E BET AND 01
FCH EKHD
THE BET
AND OTHER STORIES
THE BET
AND OTHER STORIES
BY
ANTON TCHEKHOV
TRANSLATED BY
S. KOTELIANSKY AND J. M. MURRY
JOHN W. LUCE & CO.
BOSTON
1915
TRANSLATORS' NOTE
Stiepanovich and Stepanich are two forms
of the same name, meaning " son of Stephen."
The abbreviated form is the more intimate and
familiar.
The Russian dishes mentioned in " A Tedious
Story " (p. 52) have no exact equivalents.
Sossoulki are a kind of little dumplings eaten
in soup ; schi is a soup made of sour cabbage ;
and kasha is a kind of porridge.
The words of the song which the students
sing in " The Fit " come from Poushkin.
2032461
CONTENTS
PAGE
THE BET 1
A TEDIOUS STORY 13
THE FIT 105
MISFORTUNE 141
AFTER THE THEATRE 163
THAT WRETCHED BOY 169
ENEMIES . ' . , 173
A TRIFLING OCCURRENCE .... 195
A GENTLEMAN FRIEND .... 205
OVERWHELMING SENSATIONS . . .211
EXPENSIVE LESSONS 219
A LIVING CALENDAR 229
OLD AGE . 235
THE BET
IT was a dark autumn night. The old banker
was pacing from corner to corner of his study,
recalling to his mind the party he gave in the
autumn fifteen years ago. There were many
clever people at the party and much interesting
conversation. They talked among other things
of capital punishment. The guests, among them
not a few scholars and journalists, for the most
part disapproved of capital punishment. They
found it obsolete as a means of punishment,
unfitted to a Christian State and immoral.
Some of them thought that capital punishment
should be replaced universally by life-imprison-
ment.
" I don't agree with you," said the host. " I
myself have experienced neither capital punish-
ment nor life-imprisonment, but if one may
judge a priori, then in my opinion capital punish-
ment is more moral and more humane than
imprisonment. Execution kills instantly, life-
imprisonment kills by degrees. Who is the
more humane executioner, one who kills you in
2 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
a few seconds or one who draws the life out of
you incessantly, for years ? "
" They're both equally immoral," remarked
one of the guests, " because their purpose is the
same, to take away life. The State is not God.
It has no right to take away that which it cannot
give back, if it should so desire."
Among the company was a lawyer, a young
man of about twenty-five. On being asked his
opinion, he said :
" Capital punishment and life-imprisonment are
equally immoral ; but if I were offered the choice
between them, I would certainly choose the
second. It's better to live somehow than not
to live at all."
There ensued a lively discussion. The banker
who was then younger and more nervous
suddenly lost his temper, banged his fist on the
table, and turning to the young lawyer, cried out :
" It's a lie. I bet you two millions you
wouldn't stick in a cell even for five years."
" If that's serious," replied the lawyer, " then
I bet I'll stay not five but fifteen."
"Fifteen! Done!" cried the banker. "Gentle-
men, I stake two millions."
" Agreed. You stake two millions, I my
freedom," said the lawyer.
So this wild, ridiculous bet came to pass. The
banker, who at tha^time had too many millions
to count, spoiled and capricious, was beside
himself with rapture. During supper he said
to the lawyer jokingly :
THE BET 3
" Come to your senses, young man, before it's
too late. Two millions are nothing to me, but
you stand to lose three or four of the best years
of your life. I say three or four, because you'll
never stick it out any longer. Don't forget
either, you unhappy man, that voluntary is
much heavier than enforced imprisonment. The
idea that you have the right to free yourself at
any moment will poison the whole of your life
in the cell. I pity you."
And now the banker pacing from corner to
corner, recalled all this and asked himself:
"Why did I make this bet? What's the
good ? The lawyer loses fifteen years of his life
and I throw away two millions. Will it con-
vince people that capital punishment is worse
or better than imprisonment for life. No, No !
all stuff and rubbish. On my part, it was the
caprice of a well-fed man ; on the lawyer's,
pure greed of gold."
He recollected further what happened after
the evening party. It was decided that the
lawyer must undergo his imprisonment under
the strictest observation, in a garden-wing of
the banker's house. It was agreed that during
the period he would be deprived of the right to
cross the threshold, to see living people, to hear
human voices, and to receive letters and news-
papers. He was permitted to have a musical
instrument, to read books, to write letters, to
drink wine and smoke tobacco. By the agree-
ment he could communicate, but only in silence,
4 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
with the outside world through a little window
specially constructed for this purpose. Every-
thing necessary, books, music, wine, he could
receive in any quantity by sending a note
through the window. The agreement provided
for all the minutest details, which made the
confinement strictly solitary, and it obliged the
lawyer to remain exactly fifteen years from
twelve o'clock of November 14th 1870 to twelve
o'clock of November 14th 1885. The least
attempt on his part to violate the conditions, to
escape if only for two minutes before the time
freed the banker from the obligation to pay him
the two millions.
During the first year of imprisonment, the
lawyer, as far as it was possible to judge from
his short notes, suffered terribly from loneliness
and boredom. From his wing day and night
came the sound of the piano. He rejected wine
and tobacco. " Wine," he wrote, " excites
desires, and desires are the chief foes of a
prisoner ; besides, nothing is more boring than
to drink good wine alone," and tobacco spoils
the air in his room. During the first year the
lawyer was sent books of a light character ;
novels with a complicated love interest, stories
of crime and fantasy, comedies, and so on.
In the second year the piano was heard no
longer and the lawyer asked only for classics.
In the fifth year, music was heard again, and
the prisoner asked for wine. Those who watched
him said that during the whole of that year he
THE BET 5
was only eating, drinking, and lying on his bed.
He yawned often and talked angrily to himself.
Books he did not read. Sometimes at f nights
he would sit down to write. He would write
for a long time and tear it all up in the morning.
More than once he was heard to weep.
In the second half of the sixth year, the
prisoner began zealously to study languages,
philosophy, and history. He fell on these
subjects so hungrily that the banker hardly had
time to get books enough for him. In the
space of four years about six hundred volumes
were bought at his request. It was while that
passion lasted that the banker received the
following letter from the prisoner : " My dear
gaoler, I am writing these lines in six languages.
Show them to experts. Let them read them, ff
they do not find one single mistake, I beg you
to give orders to have a gun fired off in the
garden. By the noise I shall know that my
efforts have not been in vain. The geniuses of
all ages and countries speak in different lan-
guages ; but in them all burns the same flame.
Oh, if you knew my heavenly happiness now
that I can understand them ! " The prisoner's
desire was fulfilled. Two shots were fired in
the garden by the banker's order.
Later on, after the tenth year, the lawyer sat
immovable before his table and read only the
New Testament. The banker found it strange
that a man who in four years had mastered six
hundred erudite volumes, should have spent
6 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
nearly a year in reading one book, easy to under-
stand and by no means thick. The New Testa-
ment was then replaced by the history of reli-
gions and theology.
During the last two years of his confinement
the prisoner read an extraordinary amount,
quite haphazard. Now he would apply him-
self to the natural sciences, then would read
Byron or Shakespeare. Notes used to come
from him in which he asked to be sent at the
same time a book on chemistry, a text-book of
medicine, a novel, and some treatise on philo-
sophy or theology. He read as though he were
swimming hi the sea among the broken pieces
of wreckage, and in his desire to save his life
was eagerly grasping one piece after another.
The banker recalled all this, and thought :
" To-morrow at twelve o'clock he receives his
freedom. Under the agreement, I shall have to
pay him two millions. If I pay, it's all over with
me. I am ruined for ever . . ."
Fifteen years before he had too many millions
to count, but now he was afraid to ask himself
which he had more of, money or debts. Gamb-
ling on the Stock-Exchange, risky speculation,
and the recklessness of which he could not rid
himself even in old age, had gradually brought
his business to decay ; and the fearless, self-
THE BET 7
confident, proud man of business had become an
ordinary banker, trembling at every rise and fall
in the market.
" That cursed bet," murmured the old man
clutching his head in despair ..." Why didn't
the man die ? He's only forty years old. He
will take away my last farthing, marry, enjoy
life, gamble on the Exchange, and I will look
on like an envious beggar and hear the same
words Jfrom him every day : ' I'm obliged to
you for the happiness of my life. Let me help
you.' No, it's too much ! The only escape
from bankruptcy and disgrace is that the man
should die."
The clock had just struck three. The banker
was listening. In the house everyone was asleep,
and one could hear only the frozen trees whining
outside the windows. Trying to make no
sound, he took out of his safe the key of the
door which had not been opened for fifteen years,
put on his overcoat, and went out of the house.
The garden was dark and cold. It was raining.
A keen damp wind hovered howling over all
the garden and gave the trees no rest. Though
he strained his eyes, the banker could see neither
the ground, nor the white statues, nor the
garden-wing, nor the trees. Approaching the
place where the garden wing stood, he called
the watchman twice. There was no answer.
Evidently the watchman had taken shelter from
the bad weather and was now asleep somewhere
in the kitchen or the greenhouse.
8 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" If I have the courage to fulfil my intention,"
thought the old man, " the suspicion will fall
on the watchman first of all."
In the darkness he groped for the stairs and
the door and entered the hall of the garden-
wing, then poked his way into a narrow passage
and struck a match. Not a soul was there.
Someone's bed, with no bedclothes on it, stood
there, and an iron stove was dark in the corner.
The seals on the door that led into the prisoner's
room were unbroken.
When the match went out, the old man,
trembling from agitation, peeped into the little
window.
In the prisoner's room a candle was burning
dim. The prisoner himself sat by the table.
Only his back, the hair on his head and his
hands were visible. On the table, the two
chairs, the carpet by the table open books were
strewn.
Five minutes passed and the prisoner never
once stirred. Fifteen years' confinement had
taught him to sit motionless. The banker
tapped on the window with his finger, but the
prisoner gave no movement in reply. Then the
banker cautiously tore the seals from the door
and put the key into the lock. The rusty lock
gave a hoarse groan and the door creaked. The
banker expected instantly to hear a cry of
surprise and the sound of steps. Three minutes
passed and it was as quiet behind the door as it
had been before. He made up his mind to enter.
