A Desperate Character and Other Stories Read online

  'Who's that?' my grandmother inquired of Filippitch, who was walking on tiptoe behind her.

  'Of whom … you are pleased …' Filippitch stammered.

  'Oh, fool! I mean the one that looked so sullenly at me. There, standing yonder, not working.'

  'Oh, him! Yes … th … th … that's Yermil, son of Pavel Afanasiitch, now deceased.'

  Pavel Afanasiitch had been, ten years before, head butler in my grandmother's house, and stood particularly high in her favour. But suddenly falling into disgrace, he was as suddenly degraded to being herdsman, and did not long keep even that position. He sank lower still, and struggled on for a while on a monthly pittance of flour in a little hut far away. At last he had died of paralysis, leaving his family in the most utter destitution.

  'Aha!' commented my grandmother; 'it's clear the apple's not fallen far from the tree. Well, we shall have to make arrangements about this fellow too. I've no need of people like that, with scowling faces.'

  My grandmother went back to the house—and made arrangements. Three hours later Yermil, completely 'equipped,' was brought under the window of her room. The unfortunate boy was being transported to a settlement; the other side of the fence, a few steps from him, was a little cart loaded with his poor belongings. Such were the times then. Yermil stood without his cap, with downcast head, barefoot, with his boots tied up with a string behind his back; his face, turned towards the seignorial mansion, expressed not despair nor grief, nor even bewilderment; a stupid smile was frozen on his colourless lips; his eyes, dry and half-closed, looked stubbornly on the ground. My grandmother was apprised of his presence. She got up from the sofa, went, with a faint rustle of her silken skirts, to the window of the study, and, holding her golden-rimmed double eyeglass on the bridge of her nose, looked at the new exile. In her room there happened to be at the moment four other persons, the butler, Baburin, the page who waited on my grandmother in the daytime, and I.

  My grandmother nodded her head up and down….

  'Madam,' a hoarse almost stifled voice was heard suddenly. I looked round. Baburin's face was red … dark red; under his overhanging brows could be seen little sharp points of light…. There was no doubt about it; it was he, it was Baburin, who had uttered the word 'Madam.'

  My grandmother too looked round, and turned her eyeglass from Yermil to Baburin.

  'Who is that … speaking?' she articulated slowly … through her nose.

  Baburin moved slightly forward.

  'Madam,' he began, 'it is I…. I venture … I imagine … I make bold to submit to your honour that you are making a mistake in acting as … as you are pleased to act at this moment.'

  'That is?' my grandmother said, in the same voice, not removing her eyeglass.

  'I take the liberty …' Baburin went on distinctly, uttering every word though with obvious effort—'I am referring to the case of this lad who is being sent away to a settlement … for no fault of his. Such arrangements, I venture to submit, lead to dissatisfaction, and to other—which God forbid!—consequences, and are nothing else than a transgression of the powers allowed to seignorial proprietors.'

  'And where have you studied, pray?' my grandmother asked after a short silence, and she dropped her eyeglass.

  Baburin was disconcerted. 'What are you pleased to wish?' he muttered.

  'I ask you: where have you studied? You use such learned words.'

  'I … my education …' Baburin was beginning.

  My grandmother shrugged her shoulders contemptuously. 'It seems,' she interrupted, 'that my arrangements are not to your liking. That is of absolutely no consequence to me—among my subjects I am sovereign, and answerable to no one for them, only I am not accustomed to having people criticising me in my presence, and meddling in what is not their business. I have no need of learned philanthropists of nondescript position; I want servants to do my will without question. So I always lived till you came, and so I shall live after you've gone. You do not suit me; you are discharged. Nikolai Antonov,' my grandmother turned to the steward, 'pay this man off; and let him be gone before dinner-time to-day! D'you hear? Don't put me into a passion. And the other too … the fool that lives with him—to be sent off too. What's Yermilka waiting for?' she added, looking out of window, 'I have seen him. What more does he want?' My grandmother shook her handkerchief in the direction of the window, as though to drive away an importunate fly. Then she sat down in a low chair, and turning towards us, gave the order grimly: 'Everybody present to leave the room!'

  We all withdrew—all, except the day page, to whom my grandmother's words did not apply, because he was nobody.

  My grandmother's decree was carried out to the letter. Before dinner, both Baburin and my friend Punin were driving away from the place. I will not undertake to describe my grief, my genuine, truly childish despair. It was so strong that it stifled even the feeling of awe-stricken admiration inspired by the bold action of the republican Baburin. After the conversation with my grandmother, he went at once to his room and began packing up. He did not vouchsafe me one word, one look, though I was the whole time hanging about him, or rather, in reality, about Punin. The latter was utterly distraught, and he too said nothing; but he was continually glancing at me, and tears stood in his eyes … always the same tears; they neither fell nor dried up. He did not venture to criticise his 'benefactor'—Paramon Semyonitch could not make a mistake,—but great was his distress and dejection. Punin and I made an effort to read something out of the Rossiad for the last time; we even locked ourselves up in the lumber-room—it was useless to dream of going into the garden—but at the very first line we both broke down, and I fairly bellowed like a calf, in spite of my twelve years, and my claims to be grown-up.

