A DENSE, grayish fog lay over the river, and a steamer, now and then
uttering a dull whistle, was slowly forging up against the current. Damp
and cold clouds, of a monotone pallor, enveloped the steamer from
all sides and drowned all sounds, dissolving them in their troubled
dampness. The brazen roaring of the signals came out in a muffled,
melancholy drone, and was oddly brief as it burst forth from the
whistle. The sound seemed to find no place for itself in the air, which
was soaked with heavy dampness, and fell downward, wet and choked. And
the splashing of the steamer’s wheels sounded so fantastically dull that
it seemed as though it were not begotten near by, at the sides of the
vessel, but somewhere in the depth, on the dark bottom of the river.
From the steamer one could see neither the water, nor the shore, nor
the sky; a leaden-gray gloominess enwrapped it on all sides; devoid
of shadings, painfully monotonous, the gloominess was motionless, it
oppressed the steamer with immeasurable weight, slackened its movements
and seemed as though preparing itself to swallow it even as it was
swallowing the sounds. In spite of the dull blows of the paddles upon
the water and the measured shaking of the body of the vessel, it seemed
that the steamer was painfully struggling on one spot, suffocating in
agony, hissing like a fairy tale monster breathing his last, howling in
the pangs of death, howling with pain, and in the fear of death.
Lifeless were the steamer lights. About the lantern on the mast a yellow
motionless spot had formed; devoid of lustre, it hung in the fog over
the steamer, illuminating nothing save the gray mist. The red starboard
light looked like a huge eye crushed out by some one’s cruel fist,
blinded, overflowing with blood. Pale rays of light fell from the
steamer’s windows into the fog, and only tinted its cold, cheerless
dominion over the vessel, which was pressed on all sides by the
motionless mass of stifling dampness.
The smoke from the funnel fell downwards, and, together with fragments
of the fog, penetrated into all the cracks of the deck, where the
third-class passengers were silently muffling themselves in their rags,
and forming groups, like sheep. From near the machinery were wafted
deep, strained groans, the jingling of bells, the dull sounds of orders
and the abrupt words of the machinist:
“Yes--slow! Yes--half speed!”
On the stern, in a corner, blocked up by barrels of salted fish, a group
of people was assembled, illuminated by a small electric lamp. Those
were sedate, neatly and warmly clad peasants. One of them lay on a
bench, face down; another sat at his feet, still another stood, leaning
his back against a barrel, while two others seated themselves flat
on the deck. Their faces, pensive and attentive, were turned toward a
round-shouldered man in a short cassock, turned yellow, and a torn fur
cap. That man sat on some boxes with his back bent, and staring at his
feet, spoke in a low, confident voice:
“There will come an end to the long forbearance of the Lord, and then
His wrath will burst forth upon men. We are like worms before Him, and
how are we then to ward off His wrath, with what wailing shall we appeal
to His mercy?”
Oppressed by his gloominess, Foma had come down on the deck from his
cabin, and, for some time, had been standing in the shadow of some wares
covered with tarpaulin, and listened to the admonitive and gentle voice
of the preacher. Pacing the deck he had chanced upon this group, and
attracted by the figure of the pilgrim, had paused near it. There was
something familiar to him in that large, strong body, in that stern,
dark face, in those large, calm eyes. The curly, grayish hair, falling
from under the skull-cap, the unkempt bushy beard, which fell apart in
thick locks, the long, hooked nose, the sharp-pointed ears, the thick
lips--Foma had seen all these before, but could not recall when and
where.
“Yes, we are very much in arrears before the Lord!” remarked one of the
peasants, heaving a deep sigh.
“We must pray,” whispered the peasant who lay on the bench, in a
scarcely audible voice.
“Can you scrape your sinful wretchedness off your soul with words of
prayer?” exclaimed someone loudly, almost with despair in his voice.
No one of those that formed the group around the pilgrim turned at this
voice, only their heads sank lower on their breasts, and for a long time
these people sat motionless and speechless:
The pilgrim measured his audience with a serious and meditative glance
of his blue eyes, and said softly:
“Ephraim the Syrian said: ‘Make thy soul the central point of thy
thoughts and strengthen thyself with thy desire to be free from sin.’”
And again he lowered his head, slowly fingering the beads of the rosary.
“That means we must think,” said one of the peasants; “but when has a
man time to think during his life on earth?”
“Confusion is all around us.”
“We must flee to the desert,” said the peasant who lay on the bench.
“Not everybody can afford it.”
The peasants spoke, and became silent again. A shrill whistle resounded,
a little bell began to jingle at the machine. Someone’s loud exclamation
rang out:
“Eh, there! To the water-measuring poles.”
“Oh Lord! Oh Queen of Heaven!”--a deep sigh was heard.
And a dull, half-choked voice shouted:
“Nine! nine!”
Fragments of the fog burst forth upon the deck and floated over it like
cold, gray smoke.
“Here, kind people, give ear unto the words of King David,” said the
pilgrim, and shaking his head, began to read distinctly: “‘Lead me,
Oh Lord, in thy righteousness because of mine enemies; make thy way
straight before my face. For there is no faithfulness in their mouths;
their inward part is very wickedness; their throat is an open sepulchre;
they flatter with their tongue. Destroy thou them, Oh God; let them fall
by their own counsels.’”
“Eight! seven!” Like moans these exclamations resounded in the distance.
The steamer began to hiss angrily, and slackened its speed. The noise of
the hissing of the steam deafened the pilgrim’s words, and Foma saw only
the movement of his lips.
“Get off!” a loud, angry shout was heard. “It’s my place!”
“Yours?”
“Here you have yours!”
“I’ll rap you on the jaw; then you’ll find your place. What a lord!”
“Get away!”
An uproar ensued. The peasants who were listening to the pilgrim turned
their heads toward the direction where the row was going on, and the
pilgrim heaved a sigh and became silent. Near the machine a loud and
lively dispute blazed up as though dry branches, thrown upon a dying
bonfire, had caught the flame.
“I’ll give it to you, devils! Get away, both of you.”
“Take them away to the captain.”
“Ha! ha! ha! That’s a fine settlement for you!”
“That was a good rap he gave him on the neck!”
“The sailors are a clever lot.”
“Eight! nine!” shouted the man with the measuring pole.
“Yes, increase speed!” came the loud exclamation of the engineer.
Swaying because of the motion of the steamer, Foma stood leaning against
the tarpaulin, and attentively listened to each and every sound about
him. And everything was blended into one picture, which was familiar
to him. Through fog and uncertainty, surrounded on all sides by gloom
impenetrable to the eye, life of man is moving somewhere slowly and
heavily. And men are grieved over their sins, they sigh heavily, and
then fight for a warm place, and asking each other for the sake of
possessing the place, they also receive blows from those who strive for
order in life. They timidly search for a free road toward the goal.
“Nine! eight!”
The wailing cry is softly wafted over the vessel. “And the holy prayer
of the pilgrim is deafened by the tumult of life. And there is no relief
from sorrow, there is no joy for him who reflects on his fate.”
Foma felt like speaking to this pilgrim, in whose softly uttered words
there rang sincere fear of God, and all manner of fear for men before
His countenance. The kind, admonitive voice of the pilgrim possessed a
peculiar power, which compelled Foma to listen to its deep tones.
“I’d like to ask him where he lives,” thought Foma, fixedly scrutinizing
the huge stooping figure. “And where have I seen him before? Or does he
resemble some acquaintance of mine?”
Suddenly it somehow struck Foma with particular vividness that the
humble preacher before him was no other than the son of old Anany
Shchurov. Stunned by this conjecture, he walked up to the pilgrim and
seating himself by his side, inquired freely:
“Are you from Irgiz, father?”
The pilgrim raised his head, turned his face toward Foma slowly and
heavily, scrutinized him and said in a calm and gentle voice:
“I was on the Irgiz, too.”
“Are you a native of that place?”
“Are you now coming from there?”
“No, I am coming from Saint Stephen.”
The conversation broke off. Foma lacked the courage to ask the pilgrim
whether he was not Shchurov.
“We’ll be late on account of the fog,” said some one.
“How can we help being late!”
All were silent, looking at Foma. Young, handsome, neatly and richly
dressed, he aroused the curiosity of the bystanders by his sudden
appearance among them; he was conscious of this curiosity, he understood
that they were all waiting for his words, that they wanted to understand
why he had come to them, and all this confused and angered him.
“It seems to me that I’ve met you before somewhere, father,” said he at
length.
The pilgrim replied, without looking at him:
“Perhaps.”