THE BET 9
Before the table sat a man, unlike an ordinary
human being. It was a skeleton, with tight-
drawn skin, with a woman's long curly hair,
and a shaggy beard. The colour of his face was
yellow, of an earthy shade ; the cheeks were
sunken, the back long and narrow, and the hand
upon which he leaned his hairy head was so
lean and skinny that it was painful to look
upon. His hair was already silvering with grey,
and no one who glanced at the senile emaciation of
the face would have believed that he was only
forty years old. On the table, before his bended
head, lay a sheet of paper on which something
was written in a tiny hand.
"Poor devil," thought the banker, "he's
asleep and probably seeing/millions in his dreams.
I have only to take and' throw this half-dead
thing on the bed, smother him a moment with
the pillow, and the most careful examination
will find no trace of unnatural death. But,
first, let us read what he has written here."
The banker took the sheet from the table and
read :
" To-morrow at twelve o'clock midnight, I
shall obtain my freedom and the right to mix
with people. But before I leave this room and
see the sun I think it necessary to say a few
words to you. On my own clear conscience
and before God who sees me I declare to you
that I despise freedom, life, health, and all that
your books call the blessings of the world.
" For fifteen years I have diligently studied
10 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
earthly life. True, I saw neither the earth nor
the people, but in your books I drank fragrant
wine, sang songs, hunted deer and wild boar in
the forests, loved women . . . And beautiful
women, like clouds ethereal, created by the magic
of your poets' genius, visited me by night jand
whispered me wonderful tales, which made^ my
head drunken. In your books I climbed the
summits of Elbruz and Mont Blanc and saw
from thence how the sun rose in the morning,
and in the evening overflowed the sky, the ocean
and the mountain ridges with a purple gold.
I saw from thence how above me lightnings
glimmered cleaving the clouds ; I saw green
forests, fields, rivers, lakes, cities ; I heard
syrens singing, and the playing of the pipes of
Pan ; I touched the wings of beautiful devils
who came flying to me to speak of God : . . In
your books I cast myself into bottomless abysses,
worked miracles, burned cities to the ground,
preached new religions, conquered whole
countries . . .
" Your books gave me wisdom. All that un-
wearying human thought created in the centuries
is compressed to a little lump in my skull. I
know that I am more clever than you all.
" And I despise your books, despise all
wordly blessings and wisdom. Everything is
void, frail, visionary and delusive like a mirage.
Though you be proud and wise and beautiful,
yet will death wipe you from the face of the
earth like the mice underground ; and your
THE BET 11
posterity, your history, and the immortality
of your men of genius will be as frozen slag,
burnt down together with the terrestrial
globe.
" You are mad, and gone the wrong way.
You take lie for truth and ugliness for beauty.
You would marvel if by certain conditions there
should suddenly grow on apple and orange trees,
instead of fruit, frogs and lizards, and if roses
should begin to breathe the odour of a sweating
horse. So do I marvel at you, who have bar-
tered heaven for earth. I do not want to under-
stand you.
" That I may show you in deed my contempt
for that by which you live, I waive the two
millions of which I once dreamed as of paradise,
and which I now despise. That I may deprive
myself of my right to them, I shall come out
from here five minutes before the stipulated
term, and thus shall violate the agreement."
When he had read, the banker put the sheet
on the table, kissed thelhead of the strange man,
and began to weep. He went out of the wing.
Never at any other time, not even after his
terrible losses on the Exchange, had he felt
such contempt for himself as now. Coming home,
he lay down on his bed, but agitation and tears
kept him long from sleep . . .
The next morning the poor watchman came
running to him and told him that they had seen
the man who lived in the wing climbing through
the window into the garden. He had gone to
B 2
12 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
the gate and disappeared. Together with his
servants the banker went instantly to the wing
and established the escape of his prisoner. To
avoid unnecessary rumours he took the paper
with the renunciation from the table and, on
his return, locked it in his safe.
A TEDIOUS STORY
(FROM AN OLD MAN'S JOURNAL)
THERE lives in Russia an emeritus professor,
Nicolai Stiepanovich . . . privy councillor and
knight. He has so many Russian and foreign
Orders that when he puts them on the students
call him " the holy picture." His acquaintance
is most distinguished. Not a single famous
scholar lived or died during the last twenty-five
or thirty years but he was intimately acquainted
with him. Now he has no one to be friendly
with, but speaking of the past the long list
of his eminent friends would end with such
names as Pirogov, Kavelin, and the poet
Nekrasov, who bestowed upon him their warmest
and most sincere friendship. He is a member of
all the Russian and of three foreign universities,
et cetera, et cetera. All this, and a great
deal besides, forms what is known as my
name.
This name of mine is very popular. It is
known to every literate person in Russia ;
14 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
abroad it is mentioned from professorial chairs
with the epithets " eminent and esteemed." It
is reckoned among those fortunate names which
to mention in vain or to abuse in public or in
the Press is considered a mark of bad breeding.
Indeed, it should be so ; because with my name
is inseparably associated the idea of a famous,
richly gifted, and indubitably useful person.
I am a steady worker, with the endurance of
a camel, which is important. I am also en-
dowed with talent, which is still more important.
In passing, I would add that I am a well-edu-
cated, modest, and honest fellow. I have never
poked my nose into letters or politics, never
sought popularity in disputes with the ignorant,
and made no speeches either at dinners or at my
colleagues' funerals. Altogether there is not a
single spot on my learned name, and it has
nothing to complain of. It is fortunate.
The bearer of this name, that is myself,
is a man of sixty-two, with a bald head,
false teeth and an incurable tic. My name
is as brilliant and prepossessing, as I myself
am dull and ugly. My head and hands
tremble from weakness ; my neck, like that of
one of Turgeniev's heroines, resembles the
handle of a counter-bass ; my chest is hollow
and my back narrow. When I speak or read my
mouth twists, and when I smile my whole face
is covered with senile, deathly wrinkles. There
is nothing imposing in my pitiable face, save
that when I suffer from the tic, I have a
A TEDIOUS STORY 15
singular expression which compels anyone who
looks at me to think : " This man will die soon,
for sure."
I can still read pretty well ; I can still hold
the attention of my audience for two hours.
My passionate manner, the literary form of
my exposition and my humour make the
defects of my voice almost unnoticeable,
though it is dry, harsh, and hard like a hypocrite's.
But I write badly. The part of my brain
which governs the ability to write refused
office. My memory has weakened, and my
thoughts are too inconsequent ; and when I
expound them on paper, I always have a feeling
that I have lost the sense of their organic con-
nection. The construction is monotonous, and
the sentence feeble and timid. I often do not
write what I want to, and when I write the end
I cannot remember the beginning. I often
forget common words, and in writing a letter
I always have to waste much energy in order to
avoid superfluous sentences and unnecessary
incidental statements ; both bear clear witness
of the decay of my intellectual activity. And it
is remarkable that, the simpler the letter, the
more tormenting is my effort. When writing
a scientific article I feel much freer and much
more intelligent than in writing a letter of
welcome or a report. One thing more : it is
easier for me to write German or English than
Russian.
As regards my present life, I must first of all
16 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
note insomnia, from which I have begun to suffer
lately. If I were asked : " What is now the
chief and fundamental fact of your existence ? "
I would answer : " Insomnia." From habit,
I still undress at midnight precisely and get
into bed. I soon fall asleep but wake just
after one with the feeling that I have not slept
at all. I must get out of bed and light the lamp.
For an hour or two I walk about the room from
corner to corner and inspect the long familiar
pictures. When I am weary of walking I sit
down to the table. I sit motionless thinking
of nothing, feeling no desires ; if a book lies
before me I draw it mechanically towards me
and read without interest. Thus lately in one
night I read mechanically a whole novel with
a strange title, " Of What the Swallow Sang."
Or in order to occupy my attention I make
myself count to a thousand, or I imagine the
face of some one of my friends, and begin to
remember in what year and under what cir-
cumstances he joined the faculty. I love to
listen to sounds. Now, two rooms away from me
my daughter Liza will say something quickly, in
her sleep ; then my wife will walk through the
drawing-room with a candle and infallibly drop
the box of matches. Then the shrinking wood of
the cupboard squeaks or the burner of the lamp
tinkles suddenly, and all these sounds somehow
agitate me.
Not to sleep of nights confesses one abnormal ;
and therefore I wait impatiently for the morning
A TEDIOUS STORY 17
and the day, when I have the right not to sleep.
Many oppressive hours pass before the cock
crows. He is my harbinger of good. As soon
as he has crowed I know that in an hour's
time the porter downstairs will awake and
for some reason or other go up the stairs,
coughing angrily ; and later beyond the windows
the air begins to pale gradually and voices echo
in the street.
The day begins with the coming of my wife.
She comes in to me in a petticoat, with her hair
undone, but already washed and smelling of
eau de Cologne, and looking as though she came
in by accident, saying the same thing every
time : " Pardon, I came in for a moment.
You haven't slept again ? " Then she puts
the lamp out, sits by the table and begins to
talk. I am not a prophet but I know beforehand
what the subject of conversation will be, every
morning the same. Usually, after breathless
inquiries after my health, she suddenly remembers
our son, the officer, who is serving in Warsaw.
On the twentieth of each month we send him
fifty roubles. This is our chief subject of
conversation.
" Of course it is hard on us," my wife sighs.
" But until he is finally settled we are obliged
to help him. The boy is among strangers ;
the pay is small. But if you like, next month
we'll send him forty roubles instead of fifty.
What do you think ? "
Daily experience might have convinced my
18 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
wife that expenses do not grow less by talking
of them. But my wife does not acknowledge
experience and speaks about our officer punc-
tually every day, about bread, thank Heaven,
being cheaper and sugar a half-penny dearer
and all this in a tone as though it were news to
me.
I listen and agree mechanically. Probably
because I have not slept during the night strange
idle thoughts take hold of me. I look at my
wife and wonder like a child. In perplexity
I ask myself: This old, stout, clumsy woman,
with sordid cares and anxiety about bread and
butter written in the dull expression of her face,
her eyes tired with eternal thoughts of debts
and poverty, who can talk only of expenses
and smile only when things are cheap was this
once the slim Varya whom I loved passionately
for her fine clear mind, her pure soul, her beauty,
and as Othello loved Desdemona, for her
" compassion " of my science ? Is she really
the same, my wife Varya, who bore me a son ?
