An Actor's End

SHTCHIPTSOV, the "heavy father" and "good-hearted simpleton," a
tall and thick-set old man, not so much distinguished by his talents
as an actor as by his exceptional physical strength, had a desperate
quarrel with the manager during the performance, and just when the
storm of words was at its height felt as though something had snapped
in his chest. Zhukov, the manager, as a rule began at the end of
every heated discussion to laugh hysterically and to fall into a
swoon; on this occasion, however, Shtchiptsov did not remain for
this climax, but hurried home. The high words and the sensation of
something ruptured in his chest so agitated him as he left the
theatre that he forgot to wash off his paint, and did nothing but
take off his beard.

When he reached his hotel room, Shtchiptsov spent a long time pacing
up and down, then sat down on the bed, propped his head on his
fists, and sank into thought. He sat like that without stirring or
uttering a sound till two o'clock the next afternoon, when Sigaev,
the comic man, walked into his room.

"Why is it you did not come to the rehearsal, Booby Ivanitch?" the
comic man began, panting and filling the room with fumes of vodka.
"Where have you been?"

Shtchiptsov made no answer, but simply stared at the comic man with
lustreless eyes, under which there were smudges of paint.

"You might at least have washed your phiz!" Sigaev went on. "You
are a disgraceful sight! Have you been boozing, or . . . are you
ill, or what? But why don't you speak? I am asking you: are you
ill?"

Shtchiptsov did not speak. In spite of the paint on his face, the
comic man could not help noticing his striking pallor, the drops
of sweat on his forehead, and the twitching of his lips. His hands
and feet were trembling too, and the whole huge figure of the
"good-natured simpleton" looked somehow crushed and flattened. The
comic man took a rapid glance round the room, but saw neither bottle
nor flask nor any other suspicious vessel.

"I say, Mishutka, you know you are ill!" he said in a flutter.
"Strike me dead, you are ill! You don't look yourself!"

Shtchiptsov remained silent and stared disconsolately at the floor.

"You must have caught cold," said Sigaev, taking him by the hand.
"Oh, dear, how hot your hands are! What's the trouble?"

"I wa-ant to go home," muttered Shtchiptsov.

"But you are at home now, aren't you?"

"No. . . . To Vyazma. . . ."

"Oh, my, anywhere else! It would take you three years to get to
your Vyazma. . . . What? do you want to go and see your daddy and
mummy? I'll be bound, they've kicked the bucket years ago, and you
won't find their graves. . . ."

"My ho-ome's there."

"Come, it's no good giving way to the dismal dumps. These neurotic
feelings are the limit, old man. You must get well, for you have
to play Mitka in 'The Terrible Tsar' to-morrow. There is nobody
else to do it. Drink something hot and take some castor-oil? Have
you got the money for some castor-oil? Or, stay, I'll run and buy
some."

The comic man fumbled in his pockets, found a fifteen-kopeck piece,
and ran to the chemist's. A quarter of an hour later he came back.

"Come, drink it," he said, holding the bottle to the "heavy father's"
mouth. "Drink it straight out of the bottle. . . . All at a go!
That's the way. . . . Now nibble at a clove that your very soul
mayn't stink of the filthy stuff."

The comic man sat a little longer with his sick friend, then kissed
him tenderly, and went away. Towards evening the _jeune premier_,
Brama-Glinsky, ran in to see Shtchiptsov. The gifted actor was
wearing a pair of prunella boots, had a glove on his left hand, was
smoking a cigar, and even smelt of heliotrope, yet nevertheless he
strongly suggested a traveller cast away in some land in which there
were neither baths nor laundresses nor tailors. . . .

"I hear you are ill?" he said to Shtchiptsov, twirling round on his
heel. "What's wrong with you? What's wrong with you, really? . . ."

Shtchiptsov did not speak nor stir.

"Why don't you speak? Do you feel giddy? Oh well, don't talk, I
won't pester you . . . don't talk. . . ."

Brama-Glinsky (that was his stage name, in his passport he was
called Guskov) walked away to the window, put his hands in his
pockets, and fell to gazing into the street. Before his eyes stretched
an immense waste, bounded by a grey fence beside which ran a perfect
forest of last year's burdocks. Beyond the waste ground was a dark,
deserted factory, with windows boarded up. A belated jackdaw was
flying round the chimney. This dreary, lifeless scene was beginning
to be veiled in the dusk of evening.

"I must go home!" the _jeune premier_ heard.

"Where is home?"

"To Vyazma . . . to my home. . . ."

"It is a thousand miles to Vyazma . . . my boy," sighed Brama-Glinsky,
drumming on the window-pane. "And what do you want to go to Vyazma
for?"

"I want to die there."

"What next! Now he's dying! He has fallen ill for the first time
in his life, and already he fancies that his last hour is come. . . .
No, my boy, no cholera will carry off a buffalo like you. You'll
live to be a hundred. . . . Where's the pain?"

"There's no pain, but I . . . feel . . ."

"You don't feel anything, it all comes from being too healthy. Your
surplus energy upsets you. You ought to get jolly tight--drink,
you know, till your whole inside is topsy-turvy. Getting drunk is
wonderfully restoring. . . . Do you remember how screwed you were
at Rostov on the Don? Good Lord, the very thought of it is alarming!
Sashka and I together could only just carry in the barrel, and you
emptied it alone, and even sent for rum afterwards. . . . You got
so drunk you were catching devils in a sack and pulled a lamp-post
up by the roots. Do you remember? Then you went off to beat the
Greeks. . . ."

Under the influence of these agreeable reminiscences Shtchiptsov's
face brightened a little and his eyes began to shine.

"And do you remember how I beat Savoikin the manager?" he muttered,
raising his head. "But there! I've beaten thirty-three managers in
my time, and I can't remember how many smaller fry. And what managers
they were! Men who would not permit the very winds to touch them!
I've beaten two celebrated authors and one painter!"

"What are you crying for?"

"At Kherson I killed a horse with my fists. And at Taganrog some
roughs fell upon me at night, fifteen of them. I took off their
caps and they followed me, begging: 'Uncle, give us back our caps.'
That's how I used to go on."

"What are you crying for, then, you silly?"

"But now it's all over . . . I feel it. If only I could go to
Vyazma!"

A pause followed. After a silence Shtchiptsov suddenly jumped up
and seized his cap. He looked distraught.

"Good-bye! I am going to Vyazma!" he articulated, staggering.

"And the money for the journey?"

"H'm! . . . I shall go on foot!"

"You are crazy. . . ."

The two men looked at each other, probably because the same thought
--of the boundless plains, the unending forests and swamps--
struck both of them at once.

"Well, I see you have gone off your head," the _jeune premier_
commented. "I'll tell you what, old man. . . . First thing, go to
bed, then drink some brandy and tea to put you into a sweat. And
some castor-oil, of course. Stay, where am I to get some brandy?"

Brama-Glinsky thought a minute, then made up his mind to go to a
shopkeeper called Madame Tsitrinnikov to try and get it from her
on tick: who knows? perhaps the woman would feel for them and let
them have it. The _jeune premier_ went off, and half an hour later
returned with a bottle of brandy and some castor-oil. Shtchiptsov
was sitting motionless, as before, on the bed, gazing dumbly at the
floor. He drank the castor-oil offered him by his friend like an
automaton, with no consciousness of what he was doing. Like an
automaton he sat afterwards at the table, and drank tea and brandy;
mechanically he emptied the whole bottle and let the _jeune premier_
put him to bed. The latter covered him up with a quilt and an
overcoat, advised him to get into a perspiration, and went away.

The night came on; Shtchiptsov had drunk a great deal of brandy,
but he did not sleep. He lay motionless under the quilt and stared
at the dark ceiling; then, seeing the moon looking in at the window,
he turned his eyes from the ceiling towards the companion of the
earth, and lay so with open eyes till the morning. At nine o'clock
in the morning Zhukov, the manager, ran in.

"What has put it into your head to be ill, my angel?" he cackled,
wrinkling up his nose. "Aie, aie! A man with your physique has no
business to be ill! For shame, for shame! Do you know, I was quite
frightened. 'Can our conversation have had such an effect on him?'
I wondered. My dear soul, I hope it's not through me you've fallen
ill! You know you gave me as good . . . er . . . And, besides,
comrades can never get on without words. You called me all sorts
of names . . . and have gone at me with your fists too, and yet I
am fond of you! Upon my soul, I am. I respect you and am fond of
you! Explain, my angel, why I am so fond of you. You are neither
kith nor kin nor wife, but as soon as I heard you had fallen ill
it cut me to the heart."

Zhukov spent a long time declaring his affection, then fell to
kissing the invalid, and finally was so overcome by his feelings
that he began laughing hysterically, and was even meaning to fall
into a swoon, but, probably remembering that he was not at home nor
at the theatre, put off the swoon to a more convenient opportunity
and went away.

Soon after him Adabashev, the tragic actor, a dingy, short-sighted
individual who talked through his nose, made his appearance. . . .
For a long while he looked at Shtchiptsov, for a long while he
pondered, and at last he made a discovery.

"Do you know what, Mifa?" he said, pronouncing through his nose "f"
instead of "sh," and assuming a mysterious expression. "Do you know
what? You ought to have a dose of castor-oil!"

Shtchiptsov was silent. He remained silent, too, a little later as
the tragic actor poured the loathsome oil into his mouth. Two hours
later Yevlampy, or, as the actors for some reason called him,
Rigoletto, the hairdresser of the company, came into the room. He
too, like the tragic man, stared at Shtchiptsov for a long time,
then sighed like a steam-engine, and slowly and deliberately began
untying a parcel he had brought with him. In it there were twenty
cups and several little flasks.

"You should have sent for me and I would have cupped you long ago,"
he said, tenderly baring Shtchiptsov's chest. "It is easy to neglect
illness."

Thereupon Rigoletto stroked the broad chest of the "heavy father"
and covered it all over with suction cups.

"Yes . . ." he said, as after this operation he packed up his
paraphernalia, crimson with Shtchiptsov's blood. "You should have
sent for me, and I would have come. . . . You needn't trouble about
payment. . . . I do it from sympathy. Where are you to get the money
if that idol won't pay you? Now, please take these drops. They are
nice drops! And now you must have a dose of this castor-oil. It's
the real thing. That's right! I hope it will do you good. Well,
now, good-bye. . . ."

Rigoletto took his parcel and withdrew, pleased that he had been
of assistance to a fellow-creature.

The next morning Sigaev, the comic man, going in to see Shtchiptsov,
found him in a terrible condition. He was lying under his coat,
breathing in gasps, while his eyes strayed over the ceiling. In his
hands he was crushing convulsively the crumpled quilt.

"To Vyazma!" he whispered, when he saw the comic man. "To Vyazma."

"Come, I don't like that, old man!" said the comic man, flinging
up his hands. "You see . . . you see . . . you see, old man, that's
not the thing! Excuse me, but . . . it's positively stupid. . . ."

