"Vassya, are you here?" she asks. "I have such gloomy thoughts.
Goodness, why am I so unlucky as not to sleep. Vassya, have pity, do
tell me something!"
"What shall I tell you?"
"Something about love," Lizotchka says languidly. "Or some anecdote
about Jews. . . ."
Vassily Stepanovitch, ready for anything if only his wife will be
cheerful and not talk about death, combs locks of hair over his ears,
makes an absurd face, and goes up to Lizotchka.
"Does your vatch vant mending?" he asks.
"It does, it does," giggles Lizotchka, and hands him her gold watch from
the little table. "Mend it."
Vassya takes the watch, examines the mechanism for a long time, and
wriggling and shrugging, says: "She can not be mended . . . in vun veel
two cogs are vanting. . . ."
This is the whole performance. Lizotchka laughs and claps her hands.
"Capital," she exclaims. "Wonderful. Do you know, Vassya, it's awfully
stupid of you not to take part in amateur theatricals! You have a
remarkable talent! You are much better than Sysunov. There was an
amateur called Sysunov who played with us in It's My Birthday. A first-
class comic talent, only fancy: a nose as thick as a parsnip, green
eyes, and he walks like a crane. . . . We all roared; stay, I will show
you how he walks."
Lizotchka springs out of bed and begins pacing about the floor,
barefooted and without her cap.
"A very good day to you!" she says in a bass, imitating a man's voice.
"Anything pretty? Anything new under the moon? Ha, ha, ha!" she laughs.
"Ha, ha, ha!" Vassya seconds her. And the young pair, roaring with
laughter, forgetting the illness, chase one another about the room. The
race ends in Vassya's catching his wife by her nightgown and eagerly
showering kisses upon her. After one particularly passionate embrace
Lizotchka suddenly remembers that she is seriously ill. . . .
"What silliness!" she says, making a serious face and covering herself
with the quilt. "I suppose you have forgotten that I am ill! Clever, I
must say!"
"Sorry . . ." falters her husband in confusion.
"If my illness takes a bad turn it will be your fault. Not kind! not
good!"
Lizotchka closes her eyes and is silent. Her former languor and
expression of martyrdom return again, there is a sound of gentle moans.
Vassya changes the compress, and glad that his wife is at home and not
gadding off to her aunt's, sits meekly at her feet. He does not sleep
all night. At ten o'clock the doctor comes.
"Well, how are we feeling?" he asks as he takes her pulse. "Have you
slept?"
"Badly," Lizotchka's husband answers for her, "very badly."
The doctor walks away to the window and stares at a passing chimney-
sweep.
"Doctor, may I have coffee to-day?" asks Lizotchka.
"You may."
"And may I get up?"
"You might, perhaps, but . . . you had better lie in bed another day."
"She is awfully depressed," Vassya whispers in his ear, "such gloomy
thoughts, such pessimism. I am dreadfully uneasy about her."
The doctor sits down to the little table, and rubbing his forehead,
prescribes bromide of potassium for Lizotchka, then makes his bow, and
promising to look in again in the evening, departs. Vassya does not go
to the office, but sits all day at his wife's feet.
At midday the admirers of her talent arrive in a crowd. They are
agitated and alarmed, they bring masses of flowers and French novels.
Lizotchka, in a snow-white cap and a light dressing jacket, lies in bed
with an enigmatic look, as though she did not believe in her own
recovery. The admirers of her talent see her husband, but readily
forgive his presence: they and he are united by one calamity at that
bedside!
At six o'clock in the evening Lizotchka falls asleep, and again sleeps
till two o'clock in the morning. Vassya as before sits at her feet,
struggles with drowsiness, changes her compress, plays at being a Jew,
and in the morning after a second night of suffering, Liza is prinking
before the looking-glass and putting on her hat.
"Wherever are you going, my dear?" asks Vassya, with an imploring look
at her.
"What?" says Lizotchka in wonder, assuming a scared expression, "don't
you know that there is a rehearsal to-day at Marya Lvovna's?"
After escorting her there, Vassya having nothing to do to while away his
boredom, takes his portfolio and goes to the office. His head aches so
violently from his sleepless nights that his left eye shuts of itself
and refuses to open. . . .
"What's the matter with you, my good sir?" his chief asks him. "What is
it?"
Vassya waves his hand and sits down.
"Don't ask me, your Excellency," he says with a sigh. "What I have
suffered in these two days, what I have suffered! Liza has been ill!"
"Good heavens," cried his chief in alarm. "Lizaveta Pavlovna, what is
wrong with her?"
