with such -infinite pleasure. Maria Vasilievna had been a school teacher for thirty -years, and it would have been impossible for her to count the number of -times she had driven to town for her salary, and returned home as she -was doing now. It mattered not to her whether the season were spring, as -now, or winter, or autumn with darkness and rain; she invariably longed -for one thing and one thing only: a speedy end to her journey. - -She felt as if she had lived in this part of the world for a long, long -time, even a hundred years or more, and it seemed to her that she knew -every stone and every tree along the roadside between her school and the -city. Here lay her past and her present as well, and she could not -conceive of a future beyond her school and the road and the city, and -then the road and her school again, and then once more the road and the -city. - -Of her past before she had been a school teacher she had long since -ceased to think—she had almost forgotten it. She had had a father and -mother once, and had lived with them in a large apartment near the Red -Gate in Moscow, but her recollection of that life was as vague and -shadowy as a dream. Her father had died when she was ten years old, and -her mother had soon followed him. She had had a brother, an officer, -with whom she had corresponded at first, but he had lost the habit of -writing to her after a while, and had stopped answering her letters. Of -her former belongings her mother’s photograph was now her only -possession, and this had been so faded by the dampness of the school -that her mother’s features had all disappeared except the eyebrows and -hair. - -When they had gone three miles on their way old daddy Simon, who was -driving the cart, turned round and said: - -“They have caught one of the town officials and have shipped him away. -They say he killed the mayor of Moscow with the help of some Germans.” - -“Who told you that?” - -“Ivan Ionoff read it in the paper at the inn.” - -For a long time neither spoke. Maria Vasilievna was thinking of her -school, and the coming examinations for which she was preparing four -boys and one girl. And just as her mind was full of these examinations, -a landholder named Khanoff drove up with a four-in-hand harnessed to an -open carriage. It was he who had held the examination in her school the -year before. As he drove up alongside her cart he recognised her, bowed, -and exclaimed: - -“Good morning! Are you on your way home, may I ask?” - -Khanoff was a man of forty or thereabouts. His expression was listless -and blasé, and he had already begun to age perceptibly, but he was -handsome still and admired by women. He lived alone on a large estate; -he had no business anywhere, and it was said of him that he never did -anything at home but walk about and whistle, or else play chess with his -old man servant. It was also rumoured that he was a hard drinker. Maria -Vasilievna remembered that, as a matter of fact, at the last examination -even the papers that he had brought with him had smelled of scent and -wine. Everything he had had on that day had been new, and Maria -Vasilievna had liked him very much, and had even felt shy sitting there -beside him. She was used to receiving the visits of cold, critical -examiners, but this one did not remember a single prayer, and did not -know what questions he ought to ask. He had been extremely considerate -and polite, and had given all the children full marks for everything. - -“I am on my way to visit Bakvist” he now continued to Maria Vasilievna. -“Is it true that he is away from home?” - -They turned from the highway into a lane, Khanoff in the lead, Simon -following him. The four horses proceeded at a foot-pace, straining to -drag the heavy carriage through the mud. Simon tacked hither and thither -across the road, first driving round a bump, then round a puddle, and -jumping down from his seat every minute or so to give his horse a -helpful push. Maria Vasilievna continued to think about the school, and -whether the questions at the examinations would be difficult or easy. -She felt annoyed with the board of the zemstvo, for she had been there -yesterday, and had found no one in. How badly it was managed! Here it -was two years since she had been asking to have the school watchman -discharged for loafing and being rude to her and beating her scholars, -and yet no one had paid any heed to her request. The president of the -board was hardly ever in his office, and when he was, would vow with -tears in his eyes that he hadn’t time to attend to her now. The school -inspector came only three times a year, and knew nothing about his -business anyway, as he had formerly been an exciseman, and had obtained -the office of inspector through favour. The school board seldom met, and -no one ever knew where their meetings were held. The warden was an -illiterate peasant who owned a tannery, a rough and stupid man and a -close friend of the watchman’s. In fact, the Lord only knew whom one -could turn to to have complaints remedied and wrongs put right! - -“He really is handsome!” thought the schoolteacher glancing at Khanoff. - -The road grew worse and worse. They entered a wood. There was no -possibility of turning out of the track here, the ruts were deep and -full of gurgling, running water. Prickly twigs beat against their faces. - -“What a road, eh?” cried Khanoff laughing. - -The school teacher looked at him and marvelled that this queer fellow -should be living here. - -“What good do his wealth, his handsome face, and his fine culture do him -in this God-forsaken mud and solitude?” she thought. “He has abandoned -any advantage that fate may have given him, and is enduring the same -hardships as Simon, tramping with him along this impossible road. Why -does any one live here who could live in St. Petersburg or abroad?” - -And it seemed to her that it would be worth this rich man’s while to -make a good road out of this bad one, so that he might not have to -struggle with the mud, and be forced to see the despair written on the -faces of Simon and his coachman. But he only laughed, and was obviously -absolutely indifferent to it all, asking for no better life than this. - -“He is kind and gentle and unsophisticated,” Maria Vasilievna thought -again. “He does not understand the hardships of life any more than he -knew the suitable prayers to say at the examination. He gives globes to -the school and sincerely thinks himself a useful man and a conspicuous -benefactor of popular education. Much they need his globes in this -wilderness!” - -“Sit tight, Vasilievna!” shouted Simon. - -The cart tipped violently to one side and seemed to be falling over. -Something heavy rolled down on Maria Vasilievna’s feet, it proved to be -the purchases she had made in the city. They were crawling up a steep, -clayey hill now. Torrents of water were rushing noisily down on either -side of the track, and seemed to have eaten away the road bed. Surely it -would be impossible to get by! The horses began to snort. Khanoff jumped -out of his carriage and walked along the edge of the road in his long -overcoat. He felt hot. - -“What a road!” he laughed again. “My carriage will soon be smashed to -bits at this rate!” - -“And who asked you to go driving in weather like this?” asked Simon -sternly. “Why don’t you stay at home?” - -“It is tiresome staying at home, daddy. I don’t like it.” - -He looked gallant and tall walking beside old Simon, but in spite of his -grace there was an almost imperceptible something about his walk that -betrayed a being already rotten at the core, weak, and nearing his -downfall. And the air in the woods suddenly seemed to carry an odour of -wine. Maria Vasilievna shuddered, and began to feel sorry for this man -who for some unknown reason was going to his ruin. She thought that if -she were his wife or his sister she would gladly give up her whole life -to rescuing him from disaster. His wife? Alas! He lived alone on his -great estate, and she lived alone in a forlorn little village, and yet -the very idea that they might one day become intimate and equal seemed -to her impossible and absurd. Life was like that! And, at bottom, all -human relationships and all life were so incomprehensible that if you -thought about them at all dread would overwhelm you and your heart would -stop beating. - -“And how incomprehensible it is, too,” she thought, “that God should -give such beauty and charm and such kind, melancholy eyes to weak, -unhappy, useless people, and make every one like them so!” - -“I turn off to the right here,” Khanoff said, getting into his carriage. -“Farewell! A pleasant journey to you!” - -And once more Maria Vasilievna’s thoughts turned to her scholars, and -the coming examinations, and the watchman, and the school board, until a -gust of wind from the right bringing her the rumbling of the departing -carriage, other reveries mingled with these thoughts, and she longed to -dream of handsome eyes and love and the happiness that would never be -hers. - -She, a wife! Alas, how cold her little room was early in the morning! No -one ever lit her stove, because the watchman was always away somewhere. -Her pupils came at daybreak, with a great noise, bringing in with them -mud and snow, and everything was so bleak and so uncomfortable in her -little quarters of one small bedroom which also served as a kitchen! Her -head ached every day when school was over. She was obliged to collect -money from her scholars to buy wood and pay the watchman, and then to -give it to that fat, insolent peasant, the warden, and beg him for -mercy’s sake to send her a load of wood. And at night she would dream of -examinations and peasants and snow drifts. This life had aged and -hardened her, and she had grown plain and angular and awkward, as if -lead had been emptied into her veins. She was afraid of everything, and -never dared to sit down in the presence of the warden or a member of the -school board. If she mentioned any one of them in his absence, she -always spoke of him respectfully as “his Honour.” No one found her -attractive; her life was spent without love, without friendship, without -acquaintances who interested her. What a terrible calamity it would be -were she, in her situation, to fall in love! - -“Sit tight, Vasilievna!” - -Once more they were crawling up a steep hill. - -She had felt no call to be a teacher; want had forced her to be one. She -never thought about her mission in life or the value of education; the -most important things to her were, not her scholars nor their -instruction, but the examinations. And how could she think of a mission, -and of the value of education? School teachers, and poor doctors, and -apothecaries, struggling with their heavy labours, have not even the -consolation of thinking that they are advancing an ideal, and helping -mankind. Their heads are too full of thoughts of their daily crust of -bread, their wood, the bad roads, and their sicknesses for that. Their -life is tedious and hard. Only those stand it for any length of time who -are silent beasts of burden, like Maria Vasilievna. Those who are -sensitive and impetuous and nervous, and who talk of their mission in -life and of advancing a great ideal, soon become exhausted and give up -the fight. - -To find a dryer, shorter road, Simon sometimes struck across a meadow or -drove through a back-yard, but in some places the peasants would not let -him pass, in others the land belonged to a priest; here the road was -blocked, there Ivan Ionoff had bought a piece of land from his master -and surrounded it with a ditch. In such cases they had to turn back. - -They arrived at Nijni Gorodishe. In the snowy, grimy yard around the -tavern stood rows of wagons laden with huge flasks of oil of vitriol. A -great crowd of carriers had assembled in the tavern, and the air reeked -of vodka, tobacco, and sheepskin coats. Loud talk filled the room, and -the door with its weight and pulley banged incessantly. In the tap room -behind a partition some one was playing on the concertina without a -moment’s pause. Maria Vasilievna sat down to her tea, while at a near-by -table a group of peasants saturated with tea and the heat of the room -were drinking vodka and beer. - -A confused babel filled the room. - -“Did you hear that, Kuzma? Ha! Ha! What’s that? By God! Ivan Dementitch, -you’ll catch it for that! Look, brother!” - -A small, black-bearded, pock-marked peasant, who had been drunk for a -long time, gave an exclamation of surprise and swore an ugly oath. - -“What do you mean by swearing, you!” shouted Simon angrily from where he -sat, far away at the other end of the room. “Can’t you see there’s a -lady here?” - -“A lady!” mocked some one from another corner. - -“You pig, you!” - -“I didn’t mean to do it—” faltered the little peasant with -embarrassment. “Excuse me! My money is as good here as hers. How do you -do?” - -“How do you do?” answered the school teacher. - -“Very well, thank you kindly.” - -Maria Vasilievna enjoyed her tea, and grew as flushed as the peasants. -Her thoughts were once more running on the watchman and the wood. - -“Look there, brother!” she heard a voice at the next table cry. “There’s -the schoolmarm from Viasovia! I know her! She’s a nice lady.” - -“Yes, she’s a nice lady.” - -The door banged, men came and went. Maria Vasilievna sat absorbed in the -same thoughts that had occupied her before, and the concertina behind -the partition never ceased making music for an instant. Patches of -sunlight that had lain on the floor when she had come in had moved up to -the counter, then to the walls, and now had finally disappeared. So it -was afternoon. The carriers at the table next to hers rose and prepared -to leave. The little peasant went up to Maria Vasilievna swaying -slightly, and held out his hand. The others followed him; all shook -hands with the school teacher, and went out one by one. The door banged -and whined nine times. - -“Get ready, Vasilievna!” Simon cried. - -They started again, still at a walk. - -“A little school was built here in Nijni Gorodishe, not long ago,” said -Simon, looking back. “Some of the people sinned greatly.” - -“In what way?” - -“It seems the president of the school board grabbed one thousand -roubles, and the warden another thousand, and the teacher five hundred.” - -“A school always costs several thousand roubles. It is very wrong to -repeat scandal, daddy. What you have just told me is nonsense.” - -“I don’t know anything about it. I only tell you what people say.” - -It was clear, however, that Simon did not believe the school teacher. -None of the peasants believed her. They all thought that her salary was -too large (she got twenty roubles a month, and they thought that five -would have been plenty), and they also believed that most of the money -which she collected from the children for wood she pocketed herself. The -warden thought as all the other peasants did, and made a little out of -the wood himself, besides receiving secret pay from the peasants unknown -to the authorities. - -But now, thank goodness, they had finally passed through the last of the -woods, and from here on their road would lie through flat fields all the -way to Viasovia. Only a few miles more to go, and then they would cross -the river, and then the railway track, and then they would be at home. - -“Where are you going, Simon?” asked Maria Vasilievna. “Take the -right-hand road across the bridge!” - -“What’s that? We can cross here. It isn’t very deep.” - -“Don’t let the horse drown!” - -“What’s that?” - -“There is Khanoff crossing the bridge!” cried Maria Vasilievna, catching -sight of a carriage and four in the distance at their right. “Isn’t that -he?” - -“That’s him all right. He must have found Bakvist away. My goodness, -what a donkey to drive all the way round when this road is two miles -shorter!” - -They plunged into the river. In summer time it was a tiny stream, in -late spring it dwindled rapidly to a fordable river after the freshets, -and by August it was generally dry, but during flood time it was a -torrent of swift, cold, turbid water some fifty feet wide. Fresh wheel -tracks were visible now on the bank leading down to the water’s edge; -some one, then, must have crossed here. - -“Get up!” cried Simon, madly jerking the reins and flapping his arms -like a pair of wings. “Get up!” - -The horse waded into the stream up to his belly, stopped, and then -plunged on again, throwing his whole weight into the collar. Maria -Vasilievna felt a sharp wave of cold water lap her feet. - -“Go on!” she cried, rising in her seat. “Go on!” - -They drove out on the opposite bank. - -“Well, of all things! My goodness!” muttered Simon. “What a worthless -lot those zemstvo people are——” - -Maria Vasilievna’s goloshes and shoes were full of water, and the bottom -of her dress and coat and one of her sleeves were soaked and dripping. -Her sugar and flour were wet through, and this was harder to bear than -all the rest. In her despair she could only wave her arms, and cry: - -“Oh, Simon, Simon! How stupid you are, really——” - -The gate was down when they reached the railway crossing, an express -train was leaving the station. They stood and waited for the train to go -by, and Maria Vasilievna shivered with cold from head to foot. - -Viasovia was already in sight; there was the school with its green roof, -and there stood the church with its blazing crosses reflecting the rays -of the setting sun. The windows of the station were flashing, too, and a -cloud of rosy steam was rising from the engine. Everything seemed to the -school teacher to be shivering with cold. - -At last the train appeared. Its windows were blazing like the crosses on -the church, and their brilliance was dazzling. A lady was standing on -the platform of one of the first-class carriages. One glance at her as -she slipped past, and