"To go to Vyazma! My God, to Vyazma!"

"I . . . I did not expect it of you," the comic man muttered, utterly
distracted. "What the deuce do you want to collapse like this for?
Aie . . . aie . . . aie! . . . that's not the thing. A giant as
tall as a watch-tower, and crying. Is it the thing for actors to
cry?"

"No wife nor children," muttered Shtchiptsov. "I ought not to have
gone for an actor, but have stayed at Vyazma. My life has been
wasted, Semyon! Oh, to be in Vyazma!"

"Aie . . . aie . . . aie! . . . that's not the thing! You see, it's
stupid . . . contemptible indeed!"

Recovering his composure and setting his feelings in order, Sigaev
began comforting Shtchiptsov, telling him untruly that his comrades
had decided to send him to the Crimea at their expense, and so on,
but the sick man did not listen and kept muttering about Vyazma
. . . . At last, with a wave of his hand, the comic man began talking
about Vyazma himself to comfort the invalid.

"It's a fine town," he said soothingly, "a capital town, old man!
It's famous for its cakes. The cakes are classical, but--between
ourselves--h'm!--they are a bit groggy. For a whole week after
eating them I was . . . h'm! . . . But what is fine there is the
merchants! They are something like merchants. When they treat you
they do treat you!"

The comic man talked while Shtchiptsov listened in silence and
nodded his head approvingly.

Towards evening he died.

A Troublesome Visitor

IN the low-pitched, crooked little hut of Artyom, the forester, two
men were sitting under the big dark ikon--Artyom himself, a short
and lean peasant with a wrinkled, aged-looking face and a little
beard that grew out of his neck, and a well-grown young man in a
new crimson shirt and big wading boots, who had been out hunting
and come in for the night. They were sitting on a bench at a little
three-legged table on which a tallow candle stuck into a bottle was
lazily burning.

Outside the window the darkness of the night was full of the noisy
uproar into which nature usually breaks out before a thunderstorm.
The wind howled angrily and the bowed trees moaned miserably. One
pane of the window had been pasted up with paper, and leaves torn
off by the wind could be heard pattering against the paper.

"I tell you what, good Christian," said Artyom in a hoarse little
tenor half-whisper, staring with unblinking, scared-looking eyes
at the hunter. "I am not afraid of wolves or bears, or wild beasts
of any sort, but I am afraid of man. You can save yourself from
beasts with a gun or some other weapon, but you have no means of
saving yourself from a wicked man."

"To be sure, you can fire at a beast, but if you shoot at a robber
you will have to answer for it: you will go to Siberia."

"I've been forester, my lad, for thirty years, and I couldn't tell
you what I have had to put up with from wicked men. There have been
lots and lots of them here. The hut's on a track, it's a cart-road,
and that brings them, the devils. Every sort of ruffian turns up,
and without taking off his cap or making the sign of the cross,
bursts straight in upon one with: 'Give us some bread, you old
so-and-so.' And where am I to get bread for him? What claim has he?
Am I a millionaire to feed every drunkard that passes? They are
half-blind with spite. . . . They have no cross on them, the devils
. . . . They'll give you a clout on the ear and not think twice about
it: 'Give us bread!' Well, one gives it. . . . One is not going to
fight with them, the idols! Some of them are two yards across the
shoulders, and a great fist as big as your boot, and you see the
sort of figure I am. One of them could smash me with his little
finger. . . . Well, one gives him bread and he gobbles it up, and
stretches out full length across the hut with not a word of thanks.
And there are some that ask for money. 'Tell me, where is your
money?' As though I had money! How should I come by it?"

"A forester and no money!" laughed the hunter. "You get wages every
month, and I'll be bound you sell timber on the sly."

Artyom took a timid sideway glance at his visitor and twitched his
beard as a magpie twitches her tail.

"You are still young to say a thing like that to me," he said. "You
will have to answer to God for those words. Whom may your people
be? Where do you come from?"

"I am from Vyazovka. I am the son of Nefed the village elder."

"You have gone out for sport with your gun. I used to like sport,
too, when I was young. H'm! Ah, our sins are grievous," said Artyom,
with a yawn. "It's a sad thing! There are few good folks, but
villains and murderers no end--God have mercy upon us."

"You seem to be frightened of me, too. . . ."

"Come, what next! What should I be afraid of you for? I see. . . .
I understand. . . . You came in, and not just anyhow, but you made
the sign of the cross, you bowed, all decent and proper. . . . I
understand. . . . One can give you bread. . . . I am a widower, I
don't heat the stove, I sold the samovar. . . . I am too poor to
keep meat or anything else, but bread you are welcome to."

At that moment something began growling under the bench: the growl
was followed by a hiss. Artyom started, drew up his legs, and looked
enquiringly at the hunter.

"It's my dog worrying your cat," said the hunter. "You devils!" he
shouted under the bench. "Lie down. You'll be beaten. I say, your
cat's thin, mate! She is nothing but skin and bone."

"She is old, it is time she was dead. . . . So you say you are from
Vyazovka?"

"I see you don't feed her. Though she's a cat she's a creature . . .
every breathing thing. You should have pity on her!"

"You are a queer lot in Vyazovka," Artyom went on, as though not
listening. "The church has been robbed twice in one year. . . To
think that there are such wicked men! So they fear neither man nor
God! To steal what is the Lord's! Hanging's too good for them! In
old days the governors used to have such rogues flogged."

"However you punish, whether it is with flogging or anything else,
it will be no good, you will not knock the wickedness out of a
wicked man."

"Save and preserve us, Queen of Heaven!" The forester sighed abruptly.
"Save us from all enemies and evildoers. Last week at Volovy
Zaimishtchy, a mower struck another on the chest with his scythe
. . . he killed him outright! And what was it all about, God bless
me! One mower came out of the tavern . . . drunk. The other met
him, drunk too."

The young man, who had been listening attentively, suddenly started,
and his face grew tense as he listened.

"Stay," he said, interrupting the forester. "I fancy someone is
shouting."

The hunter and the forester fell to listening with their eyes fixed
on the window. Through the noise of the forest they could hear
sounds such as the strained ear can always distinguish in every
storm, so that it was difficult to make out whether people were
calling for help or whether the wind was wailing in the chimney.
But the wind tore at the roof, tapped at the paper on the window,
and brought a distinct shout of "Help!"

"Talk of your murderers," said the hunter, turning pale and getting
up. "Someone is being robbed!"

"Lord have mercy on us," whispered the forester, and he, too, turned
pale and got up.

The hunter looked aimlessly out of window and walked up and down
the hut.

"What a night, what a night!" he muttered. "You can't see your hand
before your face! The very time for a robbery. Do you hear? There
is a shout again."

The forester looked at the ikon and from the ikon turned his eyes
upon the hunter, and sank on to the bench, collapsing like a man
terrified by sudden bad news.

"Good Christian," he said in a tearful voice, "you might go into
the passage and bolt the door. And we must put out the light."

"What for?"

"By ill-luck they may find their way here. . . . Oh, our sins!"

"We ought to be going, and you talk of bolting the door! You are a
clever one! Are you coming?"

The hunter threw his gun over his shoulder and picked up his cap.

"Get ready, take your gun. Hey, Flerka, here," he called to his
dog. "Flerka!"

A dog with long frayed ears, a mongrel between a setter and a
house-dog, came out from under the bench. He stretched himself by
his master's feet and wagged his tail.

"Why are you sitting there?" cried the hunter to the forester. "You
mean to say you are not going?"

"Where?"

"To help!"

"How can I?" said the forester with a wave of his hand, shuddering
all over. "I can't bother about it!"

"Why won't you come?"

"After talking of such dreadful things I won't stir a step into the
darkness. Bless them! And what should I go for?"

"What are you afraid of? Haven't you got a gun? Let us go, please
do. It's scaring to go alone; it will be more cheerful, the two of
us. Do you hear? There was a shout again. Get up!"

"Whatever do you think of me, lad?" wailed the forester. "Do you
think I am such a fool to go straight to my undoing?"

"So you are not coming?"

The forester did not answer. The dog, probably hearing a human cry,
gave a plaintive whine.

"Are you coming, I ask you?" cried the hunter, rolling his eyes
angrily.

"You do keep on, upon my word," said the forester with annoyance.
"Go yourself."

"Ugh! . . . low cur," growled the hunter, turning towards the door.
"Flerka, here!"

He went out and left the door open. The wind flew into the hut. The
flame of the candle flickered uneasily, flared up, and went out.

As he bolted the door after the hunter, the forester saw the puddles
in the track, the nearest pine-trees, and the retreating figure of
his guest lighted up by a flash of lightning. Far away he heard the
rumble of thunder.

"Holy, holy, holy," whispered the forester, making haste to thrust
the thick bolt into the great iron rings. "What weather the Lord
has sent us!"

Going back into the room, he felt his way to the stove, lay down,
and covered himself from head to foot. Lying under the sheepskin
and listening intently, he could no longer hear the human cry, but
the peals of thunder kept growing louder and more prolonged. He
could hear the big wind-lashed raindrops pattering angrily on the
panes and on the paper of the window.

"He's gone on a fool's errand," he thought, picturing the hunter
soaked with rain and stumbling over the tree-stumps. "I bet his
teeth are chattering with terror!"

Not more than ten minutes later there was a sound of footsteps,
followed by a loud knock at the door.

"Who's there?" cried the forester.

"It's I," he heard the young man's voice. "Unfasten the door."

The forester clambered down from the stove, felt for the candle,
and, lighting it, went to the door. The hunter and his dog were
drenched to the skin. They had come in for the heaviest of the
downpour, and now the water ran from them as from washed clothes
before they have been wrung out.

"What was it?" asked the forester.

"A peasant woman driving in a cart; she had got off the road . . ."
answered the young man, struggling with his breathlessness. "She
was caught in a thicket."

"Ah, the silly thing! She was frightened, then. . . . Well, did you
put her on the road?"

"I don't care to talk to a scoundrel like you."

The young man flung his wet cap on the bench and went on:

"I know now that you are a scoundrel and the lowest of men. And you
a keeper, too, getting a salary! You blackguard!"

The forester slunk with a guilty step to the stove, cleared his
throat, and lay down. The young man sat on the bench, thought a
little, and lay down on it full length. Not long afterwards he got
up, put out the candle, and lay down again. During a particularly
loud clap of thunder he turned over, spat on the floor, and growled
out:

"He's afraid. . . . And what if the woman were being murdered? Whose
business is it to defend her? And he an old man, too, and a Christian
. . . . He's a pig and nothing else."

The forester cleared his throat and heaved a deep sigh. Somewhere
in the darkness Flerka shook his wet coat vigorously, which sent
drops of water flying about all over the room.

"So you wouldn't care if the woman were murdered?" the hunter went
on. "Well--strike me, God--I had no notion you were that sort of
man. . . ."