Vassily Stepanovitch merely throws up his hands and raises his eyes to
the ceiling, as though he would say: "It's the will of Providence."
"Ah, my boy, I can sympathise with you with all my heart!" sighs his
chief, rolling his eyes. "I've lost my wife, my dear, I understand. That
is a loss, it is a loss! It's awful, awful! I hope Lizaveta Pavlovna is
better now! What doctor is attending her?"
"Von Schterk."
"Von Schterk! But you would have been better to have called in Magnus or
Semandritsky. But how very pale your face is. You are ill yourself! This
is awful!"
"Yes, your Excellency, I haven't slept. What I have suffered, what I
have been through!"
"And yet you came! Why you came I can't understand? One can't force
oneself like that! One mustn't do oneself harm like that. Go home and
stay there till you are well again! Go home, I command you! Zeal is a
very fine thing in a young official, but you mustn't forget as the
Romans used to say: 'mens sana in corpore sano,' that is, a healthy
brain in a healthy body."
Vassya agrees, puts his papers back in his portfolio, and, taking leave
of his chief, goes home to bed.
THE LION AND THE SUN
IN one of the towns lying on this side of the Urals a rumour was afloat
that a Persian magnate, called Rahat-Helam, was staying for a few days
in the town and putting up at the "Japan Hotel." This rumour made no
impression whatever upon the inhabitants; a Persian had arrived, well,
so be it. Only Stepan Ivanovitch Kutsyn, the mayor of the town, hearing
of the arrival of the oriental gentleman from the secretary of the Town
Hall, grew thoughtful and inquired:
"Where is he going?"
"To Paris or to London, I believe."
"H'm. . . . Then he is a big-wig, I suppose?"
"The devil only knows."
As he went home from the Town Hall and had his dinner, the mayor sank
into thought again, and this time he went on thinking till the evening.
The arrival of the distinguished Persian greatly intrigued him. It
seemed to him that fate itself had sent him this Rahat-Helam, and that a
favourable opportunity had come at last for realising his passionate,
secretly cherished dream. Kutsyn had already two medals, and the
Stanislav of the third degree, the badge of the Red Cross, and the badge
of the Society of Saving from Drowning, and in addition to these he had
made himself a little gold gun crossed by a guitar, and this ornament,
hung from a buttonhole in his uniform, looked in the distance like
something special, and delightfully resembled a badge of distinction. It
is well known that the more orders and medals you have the more you
want--and the mayor had long been desirous of receiving the Persian order
of The Lion and the Sun; he desired it passionately, madly. He knew very
well that there was no need to fight, or to subscribe to an asylum, or
to serve on committees to obtain this order; all that was needed was a
favourable opportunity. And now it seemed to him that this opportunity
had come.
At noon on the following day he put on his chain and all his badges of
distinction and went to the 'Japan.' Destiny favoured him. When he
entered the distinguished Persian's apartment the latter was alone and
doing nothing. Rahat-Helam, an enormous Asiatic, with a long nose like
the beak of a snipe, with prominent eyes, and with a fez on his head,
was sitting on the floor rummaging in his portmanteau.
"I beg you to excuse my disturbing you," began Kutsyn, smiling. "I have
the honour to introduce myself, the hereditary, honourable citizen and
cavalier, Stepan Ivanovitch Kutsyn, mayor of this town. I regard it as
my duty to honour, in the person of your Highness, so to say, the
representative of a friendly and neighbourly state."
The Persian turned and muttered something in very bad French, that
sounded like tapping a board with a piece of wood.
"The frontiers of Persia"--Kutsyn continued the greeting he had
previously learned by heart--"are in close contact with the borders of
our spacious fatherland, and therefore mutual sympathies impel me, so to
speak, to express my solidarity with you."
The illustrious Persian got up and again muttered something in a wooden
tongue. Kutsyn, who knew no foreign language, shook his head to show
that he did not understand.
"Well, how am I to talk to him?" he thought. "It would be a good thing
to send for an interpreter at once, but it is a delicate matter, I can't
talk before witnesses. The interpreter would be chattering all over the
town afterwards."
And Kutsyn tried to recall the foreign words he had picked up from the
newspapers.
"I am the mayor of the town," he muttered. "That is the lord mayor . . .
municipalais . . . Vwee? Kompreney?"
He wanted to express his social position in words or in gesture, and did
not know how. A picture hanging on the wall with an inscription in large
letters, "The Town of Venice," helped him out of his difficulties. He
pointed with his finger at the town, then at his own head, and in that
way obtained, as he imagined, the phrase: "I am the head of the town."