I gaze intently into the fat, clumsy old
woman's face. I seek in her my Varya ; but
from the past nothing remains but her fear for
my health and her way of calling my salary
" our " salary and my hat " our " hat. It pains
me to look at her, and to console her, if only a
little, I let her talk as she pleases, and I am silent
even when she judges people unjustly, or scolds
me because I do not practise and do not publish
text-books.
A TEDIOUS STORY 19
Our conversation always ends in the same way.
My wife suddenly remembers that I have not
yet had tea, and gives a start :
" Why am I sitting down ? " she says,
getting up. " The samovar has been on the
table a long while, and I sit chatting. How
forgetful I am ? Good gracious ! "
She hurries away, but stops at the door to
say :
" We owe Yegor five months' wages. Do you
realise it ? It's a bad thing to let the servants'
wages run on. I've said so often. It's much
easier to pay ten roubles every month than
fifty for five ! "
Outside the door she stops again :
" I pity our poor Liza more than anybody.
The girl studies at the Conservatoire. She's
always in good society, and the Lord only knows
how she's dressed. That fur-coat of hers !
It's a sin to show yourself in the street in it.
If she had a different father, it would do, but
everyone knows he is a famous professor, a
privy councillor."
So, having reproached me for my name and
title, she goes away at last. Thus begins my
day. It does not improve.
When I have drunk my tea, Liza comes in,
in a fur-coat and hat, with her music, ready to
go to the Conservatoire. She is twenty-two.
She looks younger. She is pretty, rather like
my wife when she was young. She kisses me
tenderly on my forehead and my hand.
20 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" Good morning, Papa. Quite well ? "
As a child she adored ice-cream, and I often
had to take her to a confectioner's. Ice-cream
was her standard of beauty. If she wanted to
praise me, she used to say : " Papa, you are
ice-creamy." One finger she called the pis-
tachio, the other the cream, the third the rasp-
berry finger and so on. And when she came to
say good morning, I used to lift her on to my
knees and kiss her fingers, and say :
" The cream one, the pistachio one, the lemon
one."
And now from force of habit I kiss Liza's
fingers and murmur :
" Pistachio one, cream one, lemon one." But
it does not sound the same. I am cold like the
ice-cream and I feel ashamed. When my
daughter comes in and touches my forehead with
her lips I shudder as though a bee had stung my
forehead, I smile constrainedly and turn away
my face. Since my insomnia began a question
has been driving like a nail into my brain. My
daughter continually sees how terribly I, an
old man, blush because I owe the servant his
wages ; she sees how often the worry of small
debts forces me to leave my work and to pace
the room from corner to corner for hours, think-
ing ; but why hasn't she, even once, come to
me without telling her mother and whispered :
" Father, here's my watch, bracelets, earrings,
dresses . . . Pawn them all ... You need
money " ? Why, seeing how I and her mother
A TEDIOUS STORY 21
try to hide our poverty, out of false pride why
does she not deny herself the luxury of music
lessons ? I would not accept the watch, the
bracelets, or her sacrifices God forbid ! I do
not want that.
Which reminds me of my son, the Warsaw
officer. He is a clever, honest, and sober fellow.
But that doesn't mean very much. If I had an
old father, and I knew that there were moments
when he was ashamed of his poverty, I think
I would give up my commission to someone
else and hire myself out as a navvy. These
thoughts of the children poison me. What good
are they ? Only a mean and irritable person
can take refuge in thinking evil of ordinary
people because they are not heroes. But enough
of that.
At a quarter to ten I have to go and lecture
to my dear boys. I dress myself and walk the
road I have known these thirty years. For me
it has a history of its own. Here is a big grey
building with a chemist's shop beneath. A tiny
house once stood there, and it was a beer-shop.
In this beer-shop I thought out my thesis, and
wrote my first love-letter to Varya. I wrote it
in pencil on a scrap of paper that began
" Historia Morbi." Here is a grocer's shop.
It used to belong to a little Jew who sold me
cigarettes on credit, and later on to a fat woman
who loved students " because every one of them
had a mother." Now a red-headed merchant
sits there, a very nonchalant man, who drinks
22 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
tea from a copper tea-pot. And here are the
gloomy gates of the University that have not
been repaired for years ; a weary porter in a
sheepskin coat, a broom, heaps of snow . . . Such
gates cannot produce a good impression on a
boy who comes fresh from the provinces and
imagines that the temple of science is really a
temple. Certainly, in the history of Russian
pessimism, the age of university buildings, the
dreariness of the corridors, the smoke-stains on
the walls, the meagre light, the dismal appear-
ance of the stairs, the clothes-pegs and the
benches, hold one of the foremost places in the
series of predisposing causes. Here is our
garden. It does not seem to have grown any
better or any worse since I was a student. I
do not like it. It would be much more sensible
if tall pine-trees and fine oaks grew there instead
of consumptive lime-trees, yellow acacias and
thin clipped lilac. The student's mood is created
mainly by every one of the surroundings in
which he studies ; therefore he must see every-
where before him only what is great and strong
and exquisite. Heaven preserve him from
starveling trees, broken windows, and drab walls
and doors covered with torn oilcloth.
As I approach my main staircase the door is
open wide. I am met by my old friend, of the
same age and name as I, Nicolas the porter.
He grunts as he lets me in :
** It's frosty, Your Excellency."
Or if my coat is wet :
A TEDIOUS STORY 23
" It's raining a bit, Your Excellency."
Then he runs in front of me and opens all the
doors on my way. In the study he carefully
takes off my coat and at the same time manages
to tell me some university news. Because of
the close acquaintance that exists between all
the University porters and keepers, he knows
all that happens in the four faculties, in the
registry, in the chancellor's cabinet, and the
library. He knows everything. When, for in-
stance, the resignation of the rector or dean is
under discussion, I hear him talking to the
junior porters, naming candidates and explain-
ing offhand that so and so will not be approved
by the Minister, so and so will himself refuse the
honour ; then he plunges into fantastic details
of some mysterious papers received in the
registry, of a secret conversation which appears
to have taken place between the Minister and
the curator, and so on. These details apart,
he is almost always right. The impressions he
forms of each candidate are original, but also
true. If you want to know who read his thesis,
joined the staff, resigned or died in a particular
year, then you must seek the assistance of this
veteran's colossal memory. He will not only
name you the year, month, and day, but give
you the accompanying details of this or any
other event. Such memory is the privilege of
love.
He is the guardian of the university traditions.
From the porters before him he inherited many
24 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
legends of the life of the university. He added
to this wealth much of his own and if you like
he will tell you many stories, long or short.
He can tell you of extraordinary savants who
knew everything, of remarkable scholars who did
not sleep for weeks on end, of numberless
martyrs to science ; good triumphs over evil
with him. The weak always conquer the strong,
the wise man the fool, the modest the proud, the
young the old. There is no need to take all
these legends and stories for sterling ; but filter
them, and you will find what you want in your
filter, a noble tradition and the names of true
heroes acknowledged by all.
In our society all the information about the
learned world consists entirely of anecdotes of
the extraordinary absent-mindedness of old
professors, and of a handful of jokes, which are
ascribed to Guber or to myself or to Baboukhin.
But this is too little for an educated society.
If it loved science, savants and students as
Nicolas loves them, it would long ago have had
a literature of whole epics, stories, and bio-
graphies. But unfortunately this is yet to be.
The news told, Nicolas looks stern and we
begin to talk business. If an outsider were then
to hear how freely Nicolas uses the jargon,
he would be inclined to think that he was a
scholar, posing as a soldier. By the way, the
rumours of the university-porter's erudition
are very exaggerated. It is true that Nicolas
knows more than a hundred Latin tags, can put
A TEDIOUS STORY 25
a skeleton together and on occasion make a
preparation, can make the students laugh with
a long learned quotation, but the simple theory
of the circulation of the blood is as dark to him
now as it was twenty years ago.
At the table in my room, bent low over a
book or a preparation, sits my dissector, Peter
Ignatievich. He is a hardworking, modest
man of thirty-five without any gifts, already
bald and with a big belly. He works from
morning to night, reads tremendously and
remembers everything he has read. In this
respect he is not merely an excellent man, but
a man of gold ; but in all others he is a cart-
horse, or if you like a learned blockhead. The
characteristic traits of a cart-horse which dis-
tinguish him from a creature of talent are these.
His outlook is narrow, absolutely bounded by
his specialism. Apart from his own subject
he is as naive as a child. I remember once
entering the room and saying :
" Think what bad luck ! They say, Skobielev
is dead."
Nicolas crossed himself ; but Peter Ignatie-
vich turned to me :
" Which Skobielev do you mean ? "
Another time, some time earlier I an-
nounced that Professor Pierov was dead. That
darling Peter Ignatievich asked :
" What was his subject ? "
I imagine that if Patti sang into his ear, or
Russia were attacked by hordes of Chinamen,
c
26 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
or there was an earthquake, he would not lift
a finger, but would go on in the quietest way
with his eye screwed over his microscope. In
a word : " What's Hecuba to him ? " I would
give anything to see how this dry old stick goes
to bed with his wife.
Another trait : a fanatical belief in the in-
fallibility of science, above all in everything
that the Germans write. He is sure of himself
and his preparations, knows the purpose of life,
is absolutely ignorant of the doubts and dis-
illusionments that turn talents grey, a slavish
worship of the authorities, and not a shadow of
need to think for himself. It is hard to persuade
him and quite impossible to discuss with him.
Just try a discussion with a man who is pro-
foundly convinced that the best science is
medicine, the best men doctors, the best
traditions the medical ! From the ugly past
of medicine only one tradition has survived,
the white necktie that doctors wear still. For
a learned, and more generally for an educated
person there can exist only a general university
tradition, without any division into traditions
of medicine, of law, and so on. But it's quite
impossible for Peter Ignatievich to agree with
that ; and he is ready to argue it with you till
doomsday.
His future is quite plain to me. During
the whole of his life he will make several hundred
preparations of extraordinary purity, will write
any number of dry, quite competent, jessays,
A TEDIOUS STORY 27
will make about ten scrupulously accurate
translations ; but he won't invent gunpowder.