A silence followed. The thunderstorm was by now over and the thunder
came from far away, but it was still raining.

"And suppose it hadn't been a woman but you shouting 'Help!'?" said
the hunter, breaking the silence. "How would you feel, you beast,
if no one ran to your aid? You have upset me with your meanness,
plague take you!"

After another long interval the hunter said:

"You must have money to be afraid of people! A man who is poor is
not likely to be afraid. . . ."

"For those words you will answer before God," Artyom said hoarsely
from the stove. "I have no money."

"I dare say! Scoundrels always have money. . . . Why are you afraid
of people, then? So you must have! I'd like to take and rob you for
spite, to teach you a lesson! . . ."

Artyom slipped noiselessly from the stove, lighted a candle, and
sat down under the holy image. He was pale and did not take his
eyes off the hunter.

"Here, I'll rob you," said the hunter, getting up. "What do you
think about it? Fellows like you want a lesson. Tell me, where is
your money hidden?"

Artyom drew his legs up under him and blinked. "What are you wriggling
for? Where is your money hidden? Have you lost your tongue, you
fool? Why don't you answer?"

The young man jumped up and went up to the forester.

"He is blinking like an owl! Well? Give me your money, or I will
shoot you with my gun."

"Why do you keep on at me?" squealed the forester, and big tears
rolled from his eyes. "What's the reason of it? God sees all! You
will have to answer, for every word you say, to God. You have no
right whatever to ask for my money."

The young man looked at Artyom's tearful face, frowned, and walked
up and down the hut, then angrily clapped his cap on his head and
picked up his gun.

"Ugh! . . . ugh! . . . it makes me sick to look at you," he filtered
through his teeth. "I can't bear the sight of you. I won't sleep
in your house, anyway. Good-bye! Hey, Flerka!"

The door slammed and the troublesome visitor went out with his dog.
. . . Artyom bolted the door after him, crossed himself, and lay
down.

A Happy Man

THE passenger train is just starting from Bologoe, the junction on
the Petersburg-Moscow line. In a second-class smoking compartment
five passengers sit dozing, shrouded in the twilight of the carriage.
They had just had a meal, and now, snugly ensconced in their seats,
they are trying to go to sleep. Stillness.

The door opens and in there walks a tall, lanky figure straight as
a poker, with a ginger-coloured hat and a smart overcoat, wonderfully
suggestive of a journalist in Jules Verne or on the comic stage.

The figure stands still in the middle of the compartment for a long
while, breathing heavily, screwing up his eyes and peering at the
seats.

"No, wrong again!" he mutters. "What the deuce! It's positively
revolting! No, the wrong one again!"

One of the passengers stares at the figure and utters a shout of
joy:

"Ivan Alexyevitch! what brings you here? Is it you?"

The poker-like gentleman starts, stares blankly at the passenger,
and recognizing him claps his hands with delight.

"Ha! Pyotr Petrovitch," he says. "How many summers, how many winters!
I didn't know you were in this train."

"How are you getting on?"

"I am all right; the only thing is, my dear fellow, I've lost my
compartment and I simply can't find it. What an idiot I am! I ought
to be thrashed!"

The poker-like gentleman sways a little unsteadily and sniggers.

"Queer things do happen!" he continues. "I stepped out just after
the second bell to get a glass of brandy. I got it, of course. Well,
I thought, since it's a long way to the next station, it would be
as well to have a second glass. While I was thinking about it and
drinking it the third bell rang. . . . I ran like mad and jumped
into the first carriage. I am an idiot! I am the son of a hen!"

"But you seem in very good spirits," observes Pyotr Petrovitch.
"Come and sit down! There's room and a welcome."

"No, no. . . . I'm off to look for my carriage. Good-bye!"

"You'll fall between the carriages in the dark if you don't look
out! Sit down, and when we get to a station you'll find your own
compartment. Sit down!"

Ivan Alexyevitch heaves a sigh and irresolutely sits down facing
Pyotr Petrovitch. He is visibly excited, and fidgets as though he
were sitting on thorns.

"Where are you travelling to?" Pyotr Petrovitch enquires.

"I? Into space. There is such a turmoil in my head that I couldn't
tell where I am going myself. I go where fate takes me. Ha-ha! My
dear fellow, have you ever seen a happy fool? No? Well, then, take
a look at one. You behold the happiest of mortals! Yes! Don't you
see something from my face?"

"Well, one can see you're a bit . . . a tiny bit so-so."

"I dare say I look awfully stupid just now. Ach! it's a pity I
haven't a looking-glass, I should like to look at my counting-house.
My dear fellow, I feel I am turning into an idiot, honour bright.
Ha-ha! Would you believe it, I'm on my honeymoon. Am I not the son
of a hen?"

"You? Do you mean to say you are married?"

"To-day, my dear boy. We came away straight after the wedding."

Congratulations and the usual questions follow. "Well, you are a
fellow!" laughs Pyotr Petrovitch. "That's why you are rigged out
such a dandy."

"Yes, indeed. . . . To complete the illusion, I've even sprinkled
myself with scent. I am over my ears in vanity! No care, no thought,
nothing but a sensation of something or other . . . deuce knows
what to call it . . . beatitude or something? I've never felt so
grand in my life!"

Ivan Alexyevitch shuts his eyes and waggles his head.

"I'm revoltingly happy," he says. "Just think; in a minute I shall
go to my compartment. There on the seat near the window is sitting
a being who is, so to say, devoted to you with her whole being. A
little blonde with a little nose . . . little fingers. . . . My
little darling! My angel! My little poppet! Phylloxera of my soul!
And her little foot! Good God! A little foot not like our
beetle-crushers, but something miniature, fairylike, allegorical.
I could pick it up and eat it, that little foot! Oh, but you don't
understand! You're a materialist, of course, you begin analyzing
at once, and one thing and another. You are cold-hearted bachelors,
that's what you are! When you get married you'll think of me.
'Where's Ivan Alexyevitch now?' you'll say. Yes; so in a minute I'm
going to my compartment. There she is waiting for me with impatience
. . . in joyful anticipation of my appearance. She'll have a smile
to greet me. I sit down beside her and take her chin with my two
fingers."

Ivan Alexyevitch waggles his head and goes off into a chuckle of
delight.

"Then I lay my noddle on her shoulder and put my arm round her
waist. Around all is silence, you know . . . poetic twilight. I
could embrace the whole world at such a moment. Pyotr Petrovitch,
allow me to embrace you!"

"Delighted, I'm sure." The two friends embrace while the passengers
laugh in chorus. And the happy bridegroom continues:

"And to complete the idiocy, or, as the novelists say, to complete
the illusion, one goes to the refreshment-room and tosses off two
or three glasses. And then something happens in your head and your
heart, finer than you can read of in a fairy tale. I am a man of
no importance, but I feel as though I were limitless: I embrace the
whole world!"

The passengers, looking at the tipsy and blissful bridegroom, are
infected by his cheerfulness and no longer feel sleepy. Instead of
one listener, Ivan Alexyevitch has now an audience of five. He
wriggles and splutters, gesticulates, and prattles on without
ceasing. He laughs and they all laugh.

"Gentlemen, gentlemen, don't think so much! Damn all this analysis!
If you want a drink, drink, no need to philosophize as to whether
it's bad for you or not. . . . Damn all this philosophy and
psychology!"

The guard walks through the compartment.

"My dear fellow," the bridegroom addresses him, "when you pass
through the carriage No. 209 look out for a lady in a grey hat with
a white bird and tell her I'm here!"

"Yes, sir. Only there isn't a No. 209 in this train; there's 219!"

"Well, 219, then! It's all the same. Tell that lady, then, that her
husband is all right!"

Ivan Alexyevitch suddenly clutches his head and groans:

"Husband. . . . Lady. . . . All in a minute! Husband. . . . Ha-ha!
I am a puppy that needs thrashing, and here I am a husband! Ach,
idiot! But think of her! . . . Yesterday she was a little girl, a
midget . . . it s simply incredible!"

"Nowadays it really seems strange to see a happy man," observes one
of the passengers; "one as soon expects to see a white elephant."

"Yes, and whose fault is it?" says Ivan Alexyevitch, stretching his
long legs and thrusting out his feet with their very pointed toes.
"If you are not happy it's your own fault! Yes, what else do you
suppose it is? Man is the creator of his own happiness. If you want
to be happy you will be, but you don't want to be! You obstinately
turn away from happiness."

"Why, what next! How do you make that out?"

"Very simply. Nature has ordained that at a certain stage in his
life man should love. When that time comes you should love like a
house on fire, but you won't heed the dictates of nature, you keep
waiting for something. What's more, it's laid down by law that the
normal man should enter upon matrimony. There's no happiness without
marriage. When the propitious moment has come, get married. There's
no use in shilly-shallying. . . . But you don't get married, you
keep waiting for something! Then the Scriptures tell us that 'wine
maketh glad the heart of man.' . . . If you feel happy and you want
to feel better still, then go to the refreshment bar and have a
drink. The great thing is not to be too clever, but to follow the
beaten track! The beaten track is a grand thing!"

"You say that man is the creator of his own happiness. How the devil
is he the creator of it when a toothache or an ill-natured mother-in-law
is enough to scatter his happiness to the winds? Everything depends
on chance. If we had an accident at this moment you'd sing a different
tune."

"Stuff and nonsense!" retorts the bridegroom. "Railway accidents
only happen once a year. I'm not afraid of an accident, for there
is no reason for one. Accidents are exceptional! Confound them! I
don't want to talk of them! Oh, I believe we're stopping at a
station."

"Where are you going now?" asks Pyotr Petrovitch. "To Moscow or
somewhere further south?

"Why, bless you! How could I go somewhere further south, when I'm
on my way to the north?"

"But Moscow isn't in the north."

"I know that, but we're on our way to Petersburg," says Ivan
Alexyevitch.

"We are going to Moscow, mercy on us!"

"To Moscow? What do you mean?" says the bridegroom in amazement.

"It's queer. . . . For what station did you take your ticket?"

"For Petersburg."

"In that case I congratulate you. You've got into the wrong train."

There follows a minute of silence. The bridegroom gets up and looks
blankly round the company.

"Yes, yes," Pyotr Petrovitch explains. "You must have jumped into
the wrong train at Bologoe. . . . After your glass of brandy you
succeeded in getting into the down-train."

Ivan Alexyevitch turns pale, clutches his head, and begins pacing
rapidly about the carriage.

"Ach, idiot that I am!" he says in indignation. "Scoundrel! The
devil devour me! Whatever am I to do now? Why, my wife is in that
train! She's there all alone, expecting me, consumed by anxiety.
Ach, I'm a motley fool!"

The bridegroom falls on the seat and writhes as though someone had
trodden on his corns.

"I am un-unhappy man!" he moans. "What am I to do, what am I to
do?"