“I would like to speak to you,” announced Foma, timidly, in a low voice.
“Well, then, speak.”
“Come with me.”
“Whither?”
“To my cabin.”
The pilgrim looked into Foma’s face, and, after a moment’s silence,
assented:
“Come.”
On leaving, Foma felt the looks of the peasants on his back, and now he
was pleased to know that they were interested in him.
In the cabin he asked gently:
“Would you perhaps eat something? Tell me. I will order it.”
“God forbid. What do you wish?”
This man, dirty and ragged, in a cassock turned red with age, and
covered with patches, surveyed the cabin with a squeamish look, and when
he seated himself on the plush-covered lounge, he turned the skirt of
the cassock as though afraid to soil it by the plush.
“What is your name, father?” asked Foma, noticing the expression of
squeamishness on the pilgrim’s face.
“Miron.”
“Not Mikhail?”
“Why Mikhail?” asked the pilgrim.
“There was in our town the son of a certain merchant Shchurov, he also
went off to the Irgiz. And his name was Mikhail.”
Foma spoke and fixedly looked at Father Miron; but the latter was as
calm as a deaf-mute--
“I never met such a man. I don’t remember, I never met him,” said he,
thoughtfully. “So you wished to inquire about him?”
“Yes.”
“No, I never met Mikhail Shchurov. Well, pardon me for Christ’s sake!”
and rising from the lounge, the pilgrim bowed to Foma and went toward
the door.
“But wait awhile, sit down, let’s talk a little!” exclaimed Foma,
rushing at him uneasily. The pilgrim looked at him searchingly and sank
down on the lounge. From the distance came a dull sound, like a deep
groan, and immediately after it the signal whistle of the steamer
drawled out as in a frightened manner over Foma’s and his guest’s heads.
From the distance came a more distant reply, and the whistle overhead
again gave out abrupt, timorous sounds. Foma opened the window. Through
the fog, not far from their steamer, something was moving along with
deep noise; specks of fantastic lights floated by, the fog was agitated
and again sank into dead immobility.
“How terrible!” exclaimed Foma, shutting the window.
“What is there to be afraid of?” asked the pilgrim. “You see! It is
neither day nor night, neither darkness nor light! We can see nothing,
we are sailing we know not whither, we are straying on the river.”
“Have inward fire within you, have light within your soul, and you shall
see everything,” said the pilgrim, sternly and instructively.
Foma was displeased with these cold words and looked at the pilgrim
askance. The latter sat with drooping head, motionless, as though
petrified in thought and prayer. The beads of his rosary were softly
rustling in his hands.
The pilgrim’s attitude gave birth to easy courage in Foma’s breast, and
he said:
“Tell me, Father Miron, is it good to live, having full freedom, without
work, without relatives, a wanderer, like yourself?”
Father Miron raised his head and softly burst into the caressing
laughter of a child. All his face, tanned from wind and sunburn,
brightened up with inward joy, was radiant with tranquil joy; he touched
Foma’s knee with his hand and said in a sincere tone:
“Cast aside from you all that is worldly, for there is no sweetness
in it. I am telling you the right word--turn away from evil. Do you
remember it is said:
‘Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly,
nor standeth in the way of sinners.’ Turn away, refresh your soul with
solitude and fill yourself with the thought of God. For only by the
thought of Him can man save his soul from profanation.”
“That isn’t the thing!” said Foma. “I have no need of working out my
salvation. Have I sinned so much? Look at others. What I would like is
to comprehend things.”
“And you will comprehend if you turn away from the world. Go forth upon
the free road, on the fields, on the steppes, on the plains, on the
mountains. Go forth and look at the world from afar, from your freedom.”
“That’s right!” cried Foma. “That’s just what I think. One can see
better from the side!”
And Miron, paying no attention to his words, spoke softly, as though of
some great mystery, known only to him, the pilgrim:
“The thick slumbering forests around you will start to rustle in sweet
voices about the wisdom of the Lord; God’s little birds will sing before
you of His holy glory, and the grasses of the steppe will burn incense
to the Holy Virgin.”
The pilgrim’s voice now rose and quivered from excess of emotion, now
sank to a mysterious whisper. He seemed as though grown younger; his
eyes beamed so confidently and clearly, and all his face was radiant
with the happy smile of a man who has found expression for his joy and
was delighted while he poured it forth.
“The heart of God throbs in each and every blade of grass; each and
every insect of the air and of the earth, breathes His holy spirit. God,
the Lord, Jesus Christ, lives everywhere! What beauty there is on earth,
in the fields and in the forests! Have you ever been on the Kerzhenz?
An incomparable silence reigns there supreme, the trees, the grass there
are like those of paradise.”
Foma listened, and his imagination, captivated by the quiet, charming
narrative, pictured to him those wide fields and dense forests, full of
beauty and soul-pacifying silence.
“You look at the sky, as you rest somewhere under a little bush, and
the sky seems to descend upon you as though longing to embrace you. Your
soul is warm, filled with tranquil joy, you desire nothing, you envy
nothing. And it actually seems to you that there is no one on earth save
you and God.”
The pilgrim spoke, and his voice and sing-song speech reminded Foma of
the wonderful fairy-tales of Aunt Anfisa. He felt as though, after a
long journey on a hot day, he drank the clear, cold water of a forest
brook, water that had the fragrance of the grasses and the flowers it
has bathed. Even wider and wider grew the pictures as they unfolded
upon him; here is a path through the thick, slumbering forest; the fine
sunbeams penetrate through the branches of the trees, and quiver in
the air and under the feet of the wanderer. There is a savoury odour of
fungi and decaying foliage; the honeyed fragrance of the flowers, the
intense odour of the pine-tree invisibly rise in the air and penetrate
the breast in a warm, rich stream. All is silence: only the birds are
singing, and the silence is so wonderful that it seems as though even
the birds were singing in your breast. You go, without haste, and your
life goes on like a dream. While here everything is enveloped in a gray,
dead fog, and we are foolishly struggling about in it, yearning for
freedom and light. There below they have started to sing something in
scarcely audible voices; it was half song, half prayer. Again someone is
shouting, scolding. And still they seek the way:
“Seven and a half. Seven!”
“And you have no care,” spoke the pilgrim, and his voice murmured like
a brook. “Anybody will give you a crust of bread; and what else do
you need in your freedom? In the world, cares fall upon the soul like
fetters.”
“You speak well,” said Foma with a sigh.
“My dear brother!” exclaimed the pilgrim, softly, moving still closer
toward him. “Since the soul has awakened, since it yearns toward
freedom, do not lull it to sleep by force; hearken to its voice. The
world with its charms has no beauty and holiness whatever, wherefore,
then, obey its laws? In John Chrysostom it is said: ‘The real shechinah
is man!’ Shechinah is a Hebrew word and it means the holy of holies.
Consequently--”
A prolonged shrill sound of the whistle drowned his voice. He listened,
rose quickly from the lounge and said:
“We are nearing the harbour. That’s what the whistle meant. I must be
off! Well, goodbye, brother! May God give you strength and firmness to
act according to the will of your soul! Goodbye, my dear boy!”
He made a low bow to Foma. There was something feminine, caressing and
soft in his farewell words and bow. Foma also bowed low to him, bowed
and remained as though petrified, standing with drooping head, his hand
leaning against the table.
“Come to see me when you are in town,” he asked the pilgrim, who was
hastily turning the handle of the cabin door.
“I will! I will come! Goodbye! Christ save you!”
When the steamer’s side touched the wharf Foma came out on the deck
and began to look downward into the fog. From the steamer people were
walking down the gang-planks, but Foma could not discern the pilgrim
among those dark figures enveloped in the dense gloom. All those
that left the steamer looked equally indistinct, and they all quickly
disappeared from sight, as though they had melted in the gray dampness.
One could see neither the shore nor anything else solid; the landing
bridge rocked from the commotion caused by the steamer; above it the
yellow spot of the lantern was swaying; the noise of the footsteps and
the bustle of the people were dull.
The steamer put off and slowly moved along into the clouds. The pilgrim,
the harbour, the turmoil of people’s voices--all suddenly disappeared
like a dream, and again there remained only the dense gloom and the
steamer heavily turning about in it. Foma stared before him into the
dead sea of fog and thought of the blue, cloudless and caressingly warm
sky--where was it?
On the next day, about noon, he sat In Yozhov’s small room and listened
to the local news from the mouth of his friend. Yozhov had climbed on
the table, which was piled with newspapers, and, swinging his feet,
narrated:
“The election campaign has begun. The merchants are putting your
godfather up as mayor--that old devil! Like the devil, he is immortal,
although he must be upwards of a hundred and fifty years old already.
