dreaming of the millions. And I have only to take this half-dead man,
throw him on the bed, stifle him a little with the pillow, and the most
conscientious expert would find no sign of a violent death. But let us
first read what he has written here...."
The banker took the page from the table and read as follows:
"To-morrow at twelve o'clock I regain my freedom and the right to
associate with other men, but before I leave this room and see the
sunshine, I think it necessary to say a few words to you. With a clear
conscience I tell you, as before God, who beholds me, that I despise
freedom and life and health, and all that in your books is called the
good things of the world.
"For fifteen years I have been intently studying earthly life. It is
true I have not seen the earth nor men, but in your books I have drunk
fragrant wine, I have sung songs, I have hunted stags and wild boars in
the forests, have loved women.... Beauties as ethereal as clouds,
created by the magic of your poets and geniuses, have visited me at
night, and have whispered in my ears wonderful tales that have set my
brain in a whirl. In your books I have climbed to the peaks of Elburz
and Mont Blanc, and from there I have seen the sun rise and have watched
it at evening flood the sky, the ocean, and the mountain-tops with gold
and crimson. I have watched from there the lightning flashing over my
head and cleaving the storm-clouds. I have seen green forests, fields,
rivers, lakes, towns. I have heard the singing of the sirens, and the
strains of the shepherds' pipes; I have touched the wings of comely
devils who flew down to converse with me of God.... In your books I have
flung myself into the bottomless pit, performed miracles, slain, burned
towns, preached new religions, conquered whole kingdoms....
"Your books have given me wisdom. All that the unresting thought of man
has created in the ages is compressed into a small compass in my brain.
I know that I am wiser than all of you.
"And I despise your books, I despise wisdom and the blessings of this
world. It is all worthless, fleeting, illusory, and deceptive, like a
mirage. You may be proud, wise, and fine, but death will wipe you off
the face of the earth as though you were no more than mice burrowing
under the floor, and your posterity, your history, your immortal
geniuses will burn or freeze together with the earthly globe.
"You have lost your reason and taken the wrong path. You have taken lies
for truth, and hideousness for beauty. You would marvel if, owing to
strange events of some sorts, frogs and lizards suddenly grew on apple
and orange trees instead of fruit, or if roses began to smell like a
sweating horse; so I marvel at you who exchange heaven for earth. I
don't want to understand you.
"To prove to you in action how I despise all that you live by, I
renounce the two millions of which I once dreamed as of paradise and
which now I despise. To deprive myself of the right to the money I shall
go out from here five hours before the time fixed, and so break the
compact...."
When the banker had read this he laid the page on the table, kissed the
strange man on the head, and went out of the lodge, weeping. At no other
time, even when he had lost heavily on the Stock Exchange, had he felt
so great a contempt for himself. When he got home he lay on his bed, but
his tears and emotion kept him for hours from sleeping.
Next morning the watchmen ran in with pale faces, and told him they had
seen the man who lived in the lodge climb out of the window into the
garden, go to the gate, and disappear. The banker went at once with the
servants to the lodge and made sure of the flight of his prisoner. To
avoid arousing unnecessary talk, he took from the table the writing in
which the millions were renounced, and when he got home locked it up in
the fireproof safe.
THE HEAD-GARDENER'S STORY
A SALE of flowers was taking place in Count N.'s greenhouses. The
purchasers were few in number--a landowner who was a neighbor of mine, a
young timber-merchant, and myself. While the workmen were carrying out
our magnificent purchases and packing them into the carts, we sat at the
entry of the greenhouse and chatted about one thing and another. It is
extremely pleasant to sit in a garden on a still April morning,
listening to the birds, and watching the flowers brought out into the
open air and basking in the sunshine.