For gunpowder, imagination is wanted, in-
ventiveness, and a gift for divination, and
Peter Ignatievich has nothing of the kind.
In short, he is not a master of science but a
labourer.
Peter Ignatievich, Nicolas, and I whisper
together. We are rather strange to ourselves.
One feels something quite particular, when the
audience booms like the sea behind the door.
In thirty years I have not grown used to this
feeling, and I have it every morning. I button
up my frock-coat nervously, ask Nicolas unneces-
sary questions, get angry ... It is as though
I were afraid ; but it is not fear, but something
else which I cannot name nor describe.
Unnecessarily, I look at my watch and say :
" Well, it's time to go."
And we march in, in this order : Nicolas with
the preparations or the atlases in front, myself
next, and after me, the cart-horse, modestly
hanging his head ; or, if necessary, a corpse on
a stretcher in front and behind the corpse
Nicolas and so on. The students rise when I
appear, then sit down and the noise of the sea
is suddenly still. Calm begins.
I know what I will lecture about, but I know
nothing of how I will lecture, where I will begin
and where I will end. There is not a single
sentence ready in my brain. But as soon as
I glance at the audience, sitting around me in
c 2
28 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
an amphitheatre, and utter the stereotyped " In
our last lecture we ended with ..." and the
sentences fly out of my soul in a long line
then it is full steam ahead. I speak with irre-
sistible speed, and with passion, and it seems
as though no earthly power could check the
current of my speech. In order to lecture well,
that is without being wearisome and to the
listener's profit, besides talent you must have
the knack of it and experience ; you must have
a clear idea both of your own powers, of the
people to whom you are lecturing, and of the
subject of your remarks. Moreover, you must
be quick in the uptake, keep a sharp eye open,
and never for a moment lose your field of
vision.
When he presents the composer's thought, a
good conductor does twenty things at once. He
reads the score, waves his baton, watches the
singer, makes a gesture now towards the drum,
now to the double-bass, and so on. It is the
same with me when lecturing. I have some
hundred and fifty faces before me, quite unlike
each other, and three hundred eyes staring me
straight in the face. My purpose is to conquer
this many-headed hydra. If I have a clear
idea how far they are attending and how much
they are comprehending every minute while I
am lecturing, then the hydra is in my power.
My other opponent is within me. This is the
endless variety of forms, phenomena and laws,
and the vast number of ideas, whether my own
A TEDIOUS STORY 29
or others', which depend upon them. Every
moment I must be skilful enough to choose
what is most important and necessary from this
enormous material, and just as swiftly as my
speech flows to clothe my thought in a form which
will penetrate the hydra's understanding and
excite its attention. Besides I must watch care"
fully to see that my thoughts shall not be pre-
sented as they have been accumulated, but in
a certain order, necessary for the correct compo-
sition of the picture which I wish to paint.
Further, I endeavour to make my speech literary,
my definitions brief and exact, my sentences
as simple and elegant as possible. Every
moment I must hold myself in and remember
that I have only an hour and forty minutes to
spend. In other words, it is a heavy labour.
At one and the same time you have to be a
savant, a schoolmaster, and an orator, and it
is a failure if the orator triumphs over the school-
master in you or the schoolmaster over the
orator.
After lecturing for a quarter, for half an hour,
I notice suddenly that the students have begun
to stare at the ceiling or Peter Ignatievich.
One will feel for his handkerchief, another settle
himself comfortably, another smile at his own
thoughts. This means their attention is tried.
I must take steps. I seize the first opening and
make a pun. All the hundred and fifty faces
have a broad smile, their eyes flash merrily, and
for a while you can hear the boom of the sea.
30 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
I laugh too. Their attention is refreshed and
I can go on.
No sport, no recreation, no game ever gave
me such delight as reading a lecture. Only in
a lecture could I surrender myself wholly to
passion and understand that inspiration is not
a poet's fiction, but exists indeed. And I do
not believe that Hercules, even after the most
delightful of his exploits, felt such a pleasant
weariness as I experienced every time after a
lecture.
This was in the past. Now at lectures I
experience only torture. Not half an hour
passes before I begin to feel an invincible weak-
ness in my legs and shoulders. I sit down in
my chair, but I am not used to lecture sitting.
In a moment I am up again, and lecture standing.
Then I sit down again. Inside my mouth is
dry, my voice is hoarse, my head feels dizzy.
To hide my state from my audience I drink some
water now and then, cough, wipe my nose con-
tinually, as though I was troubled by a cold,
make inopportune puns, and finally announce
the interval earlier than I should. But chiefly
I feel ashamed.
Conscience and reason tell me that the best
thing I could do now is to read my farewell
lecture to the boys, give them my last word,
bless them and give up my place to someone
younger and stronger than I. But, heaven be
my judge, I have not the courage to act up to
my conscience.
A TEDIOUS STORY 31
Unfortunately, I am neither philosopher nor
theologian. I know quite well I have no more
than six months to live ; and it would seem that
now I ought to be mainly occupied with questions
of the darkness beyond the grave, and the
visions which will visit my sleep in the earth.
But somehow my soul is not curious of these
questions, though my mind grants every atom
of their importance. Now before my death it is
just as it was twenty or thirty years ago. Only
science interests me. When I take my last
breath I shall still believe that Science is the
most important, the most beautiful, the most
necessary thing in the life of man ; that she has
always been and always will be the highest
manifestation of love, and that by her alone will
man triumph over nature and himself. This
faith is, perhaps, at bottom naive and unfair,
but I am not to blame if this and not another is
my faith. To conquer this faith within me is
for me impossible.
But this is beside the point. I only ask that
you should incline to my weakness and under-
stand that to tear a man who is more deeply
concerned with the destiny of a brain tissue
than the final goal of creation away from his
rostrum and his students is like taking him and
nailing him up in a coffin without waiting until
he is dead.
Because of my insomnia and the intense
struggle with my increasing weakness a strange
thing happens inside me. In the middle of my
32 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
lecture tears rise to my throat, my eyes begin
to ache, and I have a passionate and hysterical
desire to stretch out my hands and moan aloud.
I want to cry out that fate has doomed me, a
famous man, to death ; that in some six months
here in the auditorium another will be master.
I want to cry out that I am poisoned ; that new
ideas that I did not know before have poisoned
the last days of my life, and sting my brain
incessantly like mosquitoes. At that moment
my position seems so terrible to me that I want
all my students to be terrified, to jump from
their seats and rush panic-stricken to the door,
shrieking in despair.
It is not easy to live through such moments.
II
After the lecture I sit at home and work. I
read reviews, dissertations, or prepare for the
next lecture, and sometimes I write something.
I work with interruptions, since I have to receive
visitors.
The bell rings. It is a friend who has come to
talk over some business. He enters with hat
and stick. He holds them both in front of him
and says :
" Just a minute, a minute. Sit down, cher
confrere. Only a word or two."
First we try to show each other that we are
both extraordinarily polite and very glad to see
each other. I make him sit down in the chair,
A TEDIOUS STORY 33
and he makes me sit down ; and then we touch
each other's waists, and put our hands on each
other's buttons, as though we were feeling each
other and afraid to burn ourselves. We both
laugh, though we say nothing funny. Sitting
down, we bend our heads together and begin to
whisper to each other. We must gild our
conversation with such Chinese formalities as :
" You remarked most justly " or " I have already
had the occasion to say." We must giggle if
either of us makes a pun, though it's a bad one.
When we have finished with the business, my
friend gets up with a rush, waves his hat towards
my work, and begins to take his leave. We feel
each other once more and laugh. I accompany
him down to the hall. There I help my friend
on with his coat, but he emphatically declines
so great an honour. Then, when Yegor opens
the door my friend assures me that I will catch
cold, and I pretend to be ready to follow him
into the street. And when I finally return to
my study my face keeps smiling still, it must be
from inertia.
A little later another ring. Someone enters
the hall, spends a long time taking off his coat
and coughs. Yegor brings me word that a
student has come. I tell him to show him up.
In a minute a pleasant-faced young man appears.
For a year we have been on these forced terms
together. He sends in abominable answers at
examinations, and I mark him gamma. Every
year I have about seven of these people to
34 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
whom, to use the students' slang, " I give a
plough " or " haul them through." Those of
them who fail because of stupidity or illness,
usually bear their cross in patience and do not
bargain with me ; only sanguine temperaments,
" open natures," bargain with me and come to
my house, people whose appetite is spoiled or
who are prevented from going regularly to the
opera by a delay in their examinations. With
the first I am over-indulgent ; the second kind
I keep on the run for a year.
" Sit down," I say to my guest. " What was
it you wished to say ? "
" Forgive me for troubling you. Professor . . ."
he begins, stammering and never looking me
in the face. " I would not venture to trouble
you unless ... I was up for my examination
before you for the fifth time . . . and I failed.
I implore you to be kind, and give me a * satis,'
because ..."
The defence which all idlers make of them-
selves is always the same. They have passed
in every other subject with distinction, and failed
only in mine, which is all the more strange
because they had always studied my subject
most diligently and know it thoroughly. They
failed through some inconceivable misunder-
standing.
" Forgive me, my friend," I say to my guest.
" But I can't give you a ' satis ' impossible.
Go and read your lectures again, and then come.
Then we'll see."
A TEDIOUS STORY 35
Pause. I get a desire to torment the student
a little, because he prefers beer and the opera
to science ; and I say with a sigh :
" In my opinion, the best thing for you now
is to give up the Faculty of Medicine altogether.
With your abilities, if you find it impossible to
pass the examination, then it seems you have
neither the desire nor the vocation to be a
doctor."
My sanguine friend's face grows grave.
" Excuse me, Professor," he smiles, " but it
would be strange, to say the least, on my part.
Studying medicine for five years and suddenly
to throw it over."
" Yes, but it's better to waste five years than
to spend your whole life afterwards in an
occupation which you dislike."
Immediately I begin to feel sorry for him and
hasten to say :
" Well, do as you please. Read a little and
come again."
" When ? " the idler asks, dully.
" Whenever you like. To-morrow, even."
And I read in his pleasant eyes. " I can come
again ; but you'll send me away again, you
beast."
" Of course," I say, " you won't become more
learned because you have to come up to me
fifteen times for examination ; but this will
form your character. You must be thankful
for that."
