He had passed the summer waiting for a place. That night, in the
orchard at Kazakovo, it became clear to him that his dreams of orchards
were foolish. On his return to the town, after carefully thinking
over his situation he began to hunt for a position as a shop or
counting-house clerk; then he began to reconcile himself to anything
that offered, provided only that it furnished him a morsel of bread.
But his searches, efforts, and entreaties were vain. Despair seized
upon him. How was it he had failed to see that he had nothing to hope
for? In the town he had long borne the reputation of being a very
eccentric person. Drunkenness and lack of employment had converted him
into a laughing-stock. In the beginning his manner of life had amazed
the town; later on, it had come to seem suspicious. And, of a truth,
who had ever heard of such a thing as a petty burgher at his age living
in a lodging-house, being unmarried and poor as an organ-grinder? All
his property consisted of a chest and a ponderous old umbrella! Kuzma
began to look at himself in the mirror: really, now, what sort of man
was the one he beheld before him? He slept in the “common room,” among
strangers, chance people who came and went; in the morning he crawled
in the heat about the bazaar and to the eating-houses, where he picked
up rumours concerning jobs; after dinner, he took a nap, then seated
himself at the window and read Kostomaroff’s History, gazed at the
dusty, glaring white street and at the sky, pale blue with sultriness.
For whom and for what was he living in the world--that petty burgher,
broad of bone though lean, and already grey-haired from hunger and
austere thinking; who called himself an anarchist and was not able
to explain intelligently what an anarchist is? He sat and read; he
sighed and paced to and fro in the room; he squatted down on his heels
and unlocked his small chest; he arranged in more orderly fashion his
tattered little books and manuscripts, two or three faded shirts, an
old long-skirted great-coat, a waistcoat, the much worn certificates
of his birth and his baptism. And he dropped his hands forlornly.
What meaning was there to all this? Such poverty, such loneliness!
And he shuddered at the thought of what lay ahead of him. Tikhon was
childless, and rich--but Tikhon wouldn’t give so much as a copper coin
to bury him....
The summer stretched out in endless length. The Duma was dissolved,
but that did not break the monotony of the long, hot days. A vast
revolt in the country districts was expected, but no one so much as
lifted an eyebrow so long as absolutely nothing of any magnitude took
place. Fresh and savage attacks on the Jews were contrived; day after
day executions and shootings took place; but the town ceased to take
the slightest interest in them. In the country, at the manor-houses,
terror reigned--especially after that famous day when the peasants
rose in rebellion at the “order” of some one or other. But what cared
the town for the country districts? Kazakoff sent an extra company of
kazaks. The local newspaper was closed down three times, and at last
they made an end of the whole business by prohibiting the sale of the
newspapers from the capitals. Once more poster advertisements began to
bear the inscription: “By permission of the Authorities, temporarily
in this Town,” and the posters themselves again became abominable.
Little Russians arrived, attracted by the presentation of “the famous
historical drama ‘Taras Bulba, the murderer of his own son,’” and
by the announcement that “the entire company will take part” in the
national dance, the Hopak, “in sumptuous costumes,” and that there
would be “free presents”--a milch cow and a tea set “worth seventy-five
rubles.” Swift runners and fortune-tellers reappeared, as well as
certain knaves who exhibited human monstrosities--twins, a bearded
lady, a young girl who weighed five hundred and seventy-six pounds,
“the marvel of the XX century--a live freak captured in the Red Sea,”
which lay dead in a zinc bathtub behind a cotton print curtain.
“Cursed be the day I was born into this thrice-accursed country!” Kuzma
said at times, as he hurled his newspaper on to the table, closed his
eyes, and gritted his teeth. “People ought now to be shouting so that
it could be heard throughout the whole world: ‘To arms, ye who believe
in God.’”
“And you’ll go on shouting until you make yourself heard,” some one
quietly answered him.
Then he turned the conversation to the crops, the drought. And Kuzma
relapsed into silence: the events which were taking place were so
atrocious that the human mind was unable to grasp them.
Rain fell now and then in the countryside, but in town, day after day
from May until August, an infernal drought held uninterrupted sway.
