II

That day, a Saturday, the frost was so severe that the boys did not go

to school, and the horse-races were postponed for fear of the horses

catching cold. When Natalya Vladimirovna came out from the lying-in

hospital, she was for the first moment glad that it was evening, that

there was no one on the embankment, that none met her—an unmarried

girl, with a six-day-old child in her arms. It had seemed to her that,

as soon as she should cross the threshold, she would be met by a

shouting, hissing crowd, among whom would be her senile, paralytic, and

almost blind father, her acquaintances, students, officers and their

young ladies; and that all these would point the finger at her and cry:

“There goes a girl who has passed through six classes at the

high-school, had acquaintances among the students both intellectual and

of good birth, who used to blush at a word spoken unadvisedly, and who

six days ago gave birth to a child, in the lying-in hospital, side by

side with other fallen women.”

But the embankment was deserted. Along it the icy wind traveled

unrestrained, lifted a grey cloud of snow, ground by the frost into a

biting dust, and covered with it everything living and dead which met

it in its path. With a gentle whistle it wove itself round the metal

pillars of the railings, so that they shone again, and looked so cold

and lonely that it was a pain to look at them. And the girl felt

herself to be just such a cold thing, an outcast from mankind and life.

She had on a little short jacket, the one which she usually wore

skating, and which she had hurriedly thrown on when she left her home

suffering the premonitory pains of childbirth. And when the wind seized

her, and wrapped her thin skirt about her ankles, and chilled her head,

she began to fear that she might be frozen to death; and her fear of a

crowd disappeared, and the world expanded into a boundless icy

wilderness, in which was neither man, nor light, nor warmth. Two

burning tear-drops gathered in her eyes, and froze there. Bending her

head down, she wiped them away with the formless bundle she was

carrying, and went on faster. Now she no longer loved herself nor the

child, and both lives seemed to her worthless; only certain words,

which had, as it were, sunk into her brain, persistently repeated

themselves, and went before her calling:

“Nyemchinovskaya Street, the second house from the corner.

Nyemchinovskaya Street, the second house from the corner.”

These words she had repeated for six days as she lay on the bed and fed

her infant. They meant, that she must go to Nyemchinovskaya Street,

where her foster-sister, an unfortunate, lived, because only with her

could she find an asylum for herself and her child. A year ago, when

all was still well and she was continually laughing and singing, she

had visited Katya, who was ill, and had helped her with money, and now

she was the only human being remaining before whom she was not ashamed.

“Nyemchinovskaya Street, the second house from the corner.

Nyemchinovskaya Street, the second house from the corner.”

She walked on, and the wind whirled angrily round her; and when she

came upon the bridge it greedily dashed at her bosom, and dug its iron

nails into her cold face. Vanquished, it dropped noisily from the

bridge, and circled along the snow-covered surface of the river, and

again swept upwards, overshadowing the road with cold, trembling wings.

Natalya Vladimirovna stood still, and in utter weakness leaned against

the rail. From the depth below there looked up at her a dull black

eye—a spot of unfrozen water—and its gaze was mysterious and terrible.

But before her resounded and called persistently the words:

“Nyemchinovskaya Street, the second house from the corner.

Nyemchinovskaya Street, the second house from the corner.”

Khinyakov dressed, and lay down again on his bed rolled to the very

eyes in a warm overcoat, his sole remaining possession. The room was

cold, there was ice in the corners, but he breathed into the astrakhan

collar, and so became warm and comfortable. The whole long day he kept

deceiving himself, that to-morrow he would go and seek work, and ask

for something; but meanwhile he was content not to think at all, but

merely to tremble at the sound of a raised voice the other side of the

wall, or at the sound of a sharply slammed door. He had lain long in

this way, perfectly still, when at the entrance door he heard an uneven

rapping, timid, and yet hurried and sharp, as if some one was knocking

with the back of the hand. His room was the one next to the entrance

door, and by craning his head and pricking up his ears he could

distinguish everything which took place near it. Matryona went to the

door and opened it, let some one in and closed it again. Then followed

an expectant silence.