Maria Vasilievna thought: “My mother!” What a -resemblance there was! There was her mother’s thick and luxuriant hair; -there were her forehead and the poise of her head. For the first time in -all these thirty years Maria Vasilievna saw in imagination her mother, -her father, and her brother in their apartment in Moscow, saw everything -down to the least detail, even to the globe of goldfish in the -sitting-room. She heard the strains of a piano, and the sound of her -father’s voice, and saw herself young and pretty and gaily dressed, in a -warm, brightly lighted room with her family about her. Great joy and -happiness suddenly welled up in her heart, and she pressed her hands to -her temples in rapture, crying softly with a note of deep entreaty in -her voice: - -“Mother!” - -Then she wept, she could not have said why. At that moment Khanoff drove -up with his four-in-hand, and when she saw him she smiled and nodded to -him as if he and she were near and dear to each other, for she was -conjuring up in her fancy a felicity that could never be hers. The sky, -the trees, and the windows of the houses seemed to be reflecting her -happiness and rejoicing with her. No! Her mother and father had not -died; she had never been a school teacher; all that had been a long, -strange, painful dream, and now she was awake. - -“Vasilievna! Sit down!” - -And in a breath everything vanished. The gate slowly rose. Shivering and -numb with cold Maria Vasilievna sat down in the cart again. The -four-in-hand crossed the track and Simon followed. The watchman at the -crossing took off his cap as they drove by. - -“Here is Viasovia! The journey is over!” - - - THE PRIVY COUNCILLOR - -Early in April in the year 1870, my mother, Klavdia Arhipovna, the widow -of a lieutenant, received a letter from her brother Ivan, a privy -councillor in St. Petersburg. Among other things the letter said: - -“An affection of the liver obliges me to spend every summer abroad, but -as I have no funds this year with which to go to Marienbad, it is very -probable that I may spend the coming summer with you at Kotchneffka, -dear sister——” - -My mother turned pale and trembled from head to foot as she perused this -epistle, and an expression both smiling and tearful came into her face. -She began to weep and to laugh. This conflict between laughter and tears -always reminds me of the glitter and shimmer that follow when water is -spilled on a brightly burning candle. Having read the letter through -twice, my mother summoned her whole household together, and in a voice -quivering with excitement began explaining to them that there had been -four brothers in the Gundasoff family; one had died when he was a baby; -a second had been a soldier, and had also died; a third, she meant no -offence to him in saying it, had become an actor, and a fourth—— - -“The fourth brother is not of our world,” sobbed my mother. “He is my -own brother, we grew up together, and yet I am trembling all over at the -thought of him. He is a privy councillor, a general! How can I meet my -darling? What can a poor, uneducated woman like me find to talk to him -about? It is fifteen years since I saw him last. Andrusha, darling!” -cried my mother turning to me. “Rejoice little stupid, it is for your -sake that God is sending him here!” - -When we had all heard the history of the Gundasoff family down to the -smallest detail, there arose an uproar on the farm such as I had not -been accustomed to hearing except before weddings. Only the vault of -heaven, and the water in the river escaped; everything else was -subjected to a process of cleaning, scrubbing, and painting. If the sky -had been smaller and lower, and the river had not been so swift, they -too would have been scalded with boiling water and polished with cloths. -The walls were white as snow already, but they were whitewashed again. -The floors shone and glistened, but they were scrubbed every day. -Bobtail, the cat (so-called because I had chopped off a good portion of -his tail with a carving-knife when I was a baby), was taken from the -house into the kitchen and put in charge of Anfisa. Fedia was told that -if the dogs came anywhere near the front porch, “God would punish him.” -But nothing caught it so cruelly as did the unfortunate sofas and -carpets and chairs! Never before had they been so unmercifully beaten -with sticks as they now were in expectation of our guest’s arrival. -Hearing the blows, my doves fluttered anxiously about, and at last flew -away straight up into the very sky. - -From Novostroevka came Spiridon, the only tailor in the district who -ventured to sew for the gentry. He was a sober, hard-working, -intelligent man, not without some imagination and feeling for the -plastic arts, but he sewed abominably nevertheless. His doubts always -spoiled everything, for the idea that his clothes were not fashionable -enough made him cut everything over five times at least. He used to go -all the way to the city on foot on purpose to see how the young dandies -were dressed, and then decked us in costumes that even a caricaturist -would have called an exaggeration and a joke. We sported impossibly -tight trousers, and coats so short that we always felt embarrassed -whenever any young ladies were present. - -Spiridon slowly took my measurements. He measured me lengthways and -crossways as if he were going to fit me with barrel hoops, then wrote at -length upon a sheet of paper with a very thick pencil, and at last -marked his yardstick from end to end with little triangular notches. -Having finished with me, he began upon my tutor Gregory Pobedimski. This -unforgettable tutor of mine was just at the age when men anxiously watch -the growth of their moustaches, and are critical about their attire, so -that you may imagine with what holy terror Spiridon approached his -person! Pobedimski was made to throw his head back, and spread himself -apart like a V upside down, now raising, now lowering his arms. Spiridon -measured him several times, circling about him as a love-sick pigeon -circles about his mate; then he fell down on one knee, and bent himself -into the form of a hook. My mother, weary and worn with all this bustle -and faint from the heat of her irons in the laundry, said as she watched -all these endless proceedings: - -“Take care, Spiridon, God will call you to account if you spoil the -cloth! And you will be an unlucky man if you don’t hit the mark this -time!” - -My mother’s words first threw Spiridon into a sweat and then into a -fever, for he was very sure that he would not hit the mark. He asked one -rouble and twenty copecks for making my suit, and two roubles for making -my tutor’s. The cloth, the buttons, and the linings were supplied by us. -This cannot but seem cheap enough, especially when you consider that -Novostroevka was six miles away, and that he came to try on the clothes -four different times. At these fittings, as we pulled on our tight -trousers and coats all streaked with white basting threads, my mother -would look at our clothes, knit her brows with dissatisfaction and -exclaim: - -“Goodness knows we have queer fashions these days! I am almost ashamed -to look at you! If my brother did not live in St. Petersburg I declare I -wouldn’t have you dressed in the fashion!” - -Spiridon, delighted that the fashions and not he were catching the -blame, would shrug his shoulders, and sigh, as much as to say: - -“There is nothing to be done about it; it is the spirit of the times!” - -The trepidation with which we awaited the arrival of our guest can only -be compared to the excitement that prevails among spiritualists when -they are awaiting the appearance of a spirit. My mother had a headache, -and burst into tears every minute. I lost my appetite and my sleep, and -did not study my lessons. Even in my dreams I was devoured by my longing -to see a general, a man with epaulettes, an embroidered collar reaching -to his ears, and a naked sword in his hand; in short, a person exactly -like the general I saw hanging over the sofa in our drawing-room glaring -so balefully with his terrible black eyes at any one who ventured to -look at him. Pobedimski alone felt at ease. He neither trembled nor -rejoiced, and all he said as he listened to my mother’s stories of the -Gundasoff family was: - -“Yes, it will be pleasant to talk with somebody new.” - -My tutor was considered a very exceptional person on our farm. He was a -young man of twenty or thereabouts, pimply, ragged, with a low forehead, -and an uncommonly long nose. In fact, this nose of his was so long that -if he wanted to look at anything closely he had to put his head on one -side like a bird. He had gone through the six grades of the high-school, -and had then entered the Veterinary College, from which he had been -expelled in less than six months. By carefully concealing the reason of -his expulsion, my tutor gave every one who wished it an opportunity for -considering him a much-enduring and rather mysterious person. He talked -little, and when he did it was always on learned subjects; he ate meat -on fast-days, and looked upon the life about him in a high and mighty, -contemptuous fashion, which, however, did not prevent him from accepting -presents from my mother in the shape of suits of clothes, or from -painting funny faces with red teeth on my kites. My mother did not like -him on account of his “pride,” but she had a deep respect for his -learning. - -We had not long to wait for our guest. Early in May two wagons piled -with huge trunks arrived from the station. These trunks looked so -majestic that the coachman unconsciously took off his hat as he unloaded -them from the wagons. - -“They must be full of uniforms and gunpowder!” thought I. - -Why gunpowder? Probably because in my mind the idea of a general was -closely connected with powder and cannon. - -When my nurse woke me on the morning of the tenth of May, she announced -in a whisper that my “uncle had come!” I dressed hastily, washing anyhow -and forgetting my prayers, and scampered out of my room. In the hall I -ran straight into a tall, stout gentleman with fashionable side-whiskers -and an elegant overcoat. Swooning with horror, I drew myself up before -him, and remembering the ceremonial taught me by my mother, I bowed -deeply and attempted to kiss his hand. But the gentleman would not give -me his hand to kiss, and stated that he was not my uncle, but only -Peter, my uncle’s valet. The sight of this Peter, dressed a great deal -better than Pobedimski and myself, filled me with the profoundest -astonishment which, to tell the truth, has not left me to this day. Is -it possible that such grave, respectable men as he, with such stern, -intelligent faces can be servants? Why should they be? - -Peter told me that my uncle and mother were in the garden, and I rushed -thither as fast as my legs could carry me. - -Not knowing the history of the Gundasoff family and my uncle’s rank, -Nature felt a great deal freer and less constrained than I did. There -was an activity in the garden such as one only sees at a country fair. -Countless magpies were cleaving the air and hopping along the garden -paths, chasing the mayflies with noisy cries. A flock of crows was -swarming in the lilac bushes that thrust their delicate, fragrant -blossoms into my very face. From all sides came the songs of orioles and -the pipings of finches and blackbirds. At any other time I should have -darted off after the grasshoppers or thrown stones at a crow that was -sitting on a low haycock under a wasp’s nest turning its blunt bill from -side to side. But this was no time for play. My heart was hammering and -shivers were running up and down my back. I was about to see a man with -epaulettes, a naked sword, and terrible eyes! - -Imagine, then, my disappointment! A slender little dandy in a white silk -shirt and a white military cap was walking through the garden at my -mother’s side. Every now and then he would run on ahead and, with his -hands in his pockets and his head thrown back, he looked like quite a -young man. There was so much life and vivacity in his whole figure that -the treachery of old age only became apparent to me as I approached from -behind, and, peeping under his cap, saw the white hairs glistening -beneath the brim. Instead of a stolid, autocratic gravity I saw in him -an almost boyish nimbleness, and instead of a collar to the ears he wore -an ordinary light blue necktie. My mother and uncle were walking up and -down the path, chatting together. I crept up softly from behind and -waited for one of them to turn round and see me. - -“What an enchanting place you have here, Klavdia!” my uncle exclaimed. -“How sweet and lovely it all is! If I had known how beautiful it was -nothing could have taken me abroad all these years!” - -My uncle stooped abruptly, and put his nose to a tulip. Everything he -saw was a source of curiosity and delight to him, as if he had never -seen a garden, or a sunny day before in his life. The strange little man -moved as if on springs and chattered incessantly, not giving my mother a -chance to put in a word. All at once Pobedimski stepped out from behind -an elder bush at a turn of the path. His appearance was so unexpected -that my uncle started and fell back a step. My tutor was dressed in his -gala overcoat with a cape, in which he looked exactly like a windmill, -especially from behind. His mien was majestic and triumphant. With his -hat held close to his chest in Spanish fashion he took a step toward my -uncle, and bowed forward and slightly sideways like a marquis in a -melodrama. - -“I have the honour to present myself to your worshipful highness,” he -said in a loud voice. “I am a pedagogue, the instructor of your nephew, -and a former student at the Veterinary College. My name is Gregory -Pobedimski, Esquire.” - -My tutor’s beautiful manners pleased my mother immensely. She smiled and -fluttered with the sweet expectation of his next brilliant sally, but my -tutor was waiting for my uncle to respond to his lofty bearing with -something equally lofty, and thought that two fingers would be offered -him with a “h’m—” befitting a general. In consequence, he lost all his -presence of mind and was completely embarrassed when my uncle smiled -cordially and heartily pressed his hand. Murmuring some incoherent -phrases, my tutor coughed and retired. - -“Ha! Ha! Isn’t that beautiful?” laughed my uncle. “Look at him. He has -put on his wings, and is thinking what a clever fellow he is! I like -that, upon my word and honour, I do! What youthful aplomb, what life -there is in those silly wings! And who is this boy?” he asked, suddenly -turning round and catching sight of me. - -“This is my little Andrusha,” said my mother blushing. “The comfort of -my life.” - -I put my foot behind me and bowed deeply. - -“A fine little fellow, a fine little fellow!” murmured my uncle taking -his hand away from my lips, and patting my head. “So your name is -Andrusha? Well, well—yes—upon my word and honour. Do you go to school?” - -My mother began to enumerate my triumphs of learning and behaviour, -adding to them and exaggerating as all mothers do, while I walked at my -uncle’s side and did not cease from bowing deeply according to the -ceremonial we had agreed upon. When my mother began hinting that with my -remarkable attainments it would not be amiss for me to enter the -military academy at the expense of the state, and when, according to our -plan, I should have burst into tears and implored the patronage of my -uncle, that relative suddenly stopped short and threw up his hands in -astonishment. - -“Heavens and earth, who is that?” he exclaimed. - -Down the garden path came Tatiana, the wife of our manager, Theodore -Petrovitch. She was carrying a white starched skirt and a long ironing -board, and as she passed us she blushed and glanced shyly at our guest -from under her long lashes. - -“Worse and worse!” said my uncle under his breath, looking tenderly -after her. “Why, sister, one can’t take a step here without encountering -some surprise, upon my word and honour!” - -Not every one would have called Tatiana beautiful. She was a small, -plump woman of twenty, graceful, black-eyed, and always rosy and sweet, -but in all her face and figure there was not one strong feature, not one -bold line for the eye to rest upon. It was as if in making her Nature -had lacked confidence and inspiration. Tatiana was shy and timid and -well behaved. She glided quietly along, saying little, seldom laughing; -her life was as even and smooth as her face and her neatly brushed hair. -My uncle half-closed his eyes and smiled as he watched her. My mother -looked intently at his smiling face and grew serious. - -“Oh, brother, why have you never married?” she sighed. - -“I have never married because——” - -“Why not?” asked my mother softly. - -“What shall I say? Because things did not turn out that way. When I was -young I worked too hard to have time for enjoying life, and then, when I -wanted to live—behold! I had put fifty years behind me! I was too slow. -However, this is a tedious subject for conversation!” - -My mother and uncle sighed simultaneously, and walked on together while -I stayed behind, and ran to find my tutor in order to share my -impressions with him. Pobedimski was standing in the middle of the -courtyard gazing majestically at the sky. - -“He is obviously an enlightened man,” he said, wagging his head. “I hope -we shall become friends.” - -An hour later my mother came to us. - -“Oh, boys, I’m in terrible trouble!” she began with a sigh. “My brother -has brought a valet with him, you know, and he is not the sort of man, -heaven help him, whom one can put in the hall or the kitchen, he -absolutely must have a room of his own. Look here, my children, couldn’t -you move into the wing with Theodore and give the valet your room?” - -We answered