  When he had taken his seat in the carriage Baburin at last turned to me, and with a slight softening of the accustomed sternness of his face, observed: 'It's a lesson for you, young gentleman; remember this incident, and when you grow up, try to put an end to such acts of injustice. Your heart is good, your nature is not yet corrupted…. Mind, be careful; things can't go on like this!' Through my tears, which streamed copiously over my nose, my lips, and my chin, I faltered out that I would … I would remember, that I promised … I would do … I would be sure … quite sure …

  But at this point, Punin, whom I had before this embraced twenty times (my cheeks were burning from the contact with his unshaven beard, and I was odoriferous of the smell that always clung to him)—at this point a sudden frenzy came over Punin. He jumped up on the seat of the cart, flung both hands up in the air, and began in a voice of thunder (where he got it from!) to declaim the well-known paraphrase of the Psalm of David by Derzhavin,—a poet for this occasion—not a courtier.

  'God the All-powerful doth arise

  And judgeth in the congregation of the mighty! …

  How long, how long, saith the Lord,

  Will ye have mercy on the wicked?

  "Ye have to keep the laws…."'

  'Sit down!' Baburin said to him.

  Punin sat down, but continued:

  'To save the guiltless and needy,

  To give shelter to the afflicted,

  To defend the weak from the oppressors.'

  Punin at the word 'oppressors' pointed to the seignorial abode, and then poked the driver in the back.

  'To deliver the poor out of bondage!

  They know not! neither will they understand! …'

  Nikolai Antonov running out of the seignorial abode, shouted at the top of his voice to the coachman: 'Get away with you! owl! go along! don't stay lingering here!' and the cart rolled away. Only in the distance could still be heard:

  'Arise, O Lord God of righteousness! …

  Come forth to judge the unjust—

  And be Thou the only Ruler of the nations!'

  'What a clown!' remarked Nikolai Antonov.

  'He didn't get enough of the rod in his young days,' observed the deacon, appearing on the steps. He had come to inquire what hour
it would please the mistress to fix for the night service.

  The same day, learning that Yermil was still in the village, and would not till early next morning be despatched to the town for the execution of certain legal formalities, which were intended to check the arbitrary proceedings of the landowners, but served only as a source of additional revenue to the functionaries in superintendence of them, I sought him out, and, for lack of money of my own, handed him a bundle, in which I had tied up two pocket-handkerchiefs, a shabby pair of slippers, a comb, an old night-gown, and a perfectly new silk cravat. Yermil, whom I had to wake up—he was lying on a heap of straw in the back yard, near the cart—Yermil took my present rather indifferently, with some hesitation in fact, did not thank me, promptly poked his head into the straw and fell asleep again. I went home somewhat disappointed. I had imagined that he would be astonished and overjoyed at my visit, would see in it a pledge of my magnanimous intentions for the future—and instead of that …

  'You may say what you like—these people have no feeling,' was my reflection on my homeward way.

  My grandmother, who had for some reason left me in peace the whole of that memorable day, looked at me suspiciously when I came after supper to say good-night to her.

  'Your eyes are red,' she observed to me in French; 'and there's a smell of the peasant's hut about you. I am not going to enter into an examination of what you've been feeling and doing—I should not like to be obliged to punish you—but I hope you will get over all your foolishness, and begin to conduct yourself once more in a manner befitting a well-bred boy. However, we are soon going back to Moscow, and I shall get you a tutor—as I see you need a man's hand to manage you. You can go.'

  We did, as a fact, go back soon after to Moscow.

  II

  1837

  Seven years had passed by. We were living as before at Moscow—but I was by now a student in my second year—and the authority of my grandmother, who had aged very perceptibly in the last years, no longer weighed upon me. Of all my fellow-students the one with whom I was on the friendliest terms was a light-hearted and good-natured youth called Tarhov. Our habits and our tastes were similar. Tarhov was a great lover of poetry, and himself wrote verses; while in me the seeds sown by Punin had not been without fruit. As is often the case with young people who are very close friends, we had no secrets from one another. But behold, for several days together I noticed a certain excitement and agitation in Tarhov…. He disappeared for hours at a time, and I did not know where he had got to—a thing which had never happened before. I was on the point of demanding, in the name of friendship, a full explanation…. He anticipated me.

  One day I was sitting in his room…. 'Petya,' he said suddenly, blushing gaily, and looking me straight in the face, 'I must introduce you to my muse.'

  'Your muse! how queerly you talk! Like a classicist. (Romanticism was at that time, in 1837, at its full height.) As if I had not known it ever so long—your muse! Have you written a new poem, or what?'

  'You don't understand what I mean,' rejoined Tarhov, still laughing and blushing. 'I will introduce you to a living muse.'

  'Aha! so that's it! But how is she—yours?'

  'Why, because … But hush, I believe it's she coming here.'

  There was the light click of hurrying heels, the door opened, and in the doorway appeared a girl of eighteen, in a chintz cotton gown, with a black cloth cape on her shoulders, and a black straw hat on her fair, rather curly hair. On seeing me she was frightened and disconcerted, and was beating a retreat … but Tarhov at once rushed to meet her.