“Whom do you want?” asked Matryona in a hoarse, unfriendly tone. A

stranger’s voice, gentle and broken, bashfully replied:

“I want Katya Nyechayeva. She lives here?”

“She did. But what do you want with her?”

“I want her very badly. Is she not at home?” and in her voice there was

a note of fear.

“Katya is dead. She died, I say—in the hospital.”

Again there was a long silence, so long indeed that Khinyakov felt a

pain at his back; but he did not dare to move it, while the people

there kept silence.

Then the stranger’s voice pronounced gently and without expression, the

one word:

“Good-bye!”

But evidently she did not go away, since in the course of a minute

Matryona asked: “What have you there? Have you brought something for

Katya?”

Some one knelt down, striking her knees on the floor, and the

stranger’s voice, convulsed with suppressed sobs, uttered quickly the

words:

“Take it, take it! For the love of God, take it! And then I—I’ll go

away.”

“But what is it?”

Again there was a long silence, and then a gentle weeping, broken, and

hopeless. There was in it a deadly weariness, and a black despair,

without a single gleam of hope. It was as though a hand had impotently

drawn the bow across the over-tightened, the last remaining, string of

an expensive instrument, and when the string snapped the soft wailing

note had been silenced for ever.

“Why, you have nearly smothered it!” exclaimed Matryona in a rough,

angry tone. “You see what sort of people undertake to bear children.

How could you do it? Whoever would wrap up babies like that? Come now,

come along; do, I say. How could you do such a thing?”

Once more all was silent near the door.

Khinyakov listened a little longer and then lay down, delighted that no

one had come to fetch him, and not taking the trouble to guess the

truth about what he had not understood in that which had just taken

place. He began already to feel the approach of night, and wished that

some one would turn the lamp up higher. He became restless, and,

clenching his teeth, he endeavoured to restrain his thoughts. In the

past there was nothing but mire, falls, and horror, and—there was the

same horror in the future. He was just beginning by degrees to snuggle

himself together, and draw up his hands and feet, when Dunyasha came

in, dressed to go out in a red blouse, and already slightly

intoxicated. She plopped down on the bed, and said with a gesture of

surprise:

“Oh Lord!” She shook her head and smiled. “They have brought a little

baby here. Such a tiny one, my friend, but he shouts just like a

police-inspector. Just like a police-inspector!”

She swore whimsically, and coquettishly flipped Khinyakov”s nose.

“Let’s go and see. Why not, indeed! Yes, we’ll just take a look at him.

Matryona is going to bathe it; she is boiling the samovar. Abram

Petrovich is blowing up the charcoal with his boot. How funny it all

is. And the baby is crying: “Wa, wa, wa!””

Dunyasha made a face which she meant to represent the baby, and again

went on puling: ““Wa, wa, wa!” Just like a police-inspector! Let’s go.

Don’t you want to?—well, then devil take you! Turn up your toes where

you are, rotten egg, you!”

And she danced out of the room. But half an hour after Khinyakov,

tottering on his weak legs and hanging on to the doorposts,

hesitatingly opened the door of the kitchen.

“Shut it! You’ve made a draught,” cried Abram Petrovich.

Khinyakov hastily slammed the door behind him, and looked round

apologetically; but no one took any notice of him, so he calmed down.

The combined heat of the stove, the urn, and the company made the

kitchen pretty warm, and the vapour rose, and then rolled down the

colder walls in thick drops. Matryona with a severe and irritated mien

was washing the child in a trough, and with pock-marked hands was

splashing the water over him, while she crooned:

“Little lambkin, then, it s’all be clean. It s’all be white.”

Whether it was because the kitchen was light and cheerful, or because

the water was warm and caressing, at all events the child was quiet,

and wrinkled up its little red face as though about to sneeze. Dunyasha

looked at the tub over Matryona’s shoulder, and seizing her

opportunity, splashed the little one with three fingers.