that we should be delighted to do so, for, we thought, life -in the wing would be much freer than in the house under the eyes of my -mother. - -“Yes, I’m terribly worried!” my mother continued. “My brother says he -doesn’t want to have his dinner at noon, but at seven as they do in the -city. I am almost distracted. Why, by seven the dinner in the stove will -be burned to a crisp. The truth is men know nothing about housekeeping, -even if they are very clever. Oh, misery me, I shall have to have two -dinners cooked every day! You must have yours at noon as you always do, -children, and let the old lady wait until seven for her brother.” - -My mother breathed a profound sigh, told me to please my uncle whom God -had brought here especially for my benefit, and ran into the kitchen. -Pobedimski and I moved into the wing that very same day. We were put in -a passage between the hall and the manager’s bedroom. - -In spite of my uncle’s arrival and our change of quarters, our days -continued to trickle by in their usual way, more drowsily and -monotonously than we had expected. We were excused from our lessons -“because of our guest.” Pobedimski, who never read or did anything, now -spent most of his time sitting on his bed absorbed in thought, with his -long nose in the air. Every now and then he would get up, try on his new -suit, sit down again, and continue his meditations. One thing only -disturbed him, and that was the flies, whom he slapped unmercifully with -the palms of his hands. After dinner he would generally “rest,” causing -keen anguish to the whole household by his snores. I played in the -garden from morning till night, or else sat in my room making kites. -During the first two or three weeks we saw little of my uncle. He stayed -in his room and worked for days on end, heeding neither the flies nor -the heat. - -His extraordinary power of sitting as if glued to his desk appeared to -us something in the nature of an inexplicable trick. To lazybones like -ourselves, who did not know the meaning of systematic work, his industry -appeared positively miraculous. Getting up at nine, he would sit down at -his desk, and not move until dinner time. After dinner he would go to -work once more, and work until late at night. Whenever I peeped into his -room through the keyhole I invariably saw the same scene. My uncle would -be sitting at his desk and working. His work consisted of writing with -one hand while turning over the pages of a book with the other, and -strange as it may seem, he constantly wriggled all over, swinging one -foot like a pendulum, whistling and nodding his head in time to the -music he made. His appearance at these times was extraordinarily -frivolous and careless, more as if he were playing at naughts and -crosses than working. Each time I looked in I saw him wearing a dashing -little coat and a dandified necktie, and each time, even through the -keyhole, I could smell a sweet feminine perfume. He emerged from his -room only to dine, and then ate scarcely anything. - -“I can’t understand my brother,” my mother complained. “Every day I have -a turkey or some pigeons killed especially for him, and stew some fruits -for him myself, and yet he drinks a little bouillon and eats a piece of -meat no larger than my finger, after which he leaves the table at once. -If I beg him to eat more he comes back and drinks a little milk. What is -there in milk? It is slop, nothing more! He will die of eating that kind -of food! If I try to persuade him to change his ways, he only laughs and -makes a joke of it! No, children, our fare doesn’t suit him!” - -Our evenings passed much more pleasantly than our days. As a rule the -setting sun and the long shadows falling across the courtyard found -Tatiana, Pobedimski, and me seated on the porch of our wing. We did not -speak until darkness fell—what could we talk about when everything had -already been said? There had been one novelty, my uncle’s arrival, but -that theme had soon become exhausted as well as the others. My tutor -constantly kept his eyes fixed on Tatiana’s face and fetched one deep -sigh after another. At that time I did not understand the meaning of -those sighs, and did not seek to inquire into their cause, but they -explain much to me now. - -When the shadows had merged into thick, black darkness Theodore would -come home from the hunt or the field. This Theodore seemed to me to be a -wild and even fearsome man. He was the son of a Russianised gipsy, and -was swarthy and dark with large black eyes and a tangled curly beard, -and he was never spoken of by our peasants as anything but “the demon.” -There was a great deal of the gipsy in him beside his appearance. For -instance, he never could stay at home, and would vanish for days at a -time, hunting in the forest or roaming in the fields. He was gloomy, -passionate, taciturn, and fearless, and could never be brought to -acknowledge the authority of any one. He spoke gruffly to my mother, -addressed me familiarly as “thou,” and treated Pobedimski’s learning -with contempt, but we forgave him everything, because we considered that -he had a morbidly excitable nature. My mother liked him in spite of his -gipsy ways, for he was ideally honest and hard working. He loved his -Tatiana passionately, in gipsy style, but his love was a thing of gloom, -almost of suffering. He never caressed her in our presence, and only -stared at her fiercely with his mouth all awry. - -On coming back from the fields he would furiously slam down his gun on -the floor of his room, and come out on the porch to take his seat beside -his wife. When he had rested a while he would ask her a few questions -about the housekeeping, and then relapse into silence. - -“Let’s sing!” I used to suggest. - -My tutor would tune his guitar, and in a thick, deaconly voice would -drone: “In Level Valleys.” We would all chime in. My tutor sang bass, -Theodore an almost inaudible tenor, and I contralto in tune with -Tatiana. - -When all the sky was strewn with stars, and the frogs’ voices were -hushed, our supper would be brought to us from the kitchen, and we would -go into the house and fall to. My tutor and the gipsy ate ravenously, -munching so loudly that it was hard to tell whether the noise came from -the bones they were crunching or the cracking of their jaws. Tatiana and -I, on the contrary, could scarcely manage to finish our portions. After -supper our wing of the house would sink into deep slumber. - -One evening at the end of May we were sitting on the porch waiting for -our supper. Suddenly a shadow flitted toward us, and Gundasoff appeared -as if he had sprung from the ground. He stared at us for a long time, -and then waved his hands and laughed gaily. - -“How idyllic!” he cried. “Singing and dreaming under the moon! It is -beautiful, upon my word and honour! May I sit here and dream with you?” - -We silently looked at one another. My uncle sat down on the lowest step, -yawned, and gazed at the sky. Pobedimski, who had long been intending to -have a conversation with this “new person,” was delighted at the -opportunity that now presented itself, and was the first to break the -silence. He had only one subject for learned discussions, and that was -the epizooty. It sometimes happens that, out of a crowd of thousands of -persons with whom one is thrown, one face alone remains fixed in the -memory, and so it was with Pobedimski. Out of all he had learned at the -Veterinary College he remembered only one sentence: - -“Epizooty is the cause of much loss to the peasant farmers. Every -community should join hands with the state in fighting this disease.” - -Before saying this to Gundasoff, my tutor cleared his throat three -times, and excitedly wrapped his cape around him. When my uncle had been -informed concerning the epizooty, he made a noise in his nose that -sounded like a laugh. - -“How charming, upon my word and honour!” he said under his breath, -staring at us as if we were maniacs. “This is indeed life! This is real -nature! Why don’t you say something, Pelagia?” he asked of Tatiana. - -Tatiana grew confused and coughed. - -“Go on talking, friends! Sing! Play! Don’t waste a moment! That rascal -time goes fast and waits for no man. Upon my word and honour, old age -will be upon you before you know it. It will be too late to enjoy life -then; so come, Pelagia, don’t sit there and say nothing!” - -At this point our supper was brought from the kitchen. My uncle went -into the house with us, and ate five curd fritters and a duck’s wing for -company. He kept his eyes fixed on us while he despatched his supper; we -all filled his heart with enthusiasm and emotion. Whatever silliness -that unforgettable tutor of mine was guilty of, whatever Tatiana did, -was lovely and charming in his eyes. When Tatiana quietly took her -knitting into a corner after supper, his eyes never left her little -fingers, and he babbled without a moment’s pause. - -“Friends, you must hurry and begin to enjoy life as fast as you can!” he -said. “For heaven’s sake, don’t sacrifice the present to the future! You -have youth and health and passion now, and the future is deceitful—a -vapour! As soon as your twentieth year knocks at the door, then begin to -live!” - -Tatiana dropped a needle. My uncle jumped up, picked it up, and handed -it to her with a bow, at which I realised for the first time that there -was some one in the world with manners more polished than Pobedimski’s. - -“Yes,” my uncle continued. “Fall in love! Marry! Be silly! Silliness is -much more healthy and natural than our toiling and striving to be -sensible.” - -My uncle talked much and long, and I sat on a trunk in a corner -listening to him and dozing. I felt hurt because he had never once paid -the least attention to me. He left our wing of the house at two o’clock -that night, when I had given up the battle, and sunk into profound -slumber. - -From that time on my uncle came to us every evening. He sang with us and -sat with us each night until two o’clock, chatting without end always of -the same thing. He ceased his evening and nocturnal labours, and by the -end of July, when the privy councillor had learned to eat my mother’s -turkeys and stewed fruits, his daytime toil was also abandoned. My uncle -had torn himself away from his desk and had entered into “real life.” By -day he walked about the garden whistling and keeping the workmen from -their work by making them tell him stories. If he caught sight of -Tatiana he would run up to her, and, if she were carrying anything, -would offer to carry it for her, which always embarrassed her -dreadfully. - -The farther summer advanced toward autumn the more absent-minded and -frivolous and lively my uncle became. Pobedimski lost all his illusions -about him. - -“He is too one-sided,” he used to say. “Nothing about him shows that he -stands on the highest rung of the official hierarchic ladder. He can’t -even talk properly. He says ‘upon my word and honour’ after every word. -No, I don’t like him!” - -A distinct change came over my tutor and Theodore from the time that my -uncle began to visit us in our wing. Theodore stopped hunting and began -to come home early. He grew more silent and stared more ferociously than -ever at his wife. My tutor stopped talking of the epizooty in my uncle’s -presence, and now frowned and even smiled derisively at sight of him. - -“Here comes our little hop o’my thumb!” he once growled, seeing my uncle -coming toward our part of the house. - -This change in the behaviour of both men I explained by the theory that -Gundasoff had hurt their feelings. My absent-minded uncle always -confused their names, and on the day of his departure had not learned -which was my tutor, and which was Tatiana’s husband. Tatiana herself he -sometimes called Nastasia, sometimes Pelagia, sometimes Evdokia. Full of -affectionate enthusiasm as he was for us all, he laughed at us and -treated us as if we had been children. All this, of course, might easily -have offended the young men. But, as I now see, this was not a question -of lacerated feelings; sentiments much more delicate were involved. - -One night, I remember, I was sitting on the trunk contending with my -longing for sleep. A heavy glue seemed to have fallen on my eyelids, and -my body was drooping sideways, exhausted by a long day’s playing, but I -tried to conquer my sleepiness, for I wanted to see what was going on. -It was nearly midnight. Gentle, rosy, and meek as ever, Tatiana was -sitting at a little table sewing a shirt for her husband. From one -corner of the room Theodore was staring sternly and gloomily at her, in -another corner sat Pobedimski snorting angrily, his head half buried in -his high coat collar. My uncle was walking up and down plunged in -thought. Silence reigned, broken only by the rustling of the linen in -Tatiana’s hands. Suddenly my uncle stopped in front of Tatiana, and -said: - -“Oh, you are all so young and fresh and good, and you live so peacefully -in this quiet place that I envy you! I have grown so fond of this life -of yours that, upon my honour, my heart aches when I remember that some -day I shall have to leave it all.” - -Sleep closed my eyes and I heard no more. I was awakened by a bang, and -saw my uncle standing in front of Tatiana, looking at her with emotion. -His cheeks were burning. - -“My life is over and I have not lived,” he was saying. “Your young face -reminds me of my lost youth, and I should be happy to sit here looking -at you until I died. I should like to take you with me to St. -Petersburg.” - -“Why?” demanded Theodore in a hoarse voice. - -“I should like to put you under a glass case on my desk; I should -delight in contemplating you, and showing you to my friends. Do you -know, Pelagia, that we don’t have people like you where I live? We have -wealth and fame and sometimes beauty, but we have none of this natural -life and this wholesome peacefulness——” - -My uncle sat down in front of Tatiana and took her hand. - -“So you won’t come with me to St. Petersburg?” he laughed. “Then at -least let me take this hand away with me, this lovely little hand! You -won’t? Very well then, little miser, at least allow me to kiss it!” - -I heard a chair crack. Theodore sprang to his feet and strode toward his -wife with a heavy, measured tread. His face was ashy grey and quivering. -He raised his arm and brought his fist down on the table with all his -might, saying in a muffled voice: - -“I won’t allow it!” - -At the same moment Pobedimski jumped out of his chair, and with a face -as pale and angry as the other’s, he also advanced toward Tatiana and -banged the table with his fist. - -“I—I won’t allow it!” he cried. - -“What? What’s the matter,” asked my uncle in astonishment. - -“I won’t allow it!” Theodore repeated, with another blow on the table. - -My uncle jumped up and abjectly blinked his eyes. He wanted to say -something, but surprise and fright held him tongue-tied. He gave an -embarrassed smile and pattered out of the room with short, senile steps, -leaving his hat behind him. When my startled mother came into the room a -few moments later, Theodore and Pobedimski were still banging the table -with their fists like blacksmiths hammering an anvil, and shouting: - -“I won’t allow it!” - -“What has happened here?” demanded my mother. “Why has my brother -fainted? What is the matter?” - -When she saw the frightened Tatiana and her angry husband, my mother -must have guessed what had been going on, for she sighed and shook her -head. - -“Come, come, stop thumping the table!” she commanded. “Stop, Theodore! -And what are you hammering for, Gregory Pobedimski? What business is -this of yours?” - -Pobedimski recollected himself and blushed. Theodore glared intently -first at him and then at his wife, and began striding up and down the -room. After my mother had gone, I saw something that for a long time -after I took to be a dream. I saw Theodore seize my tutor, raise him in -the air, and fling him out of the door. - -When I awoke next morning my tutor’s bed was empty. To my inquiries, my -nurse replied in a whisper that he had been taken to the hospital early -that morning, to be treated for a broken arm. Saddened by this news, and -recalling yesterday’s scandal, I went out into the courtyard. The day -was overcast. The sky was covered with storm-clouds, and a strong wind -was blowing across the earth, whirling before it dust, feathers, and -scraps of paper. One could feel the approaching rain, and bad humour was -obvious in both men and beasts. When I went back to the house I was told -to walk lightly, and not to make a noise because my mother was ill in -bed with a headache. What could I do? I went out of the front gate, and, -sitting down on a bench, tried to make out the meaning of what I had -seen the night before. The road from our gate wound past a blacksmith’s -shop and around a damp meadow, turning at last into the main highway. I -sat and looked at the telegraph poles around which the dust was -whirling, and at the sleepy birds sitting on the wires until, suddenly, -such ennui overwhelmed me that I burst into tears. - -A dusty char-à-banc came along the highway filled with townspeople who -were probably on a pilgrimage to some shrine. The char-à-banc was -scarcely out of sight before a light victoria drawn by a pair of horses -appeared. Standing up in the carriage and holding on to the coachman’s -belt was the rural policeman. To my intense surprise the victoria turned -into our road and rolled past me through the gate. While I was still -seeking an answer to the riddle of the policeman’s appearance at our -farm, a troika trotted up harnessed to a landau, and in the landau sat -the captain of police pointing out our gate to his coachman. - -“What does this mean?” I asked myself. “Pobedimski must have complained -to them about Theodore, and they have come to fetch him