The head-gardener, Mihail Karlovitch, a venerable old man with a full
shaven face, wearing a fur waistcoat and no coat, superintended the
packing of the plants himself, but at the same time he listened to our
conversation in the hope of hearing something new. He was an
intelligent, very good-hearted man, respected by everyone. He was for
some reason looked upon by everyone as a German, though he was in
reality on his father's side Swedish, on his mother's side Russian, and
attended the Orthodox church. He knew Russian, Swedish, and German. He
had read a good deal in those languages, and nothing one could do gave
him greater pleasure than lending him some new book or talking to him,
for instance, about Ibsen.
He had his weaknesses, but they were innocent ones: he called himself
the head gardener, though there were no under-gardeners; the expression
of his face was unusually dignified and haughty; he could not endure to
be contradicted, and liked to be listened to with respect and attention.
"That young fellow there I can recommend to you as an awful rascal,"
said my neighbor, pointing to a laborer with a swarthy, gipsy face, who
drove by with the water-barrel. "Last week he was tried in the town for
burglary and was acquitted; they pronounced him mentally deranged, and
yet look at him, he is the picture of health. Scoundrels are very often
acquitted nowadays in Russia on grounds of abnormality and aberration,
yet these acquittals, these unmistakable proofs of an indulgent attitude
to crime, lead to no good. They demoralize the masses, the sense of
justice is blunted in all as they become accustomed to seeing vice
unpunished, and you know in our age one may boldly say in the words of
Shakespeare that in our evil and corrupt age virtue must ask forgiveness
of vice."
"That's very true," the merchant assented. "Owing to these frequent
acquittals, murder and arson have become much more common. Ask the
peasants."
Mihail Karlovitch turned towards us and said:
"As far as I am concerned, gentlemen, I am always delighted to meet with
these verdicts of not guilty. I am not afraid for morality and justice
when they say 'Not guilty,' but on the contrary I feel pleased. Even
when my conscience tells me the jury have made a mistake in acquitting
the criminal, even then I am triumphant. Judge for yourselves,
gentlemen; if the judges and the jury have more faith in man than in
evidence, material proofs, and speeches for the prosecution, is not that
faith in man in itself higher than any ordinary considerations? Such
faith is only attainable by those few who understand and feel Christ."
"A fine thought," I said.
"But it's not a new one. I remember a very long time ago I heard a
legend on that subject. A very charming legend," said the gardener, and
he smiled. "I was told it by my grandmother, my father's mother, an
excellent old lady. She told me it in Swedish, and it does not sound so
fine, so classical, in Russian."
But we begged him to tell it and not to be put off by the coarseness of
the Russian language. Much gratified, he deliberately lighted his pipe,
looked angrily at the laborers, and began:
"There settled in a certain little town a solitary, plain, elderly
gentleman called Thomson or Wilson--but that does not matter; the surname
is not the point. He followed an honorable profession: he was a doctor.
He was always morose and unsociable, and only spoke when required by his
profession. He never visited anyone, never extended his acquaintance
beyond a silent bow, and lived as humbly as a hermit. The fact was, he
was a learned man, and in those days learned men were not like other
people. They spent their days and nights in contemplation, in reading
and in healing disease, looked upon everything else as trivial, and had
no time to waste a word. The inhabitants of the town understood this,
and tried not to worry him with their visits and empty chatter. They
were very glad that God had sent them at last a man who could heal
diseases, and were proud that such a remarkable man was living in their
town. 'He knows everything,' they said about him.
"But that was not enough. They ought to have also said, 'He loves
everyone.' In the breast of that learned man there beat a wonderful
angelic heart. Though the people of that town were strangers and not his
own people, yet he loved them like children, and did not spare himself
for them. He was himself ill with consumption, he had a cough, but when
he was summoned to the sick he forgot his own illness he did not spare
himself and, gasping for breath, climbed up the hills however high they
might be. He disregarded the sultry heat and the cold, despised thirst
and hunger. He would accept no money and strange to say, when one of his
patients died, he would follow the coffin with the relations, weeping.
