It was almost completely dark in the narrow, cramped, low-pitched room,

cumbered up with an enormous wardrobe and piles of cardboard boxes and

all sorts of frippery and litter. The candle end that had been burning

on the table was going out and gave a faint flicker from time to time.

In a few minutes there would be complete darkness.

I was not long in coming to myself; everything came back to my mind at

once, without an effort, as though it had been in ambush to pounce upon

me again. And, indeed, even while I was unconscious a point seemed

continually to remain in my memory unforgotten, and round it my dreams

moved drearily. But strange to say, everything that had happened to me

in that day seemed to me now, on waking, to be in the far, far away

past, as though I had long, long ago lived all that down.

My head was full of fumes. Something seemed to be hovering over me,

rousing me, exciting me, and making me restless. Misery and spite

seemed surging up in me again and seeking an outlet. Suddenly I saw

beside me two wide open eyes scrutinising me curiously and

persistently. The look in those eyes was coldly detached, sullen, as it

were utterly remote; it weighed upon me.

A grim idea came into my brain and passed all over my body, as a

horrible sensation, such as one feels when one goes into a damp and

mouldy cellar. There was something unnatural in those two eyes,

beginning to look at me only now. I recalled, too, that during those

two hours I had not said a single word to this creature, and had, in

fact, considered it utterly superfluous; in fact, the silence had for

some reason gratified me. Now I suddenly realised vividly the hideous

idea—revolting as a spider—of vice, which, without love, grossly and

shamelessly begins with that in which true love finds its consummation.

For a long time we gazed at each other like that, but she did not drop

her eyes before mine and her expression did not change, so that at last

I felt uncomfortable.

“What is your name?” I asked abruptly, to put an end to it.

“Liza,” she answered almost in a whisper, but somehow far from

graciously, and she turned her eyes away.

I was silent.

“What weather! The snow ... it’s disgusting!” I said, almost to myself,

putting my arm under my head despondently, and gazing at the ceiling.

She made no answer. This was horrible.

“Have you always lived in Petersburg?” I asked a minute later, almost

angrily, turning my head slightly towards her.

“No.”

“Where do you come from?”

“From Riga,” she answered reluctantly.

“Are you a German?”

“No, Russian.”

“Have you been here long?”

“Where?”

“In this house?”

“A fortnight.”

She spoke more and more jerkily. The candle went out; I could no longer

distinguish her face.

“Have you a father and mother?”

“Yes ... no ... I have.”

“Where are they?”

“There ... in Riga.”

“What are they?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“Nothing? Why, what class are they?”

“Tradespeople.”

“Have you always lived with them?”

“Yes.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty.”

“Why did you leave them?”

“Oh, for no reason.”

That answer meant “Let me alone; I feel sick, sad.”

We were silent.

God knows why I did not go away. I felt myself more and more sick and

dreary. The images of the previous day began of themselves, apart from

my will, flitting through my memory in confusion. I suddenly recalled

something I had seen that morning when, full of anxious thoughts, I was

hurrying to the office.

“I saw them carrying a coffin out yesterday and they nearly dropped

it,” I suddenly said aloud, not that I desired to open the

conversation, but as it were by accident.

“A coffin?”

“Yes, in the Haymarket; they were bringing it up out of a cellar.”

“From a cellar?”

“Not from a cellar, but a basement. Oh, you know ... down below ...

from a house of ill-fame. It was filthy all round ... Egg-shells,

litter ... a stench. It was loathsome.”

Silence.

“A nasty day to be buried,” I began, simply to avoid being silent.

“Nasty, in what way?”

“The snow, the wet.” (I yawned.)

“It makes no difference,” she said suddenly, after a brief silence.

“No, it’s horrid.” (I yawned again). “The gravediggers must have sworn

at getting drenched by the snow. And there must have been water in the

grave.”

“Why water in the grave?” she asked, with a sort of curiosity, but

speaking even more harshly and abruptly than before.

I suddenly began to feel provoked.

“Why, there must have been water at the bottom a foot deep. You can’t

dig a dry grave in Volkovo Cemetery.”

“Why?”

“Why? Why, the place is waterlogged. It’s a regular marsh. So they bury

them in water. I’ve seen it myself ... many times.”

(I had never seen it once, indeed I had never been in Volkovo, and had

only heard stories of it.)

“Do you mean to say, you don’t mind how you die?”

“But why should I die?” she answered, as though defending herself.

“Why, some day you will die, and you will die just the same as that

dead woman. She was ... a girl like you. She died of consumption.”

“A wench would have died in hospital ...” (She knows all about it

already: she said “wench,” not “girl.”)

“She was in debt to her madam,” I retorted, more and more provoked by

the discussion; “and went on earning money for her up to the end,

though she was in consumption. Some sledge-drivers standing by were

talking about her to some soldiers and telling them so. No doubt they

knew her. They were laughing. They were going to meet in a pot-house to

drink to her memory.”

A great deal of this was my invention. Silence followed, profound

silence. She did not stir.

“And is it better to die in a hospital?”

“Isn’t it just the same? Besides, why should I die?” she added

irritably.

“If not now, a little later.”

“Why a little later?”

“Why, indeed? Now you are young, pretty, fresh, you fetch a high price.

But after another year of this life you will be very different—you will

go off.”

“In a year?”

“Anyway, in a year you will be worth less,” I continued malignantly.

“You will go from here to something lower, another house; a year

later—to a third, lower and lower, and in seven years you will come to

a basement in the Haymarket. That will be if you were lucky. But it

would be much worse if you got some disease, consumption, say ... and

caught a chill, or something or other. It’s not easy to get over an

illness in your way of life. If you catch anything you may not get rid

of it. And so you would die.”

“Oh, well, then I shall die,” she answered, quite vindictively, and she

made a quick movement.

“But one is sorry.”

“Sorry for whom?”

“Sorry for life.” Silence.

“Have you been engaged to be married? Eh?”

“What’s that to you?”

“Oh, I am not cross-examining you. It’s nothing to me. Why are you so

cross? Of course you may have had your own troubles. What is it to me?

It’s simply that I felt sorry.”

“Sorry for whom?”

“Sorry for you.”

“No need,” she whispered hardly audibly, and again made a faint

movement.

That incensed me at once. What! I was so gentle with her, and she....

“Why, do you think that you are on the right path?”

“I don’t think anything.”

“That’s what’s wrong, that you don’t think. Realise it while there is

still time. There still is time. You are still young, good-looking; you

might love, be married, be happy....”

“Not all married women are happy,” she snapped out in the rude abrupt

tone she had used at first.

“Not all, of course, but anyway it is much better than the life here.

Infinitely better. Besides, with love one can live even without

happiness. Even in sorrow life is sweet; life is sweet, however one

lives. But here what is there but ... foulness? Phew!”

I turned away with disgust; I was no longer reasoning coldly. I began

to feel myself what I was saying and warmed to the subject. I was

already longing to expound the cherished ideas I had brooded over in my

corner. Something suddenly flared up in me. An object had appeared

before me.

“Never mind my being here, I am not an example for you. I am, perhaps,

worse than you are. I was drunk when I came here, though,” I hastened,

however, to say in self-defence. “Besides, a man is no example for a

woman. It’s a different thing. I may degrade and defile myself, but I

am not anyone’s slave. I come and go, and that’s an end of it. I shake

it off, and I am a different man. But you are a slave from the start.

Yes, a slave! You give up everything, your whole freedom. If you want

to break your chains afterwards, you won’t be able to; you will be more

and more fast in the snares. It is an accursed bondage. I know it. I

won’t speak of anything else, maybe you won’t understand, but tell me:

no doubt you are in debt to your madam? There, you see,” I added,

though she made no answer, but only listened in silence, entirely

absorbed, “that’s a bondage for you! You will never buy your freedom.

They will see to that. It’s like selling your soul to the devil.... And

besides ... perhaps, I too, am just as unlucky—how do you know—and

wallow in the mud on purpose, out of misery? You know, men take to

drink from grief; well, maybe I am here from grief. Come, tell me, what

is there good here? Here you and I ... came together ... just now and

did not say one word to one another all the time, and it was only

afterwards you began staring at me like a wild creature, and I at you.

Is that loving? Is that how one human being should meet another? It’s

hideous, that’s what it is!”

“Yes!” she assented sharply and hurriedly.

I was positively astounded by the promptitude of this “Yes.” So the

same thought may have been straying through her mind when she was

staring at me just before. So she, too, was capable of certain

thoughts? “Damn it all, this was interesting, this was a point of

likeness!” I thought, almost rubbing my hands. And indeed it’s easy to

turn a young soul like that!

