The first outline visible in the darkness was a blue circle--the
little round window; then little by little Gusev could distinguish his
neighbour in the next hammock, Pavel Ivanitch. The man slept sitting up,
as he could not breathe lying down. His face was grey, his nose was long
and sharp, his eyes looked huge from the terrible thinness of his face,
his temples were sunken, his beard was skimpy, his hair was long....
Looking at him you could not make out of what class he was, whether he
were a gentleman, a merchant, or a peasant. Judging from his expression
and his long hair he might have been a hermit or a lay brother in a
monastery--but if one listened to what he said it seemed that he could
not be a monk. He was worn out by his cough and his illness and by the
stifling heat, and breathed with difficulty, moving his parched lips.
Noticing that Gusev was looking at him he turned his face towards him
and said:
“I begin to guess.... Yes.... I understand it all perfectly now.”
“What do you understand, Pavel Ivanitch?”
“I’ll tell you.... It has always seemed to me strange that terribly
ill as you are you should be here in a steamer where it is so hot and
stifling and we are always being tossed up and down, where, in fact,
everything threatens you with death; now it is all clear to me....
Yes.... Your doctors put you on the steamer to get rid of you. They
get sick of looking after poor brutes like you.... You don’t pay them
anything, they have a bother with you, and you damage their records with
your deaths--so, of course, you are brutes! It’s not difficult to get
rid of you.... All that is necessary is, in the first place, to have
no conscience or humanity, and, secondly, to deceive the steamer
authorities. The first condition need hardly be considered, in that
respect we are artists; and one can always succeed in the second with a
little practice. In a crowd of four hundred healthy soldiers and sailors
half a dozen sick ones are not conspicuous; well, they drove you all on
to the steamer, mixed you with the healthy ones, hurriedly counted
you over, and in the confusion nothing amiss was noticed, and when the
steamer had started they saw that there were paralytics and consumptives
in the last stage lying about on the deck....”
Gusev did not understand Pavel Ivanitch; but supposing he was being
blamed, he said in self-defence:
“I lay on the deck because I had not the strength to stand; when we were
unloaded from the barge on to the ship I caught a fearful chill.”
“It’s revolting,” Pavel Ivanitch went on. “The worst of it is they know
perfectly well that you can’t last out the long journey, and yet they
put you here. Supposing you get as far as the Indian Ocean, what then?
It’s horrible to think of it.... And that’s their gratitude for your
faithful, irreproachable service!”
Pavel Ivanitch’s eyes looked angry; he frowned contemptuously and said,
gasping:
“Those are the people who ought to be plucked in the newspapers till the
feathers fly in all directions.”
The two sick soldiers and the sailor were awake and already playing
cards. The sailor was half reclining in his hammock, the soldiers were
sitting near him on the floor in the most uncomfortable attitudes. One
of the soldiers had his right arm in a sling, and the hand was swathed
up in a regular bundle so that he held his cards under his right arm or
in the crook of his elbow while he played with the left. The ship was
rolling heavily. They could not stand up, nor drink tea, nor take their
medicines.
“Were you an officer’s servant?” Pavel Ivanitch asked Gusev.
“Yes, an officer’s servant.”
“My God, my God!” said Pavel Ivanitch, and he shook his head mournfully.
“To tear a man out of his home, drag him twelve thousand miles away,
then to drive him into consumption and... and what is it all for,
one wonders? To turn him into a servant for some Captain Kopeikin or
midshipman Dirka! How logical!”
“It’s not hard work, Pavel Ivanitch. You get up in the morning and clean
the boots, get the samovar, sweep the rooms, and then you have nothing
more to do. The lieutenant is all the day drawing plans, and if you like
you can say your prayers, if you like you can read a book or go out into
the street. God grant everyone such a life.”
“Yes, very nice, the lieutenant draws plans all the day and you sit in
the kitchen and pine for home.... Plans indeed!... It is not plans that
matter, but a human life. Life is not given twice, it must be treated
mercifully.”
“Of course, Pavel Ivanitch, a bad man gets no mercy anywhere, neither at
home nor in the army, but if you live as you ought and obey orders, who
has any need to insult you? The officers are educated gentlemen, they
understand.... In five years I was never once in prison, and I was never
struck a blow, so help me God, but once.”
“What for?”
“For fighting. I have a heavy hand, Pavel Ivanitch. Four Chinamen
came into our yard; they were bringing firewood or something, I don’t
remember. Well, I was bored and I knocked them about a bit, one’s nose
began bleeding, damn the fellow.... The lieutenant saw it through the
little window, he was angry and gave me a box on the ear.”
“Foolish, pitiful man...” whispered Pavel Ivanitch. “You don’t
understand anything.”
He was utterly exhausted by the tossing of the ship and closed his
eyes; his head alternately fell back and dropped forward on his
breast. Several times he tried to lie down but nothing came of it; his
difficulty in breathing prevented it.
“And what did you hit the four Chinamen for?” he asked a little while
afterwards.
“Oh, nothing. They came into the yard and I hit them.”
And a stillness followed.... The card-players had been playing for two
hours with enthusiasm and loud abuse of one another, but the motion of
the ship overcame them, too; they threw aside the cards and lay down.
Again Gusev saw the big pond, the brick building, the village.... Again
the sledge was coming along, again Vanka was laughing and Akulka, silly
little thing, threw open her fur coat and stuck her feet out, as much as
to say: “Look, good people, my snowboots are not like Vanka’s, they are
new ones.”
“Five years old, and she has no sense yet,” Gusev muttered in delirium.
“Instead of kicking your legs you had better come and get your soldier
uncle a drink. I will give you something nice.”
Then Andron with a flintlock gun on his shoulder was carrying a hare he
had killed, and he was followed by the decrepit old Jew Isaitchik, who
offers to barter the hare for a piece of soap; then the black calf in
the shed, then Domna sewing at a shirt and crying about something, and
then again the bull’s head without eyes, black smoke....
Overhead someone gave a loud shout, several sailors ran by, they seemed
to be dragging something bulky over the deck, something fell with a
crash. Again they ran by.... Had something gone wrong? Gusev raised
his head, listened, and saw that the two soldiers and the sailor were
playing cards again; Pavel Ivanitch was sitting up moving his lips. It
was stifling, one hadn’t strength to breathe, one was thirsty, the water
was warm, disgusting. The ship heaved as much as ever.
Suddenly something strange happened to one of the soldiers playing
cards.... He called hearts diamonds, got muddled in his score, and
dropped his cards, then with a frightened, foolish smile looked round at
all of them.
“I shan’t be a minute, mates, I’ll...” he said, and lay down on the
floor.
Everybody was amazed. They called to him, he did not answer.
“Stephan, maybe you are feeling bad, eh?” the soldier with his arm in a
sling asked him. “Perhaps we had better bring the priest, eh?”
“Have a drink of water, Stepan...” said the sailor. “Here, lad, drink.”
“Why are you knocking the jug against his teeth?” said Gusev angrily.
“Don’t you see, turnip head?”
“What?”
“What?” Gusev repeated, mimicking him. “There is no breath in him, he is
dead! That’s what! What nonsensical people, Lord have mercy on us...!”