He marries his daughter to Smolin. You remember that red-headed fellow.
They say that he is a decent man, but nowadays they even call clever
scoundrels decent men, because there are no men. Now Africashka plays
the enlightened man; he has already managed to get into intelligent
society, donated something to some enterprise or another and thus at
once came to the front. Judging from his face, he is a sharper of the
highest degree, but he will play a prominent part, for he knows how
to adapt himself. Yes, friend, Africashka is a liberal. And a liberal
merchant is a mixture of a wolf and a pig with a toad and a snake.”
“The devil take them all!” said Foma, waving his hand indifferently.
“What have I to do with them? How about yourself--do you still keep on
drinking?”
“I do! Why shouldn’t I drink?”
Half-clad and dishevelled, Yozhov looked like a plucked bird, which had
just had a fight and had not yet recovered from the excitement of the
conflict.
“I drink because, from time to time, I must quench the fire of my
wounded heart. And you, you damp stump, you are smouldering little by
little?”
“I have to go to the old man,” said Foma, wrinkling his face.
“Chance it!”
“I don’t feel like going. He’ll start to lecture me.”
“Then don’t go!”
“But I must.”
“Then go!”
“Why do you always play the buffoon?” said Foma, with displeasure, “as
though you were indeed merry.”
“By God, I feel merry!” exclaimed Yozhov, jumping down from the table.
“What a fine roasting I gave a certain gentleman in the paper yesterday!
And then--I’ve heard a clever anecdote: A company was sitting on the
sea-shore philosophizing at length upon life. And a Jew said to them:
‘Gentlemen, why do you employ so many different words? I’ll tell it to
you all at once: Our life is not worth a single copeck, even as this
stormy sea! ’”
“Eh, the devil take you!” said Foma. “Good-bye. I am going.”
“Go ahead! I am in a fine frame of mind to-day and I will not moan with
you. All the more so considering you don’t moan, but grunt.”
Foma went away, leaving Yozhov singing at the top of his voice:
“Beat the drum and fear not.”
“Drum? You are a drum yourself;” thought Foma, with irritation, as he
slowly came out on the street.
At the Mayakins he was met by Luba. Agitated and animated, she suddenly
appeared before him, speaking quickly:
“You? My God! How pale you are! How thin you’ve grown! It seems you have
been leading a fine life.”
Then her face became distorted with alarm and she exclaimed almost in a
whisper:
“Ah, Foma. You don’t know. Do you hear? Someone is ringing the bell.
Perhaps it is he.”
And she rushed out of the room, leaving behind her in the air the rustle
of her silk gown, and the astonished Foma, who had not even had a chance
to ask her where her father was. Yakov Tarasovich was at home. Attired
in his holiday clothes, in a long frock coat with medals on his breast,
he stood on the threshold with his hands outstretched, clutching at the
door posts. His green little eyes examined Foma, and, feeling their look
upon him, Foma raised his head and met them.
“How do you do, my fine gentleman?” said the old man, shaking his head
reproachfully. “Where has it pleased you to come from, may I ask? Who
has sucked off that fat of yours? Or is it true that a pig looks for a
puddle, and Foma for a place which is worse?”
“Have you no other words for me?” asked Foma, sternly, looking straight
into the old man’s face. And suddenly he noticed that his godfather
shuddered, his legs trembled, his eyes began to blink repeatedly, and
his hands clutched the door posts with an effort. Foma advanced toward
him, presuming that the old man was feeling ill, but Yakov Tarasovich
said in a dull and angry voice:
“Stand aside. Get out of the way.”
And his face assumed its usual expression.
Foma stepped back and found himself side by side with a rather short,
stout man, who bowed to Mayakin, and said in a hoarse voice:
“How do you do, papa?”
“How are you, Taras Yakovlich, how are you?” said the old man, bowing,
smiling distractedly, and still clinging to the door posts.
Foma stepped aside in confusion, seated himself in an armchair, and,
petrified with curiosity, wide-eyed, began to watch the meeting of
father and son.
The father, standing in the doorway, swayed his feeble body, leaning his
hands against the door posts, and, with his head bent on one side and
eyes half shut, stared at his son in silence. The son stood about three
steps away from him; his head already gray, was lifted high; he knitted
his brow and gazed at his father with large dark eyes. His small, black,
pointed beard and his small moustache quivered on his meagre face, with
its gristly nose, like that of his father. And the hat, also, quivered
in his hand. From behind his shoulder Foma saw the pale, frightened and
joyous face of Luba--she looked at her father with beseeching eyes and
it seemed she was on the point of crying out. For a few moments all were
silent and motionless, crushed as they were by the immensity of their
emotions. The silence was broken by the low, but dull and quivering
voice of Yakov Tarasovich:
“You have grown old, Taras.”
The son laughed in his father’s face silently, and, with a swift glance,
surveyed him from head to foot.
The father tearing his hands from the door posts, made a step toward his
son and suddenly stopped short with a frown. Then Taras Mayakin, with
one huge step, came up to his father and gave him his hand.
“Well, let us kiss each other,” suggested the father, softly.
The two old men convulsively clasped each other in their arms, exchanged
warm kisses and then stepped apart. The wrinkles of the older man
quivered, the lean face of the younger was immobile, almost stern. The
kisses had changed nothing in the external side of this scene, only
Lubov burst into a sob of joy, and Foma awkwardly moved about in his
seat, feeling as though his breath were failing him.
“Eh, children, you are wounds to the heart--you are not its joy,”
complained Yakov Tarasovich in a ringing voice, and he evidently
invested a great deal in these words, for immediately after he had
pronounced them he became radiant, more courageous, and he said briskly,
addressing himself to his daughter:
“Well, have you melted with joy? You had better go and prepare something
for us--tea and so forth. We’ll entertain the prodigal son. You must
have forgotten, my little old man, what sort of a man your father is?”
Taras Mayakin scrutinized his parent with a meditative look of his large
eyes and he smiled, speechless, clad in black, wherefore the gray hair
on his head and in his beard told more strikingly.
“Well, be seated. Tell me--how have you lived, what have you done? What
are you looking at? Ah! That’s my godson. Ignat Gordyeeff’s son, Foma.
Do you remember Ignat?”
“I remember everything,” said Taras.
“Oh! That’s good, if you are not bragging. Well, are you married?”
“I am a widower.”
“Have you any children?”
“They died. I had two.”
“That’s a pity. I would have had grandchildren.”
“May I smoke?” asked Taras.
“Go ahead. Just look at him, you’re smoking cigars.”
“Don’t you like them?”
“I? Come on, it’s all the same to me. I say that it looks rather
aristocratic to smoke cigars.”
“And why should we consider ourselves lower than the aristocrats?” said
Taras, laughing.
“Do, I consider ourselves lower?” exclaimed the old man. “I merely said
it because it looked ridiculous to me, such a sedate old fellow, with
beard trimmed in foreign fashion, cigar in his mouth. Who is he? My
son--he-he-he!” the old man tapped Taras on the shoulder and sprang away
from him, as though frightened lest he were rejoicing too soon, lest
that might not be the proper way to treat that half gray man. And he
looked searchingly and suspiciously into his son’s large eyes, which
were surrounded by yellowish swellings.
Taras smiled in his father’s face an affable and warm smile, and said to
him thoughtfully:
“That’s the way I remember you--cheerful and lively. It looks as though
you had not changed a bit during all these years.”
The old man straightened himself proudly, and, striking his breast with
his fist, said:
“I shall never change, because life has no power over him who knows his
own value. Isn’t that so?”
“Oh! How proud you are!”
“I must have taken after my son,” said the old man with a cunning
grimace. “Do you know, dear, my son was silent for seventeen years out
of pride.”
“That’s because his father would not listen to him,” Taras reminded him.
“It’s all right now. Never mind the past. Only God knows which of us is
to blame. He, the upright one, He’ll tell it to you--wait! I shall keep
silence. This is not the time for us to discuss that matter. You better
tell me--what have you been doing all these years? How did you come to
that soda factory? How have you made your way?”
“That’s a long story,” said Taras with a sigh; and emitting from his
mouth a great puff of smoke, he began slowly: “When I acquired
the possibility to live at liberty, I entered the office of the
superintendent of the gold mines of the Remezovs.”
“I know; they’re very rich. Three brothers. I know them all. One is a
cripple, the other a fool, and the third a miser. Go on!”