away to prison.” - -But the problem was not so easily solved. The policeman and the police -captain were evidently but the forerunners of some one more important -still, for five minutes had scarcely elapsed before a coach drove into -our gate. It flashed by me so quickly that, as I glanced in at the -window, I could only catch a glimpse of a red beard. - -Lost in conjectures and foreseeing some disaster, I ran into the house. -The first person I met in the hall was my mother. Her face was pale, and -she was staring with horror at a door from behind which came the sound -of men’s voices. Some guests had arrived unexpectedly and at the very -height of her headache. - -“Who is here, mamma?” I asked. - -“Sister!” we heard my uncle call. “Do give the governor and the rest of -us a bite to eat!” - -“That’s easier said than done!” whispered my mother, collapsing with -horror. “What can I give them at such short notice? I shall be disgraced -in my declining years!” - -My mother clasped her head with her hands and hurried into the kitchen. -The unexpected arrival of the governor had turned the whole farm upside -down. A cruel holocaust immediately began to take place. Ten hens were -killed and five turkeys and eight ducks, and in the hurly-burly the old -gander was beheaded, the ancestor of all our flock and the favourite of -my mother. The coachman and the cook seemed to have gone mad, and -frantically slaughtered every bird they could lay hands upon without -regard to its age or breed. A pair of my precious turtle doves, as dear -to me as the gander was to my mother, were sacrified to make a gravy. It -was long before I forgave the governor their death. - -That evening, when the governor and his suite had dined until they could -eat no more, and had climbed into their carriages and driven away, I -went into the house to look at the remains of the feast. Glancing into -the drawing-room from the hall, I saw my mother there with my uncle. My -uncle was shrugging his shoulders, and nervously pacing round and round -the room with his hands behind his back. My mother looked exhausted and -very much thinner. She was sitting on the sofa following my uncle’s -movements with eyes of suffering. - -“I beg your pardon, sister, but one cannot behave like that! I -introduced the governor to you, and you did not even shake hands with -him! You quite embarrassed the poor man. Yes, it was most unseemly. -Simplicity is all very pretty, but even simplicity must not be carried -too far, upon my word and honour——And then that dinner! How could you -serve a dinner like that? What was that dish-rag you gave us for the -fourth course?” - -“That was duck with apple sauce,” answered my mother faintly. - -“Duck! Forgive me, sister, but—but—I have an attack of indigestion! I’m -ill!” - -My uncle pulled a sour, tearful face and continued. - -“The devil the governor had to come here to see me! Much I wanted a -visit from him! Ouch—oh, my indigestion! I—I can’t work and I can’t -sleep. I’m completely run down. I don’t see how in the world you can -exist here in this wilderness without anything to do! There now, the -pain is commencing in the pit of my stomach!” - -My uncle knit his brows and walked up and down more swiftly than ever. - -“Brother,” asked my mother softly. “How much does it cost to go abroad?” - -“Three thousand roubles at least!” wailed my uncle. “I should certainly -go, but where can I get the money? I haven’t a copeck! Ouch, what a -pain!” - -My uncle stopped in his walk and gazed with anguish through the window -at the grey, cloudy sky. - -Silence fell. My mother fixed her eyes for a long time on the icon as if -she were debating something, and then burst into tears and exclaimed: - -“I’ll let you have three thousand, brother!” - -Three days later the majestic trunks were sent to the station, and -behind them rolled the carriage containing the privy councillor. He had -wept as he bade farewell to my mother, and had held her hand to his lips -for a long time. As he climbed into the carriage his face had shone with -childish joy. Radiant and happy, he had settled himself more comfortably -in his seat, kissed his hand to my weeping mother, and suddenly and -unexpectedly turned his regard to me. The utmost astonishment had -appeared on his features—— - -“What boy is this?” he had asked. - -As my mother had always assured me that God had sent my uncle to us for -my especial benefit, this question gave her quite a turn. But I was not -thinking about the question. As I looked at my uncle’s happy face I -felt, for some reason, very sorry for him. I could not endure it, and -jumped up into the carriage to embrace this man, so frivolous, so weak, -and so human. As I looked into his eyes I wanted to say something -pleasant, so I asked him: - -“Uncle, were you ever in a battle?” - -“Oh, my precious boy!” laughed my uncle kissing me. “My precious boy, -upon my word and honour! How natural and true to life it all is, upon my -word and honour!” - -The carriage moved away. I followed it with my eyes, and long after it -had disappeared I still heard ringing in my ears that farewell, “Upon my -word and honour!” - - - ROTHSCHILD’S FIDDLE - -It was a tiny town, worse than a village, inhabited chiefly by old -people who so seldom died that it was really vexatious. Very few coffins -were needed for the hospital and the jail; in a word, business was bad. -If Jacob Ivanoff had been a maker of coffins in the county town, he -would probably have owned a house of his own by now, and would have been -called Mr. Ivanoff, but here in this little place he was simply called -Jacob, and for some reason his nickname was Bronze. He lived as poorly -as any common peasant in a little old hut of one room, in which he and -Martha, and the stove, and a double bed, and the coffins, and his -joiner’s bench, and all the necessities of housekeeping were stowed -away. - -The coffins made by Jacob were serviceable and strong. For the peasants -and townsfolk he made them to fit himself and never went wrong, for, -although he was seventy years old, there was no man, not even in the -prison, any taller or stouter than he was. For the gentry and for women -he made them to measure, using an iron yardstick for the purpose. He was -always very reluctant to take orders for children’s coffins, and made -them contemptuously without taking any measurements at all, always -saying when he was paid for them: - -“The fact is, I don’t like to be bothered with trifles.” - -Beside what he received for his work as a joiner, he added a little to -his income by playing the violin. There was a Jewish orchestra in the -town that played for weddings, led by the tinsmith Moses Shakess, who -took more than half of its earnings for himself. As Jacob played the -fiddle extremely well, especially Russian songs, Shakess used sometimes -to invite him to play in his orchestra for the sum of fifty copecks a -day, not including the presents he might receive from the guests. -Whenever Bronze took his seat in the orchestra, the first thing that -happened to him was that his face grew red, and the perspiration -streamed from it, for the air was always hot, and reeking of garlic to -the point of suffocation. Then his fiddle would begin to moan, and a -double bass would croak hoarsely into his right ear, and a flute would -weep into his left. This flute was played by a gaunt, red-bearded Jew -with a network of red and blue veins on his face, who bore the name of a -famous rich man, Rothschild. This confounded Jew always contrived to -play even the merriest tunes sadly. For no obvious reason Jacob little -by little began to conceive a feeling of hatred and contempt for all -Jews, and especially for Rothschild. He quarrelled with him and abused -him in ugly language, and once even tried to beat him, but Rothschild -took offence at this, and cried with a fierce look: - -“If I had not always respected you for your music, I should have thrown -you out of the window long ago!” - -Then he burst into tears. So after that Bronze was not often invited to -play in the orchestra, and was only called upon in cases of dire -necessity, when one of the Jews was missing. - -Jacob was never in a good humour, because he always had to endure the -most terrible losses. For instance, it was a sin to work on a Sunday or -a holiday, and Monday was always a bad day, so in that way there were -about two hundred days a year on which he was compelled to sit with his -hands folded in his lap. That was a great loss to him. If any one in -town had a wedding without music, or if Shakess did not ask him to play, -there was another loss. The police inspector had lain ill with -consumption for two years while Jacob impatiently waited for him to die, -and then had gone to take a cure in the city and had died there, which -of course had meant another loss of at least ten roubles, as the coffin -would have been an expensive one lined with brocade. - -The thought of his losses worried Jacob at night more than at any other -time, so he used to lay his fiddle at his side on the bed, and when -those worries came trooping into his brain he would touch the strings, -and the fiddle would give out a sound in the darkness, and Jacob’s heart -would feel lighter. - -Last year on the sixth of May, Martha suddenly fell ill. The old woman -breathed with difficulty, staggered in her walk, and felt terribly -thirsty. Nevertheless, she got up that morning, lit the stove, and even -went for the water. When evening came she went to bed. Jacob played his -fiddle all day. When it grew quite dark, because he had nothing better -to do, he took the book in which he kept an account of his losses, and -began adding up the total for the year. They amounted to more than a -thousand roubles. He was so shaken by this discovery, that he threw the -counting board on the floor and trampled it under foot. Then he picked -it up again and rattled it once more for a long time, heaving as he did -so sighs both deep and long. His face grew purple, and perspiration -dripped from his brow. He was thinking that if those thousand roubles he -had lost had been in the bank then, he would have had at least forty -roubles interest by the end of the year. So those forty roubles were -still another loss! In a word, wherever he turned he found losses and -nothing but losses. - -“Jacob!” cried Martha unexpectedly, “I am going to die!” - -He looked round at his wife. Her face was flushed with fever and looked -unusually joyful and bright. Bronze was troubled, for he had been -accustomed to seeing her pale and timid and unhappy. It seemed to him -that she was actually dead, and glad to have left this hut, and the -coffins, and Jacob at last. She was staring at the ceiling, with her -lips moving as if she saw her deliverer Death approaching and were -whispering with him. - -The dawn was just breaking and the eastern sky was glowing with a faint -radiance. As he stared at the old woman it somehow seemed to Jacob that -he had never once spoken a tender word to her or pitied her; that he had -never thought of buying her a kerchief or of bringing her back some -sweetmeats from a wedding. On the contrary, he had shouted at her and -abused her for his losses, and had shaken his fist at her. It was true -he had never beaten her, but he had frightened her no less, and she had -been paralysed with fear every time he had scolded her. Yes, and he had -not allowed her to drink tea because his losses were heavy enough as it -was, so she had had to be content with hot water. Now he understood why -her face looked so strangely happy, and horror overwhelmed him. - -As soon as it was light he borrowed a horse from a neighbour and took -Martha to the hospital. As there were not many patients, he had not to -wait very long—only about three hours. To his great satisfaction it was -not the doctor who was receiving the sick that day, but his assistant, -Maksim Nicolaitch, an old man of whom it was said that although he -quarrelled and drank, he knew more than the doctor did. - -“Good morning, your Honour,” said Jacob leading his old woman into the -office. “Excuse us for intruding upon you with our trifling affairs. As -you see, this subject has fallen ill. My life’s friend, if you will -allow me to use the expression——” - -Knitting his grey eyebrows and stroking his whiskers, the doctor’s -assistant fixed his eyes on the old woman. She was sitting all in a heap -on a low stool, and with her thin, long-nosed face and her open mouth, -she looked like a thirsty bird. - -“Well, well—yes—” said the doctor slowly, heaving a sigh. “This is a -case of influenza and possibly fever; there is typhoid in town. What’s -to be done? The old woman has lived her span of years, thank God. How -old is she?” - -“She lacks one year of being seventy, your Honour.” - -“Well, well, she has lived long. There must come an end to everything.” - -“You are certainly right, your Honour,” said Jacob, smiling out of -politeness. “And we thank you sincerely for your kindness, but allow me -to suggest to you that even an insect dislikes to die!” - -“Never mind if it does!” answered the doctor, as if the life or death of -the old woman lay in his hands. “I’ll tell you what you must do, my good -man. Put a cold bandage around her head, and give her two of these -powders a day. Now then, good-by! Bon jour!” - -Jacob saw by the expression on the doctor’s face that it was too late -now for powders. He realised clearly that Martha must die very soon, if -not to-day, then to-morrow. He touched the doctor’s elbow gently, -blinked, and whispered: - -“She ought to be cupped, doctor!” - -“I haven’t time, I haven’t time, my good man. Take your old woman, and -go in God’s name. Good-by.” - -“Please, please, cup her, doctor!” begged Jacob. “You know yourself that -if she had a pain in her stomach, powders and drops would do her good, -but she has a cold! The first thing to do when one catches cold is to -let some blood, doctor!” - -But the doctor had already sent for the next patient, and a woman -leading a little boy came into the room. - -“Go along, go along!” he cried to Jacob, frowning. “It’s no use making a -fuss!” - -“Then at least put some leeches on her! Let me pray to God for you for -the rest of my life!” - -The doctor’s temper flared up and he shouted: - -“Don’t say another word to me, blockhead!” - -Jacob lost his temper, too, and flushed hotly, but he said nothing and, -silently taking Martha’s arm, led her out of the office. Only when they -were once more seated in their wagon did he look fiercely and mockingly -at the hospital and say: - -“They’re a pretty lot in there, they are! That doctor would have cupped -a rich man, but he even begrudged a poor one a leech. The pig!” - -When they returned to the hut, Martha stood for nearly ten minutes -supporting herself by the stove. She felt that if she lay down Jacob -would begin to talk to her about his losses, and would scold her for -lying down and not wanting to work. Jacob contemplated her sadly, -thinking that to-morrow was St. John the Baptist’s day, and day after -to-morrow was St. Nicholas the Wonder Worker’s day, and that the -following day would be Sunday, and the day after that would be Monday, a -bad day for work. So he would not be able to work for four days, and as -Martha would probably die on one of these days, the coffin would have to -be made at once. He took his iron yardstick in hand, went up to the old -woman, and measured her. Then she lay down, and he crossed himself and -went to work on the coffin. - -When the task was completed Bronze put on his spectacles and wrote in -his book: - -“To 1 coffin for Martha Ivanoff—2 roubles, 40 copecks.” - -He sighed. All day the old woman lay silent with closed eyes, but toward -evening, when the daylight began to fade, she suddenly called the old -man to her side. - -“Do you remember, Jacob?” she asked. “Do you remember how fifty years -ago God gave us a little baby with curly golden hair? Do you remember -how you and I used to sit on the bank of the river and sing songs under -the willow tree?” Then with a bitter smile she added: “The baby died.” - -Jacob racked his brains, but for the life of him he could not recall the -child or the willow tree. - -“You are dreaming,” he said. - -The priest came and administered the Sacrament and Extreme Unction. Then -Martha began muttering unintelligibly, and toward morning she died. - -The neighbouring old women washed her and dressed her, and laid her in -her coffin. To avoid paying the deacon, Jacob read the psalms over her -himself, and her grave cost him nothing, as the watchman of the cemetery -was his cousin. Four peasants carried the coffin to the grave, not for -money but for love. The old women, the beggars, and two village idiots -followed the body, and the people whom they passed on the way crossed -themselves devoutly. Jacob was very glad that everything had passed off -so nicely and decently and cheaply, without giving offence to any one. -As he said farewell to Martha for the last time he touched the coffin -with his hand and thought: - -“That’s a fine job!” - -But walking homeward from the cemetery he was seized with great -distress. He felt ill, his breath was burning hot, his legs grew weak, -and he longed for a drink. Beside this, a thousand thoughts came -crowding into his head. He remembered again that he had never once -pitied Martha or said a tender word to her. The fifty years of their -life together lay stretched far, far behind him, and somehow, during all -that time, he had never once thought about her at all or noticed her -more than if she had been a dog or a cat. And yet she had lit the stove -every day, and had cooked and baked and fetched water and chopped wood, -and when he had come home drunk from a wedding she had hung his fiddle -reverently on a nail each time, and had silently put him to bed with a -timid, anxious look on her face. - -But