"There, there!" the passengers try to console him. "It's all right
. . . . You must telegraph to your wife and try to change into the
Petersburg express. In that way you'll overtake her."

"The Petersburg express!" weeps the bridegroom, the creator of his
own happiness. "And how am I to get a ticket for the Petersburg
express? All my money is with my wife."

The passengers, laughing and whispering together, make a collection
and furnish the happy man with funds.

An Enigmatic Nature

ON the red velvet seat of a first-class railway carriage a pretty
lady sits half reclining. An expensive fluffy fan trembles in her
tightly closed fingers, a pince-nez keeps dropping off her pretty
little nose, the brooch heaves and falls on her bosom, like a boat
on the ocean. She is greatly agitated.

On the seat opposite sits the Provincial Secretary of Special
Commissions, a budding young author, who from time to time publishes
long stories of high life, or "Novelli" as he calls them, in the
leading paper of the province. He is gazing into her face, gazing
intently, with the eyes of a connoisseur. He is watching, studying,
catching every shade of this exceptional, enigmatic nature. He
understands it, he fathoms it. Her soul, her whole psychology lies
open before him.

"Oh, I understand, I understand you to your inmost depths!" says
the Secretary of Special Commissions, kissing her hand near the
bracelet. "Your sensitive, responsive soul is seeking to escape
from the maze of ---- Yes, the struggle is terrific, titanic. But
do not lose heart, you will be triumphant! Yes!"

"Write about me, Voldemar!" says the pretty lady, with a mournful
smile. "My life has been so full, so varied, so chequered. Above
all, I am unhappy. I am a suffering soul in some page of Dostoevsky.
Reveal my soul to the world, Voldemar. Reveal that hapless soul.
You are a psychologist. We have not been in the train an hour
together, and you have already fathomed my heart."

"Tell me! I beseech you, tell me!"

"Listen. My father was a poor clerk in the Service. He had a good
heart and was not without intelligence; but the spirit of the age
--of his environment--_vous comprenez?_--I do not blame my
poor father. He drank, gambled, took bribes. My mother--but why
say more? Poverty, the struggle for daily bread, the consciousness
of insignificance--ah, do not force me to recall it! I had to
make my own way. You know the monstrous education at a boarding-school,
foolish novel-reading, the errors of early youth, the first timid
flutter of love. It was awful! The vacillation! And the agonies of
losing faith in life, in oneself! Ah, you are an author. You know
us women. You will understand. Unhappily I have an intense nature.
I looked for happiness--and what happiness! I longed to set my
soul free. Yes. In that I saw my happiness!"

"Exquisite creature!" murmured the author, kissing her hand close
to the bracelet. "It's not you I am kissing, but the suffering of
humanity. Do you remember Raskolnikov and his kiss?"

"Oh, Voldemar, I longed for glory, renown, success, like every--
why affect modesty?--every nature above the commonplace. I yearned
for something extraordinary, above the common lot of woman! And
then--and then--there crossed my path--an old general--very
well off. Understand me, Voldemar! It was self-sacrifice, renunciation!
You must see that! I could do nothing else. I restored the family
fortunes, was able to travel, to do good. Yet how I suffered, how
revolting, how loathsome to me were his embraces--though I will
be fair to him--he had fought nobly in his day. There were moments
--terrible moments--but I was kept up by the thought that from
day to day the old man might die, that then I would begin to live
as I liked, to give myself to the man I adore--be happy. There
is such a man, Voldemar, indeed there is!"

The pretty lady flutters her fan more violently. Her face takes a
lachrymose expression. She goes on:

"But at last the old man died. He left me something. I was free as
a bird of the air. Now is the moment for me to be happy, isn't it,
Voldemar? Happiness comes tapping at my window, I had only to let
it in--but--Voldemar, listen, I implore you! Now is the time
for me to give myself to the man I love, to become the partner of
his life, to help, to uphold his ideals, to be happy--to find
rest--but--how ignoble, repulsive, and senseless all our life
is! How mean it all is, Voldemar. I am wretched, wretched, wretched!
Again there is an obstacle in my path! Again I feel that my happiness
is far, far away! Ah, what anguish!--if only you knew what anguish!"

"But what--what stands in your way? I implore you tell me! What
is it?"

"Another old general, very well off----"

The broken fan conceals the pretty little face. The author props
on his fist his thought--heavy brow and ponders with the air of
a master in psychology. The engine is whistling and hissing while
the window curtains flush red with the glow of the setting sun.

A Defenceless Creature

IN spite of a violent attack of gout in the night and the nervous
exhaustion left by it, Kistunov went in the morning to his office
and began punctually seeing the clients of the bank and persons who
had come with petitions. He looked languid and exhausted, and spoke
in a faint voice hardly above a whisper, as though he were dying.

"What can I do for you?" he asked a lady in an antediluvian mantle,
whose back view was extremely suggestive of a huge dung-beetle.

"You see, your Excellency," the petitioner in question began,
speaking rapidly, "my husband Shtchukin, a collegiate assessor, was
ill for five months, and while he, if you will excuse my saying so,
was laid up at home, he was for no sort of reason dismissed, your
Excellency; and when I went for his salary they deducted, if you
please, your Excellency, twenty-four roubles thirty-six kopecks
from his salary. 'What for?' I asked. 'He borrowed from the club
fund,' they told me, 'and the other clerks had stood security for
him.' How was that? How could he have borrowed it without my consent?
It's impossible, your Excellency. What's the reason of it? I am a
poor woman, I earn my bread by taking in lodgers. I am a weak,
defenceless woman . . . I have to put up with ill-usage from everyone
and never hear a kind word. . ."

The petitioner was blinking, and dived into her mantle for her
handkerchief. Kistunov took her petition from her and began reading
it.

"Excuse me, what's this?" he asked, shrugging his shoulders. "I can
make nothing of it. Evidently you have come to the wrong place,
madam. Your petition has nothing to do with us at all. You will
have to apply to the department in which your husband was employed."

"Why, my dear sir, I have been to five places already, and they
would not even take the petition anywhere," said Madame Shtchukin.
"I'd quite lost my head, but, thank goodness--God bless him for
it--my son-in-law, Boris Matveyitch, advised me to come to you.
'You go to Mr. Kistunov, mamma: he is an influential man, he can
do anything for you. . . .' Help me, your Excellency!"

"We can do nothing for you, Madame Shtchukin. You must understand:
your husband served in the Army Medical Department, and our
establishment is a purely private commercial undertaking, a bank.
Surely you must understand that!"

Kistunov shrugged his shoulders again and turned to a gentleman in
a military uniform, with a swollen face.

"Your Excellency," piped Madame Shtchukin in a pitiful voice, "I
have the doctor's certificate that my husband was ill! Here it is,
if you will kindly look at it."

"Very good, I believe you," Kistunov said irritably, "but I repeat
it has nothing to do with us. It's queer and positively absurd!
Surely your husband must know where you are to apply?"

"He knows nothing, your Excellency. He keeps on: 'It's not your
business! Get away!'--that's all I can get out of him. . . . Whose
business is it, then? It's I have to keep them all!"

Kistunov again turned to Madame Shtchukin and began explaining to
her the difference between the Army Medical Department and a private
bank. She listened attentively, nodded in token of assent, and said:

"Yes . . . yes . . . yes . . . I understand, sir. In that case,
your Excellency, tell them to pay me fifteen roubles at least! I
agree to take part on account!

"Ough!" sighed Kistunov, letting his head drop back. "There's no
making you see reason. Do understand that to apply to us with such
a petition is as strange as to send in a petition concerning divorce,
for instance, to a chemist's or to the Assaying Board. You have not
been paid your due, but what have we to do with it?"

"Your Excellency, make me remember you in my prayers for the rest
of my days, have pity on a lone, lorn woman," wailed Madame Shtchukin;
"I am a weak, defenceless woman. . . . I am worried to death, I've
to settle with the lodgers and see to my husband's affairs and fly
round looking after the house, and I am going to church every day
this week, and my son-in-law is out of a job. . . . I might as well
not eat or drink. . . . I can scarcely keep on my feet. . . . I
haven't slept all night. . . ."

Kistunov was conscious of the palpitation of his heart. With a face
of anguish, pressing his hand on his heart, he began explaining to
Madame Shtchukin again, but his voice failed him.

"No, excuse me, I cannot talk to you," he said with a wave of his
hand. "My head's going round. You are hindering us and wasting your
time. Ough! Alexey Nikolaitch," he said, addressing one of his
clerks, "please will you explain to Madame Shtchukin?"

Kistunov, passing by all the petitioners, went to his private room
and signed about a dozen papers while Alexey Nikolaitch was still
engaged with Madame Shtchukin. As he sat in his room Kistunov heard
two voices: the monotonous, restrained bass of Alexey Nikolaitch
and the shrill, wailing voice of Madame Shtchukin.

"I am a weak, defenceless woman, I am a woman in delicate health,"
said Madame Shtchukin. "I look strong, but if you were to overhaul
me there is not one healthy fibre in me. I can scarcely keep on my
feet, and my appetite is gone. . . . I drank my cup of coffee this
morning without the slightest relish. . . ."

Alexey Nikolaitch explained to her the difference between the
departments and the complicated system of sending in papers. He was
soon exhausted, and his place was taken by the accountant.

"A wonderfully disagreeable woman!" said Kistunov, revolted, nervously
cracking his fingers and continually going to the decanter of water.
"She's a perfect idiot! She's worn me out and she'll exhaust them,
the nasty creature! Ough! . . . my heart is throbbing."

Half an hour later he rang his bell. Alexey Nikolaitch made his
appearance.

"How are things going?" Kistunov asked languidly.

"We can't make her see anything, Pyotr Alexandritch! We are simply
done. We talk of one thing and she talks of something else."

"I . . . I can't stand the sound of her voice. . . . I am ill
. . . . I can't bear it."

"Send for the porter, Pyotr Alexandritch, let him put her out."

"No, no," cried Kistunov in alarm. "She will set up a squeal, and
there are lots of flats in this building, and goodness knows what
they would think of us. . . . Do try and explain to her, my dear
fellow. . . ."

A minute later the deep drone of Alexey Nikolaitch's voice was
audible again. A quarter of an hour passed, and instead of his bass
there was the murmur of the accountant's powerful tenor."

"Re-mark-ably nasty woman," Kistunov thought indignantly, nervously
shrugging his shoulders. "No more brains than a sheep. I believe
that's a twinge of the gout again. . . . My migraine is coming
back. . . ."

In the next room Alexey Nikolaitch, at the end of his resources,
at last tapped his finger on the table and then on his own forehead.

"The fact of the matter is you haven't a head on your shoulders,"
he said, "but this."

"Come, come," said the old lady, offended. "Talk to your own wife
like that. . . . You screw! . . . Don't be too free with your hands."

And looking at her with fury, with exasperation, as though he would
devour her, Alexey Nikolaitch said in a quiet, stifled voice:

"Clear out."