Silence. I rise and wait for my guest to
36 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
leave. But he stands there, looking at the
window, pulling at his little beard and thinking.
It becomes tedious.
My sanguine friend has a pleasant, succulent
voice, clever, amusing eyes, a good-natured face,
rather puffed by assiduity to beer and much
resting on the sofa. Evidently he could tell
me many interesting things about the opera,
about his love affairs, about the friends he
adores ; but, unfortunately, it is not the thing.
And I would so eagerly listen !
" On my word of honour, Professor, if you
give me a ' satis ' I'll ..."
As soon as it gets to " my word of honour,"
I wave my hands and sit down to the table.
The student thinks for a while and says, de-
jectedly :
" In that case, good-bye . . . Forgive me ! "
" Good-bye, my friend . . . Good-bye ! "
He walks irresolutely into the hall, slowly
puts on his coat, and, when he goes into the
street, probably thinks again for a long while ;
having excogitated nothing better than " old
devil " for me, he goes to a cheap restaurant to
drink beer and dine, and then home to sleep.
Peace be to your ashes, honest labourer !
A third ring. Enters a young doctor in a new
black suit, gold-rimmed spectacles and the in-
evitable white necktie. He introduces himself.
I ask him to take a seat and inquire his business.
The young priest of science begins to tell me,
not without agitation, that he passed his doctor's
A TEDIOUS STORY 37
examination this year, and now has only to write
his dissertation. He would like to work with
me, under my guidance ; and I would do him a
great kindness if I would suggest a subject for
his dissertation.
" I should be delighted to be of use to you,
mon cher confrere," I say. " But first of all,
let us come to an agreement as to what is
a dissertation. Generally we understand by
this, work produced as the result of an in-
dependent creative power. Isn't that so ?
But a work written on another's subject, under
another's guidance, has a different name."
The aspirant is silent. I fire up and jump out
of my seat. " Why do you all come to me ?
I can't understand," I cry out angrily. " Do
I keep a shop ? I don't sell theses across the
counter. For the one thousandth time I ask
you all to leave me alone. Forgive my rudeness,
but I've got tired of it at last ! "
The aspirant is silent. Only, a tinge of colour
shows on his cheek. His face expresses his
profound respect for my famous name and my
erudition, but I see in his eyes that he despises my
voice, my pitiable figure, my nervous gestures.
When I am angry I seem to him a very queer
fellow.
" I do not keep a shop," I storm. " It's an
amazing business ! Why don't you want to be
independent ? Why do you find freedom so
objectionable ? "
I say a great deal, but he is silent. At last
38 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
by degrees I grow calm, and, of course, surrender.
The aspirant will receive a valueless subject
from me, will write under my observation a
needless thesis, will pass his tedious disputation
cum laude and will get a useless and learned
degree.
The rings follow in endless succession, but here
I confine myself to four. The fourth ring sounds,
and I hear the familiar steps, the rustling dress,
the dear voice.
Eighteen years ago my dear friend, the
oculist, died and left behind him a seven year
old daughter, Katy, and sixty thousand roubles.
By his will he made me guardian. Katy lived
in my family till she was ten. Afterwards she
was sent to College and lived with me only
in her holidays in the summer months. I had
no time to attend to her education. I watched
only by fits and starts ; so that I can say very
little about her childhood.
The chief thing I remember, the one I love to
dwell upon in memory, is the extraordinary con-
fidence which she had when she entered my house,
when she had to have the doctor, a con-
fidence which was always shining in her darling
face. She would sit in a corner somewhere with
her face tied up, and would be sure to be absorbed
in watching something. Whether she was watch-
ing me write and read books, or my wife bustling
about, or the cook peeling the potatoes in the
kitchen or the dog playing about her eyes
invariably expressed the same thing : " Every-
A TEDIOUS STORY 89
thing that goes on in this world, everything is
beautiful and clever." She was inquisitive and
adored to talk to me. She would sit at the
table opposite me, watching my movements
and asking questions. She is interested to
know what I read, what I do at the University,
if I'm not afraid of corpses, what I do with my
money.
" Do the students fight at the University ? "
she would ask.
" They do, my dear."
" You make them go down on their knees ? "
" I do."
And it seemed funny to her that the students
fought and that I made them go down on their
knees, and she laughed. She was a gentle, good,
patient child.
Pretty often I happened 'to see how something
was taken away from her, or she was unjustly
punished, or her curiosity was not satisfied.
At such moments sadness would be added to
her permanent expression of confidence nothing
more. I didn't know how to take her part,
but when I saw her sadness, I always had the
desire to draw her close to me and comfort her
in an old nurse's voice : " My darling little
orphan ! "
I remember too she loved to be well dressed
and to sprinkle herself with scents. In this
she was like me. I also love good clothes and
fine scents.
I regret that I had neither the time nor the
40 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
inclination to watch the beginnings and the
growth of the passion which had completely
taken hold of Katy when she was no more than
fourteen or fifteen. I mean her passionate love
for the theatre. When she used to come from
the College for her holidays and live with us,
nothing gave her such pleasure and enthusiasm
to talk about as plays and actors. She used to
tire us with her incessant conversation about the
theatre. I alone hadn't the courage to deny her
my attention. My wife and children did not listen
to her. When she felt the desire to share her
raptures she would come to my study and coax :
" Nicolai Stiepanich, do let me speak to you
about the theatre."
I used to show her the time and say :
" I'll give you half an hour. Fire away ! "
Later on she used to bring in pictures of the
actors and actresses she worshipped whole
dozens of them. Then several times she tried
to take part in amateur theatricals, and finally
when she left College she declared to me she was
born to be an actress.
I never shared Katy's enthusiasms for the
theatre. My opinion is that if a play is good
then there's no need to trouble the actors for
it to make the proper impression ; you can be
satisfied merely by reading it. If the play is
bad, no acting will make it good.
When I was young I often went to the theatre,
and nowadays my family takes a box twice a
year and carries me off for an airing there. Of
A TEDIOUS STORY 41
course this is not enough to give me the right to
pass verdicts on the theatre ; but I will say a
few words about it. In my opinion the theatre
hasn't improved in the last thirty or forty years.
I can't find any more than I did then, a glass of
clean water, either in the corridors or the foyer.
Just as they did then, the attendants fine me
sixpence for my coat, though there's nothing
illegal in wearing a warm coat in winter. Just
as it did then, the orchestra plays quite unneces-
sarily in the intervals, and adds a new, gratuitous
impression to the one received from the play.
Just as they did then, men go to the bar in the
intervals and drink spirits. If there is no per-
ceptible improvement in little things, it will be
useless to look for it in the bigger things. When
an actor, hide-bound in theatrical traditions and
prejudices, tries to read simple straightforward
monologue : " To be or not to be," not at all
simply, but with an incomprehensible and in-
evitable hiss and convulsions over his whole
body, or when he tries to convince me that
Chazky, who is always talking to fools and is
in love with a fool, is a very clever man and that
" The Sorrows of Knowledge " is not a boring
play, then I get from the stage a breath of
the same old routine that exasperated me forty
years ago when I was regaled with classical
lamentation and beating on the breast. Every
time I come out of the theatre a more thorough
conservative than I went in.
It's quite possible to convince the sentimental,
D
42 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
self-confident crowd that the theatre in its present
state is an education. But not a man who knows
what true education is would swallow this. I
don't know what it may be in fifty or a hundred
years, but under present conditions the theatre
can only be a recreation. But the recreation
is too expensive for continual use, and robs the
country of thousands of young, healthy, gifted
men and women, who if they had not devoted
themselves to the theatre would be excellent
doctors, farmers, schoolmistresses, or officers.
It robs the public of its evenings, the best time
for intellectual work and friendly conversation.
I pass over the waste of money and the moral
injuries to the spectator when he sees murder,
adultery, or slander wrongly treated on the
stage.
But Katy's opinion was quite the opposite.
She assured me that even in its present state
the theatre is above lecture-rooms and books,
above everything else in the world. The theatre
is a power that unites in itself all the arts, and
the actors are men with a mission. No separate
art or science can act on the human soul so
strongly and truly as the stage ; and there-
fore it is reasonable that a medium actor
should enjoy much greater popularity than the
finest scholar or painter. No public activity
can give such delight and satisfaction as the
theatrical.
So one fine day Katy joined a theatrical com-
pany and went away, I believe, to Ufa, taking
A TEDIOUS STORY 43
with her a lot of money, a bagful of rainbow
hopes, and some very high-class views on the
business.
Her first letters on the journey were wonderful.
When I read them I was simply amazed that
little sheets of paper could contain so much
youth, such transparent purity, such divine
innocence, and at the same time so many
subtle, sensible judgments, that would do honour
to a sound masculine intelligence. The Volga,
nature, the towns she visited, her friends, her
successes and failures she did not write about
them, she sang. Every line breathed the con-
fidence which I used to see in her face ; and with
all this a mass of grammatical mistakes and
hardly a single stop.
Scarce six months passed before I received a
highly poetical enthusiastic letter, beginning,
" I have fallen in love." She enclosed a photo-
graph of a young man with a clean-shaven face,
in a broad-brimmed hat, with a plaid thrown
over his shoulders. The next letters were just
as splendid, but stops already began to appear
and the grammatical mistakes to vanish. They
had a strong masculine scent. Katy began to
write about what a good thing it would be to
build a big theatre somewhere in the Volga, but
on a cooperative basis, and to attract the rich
business-men and shipowners to the under-
taking. There would be plenty of money, huge
receipts, and the actors would work in partner-
ship. . . . Perhaps all this is really a good thing,
D 2
44 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
but I can't help thinking such schemes could only
come from a man's head.
Anyhow for eighteen months or a couple of
years everything seemed to be all right. Katy
was in love, had her heart in her business and
was happy. But later on I began to notice clear
symptoms of a decline in her letters. It began
with Katy complaining about her friends.
This is the first and most ominous sign. If a
young scholar or litterateur begins his career
by complaining bitterly about other scholars
or litterateurs, it means that he is tired already
and not fit for his business. Katy wrote to me
that her friends would not come to rehearsals
and never knew their parts ; that they showed
an utter contempt for the public in the absurd
plays they staged and the manner they behaved.