It was the exercise of my power that attracted me most.

She turned her head nearer to me, and it seemed to me in the darkness

that she propped herself on her arm. Perhaps she was scrutinising me.

How I regretted that I could not see her eyes. I heard her deep

breathing.

“Why have you come here?” I asked her, with a note of authority already

in my voice.

“Oh, I don’t know.”

“But how nice it would be to be living in your father’s house! It’s

warm and free; you have a home of your own.”

“But what if it’s worse than this?”

“I must take the right tone,” flashed through my mind. “I may not get

far with sentimentality.” But it was only a momentary thought. I swear

she really did interest me. Besides, I was exhausted and moody. And

cunning so easily goes hand-in-hand with feeling.

“Who denies it!” I hastened to answer. “Anything may happen. I am

convinced that someone has wronged you, and that you are more sinned

against than sinning. Of course, I know nothing of your story, but it’s

not likely a girl like you has come here of her own inclination....”

“A girl like me?” she whispered, hardly audibly; but I heard it.

Damn it all, I was flattering her. That was horrid. But perhaps it was

a good thing.... She was silent.

“See, Liza, I will tell you about myself. If I had had a home from

childhood, I shouldn’t be what I am now. I often think that. However

bad it may be at home, anyway they are your father and mother, and not

enemies, strangers. Once a year at least, they’ll show their love of

you. Anyway, you know you are at home. I grew up without a home; and

perhaps that’s why I’ve turned so ... unfeeling.”

I waited again. “Perhaps she doesn’t understand,” I thought, “and,

indeed, it is absurd—it’s moralising.”

“If I were a father and had a daughter, I believe I should love my

daughter more than my sons, really,” I began indirectly, as though

talking of something else, to distract her attention. I must confess I

blushed.

“Why so?” she asked.

Ah! so she was listening!

“I don’t know, Liza. I knew a father who was a stern, austere man, but

used to go down on his knees to his daughter, used to kiss her hands,

her feet, he couldn’t make enough of her, really. When she danced at

parties he used to stand for five hours at a stretch, gazing at her. He

was mad over her: I understand that! She would fall asleep tired at

night, and he would wake to kiss her in her sleep and make the sign of

the cross over her. He would go about in a dirty old coat, he was

stingy to everyone else, but would spend his last penny for her, giving

her expensive presents, and it was his greatest delight when she was

pleased with what he gave her. Fathers always love their daughters more

than the mothers do. Some girls live happily at home! And I believe I

should never let my daughters marry.”

“What next?” she said, with a faint smile.

“I should be jealous, I really should. To think that she should kiss

anyone else! That she should love a stranger more than her father! It’s

painful to imagine it. Of course, that’s all nonsense, of course every

father would be reasonable at last. But I believe before I should let

her marry, I should worry myself to death; I should find fault with all

her suitors. But I should end by letting her marry whom she herself

loved. The one whom the daughter loves always seems the worst to the

father, you know. That is always so. So many family troubles come from

that.”

“Some are glad to sell their daughters, rather than marrying them

honourably.”

Ah, so that was it!

“Such a thing, Liza, happens in those accursed families in which there

is neither love nor God,” I retorted warmly, “and where there is no

love, there is no sense either. There are such families, it’s true, but

I am not speaking of them. You must have seen wickedness in your own

family, if you talk like that. Truly, you must have been unlucky. H’m!

... that sort of thing mostly comes about through poverty.”

“And is it any better with the gentry? Even among the poor, honest

people who live happily?”

“H’m ... yes. Perhaps. Another thing, Liza, man is fond of reckoning up

his troubles, but does not count his joys. If he counted them up as he

ought, he would see that every lot has enough happiness provided for

it. And what if all goes well with the family, if the blessing of God

is upon it, if the husband is a good one, loves you, cherishes you,

never leaves you! There is happiness in such a family! Even sometimes

there is happiness in the midst of sorrow; and indeed sorrow is

everywhere. If you marry _you will find out for yourself_. But think of

the first years of married life with one you love: what happiness, what

happiness there sometimes is in it! And indeed it’s the ordinary thing.

In those early days even quarrels with one’s husband end happily. Some

women get up quarrels with their husbands just because they love them.

Indeed, I knew a woman like that: she seemed to say that because she

loved him, she would torment him and make him feel it. You know that

you may torment a man on purpose through love. Women are particularly

given to that, thinking to themselves ‘I will love him so, I will make

so much of him afterwards, that it’s no sin to torment him a little

now.’ And all in the house rejoice in the sight of you, and you are

happy and gay and peaceful and honourable.... Then there are some women

who are jealous. If he went off anywhere—I knew one such woman, she

couldn’t restrain herself, but would jump up at night and run off on

the sly to find out where he was, whether he was with some other woman.

That’s a pity. And the woman knows herself it’s wrong, and her heart

fails her and she suffers, but she loves—it’s all through love. And how

sweet it is to make up after quarrels, to own herself in the wrong or

to forgive him! And they both are so happy all at once—as though they

had met anew, been married over again; as though their love had begun

afresh. And no one, no one should know what passes between husband and

wife if they love one another. And whatever quarrels there may be

between them they ought not to call in their own mother to judge

between them and tell tales of one another. They are their own judges.

Love is a holy mystery and ought to be hidden from all other eyes,

whatever happens. That makes it holier and better. They respect one

another more, and much is built on respect. And if once there has been

love, if they have been married for love, why should love pass away?

Surely one can keep it! It is rare that one cannot keep it. And if the

husband is kind and straightforward, why should not love last? The

first phase of married love will pass, it is true, but then there will

come a love that is better still. Then there will be the union of

souls, they will have everything in common, there will be no secrets

between them. And once they have children, the most difficult times

will seem to them happy, so long as there is love and courage. Even

toil will be a joy, you may deny yourself bread for your children and

even that will be a joy, They will love you for it afterwards; so you

are laying by for your future. As the children grow up you feel that

you are an example, a support for them; that even after you die your

children will always keep your thoughts and feelings, because they have

received them from you, they will take on your semblance and likeness.

So you see this is a great duty. How can it fail to draw the father and

mother nearer? People say it’s a trial to have children. Who says that?

It is heavenly happiness! Are you fond of little children, Liza? I am

awfully fond of them. You know—a little rosy baby boy at your bosom,

and what husband’s heart is not touched, seeing his wife nursing his

child! A plump little rosy baby, sprawling and snuggling, chubby little

hands and feet, clean tiny little nails, so tiny that it makes one

laugh to look at them; eyes that look as if they understand everything.

And while it sucks it clutches at your bosom with its little hand,

plays. When its father comes up, the child tears itself away from the

bosom, flings itself back, looks at its father, laughs, as though it

were fearfully funny, and falls to sucking again. Or it will bite its

mother’s breast when its little teeth are coming, while it looks

sideways at her with its little eyes as though to say, ‘Look, I am

biting!’ Is not all that happiness when they are the three together,

husband, wife and child? One can forgive a great deal for the sake of

such moments. Yes, Liza, one must first learn to live oneself before

one blames others!”

“It’s by pictures, pictures like that one must get at you,” I thought

to myself, though I did speak with real feeling, and all at once I

flushed crimson. “What if she were suddenly to burst out laughing, what

should I do then?” That idea drove me to fury. Towards the end of my

speech I really was excited, and now my vanity was somehow wounded. The

silence continued. I almost nudged her.

“Why are you—” she began and stopped. But I understood: there was a

quiver of something different in her voice, not abrupt, harsh and

unyielding as before, but something soft and shamefaced, so shamefaced

that I suddenly felt ashamed and guilty.

“What?” I asked, with tender curiosity.

“Why, you...”

“What?”

“Why, you ... speak somehow like a book,” she said, and again there was

a note of irony in her voice.

That remark sent a pang to my heart. It was not what I was expecting.

I did not understand that she was hiding her feelings under irony, that

this is usually the last refuge of modest and chaste-souled people when

the privacy of their soul is coarsely and intrusively invaded, and that

their pride makes them refuse to surrender till the last moment and

shrink from giving expression to their feelings before you. I ought to

have guessed the truth from the timidity with which she had repeatedly

approached her sarcasm, only bringing herself to utter it at last with

an effort. But I did not guess, and an evil feeling took possession of

me.

“Wait a bit!” I thought.