The Persian did not understand, but he gave a smile, and said:
"Goot, monsieur . . . goot . . . . ." Half-an-hour later the mayor was
slapping the Persian, first on the knee and then on the shoulder, and
saying:
"Kompreney? Vwee? As lord mayor and municipalais I suggest that you
should take a little promenage . . . kompreney? Promenage."
Kutsyn pointed at Venice, and with two fingers represented walking legs.
Rahat-Helam who kept his eyes fixed on his medals, and was apparently
guessing that this was the most important person in the town, understood
the word promenage and grinned politely. Then they both put on their
coats and went out of the room. Downstairs near the door leading to the
restaurant of the 'Japan,' Kutsyn reflected that it would not be amiss
to entertain the Persian. He stopped and indicating the tables, said:
"By Russian custom it wouldn't be amiss . . . puree, entrekot, champagne
and so on, kompreney."
The illustrious visitor understood, and a little later they were both
sitting in the very best room of the restaurant, eating, and drinking
champagne.
"Let us drink to the prosperity of Persia!" said Kutsyn. "We Russians
love the Persians. Though we are of another faith, yet there are common
interests, mutual, so to say, sympathies . . . progress . . . Asiatic
markets. . . . The campaigns of peace so to say. . . ."
The illustrious Persian ate and drank with an excellent appetite, he
stuck his fork into a slice of smoked sturgeon, and wagging his head,
enthusiastically said: "Goot, bien."
"You like it?" said the mayor delighted. "Bien, that's capital." And
turning to the waiter he said: "Luka, my lad, see that two pieces of
smoked sturgeon, the best you have, are sent up to his Highness's room!"
Then the mayor and the Persian magnate went to look at the menagerie.
The townspeople saw their Stepan Ivanovitch, flushed with champagne, gay
and very well pleased, leading the Persian about the principal streets
and the bazaar, showing him the points of interest of the town, and even
taking him to the fire tower.
Among other things the townspeople saw him stop near some stone gates
with lions on it, and point out to the Persian first the lion, then the
sun overhead, and then his own breast; then again he pointed to the lion
and to the sun while the Persian nodded his head as though in sign of
assent, and smiling showed his white teeth. In the evening they were
sitting in the London Hotel listening to the harp-players, and where
they spent the night is not known.
Next day the mayor was at the Town Hall in the morning; the officials
there apparently already knew something and were making their
conjectures, for the secretary went up to him and said with an ironical
smile:
"It is the custom of the Persians when an illustrious visitor comes to
visit you, you must slaughter a sheep with your own hands."
And a little later an envelope that had come by post was handed to him.
The mayor tore it open and saw a caricature in it. It was a drawing of
Rahat-Helam with the mayor on his knees before him, stretching out his
hands and saying:
"To prove our Russian friendship For Persia's mighty realm, And show
respect for you, her envoy, Myself I'd slaughter like a lamb, But,
pardon me, for I'm a--donkey!"
The mayor was conscious of an unpleasant feeling like a gnawing in the
pit of the stomach, but not for long. By midday he was again with the
illustrious Persian, again he was regaling him and showing him the
points of interest in the town. Again he led him to the stone gates, and
again pointed to the lion, to the sun and to his own breast. They dined
at the 'Japan'; after dinner, with cigars in their teeth, both, flushed
and blissful, again mounted the fire tower, and the mayor, evidently
wishing to entertain the visitor with an unusual spectacle, shouted from
the top to a sentry walking below:
"Sound the alarm!"
But the alarm was not sounded as the firemen were at the baths at the
moment.
They supped at the 'London' and, after supper, the Persian departed.
When he saw him off, Stepan Ivanovitch kissed him three times after the
Russian fashion, and even grew tearful. And when the train started, he
shouted:
"Give our greeting to Persia! Tell her that we love her!"
A year and four months had passed. There was a bitter frost, thirty-five
degrees, and a piercing wind was blowing. Stepan Ivanovitch was walking
along the street with his fur coat thrown open over his chest, and he
was annoyed that he met no one to see the Lion and the Sun upon his
breast. He walked about like this till evening with his fur coat open,
was chilled to the bone, and at night tossed from side to side and could
not get to sleep.
He felt heavy at heart.
There was a burning sensation inside him, and his heart throbbed
uneasily; he had a longing now to get a Serbian order. It was a painful,
passionate longing.
A DAUGHTER OF ALBION
A FINE carriage with rubber tyres, a fat coachman, and velvet on the
seats, rolled up to the house of a landowner called Gryabov. Fyodor
Andreitch Otsov, the district Marshal of Nobility, jumped out of the
carriage. A drowsy footman met him in the hall.