The lodging-house, a corner building, baked in the sun. At night one’s
blood hammered in one’s head from the stifling heat, and every noise
which came through the open windows wakened one with a start. It was
impossible to sleep in the hayloft because of the fleas, the crowing of
the young cocks, and the odour of the manure-yard. Moreover, smoking
was prohibited there: the landlord was fat, weak, and nervous as an old
woman. All summer long Kuzma never abandoned the hope of getting to
Voronezh. Akh, how little he had prized the days of his youth! If now
he might only saunter between trains through the streets of Voronezh,
gaze at the familiar poplar trees, at the tiny blue house outside the
town--! But what was the use? Should he spend ten or fifteen rubles,
and then have to deny himself a candle or a roll of white bread? More
than that, it was shameful for an old man to surrender himself to
memories of love. And how about Klasha? Was she really his daughter?
He had seen her a couple of years ago: she was sitting at the window,
weaving lace; she had a charming, modest face, but resembled only her
mother. What could he say to her, even if he should make up his mind to
go? How could he look old Ivan Semyonitch in the face?
Time flowed on in intolerable boredom. There were not even any visitors
at the inn. During the whole of July the only person who put up there
was a youthful deacon, rather a queer fellow, after the pattern of
seminary queer sticks. A relative of his came to see him, but the visit
ended in nothing: the deacon was absent in the bazaar, and his name,
Krasnobaeff, was written up on the board after the Latin fashion:
Benedictoff.
As autumn drew near, Kuzma persuaded himself that it was indispensable
for him to make a pilgrimage to the holy places, to some monastery,
or--to give up the struggle for good and all and take to drinking
again in order to spite some one or other. One day, having unlocked
his chest, he found Tolstoy’s “Confession,” opened it, and read
the pencilled inscription which he had written while in a state of
intoxication, during his services with Kasatkin: “It is impossible to
wean all men from vodka.” A couple of months earlier he would merely
have contracted his brows in a frown--what a stupid inscription!--but
now he grinned and said to himself: “Why not consign everything to the
devil’s mother, burn everything to the last thread, and draw a razor
across my throat?”
Autumn set in. In the bazaar there was a fragrance of apples and
plums. The schoolboys were brought back to the gymnasium from their
vacation in the country. The horse races began. The sun began to set
behind Chips Square. If one emerged from the gate in the evening and
crossed the intersection of the streets, one was blinded: to the left
the whole street, ending at the square in the distance, was flooded
with a low, mournful light. The gardens, behind their fences, were
full of dust and spiders’ webs. Polozoff came to meet one, wearing
a coat with sleeve-flaps, but he had already exchanged his hat for
a peaked cap with military insignia. There was not a soul in the
town park. The band-stand for the musicians was boarded up; so was
the kiosk where, in summer, kumys and lemonade were sold; the wooden
refreshment counter was closed. And one day, as he sat near the
band-stand, Kuzma was so overwhelmed with depression that he seriously
meditated committing suicide. The sun had set; its light was reddish;
thin, rose-hued foliage was drifting along the alley; a cold wind was
blowing. The cathedral bells were ringing the summons to the All-Night
Vigil Service, and one’s soul ached unbearably at this closely set,
methodical peal, executed in countrified Saturday fashion.
All at once, from under the band-stand, a cough became audible, and
a clearing of the throat. “Motka,” Kuzma said to himself. And sure
enough, from under the stairs crawled Duck-Headed Matty. He wore
rusty soldier’s boots, an extremely long uniform from the shoulders
of a second-school boy, besprinkled with flour--evidently the bazaar
had been making merry--and a straw hat which had once been run over
by wheels. With his eyes still closed, spitting and staggering with
intoxication, he stalked past, without so much as asking for a smoke.
Kuzma, repressing his tears, shouted to him: “Mot! Come, let’s have a
chat, and a smoke--”
And Motka turned, seated himself on the bench, began drowsily, with
twitching brows, to roll himself a cigarette. But apparently he had
only a dim idea as to the identity of the person who was sitting by his
side--who it was that was complaining to him about his fate....
On the following day that same Motka brought Tikhon’s note to Kuzma.
And, once more, the noose which had come near strangling Kuzma broke.
At the end of September he went to Durnovka.