VII

“Oh, hush, Liza! How can you talk about being like a book, when it

makes even me, an outsider, feel sick? Though I don’t look at it as an

outsider, for, indeed, it touches me to the heart.... Is it possible,

is it possible that you do not feel sick at being here yourself?

Evidently habit does wonders! God knows what habit can do with anyone.

Can you seriously think that you will never grow old, that you will

always be good-looking, and that they will keep you here for ever and

ever? I say nothing of the loathsomeness of the life here.... Though

let me tell you this about it—about your present life, I mean; here

though you are young now, attractive, nice, with soul and feeling, yet

you know as soon as I came to myself just now I felt at once sick at

being here with you! One can only come here when one is drunk. But if

you were anywhere else, living as good people live, I should perhaps be

more than attracted by you, should fall in love with you, should be

glad of a look from you, let alone a word; I should hang about your

door, should go down on my knees to you, should look upon you as my

betrothed and think it an honour to be allowed to. I should not dare to

have an impure thought about you. But here, you see, I know that I have

only to whistle and you have to come with me whether you like it or

not. I don’t consult your wishes, but you mine. The lowest labourer

hires himself as a workman, but he doesn’t make a slave of himself

altogether; besides, he knows that he will be free again presently. But

when are you free? Only think what you are giving up here? What is it

you are making a slave of? It is your soul, together with your body;

you are selling your soul which you have no right to dispose of! You

give your love to be outraged by every drunkard! Love! But that’s

everything, you know, it’s a priceless diamond, it’s a maiden’s

treasure, love—why, a man would be ready to give his soul, to face

death to gain that love. But how much is your love worth now? You are

sold, all of you, body and soul, and there is no need to strive for

love when you can have everything without love. And you know there is

no greater insult to a girl than that, do you understand? To be sure, I

have heard that they comfort you, poor fools, they let you have lovers

of your own here. But you know that’s simply a farce, that’s simply a

sham, it’s just laughing at you, and you are taken in by it! Why, do

you suppose he really loves you, that lover of yours? I don’t believe

it. How can he love you when he knows you may be called away from him

any minute? He would be a low fellow if he did! Will he have a grain of

respect for you? What have you in common with him? He laughs at you and

robs you—that is all his love amounts to! You are lucky if he does not

beat you. Very likely he does beat you, too. Ask him, if you have got

one, whether he will marry you. He will laugh in your face, if he

doesn’t spit in it or give you a blow—though maybe he is not worth a

bad halfpenny himself. And for what have you ruined your life, if you

come to think of it? For the coffee they give you to drink and the

plentiful meals? But with what object are they feeding you up? An

honest girl couldn’t swallow the food, for she would know what she was

being fed for. You are in debt here, and, of course, you will always be

in debt, and you will go on in debt to the end, till the visitors here

begin to scorn you. And that will soon happen, don’t rely upon your

youth—all that flies by express train here, you know. You will be

kicked out. And not simply kicked out; long before that she’ll begin

nagging at you, scolding you, abusing you, as though you had not

sacrificed your health for her, had not thrown away your youth and your

soul for her benefit, but as though you had ruined her, beggared her,

robbed her. And don’t expect anyone to take your part: the others, your

companions, will attack you, too, win her favour, for all are in

slavery here, and have lost all conscience and pity here long ago. They

have become utterly vile, and nothing on earth is viler, more

loathsome, and more insulting than their abuse. And you are laying down

everything here, unconditionally, youth and health and beauty and hope,

and at twenty-two you will look like a woman of five-and-thirty, and

you will be lucky if you are not diseased, pray to God for that! No

doubt you are thinking now that you have a gay time and no work to do!

Yet there is no work harder or more dreadful in the world or ever has

been. One would think that the heart alone would be worn out with

tears. And you won’t dare to say a word, not half a word when they

drive you away from here; you will go away as though you were to blame.

You will change to another house, then to a third, then somewhere else,

till you come down at last to the Haymarket. There you will be beaten

at every turn; that is good manners there, the visitors don’t know how

to be friendly without beating you. You don’t believe that it is so

hateful there? Go and look for yourself some time, you can see with

your own eyes. Once, one New Year’s Day, I saw a woman at a door. They

had turned her out as a joke, to give her a taste of the frost because

she had been crying so much, and they shut the door behind her. At nine

o’clock in the morning she was already quite drunk, dishevelled,

half-naked, covered with bruises, her face was powdered, but she had a

black-eye, blood was trickling from her nose and her teeth; some cabman

had just given her a drubbing. She was sitting on the stone steps, a

salt fish of some sort was in her hand; she was crying, wailing

something about her luck and beating with the fish on the steps, and

cabmen and drunken soldiers were crowding in the doorway taunting her.

You don’t believe that you will ever be like that? I should be sorry to

believe it, too, but how do you know; maybe ten years, eight years ago

that very woman with the salt fish came here fresh as a cherub,

innocent, pure, knowing no evil, blushing at every word. Perhaps she

was like you, proud, ready to take offence, not like the others;

perhaps she looked like a queen, and knew what happiness was in store

for the man who should love her and whom she should love. Do you see

how it ended? And what if at that very minute when she was beating on

the filthy steps with that fish, drunken and dishevelled—what if at

that very minute she recalled the pure early days in her father’s

house, when she used to go to school and the neighbour’s son watched

for her on the way, declaring that he would love her as long as he

lived, that he would devote his life to her, and when they vowed to

love one another for ever and be married as soon as they were grown up!

No, Liza, it would be happy for you if you were to die soon of

consumption in some corner, in some cellar like that woman just now. In

the hospital, do you say? You will be lucky if they take you, but what

if you are still of use to the madam here? Consumption is a queer

disease, it is not like fever. The patient goes on hoping till the last

minute and says he is all right. He deludes himself And that just suits

your madam. Don’t doubt it, that’s how it is; you have sold your soul,

and what is more you owe money, so you daren’t say a word. But when you

are dying, all will abandon you, all will turn away from you, for then

there will be nothing to get from you. What’s more, they will reproach

you for cumbering the place, for being so long over dying. However you

beg you won’t get a drink of water without abuse: ‘Whenever are you

going off, you nasty hussy, you won’t let us sleep with your moaning,

you make the gentlemen sick.’ That’s true, I have heard such things

said myself. They will thrust you dying into the filthiest corner in

the cellar—in the damp and darkness; what will your thoughts be, lying

there alone? When you die, strange hands will lay you out, with

grumbling and impatience; no one will bless you, no one will sigh for

you, they only want to get rid of you as soon as may be; they will buy

a coffin, take you to the grave as they did that poor woman today, and

celebrate your memory at the tavern. In the grave, sleet, filth, wet

snow—no need to put themselves out for you—‘Let her down, Vanuha; it’s

just like her luck—even here, she is head-foremost, the hussy. Shorten

the cord, you rascal.’ ‘It’s all right as it is.’ ‘All right, is it?

Why, she’s on her side! She was a fellow-creature, after all! But,

never mind, throw the earth on her.’ And they won’t care to waste much

time quarrelling over you. They will scatter the wet blue clay as quick

as they can and go off to the tavern ... and there your memory on earth

will end; other women have children to go to their graves, fathers,

husbands. While for you neither tear, nor sigh, nor remembrance; no one

in the whole world will ever come to you, your name will vanish from

the face of the earth—as though you had never existed, never been born

at all! Nothing but filth and mud, however you knock at your coffin lid

at night, when the dead arise, however you cry: ‘Let me out, kind

people, to live in the light of day! My life was no life at all; my

life has been thrown away like a dish-clout; it was drunk away in the

tavern at the Haymarket; let me out, kind people, to live in the world

again.’”

And I worked myself up to such a pitch that I began to have a lump in

my throat myself, and ... and all at once I stopped, sat up in dismay

and, bending over apprehensively, began to listen with a beating heart.

I had reason to be troubled.

I had felt for some time that I was turning her soul upside down and

rending her heart, and—and the more I was convinced of it, the more

eagerly I desired to gain my object as quickly and as effectually as

possible. It was the exercise of my skill that carried me away; yet it

was not merely sport....