"Are the family at home?" asked the Marshal.
"No, sir. The mistress and the children are gone out paying visits,
while the master and mademoiselle are catching fish. Fishing all the
morning, sir."
Otsov stood a little, thought a little, and then went to the river to
look for Gryabov. Going down to the river he found him a mile and a half
from the house. Looking down from the steep bank and catching sight of
Gryabov, Otsov gushed with laughter. . . . Gryabov, a large stout man,
with a very big head, was sitting on the sand, angling, with his legs
tucked under him like a Turk. His hat was on the back of his head and
his cravat had slipped on one side. Beside him stood a tall thin
Englishwoman, with prominent eyes like a crab's, and a big bird-like
nose more like a hook than a nose. She was dressed in a white muslin
gown through which her scraggy yellow shoulders were very distinctly
apparent. On her gold belt hung a little gold watch. She too was
angling. The stillness of the grave reigned about them both. Both were
motionless, as the river upon which their floats were swimming.
"A desperate passion, but deadly dull!" laughed Otsov. "Good-day, Ivan
Kuzmitch."
"Ah . . . is that you?" asked Gryabov, not taking his eyes off the
water. "Have you come?"
"As you see . . . . And you are still taken up with your crazy nonsense!
Not given it up yet?"
"The devil's in it. . . . I begin in the morning and fish all day . . .
. The fishing is not up to much to-day. I've caught nothing and this
dummy hasn't either. We sit on and on and not a devil of a fish! I could
scream!"
"Well, chuck it up then. Let's go and have some vodka!"
"Wait a little, maybe we shall catch something. Towards evening the fish
bite better . . . . I've been sitting here, my boy, ever since the
morning! I can't tell you how fearfully boring it is. It was the devil
drove me to take to this fishing! I know that it is rotten idiocy for me
to sit here. I sit here like some scoundrel, like a convict, and I stare
at the water like a fool. I ought to go to the haymaking, but here I sit
catching fish. Yesterday His Holiness held a service at Haponyevo, but I
didn't go. I spent the day here with this . . . with this she-devil."
"But . . . have you taken leave of your senses?" asked Otsov, glancing
in embarrassment at the Englishwoman. "Using such language before a lady
and she . . . ."
"Oh, confound her, it doesn't matter, she doesn't understand a syllable
of Russian, whether you praise her or blame her, it is all the same to
her! Just look at her nose! Her nose alone is enough to make one faint.
We sit here for whole days together and not a single word! She stands
like a stuffed image and rolls the whites of her eyes at the water."
The Englishwoman gave a yawn, put a new worm on, and dropped the hook
into the water.
"I wonder at her not a little," Gryabov went on, "the great stupid has
been living in Russia for ten years and not a word of Russian! . . . Any
little aristocrat among us goes to them and learns to babble away in
their lingo, while they . . . there's no making them out. Just look at
her nose, do look at her nose!"
"Come, drop it . . . it's uncomfortable. Why attack a woman?"
"She's not a woman, but a maiden lady. . . . I bet she's dreaming of
suitors. The ugly doll. And she smells of something decaying . . . .
I've got a loathing for her, my boy! I can't look at her with
indifference. When she turns her ugly eyes on me it sends a twinge all
through me as though I had knocked my elbow on the parapet. She likes
fishing too. Watch her: she fishes as though it were a holy rite! She
looks upon everything with disdain . . . . She stands there, the wretch,
and is conscious that she is a human being, and that therefore she is
the monarch of nature. And do you know what her name is? Wilka
Charlesovna Fyce! Tfoo! There is no getting it out!"
The Englishwoman, hearing her name, deliberately turned her nose in
Gryabov's direction and scanned him with a disdainful glance; she raised
her eyes from Gryabov to Otsov and steeped him in disdain. And all this
in silence, with dignity and deliberation.
"Did you see?" said Gryabov chuckling. "As though to say 'take that.'
Ah, you monster! It's only for the children's sake that I keep that
triton. If it weren't for the children, I wouldn't let her come within
ten miles of my estate. . . . She has got a nose like a hawk's . . . and
her figure! That doll makes me think of a long nail, so I could take
her, and knock her into the ground, you know. Stay, I believe I have got
a bite. . . ."
Gryabov jumped up and raised his rod. The line drew taut. . . . Gryabov
tugged again, but could not pull out the hook.
"It has caught," he said, frowning, "on a stone I expect . . . damnation
take it . . . ."