“I served under him for two years. And then I married his daughter,”
narrated Mayakin in a hoarse voice.
“The superintendent’s? That wasn’t foolish at all.” Taras became
thoughtful and was silent awhile. The old man looked at his sad face and
understood his son.
“And so you lived with your wife happily,” he said. “Well, what can you
do? To the dead belongs paradise, and the living must live on. You are
not so very old as yet. Have you been a widower long?”
“This is the third year.”
“So? And how did you chance upon the soda factory?”
“That belongs to my father-in-law.”
“Aha! What is your salary?”
“About five thousand.”
“Mm. That’s not a stale crust. Yes, that’s a galley slave for you!”
Taras glanced at his father with a firm look and asked him drily:
“By the way, what makes you think that I was a convict?”
The old man glanced at his son with astonishment, which was quickly
changed into joy:
“Ah! What then? You were not? The devil take them! Then--how was it?
Don’t take offence! How could I know? They said you were in Siberia!
Well, and there are the galleys!”
“To make an end of this once for all,” said Taras, seriously and
impressively, clapping his hand on his knee, “I’ll tell you right now
how it all happened. I was banished to Siberia to settle there for
six years, and, during all the time of my exile, I lived in the mining
region of the Lena. In Moscow I was imprisoned for about nine months.
That’s all!”
“So-o! But what does it mean?” muttered Yakov Tarasovich, with confusion
and joy.
“And here they circulated that absurd rumour.”
“That’s right--it is absurd indeed!” said the old man, distressed.
“And it did a pretty great deal of harm on a certain occasion.”
“Really? Is that possible?”
“Yes. I was about to go into business for myself, and my credit was
ruined on account of--”
“Pshaw!” said Yakov Tarasovich, as he spat angrily. “Oh, devil! Come,
come, is that possible?”
Foma sat all this time in his corner, listening to the conversation
between the Mayakins, and, blinking perplexedly, he fixedly examined the
newcomer. Recalling Lubov’s bearing toward her brother, and influenced,
to a certain degree, by her stories about Taras, he expected to see
in him something unusual, something unlike the ordinary people. He had
thought that Taras would speak in some peculiar way, would dress in
a manner peculiar to himself; and in general he would be unlike other
people. While before him sat a sedate, stout man, faultlessly dressed,
with stern eyes, very much like his father in face, and the only
difference between them was that the son had a cigar in his mouth and
a black beard. He spoke briefly in a business-like way of everyday
things--where was, then, that peculiar something about him? Now he began
to tell his father of the profits in the manufacture of soda. He had not
been a galley slave--Lubov had lied! And Foma was very much pleased when
he pictured to himself how he would speak to Lubov about her brother.
Now and then she appeared in the doorway during the conversation between
her father and her brother. Her face was radiant with happiness, and her
eyes beamed with joy as she looked at the black figure of Taras, clad in
such a peculiarly thick frock coat, with pockets on the sides and with
big buttons. She walked on tiptoe, and somehow always stretched her neck
toward her brother. Foma looked at her questioningly, but she did not
notice him, constantly running back and forth past the door, with plates
and bottles in her hands.
It so happened that she glanced into the room just when her brother was
telling her father about the galleys. She stopped as though petrified,
holding a tray in her outstretched hands and listened to everything her
brother said about the punishment inflicted upon him. She listened, and
slowly walked away, without catching Foma’s astonished and sarcastic
glance. Absorbed in his reflections on Taras, slightly offended by the
lack of attention shown him, and by the fact that since the handshake
at the introduction Taras had not given him a single glance, Foma ceased
for awhile to follow the conversation of the Mayakins, and suddenly he
felt that someone seized him by the shoulder. He trembled and sprang
to his feet, almost felling his godfather, who stood before him with
excited face:
“There--look! That is a man! That’s what a Mayakin is! They have seven
times boiled him in lye; they have squeezed oil out of him, and yet he
lives! Understand? Without any aid--alone--he made his way and found his
place and--he is proud! That means Mayakin! A Mayakin means a man who
holds his fate in his own hands. Do you understand? Take a lesson from
him! Look at him! You cannot find another like him in a hundred; you’d
have to look for one in a thousand. What? Just bear this in mind: You
cannot forge a Mayakin from man into either devil or angel.”
Stupefied by this tempestuous shock, Foma became confused and did not
know what to say in reply to the old man’s noisy song of praise. He saw
that Taras, calmly smoking his cigar, was looking at his father, and
that the corners of his lips were quivering with a smile. His
face looked condescendingly contented, and all his figure somewhat
aristocratic and haughty. He seemed to be amused by the old man’s joy.
And Yakov Tarasovich tapped Foma on the chest with his finger and said:
“I do not know him, my own son. He has not opened his soul to me. It
may be that such a difference had grown up between us that not only
an eagle, but the devil himself cannot cross it. Perhaps his blood has
overboiled; that there is not even the scent of the father’s blood in
it. But he is a Mayakin! And I can feel it at once! I feel it and say:
‘Today thou forgivest Thy servant, Oh Lord!’”
The old man was trembling with the fever of his exultation, and fairly
hopped as he stood before Foma.
“Calm yourself, father!” said Taras, slowly rising from his chair and
walking up to his father. “Why confuse the young man? Come, let us sit
down.”
He gave Foma a fleeting smile, and, taking his father by the arm, led
him toward the table.
“I believe in blood,” said Yakov Tarasovich; “in hereditary blood.
Therein lies all power! My father, I remember, told me: ‘Yashka, you
are my genuine blood!’ There. The blood of the Mayakins is thick--it is
transferred from father to father and no woman can ever weaken it. Let
us drink some champagne! Shall we? Very well, then! Tell me more--tell
me about yourself. How is it there in Siberia?”
And again, as though frightened and sobered by some thought, the old
man fixed his searching eyes upon the face of his son. And a few minutes
later the circumstantial but brief replies of his son again aroused in
him a noisy joy. Foma kept on listening and watching, as he sat quietly
in his corner.
“Gold mining, of course, is a solid business,” said Taras, calmly, with
importance, “but it is a rather risky operation and one requiring a
large capital. The earth says not a word about what it contains within
it. It is very profitable to deal with foreigners. Dealings with
them, under any circumstances, yield an enormous percentage. That is a
perfectly infallible enterprise. But a weary one, it must be admitted.
It does not require much brains; there is no room in it for an
extraordinary man; a man with great enterprising power cannot develop in
it.”
Lubov entered and invited them all into the dining-room. When the
Mayakins stepped out Foma imperceptibly tugged Lubov by the sleeve, and
she remained with him alone, inquiring hastily:
“What is it?”
“Nothing,” said Foma, with a smile. “I want to ask you whether you are
glad?”
“Of course I am!” exclaimed Lubov.
“And what about?”
“That is, what do you mean?”
“Just so. What about?”
“You’re queer!” said Lubov, looking at him with astonishment. “Can’t you
see?”
“What?” asked Foma, sarcastically.
“What’s the trouble with you?” said Lubov, looking at him uneasily.
“Eh, you!” drawled out Foma, with contemptuous pity. “Can your father,
can the merchant class beget anything good? Can you expect a radish to
bring forth raspberries? And you lied to me. Taras is this, Taras is
that. What is in him? A merchant, like the other merchants, and his
paunch is also that of the real merchant. He-he!” He was satisfied,
seeing that the girl, confused by his words, was biting her lips, now
flushing, now turning pale.
“You--you, Foma,” she began, in a choking voice, and suddenly stamping
her foot, she cried:
“Don’t you dare to speak to me!”
On reaching the threshold of the room, she turned her angry face to him,
and ejaculated in a low voice, emphatically:
“Oh, you malicious man!”
Foma burst into laughter. He did not feel like going to the table, where
three happy people were engaged in a lively conversation. He heard their
merry voices, their contented laughter, the rattle of the dishes, and he
understood that, with that burden on his heart, there was no place for
him beside them. Nor was there a place for him anywhere. If all people
only hated him, even as Lubov hated him now, he would feel more at ease
in their midst, he thought. Then he would know how to behave with them,
would find something to say to them. While now he could not understand
whether they were pitying him or whether they were laughing at him,
because he had lost his way and could not conform himself to anything.
As he stood awhile alone in the middle of the room, he unconsciously
resolved to leave this house where people were rejoicing and where he
was superfluous. On reaching the street, he felt himself offended by the
Mayakins. After all, they were the only people near to him in the world.
Before him arose his godfather’s face, on which the wrinkles quivered
with agitation, and illuminated by the merry glitter of his green eyes,
seemed to beam with phosphoric light.