I knew I was speaking stiffly, artificially, even bookishly, in fact, I

could not speak except “like a book.” But that did not trouble me: I

knew, I felt that I should be understood and that this very bookishness

might be an assistance. But now, having attained my effect, I was

suddenly panic-stricken. Never before had I witnessed such despair! She

was lying on her face, thrusting her face into the pillow and clutching

it in both hands. Her heart was being torn. Her youthful body was

shuddering all over as though in convulsions. Suppressed sobs rent her

bosom and suddenly burst out in weeping and wailing, then she pressed

closer into the pillow: she did not want anyone here, not a living

soul, to know of her anguish and her tears. She bit the pillow, bit her

hand till it bled (I saw that afterwards), or, thrusting her fingers

into her dishevelled hair, seemed rigid with the effort of restraint,

holding her breath and clenching her teeth. I began saying something,

begging her to calm herself, but felt that I did not dare; and all at

once, in a sort of cold shiver, almost in terror, began fumbling in the

dark, trying hurriedly to get dressed to go. It was dark; though I

tried my best I could not finish dressing quickly. Suddenly I felt a

box of matches and a candlestick with a whole candle in it. As soon as

the room was lighted up, Liza sprang up, sat up in bed, and with a

contorted face, with a half insane smile, looked at me almost

senselessly. I sat down beside her and took her hands; she came to

herself, made an impulsive movement towards me, would have caught hold

of me, but did not dare, and slowly bowed her head before me.

“Liza, my dear, I was wrong ... forgive me, my dear,” I began, but she

squeezed my hand in her fingers so tightly that I felt I was saying the

wrong thing and stopped.

“This is my address, Liza, come to me.”

“I will come,” she answered resolutely, her head still bowed.

“But now I am going, good-bye ... till we meet again.”

I got up; she, too, stood up and suddenly flushed all over, gave a

shudder, snatched up a shawl that was lying on a chair and muffled

herself in it to her chin. As she did this she gave another sickly

smile, blushed and looked at me strangely. I felt wretched; I was in

haste to get away—to disappear.

“Wait a minute,” she said suddenly, in the passage just at the doorway,

stopping me with her hand on my overcoat. She put down the candle in

hot haste and ran off; evidently she had thought of something or wanted

to show me something. As she ran away she flushed, her eyes shone, and

there was a smile on her lips—what was the meaning of it? Against my

will I waited: she came back a minute later with an expression that

seemed to ask forgiveness for something. In fact, it was not the same

face, not the same look as the evening before: sullen, mistrustful and

obstinate. Her eyes now were imploring, soft, and at the same time

trustful, caressing, timid. The expression with which children look at

people they are very fond of, of whom they are asking a favour. Her

eyes were a light hazel, they were lovely eyes, full of life, and

capable of expressing love as well as sullen hatred.

Making no explanation, as though I, as a sort of higher being, must

understand everything without explanations, she held out a piece of

paper to me. Her whole face was positively beaming at that instant with

naive, almost childish, triumph. I unfolded it. It was a letter to her

from a medical student or someone of that sort—a very high-flown and

flowery, but extremely respectful, love-letter. I don’t recall the

words now, but I remember well that through the high-flown phrases

there was apparent a genuine feeling, which cannot be feigned. When I

had finished reading it I met her glowing, questioning, and childishly

impatient eyes fixed upon me. She fastened her eyes upon my face and

waited impatiently for what I should say. In a few words, hurriedly,

but with a sort of joy and pride, she explained to me that she had been

to a dance somewhere in a private house, a family of “very nice people,

_who knew nothing_, absolutely nothing, for she had only come here so

lately and it had all happened ... and she hadn’t made up her mind to

stay and was certainly going away as soon as she had paid her debt...”

and at that party there had been the student who had danced with her

all the evening. He had talked to her, and it turned out that he had

known her in old days at Riga when he was a child, they had played

together, but a very long time ago—and he knew her parents, but _about

this_ he knew nothing, nothing whatever, and had no suspicion! And the

day after the dance (three days ago) he had sent her that letter

through the friend with whom she had gone to the party ... and ...

well, that was all.

She dropped her shining eyes with a sort of bashfulness as she

finished.

The poor girl was keeping that student’s letter as a precious treasure,

and had run to fetch it, her only treasure, because she did not want me

to go away without knowing that she, too, was honestly and genuinely

loved; that she, too, was addressed respectfully. No doubt that letter

was destined to lie in her box and lead to nothing. But none the less,

I am certain that she would keep it all her life as a precious

treasure, as her pride and justification, and now at such a minute she

had thought of that letter and brought it with naive pride to raise

herself in my eyes that I might see, that I, too, might think well of

her. I said nothing, pressed her hand and went out. I so longed to get

away ... I walked all the way home, in spite of the fact that the

melting snow was still falling in heavy flakes. I was exhausted,

shattered, in bewilderment. But behind the bewilderment the truth was

already gleaming. The loathsome truth.

VIII

It was some time, however, before I consented to recognise that truth.

Waking up in the morning after some hours of heavy, leaden sleep, and

immediately realising all that had happened on the previous day, I was

positively amazed at my last night’s _sentimentality_ with Liza, at all

those “outcries of horror and pity.” “To think of having such an attack

of womanish hysteria, pah!” I concluded. And what did I thrust my

address upon her for? What if she comes? Let her come, though; it

doesn’t matter.... But _obviously_, that was not now the chief and the

most important matter: I had to make haste and at all costs save my

reputation in the eyes of Zverkov and Simonov as quickly as possible;

that was the chief business. And I was so taken up that morning that I

actually forgot all about Liza.

First of all I had at once to repay what I had borrowed the day before

from Simonov. I resolved on a desperate measure: to borrow fifteen

roubles straight off from Anton Antonitch. As luck would have it he was

in the best of humours that morning, and gave it to me at once, on the

first asking. I was so delighted at this that, as I signed the IOU with

a swaggering air, I told him casually that the night before “I had been

keeping it up with some friends at the Hôtel de Paris; we were giving a

farewell party to a comrade, in fact, I might say a friend of my

childhood, and you know—a desperate rake, fearfully spoilt—of course,

he belongs to a good family, and has considerable means, a brilliant

career; he is witty, charming, a regular Lovelace, you understand; we

drank an extra ‘half-dozen’ and ...”

And it went off all right; all this was uttered very easily,

unconstrainedly and complacently.

On reaching home I promptly wrote to Simonov.

To this hour I am lost in admiration when I recall the truly

gentlemanly, good-humoured, candid tone of my letter. With tact and

good-breeding, and, above all, entirely without superfluous words, I

blamed myself for all that had happened. I defended myself, “if I

really may be allowed to defend myself,” by alleging that being utterly

unaccustomed to wine, I had been intoxicated with the first glass,

which I said, I had drunk before they arrived, while I was waiting for

them at the Hôtel de Paris between five and six o’clock. I begged

Simonov’s pardon especially; I asked him to convey my explanations to

all the others, especially to Zverkov, whom “I seemed to remember as

though in a dream” I had insulted. I added that I would have called

upon all of them myself, but my head ached, and besides I had not the

face to. I was particularly pleased with a certain lightness, almost

carelessness (strictly within the bounds of politeness, however), which

was apparent in my style, and better than any possible arguments, gave

them at once to understand that I took rather an independent view of

“all that unpleasantness last night”; that I was by no means so utterly

crushed as you, my friends, probably imagine; but on the contrary,

looked upon it as a gentleman serenely respecting himself should look

upon it. “On a young hero’s past no censure is cast!”

“There is actually an aristocratic playfulness about it!” I thought

admiringly, as I read over the letter. “And it’s all because I am an

intellectual and cultivated man! Another man in my place would not have

known how to extricate himself, but here I have got out of it and am as

jolly as ever again, and all because I am ‘a cultivated and educated

man of our day.’ And, indeed, perhaps, everything was due to the wine

yesterday. H’m!” ... No, it was not the wine. I did not drink anything

at all between five and six when I was waiting for them. I had lied to

Simonov; I had lied shamelessly; and indeed I wasn’t ashamed now....

Hang it all though, the great thing was that I was rid of it.

I put six roubles in the letter, sealed it up, and asked Apollon to

take it to Simonov. When he learned that there was money in the letter,

Apollon became more respectful and agreed to take it. Towards evening I

went out for a walk. My head was still aching and giddy after

yesterday. But as evening came on and the twilight grew denser, my

impressions and, following them, my thoughts, grew more and more

different and confused. Something was not dead within me, in the depths

of my heart and conscience it would not die, and it showed itself in

acute depression. For the most part I jostled my way through the most

crowded business streets, along Myeshtchansky Street, along Sadovy

Street and in Yusupov Garden. I always liked particularly sauntering

along these streets in the dusk, just when there were crowds of working

people of all sorts going home from their daily work, with faces

looking cross with anxiety. What I liked was just that cheap bustle,

that bare prose. On this occasion the jostling of the streets irritated

me more than ever, I could not make out what was wrong with me, I could

not find the clue, something seemed rising up continually in my soul,

painfully, and refusing to be appeased. I returned home completely

upset, it was just as though some crime were lying on my conscience.