"And soon he became so necessary to the town that the inhabitants
wondered how they could have got on before without the man. Their
gratitude knew no bounds. Grown-up people and children, good and bad
alike, honest men and cheats--all in fact, respected him and knew his
value. In the little town and all the surrounding neighborhood there was
no man who would allow himself to do anything disagreeable to him;
indeed, they would never have dreamed of it. When he came out of his
lodging, he never fastened the doors or windows, in complete confidence
that there was no thief who could bring himself to do him wrong. He
often had in the course of his medical duties to walk along the
highroads, through the forests and mountains haunted by numbers of
hungry vagrants; but he felt that he was in perfect security.
"One night he was returning from a patient when robbers fell upon him in
the forest, but when they recognized him, they took off their hats
respectfully and offered him something to eat. When he answered that he
was not hungry, they gave him a warm wrap and accompanied him as far as
the town, happy that fate had given them the chance in some small way to
show their gratitude to the benevolent man. Well, to be sure, my
grandmother told me that even the horses and the cows and the dogs knew
him and expressed their joy when they met him.
"And this man who seemed by his sanctity to have guarded himself from
every evil, to whom even brigands and frenzied men wished nothing but
good, was one fine morning found murdered. Covered with blood, with his
skull broken, he was lying in a ravine, and his pale face wore an
expression of amazement. Yes, not horror but amazement was the emotion
that had been fixed upon his face when he saw the murderer before him.
You can imagine the grief that overwhelmed the inhabitants of the town
and the surrounding districts. All were in despair, unable to believe
their eyes, wondering who could have killed the man. The judges who
conducted the inquiry and examined the doctor's body said: 'Here we have
all the signs of a murder, but as there is not a man in the world
capable of murdering our doctor, obviously it was not a case of murder,
and the combination of evidence is due to simple chance. We must suppose
that in the darkness he fell into the ravine of himself and was mortally
injured.'
"The whole town agreed with this opinion. The doctor was buried, and
nothing more was said about a violent death. The existence of a man who
could have the baseness and wickedness to kill the doctor seemed
incredible. There is a limit even to wickedness, isn't there?
"All at once, would you believe it, chance led them to discovering the
murderer. A vagrant who had been many times convicted, notorious for his
vicious life, was seen selling for drink a snuff-box and watch that had
belonged to the doctor. When he was questioned he was confused, and
answered with an obvious lie. A search was made, and in his bed was
found a shirt with stains of blood on the sleeves, and a doctor's lancet
set in gold. What more evidence was wanted? They put the criminal in
prison. The inhabitants were indignant, and at the same time said:
"'It's incredible! It can't be so! Take care that a mistake is not made;
it does happen, you know, that evidence tells a false tale.'
"At his trial the murderer obstinately denied his guilt. Everything was
against him, and to be convinced of his guilt was as easy as to believe
that this earth is black; but the judges seem to have gone mad: they
weighed every proof ten times, looked distrustfully at the witnesses,
flushed crimson and sipped water.... The trial began early in the
morning and was only finished in the evening.
"'Accused!' the chief judge said, addressing the murderer, 'the court
has found you guilty of murdering Dr. So-and-so, and has sentenced you
to....'
"The chief judge meant to say 'to the death penalty,' but he dropped
from his hands the paper on which the sentence was written, wiped the
cold sweat from his face, and cried out:
"'No! May God punish me if I judge wrongly, but I swear he is not
guilty. I cannot admit the thought that there exists a man who would
dare to murder our friend the doctor! A man could not sink so low!'
"'There cannot be such a man!' the other judges assented.
"'No,' the crowd cried. 'Let him go!'
"The murderer was set free to go where he chose, and not one soul blamed
the court for an unjust verdict. And my grandmother used to say that for
such faith in humanity God forgave the sins of all the inhabitants of
that town. He rejoices when people believe that man is His image and
semblance, and grieves if, forgetful of human dignity, they judge worse
of men than of dogs. The sentence of acquittal may bring harm to the
inhabitants of the town, but on the other hand, think of the beneficial
influence upon them of that faith in man--a faith which does not remain
dead, you know; it raises up generous feelings in us, and always impels
us to love and respect every man. Every man! And that is important."