"Wha-at?" squealed Madame Shtchukin. "How dare you? I am a weak,
defenceless woman; I won't endure it. My husband is a collegiate
assessor. You screw! . . . I will go to Dmitri Karlitch, the lawyer,
and there will be nothing left of you! I've had the law of three
lodgers, and I will make you flop down at my feet for your saucy
words! I'll go to your general. Your Excellency, your Excellency!"

"Be off, you pest," hissed Alexey Nikolaitch.

Kistunov opened his door and looked into the office.

"What is it?" he asked in a tearful voice.

Madame Shtchukin, as red as a crab, was standing in the middle of
the room, rolling her eyes and prodding the air with her fingers.
The bank clerks were standing round red in the face too, and,
evidently harassed, were looking at each other distractedly.

"Your Excellency," cried Madame Shtchukin, pouncing upon Kistunov.
"Here, this man, he here . . . this man . . ." (she pointed to
Alexey Nikolaitch) "tapped himself on the forehead and then tapped
the table. . . . You told him to go into my case, and he's jeering
at me! I am a weak, defenceless woman. . . . My husband is a
collegiate assessor, and I am a major's daughter myself!"

"Very good, madam," moaned Kistunov. "I will go into it . . . I
will take steps. . . . Go away . . . later!"

"And when shall I get the money, your Excellency? I need it to-day!"

Kistunov passed his trembling hand over his forehead, heaved a sigh,
and began explaining again.

"Madam, I have told you already this is a bank, a private commercial
establishment. . . . What do you want of us? And do understand that
you are hindering us."

Madame Shtchukin listened to him and sighed.

"To be sure, to be sure," she assented. "Only, your Excellency, do
me the kindness, make me pray for you for the rest of my life, be
a father, protect me! If a medical certificate is not enough I can
produce an affidavit from the police. . . . Tell them to give me
the money."

Everything began swimming before Kistunov's eyes. He breathed out
all the air in his lungs in a prolonged sigh and sank helpless on
a chair.

"How much do you want?" he asked in a weak voice.

"Twenty-four roubles and thirty-six kopecks."

Kistunov took his pocket-book out of his pocket, extracted a
twenty-five rouble note and gave it to Madame Shtchukin.

"Take it and . . . and go away!"

Madame Shtchukin wrapped the money up in her handkerchief, put it
away, and pursing up her face into a sweet, mincing, even coquettish
smile, asked:

"Your Excellency, and would it be possible for my husband to get a
post again?"

"I am going . . . I am ill . . ." said Kistunov in a weary voice.
"I have dreadful palpitations."

When he had driven home Alexey Nikolaitch sent Nikita for some
laurel drops, and, after taking twenty drops each, all the clerks
set to work, while Madame Shtchukin stayed another two hours in the
vestibule, talking to the porter and waiting for Kistunov to
return. . . .

She came again next day.

The Jeune Premier

YEVGENY ALEXEYITCH PODZHAROV, the _jeune premier_, a graceful,
elegant young man with an oval face and little bags under his eyes,
had come for the season to one of the southern towns of Russia, and
tried at once to make the acquaintance of a few of the leading
families of the place. "Yes, signor," he would often say, gracefully
swinging his foot and displaying his red socks, "an artist ought
to act upon the masses, both directly and indirectly; the first aim
is attained by his work on the stage, the second by an acquaintance
with the local inhabitants. On my honour, _parole d'honneur_, I
don't understand why it is we actors avoid making acquaintance with
local families. Why is it? To say nothing of dinners, name-day
parties, feasts, _soirees fixes_, to say nothing of these entertainments,
think of the moral influence we may have on society! Is it not
agreeable to feel one has dropped a spark in some thick skull? The
types one meets! The women! _Mon Dieu_, what women! they turn one's
head! One penetrates into some huge merchant's house, into the
sacred retreats, and picks out some fresh and rosy little peach--
it's heaven, _parole d'honneur!_"

In the southern town, among other estimable families he made the
acquaintance of that of a manufacturer called Zybaev. Whenever he
remembers that acquaintance now he frowns contemptuously, screws
up his eyes, and nervously plays with his watch-chain.

One day--it was at a name-day party at Zybaev's--the actor was
sitting in his new friends' drawing-room and holding forth as usual.
Around him "types" were sitting in armchairs and on the sofa,
listening affably; from the next room came feminine laughter and
the sounds of evening tea. . . . Crossing his legs, after each
phrase sipping tea with rum in it, and trying to assume an expression
of careless boredom, he talked of his stage triumphs.

"I am a provincial actor principally," he said, smiling condescendingly,
"but I have played in Petersburg and Moscow too. . . . By the way,
I will describe an incident which illustrates pretty well the state
of mind of to-day. At my benefit in Moscow the young people brought
me such a mass of laurel wreaths that I swear by all I hold sacred
I did not know where to put them! _Parole d'honneur!_ Later on, at
a moment when funds were short, I took the laurel wreaths to the
shop, and . . . guess what they weighed. Eighty pounds altogether.
Ha, ha! you can't think how useful the money was. Artists, indeed,
are often hard up. To-day I have hundreds, thousands, tomorrow
nothing. . . . To-day I haven't a crust of bread, to-morrow I have
oysters and anchovies, hang it all!"

The local inhabitants sipped their glasses decorously and listened.
The well-pleased host, not knowing how to make enough of his cultured
and interesting visitor, presented to him a distant relative who
had just arrived, one Pavel Ignatyevitch Klimov, a bulky gentleman
about forty, wearing a long frock-coat and very full trousers.

"You ought to know each other," said Zybaev as he presented Klimov;
"he loves theatres, and at one time used to act himself. He has an
estate in the Tula province."

Podzharov and Klimov got into conversation. It appeared, to the
great satisfaction of both, that the Tula landowner lived in the
very town in which the _jeune premier_ had acted for two seasons
in succession. Enquiries followed about the town, about common
acquaintances, and about the theatre. . . .

"Do you know, I like that town awfully," said the jeune premier,
displaying his red socks. "What streets, what a charming park, and
what society! Delightful society!"

"Yes, delightful society," the landowner assented.

"A commercial town, but extremely cultured. . . . For instance,
er-er-er . . . the head master of the high school, the public
prosecutor . . . the officers. . . . The police captain, too, was
not bad, a man, as the French say, enchante, and the women, Allah,
what women!"

"Yes, the women . . . certainly. . . ."

"Perhaps I am partial; the fact is that in your town, I don't know
why, I was devilishly lucky with the fair sex! I could write a dozen
novels. To take this episode, for instance. . . . I was staying in
Yegoryevsky Street, in the very house where the Treasury is. . . ."

"The red house without stucco?"

"Yes, yes . . . without stucco. . . . Close by, as I remember now,
lived a local beauty, Varenka. . . ."

"Not Varvara Nikolayevna?" asked Klimov, and he beamed with
satisfaction. "She really is a beauty . . . the most beautiful girl
in the town."

"The most beautiful girl in the town! A classic profile, great black
eyes . . . . and hair to her waist! She saw me in 'Hamlet,' she
wrote me a letter _a la_ Pushkin's 'Tatyana.' . . . I answered, as
you may guess. . . ."

Podzharov looked round, and having satisfied himself that there
were no ladies in the room, rolled his eyes, smiled mournfully, and
heaved a sigh.

"I came home one evening after a performance," he whispered, "and
there she was, sitting on my sofa. There followed tears, protestations
of love, kisses. . . . Oh, that was a marvellous, that was a divine
night! Our romance lasted two months, but that night was never
repeated. It was a night, parole d'honneur!"

"Excuse me, what's that?" muttered Klimov, turning crimson and
gazing open-eyed at the actor. "I know Varvara Nikolayevna well:
she's my niece."

Podzharov was embarrassed, and he, too, opened his eyes wide.

"How's this?" Klimov went on, throwing up his hands. "I know the
girl, and . . . and . . . I am surprised. . . ."

"I am very sorry this has come up," muttered the actor, getting up
and rubbing something out of his left eye with his little finger.
"Though, of course . . . of course, you as her uncle . . ."

The other guests, who had hitherto been listening to the actor with
pleasure and rewarding him with smiles, were embarrassed and dropped
their eyes.

"Please, do be so good . . . take your words back . . ." said Klimov
in extreme embarrassment. "I beg you to do so!"

"If . . . er-er-er . . . it offends you, certainly," answered the
actor, with an undefined movement of his hand.

"And confess you have told a falsehood."

"I, no . . . er-er-er. . . . It was not a lie, but I greatly regret
having spoken too freely. . . . And, in fact . . . I don't understand
your tone!"

Klimov walked up and down the room in silence, as though in uncertainty
and hesitation. His fleshy face grew more and more crimson, and the
veins in his neck swelled up. After walking up and down for about
two minutes he went up to the actor and said in a tearful voice:

"No, do be so good as to confess that you told a lie about Varenka!
Have the goodness to do so!"

"It's queer," said the actor, with a strained smile, shrugging his
shoulders and swinging his leg. "This is positively insulting!"

"So you will not confess it?"

"I do-on't understand!"

"You will not? In that case, excuse me . . . I shall have to resort
to unpleasant measures. Either, sir, I shall insult you at once on
the spot, or . . . if you are an honourable man, you will kindly
accept my challenge to a duel. . . . We will fight!"

"Certainly!" rapped out the jeune premier, with a contemptuous
gesture. "Certainly."

Extremely perturbed, the guests and the host, not knowing what to
do, drew Klimov aside and began begging him not to get up a scandal.
Astonished feminine countenances appeared in the doorway. . . . The
jeune premier turned round, said a few words, and with an air of
being unable to remain in a house where he was insulted, took his
cap and made off without saying good-bye.

On his way home the jeune premier smiled contemptuously and shrugged
his shoulders, but when he reached his hotel room and stretched
himself on his sofa he felt exceedingly uneasy.

"The devil take him!" he thought. "A duel does not matter, he won't
kill me, but the trouble is the other fellows will hear of it, and
they know perfectly well it was a yarn. It's abominable! I shall
be disgraced all over Russia. . . ."

Podzharov thought a little, smoked, and to calm himself went out
into the street.

"I ought to talk to this bully, ram into his stupid noddle that he
is a blockhead and a fool, and that I am not in the least afraid
of him. . . ."

The jeune premier stopped before Zybaev's house and looked at the
windows. Lights were still burning behind the muslin curtains and
figures were moving about.

"I'll wait for him!" the actor decided.

It was dark and cold. A hateful autumn rain was drizzling as though
through a sieve. Podzharov leaned his elbow on a lamp-post and
abandoned himself to a feeling of uneasiness.

He was wet through and exhausted.

At two o'clock in the night the guests began coming out of Zybaev's
house. The landowner from Tula was the last to make his appearance.
He heaved a sigh that could be heard by the whole street and scraped
the pavement with his heavy overboots.

"Excuse me!" said the jeune premier, overtaking him. "One minute."