“Get away!” the old woman cried in a threatening tone, “where are you

coming to? I know what to do without your help. I have had children of

my own.”

“Don’t meddle. She’s quite right, children are such tender things,”

said Abram Petrovich, in support of her; “they want some handling.”

He sat down on the table, and with condescending satisfaction

contemplated the little rosy body. The baby wriggled its fingers, and

Dunyasha with wild delight wagged her head and laughed.

“Just like a police-inspector!”

“But have you seen a police-inspector in a trough?” asked Abram

Petrovich.

All laughed, and even Khinyakov smiled; but almost immediately the

smile left his face affright, and he looked round at the mother. She

was sitting wearily on the bench, with her head thrown back, and her

black eyes, abnormally large from sickness and suffering, lighted up

with a peaceful gleam, and on her pale lips hovered the proud smile of

a mother. And when he saw this Khinyakov burst into a solitary, belated

laugh:

“He! he! he!”

He even looked proudly round on all sides. Matryona took the baby out

of the tub, and wrapped it in a bath-sheet. The child burst into loud

crying, but was soon quieted again, and Matryona, unrolling the sheet,

smiled in confusion, and said:

“What a dear little body, just like velvet.”

“Let me feel,” entreated Dunyasha.

“What next!”

Dunyasha began suddenly to tremble all over, and stamped her feet;

choking with longing, and mad with the desire, which overwhelmed her,

she cried in such a shrill voice as none had ever heard from her:

“Let me! let me!”

“Yes, let her,” entreated Natalya Vladimirovna in a fright. And

Dunyasha just as suddenly became quiet again. She cautiously touched

the child’s little shoulder with two fingers, and following her

example, Abram Petrovich, with a condescending wink, also reached out

to that little red shoulder.

“Yes, indeed, children are tender things,” said he in

self-justification.

Last of all Khinyakov tried it. His fingers felt for a moment the touch

of something living, downy like velvet, and withal so tender and feeble

that his fingers seemed no longer to belong to him, and became as

tender as the something he touched. And thus, craning their necks, and

unconsciously lighting up into a smile of strange happiness, stood the

three, the thief, the prostitute, and the lonely broken man, and that

little life, feeble as a distant light on the steppe, was vaguely

calling them somewhither, and promising them something beautiful,

bright, immortal. And the happy mother looked proudly on, while above

the low ceiling the house rose in a heavy mass of stone, and in the

upper flats the rich sauntered about, and yawned with ennui.

Night had come on, black, malign, as all nights are, and had pitched

her tent in darkness over the distant snowy fields; and the lonely

branches of trees became chilled with fear, just those branches which

first welcomed the morning sun. With feeble artificial light man fought

against her, but strong and malign she girded the isolated lights in a

hopeless circle, and filled the hearts of men with darkness. And in

many a heart she extinguished the feeble flickering sparks.

Khinyakov did not sleep. Huddled up together into a little ball, he hid

himself under a soft heap of rags from the cold and from the night, and

wept, without effort, without pain or convulsion, as those weep whose

heart is pure and without sin, as the heart of a little child. He

pitied himself huddled up into a heap, and it seemed to him that he

pitied all mankind and the whole of human life, and in this feeling

there was a secret, profound gladness. He saw the child, just born, and

it seemed to him that he himself was reborn to a new life, and would

live long, and that his life would be beautiful. He loved and yet

pitied this new life, and he felt so happy, that he laughed so that he

shook the heap of rags, and then asked himself:

“Why am I weeping?”

But he could not discover the answer to his own question, and so

replied:

“So!”

And such a profound thought was conveyed by this short word, that this

wreck of a man, whose life was so pitiable and lonely, was convulsed

with a fresh burst of scalding tears.

But at his bedside rapacious death was noiselessly taking its seat, and

waiting—quietly, patiently, persistently.