The ship was not rocking and Pavel Ivanitch was more cheerful. He was
no longer ill-humoured. His face had a boastful, defiant, mocking
expression. He looked as though he wanted to say: “Yes, in a minute
I will tell you something that will make you split your sides with
laughing.” The little round window was open and a soft breeze was
blowing on Pavel Ivanitch. There was a sound of voices, of the plash of
oars in the water.... Just under the little window someone began droning
in a high, unpleasant voice: no doubt it was a Chinaman singing.
“Here we are in the harbour,” said Pavel Ivanitch, smiling ironically.
“Only another month and we shall be in Russia. Well, worthy gentlemen
and warriors! I shall arrive at Odessa and from there go straight to
Harkov. In Harkov I have a friend, a literary man. I shall go to him and
say, ‘Come, old man, put aside your horrid subjects, ladies’ amours and
the beauties of nature, and show up human depravity.’”
For a minute he pondered, then said:
“Gusev, do you know how I took them in?”
“Took in whom, Pavel Ivanitch?”
“Why, these fellows.... You know that on this steamer there is only a
first-class and a third-class, and they only allow peasants--that is the
rift-raft--to go in the third. If you have got on a reefer jacket and
have the faintest resemblance to a gentleman or a bourgeois you must go
first-class, if you please. You must fork out five hundred roubles if
you die for it. Why, I ask, have you made such a rule? Do you want to
raise the prestige of educated Russians thereby? Not a bit of it. We
don’t let you go third-class simply because a decent person can’t go
third-class; it is very horrible and disgusting. Yes, indeed. I am very
grateful for such solicitude for decent people’s welfare. But in any
case, whether it is nasty there or nice, five hundred roubles I haven’t
got. I haven’t pilfered government money. I haven’t exploited the
natives, I haven’t trafficked in contraband, I have flogged no one to
death, so judge whether I have the right to travel first-class and even
less to reckon myself of the educated class? But you won’t catch them
with logic.... One has to resort to deception. I put on a workman’s coat
and high boots, I assumed a drunken, servile mug and went to the agents:
‘Give us a little ticket, your honour,’ said I....”
“Why, what class do you belong to?” asked a sailor.
“Clerical. My father was an honest priest, he always told the great ones
of the world the truth to their faces; and he had a great deal to put up
with in consequence.”
Pavel Ivanitch was exhausted with talking and gasped for breath, but
still went on:
“Yes, I always tell people the truth to their faces. I am not afraid of
anyone or anything. There is a vast difference between me and all of you
in that respect. You are in darkness, you are blind, crushed; you see
nothing and what you do see you don’t understand.... You are told the
wind breaks loose from its chain, that you are beasts, Petchenyegs, and
you believe it; they punch you in the neck, you kiss their hands; some
animal in a sable-lined coat robs you and then tips you fifteen
kopecks and you: ‘Let me kiss your hand, sir.’ You are pariahs, pitiful
people.... I am a different sort. My eyes are open, I see it all as
clearly as a hawk or an eagle when it floats over the earth, and I
understand it all. I am a living protest. I see irresponsible tyranny--I
protest. I see cant and hypocrisy--I protest. I see swine triumphant--I
protest. And I cannot be suppressed, no Spanish Inquisition can make
me hold my tongue. No.... Cut out my tongue and I would protest in dumb
show; shut me up in a cellar--I will shout from it to be heard half a
mile away, or I will starve myself to death that they may have another
weight on their black consciences. Kill me and I will haunt them with
my ghost. All my acquaintances say to me: ‘You are a most insufferable
person, Pavel Ivanitch.’ I am proud of such a reputation. I have served
three years in the far East, and I shall be remembered there for a
hundred years: I had rows with everyone. My friends write to me from
Russia, ‘Don’t come back,’ but here I am going back to spite them...
yes.... That is life as I understand it. That is what one can call
life.”
Gusev was looking at the little window and was not listening. A boat
was swaying on the transparent, soft, turquoise water all bathed in hot,
dazzling sunshine. In it there were naked Chinamen holding up cages with
canaries and calling out:
“It sings, it sings!”
Another boat knocked against the first; the steam cutter darted by. And
then there came another boat with a fat Chinaman sitting in it, eating
rice with little sticks.
Languidly the water heaved, languidly the white seagulls floated over
it.
“I should like to give that fat fellow one in the neck,” thought Gusev,
gazing at the stout Chinaman, with a yawn.
He dozed off, and it seemed to him that all nature was dozing, too.
Time flew swiftly by; imperceptibly the day passed, imperceptibly the
darkness came on.... The steamer was no longer standing still, but
moving on further.