here came Rothschild toward him, bowing and scraping and smiling. - -“I have been looking for you, uncle!” he said. “Moses Shakess presents -his compliments and wants you to go to him at once.” - -Jacob did not feel in a mood to do anything. He wanted to cry. - -“Leave me alone!” he exclaimed, and walked on. - -“Oh, how can you say that?” cried Rothschild, running beside him in -alarm. “Moses will be very angry. He wants you to come at once!” - -Jacob was disgusted by the panting of the Jew, by his blinking eyes, and -by the quantities of reddish freckles on his face. He looked with -aversion at his long green coat and at the whole of his frail, delicate -figure. - -“What do you mean by pestering me, garlic?” he shouted. “Get away!” - -The Jew grew angry and shouted back: - -“Don’t yell at me like that or I’ll send you flying over that fence!” - -“Get out of my sight!” bellowed Jacob, shaking his fist at him. “There’s -no living in the same town with swine like you!” - -Rothschild was petrified with terror. He sank to the ground and waved -his hands over his head as if to protect himself from falling blows; -then he jumped up and ran away as fast as his legs could carry him. As -he ran he leaped and waved his arms, and his long, gaunt back could be -seen quivering. The little boys were delighted at what had happened, and -ran after him screaming: “Sheeny! Sheeny!” The dogs also joined barking -in the chase. Somebody laughed and then whistled, at which the dogs -barked louder and more vigorously than ever. - -Then one of them must have bitten Rothschild, for a piteous, despairing -scream rent the air. - -Jacob walked across the common to the edge of the town without knowing -where he was going, and the little boys shouted after him. “There goes -old man Bronze! There goes old man Bronze!” He found himself by the -river where the snipe were darting about with shrill cries, and the -ducks were quacking and swimming to and fro. The sun was shining -fiercely and the water was sparkling so brightly that it was painful to -look at. Jacob struck into a path that led along the river bank. He came -to a stout, red-cheeked woman just leaving a bath-house. “Aha, you -otter, you!” he thought. Not far from the bath-house some little boys -were fishing for crabs with pieces of meat. When they saw Jacob they -shouted mischievously: “Old man Bronze! Old man Bronze!” But there -before him stood an ancient, spreading willow tree with a massive trunk, -and a crow’s nest among its branches. Suddenly there flashed across -Jacob’s memory with all the vividness of life a little child with golden -curls, and the willow of which Martha had spoken. Yes, this was the same -tree, so green and peaceful and sad. How old it had grown, poor thing! - -He sat down at its foot and thought of the past. On the opposite shore, -where that meadow now was, there had stood in those days a wood of tall -birch-trees, and that bare hill on the horizon yonder had been covered -with the blue bloom of an ancient pine forest. And sailboats had plied -the river then, but now all lay smooth and still, and only one little -birch-tree was left on the opposite bank, a graceful young thing, like a -girl, while on the river there swam only ducks and geese. It was hard to -believe that boats had once sailed there. It even seemed to him that -there were fewer geese now than there had been. Jacob shut his eyes, and -one by one white geese came flying toward him, an endless flock. - -He was puzzled to know why he had never once been down to the river -during the last forty or fifty years of his life, or, if he had been -there, why he had never paid any attention to it. The stream was fine -and large; he might have fished in it and sold the fish to the merchants -and the government officials and the restaurant keeper at the station, -and put the money in the bank. He might have rowed in a boat from farm -to farm and played on his fiddle. People of every rank would have paid -him money to hear him. He might have tried to run a boat on the river, -that would have been better than making coffins. Finally, he might have -raised geese, and killed them, and sent them to Moscow in the winter. -Why, the down alone would have brought him ten roubles a year! But he -had missed all these chances and had done nothing. What losses were -here! Ah, what terrible losses! And, oh, if he had only done all these -things at the same time! If he had only fished, and played the fiddle, -and sailed a boat, and raised geese, what capital he would have had by -now! But he had not even dreamed of doing all this; his life had gone by -without profit or pleasure. It had been lost for a song. Nothing was -left ahead; behind lay only losses, and such terrible losses that he -shuddered to think of them. But why shouldn’t men live so as to avoid -all this waste and these losses? Why, oh, why, should those birch and -pine forests have been felled? Why should those meadows be lying so -deserted? Why did people always do exactly what they ought not to do? -Why had Jacob scolded and growled and clenched his fists and hurt his -wife’s feelings all his life? Why, oh why, had he frightened and -insulted that Jew just now? Why did people in general always interfere -with one another? What losses resulted from this! What terrible losses! -If it were not for envy and anger they would get great profit from one -another. - -All that evening and night Jacob dreamed of the child, of the willow -tree, of the fish and the geese, of Martha with her profile like a -thirsty bird, and of Rothschild’s pale, piteous mien. Queer faces seemed -to be moving toward him from all sides, muttering to him about his -losses. He tossed from side to side, and got up five times during the -night to play his fiddle. - -He rose with difficulty next morning, and walked to the hospital. The -same doctor’s assistant ordered him to put cold bandages on his head, -and gave him little powders to take; by his expression and the tone of -his voice Jacob knew that the state of affairs was bad, and that no -powders could save him now. As he walked home he reflected that one good -thing would result from his death: he would no longer have to eat and -drink and pay taxes, neither would he offend people any more, and, as a -man lies in his grave for hundreds of thousands of years, the sum of his -profits would be immense. So, life to a man was a loss—death, a gain. Of -course this reasoning was correct, but it was also distressingly sad. -Why should the world be so strangely arranged that a man’s life which -was only given to him once must pass without profit? - -He was not sorry then that he was going to die, but when he reached -home, and saw his fiddle, his heart ached, and he regretted it deeply. -He would not be able to take his fiddle with him into the grave, and now -it would be left an orphan, and its fate would be that of the birch -grove and the pine forest. Everything in the world had been lost, and -would always be lost for ever. Jacob went out and sat on the threshold -of his hut, clasping his fiddle to his breast. And as he thought of his -life so full of waste and losses he began playing without knowing how -piteous and touching his music was, and the tears streamed down his -cheeks. And the more he thought the more sorrowfully sang his violin. - -The latch clicked and Rothschild came in through the garden-gate, and -walked boldly half-way across the garden. Then he suddenly stopped, -crouched down, and, probably from fear, began making signs with his -hands as if he were trying to show on his fingers what time it was. - -“Come on, don’t be afraid!” said Jacob gently, beckoning him to advance. -“Come on!” - -With many mistrustful and fearful glances Rothschild went slowly up to -Jacob, and stopped about two yards away. - -“Please don’t beat me!” he said with a ducking bow. “Moses Shakess has -sent me to you again. ‘Don’t be afraid,’ he said, ‘go to Jacob,’ says -he, ‘and say that we can’t possibly manage without him.’ There is a -wedding next Thursday. Ye-es, sir. Mr. Shapovaloff is marrying his -daughter to a very fine man. It will be an expensive wedding, ai, ai!” -added the Jew with a wink. - -“I can’t go” said Jacob breathing hard. “I’m ill, brother.” - -And he began to play again, and the tears gushed out of his eyes over -his fiddle. Rothschild listened intently with his head turned away and -his arms folded on his breast. The startled, irresolute look on his face -gradually gave way to one of suffering and grief. He cast up his eyes as -if in an ecstasy of agony and murmured: “Ou—ouch!” And the tears began -to trickle slowly down his cheeks, and to drip over his green coat. - -All day Jacob lay and suffered. When the priest came in the evening to -administer the Sacrament he asked him if he could not think of any -particular sin. - -Struggling with his fading memories, Jacob recalled once more Martha’s -sad face, and the despairing cry of the Jew when the dog had bitten him. -He murmured almost inaudibly: - -“Give my fiddle to Rothschild.” - -“It shall be done,” answered the priest. - -So it happened that every one in the little town began asking: - -“Where did Rothschild get that good fiddle? Did he buy it or steal it or -get it out of a pawnshop?” - -Rothschild has long since abandoned his flute, and now only plays on the -violin. The same mournful notes flow from under his bow that used to -come from his flute, and when he tries to repeat what Jacob played as he -sat on the threshold of his hut, the result is an air so plaintive and -sad that every one who hears him weeps, and he himself at last raises -his eyes and murmurs: “Ou—ouch!” And this new song has so delighted the -town that the merchants and government officials vie with each other in -getting Rothschild to come to their houses, and sometimes make him play -it ten times in succession. - - - A HORSEY NAME - -Major-General Buldeeff was suffering from toothache. He had rinsed his -mouth with vodka and cognac; applied tobacco ashes, opium, turpentine, -and kerosene to the aching tooth; rubbed his cheek with iodine, and put -cotton wool soaked with alcohol into his ears, but all these remedies -had either failed to relieve him or else had made him sick. The dentist -was sent for. He picked at his tooth and prescribed quinine, but this -did not help the general. Buldeeff met the suggestion that the tooth -should be pulled with refusal. Every one in the house, his wife, his -children, the servants, even Petka, the scullery boy, suggested some -remedy. Among others his steward, Ivan Evceitch came to him, and advised -him to try a conjuror. - -“Your Excellency,” said he, “ten years ago an exciseman lived in this -county whose name was Jacob. He was a first-class conjuror for the -toothache. He used simply to turn toward the window and spit, and the -pain would go in a minute. That was his gift.” - -“Where is he now?” - -“After he was dismissed from the revenue service, he went to live in -Saratoff with his mother-in-law. He makes his living off nothing but -teeth now. If any one has a toothache, he sends for him to cure it. The -Saratoff people have him come to their houses, but he cures people in -other cities by telegraph. Send him a telegram, your Excellency, say: -‘I, God’s servant Alexei, have the toothache. I want you to cure me.’ -You can send him his fee by mail.” - -“Stuff and nonsense! Humbug!” - -“Just try it, your Excellency! He is fond of vodka, it is true, and is -living with some German woman instead of his wife, and he uses terrible -language, but he is a remarkable wonder worker.” - -“Do send him a telegram, Alexei!” begged the general’s wife. “You don’t -believe in conjuring, I know, but I have tried it. Why not send him the -message, even if you don’t believe it will do you any good? It can’t -kill you!” - -“Very well, then,” Buldeeff consented. “I would willingly send a -telegram to the devil, let alone to an exciseman. Ouch! I can’t stand -this! Come, where does your conjuror live? What is his name?” - -The general sat down at his desk, and took up a pen. - -“He is known to every dog in Saratoff,” said the steward. “Just address -the telegram to Mr. Jacob—Jacob——” - -“Well?” - -“Jacob—Jacob—what? I can’t remember his surname. Jacob—darn it, what is -his surname? I thought of it as I was coming along. Wait a minute!” - -Ivan raised his eyes to the ceiling, and moved his lips. Buldeeff and -his wife waited impatiently for him to remember the name. - -“Well then, what is it? Think harder.” - -“Just a minute! Jacob—Jacob—I can’t remember it! It’s a common name too, -something to do with a horse. Is it Mayres? No it isn’t Mayres—Wait a -bit, is it Colt? No, it isn’t Colt. I know perfectly well it’s a horsey -name, but it has absolutely gone out of my head!” - -“It isn’t Filley?” - -“No, no—wait a jiffy. Maresfield, Maresden—Farrier—Harrier——” - -“That’s a doggy name, not a horsey one. Is it Foley?” - -“No, no, it isn’t Foley. Just a second—Horseman—Horsey—Hackney. No, it -isn’t any of those.” - -“Then how am I to send that telegram? Think a little harder!” - -“One moment! Carter—Coltsford—Shafter——” - -“Shaftsbury?” suggested the general’s wife. - -“No, no—Wheeler—no, that isn’t it! I’ve forgotten it!” - -“Then why on earth did you come pestering me with your advice, if you -couldn’t remember the man’s name?” stormed the general. “Get out of -here!” - -Ivan went slowly out, and the general clutched his cheek, and went -rushing through the house. - -“Ouch! Oh Lord!” he howled. “Oh, mother! Ouch! I’m as blind as a bat!” - -The steward went into the garden, and, raising his eyes to heaven, tried -to remember the exciseman’s name. - -“Hunt—Hunter—Huntley. No, that’s wrong! Cobb—Cobden—Dobbins—Maresly——” - -Shortly afterward, the steward was again summoned by his master. - -“Well, have you thought of it?” asked the general. - -“No, not yet, your Excellency!” - -“Is it Barnes?” asked the general. “Is it Palfrey, by any chance?” - -Every one in the house began madly to invent names. Horses of every -possible age, breed, and sex were considered; their names, hoofs, and -harness were all thought of. People were frantically walking up and down -in the house, garden, servants’ quarters, and kitchen, all scratching -their heads, and searching for the right name. - -Suddenly the steward was sent for again. - -“Is it Herder?” they asked him. “Hocker? Hyde? Groome?” - -“No, no, no,” answered Ivan, and, casting up his eyes, he went on -thinking aloud. - -“Steed—Charger—Horsely—Harness——” - -“Papa!” cried a voice from the nursery. “Tracey! Bitter!” - -The whole farm was now in an uproar. The impatient, agonised general -promised five roubles to any one who would think of the right name, and -a perfect mob began to follow Ivan Evceitch about. - -“Bayley!” They cried to him. “Trotter! Hackett!” - -Evening came at last, and still the name had not been found. The -household went to bed without sending the telegram. - -The general did not sleep a wink, but walked, groaning, up and down his -room. At three o’clock in the morning he went out into the yard and -tapped at the steward’s window. - -“It isn’t Gelder, is it?” he asked almost in tears. - -“No, not Gelder, your Excellency,” answered Ivan, sighing -apologetically. - -“Perhaps it isn’t a horsey name at all? Perhaps it is something entirely -different?” - -“No, no, upon my word, it’s a horsey name, your Excellency, I remember -that perfectly.” - -“What an abominable memory you have, brother! That name is worth more -than anything on earth to me now! I’m in agony!” - -Next morning the general sent for the dentist again. - -“I’ll have it out!” he cried. “I can’t stand this any longer!” - -The dentist came and pulled out the aching tooth. The pain at once -subsided, and the general grew quieter. Having done his work and -received his fee, the dentist climbed into his gig, and drove away. In -the field outside the front gate he met Ivan. The steward was standing -by the roadside plunged in thought, with his eyes fixed on the ground at -his feet. Judging from the deep wrinkles that furrowed his brow, he was -painfully racking his brains over something, and was muttering to -himself: - -“Dunn—Sadler—Buckle—Coachman——” - -“Hello, Ivan!” cried the doctor driving up. “Won’t you sell me a load of -hay? I have been buying mine from the peasants lately, but it’s no -good.” - -Ivan glared dully at the doctor, smiled vaguely, and without answering a -word threw up his arms, and rushed toward the house as if a mad dog were -after him. - -“I’ve thought of the name, your Excellency!” he shrieked with delight, -bursting into the general’s study. “I’ve thought of it, thanks to the -doctor. Hayes! Hayes is the exciseman’s name! Hayes, your Honour! Send a -telegram to Hayes!” - -“Slow-coach!” said the general contemptuously, snapping his fingers at -him. “I don’t need your horsey name now! Slow-coach!” - - - THE PETCHENEG[1] - -One hot summer’s day Ivan Jmukin was returning from town to his farm in -southern Russia. Jmukin was a retired old Cossack officer, who had -served in the Caucasus, and had once been lusty and strong, but he was -an old man now, shrivelled and bent, with bushy eyebrows and a long, -greenish-grey moustache. He had been fasting in town, and had made his -will, for it was only two weeks since he had had a slight stroke of -paralysis, and now, sitting in the train, he was full of deep, gloomy -thoughts of his approaching death, of the vanity of life, and of the -transient quality of all earthly things. At Provalye, one of the -stations on the Don railway, a fair-haired, middle-aged man, carrying a -worn portfolio under his arm, entered the compartment and sat down -opposite the old Cossack. They began talking together. - -Footnote 1: - - Petchenegs, wild tribesmen of the Caucasus. - -“No,” said Jmukin gazing pensively out of the window. “It is never too -late to marry. I myself