“Even a rotten trunk of a tree stands out in the dark!” reflected Foma,
savagely. Then he recalled the calm and serious face of Taras and beside
it the figure of Lubov bowing herself hastily toward him. That aroused
in him feelings of envy and sorrow.
“Who will look at me like that? There is not a soul to do it.”
He came to himself from his broodings on the shore, at the
landing-places, aroused by the bustle of toil. All sorts of articles
and wares were carried and carted in every direction; people moved about
hastily, care-worn, spurring on their horses excitedly, shouting at one
another, filling the street with unintelligible bustle and deafening
noise of hurried work. They busied themselves on a narrow strip of
ground, paved with stone, built up on one side with tall houses, and the
other side cut off by a steep ravine at the river, and their seething
bustle made upon Foma an impression as though they had all prepared
themselves to flee from this toil amid filth and narrowness and
tumult--prepared themselves to flee and were now hastening to complete
the sooner the unfinished work which would not release them. Huge
steamers, standing by the shore and emitting columns of smoke from their
funnels, were already awaiting them. The troubled water of the river,
closely obstructed with vessels, was softly and plaintively splashing
against the shore, as though imploring for a minute of rest and repose.
“Your Honour!” a hoarse cry rang out near Foma’s ears, “contribute some
brandy in honour of the building!”
Foma glanced at the petitioner indifferently; he was a huge, bearded
fellow, barefooted, with a torn shirt and a bruised, swollen face.
“Get away!” muttered Foma, and turned away from him.
“Merchant! When you die you can’t take your money with you. Give me
for one glass of brandy, or are you too lazy to put your hand into your
pocket?”
Foma again looked at the petitioner; the latter stood before
him, covered more with mud than with clothes, and, trembling with
intoxication, waited obstinately, staring at Foma with blood-shot,
swollen eyes.
“Is that the way to ask?” inquired Foma.
“How else? Would you want me to go down on my knees before you for a
ten-copeck piece?” asked the bare-footed man, boldly.
“There!” and Foma gave him a coin.
“Thanks! Fifteen copecks. Thanks! And if you give me fifteen more I’ll
crawl on all fours right up to that tavern. Do you want me to?” proposed
the barefooted man.
“Go, leave me alone!” said Foma, waving him off with his hand.
“He who gives not when he may, when he fain would, shall have nay,” said
the barefooted man, and stepped aside.
Foma looked at him as he departed, and said to himself:
“There is a ruined man and yet how bold he is. He asks alms as though
demanding a debt. Where do such people get so much boldness?”
And heaving a deep sigh, he answered himself:
“From freedom. The man is not fettered. What is there that he should
regret? What does he fear? And what do I fear? What is there that I
should regret?”
These two questions seemed to strike Foma’s heart and called forth in
him a dull perplexity. He looked at the movement of the working people
and kept on thinking: What did he regret? What did he fear?
“Alone, with my own strength, I shall evidently never come out anywhere.
Like a fool I shall keep on tramping about among people, mocked and
offended by all. If they would only jostle me aside; if they would only
hate me, then--then--I would go out into the wide world! Whether I liked
or not, I would have to go!”
From one of the landing wharves the merry “dubinushka” [“Dubinushka,”
or the “Oaken Cudgel,” is a song popular with the Russian workmen.] had
already been smiting the air for a long time. The carriers were doing a
certain work, which required brisk movements, and were adapting the song
and the refrain to them.
“In the tavern sit great merchants
Drinking liquors strong,”
narrated the leader, in a bold recitative. The company joined in unison:
“Oh, dubinushka, heave-ho!”
And then the bassos smote the air with deep sounds:
“It goes, it goes.”
And the tenors repeated:
“It goes, it goes.”
Foma listened to the song and directed his footsteps toward it, on the
wharf. There he noticed that the carriers, formed in two rows, were
rolling out of the steamer’s hold huge barrels of salted fish. Dirty,
clad in red blouses, unfastened at the collar, with mittens on their
hands, with arms bare to the elbow, they stood over the hold, and,
merrily jesting, with faces animated by toil, they pulled the ropes,
all together, keeping time to their song. And from the hold rang out the
high, laughing voice of the invisible leader:
“But for our peasant throats
There is not enough vodka.”
And the company, like one huge pair of lungs, heaved forth loudly and in
unison:
“Oh, dubinushka, heave-ho!”
Foma felt pleased and envious as he looked at this work, which was as
harmonious as music. The slovenly faces of the carriers beamed with
smiles, the work was easy, it went on smoothly, and the leader of the
chorus was in his best vein. Foma thought that it would be fine to work
thus in unison, with good comrades, to the tune of a cheerful song, to
get tired from work to drink a glass of vodka and eat fat cabbage soup,
prepared by the stout, sprightly matron of the company.
“Quicker, boys, quicker!” rang out beside him someone’s unpleasant,
hoarse voice.
Foma turned around. A stout man, with an enormous paunch, tapped on the
boards of the landing bridge with his cane, as he looked at the carriers
with his small eyes and said:
“Bawl less and work faster.”
His face and neck were covered with perspiration; he wiped it off every
now and then with his left hand and breathed heavily, as though he were
going uphill.
Foma cast at the man a hostile look and thought:
“Others are working and he is sweating. And I am still worse than he.
I’m like a crow on the fence, good for nothing.”
From each and every impression there immediately stood out in his mind
the painful thought of his unfitness for life. Everything that attracted
his attention contained something offensive to him, and this something
fell like a brick upon his breast. At one side of him, by the freight
scales, stood two sailors, and one of them, a square-built, red-faced
fellow, was telling the other:
“As they rushed on me it began for fair, my dear chap! There were four
of them--I was alone! But I didn’t give in to them, because I saw that
they would beat me to death! Even a ram will kick out if you fleece
it alive. How I tore myself away from them! They all rolled away in
different directions.”
“But you came in for a sound drubbing all the same?” inquired the other
sailor.
“Of course! I caught it. I swallowed about five blows. But what’s the
difference? They didn’t kill me. Well, thank God for it!”
“Certainly.”
“To the stern, devils, to the stern, I’m telling you!” roared the
perspiring man in a ferocious voice at two carriers who were rolling a
barrel of fish along the deck.
“What are you yelling for?” Foma turned to him sternly, as he had
started at the shout.
“Is that any of your business?” asked the perspiring man, casting a
glance at Foma.
“It is my business! The people are working and your fat is melting away.
So you think you must yell at them?” said Foma, threateningly, moving
closer toward him.
“You--you had better keep your temper.”
The perspiring man suddenly rushed away from his place and went into his
office. Foma looked after him and also went away from the wharf; filled
with a desire to abuse some one, to do something, just to divert his
thoughts from himself at least for a short while. But his thoughts took
a firmer hold on him.
“That sailor there, he tore himself away, and he’s safe and sound! Yes,
while I--”
In the evening he again went up to the Mayakins. The old man was not at
home, and in the dining-room sat Lubov with her brother, drinking tea.
On reaching the door Foma heard the hoarse voice of Taras:
“What makes father bother himself about him?”
At the sight of Foma he stopped short, staring at his face with a
serious, searching look. An expression of agitation was clearly depicted
on Lubov’s face, and she said with dissatisfaction and at the same time
apologetically:
“Ah! So it’s you?”
“They’ve been speaking of me,” thought Foma, as he seated himself at
the table. Taras turned his eyes away from him and sank deeper in the
armchair. There was an awkward silence lasting for about a minute, and
this pleased Foma.
“Are you going to the banquet?”
“What banquet?”
“Don’t you know? Kononov is going to consecrate his new steamer. A mass
will be held there and then they are going to take a trip up the Volga.”
“I was not invited,” said Foma.
“Nobody was invited. He simply announced on the Exchange: ‘Anybody who
wishes to honour me is welcome!
“I don’t care for it.”
“Yes? But there will be a grand drinking bout,” said Lubov, looking at
him askance.
“I can drink at my own expense if I choose to do so.”
“I know,” said Lubov, nodding her head expressively.
Taras toyed with his teaspoon, turning it between his fingers and
looking at them askance.
“And where’s my godfather?” asked Foma.
“He went to the bank. There’s a meeting of the board of directors today.
Election of officers is to take place.
“They’ll elect him again.”
“Of course.”
And again the conversation broke off. Foma began to watch the brother
and the sister. Having dropped the spoon, Taras slowly drank his tea in
big sips, and silently moving the glass over to his sister, smiled to
her. She, too, smiled joyously and happily, seized the glass and began
to rinse it assiduously. Then her face assumed a strained expression;
she seemed to prepare herself for something and asked her brother in a
low voice, almost reverently:
“Shall we return to the beginning of our conversation?”