To swell the box-office receipts the only topic
of conversation serious actresses degrade them-
selves by singing sentimentalities, and tragic
actors sing music-hall songs, laughing at husbands
who are deceived and unfaithful wives who are
pregnant. In short, it was amazing that the
profession, in the provinces, was not absolutely
dead. The marvel was that it could exist at all
with such thin, rotten blood in its veins.
In reply I sent Katy a long and, I confess, a
very tedious letter. Among other things I
wrote : "I used to talk fairly often to actors
in the past, men of the noblest character, who
honoured me with their friendship. From my
conversations with them I understood that their
A TEDIOUS STORY 45
activities were guided rather by the whim and
fashion of society than by the free working of
their own minds. The best of them in their
lifetime had to play in tragedy, in musical
comedy, in French farce, and in pantomime ;
yet all through they considered that they were
treading the right path and being useful. You
see that this means that you must look for the
cause of the evil, not in the actors, but deeper
down, in the art itself and the attitude of society
towards it." This letter of mine only made
Katy cross. " You and I are playing in different
operas. I didn't write to you about men of the
noblest character, but about a lot of sharks who
haven't a spark of nobility in them. They are a
horde of savages who came on the stage only
because they wouldn't be allowed anywhere else.
The only ground they have for calling themselves
artists is their impudence. Not a single talent
among them, but any number of incapables,
drunkards, intriguers, and slanderers. I can't
tell you how bitterly I feel it that the art I love
so much is fallen into the hands of people I
despise. It hurts me that the best men should
be content to look at evil from a distance and
not want to come nearer. Instead of taking an
active part, they write ponderous platitudes
and useless sermons. . . ." and more in the same
strain.
A little while after I received the following :
" I have been inhumanly deceived. I can't
go on living any more. Do as you think fit
46 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
with my money. I loved you as a father and as
my only friend. Forgive me."
So it appeared that he too belonged to the
horde of savages. Later on, I gathered from
various hints, that there was an attempt at
suicide. Apparently, Katy tried to poison
herself. I think she must have been seriously
ill afterwards, for I got the following letter from
Yalta, where most probably the doctors had
sent her. Her last letter to me contained a
request that I should send her at Yalta a thousand
roubles, and it ended with the words : " For-
give me for writing such a sad letter. I buried
my baby yesterday." After she had spent
about a year in the Crimea she returned home.
She had been travelling for about four years,
and during these four years I confess that I
occupied a strange and unenviable position in
regard to her. When she announced to me that
she was going on to the stage and afterwards
wrote to me about her love ; when the desire to
spend took hold of her, as it did periodically,
and I had to send her every now and then one
or two thousand roubles at her request ; when
she wrote that she intended to die, and after-
wards that her baby was dead, I was at a loss
every time. All my sympathy with her fate
consisted in thinking hard and writing long
tedious letters which might as well never have
been written. But then I was in loco parentis
and I loved her as a daughter.
Katy lives half a mile away from me now.
A TEDIOUS STORY 47
She took a five-roomed house and furnished it
comfortably, with the taste that was born in her.
If anyone were to undertake to depict her
surroundings, then the dominating mood of the
picture would be indolence. Soft cushions, soft
chairs for her indolent body ; carpets for her
indolent feet ; faded, dim, dull colours for her
indolent eyes ; for her indolent soul, a heap of
cheap fans and tiny pictures on the walls,
pictures in which novelty of execution was more
noticeable than content ; plenty of little tables
and stands, set out with perfectly useless and
worthless things, shapeless scraps instead of
curtains. ... All this, combined with a horror
of bright colours, of symmetry, and space, be-
tokened a perversion of the natural taste as well
as indolence of the soul. For whole days Katy
lies on the sofa and reads books, mostly novels
and stories. She goes outside her house but
once in the day, to come and see me.
I work. Katy sits on the sofa at my side.
She is silent, and wraps herself up in her shawl
as though she were cold. Either because she is
sympathetic to me, or I because I had got used
to her continual visits while she was still a little
girl, her presence does not prevent me from
concentrating on my work. At long intervals
I ask her some question or other, mechanically,
and she answers very curtly ; or, for a moment's
rest, I turn towards her and watch how she is
absorbed in looking through some medical review
or newspaper. And then I see that the old
48 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
expression of confidence in her face is there no
more. Her expression now is cold, indifferent,
distracted, like that of a passenger who has to
wait a long while for his train. She dresses as
she used well and simply, but carelessly.
Evidently her clothes and her hair suffer not a
little from the sofas and hammocks on which
she lies for days together. And she is not
curious any more. She doesn't ask me ques-
tions any more, as if she had experienced every-
thing in life and did not expect to hear anything
new.
About four o'clock there is a sound of move-
ment in the hall and the drawing-room. It's
Liza come back from the Conservatoire, bringing
her friends with her. You can hear them play-
ing the piano, trying their voices and giggling.
Yegor is laying the table in the dining-room and
making a noise with the plates.
" Good-bye," says Katy. " I shan't go in to
see your people. They must excuse me. I
haven't time. Come and see me."
When I escort her into the hall, she looks me
over sternly from head to foot, and says in
vexation :
" You get thinner and thinner. Why don't
you take a cure ? I'll go to Sergius Fiodoro-
vich and ask him to come. You must let him
see you."
" It's not necessary, Katy."
" I can't understand why your family does
nothing. They're a nice lot."
A TEDIOUS STORY 49
She puts on her jacket with her rush. In-
evitably, two or three hair-pins fall out of her
careless hair on to the floor. It's too much
bother to tidy her hair now ; besides she is in a
hurry. She pushes the straggling strands of
hair untidily under her hat and goes away.
As soon as I come into the dining-room, my
wife asks :
" Was that Katy with you just now ? Why
didn't she come to see us. It really is extra-
ordinary. . . ."
" Mamma ! " says Liza reproachfully, " If
she doesn't want to come, that's her affair.
There's no need for us to go on our knees."
" Very well ; but it's insulting. To sit in the
study for three hours, without thinking of us.
But she can do as she likes."
Varya and Liza both hate Katy. This hatred
is unintelligible to me ; probably you have to be
a woman to understand it. I'll bet my life on
it that you'll hardly find a single one among the
hundred and fifty young men I see almost every
day in my audience, or the hundred old ones I
happen to meet every week, who would be able
to understand why women hate and abhor Katy's
past, her being pregnant and unmarried and her
illegitimate child. Yet at the same time I
cannot bring to mind a single woman or girl of
my acquaintance who would not cherish such
feelings, either consciously or instinctively. And
it's not because women are purer and more
virtuous than men. If virtue and purity are
50 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
not free from evil feeling, there's precious little
difference between them and vice. I explain it
simply by the backward state of women's develop-
ment. The sorrowful sense of compassion and
the torment of conscience, which the modern
man experiences when he sees distress have
much more to tell me about culture and moral
development than have hatred and repulsion.
The modern woman is as lachrymose and as
coarse in heart as she was in the middle ages.
And in my opinion those who advise her to be
educated like a man have wisdom on their side.
But still my wife does not like Katy, because
she was an actress, and for her ingratitude, her
pride, her extravagances, and all the innumerable
vices one woman can always discover in another.
Besides myself and my family we have two
or three of my daughter's girl friends to dinner
and Alexander Adolphovich Gnekker, Liza's
admirer and suitor. He is a fair young man,
not more than thirty years old, of middle height,
very fat, broad shouldered, with reddish hair
round his ears and a little stained moustache,
which give his smooth chubby face the look of
a doll's. He wears a very short jacket, a fancy
waistcoat, large-striped trousers, very full on
the hip and very narrow in the leg, and brown
boots without heels. His eyes stick out like a
lobster's, his tie is like a lobster's tail, and I can't
help thinking even that the smell of lobster
soup clings about the whole of this young man.
He visits us every day ; but no one in the family
A TEDIOUS STORY 51
knows where he comes from, where he was
educated, or how he lives. He cannot play or
sing, but he has a certain connection with music
as well as singing, for he is agent for somebody's
pianos, and is often at the Academy. He knows
all the celebrities, and he manages concerts.
He gives his opinion on music with great autho-
rity and I have noticed that everybody hastens
to agree with him.
Rich men always have parasites about them.
So do the sciences and the arts. It seems that
there is no science or art in existence, which is
free from such " foreign bodies " as this Mr.
Gnekker. I am not a musician and perhaps I
am mistaken about Gnekker, besides I don't
know him very well. But I can't help suspect-
ing the authority and dignity with which he
stands beside the piano and listens when anyone
is singing or playing.
You may be a gentleman and a privy councillor
a hundred times over ; but if you have a daughter
you can't be guaranteed against the pettinesses
that are so often brought into your house and into
your own humour, by courtings, engagements,
and weddings. For instance, I cannot reconcile
myself to my wife's solemn expression every
time Gnekker comes to our house, nor to those
bottles of Chateau Lafitte, port, and sherry
which are put on the table only for him, to
convince him beyond doubt of the generous
luxury in which we live. Nor can I stomach
the staccato laughter which Liza learned at
52 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
the Academy, and her way of screwing up her
eyes, when men are about the house. Above all,
I can't understand why it is that such a creature
should come to me every day and have dinner
with me a creature perfectly foreign to my
habits, my science, and the whole tenour of my
life, a creature absolutely unlike the men I love.
My wife and the servants whisper mysteriously
that that is " the bridegroom," but still I can't
understand why he's there. It disturbs my
mind just as much as if a Zulu were put next to
me at table. Besides, it seems strange to me that
my daughter whom I used to think of as a baby
should be in love with that necktie, those eyes,
those chubby cheeks.