The thought that Liza was coming worried me continually. It seemed

queer to me that of all my recollections of yesterday this tormented

me, as it were, especially, as it were, quite separately. Everything

else I had quite succeeded in forgetting by the evening; I dismissed it

all and was still perfectly satisfied with my letter to Simonov. But on

this point I was not satisfied at all. It was as though I were worried

only by Liza. “What if she comes,” I thought incessantly, “well, it

doesn’t matter, let her come! H’m! it’s horrid that she should see, for

instance, how I live. Yesterday I seemed such a hero to her, while now,

h’m! It’s horrid, though, that I have let myself go so, the room looks

like a beggar’s. And I brought myself to go out to dinner in such a

suit! And my American leather sofa with the stuffing sticking out. And

my dressing-gown, which will not cover me, such tatters, and she will

see all this and she will see Apollon. That beast is certain to insult

her. He will fasten upon her in order to be rude to me. And I, of

course, shall be panic-stricken as usual, I shall begin bowing and

scraping before her and pulling my dressing-gown round me, I shall

begin smiling, telling lies. Oh, the beastliness! And it isn’t the

beastliness of it that matters most! There is something more important,

more loathsome, viler! Yes, viler! And to put on that dishonest lying

mask again! ...”

When I reached that thought I fired up all at once.

“Why dishonest? How dishonest? I was speaking sincerely last night. I

remember there was real feeling in me, too. What I wanted was to excite

an honourable feeling in her.... Her crying was a good thing, it will

have a good effect.”

Yet I could not feel at ease. All that evening, even when I had come

back home, even after nine o’clock, when I calculated that Liza could

not possibly come, still she haunted me, and what was worse, she came

back to my mind always in the same position. One moment out of all that

had happened last night stood vividly before my imagination; the moment

when I struck a match and saw her pale, distorted face, with its look

of torture. And what a pitiful, what an unnatural, what a distorted

smile she had at that moment! But I did not know then, that fifteen

years later I should still in my imagination see Liza, always with the

pitiful, distorted, inappropriate smile which was on her face at that

minute.

Next day I was ready again to look upon it all as nonsense, due to

over-excited nerves, and, above all, as _exaggerated_. I was always

conscious of that weak point of mine, and sometimes very much afraid of

it. “I exaggerate everything, that is where I go wrong,” I repeated to

myself every hour. But, however, “Liza will very likely come all the

same,” was the refrain with which all my reflections ended. I was so

uneasy that I sometimes flew into a fury: “She’ll come, she is certain

to come!” I cried, running about the room, “if not today, she will come

tomorrow; she’ll find me out! The damnable romanticism of these pure

hearts! Oh, the vileness—oh, the silliness—oh, the stupidity of these

‘wretched sentimental souls!’ Why, how fail to understand? How could

one fail to understand? ...”

But at this point I stopped short, and in great confusion, indeed.

And how few, how few words, I thought, in passing, were needed; how

little of the idyllic (and affectedly, bookishly, artificially idyllic

too) had sufficed to turn a whole human life at once according to my

will. That’s virginity, to be sure! Freshness of soil!

At times a thought occurred to me, to go to her, “to tell her all,” and

beg her not to come to me. But this thought stirred such wrath in me

that I believed I should have crushed that “damned” Liza if she had

chanced to be near me at the time. I should have insulted her, have

spat at her, have turned her out, have struck her!

One day passed, however, another and another; she did not come and I

began to grow calmer. I felt particularly bold and cheerful after nine

o’clock, I even sometimes began dreaming, and rather sweetly: I, for

instance, became the salvation of Liza, simply through her coming to me

and my talking to her.... I develop her, educate her. Finally, I notice

that she loves me, loves me passionately. I pretend not to understand

(I don’t know, however, why I pretend, just for effect, perhaps). At

last all confusion, transfigured, trembling and sobbing, she flings

herself at my feet and says that I am her saviour, and that she loves

me better than anything in the world. I am amazed, but.... “Liza,” I

say, “can you imagine that I have not noticed your love? I saw it all,

I divined it, but I did not dare to approach you first, because I had

an influence over you and was afraid that you would force yourself,

from gratitude, to respond to my love, would try to rouse in your heart

a feeling which was perhaps absent, and I did not wish that ... because

it would be tyranny ... it would be indelicate (in short, I launch off

at that point into European, inexplicably lofty subtleties a la George

Sand), but now, now you are mine, you are my creation, you are pure,

you are good, you are my noble wife.

‘Into my house come bold and free,

Its rightful mistress there to be’.”

Then we begin living together, go abroad and so on, and so on. In fact,

in the end it seemed vulgar to me myself, and I began putting out my

tongue at myself.

Besides, they won’t let her out, “the hussy!” I thought. They don’t let

them go out very readily, especially in the evening (for some reason I

fancied she would come in the evening, and at seven o’clock precisely).

Though she did say she was not altogether a slave there yet, and had

certain rights; so, h’m! Damn it all, she will come, she is sure to

come!

It was a good thing, in fact, that Apollon distracted my attention at

that time by his rudeness. He drove me beyond all patience! He was the

bane of my life, the curse laid upon me by Providence. We had been

squabbling continually for years, and I hated him. My God, how I hated

him! I believe I had never hated anyone in my life as I hated him,

especially at some moments. He was an elderly, dignified man, who

worked part of his time as a tailor. But for some unknown reason he

despised me beyond all measure, and looked down upon me insufferably.

Though, indeed, he looked down upon everyone. Simply to glance at that

flaxen, smoothly brushed head, at the tuft of hair he combed up on his

forehead and oiled with sunflower oil, at that dignified mouth,

compressed into the shape of the letter V, made one feel one was

confronting a man who never doubted of himself. He was a pedant, to the

most extreme point, the greatest pedant I had met on earth, and with

that had a vanity only befitting Alexander of Macedon. He was in love

with every button on his coat, every nail on his fingers—absolutely in

love with them, and he looked it! In his behaviour to me he was a

perfect tyrant, he spoke very little to me, and if he chanced to glance

at me he gave me a firm, majestically self-confident and invariably

ironical look that drove me sometimes to fury. He did his work with the

air of doing me the greatest favour, though he did scarcely anything

for me, and did not, indeed, consider himself bound to do anything.

There could be no doubt that he looked upon me as the greatest fool on

earth, and that “he did not get rid of me” was simply that he could get

wages from me every month. He consented to do nothing for me for seven

roubles a month. Many sins should be forgiven me for what I suffered

from him. My hatred reached such a point that sometimes his very step

almost threw me into convulsions. What I loathed particularly was his

lisp. His tongue must have been a little too long or something of that

sort, for he continually lisped, and seemed to be very proud of it,

imagining that it greatly added to his dignity. He spoke in a slow,

measured tone, with his hands behind his back and his eyes fixed on the

ground. He maddened me particularly when he read aloud the psalms to

himself behind his partition. Many a battle I waged over that reading!

But he was awfully fond of reading aloud in the evenings, in a slow,

even, sing-song voice, as though over the dead. It is interesting that

that is how he has ended: he hires himself out to read the psalms over

the dead, and at the same time he kills rats and makes blacking. But at

that time I could not get rid of him, it was as though he were

chemically combined with my existence. Besides, nothing would have

induced him to consent to leave me. I could not live in furnished

lodgings: my lodging was my private solitude, my shell, my cave, in

which I concealed myself from all mankind, and Apollon seemed to me,

for some reason, an integral part of that flat, and for seven years I

could not turn him away.

To be two or three days behind with his wages, for instance, was

impossible. He would have made such a fuss, I should not have known

where to hide my head. But I was so exasperated with everyone during

those days, that I made up my mind for some reason and with some object

to _punish_ Apollon and not to pay him for a fortnight the wages that

were owing him. I had for a long time—for the last two years—been

intending to do this, simply in order to teach him not to give himself

airs with me, and to show him that if I liked I could withhold his

wages. I purposed to say nothing to him about it, and was purposely

silent indeed, in order to score off his pride and force him to be the

first to speak of his wages. Then I would take the seven roubles out of

a drawer, show him I have the money put aside on purpose, but that I

won’t, I won’t, I simply won’t pay him his wages, I won’t just because

that is “what I wish,” because “I am master, and it is for me to

decide,” because he has been disrespectful, because he has been rude;

but if he were to ask respectfully I might be softened and give it to

him, otherwise he might wait another fortnight, another three weeks, a

whole month....