Mihail Karlovitch had finished. My neighbor would have urged some
objection, but the head-gardener made a gesture that signified that he
did not like objections; then he walked away to the carts, and, with an
expression of dignity, went on looking after the packing.
THE BEAUTIES I
I REMEMBER, when I was a high school boy in the fifth or sixth class, I
was driving with my grandfather from the village of Bolshoe Kryepkoe in
the Don region to Rostov-on-the-Don. It was a sultry, languidly dreary
day of August. Our eyes were glued together, and our mouths were parched
from the heat and the dry burning wind which drove clouds of dust to
meet us; one did not want to look or speak or think, and when our drowsy
driver, a Little Russian called Karpo, swung his whip at the horses and
lashed me on my cap, I did not protest or utter a sound, but only,
rousing myself from half-slumber, gazed mildly and dejectedly into the
distance to see whether there was a village visible through the dust. We
stopped to feed the horses in a big Armenian village at a rich
Armenian's whom my grandfather knew. Never in my life have I seen a
greater caricature than that Armenian. Imagine a little shaven head with
thick overhanging eyebrows, a beak of a nose, long gray mustaches, and a
wide mouth with a long cherry-wood chibouk sticking out of it. This
little head was clumsily attached to a lean hunch-back carcass attired
in a fantastic garb, a short red jacket, and full bright blue trousers.
This figure walked straddling its legs and shuffling with its slippers,
spoke without taking the chibouk out of its mouth, and behaved with
truly Armenian dignity, not smiling, but staring with wide-open eyes and
trying to take as little notice as possible of its guests.
There was neither wind nor dust in the Armenian's rooms, but it was just
as unpleasant, stifling, and dreary as in the steppe and on the road. I
remember, dusty and exhausted by the heat, I sat in the corner on a
green box. The unpainted wooden walls, the furniture, and the floors
colored with yellow ocher smelt of dry wood baked by the sun. Wherever I
looked there were flies and flies and flies.... Grandfather and the
Armenian were talking about grazing, about manure, and about oats.... I
knew that they would be a good hour getting the samovar; that
grandfather would be not less than an hour drinking his tea, and then
would lie down to sleep for two or three hours; that I should waste a
quarter of the day waiting, after which there would be again the heat,
the dust, the jolting cart. I heard the muttering of the two voices, and
it began to seem to me that I had been seeing the Armenian, the cupboard
with the crockery, the flies, the windows with the burning sun beating
on them, for ages and ages, and should only cease to see them in the
far-off future, and I was seized with hatred for the steppe, the sun,
the flies....
A Little Russian peasant woman in a kerchief brought in a tray of tea-
things, then the samovar. The Armenian went slowly out into the passage
and shouted: "Mashya, come and pour out tea! Where are you, Mashya?"
Hurried footsteps were heard, and there came into the room a girl of
sixteen in a simple cotton dress and a white kerchief. As she washed the
crockery and poured out the tea, she was standing with her back to me,
and all I could see was that she was of a slender figure, barefooted,
and that her little bare heels were covered by long trousers.
The Armenian invited me to have tea. Sitting down to the table, I
glanced at the girl, who was handing me a glass of tea, and felt all at
once as though a wind were blowing over my soul and blowing away all the
impressions of the day with their dust and dreariness. I saw the
bewitching features of the most beautiful face I have ever met in real
life or in my dreams. Before me stood a beauty, and I recognized that at
the first glance as I should have recognized lightning.