“If you please,” assented Taras, shortly.
“You said something, but I didn’t understand. What was it? I asked: ‘If
all this is, as you say, Utopia, if it is impossible, dreams, then what
is he to do who is not satisfied with life as it is?’”
The girl leaned her whole body toward her brother, and her eyes, with
strained expectation, stopped on the calm face of her brother. He
glanced at her in a weary way, moved about in his seat, and, lowering
his head, said calmly and impressively:
“We must consider from what source springs that dissatisfaction with
life. It seems to me that, first of all, it comes from the inability
to work; from the lack of respect for work. And, secondly, from a wrong
conception of one’s own powers. The misfortune of most of the people
is that they consider themselves capable of doing more than they really
can. And yet only little is required of man: he must select for himself
an occupation to suit his powers and must master it as well as possible,
as attentively as possible. You must love what you are doing, and then
labour, be it ever so rough, rises to the height of creativeness. A
chair, made with love, will always be a good, beautiful and solid chair.
And so it is with everything. Read Smiles. Haven’t you read him? It is
a very sensible book. It is a sound book. Read Lubbock. In general,
remember that the English people constitute the nation most qualified
for labour, which fact explains their astonishing success in the domain
of industry and commerce. With them labour is almost a cult. The height
of culture stands always directly dependent upon the love of labour. And
the higher the culture the more satisfied are the requirements of man,
the fewer the obstacles on the road toward the further development
of man’s requirements. Happiness is possible--it is the complete
satisfaction of requirements. There it is. And, as you see, man’s
happiness is dependent upon his relation toward his work.”
Taras Mayakin spoke slowly and laboriously, as though it were unpleasant
and tedious for him to speak. And Lubov, with knitted brow, leaning
toward him, listened to his words with eager attention in her eyes,
ready to accept everything and imbibe it into her soul.
“Well, and suppose everything is repulsive to a man?” asked Foma,
suddenly, in a deep voice, casting a glance at Taras’s face.
“But what, in particular, is repulsive to the man?” asked Mayakin,
calmly, without looking at Foma.
Foma bent his head, leaned his arms against the table and thus, like a
bull, went on to explain himself:
“Nothing pleases him--business, work, all people and deeds. Suppose I
see that all is deceit, that business is not business, but merely a
plug that we prop up with it the emptiness of our souls; that some work,
while others only give orders and sweat, but get more for that. Why is
it so? Eh?”
“I cannot grasp your idea,” announced Taras, when Foma paused, feeling
on himself Lubov’s contemptuous and angry look.
“You do not understand?” asked Foma, looking at Taras with a smile.
“Well, I’ll put it in this way:
A man is sailing in a boat on the river. The boat may be good, but under
it there is always a depth all the same. The boat is sound, but if the
man feels beneath him this dark depth, no boat can save him.”
Taras looked at Foma indifferently and calmly. He looked in silence, and
softly tapped his fingers on the edge of the table. Lubov was uneasily
moving about in her chair. The pendulum of the clock told the seconds
with a dull, sighing sound. And Foma’s heart throbbed slowly and
painfully, as though conscious that here no one would respond with a
warm word to its painful perplexity.
“Work is not exactly everything for a man,” said he, more to himself
than to these people who had no faith in the sincerity of his words. “It
is not true that in work lies justification. There are people who do not
work at all during all their lives long, and yet they live better
than those that do work. How is that? And the toilers--they are merely
unfortunate--horses! Others ride on them, they suffer and that’s all.
But they have their justification before God. They will be asked: ‘To
what purpose did you live?’ Then they will say: ‘We had no time to think
of that. We worked all our lives.’ And I--what justification have I? And
all those people who give orders--how will they justify themselves? To
what purpose have they lived? It is my idea that everybody necessarily
ought to know, to know firmly what he is living for.”
He became silent, and, tossing his head up, exclaimed in a heavy voice:
“Can it be that man is born merely to work, acquire money, build a
house, beget children and--die? No, life means something. A man is born,
he lives and dies. What for? It is necessary, by God, it is necessary
for all of us to consider what we are living for. There is no sense in
our life. No sense whatever! Then things are not equal, that can be seen
at once. Some are rich--they have money enough for a thousand people,
and they live in idleness. Others bend their backs over their work all
their lives, and yet they have not even a grosh. And the difference
in people is very insignificant. There are some that have not even any
trousers and yet they reason as though they were attired in silks.”
Carried away by his thoughts, Foma would have continued to give them
utterance, but Taras moved his armchair away from the table, rose and
said softly, with a sigh:
“No, thank you! I don’t want any more.”
Foma broke off his speech abruptly, shrugged his shoulders and looked at
Lubov with a smile.
“Where have you picked up such philosophy?” she asked, suspiciously and
drily.
“That is not philosophy. That is simply torture!” said Foma in an
undertone. “Open your eyes and look at everything. Then you will think
so yourself.”
“By the way, Luba, turn your attention to the fact,” began Taras,
standing with his back toward the table and scrutinizing the clock,
“that pessimism is perfectly foreign to the Anglo-Saxon race. That
which they call pessimism in Swift and in Byron is only a burning, sharp
protest against the imperfection of life and man. But you cannot find
among them the cold, well weighed and passive pessimism.”
Then, as though suddenly recalling Foma, he turned to him, clasping his
hands behind his back, and, wriggling his thigh, said:
“You raise very important questions, and if you are seriously interested
in them you must read books. In them will you find many very valuable
opinions as to the meaning of life. How about you--do you read books?”
“No!” replied Foma, briefly.
“Ah!”
“I don’t like them.”
“Aha! But they might nevertheless be of some help to you,” said Taras,
and a smile passed across his lips.
“Books? Since men cannot help me in my thoughts books can certainly do
nothing for me,” ejaculated Foma, morosely.
He began to feel awkward and weary with this indifferent man. He felt
like going away, but at the same time he wished to tell Lubov something
insulting about her brother, and he waited till Taras would leave the
room. Lubov washed the dishes; her face was concentrated and thoughtful;
her hands moved lazily. Taras was pacing the room, now and then
he stopped short before the sideboard on which was the silverware,
whistled, tapped his fingers against the window-panes and examined the
articles with his eyes half shut. The pendulum of the clock flashed
beneath the glass door of the case like some broad, grinning face, and
monotonously told the seconds. When Foma noticed that Lubov glanced
at him a few times questioningly, with expectant and hostile looks, he
understood that he was in her way and that she was impatiently expecting
him to leave.
“I am going to stay here over night,” said he, with a smile. “I must
speak with my godfather. And then it is rather lonesome in my house
alone.”
“Then go and tell Marfusha to make the bed for you in the corner room,”
Lubov hastened to advise him.
“I shall.”
He arose and went out of the dining-room. And he soon heard that Taras
asked his sister about something in a low voice.
“About me!” he thought. Suddenly this wicked thought flashed through
his mind: “It were but right to listen and hear what wise people have to
say.”
He laughed softly, and, stepping on tiptoe, went noiselessly into the
other room, also adjoining the dining-room. There was no light there,
and only a thin band of light from the dining-room, passing through the
unclosed door, lay on the dark floor. Softly, with sinking heart and
malicious smile, Foma walked up close to the door and stopped.
“He’s a clumsy fellow,” said Taras.
Then came Lubov’s lowered and hasty speech:
“He was carousing here all the time. He carried on dreadfully! It all
started somehow of a sudden. The first thing he did was to thrash
the son-in-law of the Vice-Governor at the Club. Papa had to take the
greatest pains to hush up the scandal, and it was a good thing that
the Vice-Governor’s son-in-law is a man of very bad reputation. He is a
card-sharper and in general a shady personality, yet it cost father more
than two thousand roubles. And while papa was busying himself about that
scandal Foma came near drowning a whole company on the Volga.”
“Ha-ha! How monstrous! And that same man busies himself with
investigating as to the meaning of life.”
“On another occasion he was carousing on a steamer with a company of
people like himself. Suddenly he said to them: ‘Pray to God! I’ll fling
every one of you overboard!’ He is frightfully strong. They screamed,
while he said: ‘I want to serve my country. I want to clear the earth of
base people.’”
“Really? That’s clever!”
“He’s a terrible man! How many wild pranks he has perpetrated during
these years! How much money he has squandered!”
“And, tell me, on what conditions does father manage his affairs for
him? Do you know?”