Klimov stopped. The actor gave a smile, hesitated, and began,
stammering: "I . . . I confess . . . I told a lie."

"No, sir, you will please confess that publicly," said Klimov, and
he turned crimson again. "I can't leave it like that. . . ."

"But you see I am apologizing! I beg you . . . don't you understand?
I beg you because you will admit a duel will make talk, and I am
in a position. . . . My fellow-actors . . . goodness knows what
they may think. . . ."

The jeune premier tried to appear unconcerned, to smile, to stand
erect, but his body would not obey him, his voice trembled, his
eyes blinked guiltily, and his head drooped. For a good while he
went on muttering something. Klimov listened to him, thought a
little, and heaved a sigh.

"Well, so be it," he said. "May God forgive you. Only don't lie in
future, young man. Nothing degrades a man like lying . . . yes,
indeed! You are a young man, you have had a good education. . . ."

The landowner from Tula, in a benignant, fatherly way, gave him a
lecture, while the jeune premier listened and smiled meekly. . . .
When it was over he smirked, bowed, and with a guilty step and a
crestfallen air set off for his hotel.

As he went to bed half an hour later he felt that he was out of
danger and was already in excellent spirits. Serene and satisfied
that the misunderstanding had ended so satisfactorily, he wrapped
himself in the bedclothes, soon fell asleep, and slept soundly till
ten o'clock next morning.

An Avenger

SHORTLY after finding his wife _in flagrante delicto_ Fyodor
Fyodorovitch Sigaev was standing in Schmuck and Co.'s, the gunsmiths,
selecting a suitable revolver. His countenance expressed wrath,
grief, and unalterable determination.

"I know what I must do," he was thinking. "The sanctities of the
home are outraged, honour is trampled in the mud, vice is triumphant,
and therefore as a citizen and a man of honour I must be their
avenger. First, I will kill her and her lover and then myself."

He had not yet chosen a revolver or killed anyone, but already in
imagination he saw three bloodstained corpses, broken skulls, brains
oozing from them, the commotion, the crowd of gaping spectators,
the post-mortem. . . . With the malignant joy of an insulted man
he pictured the horror of the relations and the public, the agony
of the traitress, and was mentally reading leading articles on the
destruction of the traditions of the home.

The shopman, a sprightly little Frenchified figure with rounded
belly and white waistcoat, displayed the revolvers, and smiling
respectfully and scraping with his little feet observed:

". . . I would advise you, M'sieur, to take this superb revolver,
the Smith and Wesson pattern, the last word in the science of
firearms: triple-action, with ejector, kills at six hundred paces,
central sight. Let me draw your attention, M'sieu, to the beauty
of the finish. The most fashionable system, M'sieu. We sell a dozen
every day for burglars, wolves, and lovers. Very correct and powerful
action, hits at a great distance, and kills wife and lover with one
bullet. As for suicide, M'sieu, I don't know a better pattern."

The shopman pulled and cocked the trigger, breathed on the barrel,
took aim, and affected to be breathless with delight. Looking at
his ecstatic countenance, one might have supposed that he would
readily have put a bullet through his brains if he had only possessed
a revolver of such a superb pattern as a Smith-Wesson.

"And what price?" asked Sigaev.

"Forty-five roubles, M'sieu."

"Mm! . . . that's too dear for me."

"In that case, M'sieu, let me offer you another make, somewhat
cheaper. Here, if you'll kindly look, we have an immense choice,
at all prices. . . . Here, for instance, this revolver of the
Lefaucher pattern costs only eighteen roubles, but . . ." (the
shopman pursed up his face contemptuously) ". . . but, M'sieu, it's
an old-fashioned make. They are only bought by hysterical ladies
or the mentally deficient. To commit suicide or shoot one's wife
with a Lefaucher revolver is considered bad form nowadays. Smith-Wesson
is the only pattern that's correct style."

"I don't want to shoot myself or to kill anyone," said Sigaev, lying
sullenly. "I am buying it simply for a country cottage . . . to
frighten away burglars. . . ."

"That's not our business, what object you have in buying it." The
shopman smiled, dropping his eyes discreetly. "If we were to
investigate the object in each case, M'sieu, we should have to close
our shop. To frighten burglars Lefaucher is not a suitable pattern,
M'sieu, for it goes off with a faint, muffled sound. I would suggest
Mortimer's, the so-called duelling pistol. . . ."

"Shouldn't I challenge him to a duel?" flashed through Sigaev's
mind. "It's doing him too much honour, though. . . . Beasts like
that are killed like dogs. . . ."

The shopman, swaying gracefully and tripping to and fro on his
little feet, still smiling and chattering, displayed before him a
heap of revolvers. The most inviting and impressive of all was the
Smith and Wesson's. Sigaev picked up a pistol of that pattern, gazed
blankly at it, and sank into brooding. His imagination pictured how
he would blow out their brains, how blood would flow in streams
over the rug and the parquet, how the traitress's legs would twitch
in her last agony. . . . But that was not enough for his indignant
soul. The picture of blood, wailing, and horror did not satisfy
him. He must think of something more terrible.

"I know! I'll kill myself and him," he thought, "but I'll leave her
alive. Let her pine away from the stings of conscience and the
contempt of all surrounding her. For a sensitive nature like hers
that will be far more agonizing than death."

And he imagined his own funeral: he, the injured husband, lies in
his coffin with a gentle smile on his lips, and she, pale, tortured
by remorse, follows the coffin like a Niobe, not knowing where to
hide herself to escape from the withering, contemptuous looks cast
upon her by the indignant crowd.

"I see, M'sieu, that you like the Smith and Wesson make," the shopman
broke in upon his broodings. "If you think it too dear, very well,
I'll knock off five roubles. . . . But we have other makes, cheaper."

The little Frenchified figure turned gracefully and took down another
dozen cases of revolvers from the shelf.

"Here, M'sieu, price thirty roubles. That's not expensive, especially
as the rate of exchange has dropped terribly and the Customs duties
are rising every hour. M'sieu, I vow I am a Conservative, but even
I am beginning to murmur. Why, with the rate of exchange and the
Customs tariff, only the rich can purchase firearms. There's nothing
left for the poor but Tula weapons and phosphorus matches, and Tula
weapons are a misery! You may aim at your wife with a Tula revolver
and shoot yourself through the shoulder-blade."

Sigaev suddenly felt mortified and sorry that he would be dead, and
would miss seeing the agonies of the traitress. Revenge is only
sweet when one can see and taste its fruits, and what sense would
there be in it if he were lying in his coffin, knowing nothing about
it?

"Hadn't I better do this?" he pondered. "I'll kill him, then I'll
go to his funeral and look on, and after the funeral I'll kill
myself. They'd arrest me, though, before the funeral, and take away
my pistol. . . . And so I'll kill him, she shall remain alive, and
I . . . for the time, I'll not kill myself, but go and be arrested.
I shall always have time to kill myself. There will be this advantage
about being arrested, that at the preliminary investigation I shall
have an opportunity of exposing to the authorities and to the public
all the infamy of her conduct. If I kill myself she may, with her
characteristic duplicity and impudence, throw all the blame on me,
and society will justify her behaviour and will very likely laugh
at me. . . . If I remain alive, then . . ."

A minute later he was thinking:

"Yes, if I kill myself I may be blamed and suspected of petty
feeling. . . . Besides, why should I kill myself? That's one thing.
And for another, to shoot oneself is cowardly. And so I'll kill him
and let her live, and I'll face my trial. I shall be tried, and she
will be brought into court as a witness. . . . I can imagine her
confusion, her disgrace when she is examined by my counsel! The
sympathies of the court, of the Press, and of the public will
certainly be with me."

While he deliberated the shopman displayed his wares, and felt it
incumbent upon him to entertain his customer.

"Here are English ones, a new pattern, only just received," he
prattled on. "But I warn you, M'sieu, all these systems pale beside
the Smith and Wesson. The other day--as I dare say you have read--an
officer bought from us a Smith and Wesson. He shot his wife's lover,
and-would you believe it?-the bullet passed through him, pierced
the bronze lamp, then the piano, and ricochetted back from the
piano, killing the lap-dog and bruising the wife. A magnificent
record redounding to the honour of our firm! The officer is now
under arrest. He will no doubt be convicted and sent to penal
servitude. In the first place, our penal code is quite out of date;
and, secondly, M'sieu, the sympathies of the court are always with
the lover. Why is it? Very simple, M'sieu. The judges and the jury
and the prosecutor and the counsel for the defence are all living
with other men's wives, and it'll add to their comfort that there
will be one husband the less in Russia. Society would be pleased
if the Government were to send all the husbands to Sahalin. Oh,
M'sieu, you don't know how it excites my indignation to see the
corruption of morals nowadays. To love other men's wives is as much
the regular thing to-day as to smoke other men s cigarettes and to
read other men's books. Every year our trade gets worse and worse
--it doesn't mean that wives are more faithful, but that husbands
resign themselves to their position and are afraid of the law and
penal servitude."

The shopman looked round and whispered: "And whose fault is it,
M'sieu? The Government's."

"To go to Sahalin for the sake of a pig like that--there's no
sense in that either," Sigaev pondered. "If I go to penal servitude
it will only give my wife an opportunity of marrying again and
deceiving a second husband. She would triumph. . . . And so I will
leave _her_ alive, I won't kill myself, _him_ . . . I won't kill
either. I must think of something more sensible and more effective.
I will punish them with my contempt, and will take divorce proceedings
that will make a scandal."

"Here, M'sieu, is another make," said the shopman, taking down
another dozen from the shelf. "Let me call your attention to the
original mechanism of the lock."

In view of his determination a revolver was now of no use to Sigaev,
but the shopman, meanwhile, getting more and more enthusiastic,
persisted in displaying his wares before him. The outraged husband
began to feel ashamed that the shopman should be taking so much
trouble on his account for nothing, that he should be smiling,
wasting time, displaying enthusiasm for nothing.

"Very well, in that case," he muttered, "I'll look in again later
on . . . or I'll send someone."

He didn't see the expression of the shopman's face, but to smooth
over the awkwardness of the position a little he felt called upon
to make some purchase. But what should he buy? He looked round the
walls of the shop to pick out something inexpensive, and his eyes
rested on a green net hanging near the door.

"That's . . . what's that?" he asked.

"That's a net for catching quails."

"And what price is it?"

"Eight roubles, M'sieu."

"Wrap it up for me. . . ."

The outraged husband paid his eight roubles, took the net, and,
feeling even more outraged, walked out of the shop.

Gone Astray

A COUNTRY village wrapped in the darkness of night. One o'clock
strikes from the belfry. Two lawyers, called Kozyavkin and Laev,
both in the best of spirits and a little unsteady on their legs,
come out of the wood and turn towards the cottages.

"Well, thank God, we've arrived," says Kozyavkin, drawing a deep
breath. "Tramping four miles from the station in our condition is
a feat. I am fearfully done up! And, as ill-luck would have it, not
a fly to be seen."