was forty-eight when I married, and every one -said it was too late, but it has turned out to be neither too late nor -too early. Still, it is better never to marry at all. Every one soon -gets tired of a wife, though not every one will tell you the truth, -because, you know, people are ashamed of their family troubles, and try -to conceal them. It is often ‘Manya, dear Manya,’ with a man when, if he -had his way, he would put that Manya of his into a sack, and throw her -into the river. A wife is a nuisance and a bore, and children are no -better, I can assure you. I have two scoundrels myself. There is nowhere -they can go to school on the steppe, and I can’t afford to send them to -Novotcherkask, so they are growing up here like young wolf cubs. At any -moment they may murder some one on the highway.” - -The fair-haired man listened attentively, and answered all questions -addressed to him briefly, in a low voice. He was evidently gentle and -unassuming. He told his companion that he was an attorney, on his way to -the village of Duevka on business. - -“Why, for heaven’s sake, that’s only nine miles from where I live!” -cried Jmukin, as if some one had been disputing it. “You won’t be able -to get any horses at the station this evening. In my opinion the best -thing for you to do is to come home with me, you know, and spend the -night at my house, you know, and let me send you on to-morrow with my -horses.” - -After a moment’s reflection the attorney accepted the invitation. - -The sun was hanging low over the steppe when they arrived at the -station. The two men remained silent as they drove from the railway to -the farm, for the jolting that the road gave them forbade conversation. -The tarantass[2] bounded and whined and seemed to be sobbing, as if its -leaps caused it the keenest pain, and the attorney, who found his seat -very uncomfortable, gazed with anguish before him, hoping to descry the -farm in the distance. After they had driven eight miles a low house -surrounded by a dark wattle fence came into view. The roof was painted -green, the stucco on the walls was peeling off, and the little windows -looked like puckered eyes. The farmhouse stood exposed to all the ardour -of the sun; neither trees nor water were visible anywhere near it. The -neighbouring landowners and peasants called it “Petcheneg Grange.” Many -years ago a passing surveyor, who was spending the night at the farm, -had talked with Jmukin all night, and had gone away in the morning much -displeased, saying sternly as he left: “Sir, you are nothing but a -Petcheneg!” So the name “Petcheneg Grange” had been given to the farm, -and had stuck to it all the more closely as Jmukin’s boys began to grow -up, and to perpetrate raids on the neighbouring gardens and melon -fields. Jmukin himself was known as “old man you know,” because he -talked so much, and used the words “you know” so often. - -Footnote 2: - - A rough carriage used in southern Russia. - -Jmukin’s two sons were standing in the courtyard, near the stables, as -the tarantass drove up. One was about nineteen, the other was a -hobbledehoy of a few years younger; both were barefoot and hatless. As -the carriage went by the younger boy threw a hen high up over his head. -It described an arc in the air, and fluttered cackling down till the -elder fired a shot from his gun, and the dead bird fell to earth with a -thud. - -“Those are my boys learning to shoot birds on the wing,” Jmukin said. - -The travellers were met in the front entry by a woman, a thin, -pale-faced little creature, still pretty and young, who, from her dress, -might have been taken for a servant. - -“This,” said Jmukin, “is the mother of those sons of guns of mine. Come -on, Lyuboff!” he cried to his wife. “Hustle, now, mother, and help -entertain our guest. Bring us some supper! Quick!” - -The house consisted of two wings. On one side were the “drawing-room” -and, adjoining it, the old man’s bedchamber; close, stuffy apartments -both, with low ceilings, infested by thousands of flies. On the other -side was the kitchen, where the cooking and washing were done and the -workmen were fed. Here, under benches, geese and turkeys were sitting on -their nests, and here stood the beds of Lyuboff and her two sons. The -furniture in the drawing-room was unpainted and had evidently been made -by a country joiner. On the walls hung guns, game bags, and whips, all -of which old trash was rusty and grey with dust. Not a picture was on -the walls, only a dark, painted board that had once been an icon hung in -one corner of the room. - -A young peasant woman set the table and brought in ham and borstch.[3] -Jmukin’s guest declined vodka, and confined himself to eating cucumbers -and bread. - -Footnote 3: - - Borstch: the national soup of Little Russia. - -“And what about the ham?” Jmukin asked. - -“No, thank you, I don’t eat ham,” answered his guest. “I don’t eat meat -of any kind.” - -“Why not?” - -“I’m a vegetarian. It’s against my principles to kill animals.” - -Jmukin was silent for a moment, and then said slowly, with a sigh: - -“I see—yes. I saw a man in town who didn’t eat meat either. It is a new -religion people have. And why shouldn’t they have it? It’s a good thing. -One can’t always be killing and shooting; one must take a rest sometimes -and let the animals have a little peace. Of course it’s a sin to kill, -there’s no doubt about that. Sometimes, when you shoot a hare, and hit -him in the leg he will scream like a baby. So it hurts him!” - -“Of course it hurts him! Animals suffer pain just as much as we do.” - -“That’s a fact!” Jmukin agreed. “I see that perfectly,” he added -pensively. “Only there is one thing that I must say I can’t quite -understand. Suppose, for instance, you know, every one were to stop -eating meat, what would become of all our barnyard fowls, like chickens -and geese?” - -“Chickens and geese would go free just like all other birds.” - -“Ah! Now I understand. Of course. Crows and magpies get on without us -all right. Yes. And chickens and geese and rabbits and sheep would all -be free and happy, you know, and would praise God, and not be afraid of -us any more. So peace and quiet would reign upon earth. Only one thing I -can’t understand, you know,” Jmukin continued, with a glance at the ham. -“Where would all the pigs go to? What would become of them?” - -“The same thing that would become of all the other animals, they would -go free.” - -“I see—yes. But, listen, if they were not killed, they would multiply, -you know, and then it would be good-by to our meadows and vegetable -gardens! Why, if a pig is turned loose and not watched, it will ruin -everything for you in a day! A pig is a pig, and hasn’t been called one -for nothing!” - -They finished their supper. Jmukin rose from the table, and walked up -and down the room for a long time, talking interminably. He loved to -think of and discuss deep and serious subjects, and was longing to -discover some theory that would sustain him in his old age, so that he -might find peace of mind, and not think it so terrible to die. He -desired for himself the same gentleness and self-confidence and peace of -mind which he saw in this guest of his, who had just eaten his fill of -cucumbers and bread, and was a better man for it, sitting there on a -bench so healthy and fat, patiently bored, looking like a huge heathen -idol that nothing could move from his seat. - -“If a man can only find some idea to hold to in life, he will be happy,” -Jmukin thought. - -The old Cossack went out on the front steps, and the attorney could hear -him sighing and repeating to himself: - -“Yes—I see——” - -Night was falling, and the stars were shining out one by one. The lamps -in the house had not been lit. Some one came creeping toward the -drawing-room as silently as a shadow, and stopped in the doorway. It was -Lyuboff, Jmukin’s wife. - -“Have you come from the city?” she asked timidly, without looking at her -guest. - -“Yes, I live in the city.” - -“Maybe you know about schools, master, and can tell us what to do if you -will be so kind. We need advice.” - -“What do you want?” - -“We have two sons, kind master, and they should have been sent to school -long ago, but nobody ever comes here and we have no one to tell us -anything. I myself know nothing. If they don’t go to school, they will -be taken into the army as common Cossacks. That is hard, master. They -can’t read or write, they are worse off than peasants, and their father -himself despises them, and won’t let them come into the house. Is it -their fault? If only the younger one, at least, could be sent to school! -It’s a pity to see them so!” she wailed, and her voice trembled. It -seemed incredible that a woman so little and young could already have -grown-up children. “Ah, it is such a pity!” she said again. - -“You know nothing about it, mother, and it’s none of your business,” -said Jmukin, appearing in the doorway. “Don’t pester our guest with your -wild talk. Go away, mother!” - -Lyuboff went out, repeating once more in a high little voice as she -reached the hall: - -“Ah, it is such a pity!” - -A bed was made up for the attorney on a sofa in the drawing-room, and -Jmukin lit the little shrine lamp, so that he might not be left in the -dark. Then he lay down in his own bedroom. Lying there he thought of -many things: his soul, his old age, and his recent stroke which had -given him such a fright and had so sharply reminded him of his -approaching death. He liked to philosophise when he was alone in the -dark, and at these times he imagined himself to be a very deep and -serious person indeed, whose attention only questions of importance -could engage. He now kept thinking that he would like to get hold of -some one idea unlike any other idea he had ever had, something -significant that would be the lodestar of his life. He wanted to think -of some law for himself, that would make his life as serious and deep as -he himself personally was. And here was an idea! He could go without -meat now, and deprive himself of everything that was superfluous to his -existence! The time would surely come when people would no longer kill -animals or one another, it could not but come, and he pictured this -future in his mind’s eye, and distinctly saw himself living at peace -with all the animal world. Then he remembered the pigs again, and his -brain began to reel. - -“What a muddle it all is!” he muttered, heaving a deep sigh. - -“Are you asleep?” he asked. - -“No.” - -Jmukin rose from his bed, and stood on the threshold of the door in his -nightshirt, exposing to his guest’s view his thin, sinewy legs, as -straight as posts. - -“Just look, now,” he began. “Here is all this telegraph and telephone -business, in a word, all these marvels, you know, and yet people are no -more virtuous than they used to be. It is said that when I was young, -thirty or forty years ago, people were rougher and crueller than they -are now, but aren’t they just the same to-day? Of course, they were less -ceremonious when I was a youngster. I remember how once, when we had -been stationed on the bank of a river in the Caucasus for four months -without anything to do, quite a little romance took place. On the very -bank of the river, you know, where our regiment was encamped, we had -buried a prince whom we had killed not long before. So at night, you -know, his princess used to come down to the grave and cry. She screamed -and screamed, and groaned and groaned until we got into such a state -that we couldn’t sleep a wink. We didn’t sleep for nights. We grew tired -of it. And honestly, why should we be kept awake by that devil of a -voice? Excuse the expression! So we took that princess and gave her a -good thrashing, and she stopped coming to the grave. There you are! -Nowadays, of course, men of that category don’t exist any more. People -don’t thrash one another, and they live more cleanly and learn more -lessons than they used to, but their hearts haven’t changed one bit, you -know. Listen to this, for instance. There is a landlord near here who -owns a coal mine, you know. He has all sorts of vagabonds and men -without passports working for him, men who have nowhere else to go. When -Saturday comes round the workmen have to be paid, and their employer -never wants to do that, he is too fond of his money. So he has picked -out a foreman, a vagabond, too, though he wears a hat, and he says to -him: ‘Don’t pay them a thing,’ says our gentleman, ‘not even a penny. -They will beat you, but you must stand it. If you do, I’ll give you ten -roubles every Saturday.’ So every week, regularly, when Saturday evening -comes round the workmen come for their wages, and the foreman says: -‘There aren’t any wages!’ Well, words follow, and then come abuse, and a -drubbing. They beat him and kick him, for the men are wild with hunger, -you know; they beat him until he is unconscious, and then go off to the -four winds of heaven. The owner of the mine orders cold water to be -thrown over his foreman, and pitches him ten roubles. The man takes the -money, and is thankful, for the fact is he would agree to wear a noose -round his neck for a penny! Yes, and on Monday a new gang of workmen -arrives. They come because they have nowhere else to go. On Saturday -there is the same old story over again.” - -The attorney rolled over, with his face toward the back of the sofa, and -mumbled something incoherent. - -“Take another example, for instance,” Jmukin went on. “When we had the -Siberian cattle plague here, you know, the cattle died like flies, I can -tell you. The veterinary surgeons came, and strictly ordered all -infected stock that died to be buried as far away from the farm as -possible, and to be covered with lime and so on, according to the laws -of science. Well, one of my horses died. I buried it with the greatest -care, and shovelled at least ten poods[4] of lime on top of it, but what -do you think? That pair of young jackanapes of mine dug up the horse one -night, and sold the skin for three roubles! There now, what do you think -of that?” - -Footnote 4: - - Pood: Russian measure of weight = 40 pounds. - -Flashes of lightning were gleaming through the cracks of the shutters on -one side of the room. The air was sultry before the approaching storm, -and the mosquitoes had begun to bite. Jmukin groaned and sighed, as he -lay meditating in his bed, and kept repeating to himself: - -“Yes—I see——” - -Sleep was impossible. Somewhere in the distance thunder was growling. - -“Are you awake?” - -“Yes,” answered his guest. - -Jmukin rose and walked with shuffling slippers through the drawing-room, -and hall, and into the kitchen to get a drink of water. - -“The worst thing in the world is stupidity,” he said, as he returned a -few minutes later with a dipper in his hand. “That Lyuboff of mine gets -down on her knees and prays to God every night. She flops down on the -floor and prays that the boys may be sent to school, you know. She is -afraid they will be drafted into the army as common Cossacks, and have -their backs tickled with sabres. But it would take money to send them to -school, and where can I get it? What you haven’t got you haven’t got, -and it’s no use crying for the moon! Another reason she prays is -because, like all women, you know, she thinks she is the most unhappy -creature in the world. I am an outspoken man, and I won’t hide anything -from you. She comes of a poor priest’s family—of church-bell stock, one -might say—and I married her when she was seventeen. They gave her to me -chiefly because times were hard, and her family were in want and had -nothing to eat, and when all is said and done I do own some land, as you -see, and I am an officer of sorts. She felt flattered at the idea of -being my wife, you know. But she began to cry on the day of our wedding, -and has cried every day since for twenty years; her eyes must be made of -water! She does nothing but sit and think. What does she think about, I -ask you? What can a woman think about? Nothing! The fact is, I don’t -consider women human beings.” - -The attorney jumped up impetuously, and sat up in bed. - -“Excuse me, I feel a little faint,” he said. “I am going out-of-doors.” - -Jmukin, still talking about women, drew back the bolts of the hall door, -and both men went out together. A full moon was floating over the -grange. The house and stables looked whiter than they had by day, and -shimmering white bands of light lay among the shadows on the lawn. To -the right lay the steppe, with the stars glowing softly over it; as one -gazed into its depths, it looked mysterious and infinitely distant, like -some bottomless abyss. To the left, heavy thunder-clouds lay piled one -upon another. Their margins were lit by the rays of the moon, and they -resembled dark forests, seas, and mountains with snowy summits. Flashes -of lightning were playing about their peaks, and soft thunder was -growling in their depths; a battle seemed to be raging among them. - -Quite near the house a little screech owl was crying monotonously: - -“Whew! Whew!” - -“What time is it?” asked the attorney. - -“Nearly two o’clock.” - -“What a long time yet until dawn!” - -They re-entered the house and lay down. It was time to go to sleep, and -sleep is usually so sound before a storm, but the old man was pining for -grave, weighty meditations, and he not only wanted to think, he wanted -to talk as well. So he babbled on of what a fine thing it would be if, -for the sake of his soul, a man could shake off this idleness that was -imperceptibly and uselessly devouring his days and years one after -another. He said he would like to think of some feat of strength to -perform, such as making a long journey on foot or giving up meat, as -this young man had done. And once more he pictured the future when men -would no longer kill animals; he pictured it as clearly and precisely as -if