“No, I don’t. He has a full power of attorney. Why do you ask?”
“Simply so. It’s a solid business. Of course it is conducted in purely
Russian fashion; in other words, it is conducted abominably. But it is a
splendid business, nevertheless. If it were managed properly it would be
a most profitable gold mine.”
“Foma does absolutely nothing. Everything is in father’s hands.”
“Yes? That’s fine.”
“Do you know, sometimes it occurs to me that his thoughtful frame of
mind--that these words of his are sincere, and that he can be very
decent. But I cannot reconcile his scandalous life with his words and
arguments. I cannot do it under any circumstances!”
“It isn’t even worthwhile to bother about it. The stripling and lazy
bones seeks to justify his laziness.”
“No. You see, at times he is like a child. He was particularly so
before.”
“Well, that’s what I have said: he’s a stripling. Is it worth while
talking about an ignoramus and a savage, who wishes to remain an
ignoramus and a savage, and does not conceal the fact? You see: he
reasons as the bear in the fable bent the shafts.”
“You are very harsh.”
“Yes, I am harsh! People require that. We Russians are all desperately
loose. Happily, life is so arranged that, whether we will it or not, we
gradually brace up. Dreams are for the lads and maidens, but for serious
people there is serious business.”
“Sometimes I feel very sorry for Foma. What will become of him?”
“That does not concern me. I believe that nothing in particular will
become of him--neither good nor bad. The insipid fellow will squander
his money away, and will be ruined. What else? Eh, the deuce take him!
Such people as he is are rare nowadays. Now the merchant knows the power
of education. And he, that foster-brother of yours, he will go to ruin.”
“That’s true, sir!” said Foma, opening the door and appearing on the
threshold.
Pale, with knitted brow and quivering lips, he stared straight into
Taras’s face and said in a dull voice: “True! I will go to ruin
and--amen! The sooner the better!”
Lubov sprang up from the chair with frightened face, and ran up to
Taras, who stood calmly in the middle of the room, with his hands thrust
in his pockets.
“Foma! Oh! Shame! You have been eavesdropping. Oh, Foma!” said she in
confusion.
“Keep quiet, you lamb!” said Foma to her.
“Yes, eavesdropping is wrong!” ejaculated Taras, slowly, without lifting
from Foma his look of contempt.
“Let it be wrong!” said Foma, with a wave of the hand. “Is it my fault
that the truth can be learned by eavesdropping only?”
“Go away, Foma, please!” entreated Lubov, pressing close to her brother.
“Perhaps you have something to say to me?” asked Taras, calmly.
“I?” exclaimed Foma. “What can I say? I cannot say anything. It is you
who--you, I believe, know everything.”
“You have nothing then to discuss with me?” asked Taras again.
“I am very pleased.”
He turned sideways to Foma and inquired of Lubov:
“What do you think--will father return soon?”
Foma looked at him, and, feeling something akin to respect for the man,
deliberately left the house. He did not feel like going to his own huge
empty house, where each step of his awakened a ringing echo, he strolled
along the street, which was enveloped in the melancholy gray twilight of
late autumn. He thought of Taras Mayakin.
“How severe he is. He takes after his father. Only he’s not so restless.
He’s also a cunning rogue, I think, while Lubka regarded him almost as a
saint. That foolish girl! What a sermon he read to me! A regular judge.
And she--she was kind toward me.” But all these thoughts stirred in
him no feelings--neither hatred toward Taras nor sympathy for Lubov.
He carried with him something painful and uncomfortable, something
incomprehensible to him, that kept growing within his breast, and it
seemed to him that his heart was swollen and was gnawing as though from
an abscess. He hearkened to that unceasing and indomitable pain, noticed
that it was growing more and more acute from hour to hour, and, not
knowing how to allay it, waited for the results.
Then his godfather’s trotter passed him. Foma saw in the carriage the
small figure of Yakov Mayakin, but even that aroused no feeling in him.
A lamplighter ran past Foma, overtook him, placed his ladder against the
lamp post and went up. The ladder suddenly slipped under his weight, and
he, clasping the lamp post, cursed loudly and angrily. A girl jostled
Foma in the side with her bundle and said:
“Excuse me.”
He glanced at her and said nothing. Then a drizzling rain began to fall
from the sky--tiny, scarcely visible drops of moisture overcast the
lights of the lanterns and the shop windows with grayish dust. This dust
made him breathe with difficulty.
“Shall I go to Yozhov and pass the night there? I might drink with him,”
thought Foma and went away to Yozhov, not having the slightest desire
either to see the feuilleton-writer or to drink with him.
At Yozhov’s he found a shaggy fellow sitting on the lounge. He had on a
blouse and gray pantaloons. His face was swarthy, as though smoked, his
eyes were large, immobile and angry, his thick upper lip was covered
with a bristle-like, soldier moustache. He was sitting on the lounge,
with his feet clasped in his huge arms and his chin resting on his
knees. Yozhov sat sideways in a chair, with his legs thrown across the
arm of the chair. Among books and newspapers on the table stood a bottle
of vodka and there was an odour of something salty in the room.
“Why are you tramping about?” Yozhov asked Foma, and, nodding at him,
said to the man on the lounge: “Gordyeeff!”
The man glanced at the newcomer and said in a harsh, shrill voice:
“Krasnoshchokov.”
Foma seated himself on a corner of the lounge and said to Yozhov:
“I have come to stay here over night.”
“Well? Go on, Vasily.”
The latter glanced at Foma askance and went on in a creaking voice:
“In my opinion, you are attacking the stupid people in vain. Masaniello
was a fool, but what had to be performed was done in the best way
possible. And that Winkelried was certainly a fool also, and yet had he
not thrust the imperial spears into himself the Swiss would have been
thrashed. Have there not been many fools like that? Yet they are the
heroes. And the clever people are the cowards. Where they ought to deal
the obstacle a blow with all their might they stop to reflect: ‘What
will come of it? Perhaps we may perish in vain?’ And they stand there
like posts--until they breathe their last. And the fool is brave! He
rushes headforemost against the wall--bang! If his skull breaks--what of
it? Calves’ heads are not dear. And if he makes a crack in the wall
the clever people will pick it open into gates, will pass and credit
themselves with the honour. No, Nikolay Matveyich, bravery is a good
thing even though it be without reason.”
“Vasily, you are talking nonsense!” said Yozhov, stretching his hand
toward him.
“Ah, of course!” assented Vasily. “How am I to sip cabbage soup with a
bast shoe? And yet I am not blind. I can see. There is plenty of brains,
but no good comes of it. During the time the clever people think and
reflect as to how to act in the wisest way, the fools will down them.
That’s all.”
“Wait a little!” said Yozhov.
“I can’t! I am on duty today. I am rather late as it is. I’ll drop in
tomorrow--may I?”
“Come! I’ll give a roasting!”
“That’s exactly your business.”
Vasily adjusted himself slowly, rose from the lounge, took Yozhov’s
yellow, thin little hand in his big, swarthy paw and pressed it.
“Goodbye!”
Then he nodded toward Foma and went through the door sideways.
“Have you seen?” Yozhov asked Foma, pointing his hand at the door,
behind which the heavy footsteps still resounded.
“What sort of a man is he?”
“Assistant machinist, Vaska Krasnoshchokov. Here, take an example from
him: At the age of fifteen he began to study, to read and write, and at
twenty-eight he has read the devil knows how many good books, and has
mastered two languages to perfection. Now he’s going abroad.”
“What for?” inquired Foma.
“To study. To see how people live there, while you languish here--what
for?”
“He spoke sensibly of the fools,” said Foma, thoughtfully.
“I don’t know, for I am not a fool.”
“That was well said. The stupid man ought to act at once. Rush forward
and overturn.”
“There, he’s broken loose!” exclaimed Yozhov. “You better tell me
whether it is true that Mayakin’s son has returned?”
“Yes.”
“Why do you ask?”
“Nothing.”
“I can see by your face that there is something.”
“We know all about his son; we’ve heard about him.”
“But I have seen him.”
“Well? What sort of man is he?”
“The devil knows him! What have I to do with him?”
“Is he like his father?”
“He’s stouter, plumper; there is more seriousness about him; he is so
cold.”
“Which means that he will be even worse than Yashka. Well, now, my dear,
be on your guard or they will suck you dry.”
“Well, let them do it!”
“They’ll rob you. You’ll become a pauper. That Taras fleeced his
father-in-law in Yekateringburg so cleverly.”
“Let him fleece me too, if he likes. I shall not say a word to him
except ‘thanks.’”
