My nearest neighbor was sleeping contentedly, letting me stretch out as I
could. Opposite me one passenger was lying down and another was sitting
by the window. They kept on with the conversation they had already
commenced.
“Let’s imagine,” said the one who was lying down, “that I am a man who
is not superstitious.... But yet” (he yawned pleasantly and slowly) “it
cannot be denied that there is much, so to speak, unknown,—isn’t that
so?... Let’s suppose, the peasants ... country naïvete and superstition.
But take a paper....”
“Well, a paper. Superstition is for peasants, but this is for the papers.
A peasant, simple fellow, sees a primitive devil with horns and breathing
fire. He’s frightened.... A reporter sees a figure from the ballet....”
The gentleman who admitted that there was “much unknown” yawned again.
“Yes,” he said with a somewhat scientific air, “that is true; fears
disappear with the development of culture and education....”
His companion did not reply, but later said thoughtfully:
“Disappear?... Do you remember in Tolstoy: Anna Karenina and Vronsky have
the identical dream: a peasant, an ordinary laborer ‘works in steel’ and
speaks French.... Both wake up in terror.... What’s so terrible there?
Of course, it’s a little strange for a peasant to speak French. But,
granted.... Nevertheless, in a given combination of circumstances, a
picture which is not frightful will terrify you.... Take the Brothers
Karamazov of Dostoyevsky.... We’ve got there an urban devil.... You
remember, of course....”
“No, I don’t.... You know, Pavel Semenovich, I’m an instructor of
mathematics....”
“Oh, excuse me.... I thought.... Yes, I remember: he was a certain man,
or, better yet, a certain type of Russian gentleman, quite well along
in years, with his hair and pointed beard rather gray.... His linen and
necktie, you know, were like those of any other stylish gentleman, but
his linen was rather dirty and his necktie frayed. To sum up, ‘He looked
like a man of taste with slender financial resources....’”
“That’s a fine devil! A mere sharper, and they’re common enough,”
remarked the mathematician.
“Yes, I know there’s a lot of them.... But it’s frightful and it’s that,
just because it’s so common; that same poor necktie, linen, and coat....
If it were only frayed, it would be like yours or mine....”
“All right, Pavel Semenovich.... Excuse me, but you have a strange
philosophy.”
The mathematician seemed rather insulted. Pavel Semenovich turned towards
the light, and I had a good view of his broad face, straight brows and
gray, thoughtful eyes hidden under his stern forehead.
Both paused. For a little while you could hear only the hurried roar of
the train. Then Pavel Semenovich began again in his even voice.
“At the station of N-sk I happened, you know, to walk up toward the
engine. I’m a little acquainted with the engineer.... A chronically
sleepy individual with swollen eyes.”
“Yes?” asked his companion indifferently, and not trying to conceal his
feelings.
“Certainly.... A natural condition. He hadn’t slept for thirty-six hours.”
“M-n, yes.... That is a long while.”
“I thought so too: we fall asleep.... The train is flying at full
speed.... And it’s run by a man who is almost stupefied....”
His companion fidgeted a little.
“What an idea!... Really, damnation.... You should have told the chief of
the station....”
“What for?... He’d laugh! A common thing. You might almost call it the
system. In Petersburg there’s a gentleman sitting in some office.... He’s
got a board in front of him with numbers on it. Arrival.... Departure....
And the engineers are listed too.... Pay—so much. Versts—so many.
Versts—that’s the length of the run,—a useful number, profitable, steady,
that can be increased. The pay for the men is minus.... And this fellow
just cracks his head, thinking how to run the largest number of miles on
the smallest number of engineers. Or even make the distance larger than
ever.... It’s a sort of silent game with numbers, so to speak.... And a
most ordinary chap bothers with it.... He wears a poor coat and necktie,
and he looks respectable.... A good friend and a fine husband.... He
loves his child and gives presents to his wife on holidays.... His job
is harmless, and he merely decides simple questions. The result is that
sleep kills people.... And across the fields and through the ravines of
our beloved country on such moonlight nights as this trains tear along
like this, and the watch is kept by the sleepy, swollen eyes of the man
who is responsible for hundreds of lives.... A moment’s slumber....”
The legs of the mathematician in their checkered trousers stirred: he
got up from his seat in the shadow and sat down on a bench.... His fat,
expressionless face, with its thick, clipped mustache, made you uneasy.