Formerly, I either enjoyed my dinner or was
indifferent about it. Now it does nothing but
bore and exasperate me. Since I was made
an Excellency and Dean of the Faculty, for some
reason or other my family found it necessary
to make a thorough change in our menu and the
dinner arrangements. Instead of the simple
food I was used to as a student and a doctor,
I am now fed on potage-pur6e, with some
sossoulki swimming about in it, and kidneys in
Madeira. The title of General and my renown
have robbed me for ever of schi and savoury
pies, and roast goose with apple sauce, and
bream with kasha. They robbed me as well of
my maid servant Agasha, a funny, talkative old
woman, instead of whom I am now waited on
by Yegor, a stupid, conceited fellow who always
A TEDIOUS STORY 53
has a white glove in his right hand. The in-
tervals between the courses are short, but they
seem terribly long. There is nothing to fill
them. We don't have any more of the old
good-humour, the familiar conversations, the
jokes and the laughter ; no more mutual endear-
ments, or the gaiety that used to animate my
children, my wife, and myself when we met at the
dinner table. For a busy man like me dinner was
a time to rest and meet my friends, and a feast
for my wife and children, not a very long feast,
to be sure, but a gay and happy one, for they
knew that for half an hour I did not belong to
science and my students, but solely to them and
to no one else. No more chance of getting tipsy
on a single glass of wine, no more Agasha, no
more bream with kasha, no more the old uproar
to welcome our little contretemps at dinner, when
the cat fought the dog under the table, or
Katy's head-band fell down her cheek into her
soup.
Our dinner nowadays is as nasty to describe
as to eat. On my wife's face there is pompous-
ness, an assumed gravity, and the usual anxiety.
She eyes our plates nervously : "I see you don't
like the meat ? . . . Honestly, don't you like
it ? " And I must answer, " Don't worry, my dear.
The meat is very good." She : " You're always
taking my part, Nicolai Stiepanich. You never
tell the truth. Why has Alexander Adolpho-
vich eaten so little ? " and the same sort of
conversation for the whole of dinner. Liza
54 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
laughs staccato and screws up her eyes. I
look at both of them, and at this moment at
dinner here I can see quite clearly that their
inner lives have slipped out of my observation
long ago. I feel as though once upon a time I
lived at home with a real family, but now I am
dining as a guest with an unreal wife and looking
at an unreal Liza. There has been an utter
change in both of them, while I have lost sight
of the long process that led up to the change.
No wonder I don't understand anything. What
was the reason of the change ? I don't know.
Perhaps the only trouble is that God did not give
my wife and daughter the strength He gave me.
From my childhood I have been accustomed to
resist outside influences and have been hardened
enough. Such earthly catastrophes as fame,
being made General, the change from comfort
to living above my means, acquaintance with
high society, have scarcely touched me. I have
survived safe and sound. But it all fell
down like an avalanche on my weak, un-
hardened wife and Liza, and crushed them.
Gnekker and the girls talk of fugues and
counter-fugues ; singers and pianists, Bach and
Brahms, and my wife, frightened of being suspected
of musical ignorance, smiles sympathetically and
murmurs : " Wonderful ... Is it possible ? . . .
Why? ..." Gnekker eats steadily, jokes gravely,
and listens condescendingly to the ladies' re-
marks. Now and then he has the desire to talk
bad French, and then he finds it necessary for
A TEDIOUS STORY 55
some unknown reason to address me magnifi-
cently, " Votre Excellence."
And I am morose. Apparently I embarrass
them all and they embarrass me. I never had
any intimate acquaintance with class antagonism
before, but now something of the kind torments
me indeed. I try to find only bad traits in
Gnekker. It does not take long and then I am
tormented because one of my friends has not
taken his place as bridegroom. In another way
too his presence has a bad effect upon me.
Usually, when I am left alone with myself or
when I am in the company of people I love, I
never think of my merits ; and if I begin to
think about them they seem as trivial as though
I had become a scholar only yesterday. But
in the presence of a man like Gnekker my merits
appear to me like an extremely high mountain,
whose summit is lost in the clouds, while Gnekkers
move about the foot, so small as hardly to be
seen.
After dinner I go up to my study and light
my little pipe, the only one during the whole
day, the sole survivor of my old habit of smoking
from morning to night. My wife comes into
me while I am smoking and sits down to speak
to me. Just as in the morning, I know before-
hand what the conversation will be.
" We ought to talk seriously, Nicolai Stiepano-
vich," she begins. " I mean about Liza.
Why won't you attend ? "
" Attend to what ? "
56 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" You pretend you don't notice anything.
It's not right. It's not right to be unconcerned.
Gnekker has intentions about Liza. What do
you say to that ? "
" I can't say he's a bad man, because I don't
know him ; but I've told you a thousand times
already that I don't like him."
" But that's impossible . . . impossible. . . ."
She rises and walks about in agitation.
" It's impossible to have such an attitude to
a serious matter," she says. " When our
daughter's happiness is concerned, we must put
everything personal aside. I know you don't
like him. . . . Very well. . . . But if we refuse
him now and upset everything, how can you
guarantee that Liza won't have a grievance
against us for the rest of her life ? Heaven knows
there aren't many young men nowadays. It's
quite likely there won't be another chance. He
loves Liza very much and she likes him, evidently.
Of course he hasn't a settled position. But
what is there to do ? Please God, he'll get a
position in time. He comes of a good family,
and he's rich."
" How did you find that out ? "
" He said so himself. His father has a big
house in Kharkov and an estate outside. You
must certainly go to Kharkov "
" Why ? "
" You'll find out there. You have acquaint-
ances among the professors there. I'd go
myself. But I'm a woman. I can't."
A TEDIOUS STORY 57
" I will not go to Kharkov," I say morosely.
My wife gets frightened ; a tormented ex-
pression comes over her face.
" For God's sake, Nicolai Stiepanich," she
implores, sobbing, " For God's sake help me
with this burden ! It hurts me."
It is painful to look at her.
" Very well, Varya," I say kindly, " If you
like very well I'll go to Kharkov, and do every-
thing you want."
She puts her handkerchief to her eyes and goes
to cry in her room. I am left alone.
A little later they bring in the lamp. The
familiar shadows that have wearied me for years
fall from the chairs and the lamp-shade on to
the walls and the floor. When I look at them
it seems that it's night already, and the cursed
insomnia has begun. I lie down on the bed ;
then I get up and walk about the room ; then
lie down again. My nervous excitement gener-
ally reaches its highest after dinner, before the
evening. For no reason I begin to cry and hide
my head in the pillow. All the while I am afraid
somebody may come in ; I am afraid I shall die
suddenly ; I am ashamed of my tears ; alto-
gether, something intolerable is happening in my
soul. I feel I cannot look at the lamp or the
books or the shadows on the floor, or listen to the
voices in the drawing-room any more. Some
invisible, mysterious force pushes me rudely
out of my house. I jump up, dress hurriedly,
and go cautiously out into the street so that the
E
58 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
household shall not notice me. Where shall I
go ?
The answer to this question has long been there
in my brain : "To Katy."
Ill
As usual she is lying on the Turkish divan or
the couch and reading something. Seeing me
she lifts her head languidly, sits down, and gives
me her hand.
" You are always lying down like that," I say
after a reposeful silence. "It's unhealthy.
You'd far better be doing something."
" Ah ? "
" You'd far better be doing something, I
say."
" What ? . . . A woman can be either a simple
worker or an actress."
" Well, then if you can't become a worker, be
an actress.'
She is silent.
" You had better marry," I say, half -joking.
" There's no one to marry : and no use if I
did."
" You can't go on living like this."
" Without a husband ? As if that mattered.
There are as many men as you like, if you only
had the will."
" This isn't right, Katy."
" What isn't right ? "
A TEDIOUS STORY 59
" What you said just now."
Katy sees that I am chagrined, and desires to
soften the bad impression.
" Come. Let's come here. Here."
She leads me into a small room, very cosy,
and points to the writing table.
" There. I made it for you. You'll work
here. Come every day and bring your work
with you. They only disturb you there at
home. . . . Will you work here ? Would you
like to ? "
In order not to hurt her by refusing, I answer
that I shall work with her and that I like the
room immensely. Then we both sit down in
the cosy room and begin to talk.
The warmth, the cosy surroundings, the
presence of a sympathetic being, rouses in me now
not a feeling of pleasure as it used but a strong
desire to complain and grumble. Anyhow it
seems to me that if I moan and complain I shall
feel better.
" It's a bad business, my dear," I begin with
a sigh. " Very bad."
" What is the matter ? "
" I'll tell you what is the matter. The best
and most sacred right of kings is the right to
pardon. And I have always felt myself a king
so long as I used this right prodigally. I never
judged, I was compassionate, I pardoned every-
one right and left. Where others protested
and revolted I only advised and persuaded. All
my life I've tried to make my society tolerable
E 2
60 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
to the family of students, friends and servanti.
And this attitude of mine towards people, I
know, educated every one who came into contact
with me. But now I am king no more. There's
something going on in me which belongs only
to slaves. Day and night evil thoughts roam
about in my head, and feelings which I never
knew before have made their home in my soul.
I hate and despise ; I'm exasperated, disturbed,
and afraid. I've become strict beyond measure,
exacting, unkind, and suspicious. Even the
things which in the past gave me the chance of
making an extra pun, now bring me a feeling
of oppression. My logic has changed too. I
used to despise money alone ; now I cherish
evil feelings, not to money, but to the rich, as if
they were guilty. I used to hate violence and
arbitrariness ; now I hate the people who employ
violence, as if they alone are to blame and not
all of us, who cannot educate one another.
What does it all mean ? If my new thoughts
and feelings come from a change of my con-
victions, where could the change have come
from ? Has the world grown worse and I
better, or was I blind and indifferent before ?
But if the change is due to the general decline
of my physical and mental powers I am sick
and losing weight every day then I'm in a
pitiable position. It means that my new thoughts
are abnormal and unhealthy, that I must be
ashamed of them and consider them valueless. . ."
" Sickness hasn't anything to do with it,"
A TEDIOUS STORY 61
Katy interrupts. " Your eyes are opened
that's all. You've begun to notice things you
didn't want to notice before for some reason.
My opinion is that you must break with your
family finally first of all and then go away."
" You're talking nonsense."
" You don't love them any more. Then,
why do you behave unfairly ? And is it a
family ! Mere nobodies. If they died to-day,
no one would notice their absence to-morrow."
Katy despises my wife and daughter as much
as they hate her. It's scarcely possible nowadays
to speak of the right of people to despise one
another. But if you accept Katy's point of
view and own that such a right exists, you will
notice that she has the same right to despise
my wife and Liza as they have to hate her.
" Mere nobodies ! " she repeats. " Did you
have any dinner to-day ? It's a wonder they
didn't forget to tell you dinner was ready. I
don't know how they still remember that you
exist."
" Katy ! " I say sternly. " Please be quiet."
