One long winter night Kovrin was lying in bed, reading a French novel.
Poor Tanya, who had headaches in the evenings from living in town, to
which she was not accustomed, had been asleep a long while, and, from
time to time, articulated some incoherent phrase in her restless dreams.
It struck three o'clock. Kovrin put out the light and lay down to sleep,
lay for a long time with his eyes closed, but could not get to sleep
because, as he fancied, the room was very hot and Tanya talked in her
sleep. At half-past four he lighted the candle again, and this time he
saw the black monk sitting in an arm-chair near the bed.
"Good-morning," said the monk, and after a brief pause he asked: "What
are you thinking of now?"
"Of fame," answered Kovrin. "In the French novel I have just been
reading, there is a description of a young _savant_, who does silly
things and pines away through worrying about fame. I can't understand
such anxiety."
"Because you are wise. Your attitude towards fame is one of
indifference, as towards a toy which no longer interests you."
"Yes, that is true."
"Renown does not allure you now. What is there flattering, amusing, or
edifying in their carving your name on a tombstone, then time rubbing
off the inscription together with the gilding? Moreover, happily there
are too many of you for the weak memory of mankind to be able to retain
your names."
"Of course," assented Kovrin. "Besides, why should they be remembered?
But let us talk of something else. Of happiness, for instance. What is
happiness?"
When the clock struck five, he was sitting on the bed, dangling his feet
to the carpet, talking to the monk:
"In ancient times a happy man grew at last frightened of his happiness
--it was so great!--and to propitiate the gods he brought as a sacrifice
his favourite ring. Do you know, I, too, like Polykrates, begin to be
uneasy of my happiness. It seems strange to me that from morning to
night I feel nothing but joy; it fills my whole being and smothers all
other feelings. I don't know what sadness, grief, or boredom is. Here I
am not asleep; I suffer from sleeplessness, but I am not dull. I say it
in earnest; I begin to feel perplexed."
"But why?" the monk asked in wonder. "Is joy a supernatural feeling?
Ought it not to be the normal state of man? The more highly a man is
developed on the intellectual and moral side, the more independent he
is, the more pleasure life gives him. Socrates, Diogenes, and Marcus
Aurelius, were joyful, not sorrowful. And the Apostle tells us: 'Rejoice
continually'; 'Rejoice and be glad.'"
"But will the gods be suddenly wrathful?" Kovrin jested; and he laughed.
"If they take from me comfort and make me go cold and hungry, it won't
be very much to my taste."
Meanwhile Tanya woke up and looked with amazement and horror at her
husband. He was talking, addressing the arm-chair, laughing and
gesticulating; his eyes were gleaming, and there was something strange
in his laugh.
"Andryusha, whom are you talking to?" she asked, clutching the hand he
stretched out to the monk. "Andryusha! Whom?"
"Oh! Whom?" said Kovrin in confusion. "Why, to him.... He is sitting
here," he said, pointing to the black monk.
"There is no one here ... no one! Andryusha, you are ill!"
Tanya put her arm round her husband and held him tight, as though
protecting him from the apparition, and put her hand over his eyes.
"You are ill!" she sobbed, trembling all over. "Forgive me, my precious,
my dear one, but I have noticed for a long time that your mind is
clouded in some way.... You are mentally ill, Andryusha...."
Her trembling infected him, too. He glanced once more at the arm-chair,
which was now empty, felt a sudden weakness in his arms and legs, was
frightened, and began dressing.
"It's nothing, Tanya; it's nothing," he muttered, shivering. "I really
am not quite well ... it's time to admit that."
"I have noticed it for a long time ... and father has noticed it," she
said, trying to suppress her sobs. "You talk to yourself, smile somehow
strangely ... and can't sleep. Oh, my God, my God, save us!" she said in
terror. "But don't be frightened, Andryusha; for God's sake don't be
frightened...."
She began dressing, too. Only now, looking at her, Kovrin realised the
danger of his position--realised the meaning of the black monk and his
conversations with him. It was clear to him now that he was mad.
Neither of them knew why they dressed and went into the dining-room: she
in front and he following her. There they found Yegor Semyonitch
standing in his dressing-gown and with a candle in his hand. He was
staying with them, and had been awakened by Tanya's sobs.
"Don't be frightened, Andryusha," Tanya was saying, shivering as though
in a fever; "don't be frightened.... Father, it will all pass over ...
it will all pass over...."
Kovrin was too much agitated to speak. He wanted to say to his
father-in-law in a playful tone: "Congratulate me; it appears I have
gone out of my mind"; but he could only move his lips and smile
bitterly.
At nine o'clock in the morning they put on his jacket and fur coat,
wrapped him up in a shawl, and took him in a carriage to a doctor.