But angry as I was, yet he got the better of me. I could not hold out

for four days. He began as he always did begin in such cases, for there

had been such cases already, there had been attempts (and it may be

observed I knew all this beforehand, I knew his nasty tactics by

heart). He would begin by fixing upon me an exceedingly severe stare,

keeping it up for several minutes at a time, particularly on meeting me

or seeing me out of the house. If I held out and pretended not to

notice these stares, he would, still in silence, proceed to further

tortures. All at once, _à propos_ of nothing, he would walk softly and

smoothly into my room, when I was pacing up and down or reading, stand

at the door, one hand behind his back and one foot behind the other,

and fix upon me a stare more than severe, utterly contemptuous. If I

suddenly asked him what he wanted, he would make me no answer, but

continue staring at me persistently for some seconds, then, with a

peculiar compression of his lips and a most significant air,

deliberately turn round and deliberately go back to his room. Two hours

later he would come out again and again present himself before me in

the same way. It had happened that in my fury I did not even ask him

what he wanted, but simply raised my head sharply and imperiously and

began staring back at him. So we stared at one another for two minutes;

at last he turned with deliberation and dignity and went back again for

two hours.

If I were still not brought to reason by all this, but persisted in my

revolt, he would suddenly begin sighing while he looked at me, long,

deep sighs as though measuring by them the depths of my moral

degradation, and, of course, it ended at last by his triumphing

completely: I raged and shouted, but still was forced to do what he

wanted.

This time the usual staring manoeuvres had scarcely begun when I lost

my temper and flew at him in a fury. I was irritated beyond endurance

apart from him.

“Stay,” I cried, in a frenzy, as he was slowly and silently turning,

with one hand behind his back, to go to his room. “Stay! Come back,

come back, I tell you!” and I must have bawled so unnaturally, that he

turned round and even looked at me with some wonder. However, he

persisted in saying nothing, and that infuriated me.

“How dare you come and look at me like that without being sent for?

Answer!”

After looking at me calmly for half a minute, he began turning round

again.

“Stay!” I roared, running up to him, “don’t stir! There. Answer, now:

what did you come in to look at?”

“If you have any order to give me it’s my duty to carry it out,” he

answered, after another silent pause, with a slow, measured lisp,

raising his eyebrows and calmly twisting his head from one side to

another, all this with exasperating composure.

“That’s not what I am asking you about, you torturer!” I shouted,

turning crimson with anger. “I’ll tell you why you came here myself:

you see, I don’t give you your wages, you are so proud you don’t want

to bow down and ask for it, and so you come to punish me with your

stupid stares, to worry me and you have no sus-pic-ion how stupid it

is—stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid! ...”

He would have turned round again without a word, but I seized him.

“Listen,” I shouted to him. “Here’s the money, do you see, here it is,”

(I took it out of the table drawer); “here’s the seven roubles

complete, but you are not going to have it, you ... are ... not ...

going ... to ... have it until you come respectfully with bowed head to

beg my pardon. Do you hear?”

“That cannot be,” he answered, with the most unnatural self-confidence.

“It shall be so,” I said, “I give you my word of honour, it shall be!”

“And there’s nothing for me to beg your pardon for,” he went on, as

though he had not noticed my exclamations at all. “Why, besides, you

called me a ‘torturer,’ for which I can summon you at the

police-station at any time for insulting behaviour.”

“Go, summon me,” I roared, “go at once, this very minute, this very

second! You are a torturer all the same! a torturer!”

But he merely looked at me, then turned, and regardless of my loud

calls to him, he walked to his room with an even step and without

looking round.

“If it had not been for Liza nothing of this would have happened,” I

decided inwardly. Then, after waiting a minute, I went myself behind

his screen with a dignified and solemn air, though my heart was beating

slowly and violently.

“Apollon,” I said quietly and emphatically, though I was breathless,

“go at once without a minute’s delay and fetch the police-officer.”

He had meanwhile settled himself at his table, put on his spectacles

and taken up some sewing. But, hearing my order, he burst into a

guffaw.

“At once, go this minute! Go on, or else you can’t imagine what will

happen.”

“You are certainly out of your mind,” he observed, without even raising

his head, lisping as deliberately as ever and threading his needle.

“Whoever heard of a man sending for the police against himself? And as

for being frightened—you are upsetting yourself about nothing, for

nothing will come of it.”

“Go!” I shrieked, clutching him by the shoulder. I felt I should strike

him in a minute.

But I did not notice the door from the passage softly and slowly open

at that instant and a figure come in, stop short, and begin staring at

us in perplexity I glanced, nearly swooned with shame, and rushed back

to my room. There, clutching at my hair with both hands, I leaned my

head against the wall and stood motionless in that position.

Two minutes later I heard Apollon’s deliberate footsteps. “There is

some woman asking for you,” he said, looking at me with peculiar

severity. Then he stood aside and let in Liza. He would not go away,

but stared at us sarcastically.

“Go away, go away,” I commanded in desperation. At that moment my clock

began whirring and wheezing and struck seven.

IX

“Into my house come bold and free,

Its rightful mistress there to be.”

I stood before her crushed, crestfallen, revoltingly confused, and I

believe I smiled as I did my utmost to wrap myself in the skirts of my

ragged wadded dressing-gown—exactly as I had imagined the scene not

long before in a fit of depression. After standing over us for a couple

of minutes Apollon went away, but that did not make me more at ease.

What made it worse was that she, too, was overwhelmed with confusion,

more so, in fact, than I should have expected. At the sight of me, of

course.

“Sit down,” I said mechanically, moving a chair up to the table, and I

sat down on the sofa. She obediently sat down at once and gazed at me

open-eyed, evidently expecting something from me at once. This naïveté

of expectation drove me to fury, but I restrained myself.

She ought to have tried not to notice, as though everything had been as

usual, while instead of that, she ... and I dimly felt that I should

make her pay dearly for _all this_.

“You have found me in a strange position, Liza,” I began, stammering

and knowing that this was the wrong way to begin. “No, no, don’t

imagine anything,” I cried, seeing that she had suddenly flushed. “I am

not ashamed of my poverty.... On the contrary, I look with pride on my

poverty. I am poor but honourable.... One can be poor and honourable,”

I muttered. “However ... would you like tea?....”

“No,” she was beginning.

“Wait a minute.”

I leapt up and ran to Apollon. I had to get out of the room somehow.

“Apollon,” I whispered in feverish haste, flinging down before him the

seven roubles which had remained all the time in my clenched fist,

“here are your wages, you see I give them to you; but for that you must

come to my rescue: bring me tea and a dozen rusks from the restaurant.

If you won’t go, you’ll make me a miserable man! You don’t know what

this woman is.... This is—everything! You may be imagining

something.... But you don’t know what that woman is! ...”

Apollon, who had already sat down to his work and put on his spectacles

again, at first glanced askance at the money without speaking or

putting down his needle; then, without paying the slightest attention

to me or making any answer, he went on busying himself with his needle,

which he had not yet threaded. I waited before him for three minutes

with my arms crossed _à la Napoléon_. My temples were moist with sweat.

I was pale, I felt it. But, thank God, he must have been moved to pity,

looking at me. Having threaded his needle he deliberately got up from

his seat, deliberately moved back his chair, deliberately took off his

spectacles, deliberately counted the money, and finally asking me over

his shoulder: “Shall I get a whole portion?” deliberately walked out of

the room. As I was going back to Liza, the thought occurred to me on

the way: shouldn’t I run away just as I was in my dressing-gown, no

matter where, and then let happen what would?

I sat down again. She looked at me uneasily. For some minutes we were

silent.

“I will kill him,” I shouted suddenly, striking the table with my fist

so that the ink spurted out of the inkstand.

“What are you saying!” she cried, starting.

“I will kill him! kill him!” I shrieked, suddenly striking the table in

absolute frenzy, and at the same time fully understanding how stupid it

was to be in such a frenzy. “You don’t know, Liza, what that torturer

is to me. He is my torturer.... He has gone now to fetch some rusks; he

...”

And suddenly I burst into tears. It was an hysterical attack. How

ashamed I felt in the midst of my sobs; but still I could not restrain

them.

She was frightened.

“What is the matter? What is wrong?” she cried, fussing about me.

“Water, give me water, over there!” I muttered in a faint voice, though

I was inwardly conscious that I could have got on very well without

water and without muttering in a faint voice. But I was, what is

called, _putting it on_, to save appearances, though the attack was a

genuine one.