“Stop your croaking, for heaven’s sake,” he said angrily. “However you
argue, the result is the same, devil take it.... I wanted to fall
asleep....”
Pavel Semenovich looked at him in surprise.
“What’s the matter?” he said. “Are you crazy? We’ll get there all right,
if God wills. I merely want to point out how the terrible and the usual
are combined.... Economy is the most ordinary idea of life.... But
sometimes it involves death.... It is even measurable by the law of
probability....”
The mathematician, still more angry, took out his cigar case and said, as
he began to smoke:
“No, you’re right: the devil knows: the rascal’ll fall asleep, and all
at once.... These beasts of railroad men.... O, let’s talk of something
else. The devil take these fears.... Are you still vegetating in
Tikhodol?... You’ve stuck there a long time....”
“Yes,” answered Pavel Semenovich, a little embarrassed. “It’s such
a wretched place. It’s just like living in a yoke.... A teacher,
prosecutor, excise official.... When you once land there, you’re
forgotten, and removed from the lists of the living....”
“Yes.... It is an awful place.... It’s deadening.... Why, there’s not
even a club there. And the mud is unendurable.”
“There’s a club now, at least that’s what we call it.... And there are a
few stretches of pavement.... Lighting, especially in the centre of the
town.... But, I’ll confess, I live on the edge, and don’t make much use
of these conveniences.”
“Where do you live?”
“With Budnikov, in the suburbs.”
“Budnikov? Semen Nikolayevich? Just think, I lived in that section
myself: with Father Polidorov.... Of course, I met Budnikov! A fine man,
well educated, but rather—filled with ideas?”
“Yes, with a few notions....”
“No, not that.... I said ideas. But notions. What? None special, I think.”
“No, nothing special, but just the same: he used to keep valuable papers
in a mattress....”
“Why, I never knew that. But when I met him he made a queer impression on
me. He was so fresh and original.... A house owner, and all of a sudden
he went to living in two rooms without servants.... No, I remember, he
had a kind of porter....”
“Yes, Gavrilo....”
“That’s right, that’s right. Gavrilo, a little fellow with white
eyebrows? Yes? That’s right.... I remember I liked to look at his
face: such a good-natured snout. I almost thought the master was part
workman.... Who is he? Is he always that way?”
Pavel Semenovich said nothing for a few minutes. He then looked at his
companion with some embarrassment and replied:
“Y-yes, you’re right.... That actually happened.... Semen Nikolayevich
... and Gavrilo.... Both together....”
“Yes, I remember....”
“He was a fine man for our city.... Educated, independent, with ideas....
He went to the university but never finished because of some escapade....
He once spoke of it as if he had made an unfortunate venture into
love. ‘My heart was broken,’ he said. On the other hand I know that he
corresponded with a friend in some outlandish place. That shows there
was something behind it.... His father, he said, was a usurer, but not
a malicious one. This caused a row between father and son. The young
student didn’t approve of it and wouldn’t touch the money, but lived by
teaching.... When the father died, Semen Nikolayevich came and inherited
the property. He said to some one: ‘I don’t want it.... This is owed to
society.’ Then I don’t know what happened.... The house, land, long-term
leases, a lawsuit.... He carried it on one, two, three years, and then
got to like it. Many still remember how he said: ‘I’ll finish the lawsuit
with these curs and settle up.... I won’t stay a day longer in this
confounded hole.’ ... But it’s the usual story.... We had a teacher once,
a zoölogist, who came to our gymnasium and said bluntly: ‘As soon as I
write my dissertation, I’ll get out of the swamp!’”
“That’s Kallistov, isn’t it?” asked the mathematician, with great
interest. The narrator waved assent.
“He’s still writing it. He married; had three children.... That’s just
the way with Semen Nikolayevich Budnikov. He’s been making a dissertation
of his life, so to speak. He began to enjoy this lawsuit. Challenges,
protests, cassation, the whole game.... And he kept writing himself
without consulting lawyers.... Then, after a while, he commenced to build
a new house. When I got to know him, he was already a lucky, middle-aged
bachelor, with a reddish face, and such a pleasant, quiet, substantial
and sleepy voice. Then he had a few peculiarities. He sometimes used to
come to see me, especially when it was time to pay my rent.... This was
due on the twentieth. That meant that on the twentieth he used to come
at eight o’clock in the evening and drink two cups of tea with rum in
it. No more, no less! In each cup two spoonfuls of rum and one of sugar.