"Petya, my dear fellow. . . . I can't. . . . I feel like dying if
I'm not in bed in five minutes."

"In bed! Don't you think it, my boy! First we'll have supper and a
glass of red wine, and then you can go to bed. Verotchka and I will
wake you up. . . . Ah, my dear fellow, it's a fine thing to be
married! You don't understand it, you cold-hearted wretch! I shall
be home in a minute, worn out and exhausted. . . . A loving wife
will welcome me, give me some tea and something to eat, and repay
me for my hard work and my love with such a fond and loving look
out of her darling black eyes that I shall forget how tired I am,
and forget the burglary and the law courts and the appeal division
. . . . It's glorious!"

"Yes--I say, I feel as though my legs were dropping off, I can
scarcely get along. . . . I am frightfully thirsty. . . ."

"Well, here we are at home."

The friends go up to one of the cottages, and stand still under the
nearest window.

"It's a jolly cottage," said Kozyavkin. "You will see to-morrow
what views we have! There's no light in the windows. Verotchka must
have gone to bed, then; she must have got tired of sitting up. She's
in bed, and must be worrying at my not having turned up." (He pushes
the window with his stick, and it opens.) "Plucky girl! She goes
to bed without bolting the window." (He takes off his cape and
flings it with his portfolio in at the window.) "I am hot! Let us
strike up a serenade and make her laugh!" (He sings.) "The moon
floats in the midnight sky. . . . Faintly stir the tender breezes
. . . . Faintly rustle in the treetops. . . . Sing, sing, Alyosha!
Verotchka, shall we sing you Schubert's Serenade?" (He sings.)

His performance is cut short by a sudden fit of coughing. "Tphoo!
Verotchka, tell Aksinya to unlock the gate for us!" (A pause.)
"Verotchka! don't be lazy, get up, darling!" (He stands on a stone
and looks in at the window.) "Verotchka, my dumpling; Verotchka,
my poppet . . . my little angel, my wife beyond compare, get up and
tell Aksinya to unlock the gate for us! You are not asleep, you
know. Little wife, we are really so done up and exhausted that we're
not in the mood for jokes. We've trudged all the way from the
station! Don't you hear? Ah, hang it all!" (He makes an effort to
climb up to the window and falls down.) "You know this isn't a nice
trick to play on a visitor! I see you are just as great a schoolgirl
as ever, Vera, you are always up to mischief!"

"Perhaps Vera Stepanovna is asleep," says Laev.

"She isn't asleep! I bet she wants me to make an outcry and wake
up the whole neighbourhood. I'm beginning to get cross, Vera! Ach,
damn it all! Give me a leg up, Alyosha; I'll get in. You are a
naughty girl, nothing but a regular schoolgirl. . . Give me a hoist."

Puffing and panting, Laev gives him a leg up, and Kozyavkin climbs
in at the window and vanishes into the darkness within.

"Vera!" Laev hears a minute later, "where are you? . . . D--damnation!
Tphoo! I've put my hand into something! Tphoo!"

There is a rustling sound, a flapping of wings, and the desperate
cackling of a fowl.

"A nice state of things," Laev hears. "Vera, where on earth did
these chickens come from? Why, the devil, there's no end of them!
There's a basket with a turkey in it. . . . It pecks, the nasty
creature."

Two hens fly out of the window, and cackling at the top of their
voices, flutter down the village street.

"Alyosha, we've made a mistake!" says Kozyavkin in a lachrymose
voice. "There are a lot of hens here. . . . I must have mistaken
the house. Confound you, you are all over the place, you cursed
brutes!"

"Well, then, make haste and come down. Do you hear? I am dying of
thirst!"

"In a minute. . . . I am looking for my cape and portfolio."

"Light a match."

"The matches are in the cape. . . . I was a crazy idiot to get into
this place. The cottages are exactly alike; the devil himself
couldn't tell them apart in the dark. Aie, the turkey's pecked my
cheek, nasty creature!"

"Make haste and get out or they'll think we are stealing the
chickens."

"In a minute. . . . I can't find my cape anywhere. . . . There are
lots of old rags here, and I can't tell where the cape is. Throw
me a match."

"I haven't any."

"We are in a hole, I must say! What am I to do? I can't go without
my cape and my portfolio. I must find them."

"I can't understand a man's not knowing his own cottage," says Laev
indignantly. "Drunken beast. . . . If I'd known I was in for this
sort of thing I would never have come with you. I should have been
at home and fast asleep by now, and a nice fix I'm in here. . . .
I'm fearfully done up and thirsty, and my head is going round."

"In a minute, in a minute. . . . You won't expire."

A big cock flies crowing over Laev's head. Laev heaves a deep sigh,
and with a hopeless gesture sits down on a stone. He is beset with
a burning thirst, his eyes are closing, his head drops forward. . . .
Five minutes pass, ten, twenty, and Kozyavkin is still busy among
the hens.

"Petya, will you be long?"

"A minute. I found the portfolio, but I have lost it again."

Laev lays his head on his fists, and closes his eyes. The cackling
of the fowls grows louder and louder. The inhabitants of the empty
cottage fly out of the window and flutter round in circles, he
fancies, like owls over his head. His ears ring with their cackle,
he is overwhelmed with terror.

"The beast!" he thinks. "He invited me to stay, promising me wine
and junket, and then he makes me walk from the station and listen
to these hens. . . ."

In the midst of his indignation his chin sinks into his collar, he
lays his head on his portfolio, and gradually subsides. Weariness
gets the upper hand and he begins to doze.

"I've found the portfolio!" he hears Kozyavkin cry triumphantly.
"I shall find the cape in a minute and then off we go!"

Then through his sleep he hears the barking of dogs. First one dog
barks, then a second, and a third. . . . And the barking of the
dogs blends with the cackling of the fowls into a sort of savage
music. Someone comes up to Laev and asks him something. Then he
hears someone climb over his head into the window, then a knocking
and a shouting. . . . A woman in a red apron stands beside him with
a lantern in her hand and asks him something.

"You've no right to say so," he hears Kozyavkin's voice. "I am a
lawyer, a bachelor of laws--Kozyavkin--here's my visiting card."

"What do I want with your card?" says someone in a husky bass.
"You've disturbed all my fowls, you've smashed the eggs! Look what
you've done. The turkey poults were to have come out to-day or
to-morrow, and you've smashed them. What's the use of your giving
me your card, sir?"

"How dare you interfere with me! No! I won't have it!"

"I am thirsty," thinks Laev, trying to open his eyes, and he feels
somebody climb down from the window over his head.

"My name is Kozyavkin! I have a cottage here. Everyone knows me."

"We don't know anyone called Kozyavkin."

"What are you saying? Call the elder. He knows me."

"Don't get excited, the constable will be here directly. . . . We
know all the summer visitors here, but I've never seen you in my
life."

"I've had a cottage in Rottendale for five years."

"Whew! Do you take this for the Dale? This is Sicklystead, but
Rottendale is farther to the right, beyond the match factory. It's
three miles from here."

"Bless my soul! Then I've taken the wrong turning!"

The cries of men and fowls mingle with the barking of dogs, and the
voice of Kozyavkin rises above the chaos of confused sounds:

"You shut up! I'll pay. I'll show you whom you have to deal with!"

Little by little the voices die down. Laev feels himself being
shaken by the shoulder. . . .

Minds in Ferment (from the Annals of a Town)

THE earth was like an oven. The afternoon sun blazed with such
energy that even the thermometer hanging in the excise officer's
room lost its head: it ran up to 112.5 and stopped there, irresolute.
The inhabitants streamed with perspiration like overdriven horses,
and were too lazy to mop their faces.

Two of the inhabitants were walking along the market-place in front
of the closely shuttered houses. One was Potcheshihin, the local
treasury clerk, and the other was Optimov, the agent, for many years
a correspondent of the _Son of the Fatherland_ newspaper. They
walked in silence, speechless from the heat. Optimov felt tempted
to find fault with the local authorities for the dust and disorder
of the market-place, but, aware of the peace-loving disposition and
moderate views of his companion, he said nothing.

In the middle of the market-place Potcheshihin suddenly halted and
began gazing into the sky.

"What are you looking at?"

"Those starlings that flew up. I wonder where they have settled.
Clouds and clouds of them. . . . If one were to go and take a shot
at them, and if one were to pick them up . . . and if . . . They
have settled in the Father Prebendary's garden!"

"Oh no! They are not in the Father Prebendary's, they are in the
Father Deacon's. If you did have a shot at them from here you
wouldn't kill anything. Fine shot won't carry so far; it loses its
force. And why should you kill them, anyway? They're birds destructive
of the fruit, that's true; still, they're fowls of the air, works
of the Lord. The starling sings, you know. . . . And what does it
sing, pray? A song of praise. . . . 'All ye fowls of the air, praise
ye the Lord.' No. I do believe they have settled in the Father
Prebendary's garden."

Three old pilgrim women, wearing bark shoes and carrying wallets,
passed noiselessly by the speakers. Looking enquiringly at the
gentlemen who were for some unknown reason staring at the Father
Prebendary's house, they slackened their pace, and when they were
a few yards off stopped, glanced at the friends once more, and then
fell to gazing at the house themselves.

"Yes, you were right; they have settled in the Father Prebendary's,"
said Optimov. "His cherries are ripe now, so they have gone there
to peck them."

From the garden gate emerged the Father Prebendary himself, accompanied
by the sexton. Seeing the attention directed upon his abode and
wondering what people were staring at, he stopped, and he, too, as
well as the sexton, began looking upwards to find out.

"The father is going to a service somewhere, I suppose," said
Potcheshihin. "The Lord be his succour!"

Some workmen from Purov's factory, who had been bathing in the
river, passed between the friends and the priest. Seeing the latter
absorbed in contemplation of the heavens and the pilgrim women,
too, standing motionless with their eyes turned upwards, they stood
still and stared in the same direction.

A small boy leading a blind beggar and a peasant, carrying a tub
of stinking fish to throw into the market-place, did the same.

"There must be something the matter, I should think," said Potcheshihin,
"a fire or something. But there's no sign of smoke anywhere. Hey!
Kuzma!" he shouted to the peasant, "what's the matter?"

The peasant made some reply, but Potcheshihin and Optimov did not
catch it. Sleepy-looking shopmen made their appearance at the doors
of all the shops. Some plasterers at work on a warehouse near left
their ladders and joined the workmen.

The fireman, who was describing circles with his bare feet, on the
watch-tower, halted, and, after looking steadily at them for a few
minutes, came down. The watch-tower was left deserted. This seemed
suspicious.

"There must be a fire somewhere. Don't shove me! You damned swine!"

"Where do you see the fire? What fire? Pass on, gentlemen! I ask
you civilly!"

"It must be a fire indoors!"