“You are still singing that same old tune?”
“Yes.”
“To be set at liberty.”
“Yes.”
“Drop it! What do you want freedom for? What will you do with it? Don’t
you know that you are not fit for anything, that you are illiterate,
that you certainly cannot even split a log of wood? Now, if I could only
free myself from the necessity of drinking vodka and eating bread!”
Yozhov jumped to his feet, and, stopping in front of Foma, began to
speak in a loud voice, as though declaiming:
“I would gather together the remains of my wounded soul, and together
with the blood of my heart I would spit them into the face of our
intelligent society, the devil take it! I would say to them:
‘You insects, you are the best sap of my country! The fact of your
existence has been repaid by the blood and the tears of scores of
generations of Russian people. O, you nits! How dearly your country
has paid for you! What are you doing for its sake in return? Have you
transformed the tears of the past into pearls? What have you contributed
toward life? What have you accomplished? You have permitted yourselves
to be conquered? What are you doing? You permit yourselves to be
mocked.’”
He stamped his feet with rage, and setting his teeth together stared at
Foma with burning, angry looks, and resembled an infuriated wild beast.
“I would say to them: ‘You! You reason too much, but you are not very
wise, and you are utterly powerless, and you are all cowards! Your
hearts are filled up with morality and noble intentions, but they are as
soft and warm as feather beds; the spirit of creativeness sleeps within
them a profound and calm sleep, and your hearts do not throb, they
merely rock slowly, like cradles.’ Dipping my finger in the blood of my
heart, I would smear upon their brows the brands of my reproaches, and
they, paupers in spirit, miserable in their self-contentment, they would
suffer. Oh, how they would suffer! My scourge is sharp, my hand is firm!
And I love too deeply to have compassion! They would suffer! And now
they do not suffer, for they speak of their sufferings too much, too
often, and too loud! They lie! Genuine suffering is mute, and genuine
passion knows no bounds! Passions, passions! When will they spring up in
the hearts of men? We are all miserable because of apathy.”
Short of breath he burst into a fit of coughing, he coughed for a long
time, hopping about hither and thither, waving his hands like a madman.
And then he again stopped in front of Foma with pale face and blood-shot
eyes. He breathed heavily, his lips trembled now and then, displaying
his small, sharp teeth. Dishevelled, with his head covered with short
heir, he looked like a perch just thrown out of the water. This was
not the first time Foma saw him in such a state, and, as always, he was
infected by his agitation. He listened to the fiery words of the small
man, silently, without attempting to understand their meaning, having
no desire to know against whom they were directed, absorbing their force
only. Yozhov’s words bubbled on like boiling water, and heated his soul.
“I will say to them, to those miserable idlers:
‘Look! Life goes onward, leaving you behind!’”
“Eh! That’s fine!” exclaimed Foma, ecstatically, and began to move about
on the lounge. “You’re a hero, Nikolay! Oh! Go ahead! Throw it right
into their faces!”
But Yozhov was not in need of encouragement, it seemed even as though he
had not heard at all Foma’s exclamations, and he went on:
“I know the limitations of my powers. I know they’ll shout at me: ‘Hold
your peace!’ They’ll tell me: ‘Keep silence!’ They will say it wisely,
they will say it calmly, mocking me, they will say it from the height
of their majesty. I know I am only a small bird, Oh, I am not a
nightingale! Compared with them I am an ignorant man, I am only a
feuilleton-writer, a man to amuse the public. Let them cry and silence
me, let them do it! A blow will fall on my cheek, but the heart will
nevertheless keep on throbbing! And I will say to them:
“‘Yes, I am an ignorant man! And my first advantage over you is that
I do not know a single book-truth dearer to me than a man! Man is the
universe, and may he live forever who carries the whole world within
him! And you,’ I will say, ‘for the sake of a word which, perhaps, does
not always contain a meaning comprehensible to you, for the sake of a
word you often inflict sores and wounds on one another, for the sake of
a word you spurt one another with bile, you assault the soul. For this,
believe me, life will severely call you to account: a storm will break
loose, and it will whisk and wash you off the earth, as wind and rain
whisk and wash the dust off a tree I There is in human language only one
word whose meaning is clear and dear to everybody, and when that word is
pronounced, it sounds thus: ‘Freedom!’”
“Crush on!” roared Foma, jumping up from the lounge and grasping Yozhov
by the shoulders. With flashing eyes he gazed into Yozhov’s face,
bending toward him, and almost moaned with grief and affliction: “Oh!
Nikolay! My dear fellow, I am mortally sorry for you! I am more sorry
than words can tell!”
“What’s this? What’s the matter with you?” cried Yozhov, pushing him
away, amazed and shifted from his position by Foma’s unexpected outburst
and strange words.
“Oh, brother!” said Foma, lowering his voice, which thus sounded deeper,
more persuasive. “Oh, living soul, why do you sink to ruin?”
“Who? I? I sink? You lie!”
“My dear boy! You will not say anything to anybody! There is no one to
speak to! Who will listen to you? Only I!”
“Go to the devil!” shouted Yozhov, angrily, jumping away from him as
though he had been scorched.
And Foma went toward him, and spoke convincingly, with intense sorrow:
“Speak! speak to me! I shall carry away your words to the proper place.
I understand them. And, ah! how I will scorch the people! Just wait! My
opportunity will come.”
“Go away!” screamed Yozhov, hysterically, squeezing his back to the
wall, under Foma’s pressure. Perplexed, crushed, and infuriated he stood
and waved off Foma’s arms outstretched toward him. And at this time the
door of the room opened, and on the threshold appeared a woman all in
black. Her face was angry-looking and excited, her cheek was tied up
with a kerchief. She tossed her head back, stretched out her hand toward
Yozhov and said, in a hissing and shrill voice:
“Nikolay Matveyich! Excuse me, but this is impossible! Such beast-like
howling and roaring. Guests everyday. The police are coming. No, I can’t
bear it any longer! I am nervous. Please vacate the lodgings to-morrow.
You are not living in a desert, there are people about you here. And
an educated man at that! A writer! All people require rest. I have a
toothache. I request you to move tomorrow. I’ll paste up a notice, I’ll
notify the police.”
She spoke rapidly, and the majority of her words were lost in the
hissing and whistling of her voice; only those words were distinct,
which she shrieked out in a shrill, irritated tone. The corners of her
kerchief protruded on her head like small horns, and shook from the
movement of her jaws. At the sight of her agitated and comical figure
Foma gradually retreated toward the lounge, while Yozhov stood, and
wiping his forehead, stared at her fixedly, and listened to her words:
“So know it now!” she screamed, and behind the door, she said once more:
“Tomorrow! What an outrage.”
“Devil!” whispered Yozhov, staring dully at the door.
“Yes! what a woman! How strict!” said Foma, looking at him in amazement,
as he seated himself on the lounge.
Yozhov, raising his shoulders, walked up to the table, poured out a half
a tea-glass full of vodka, emptied it and sat down by the table, bowing
his head low. There was silence for about a minute. Then Foma said,
timidly and softly:
“How it all happened! We had no time even to wink an eye, and, suddenly,
such an outcome. Ah!”
“You!” said Yozhov in an undertone, tossing up his head, and staring at
Foma angrily and wildly. “Keep quiet! You, the devil take you. Lie down
and sleep! You monster. Nightmare. Oh!”
And he threatened Foma with his fist. Then he filled the glass with more
brandy, and emptied it again.
A few minutes later Foma lay undressed on the lounge, and, with
half-shut eyes, followed Yozhov who sat by the table in an awkward
pose. He stared at the floor, and his lips were quietly moving. Foma was
astonished, he could not make out why Yozhov had become angry at him.
It could not be because he had been ordered to move out. For it was he
himself who had been shouting.
“Oh devil!” whispered Yozhov, and gnashed his teeth.
Foma quietly lifted his head from the pillow. Yozhov deeply and noisily
sighing, again stretched out his hand toward the bottle. Then Foma said
to him softly:
“Let’s go to some hotel. It isn’t late yet.”
Yozhov looked at him, and, rubbing his head with his hands, began to
laugh strangely. Then he rose from his chair and said to Foma curtly:
“Dress yourself!”
And seeing how clumsily and slowly he turned on the lounge, Yozhov
shouted with anger and impatience:
“Well, be quicker! You personification of stupidity. You symbolical
cart-shaft.”
“Don’t curse!” said Foma, with a peaceable smile. “Is it worthwhile to
be angry because a woman has cackled?”
Yozhov glanced at him, spat and burst into harsh laughter.