  'Please, please, Musa Pavlovna, come in! This is my great friend, a splendid fellow—and the soul of discretion. You've no need to be afraid of him. Petya,' he turned to me, 'let me introduce my Musa—Musa Pavlovna Vinogradov, a great friend of mine.'

  I bowed.

  'How is that … Musa?' I was beginning…. Tarhov laughed. 'Ah, you didn't know there was such a name in the calendar? I didn't know it either, my boy, till I met this dear young lady. Musa! such a charming name! And suits her so well!'

  I bowed again to my comrade's great friend. She left the door, took two steps forward and stood still. She was very attractive, but I could not agree with Tarhov's opinion, and inwardly said to myself: 'Well, she's a strange sort of muse!'

  The features of her curved, rosy face were small and delicate; there was an air of fresh, buoyant youth about all her slender, miniature figure; but of the muse, of the personification of the muse, I—and not only I—all the young people of that time had a very different conception! First of all the muse had infallibly to be dark-haired and pale. An expression of scornful pride, a bitter smile, a glance of inspiration, and that 'something'—mysterious, demonic, fateful—that was essential to our conception of the muse, the muse of Byron, who at that time held sovereign sway over men's fancies. There was nothing of that kind to be discerned in the face of the girl who came in. Had I been a little older and more experienced I should probably have paid more attention to her eyes, which were small and deep-set, with full lids, but dark as agate, alert and bright, a thing rare in fair-haired people. Poetical tendencies I should not have detected in their rapid, as it were elusive, glance, but hints of a passionate soul, passionate to self-forgetfulness. But I was very young then.

  I held out my hand to Musa Pavlovna—she did not give me hers—she did not notice my movement; she sat down on the chair Tarhov placed for her, but did not take off her hat and cape.

  She was, obviously, ill at ease; my presence embarrassed her. She drew deep breaths, at irregular intervals, as though she were gasping for air.

  'I've only come to you for one minute, Vladimir Nikolaitch,' she began—her voice was very soft and deep; from her crimson, almost childish lips, it seemed rather strange;—'but our madame would not let me out for more than half an hour. You weren't well the day before yesterday … and so, I thought …'

  She stammered and hung her head. Under the shade of her thick, low brows her dark eyes darted—to and fro—elusively. There are dark, swift, flashing beetles that flit so in the heat of summer among the blades of dry grass.

  'How good you are, Musa, Musotchka!' cried Tarhov. 'But you must stay, you must stay a little…. We'll have the samovar in directly.'

  'Oh no, Vladimir Nikolaevitch! it's impossible! I must go away this minute.'

  'You must rest a little, anyway. You're out of breath…. You're tired.'

  'I'm not tired. It's … not that … only … give me another book; I've finished this one.' She took out of her pocket a tattered grey volume of a Moscow edition.

  'Of course, of course. Well, did you like it? Roslavlev,' added

  Tarhov, addressing me.

  'Yes. Only I think Yury Miloslavsky is much better. Our madame is very strict about books. She says they hinder our working. For, to her thinking …'

  'But, I say, Yury Miloslavsky's not equal to Pushkin's Gipsies? Eh?

  Musa Pavlovna?' Tarhov broke in with a smile.

  'No, indeed! The Gipsies …' she murmured slowly. 'Oh yes, another thing, Vladimir Nikolaitch; don't come to-morrow … you know where.'

  'Why not?'

  'It's impossible.'

  'But why?'

  The girl shrugged her shoulders, and all at once, as though she had received a sudden shove, got up from her chair.

  'Why, Musa, Musotchka,' Tarhov expostulated plaintively. 'Stay a little!'

  'No, no, I can't.' She went quickly to the door, took hold of the handle….

  'Well, at least, take the book!'

  'Another time.'

  Tarhov rushed towards the girl, but at that instant she darted out of the room. He almost knocked his nose against the door. 'What a girl! She's a regular little viper!' he declared with some vexation, and then sank into thought.

  I stayed at Tarhov's. I wanted to find out what was the meaning of it all. Tarhov was not disposed to be reserved. He told me that the girl was a milliner; that he had seen her for the fir
st time three weeks before in a fashionable shop, where he had gone on a commission for his sister, who lived in the provinces, to buy a hat; that he had fallen in love with her at first sight, and that next day he had succeeded in speaking to her in the street; that she had herself, it seemed, taken rather a fancy to him.

  'Only, please, don't you suppose,' he added with warmth,—'don't you imagine any harm of her. So far, at any rate, there's been nothing of that sort between us.

  'Harm!' I caught him up; 'I've no doubt of that; and I've no doubt either that you sincerely deplore the fact, my dear fellow! Have patience—everything will come right'

  'I hope so,' Tarhov muttered through his teeth, though with a laugh. 'But really, my boy, that girl … I tell you—it's a new type, you know. You hadn't time to get a good look at her. She's a shy thing!—oo! such a shy thing! and what a will of her own! But that very shyness is what I like in her. It's a sign of independence! I'm simply over head and ears, my boy!'