"Asks us civilly and keeps poking with his elbows. Keep your hands
to yourself! Though you are a head constable, you have no sort of
right to make free with your fists!"

"He's trodden on my corn! Ah! I'll crush you!"

"Crushed? Who's crushed? Lads! a man's been crushed!

"What's the meaning of this crowd? What do you want?"

"A man's been crushed, please your honour!"

"Where? Pass on! I ask you civilly! I ask you civilly, you blockheads!"

"You may shove a peasant, but you daren't touch a gentleman! Hands
off!"

"Did you ever know such people? There's no doing anything with them
by fair words, the devils! Sidorov, run for Akim Danilitch! Look
sharp! It'll be the worse for you, gentlemen! Akim Danilitch is
coming, and he'll give it to you! You here, Parfen? A blind man,
and at his age too! Can't see, but he must be like other people and
won't do what he's told. Smirnov, put his name down!"

"Yes, sir! And shall I write down the men from Purov's? That man
there with the swollen cheek, he's from Purov's works."

"Don't put down the men from Purov's. It's Purov's birthday to-morrow."

The starlings rose in a black cloud from the Father Prebendary's
garden, but Potcheshihin and Optimov did not notice them. They stood
staring into the air, wondering what could have attracted such a
crowd, and what it was looking at.

Akim Danilitch appeared. Still munching and wiping his lips, he cut
his way into the crowd, bellowing:

"Firemen, be ready! Disperse! Mr. Optimov, disperse, or it'll be
the worse for you! Instead of writing all kinds of things about
decent people in the papers, you had better try to behave yourself
more conformably! No good ever comes of reading the papers!"

"Kindly refrain from reflections upon literature!" cried Optimov
hotly. "I am a literary man, and I will allow no one to make
reflections upon literature! though, as is the duty of a citizen,
I respect you as a father and benefactor!"

"Firemen, turn the hose on them!"

"There's no water, please your honour!"

"Don't answer me! Go and get some! Look sharp!"

"We've nothing to get it in, your honour. The major has taken the
fire-brigade horses to drive his aunt to the station.

"Disperse! Stand back, damnation take you! Is that to your taste?
Put him down, the devil!"

"I've lost my pencil, please your honour!"

The crowd grew larger and larger. There is no telling what proportions
it might have reached if the new organ just arrived from Moscow had
not fortunately begun playing in the tavern close by. Hearing their
favourite tune, the crowd gasped and rushed off to the tavern. So
nobody ever knew why the crowd had assembled, and Potcheshihin and
Optimov had by now forgotten the existence of the starlings who
were innocently responsible for the proceedings.

An hour later the town was still and silent again, and only a
solitary figure was to be seen--the fireman pacing round and round
on the watch-tower.

The same evening Akim Danilitch sat in the grocer's shop drinking
_limonade gaseuse_ and brandy, and writing:

"In addition to the official report, I venture, your Excellency,
to append a few supplementary observations of my own. Father and
benefactor! In very truth, but for the prayers of your virtuous
spouse in her salubrious villa near our town, there's no knowing
what might not have come to pass. What I have been through to-day
I can find no words to express. The efficiency of Krushensky and
of the major of the fire brigade are beyond all praise! I am proud
of such devoted servants of our country! As for me, I did all that
a weak man could do, whose only desire is the welfare of his
neighbour; and sitting now in the bosom of my family, with tears
in my eyes I thank Him Who spared us bloodshed! In absence of
evidence, the guilty parties remain in custody, but I propose to
release them in a week or so. It was their ignorance that led them
astray!"

A Slander

SERGE KAPITONICH AHINEEV, the writing master, was marrying his
daughter to the teacher of history and geography. The wedding
festivities were going off most successfully. In the drawing room
there was singing, playing, and dancing. Waiters hired from the
club were flitting distractedly about the rooms, dressed in black
swallow-tails and dirty white ties. There was a continual hubbub
and din of conversation. Sitting side by side on the sofa, the
teacher of mathematics, Tarantulov, the French teacher, Pasdequoi,
and the junior assessor of taxes, Mzda, were talking hurriedly and
interrupting one another as they described to the guests cases of
persons being buried alive, and gave their opinions on spiritualism.
None of them believed in spiritualism, but all admitted that there
were many things in this world which would always be beyond the
mind of man. In the next room the literature master, Dodonsky, was
explaining to the visitors the cases in which a sentry has the right
to fire on passers-by. The subjects, as you perceive, were alarming,
but very agreeable. Persons whose social position precluded them
from entering were looking in at the windows from the yard.

Just at midnight the master of the house went into the kitchen to
see whether everything was ready for supper. The kitchen from floor
to ceiling was filled with fumes composed of goose, duck, and many
other odours. On two tables the accessories, the drinks and light
refreshments, were set out in artistic disorder. The cook, Marfa,
a red-faced woman whose figure was like a barrel with a belt around
it, was bustling about the tables.

"Show me the sturgeon, Marfa," said Ahineev, rubbing his hands and
licking his lips. "What a perfume! I could eat up the whole kitchen.
Come, show me the sturgeon."

Marfa went up to one of the benches and cautiously lifted a piece
of greasy newspaper. Under the paper on an immense dish there reposed
a huge sturgeon, masked in jelly and decorated with capers, olives,
and carrots. Ahineev gazed at the sturgeon and gasped. His face
beamed, he turned his eyes up. He bent down and with his lips emitted
the sound of an ungreased wheel. After standing a moment he snapped
his fingers with delight and once more smacked his lips.

"Ah-ah! the sound of a passionate kiss. . . . Who is it you're
kissing out there, little Marfa?" came a voice from the next room,
and in the doorway there appeared the cropped head of the assistant
usher, Vankin. "Who is it? A-a-h! . . . Delighted to meet you!
Sergei Kapitonich! You're a fine grandfather, I must say! _Tete-a-tete_
with the fair sex--tette!"

"I'm not kissing," said Ahineev in confusion. "Who told you so, you
fool? I was only . . . I smacked my lips . . . in reference to . . .
as an indication of . . . pleasure . . . at the sight of the fish."

"Tell that to the marines!" The intrusive face vanished, wearing a
broad grin.

Ahineev flushed.

"Hang it!" he thought, "the beast will go now and talk scandal.
He'll disgrace me to all the town, the brute."

Ahineev went timidly into the drawing-room and looked stealthily
round for Vankin. Vankin was standing by the piano, and, bending
down with a jaunty air, was whispering something to the inspector's
sister-in-law, who was laughing.

"Talking about me!" thought Ahineev. "About me, blast him! And she
believes it . . . believes it! She laughs! Mercy on us! No, I can't
let it pass . . . I can't. I must do something to prevent his being
believed. . . . I'll speak to them all, and he'll be shown up for
a fool and a gossip."

Ahineev scratched his head, and still overcome with embarrassment,
went up to Pasdequoi.

"I've just been in the kitchen to see after the supper," he said
to the Frenchman. "I know you are fond of fish, and I've a sturgeon,
my dear fellow, beyond everything! A yard and a half long! Ha, ha,
ha! And, by the way . . . I was just forgetting. . . . In the kitchen
just now, with that sturgeon . . . quite a little story! I went
into the kitchen just now and wanted to look at the supper dishes.
I looked at the sturgeon and I smacked my lips with relish . . .
at the piquancy of it. And at the very moment that fool Vankin came
in and said: . . . 'Ha, ha, ha! . . . So you're kissing here!'
Kissing Marfa, the cook! What a thing to imagine, silly fool! The
woman is a perfect fright, like all the beasts put together, and
he talks about kissing! Queer fish!"

"Who's a queer fish?" asked Tarantulov, coming up.

"Why he, over there--Vankin! I went into the kitchen . . ."

And he told the story of Vankin. ". . . He amused me, queer fish!
I'd rather kiss a dog than Marfa, if you ask me," added Ahineev.
He looked round and saw behind him Mzda.

"We were talking of Vankin," he said. "Queer fish, he is! He went
into the kitchen, saw me beside Marfa, and began inventing all sorts
of silly stories. 'Why are you kissing?' he says. He must have had
a drop too much. 'And I'd rather kiss a turkeycock than Marfa,' I
said, 'And I've a wife of my own, you fool,' said I. He did amuse
me!"

"Who amused you?" asked the priest who taught Scripture in the
school, going up to Ahineev.

"Vankin. I was standing in the kitchen, you know, looking at the
sturgeon. . . ."

And so on. Within half an hour or so all the guests knew the incident
of the sturgeon and Vankin.

"Let him tell away now!" thought Ahineev, rubbing his hands. "Let
him! He'll begin telling his story and they'll say to him at once,
'Enough of your improbable nonsense, you fool, we know all about
it!'"

And Ahineev was so relieved that in his joy he drank four glasses
too many. After escorting the young people to their room, he went
to bed and slept like an innocent babe, and next day he thought no
more of the incident with the sturgeon. But, alas! man proposes,
but God disposes. An evil tongue did its evil work, and Ahineev's
strategy was of no avail. Just a week later--to be precise, on
Wednesday after the third lesson--when Ahineev was standing in
the middle of the teacher's room, holding forth on the vicious
propensities of a boy called Visekin, the head master went up to
him and drew him aside:

"Look here, Sergei Kapitonich," said the head master, "you must
excuse me. . . . It's not my business; but all the same I must make
you realize. . . . It's my duty. You see, there are rumors that you
are romancing with that . . . cook. . . . It's nothing to do with
me, but . . . flirt with her, kiss her . . . as you please, but
don't let it be so public, please. I entreat you! Don't forget that
you're a schoolmaster."

Ahineev turned cold and faint. He went home like a man stung by a
whole swarm of bees, like a man scalded with boiling water. As he
walked home, it seemed to him that the whole town was looking at
him as though he were smeared with pitch. At home fresh trouble
awaited him.

"Why aren't you gobbling up your food as usual?" his wife asked him
at dinner. "What are you so pensive about? Brooding over your amours?
Pining for your Marfa? I know all about it, Mohammedan! Kind friends
have opened my eyes! O-o-o! . . . you savage!"

And she slapped him in the face. He got up from the table, not
feeling the earth under his feet, and without his hat or coat, made
his way to Vankin. He found him at home.

"You scoundrel!" he addressed him. "Why have you covered me with
mud before all the town? Why did you set this slander going about
me?"

"What slander? What are you talking about?"

"Who was it gossiped of my kissing Marfa? Wasn't it you? Tell me
that. Wasn't it you, you brigand?"

Vankin blinked and twitched in every fibre of his battered countenance,
raised his eyes to the icon and articulated, "God blast me! Strike
me blind and lay me out, if I said a single word about you! May I
be left without house and home, may I be stricken with worse than
cholera!"

Vankin's sincerity did not admit of doubt. It was evidently not he
who was the author of the slander.

"But who, then, who?" Ahineev wondered, going over all his acquaintances
in his mind and beating himself on the breast. "Who, then?"

Who, then? We, too, ask the reader.