he himself had lived at that time, but suddenly his thoughts grew -confused, and again he understood nothing. - -The thunder-storm rolled by, but one corner of the cloud passed over the -grange, and the rain began to drum on the roof. Jmukin got up, sighing -with age and stretching his limbs, and peered into the drawing-room. -Seeing that his guest was still awake, he said: - -“When we were in the Caucasus, you know, we had a colonel who was a -vegetarian as you are. He never ate meat and never hunted or allowed his -men to fish. I can understand that, of course. Every animal has a right -to enjoy its life and its freedom. But I can’t understand how pigs could -be allowed to roam wherever they pleased without being watched——” - -His guest sat up in bed; his pale, haggard face was stamped with -vexation and fatigue. It was plain that he was suffering agonies, and -that only a kind and considerate heart forbade him to put his irritation -into words. - -“It is already light,” he said briefly. “Please let me have a horse -now.” - -“What do you mean? Wait until the rain stops!” - -“No, please!” begged the guest in a panic. “I really must be going at -once!” - -And he began to dress quickly. - -The sun was already rising when a horse and carriage were brought to the -door. The rain had stopped, the clouds were skimming across the sky, and -the rifts of blue were growing wider and wider between them. The first -rays of the sun were timidly lighting up the meadows below. The attorney -passed through the front entry with his portfolio under his arm, while -Jmukin’s wife, with red eyes, and a face even paler than it had been the -evening before, stood gazing fixedly at him with the innocent look of a -little girl. Her sorrowful face showed how much she envied her guest his -liberty. Ah, with what joy she, too, would have left this place! Her -eyes spoke of something she longed to say to him, perhaps some advice -she wanted to ask him about her boys. How pitiful she was! She was not a -wife, she was not the mistress of the house, she was not even a servant, -but a miserable dependent, a poor relation, a nonentity wanted by no -one. Her husband bustled about near his guest, not ceasing his talk for -an instant, and at last ran ahead to see him into the carriage, while -she stood shrinking timidly and guiltily against the wall, still waiting -for the moment to come that would give her an opportunity to speak. - -“Come again! Come again!” the old man repeated over and over again. -“Everything we have is at your service, you know!” - -His guest hastily climbed into the tarantass, obviously with infinite -pleasure, looking as if he were afraid every second of being detained. -The tarantass bounded and whined as it had done the day before, and a -bucket tied on behind clattered madly. The attorney looked round at -Jmukin with a peculiar expression in his eyes. He seemed to be wanting -to call him a Petcheneg, or something of the sort, as the surveyor had -done, but his kindness triumphed. He controlled himself, and the words -remained unsaid. As he reached the gate, however, he suddenly felt that -he could no longer contain himself; he rose in his seat, and cried out -in a loud, angry voice: - -“You bore me to death!” - -And with these words he vanished through the gate. - -Jmukin’s two sons were standing in front of the stable. The older was -holding a gun, the younger had in his arms a grey cock with a bright red -comb. The younger tossed the cock into the air with all his might; the -bird shot up higher than the roof of the house, and turned over in the -air. The elder boy shot, and it fell to the ground like a stone. - -The old man stood nonplussed, and unable to comprehend his guest’s -unexpected exclamation. At last he turned and slowly went into the -house. Sitting down to his breakfast, he fell into a long reverie about -the present tendency of thought, about the universal wickedness of the -present generation, about the telegraph and the telephone and bicycles, -and about how unnecessary it all was. But he grew calmer little by -little as he slowly ate his meal. He drank five glasses of tea, and lay -down to take a nap. - - - THE BISHOP - -It was on the eve of Palm Sunday; vespers were being sung in the -Staro-Petrovski Convent. The hour was nearly ten when the palm leaves -were distributed, and the little shrine lamps were growing dim; their -wicks had burnt low, and a soft haze hung in the chapel. As the -worshippers surged forward in the twilight like the waves of the sea, it -seemed to his Reverence Peter, who had been feeling ill for three days, -that the people who came to him for palm leaves all looked alike, and, -men or women, old or young, all had the same expression in their eyes. -He could not see the doors through the haze; the endless procession -rolled toward him, and seemed as if it must go on rolling for ever. A -choir of women’s voices was singing and a nun was reading the canon. - -How hot and close the air was, and how long the prayers! His Reverence -was tired. His dry, parching breath was coming quickly and painfully, -his shoulders were aching, and his legs were trembling. The occasional -cries of an idiot in the gallery annoyed him. And now, as a climax, his -Reverence saw, as in a delirium, his own mother whom he had not seen for -nine years coming toward him in the crowd. She, or an old woman exactly -like her, took a palm leaf from his hands, and moved away looking at him -all the while with a glad, sweet smile, until she was lost in the crowd. -And for some reason the tears began to course down his cheeks. His heart -was happy and peaceful, but his eyes were fixed on a distant part of the -chapel where the prayers were being read, and where no human being could -be distinguished among the shadows. The tears glistened on his cheeks -and beard. Then some one who was standing near him began to weep, too, -and then another, and then another, until little by little the chapel -was filled with a low sound of weeping. Then the convent choir began to -sing, the weeping stopped, and everything went on as before. - -Soon afterward the service ended. The fine, jubilant notes of the heavy -chapel-bells were throbbing through the moonlit garden as the bishop -stepped into his coach and drove away. The white walls, the crosses on -the graves, the silvery birches, and the far-away moon hanging directly -over the monastery, all seemed to be living a life of their own, -incomprehensible, but very near to mankind. It was early in April, and a -chilly night had succeeded a warm spring day. A light frost was falling, -but the breath of spring could be felt in the soft, cool air. The road -from the monastery was sandy, the horses were obliged to proceed at a -walk, and, bathed in the bright, tranquil moonlight, a stream of -pilgrims was crawling along on either side of the coach. All were -thoughtful, no one spoke. Everything around them, the trees, the sky, -and even the moon, looked so young and intimate and friendly that they -were reluctant to break the spell which they hoped might last for ever. - -Finally the coach entered the city, and rolled down the main street. All -the stores were closed but that of Erakin, the millionaire merchant. He -was trying his electric lights for the first time, and they were -flashing so violently that a crowd had collected in front of the store. -Then came wide, dark streets in endless succession, and then the -highway, and fields, and the smell of pines. Suddenly a white crenelated -wall loomed before him, and beyond it rose a tall belfry flanked by five -flashing golden cupolas, all bathed in moonlight. This was the -Pankratievski Monastery where his Reverence Peter lived. Here, too, the -calm, brooding moon was floating directly above the monastery. The coach -drove through the gate, its wheels crunching on the sand. Here and there -the dark forms of monks started out into the moonlight and footsteps -rang along the flagstone paths. - -“Your mother has been here while you were away, your Reverence,” a lay -brother told the bishop as he entered his room. - -“My mother? When did she come?” - -“Before vespers. She first found out where you were, and then drove to -the convent.” - -“Then it was she whom I saw just now in the chapel! Oh, Father in -heaven!” - -And his Reverence laughed for joy. - -“She told me to tell you, your Reverence,” the lay brother continued, -“that she would come back to-morrow. She had a little girl with her, a -grandchild, I think. She is stopping at Ovsianikoff’s inn.” - -“What time is it now?” - -“It is after eleven.” - -“What a nuisance!” - -His Reverence sat down irresolutely in his sitting-room, unwilling to -believe that it was already so late. His arms and legs were racked with -pain, the back of his neck was aching, and he felt uncomfortable and -hot. When he had rested a few moments he went into his bedroom and -there, too, he sat down, and dreamed of his mother. He heard the lay -brother walking away and Father Sisoi the priest coughing in the next -room. The monastery clock struck the quarter. - -His Reverence undressed and began his prayers. He spoke the old, -familiar words with scrupulous attention, and at the same time he -thought of his mother. She had nine children, and about forty -grandchildren. She had lived from the age of seventeen to the age of -sixty with her husband the deacon in a little village. His Reverence -remembered her from the days of his earliest childhood, and, ah, how he -had loved her! Oh, that dear, precious, unforgettable childhood of his! -Why did those years that had vanished for ever seem so much brighter and -richer and gayer than they really had been? How tender and kind his -mother had been when he was ill in his childhood and youth! His prayers -mingled with the memories that burned ever brighter and brighter in his -heart like a flame, but they did not hinder his thoughts of his mother. - -When he had prayed he lay down, and as soon as he found himself in the -dark there rose before his eyes the vision of his dead father, his -mother, and Lyesopolye, his native village. The creaking of wagon -wheels, the bleating of sheep, the sound of church-bells on a clear -summer morning, ah, how pleasant it was to think of these things! He -remembered Father Simeon, the old priest at Lyesopolye, a kind, gentle, -good-natured old man. He himself had been small, and the priest’s son -had been a huge strapping novice with a terrible bass voice. He -remembered how this young priest had scolded the cook once, and had -shouted: “Ah, you she-ass of Jehovah!” And Father Simeon had said -nothing, and had only been mortified because he could not for the life -of him remember reading of an ass of that name in the Bible! - -Father Simeon had been succeeded by Father Demian, a hard drinker who -sometimes even went so far as to see green snakes. He had actually borne -the nickname of “Demian the Snake-Seer” in the village. Matvei -Nikolaitch had been the schoolmaster, a kind, intelligent man, but a -hard drinker, too. He never thrashed his scholars, but for some reason -he kept a little bundle of birch twigs hanging on his wall, under which -was a tablet bearing the absolutely unintelligible inscription: “Betula -Kinderbalsamica Secuta.” He had had a woolly black dog whom he called -“Syntax.” - -The bishop laughed. Eight miles from Lyesopolye lay the village of -Obnino possessing a miraculous icon. A procession started from Obnino -every summer bearing the wonder-working icon and making the round of all -the neighbouring villages. The church-bells would ring all day long -first in one village, then in another, and to Little Paul (his Reverence -was called Little Paul then) the air itself seemed tremulous with -rapture. Barefoot, hatless, and infinitely happy, he followed the icon -with a naïve smile on his lips and naïve faith in his heart. - -Until the age of fifteen Little Paul had been so slow at his lessons -that his parents had even thought of taking him out of the -ecclesiastical school and putting him to work in the village store. - -The bishop turned over so as to break the train of his thoughts, and -tried to go to sleep. - -“My mother has come!” he remembered, and laughed. - -The moon was shining in through the window, and the floor was lit by its -rays while he lay in shadow. A cricket was chirping. Father Sisoi was -snoring in the next room, and there was a forlorn, friendless, even a -vagrant note in the old man’s cadences. - -Sisoi had once been the steward of a diocesan bishop and was known as -“Father Former Steward.” He was seventy years old, and lived sometimes -in a monastery sixteen miles away, sometimes in the city, sometimes -wherever he happened to be. Three days ago he had turned up at the -Pankratievski Monastery, and the bishop had kept him here in order to -discuss with him at his leisure the affairs of the monastery. - -The bell for matins rang at half past one. Father Sisoi coughed, growled -something, and got up. - -“Father Sisoi!” called the bishop. - -Sisoi came in dressed in a white cassock, carrying a candle in his hand. - -“I can’t go to sleep,” his Reverence said. “I must be ill. I don’t know -what the matter is; I have fever.” - -“You have caught cold, your Lordship. I must rub you with tallow.” - -Father Sisoi stood looking at him for a while and yawned: “Ah-h—the Lord -have mercy on us!” - -“Erakin has electricity in his store now—I hate it!” he continued. - -Father Sisoi was aged, and round-shouldered, and gaunt. He was always -displeased with something or other, and his eyes, which protruded like -those of a crab, always wore an angry expression. - -“I don’t like it at all,” he repeated—“I hate it.” - - - II - -Next day, on Palm Sunday, his Reverence officiated at the cathedral in -the city. Then he went to the diocesan bishop’s, then to see a general’s -wife who was very ill, and at last he drove home. At two o’clock two -beloved guests were having dinner with him, his aged mother, and his -little niece Kitty, a child of eight. The spring sun was peeping -cheerily in through the windows as they sat at their meal, and was -shining merrily on the white tablecloth, and on Kitty’s red hair. -Through the double panes they heard the rooks cawing, and the magpies -chattering in the garden. - -“It is nine years since I saw you last,” said the old mother, “and yet -when I caught sight of you in the convent chapel yesterday I thought to -myself: God bless me, he has not changed a bit! Only perhaps you are a -little thinner than you were, and your beard has grown longer. Oh, holy -Mother, Queen of Heaven! Everybody was crying yesterday. As soon as I -saw you, I began to cry myself, I don’t know why. His holy will be -done!” - -In spite of the tenderness with which she said this, it was clear that -she was not at her ease. It was as if she did not know whether to -address the bishop by the familiar “thee” or the formal “you,” and -whether she ought to laugh or not. She seemed to feel herself more of a -poor deacon’s wife than a mother in his presence. Meanwhile Kitty was -sitting with her eyes glued to the face of her uncle the bishop as if -she were trying to make out what manner of man this was. Her hair had -escaped from her comb and her bow of velvet ribbon, and was standing -straight up around her head like a halo. Her eyes were foxy and bright. -She had broken a glass before sitting down, and now, as she talked, her -grandmother kept moving first a glass, and then a wine glass out of her -reach. As the bishop sat listening to his mother, he remembered how, -many, many years ago, she had sometimes taken him and his brothers and -sisters to visit relatives whom they considered rich. She had been busy -with her own children in those days, and now she was busy with her -grandchildren, and had come to visit him with Kitty here. - -“Your sister Varenka has four children”—she was telling him—“Kitty is -the oldest. God knows why, her father fell ill and died three days -before Assumption. So my Varenka has been thrown out into the cold -world.” - -“And how is my brother Nikanor?” the bishop asked. - -“He is well, thank the Lord. He is pretty well, praise be to God. But -his son Nikolasha wouldn’t go into the church, and is at college instead -learning to be a doctor. He thinks it is best, but who knows? However, -God’s will be done!” - -“Nikolasha cuts up dead people!” said Kitty, spilling some water into -her lap. - -“Sit still child!” her grandmother said, quietly taking the glass out of -her hands. - -“How long it is since we have seen one another!” exclaimed his -Reverence, tenderly stroking his mother’s shoulder and hand. “I missed -you when I was abroad, I missed you dreadfully.” - -“Thank you very much!” - -“I used to sit by my window in the evening listening to the band -playing, and feeling lonely and forlorn. Sometimes I would suddenly grow -so homesick that I used to think I would gladly give everything I had in -the world for a glimpse of you and home.” - -His mother smiled and beamed, and then immediately drew a long face and -said stiffly: - -“Thank you very much!” - -The bishop’s mood changed. He looked at his mother, and could not -understand where she had acquired that deferential, humble expression of -face and voice, and what the meaning of it might be. He hardly -recognised her, and felt sorrowful and vexed. Besides, his head was -still aching, and his legs were racked with pain. The fish he was eating -tasted insipid and he was very thirsty. - -After dinner two wealthy lady landowners visited him, and sat for an -hour and a half with faces a mile long, never uttering a word. Then an -archimandrite, a gloomy, taciturn man, came on business. Then the bells -rang for vespers, the sun set behind the woods, and the day was done. As -soon as he got back from church the bishop said his prayers, and went to -bed, drawing the covers up closely about his ears. The moonlight -troubled him, and soon the sound of voices came to his ears. Father -Sisoi was talking politics with his mother in the next room. - -“There is a war in Japan now,” he was saying. “The Japanese belong to -the same race as the Montenegrins. They fell under the Turkish yoke at -the same time.” - -And then the bishop heard his mother’s voice say: - -“And so, you see, when we had said our prayers, and had our tea, we went -to Father Yegor——” - -She kept saying over and over again that they “had tea,” as if all she -knew of life was tea-drinking. - -The memory of his seminary and college life slowly and mistily took -shape in the bishop’s mind. He had been a teacher of Greek for three -years, until he could no longer read without glasses, and then he had -taken the vows, and had been made an inspector. When he was thirty-two -he had been made the rector of a seminary, and then an archimandrite. At -that time his life had been so easy and pleasant, and had seemed to -stretch so far, far into the future that he could see absolutely no end -to it. But his health had failed, and he had nearly lost his eyesight. -His doctors had advised him to give up his work and go abroad. - -“And what did you do next?” asked Father Sisoi in the adjoining room. - -“And then we had tea,” answered his mother. - -“Why, Father, your beard is green!” exclaimed Kitty suddenly. And she -burst out laughing. - -The bishop remembered that the colour of Father Sisoi’s beard really did -verge on green, and he, too, laughed. - -“My goodness! What a plague that child is!” cried Father Sisoi in a loud -voice, for he was growing angry. “You’re a spoiled baby you are! Sit -still!” - -The bishop recalled the new white church in which he had officiated when -he was abroad, and the sound of a warm sea. Eight years had slipped by -while he was there; then he had been recalled to Russia, and now he was -already a bishop, and the past had faded away into mist as if it had -been but a dream. - -Father Sisoi came into his room with a candle in his hand. - -“Well, well!” he exclaimed, surprised. “Asleep already, your Reverence?” - -“Why not?” - -“It’s early yet, only ten o’clock! I bought a candle this evening and -wanted to rub you with tallow.” - -“I have a fever,” the bishop said, sitting up. “I suppose something -ought to be done. My head feels so queer.” - -Sisoi began to rub the bishop’s chest and back with tallow. - -“There—there—” he said. “Oh, Lord God Almighty! There! I went to town -to-day, and saw that—what do you call him?