I am ready to swear that Masha--or, as her father called her, Mashya--was
a real beauty, but I don't know how to prove it. It sometimes happens
that clouds are huddled together in disorder on the horizon, and the sun
hiding behind them colors them and the sky with tints of every possible
shade--crimson, orange, gold, lilac, muddy pink; one cloud is like a
monk, another like a fish, a third like a Turk in a turban. The glow of
sunset enveloping a third of the sky gleams on the cross on the church,
flashes on the windows of the manor house, is reflected in the river and
the puddles, quivers on the trees; far, far away against the background
of the sunset, a flock of wild ducks is flying homewards.... And the boy
herding the cows, and the surveyor driving in his chaise over the dam,
and the gentleman out for a walk, all gaze at the sunset, and every one
of them thinks it terribly beautiful, but no one knows or can say in
what its beauty lies.
I was not the only one to think the Armenian girl beautiful. My
grandfather, an old man of seventy, gruff and indifferent to women and
the beauties of nature, looked caressingly at Masha for a full minute,
and asked:
"Is that your daughter, Avert Nazaritch?"
"Yes, she is my daughter," answered the Armenian.
"A fine young lady," said my grandfather approvingly.
An artist would have called the Armenian girl's beauty classical and
severe, it was just that beauty, the contemplation of which--God knows
why!--inspires in one the conviction that one is seeing correct features;
that hair, eyes, nose, mouth, neck, bosom, and every movement of the
young body all go together in one complete harmonious accord in which
nature has not blundered over the smallest line. You fancy for some
reason that the ideally beautiful woman must have such a nose as
Masha's, straight and slightly aquiline, just such great dark eyes, such
long lashes, such a languid glance; you fancy that her black curly hair
and eyebrows go with the soft white tint of her brow and cheeks as the
green reeds go with the quiet stream. Masha's white neck and her
youthful bosom were not fully developed, but you fancy the sculptor
would need a great creative genius to mold them. You gaze, and little by
little the desire comes over you to say to Masha something
extraordinarily pleasant, sincere, beautiful, as beautiful as she
herself was.
At first I felt hurt and abashed that Masha took no notice of me, but
was all the time looking down; it seemed to me as though a peculiar
atmosphere, proud and happy, separated her from me and jealously
screened her from my eyes.
"That's because I am covered with dust," I thought, "am sunburnt, and am
still a boy."
But little by little I forgot myself, and gave myself up entirely to the
consciousness of beauty. I thought no more now of the dreary steppe, of
the dust, no longer heard the buzzing of the flies, no longer tasted the
tea, and felt nothing except that a beautiful girl was standing only the
other side of the table.
I felt this beauty rather strangely. It was not desire, nor ecstacy, nor
enjoyment that Masha excited in me, but a painful though pleasant
sadness. It was a sadness vague and undefined as a dream. For some
reason I felt sorry for myself, for my grandfather and for the Armenian,
even for the girl herself, and I had a feeling as though we all four had
lost something important and essential to life which we should never
find again. My grandfather, too, grew melancholy; he talked no more
about manure or about oats, but sat silent, looking pensively at Masha.
After tea my grandfather lay down for a nap while I went out of the
house into the porch. The house, like all the houses in the Armenian
village stood in the full sun; there was not a tree, not an awning, no
shade. The Armenian's great courtyard, overgrown with goosefoot and wild
mallows, was lively and full of gaiety in spite of the great heat.
Threshing was going on behind one of the low hurdles which intersected
the big yard here and there. Round a post stuck into the middle of the
threshing-floor ran a dozen horses harnessed side by side, so that they
formed one long radius. A Little Russian in a long waistcoat and full
trousers was walking beside them, cracking a whip and shouting in a tone
that sounded as though he were jeering at the horses and showing off his
power over them.
"A--a--a, you damned brutes!... A--a--a, plague take you! Are you
frightened?"
The horses, sorrel, white, and piebald, not understanding why they were
made to run round in one place and to crush the wheat straw, ran
unwillingly as though with effort, swinging their tails with an offended
air. The wind raised up perfect clouds of golden chaff from under their
hoofs and carried it away far beyond the hurdle. Near the tall fresh
stacks peasant women were swarming with rakes, and carts were moving,
and beyond the stacks in another yard another dozen similar horses were
running round a post, and a similar Little Russian was cracking his whip
and jeering at the horses.