I got to look at this as an addition to my rent. He did the same with
all his lodgers,—only some with and some without rum. The rents were
all different, about twenty in his four houses (one in the city was
quite large).... That made forty cups of tea.... He seemed as if he had
included that in his budget and marked it down.... Sometimes, ‘I didn’t
find so and so at home, but he brought the money the next day. Still
owing, two cups of tea.’”
“Really?” laughed Petr Petrovich. “He never reasoned that way! Why do you
think so?”
“For this reason. At first this was an unexpected characteristic, but
it got to be believed, although in your time maybe it didn’t exist. The
tenants began to say: you know M. Budnikov is an economical man. That
was meant well and even as a sign of approval. But it suddenly reacted
on Budnikov.... You understand? The unintelligible man began to develop
a special intelligible trait.... It became clearer and clearer. All
believed, for example, that M. Budnikov kept no servants. Gavrilo was
the porter of the house where I lived; he used to clean the clothes of
the different people, fix the samovars, and run errands. Sometimes the
master and servant used to sit side by side and clean shoes, the porter
for the tenants, Budnikov for himself. Then M. Budnikov got a horse. No
special need for him to do it. As a luxury, he’d ride twice a week to
a farm near the city. The rest of the time the horse was free. Gavrilo
wasn’t busy all the time either.... The result was—the horse was put at
Gavrilo’s disposal, and he used to ride down town. Gavrilo had nothing
against this arrangement, because he considered incessant work his
special duty. You know there’s a sort of talent for everything, and I
thought once that Gavrilo was a kind of genius in the field of muscular
labor.... Easy motioned,—unwearied freshness. Sometimes at night he
wouldn’t sleep. Look out of the window and you’d see Gavrilo sweeping
the street or cleaning the ditches. It meant—he’d gone to bed and then
remembered he hadn’t swept all the pavement the last thing. So he’d go
and clean it. And this was really beautiful.”
“Yes,” said the mathematician, “that’s a good description of the man. I
remember I liked to look at him,—he seemed rather attractive.”
“Spiritual poise is always beautiful, and he did his duty without
speculating about his relation to his master.... And that was a fine
thing, you know,—their mutual relations. One used his muscles admirably.
The other gave reason and rational meaning to it.... He saw that the time
was not all filled ... and he found a new occupation.... There was a sort
of balancing of interests, almost an idyl.... Almost before dawn Gavrilo
was at work. M. Budnikov also got up early. They said good morning with a
manifestly pleasant feeling. Then M. Budnikov either went to work in his
garden or went around his ‘estate’ scattered through the city. Poverty
gets up early, and he went mornings to poverty’s quarters.... Then he’d
come back and say:
“‘Now harness up, Gavrilo, and I’ll finish cleaning up.... The officials
are just going to their offices. You may meet some one....’
“At this time he considered himself neither a Tolstoyan nor a deliberate
simplifier.... He often spoke of the abnormality of our lives, of the
necessity of paying our debt to the laboring man, of the advantages
of physical labor. ‘See, I’m working,’ he’d say to any one who caught
him busied with axe or spade. ‘I’m helping my neighbor, my porter,
with his work.’ It was hard to tell whether he was talking ironically
or seriously.... At noon Gavrilo’d come back and put his horse in the
stable, and M. Budnikov would go of on business and make polite remarks
to his tenants about a broken fence or a piece of plaster knocked down
by children’s balls.... He often came back with one or two beggars. They
had asked him for alms on the street and he’d offered ‘assistance through
toil.’ ... Of course, the rogues ran off shamefully, but M. Budnikov
took especial pleasure in working, either alone or with Gavrilo. All the
beggars in the city soon got to know him and bowed with a friendly smile,
but did not ask for money. ‘Why can’t you see what’s good for you, my
friends?’ he’d say meaningly. I must say that a ‘life of toil’ did bring
him manifest personal benefits; his ruddy color was absolutely evident,
even, and healthy. His face was always quiet and placid, and almost like
Gavrilo’s.... It had nothing malicious or strange in it.”
“I see, you’re back on your old theme!” said the mathematician,
standing up and striking his companion’s shoulder. “Of course, nothing
terrible.... I’m going out here.... Eight minutes’ wait.”
The train slowed down and stopped.