She gave me water, looking at me in bewilderment. At that moment

Apollon brought in the tea. It suddenly seemed to me that this

commonplace, prosaic tea was horribly undignified and paltry after all

that had happened, and I blushed crimson. Liza looked at Apollon with

positive alarm. He went out without a glance at either of us.

“Liza, do you despise me?” I asked, looking at her fixedly, trembling

with impatience to know what she was thinking.

She was confused, and did not know what to answer.

“Drink your tea,” I said to her angrily. I was angry with myself, but,

of course, it was she who would have to pay for it. A horrible spite

against her suddenly surged up in my heart; I believe I could have

killed her. To revenge myself on her I swore inwardly not to say a word

to her all the time. “She is the cause of it all,” I thought.

Our silence lasted for five minutes. The tea stood on the table; we did

not touch it. I had got to the point of purposely refraining from

beginning in order to embarrass her further; it was awkward for her to

begin alone. Several times she glanced at me with mournful perplexity.

I was obstinately silent. I was, of course, myself the chief sufferer,

because I was fully conscious of the disgusting meanness of my spiteful

stupidity, and yet at the same time I could not restrain myself.

“I want to... get away ... from there altogether,” she began, to break

the silence in some way, but, poor girl, that was just what she ought

not to have spoken about at such a stupid moment to a man so stupid as

I was. My heart positively ached with pity for her tactless and

unnecessary straightforwardness. But something hideous at once stifled

all compassion in me; it even provoked me to greater venom. I did not

care what happened. Another five minutes passed.

“Perhaps I am in your way,” she began timidly, hardly audibly, and was

getting up.

But as soon as I saw this first impulse of wounded dignity I positively

trembled with spite, and at once burst out.

“Why have you come to me, tell me that, please?” I began, gasping for

breath and regardless of logical connection in my words. I longed to

have it all out at once, at one burst; I did not even trouble how to

begin. “Why have you come? Answer, answer,” I cried, hardly knowing

what I was doing. “I’ll tell you, my good girl, why you have come.

You’ve come because I talked sentimental stuff to you then. So now you

are soft as butter and longing for fine sentiments again. So you may as

well know that I was laughing at you then. And I am laughing at you

now. Why are you shuddering? Yes, I was laughing at you! I had been

insulted just before, at dinner, by the fellows who came that evening

before me. I came to you, meaning to thrash one of them, an officer;

but I didn’t succeed, I didn’t find him; I had to avenge the insult on

someone to get back my own again; you turned up, I vented my spleen on

you and laughed at you. I had been humiliated, so I wanted to

humiliate; I had been treated like a rag, so I wanted to show my

power.... That’s what it was, and you imagined I had come there on

purpose to save you. Yes? You imagined that? You imagined that?”

I knew that she would perhaps be muddled and not take it all in

exactly, but I knew, too, that she would grasp the gist of it, very

well indeed. And so, indeed, she did. She turned white as a

handkerchief, tried to say something, and her lips worked painfully;

but she sank on a chair as though she had been felled by an axe. And

all the time afterwards she listened to me with her lips parted and her

eyes wide open, shuddering with awful terror. The cynicism, the

cynicism of my words overwhelmed her....

“Save you!” I went on, jumping up from my chair and running up and down

the room before her. “Save you from what? But perhaps I am worse than

you myself. Why didn’t you throw it in my teeth when I was giving you

that sermon: ‘But what did you come here yourself for? was it to read

us a sermon?’ Power, power was what I wanted then, sport was what I

wanted, I wanted to wring out your tears, your humiliation, your

hysteria—that was what I wanted then! Of course, I couldn’t keep it up

then, because I am a wretched creature, I was frightened, and, the

devil knows why, gave you my address in my folly. Afterwards, before I

got home, I was cursing and swearing at you because of that address, I

hated you already because of the lies I had told you. Because I only

like playing with words, only dreaming, but, do you know, what I really

want is that you should all go to hell. That is what I want. I want

peace; yes, I’d sell the whole world for a farthing, straight off, so

long as I was left in peace. Is the world to go to pot, or am I to go

without my tea? I say that the world may go to pot for me so long as I

always get my tea. Did you know that, or not? Well, anyway, I know that

I am a blackguard, a scoundrel, an egoist, a sluggard. Here I have been

shuddering for the last three days at the thought of your coming. And

do you know what has worried me particularly for these three days? That

I posed as such a hero to you, and now you would see me in a wretched

torn dressing-gown, beggarly, loathsome. I told you just now that I was

not ashamed of my poverty; so you may as well know that I am ashamed of

it; I am more ashamed of it than of anything, more afraid of it than of

being found out if I were a thief, because I am as vain as though I had

been skinned and the very air blowing on me hurt. Surely by now you

must realise that I shall never forgive you for having found me in this

wretched dressing-gown, just as I was flying at Apollon like a spiteful

cur. The saviour, the former hero, was flying like a mangy, unkempt

sheep-dog at his lackey, and the lackey was jeering at him! And I shall

never forgive you for the tears I could not help shedding before you

just now, like some silly woman put to shame! And for what I am

confessing to you now, I shall never forgive you either! Yes—you must

answer for it all because you turned up like this, because I am a

blackguard, because I am the nastiest, stupidest, absurdest and most

envious of all the worms on earth, who are not a bit better than I am,

but, the devil knows why, are never put to confusion; while I shall

always be insulted by every louse, that is my doom! And what is it to

me that you don’t understand a word of this! And what do I care, what

do I care about you, and whether you go to ruin there or not? Do you

understand? How I shall hate you now after saying this, for having been

here and listening. Why, it’s not once in a lifetime a man speaks out

like this, and then it is in hysterics! ... What more do you want? Why

do you still stand confronting me, after all this? Why are you worrying

me? Why don’t you go?”

But at this point a strange thing happened. I was so accustomed to

think and imagine everything from books, and to picture everything in

the world to myself just as I had made it up in my dreams beforehand,

that I could not all at once take in this strange circumstance. What

happened was this: Liza, insulted and crushed by me, understood a great

deal more than I imagined. She understood from all this what a woman

understands first of all, if she feels genuine love, that is, that I

was myself unhappy.

The frightened and wounded expression on her face was followed first by

a look of sorrowful perplexity. When I began calling myself a scoundrel

and a blackguard and my tears flowed (the tirade was accompanied

throughout by tears) her whole face worked convulsively. She was on the

point of getting up and stopping me; when I finished she took no notice

of my shouting: “Why are you here, why don’t you go away?” but realised

only that it must have been very bitter to me to say all this. Besides,

she was so crushed, poor girl; she considered herself infinitely

beneath me; how could she feel anger or resentment? She suddenly leapt

up from her chair with an irresistible impulse and held out her hands,

yearning towards me, though still timid and not daring to stir.... At

this point there was a revulsion in my heart too. Then she suddenly

rushed to me, threw her arms round me and burst into tears. I, too,

could not restrain myself, and sobbed as I never had before.

“They won’t let me ... I can’t be good!” I managed to articulate; then

I went to the sofa, fell on it face downwards, and sobbed on it for a

quarter of an hour in genuine hysterics. She came close to me, put her

arms round me and stayed motionless in that position. But the trouble

was that the hysterics could not go on for ever, and (I am writing the

loathsome truth) lying face downwards on the sofa with my face thrust

into my nasty leather pillow, I began by degrees to be aware of a

far-away, involuntary but irresistible feeling that it would be awkward

now for me to raise my head and look Liza straight in the face. Why was

I ashamed? I don’t know, but I was ashamed. The thought, too, came into

my overwrought brain that our parts now were completely changed, that

she was now the heroine, while I was just a crushed and humiliated

creature as she had been before me that night—four days before.... And

all this came into my mind during the minutes I was lying on my face on

the sofa.

My God! surely I was not envious of her then.

I don’t know, to this day I cannot decide, and at the time, of course,

I was still less able to understand what I was feeling than now. I

cannot get on without domineering and tyrannising over someone, but ...

there is no explaining anything by reasoning and so it is useless to

reason.

I conquered myself, however, and raised my head; I had to do so sooner

or later ... and I am convinced to this day that it was just because I

was ashamed to look at her that another feeling was suddenly kindled

and flamed up in my heart ... a feeling of mastery and possession. My

eyes gleamed with passion, and I gripped her hands tightly. How I hated

her and how I was drawn to her at that minute! The one feeling

intensified the other. It was almost like an act of vengeance. At first

there was a look of amazement, even of terror on her face, but only for

one instant. She warmly and rapturously embraced me.