There was a look of distress on Gryabov's face. Sighing, moving
uneasily, and muttering oaths, he began tugging at the line.
"What a pity; I shall have to go into the water."
"Oh, chuck it!"
"I can't. . . . There's always good fishing in the evening. . . . What a
nuisance. Lord, forgive us, I shall have to wade into the water, I must!
And if only you knew, I have no inclination to undress. I shall have to
get rid of the Englishwoman. . . . It's awkward to undress before her.
After all, she is a lady, you know!"
Gryabov flung off his hat, and his cravat.
"Meess . . . er, er . . ." he said, addressing the Englishwoman, "Meess
Fyce, je voo pree . . . ? Well, what am I to say to her? How am I to
tell you so that you can understand? I say . . . over there! Go away
over there! Do you hear?"
Miss Fyce enveloped Gryabov in disdain, and uttered a nasal sound.
"What? Don't you understand? Go away from here, I tell you! I must
undress, you devil's doll! Go over there! Over there!"
Gryabov pulled the lady by her sleeve, pointed her towards the bushes,
and made as though he would sit down, as much as to say: Go behind the
bushes and hide yourself there. . . . The Englishwoman, moving her
eyebrows vigorously, uttered rapidly a long sentence in English. The
gentlemen gushed with laughter.
"It's the first time in my life I've heard her voice. There's no
denying, it is a voice! She does not understand! Well, what am I to do
with her?"
"Chuck it, let's go and have a drink of vodka!"
"I can't. Now's the time to fish, the evening. . . . It's evening . . .
. Come, what would you have me do? It is a nuisance! I shall have to
undress before her. . . ."
Gryabov flung off his coat and his waistcoat and sat on the sand to take
off his boots.
"I say, Ivan Kuzmitch," said the marshal, chuckling behind his hand.
"It's really outrageous, an insult."
"Nobody asks her not to understand! It's a lesson for these foreigners!"
Gryabov took off his boots and his trousers, flung off his undergarments
and remained in the costume of Adam. Otsov held his sides, he turned
crimson both from laughter and embarrassment. The Englishwoman twitched
her brows and blinked . . . . A haughty, disdainful smile passed over
her yellow face.
"I must cool off," said Gryabov, slapping himself on the ribs. "Tell me
if you please, Fyodor Andreitch, why I have a rash on my chest every
summer."
"Oh, do get into the water quickly or cover yourself with something, you
beast."
"And if only she were confused, the nasty thing," said Gryabov, crossing
himself as he waded into the water. "Brrrr . . . the water's cold. . . .
Look how she moves her eyebrows! She doesn't go away . . . she is far
above the crowd! He, he, he . . . . and she doesn't reckon us as human
beings."
Wading knee deep in the water and drawing his huge figure up to its full
height, he gave a wink and said:
"This isn't England, you see!"
Miss Fyce coolly put on another worm, gave a yawn, and dropped the hook
in. Otsov turned away, Gryabov released his hook, ducked into the water
and, spluttering, waded out. Two minutes later he was sitting on the
sand and angling as before.
CHORISTERS
THE Justice of the Peace, who had received a letter from Petersburg, had
set the news going that the owner of Yefremovo, Count Vladimir
Ivanovitch, would soon be arriving. When he would arrive--there was no
saying.
"Like a thief in the night," said Father Kuzma, a grey-headed little
priest in a lilac cassock. "And when he does come the place will be
crowded with the nobility and other high gentry. All the neighbours will
flock here. Mind now, do your best, Alexey Alexeitch. . . . I beg you
most earnestly."
"You need not trouble about me," said Alexey Alexeitch, frowning. "I
know my business. If only my enemy intones the litany in the right key.
He may . . . out of sheer spite. . . ."
"There, there. . . . I'll persuade the deacon. . . I'll persuade him."
Alexey Alexeitch was the sacristan of the Yefremovo church. He also
taught the schoolboys church and secular singing, for which he received
sixty roubles a year from the revenues of the Count's estate. The
schoolboys were bound to sing in church in return for their teaching.
Alexey Alexeitch was a tall, thick-set man of dignified deportment, with
a fat, clean-shaven face that reminded one of a cow's udder. His
imposing figure and double chin made him look like a man occupying an
important position in the secular hierarchy rather than a sacristan. It
was strange to see him, so dignified and imposing, flop to the ground
before the bishop and, on one occasion, after too loud a squabble with
the deacon Yevlampy Avdiessov, remain on his knees for two hours by
order of the head priest of the district. Grandeur was more in keeping
with his figure than humiliation.