—that archpresbyter Sidonski. -I had tea with him. I hate him! Oh, Lord God Almighty! There! I hate -him!” - - - III - -The diocesan bishop was very old and very fat, and had been ill in bed -with gout for a month. So his Reverence Peter had been visiting him -almost every day, and had received his suppliants for him. And now that -he was ill he was appalled to think of the futilities and trifles they -asked for and wept over. He felt annoyed at their ignorance and -cowardice. The very number of all those useless trivialities oppressed -him, and he felt as if he could understand the diocesan bishop who had -written “Lessons in Free Will” when he was young, and now seemed so -absorbed in details that the memory of everything else, even of God, had -forsaken him. Peter must have grown out of touch with Russian life while -he was abroad, for it was hard for him to grow used to it now. The -people seemed rough, the women stupid and tiresome, the novices and -their teachers uneducated and often disorderly. And then the documents -that passed through his hands by the hundreds of thousands! The provosts -gave all the priests in the diocese, young and old, and their wives and -children marks for good behaviour, and he was obliged to talk about all -this, and read about it, and write serious articles on it. His Reverence -never had a moment which he could call his own; all day his nerves were -on edge, and he only grew calm when he found himself in church. - -He could not grow accustomed to the terror which he involuntarily -inspired in every breast in spite of his quiet and modest ways. Every -one in the district seemed to shrivel and quake and apologise as soon as -he looked at them. Every one trembled in his presence; even the old -archpresbyters fell down at his feet, and not long ago one suppliant, -the old wife of a village priest, had been prevented by terror from -uttering a word, and had gone away without asking for anything. And he, -who had never been able to say a harsh word in his sermons, and who -never blamed people because he pitied them so, would grow exasperated -with these suppliants, and hurl their petitions to the ground. Not a -soul had spoken sincerely and naturally to him since he had been here; -even his old mother had changed, yes, she had changed very much! Why did -she talk so freely to Sisoi when all the while she was so serious and -ill at ease with him, her own son? It was not like her at all! The only -person who behaved naturally in his presence, and who said whatever came -into his head was old man Sisoi, who had lived with bishops all his -life, and had outlasted eleven of them. And therefore his Reverence felt -at ease with Sisoi, even though he was, without doubt, a rough and -quarrelsome person. - -After morning prayers on Tuesday the bishop received his suppliants, and -lost his temper with them. He felt ill, as usual, and longed to go to -bed, but he had hardly entered his room before he was told that the -young merchant Erakin, a benefactor of the monastery, had called on very -important business. The bishop was obliged to receive him. Erakin stayed -about an hour talking in a very loud voice, and it was hard to -understand what he was trying to say. - -After he had gone there came an abbess from a distant convent, and by -the time she had gone the bells were tolling for vespers; it was time -for the bishop to go to church. - -The monks sang melodiously and rapturously that evening; a young, -black-bearded priest officiated. His Reverence listened as they sang of -the Bridegroom and of the chamber swept and garnished, and felt neither -repentance nor sorrow, but only a deep peace of mind. He sat by the -altar where the shadows were deepest, and was swept in imagination back -into the days of his childhood and youth, when he had first heard these -words sung. The tears trickled down his cheeks, and he meditated on how -he had attained everything in life that it was possible for a man in his -position to attain; his faith was unsullied, and yet all was not clear -to him; something was lacking, and he did not want to die. It still -seemed to him that he was leaving unfound the most important thing of -all. Something of which he had dimly dreamed in the past, hopes that had -thrilled his heart as a child, a schoolboy, and a traveller in foreign -lands, troubled him still. - -“How beautifully they are singing to-day!” he thought. “Oh, how -beautifully!” - - - IV - -On Thursday he held a service in the cathedral. It was the festival of -the Washing of Feet. When the service was over, and the people had gone -to their several homes, the sun was shining brightly and cheerily, and -the air was warm. The gutters were streaming with bubbling water, and -the tender songs of larks came floating in from the fields beyond the -city, bringing peace to his heart. The trees were already awake, and -over them brooded the blue, unfathomable sky. - -His Reverence went to bed as soon as he reached home, and told the lay -brother to close his shutters. The room grew dark. Oh, how tired he was! - -As on the day before, the sound of voices and the tinkling of glasses -came to him from the next room. His mother was gaily recounting some -tale to Father Sisoi, with many a quaint word and saying, and the old -man was listening gloomily, and answering in a gruff voice: - -“Well, I never! Did they, indeed? What do you think of that!” - -And once more the bishop felt annoyed, and then hurt that the old lady -should be so natural and simple with strangers, and so silent and -awkward with her own son. It even seemed to him that she always tried to -find some pretext for standing in his presence, as if she felt uneasy -sitting down. And his father? If he had been alive, he would probably -not have been able to utter a word when the bishop was there. - -Something in the next room fell to the floor with a crash. Kitty had -evidently broken a cup or a saucer, for Father Sisoi suddenly snorted, -and cried angrily: - -“What a terrible plague this child is! Merciful heavens! No one could -keep her supplied with china!” - -Then silence fell. When he opened his eyes again, the bishop saw Kitty -standing by his bedside staring at him, her red hair standing up around -her head like a halo, as usual. - -“Is that you, Kitty?” he asked. “Who is that opening and shutting doors -down there?” - -“I don’t hear anything.” - -He stroked her head. - -“So your cousin Nikolasha cuts up dead people, does he?” he asked, after -a pause. - -“Yes, he is learning to.” - -“Is he nice?” - -“Yes, very, only he drinks a lot.” - -“What did your father die of?” - -“Papa grew weaker and weaker, and thinner and thinner, and then came his -sore throat. And I was ill, too, and so was my brother Fedia. We all had -sore throats. Papa died, Uncle, but we got well.” - -Her chin quivered, her eyes filled with tears. - -“Oh, your Reverence!” she cried in a shrill voice, beginning to weep -bitterly. “Dear Uncle, mother and all of us are so unhappy! Do give us a -little money! Help us, Uncle darling!” - -He also shed tears, and for a moment could not speak for emotion. He -stroked her hair, and touched her shoulder, and said: - -“All right, all right, little child. Wait until Easter comes, then we -will talk about it. I’ll help you.” - -His mother came quietly and timidly into the room, and said a prayer -before the icon. When she saw that he was awake, she asked: - -“Would you like a little soup?” - -“No, thanks,” he answered. “I’m not hungry.” - -“I don’t believe you are well—I can see that you are not well. You -really mustn’t fall ill! You have to be on your feet all day long. My -goodness, it makes one tired to see you! Never mind, Easter is no longer -over the hills and far away. When Easter comes you will rest. God will -give us time for a little talk then, but now I’m not going to worry you -any more with my silly chatter. Come, Kitty, let his Lordship have -another forty winks——” - -And the bishop remembered that, when he was a boy, she had used exactly -the same half playful, half respectful tone to all high dignitaries of -the church. Only by her strangely tender eyes, and by the anxious look -which she gave him as she left the room could any one have guessed that -she was his mother. He shut his eyes, and seemed to be asleep, but he -heard the clock strike twice, and Father Sisoi coughing next door. His -mother came in again, and looked shyly at him. Suddenly there came a -bang, and a door slammed; a vehicle of some kind drove up to the front -steps. The lay brother came into the bishop’s room, and called: - -“Your Reverence!” - -“What is it?” - -“Here is the coach! It is time to go to our Lord’s Passion——” - -“What time is it?” - -“Quarter to eight.” - -The bishop dressed, and drove to the cathedral. He had to stand -motionless in the centre of the church while the twelve gospels were -being read, and the first and longest and most beautiful of them all he -read himself. A strong, valiant mood took hold of him. He knew this -gospel, beginning “The Son of Man is risen to-day—,” by heart, and as he -repeated it, he raised his eyes, and saw a sea of little lights about -him. He heard the sputtering of candles, but the people had disappeared. -He felt surrounded by those whom he had known in his youth; he felt that -they would always be here until—God knew when! - -His father had been a deacon, his grandfather had been a priest, and his -great grandfather a deacon. He sprang from a race that had belonged to -the church since Christianity first came to Russia, and his love for the -ritual of the church, the clergy, and the sound of church-bells was -inborn in him, deeply, irradicably implanted in his heart. When he was -in church, especially when he was taking part in the service himself, he -felt active and valorous and happy. And so it was with him now. Only, -after the eighth gospel had been read, he felt that his voice was -becoming so feeble that even his cough was inaudible; his head was -aching, and he began to fear that he might collapse. His legs were -growing numb; in a little while he ceased to have any sensation in them -at all, and could not imagine what he was standing on, and why he did -not fall down. - -It was quarter to twelve when the service ended. The bishop went to bed -as soon as he reached home, without even saying his prayers. As he -pulled his blanket up over him, he suddenly wished that he were abroad; -he passionately wished it. He would give his life, he thought, to cease -from seeing these cheap, wooden walls and that low ceiling, to cease -from smelling the stale scent of the monastery. - -If there were only some one with whom he could talk, some one to whom he -could unburden his heart! - -He heard steps in the adjoining room, and tried to recall who it might -be. At last the door opened, and Father Sisoi came in with a candle in -one hand, and a teacup in the other. - -“In bed already, your Reverence?” he asked. “I have come to rub your -chest with vinegar and vodka. It is a fine thing, if rubbed in good and -hard. Oh, Lord God Almighty! There—there—I have just come from our -monastery. I hate it. I am going away from here to-morrow, my Lord. Oh, -Lord, God Almighty—there——” - -Sisoi never could stay long in one place, and he now felt as if he had -been in this monastery for a year. It was hard to tell from what he said -where his home was, whether there was any one or anything in the world -that he loved, and whether he believed in God or not. He himself never -could make out why he had become a monk, but then, he never gave it any -thought, and the time when he had taken the vows had long since faded -from his memory. He thought he must have been born a monk. - -“Yes, I am going away to-morrow. Bother this place!” - -“I want to have a talk with you—I never seem to have the time—” -whispered the bishop, making a great effort to speak. “You see, I don’t -know any one—or anything—here——” - -“Very well then, I shall stay until Sunday, but no longer! Bother this -place!” - -“What sort of a bishop am I?” his Reverence went on, in a faint voice. -“I ought to have been a village priest, or a deacon, or a plain monk. -All this is choking me—it is choking me——” - -“What’s that? Oh, Lord God Almighty! There—go to sleep now, your -Reverence. What do you mean? What’s all this you are saying? Good -night!” - -All night long the bishop lay awake, and in the morning he grew very -ill. The lay brother took fright and ran first to the archimandrite, and -then for the monastery doctor who lived in the city. The doctor, a -stout, elderly man, with a long, grey beard, looked intently at his -Reverence, shook his head, knit his brows, and finally said: - -“I’ll tell you what, your Reverence; you have typhoid.” - -The bishop grew very thin and pale in the next hour, his eyes grew -larger, his face became covered with wrinkles, and he looked quite small -and old. He felt as if he were the thinnest, weakest, puniest man in the -whole world, and as if everything that had occurred before this had been -left far, far behind, and would never happen again. - -“How glad I am of that!” he thought. “Oh, how glad!” - -His aged mother came into the room. When she saw his wrinkled face and -his great eyes, she was seized with fear, and, falling down on her knees -by his bedside, she began kissing his face, his shoulders, and his -hands. He seemed to her to be the thinnest, weakest, puniest man in the -world, and she forgot that he was a bishop, and kissed him as if he had -been a little child whom she dearly, dearly loved. - -“Little Paul, my dearie!” she cried. “My little son, why do you look -like this? Little Paul, oh, answer me!” - -Kitty, pale and severe, stood near them, and could not understand what -was the matter with her uncle, and why granny wore such a look of -suffering on her face, and spoke such heartrending words. And he, he was -speechless, and knew nothing of what was going on around him. He was -dreaming that he was an ordinary man once more, striding swiftly and -merrily through the open country, a staff in his hand, bathed in -sunshine, with the wide sky above him, as free as a bird to go wherever -his fancy led him. - -“My little son! My little Paul! Answer me!” begged his mother. - -“Don’t bother his Lordship,” said Sisoi. “Let him sleep. What’s the -matter?” - -Three doctors came, consulted together, and drove away. The day seemed -long, incredibly long, and then came the long, long night. Just before -dawn on Saturday morning the lay brother went to the old mother who was -lying on a sofa in the sitting-room, and asked her to come into the -bedroom; his Reverence had gone to eternal peace. - -Next day was Easter. There were forty-two churches in the city, and two -monasteries, and the deep, joyous notes of their bells pealed out over -the town from morning until night. The birds were carolling, the bright -sun was shining. The big market place was full of noise; barrel organs -were droning, concertinas were squealing, and drunken voices were -ringing through the air. Trotting races were held in the main street -that afternoon; in a word, all was merry and gay, as had been the year -before and as, doubtless, it would be the year to come. - -A month later a new bishop was appointed, and every one forgot his -Reverence Peter. 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