X

A quarter of an hour later I was rushing up and down the room in

frenzied impatience, from minute to minute I went up to the screen and

peeped through the crack at Liza. She was sitting on the ground with

her head leaning against the bed, and must have been crying. But she

did not go away, and that irritated me. This time she understood it

all. I had insulted her finally, but ... there’s no need to describe

it. She realised that my outburst of passion had been simply revenge, a

fresh humiliation, and that to my earlier, almost causeless hatred was

added now a _personal hatred_, born of envy.... Though I do not

maintain positively that she understood all this distinctly; but she

certainly did fully understand that I was a despicable man, and what

was worse, incapable of loving her.

I know I shall be told that this is incredible—but it is incredible to

be as spiteful and stupid as I was; it may be added that it was strange

I should not love her, or at any rate, appreciate her love. Why is it

strange? In the first place, by then I was incapable of love, for I

repeat, with me loving meant tyrannising and showing my moral

superiority. I have never in my life been able to imagine any other

sort of love, and have nowadays come to the point of sometimes thinking

that love really consists in the right—freely given by the beloved

object—to tyrannise over her.

Even in my underground dreams I did not imagine love except as a

struggle. I began it always with hatred and ended it with moral

subjugation, and afterwards I never knew what to do with the subjugated

object. And what is there to wonder at in that, since I had succeeded

in so corrupting myself, since I was so out of touch with “real life,”

as to have actually thought of reproaching her, and putting her to

shame for having come to me to hear “fine sentiments”; and did not even

guess that she had come not to hear fine sentiments, but to love me,

because to a woman all reformation, all salvation from any sort of

ruin, and all moral renewal is included in love and can only show

itself in that form.

I did not hate her so much, however, when I was running about the room

and peeping through the crack in the screen. I was only insufferably

oppressed by her being here. I wanted her to disappear. I wanted

“peace,” to be left alone in my underground world. Real life oppressed

me with its novelty so much that I could hardly breathe.

But several minutes passed and she still remained, without stirring, as

though she were unconscious. I had the shamelessness to tap softly at

the screen as though to remind her.... She started, sprang up, and flew

to seek her kerchief, her hat, her coat, as though making her escape

from me.... Two minutes later she came from behind the screen and

looked with heavy eyes at me. I gave a spiteful grin, which was forced,

however, to _keep up appearances_, and I turned away from her eyes.

“Good-bye,” she said, going towards the door.

I ran up to her, seized her hand, opened it, thrust something in it and

closed it again. Then I turned at once and dashed away in haste to the

other corner of the room to avoid seeing, anyway....

I did mean a moment since to tell a lie—to write that I did this

accidentally, not knowing what I was doing through foolishness, through

losing my head. But I don’t want to lie, and so I will say straight out

that I opened her hand and put the money in it ... from spite. It came

into my head to do this while I was running up and down the room and

she was sitting behind the screen. But this I can say for certain:

though I did that cruel thing purposely, it was not an impulse from the

heart, but came from my evil brain. This cruelty was so affected, so

purposely made up, so completely a product of the brain, of books, that

I could not even keep it up a minute—first I dashed away to avoid

seeing her, and then in shame and despair rushed after Liza. I opened

the door in the passage and began listening.

“Liza! Liza!” I cried on the stairs, but in a low voice, not boldly.

There was no answer, but I fancied I heard her footsteps, lower down on

the stairs.

“Liza!” I cried, more loudly.

No answer. But at that minute I heard the stiff outer glass door open

heavily with a creak and slam violently; the sound echoed up the

stairs.

She had gone. I went back to my room in hesitation. I felt horribly

oppressed.

I stood still at the table, beside the chair on which she had sat and

looked aimlessly before me. A minute passed, suddenly I started;

straight before me on the table I saw.... In short, I saw a crumpled

blue five-rouble note, the one I had thrust into her hand a minute

before. It was the same note; it could be no other, there was no other

in the flat. So she had managed to fling it from her hand on the table

at the moment when I had dashed into the further corner.

Well! I might have expected that she would do that. Might I have

expected it? No, I was such an egoist, I was so lacking in respect for

my fellow-creatures that I could not even imagine she would do so. I

could not endure it. A minute later I flew like a madman to dress,

flinging on what I could at random and ran headlong after her. She

could not have got two hundred paces away when I ran out into the

street.

It was a still night and the snow was coming down in masses and falling

almost perpendicularly, covering the pavement and the empty street as

though with a pillow. There was no one in the street, no sound was to

be heard. The street lamps gave a disconsolate and useless glimmer. I

ran two hundred paces to the cross-roads and stopped short.

Where had she gone? And why was I running after her?

Why? To fall down before her, to sob with remorse, to kiss her feet, to

entreat her forgiveness! I longed for that, my whole breast was being

rent to pieces, and never, never shall I recall that minute with

indifference. But—what for? I thought. Should I not begin to hate her,

perhaps, even tomorrow, just because I had kissed her feet today?

Should I give her happiness? Had I not recognised that day, for the

hundredth time, what I was worth? Should I not torture her?

I stood in the snow, gazing into the troubled darkness and pondered

this.

“And will it not be better?” I mused fantastically, afterwards at home,

stifling the living pang of my heart with fantastic dreams. “Will it

not be better that she should keep the resentment of the insult for

ever? Resentment—why, it is purification; it is a most stinging and

painful consciousness! Tomorrow I should have defiled her soul and have

exhausted her heart, while now the feeling of insult will never die in

her heart, and however loathsome the filth awaiting her—the feeling of

insult will elevate and purify her ... by hatred ... h’m! ... perhaps,

too, by forgiveness.... Will all that make things easier for her

though? ...”

And, indeed, I will ask on my own account here, an idle question: which

is better—cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?

So I dreamed as I sat at home that evening, almost dead with the pain

in my soul. Never had I endured such suffering and remorse, yet could

there have been the faintest doubt when I ran out from my lodging that

I should turn back half-way? I never met Liza again and I have heard

nothing of her. I will add, too, that I remained for a long time

afterwards pleased with the phrase about the benefit from resentment

and hatred in spite of the fact that I almost fell ill from misery.

Even now, so many years later, all this is somehow a very evil memory.

I have many evil memories now, but ... hadn’t I better end my “Notes”

here? I believe I made a mistake in beginning to write them, anyway I

have felt ashamed all the time I’ve been writing this story; so it’s

hardly literature so much as a corrective punishment. Why, to tell long

stories, showing how I have spoiled my life through morally rotting in

my corner, through lack of fitting environment, through divorce from

real life, and rankling spite in my underground world, would certainly

not be interesting; a novel needs a hero, and all the traits for an

anti-hero are _expressly_ gathered together here, and what matters

most, it all produces an unpleasant impression, for we are all divorced

from life, we are all cripples, every one of us, more or less. We are

so divorced from it that we feel at once a sort of loathing for real

life, and so cannot bear to be reminded of it. Why, we have come almost

to looking upon real life as an effort, almost as hard work, and we are

all privately agreed that it is better in books. And why do we fuss and

fume sometimes? Why are we perverse and ask for something else? We

don’t know what ourselves. It would be the worse for us if our petulant

prayers were answered. Come, try, give any one of us, for instance, a

little more independence, untie our hands, widen the spheres of our

activity, relax the control and we ... yes, I assure you ... we should

be begging to be under control again at once. I know that you will very

likely be angry with me for that, and will begin shouting and stamping.

Speak for yourself, you will say, and for your miseries in your

underground holes, and don’t dare to say all of us—excuse me,

gentlemen, I am not justifying myself with that “all of us.” As for

what concerns me in particular I have only in my life carried to an

extreme what you have not dared to carry halfway, and what’s more, you

have taken your cowardice for good sense, and have found comfort in

deceiving yourselves. So that perhaps, after all, there is more life in

me than in you. Look into it more carefully! Why, we don’t even know

what living means now, what it is, and what it is called? Leave us

alone without books and we shall be lost and in confusion at once. We

shall not know what to join on to, what to cling to, what to love and

what to hate, what to respect and what to despise. We are oppressed at

being men—men with a real individual body and blood, we are ashamed of

it, we think it a disgrace and try to contrive to be some sort of

impossible generalised man. We are stillborn, and for generations past

have been begotten, not by living fathers, and that suits us better and

better. We are developing a taste for it. Soon we shall contrive to be

born somehow from an idea. But enough; I don’t want to write more from

“Underground.”

[The notes of this paradoxalist do not end here, however. He could not

refrain from going on with them, but it seems to us that we may stop

here.]