MOSCOW,
January 31, 1891.
At home I found depression. My nicest and most intelligent mongoose had
fallen ill and was lying very quietly under a quilt. The little beast eats
and drinks nothing. The climate has already laid its cold claw on it and
means to kill it. What for?
We have received a dismal letter. In Taganrog we were on friendly
terms with a well-to-do Polish family. The cakes and jam I ate in their
house when I was a boy at school arouse in me now the most touching
reminiscences; there used to be music, young ladies, home-made liqueurs,
and catching goldfinches in the immense courtyard. The father had a post in
the Taganrog customs and got into trouble. The investigation and trial
ruined the family. There were two daughters and a son. When the elder
daughter married a rascal of a Greek, the family took an orphan girl into
the house to bring up. This little girl was attacked by disease of the knee
and they amputated the leg. Then the son died of consumption, a medical
student in his fourth year, an excellent fellow, a perfect Hercules, the
hope of the family.... Then came terrible poverty.... The father took to
wandering about the cemetery, longed to take to drink but could not: vodka
simply made his head ache cruelly while his thoughts remained the same,
just as sober and revolting. Now they write that the younger daughter, a
beautiful, plump young girl, is consumptive.... The father writes to me of
that and writes to me for a loan of _ten roubles_.... Ach!
I felt awfully unwilling to leave you, but still I am glad I did not remain
another day--I went away and showed that I had strength of will. I am
writing already. By the time you come to Moscow my novel [Footnote: “The
Duel.”] will be finished, and I will go back with you to Petersburg.
Tell Borya, Mitya, and Andrushka that I vituperate them. In the pocket of
my greatcoat I found some notes on which was scrawled: “Anton Pavlovitch,
for shame, for shame, for shame!” O pessimi discipuli! Utinam vos lupus
devoret!
Last night I did not sleep, and I read through my “Motley Tales” for the
second edition. I threw out about twenty stories.
MOSCOW,
February 5, 1891.
My mongoose has recovered and breaks crockery again with unfailing
regularity.
I am writing and writing! I must own I was afraid that my Sahalin
expedition would have put me out of the way of writing, but now I see that
it is all right. I have written a great deal. I am writing diffusely a la
Yasinsky. I want to get hold of a thousand roubles.
I shall soon begin to expect you. Are we going to Italy or not? We ought
to.
In Petersburg I don’t sleep at night, I drink and loaf about, but I feel
immeasurably better than in Moscow. The devil only knows why it is so.
I am not depressed, because in the first place I am writing, and in the
second, one feels that summer, which I love more than anything, is close at
hand. I long to prepare my fishing tackle....
February 23.
Greetings, my dear friend.
Your telegram about the Tormidor upset me. I felt dreadfully attracted to
Petersburg: now for the sake of Sardou and the Parisian visitors. But
practical considerations pulled me up. I reflected that I must hurry on
with my novel; that I don’t know French, and so should only be taking up
someone else’s place in the box; that I have very little money, and so on.
In short, as it seems to me now, I am a poor comrade, though apparently I
acted sensibly.
My novel is progressing. It’s all smooth, even, there is scarcely anything
that is too long. But do you know what is very bad? There is no movement in
my novel, and that frightens me. I am afraid it will be difficult to read
to the middle, to say nothing of reading to the end. Anyway, I shall finish
it. I shall bring Anna Pavlovna a copy on vellum paper to read in the
bathroom. I should like something to sting her in the water, so that she
would run out of the bathroom sobbing.