" You don't think it's fun for me to talk
about them, do you ? I wish I didn't know
them at all. You listen to me, dear. Leave
everything and go away : go abroad the
quicker, the better."
" What nonsense ! What about the Uni-
versity ? "
" And the University, too. What is it to
62 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
lecturing for thirty years, and where are your
pupils ? Have you many famous scholars? Count
them up. But to increase the number of doctors
who exploit the general ignorance and make
hundreds of thousands, there's no need to be a
good and gifted man. You aren't wanted."
" My God, how bitter you are ! " I get
terrified. " How bitter you are. Be quiet,
or I'll go away. I can't reply to the bitter
things you say."
The maid enters and calls us to tea. Thank
God, our conversation changes round the
samovar. I have made my moan, and now I
want to indulge another senile weakness remi-
niscences. I tell Katy about my past, to my
great surprise with details that I never suspected
I had kept safe in my memory. And she listens
to me with emotion, with pride, holding her
breath. I like particularly to tell how I once
was a student at a seminary and how I dreamed
of entering the University.
" I used to walk in the seminary garden," I
tell her, " and the wind would bring the sound
of a song and the thrumming of an accordion
from a distant tavern, or a troika with bells
would pass quickly by the seminary fence. That
would be quite enough to fill not only my breast
with a sense of happiness, but my stomach,
legs, and hands. As I heard the sound of the
accordion or the bells fading away, I would see
myself a doctor and paint pictures, one more
glorious than another. And, you see, my
A TEDIOUS STORY 63
dreams came true. There were more things
I dared to dream of. I have been a favourite
professor thirty years, I have had excellent
friends and an honourable reputation. I loved
and married when I was passionately in love.
I had children. Altogether, when I look back
the whole of my life seems like a nice, clever
composition. The only thing I have to do now
is not to spoil the finale. For this, I must die
like a man. If death is really a danger then I
must meet it as becomes a teacher, a scholar,
and a citizen of a Christian State. But I am
spoiling the finale. I am drowning, and I run to
you and beg for help, and you say : ' Drown.
It's your duty.' "
At this point a ring at the bell sounds in
the hall. Katy and I both recognise it and
say:
" That must be Mikhail Fiodorovich."
And indeed in a minute Mikhail Fiodorovich,
my colleague, the philologist, enters. He is a
tall, well-built man about fifty years old, clean
shaven, with thick grey hair and black eyebrows.
He is a good man and an admirable friend. He
belongs to an old aristocratic family, a prosper-
ous and gifted house which has played a notable
role in the history of our literature and education.
He himself is clever, gifted, and highly educated,
but not without his eccentricities. To a certain
extent we are all eccentric, queer fellows, but
his eccentricities have an element of the excep-
tional, not quite safe for his friends. Among
64 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
the latter I know not a few who cannot see his
many merits clearly because of his eccentricities.
As he walks in he slowly removes his gloves
and says in his velvety bass :
" How do you do ? Drinking tea. Just in
time. It's hellishly cold."
Then he sits down at the table, takes a glass
of tea and immediately begins to talk. What
chiefly marks his way of talking is his invariably
ironical tone, a mixture of philosophy and jest,
like Shakespeare's grave-diggers. He always
talks of serious matters ; but never seriously.
His opinions are always acid and provocative,
but thanks to his tender, easy, jesting tone, it
somehow happens that his acidity and provo-
cativeness don't tire one's ears, and one very
soon gets used to it. Every evening he brings
along some half-dozen stories of the university
life and generally begins with them when he sits
down at the table.
" O Lord," he sighs with an amusing move-
ment of his black eyebrows, " there are some
funny people in the world."
" Who ? " asks Katy.
" I was coming down after my lecture to-day
and I met that old idiot N on the stairs.
He walks along, as usual pushing out that horse
jowl of his, looking for some one to bewail his
headaches, his wife, and his students, who won't
come to his lectures. * Well,' I think to my-
self, ' he's seen me. It's all up no hope for
me . . . ' "
A TEDIOUS STORY 65
And so on in the same strain. Or he begins
like this,
" Yesterday I was at Z's public lecture. Tell
it not in Gath, but I do wonder how our alma
mater dares to show the public such an ass,
such a double-dyed blockhead as Z. Why he's
a European fool. Good Lord, you won't find
one like him in all Europe not even if you looked
in daytime, and with a lantern. Imagine it :
he lectures as though he were sucking a stick of
barley-sugar su su su. He gets a fright
because he can't make out his manuscript. His
little thoughts will only just keep moving,
hardly moving, like a bishop riding a bicycle.
Above all you can't make out a word he says.
The flies die of boredom, it's so terrific. It can
only be compared with the boredom in the
great Hall at the Commemoration, when the
traditional speech is made. To hell with it ! "
Immediately an abrupt change of subject.
" I had to make the speech ; three years ago.
Nicolai Stiepanovich will remember. It was
hot, close. My full uniform was tight under my
arms, tight as death. I read for half an hour,
an hour, an hour and a half, two hours. ' Well,'
I thought, * thank God I've only ten pages left.'
And I had four pages of peroration that I
needn't read at all. ' Only six pages then,' I
thought. Imagine it. I just gave a glance in
front of me and saw sitting next to each other in
the front row a general with a broad ribbon and
a bishop. The poor devils were bored stiff. They
66 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
were staring about madly to stop themselves
from going to steep. For all that they are still
trying to look attentive, to make some appear-
ance of understanding what I'm reading, and
look as though they like it. ' Well,' I thought,
* if you like it, then you shall have it. I'll spite
you.' So I set to and read the four pages,
every word."
When he speaks only his eyes and eyebrows
smile as it is generally with the ironical. At such
moments there is no hatred or malice in his
eyes but a great deal of acuteness and that
peculiar fox-cunning which you can catch only
in very observant people. Further, about his
eyes I have noticed one more peculiarity. When
he takes his glass from Katy, or listens to her
remarks, or follows her with a glance as she goes
out of the room for a little while, then I catch
in his look something humble, prayerful,
pure. . . .
The maid takes the samovar away and puts
on the table a big piece of cheese, some fruit,
and a bottle of Crimean champagne, a thoroughly
bad wine which Katy got to like when she lived
in the Crimea. Mikhail Fiodorovich takes two
packs of cards from the shelves and sets them
out for patience. If one may believe his assur-
ances, some games of patience demand a great
power of combination and concentration. Never-
theless while he sets out the cards he amuses
himself by talking continually. Katy follows his
cards carefully, helping him more by mimicry
A TEDIOUS STORY 67
than words. In the whole evening she drinks
no more than two small glasses of wine, I drink
only a quarter of a glass, the remainder of the
bottle falls to Mikhail Fiodorovich, who can
drink any amount without ever getting drunk.
During patience we solve all kinds of questions,
mostly of the lofty order, and our dearest love,
science, comes off second best.
" Science, thank God, has had her day," says
Mikhail Fiodorovich very slowly. " She has
had her swan-song. Ye-es. Mankind has begun
to feel the desire to replace her by something
else. She was grown from the soil of prejudice,
fed by prejudices, and is now the same quin-
tessence of prejudices as were her bygone grand-
mothers : alchemy, metaphysics and philosophy.
As between European scholars and the Chinese
who have no sciences at all the difference is
merely trifling, a matter only of externals.
The Chinese had no scientific knowledge, but
what have they lost by that ? "
" Flies haven't any scientific knowledge
either," I say ; " but what does that prove ? "
" It's no use getting angry, Nicolai Stiepanich.
I say this only between ourselves. I'm more
cautious than you think. I shan't proclaim it
from the housetops, God forbid ! The masses
still keep alive a prejudice that science and art
are superior to agriculture and commerce,
superior to crafts. Our persuasion makes a
living from this prejudice. It's not for you
and me to destroy it. God forbid | "
68 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
During patience the younger generation also
comes in for it.
" Our public is degenerate nowadays," Mikhail
Fiodorovich sighs. " I don't speak of ideals and
such things, I only ask that they should be able
to work and think decently. ' Sadly I look at
the men of our time ' it's quite true in this
connection."
" Yes, they're frightfully degenerate," Katy
agrees. " Tell me, had you one single eminent
person under you during the last five or ten
years ? "
" I don't know how it is with the other
professors, but somehow I don't recollect that
it ever happened to me."
" In my lifetime I've seen a great many of
your students and young scholars, a great many
actors. . . . What happened ? I never once
had the luck to meet, not a hero or a man of
talent, but an ordinarily interesting person.
Everything's dull and incapable, swollen and
pretentious. . . ."
All these conversations about degeneracy give
me always the impression that I have unwit-
tingly overheard an unpleasant conversation
about my daughter. I feel offended because the
indictments are made wholesale and are based
upon such ancient hackneyed commonplaces
and such penny- dreadful notions as degeneracy,
lack of ideals, or comparisons with the glorious
past. Any indictment, even if it's made in a
company of ladies, should be formulated with
A TEDIOUS STORY 69
all possible precision ; otherwise it isn't an
indictment, but an empty calumny, unworthy
of decent people.
I am an old man, and have served for the
last thirty years ; but I don't see any sign
either of degeneracy or the lack of ideals.
I don't find it any worse now than before.
My porter, Nicolas, whose experience in this
case has its value, says that students nowadays
are neither better nor worse than their pre-
decessors.
If I were asked what was the thing I did not
like about my present pupils, I wouldn't say
offhand or answer at length, but with a certain
precision. I know their defects and there's no
need for me to take refuge in a mist of common-
places. I don't like the way they smoke, and
drink spirits, and marry late ; or the way they
are careless and indifferent to the point of allow-
ing students to go hungry in their midst, and not
paying their debts into " The Students' Aid
Society." They are ignorant of modern lan-
guages and express themselves incorrectly in
Russian. Only yesterday my colleague, the
hygienist, complained to me that he had to
lecture twice as often because of their in-
competent knowledge of physics and their
complete ignorance of meteorology. They are
readily influenced by the most modern writers,
and some of those not the best, but they are
absolutely indifferent to classics like Shakespeare,
Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus and Pascal ; and
70 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
their worldly unpractically shows itself mostly
in their inability to distinguish between great
and small. They solve all difficult questions
which have a more or less social character
(emigration, for instance) by getting up sub-
scriptions, but not by the method of scientific
investigation and experiment, though this is at
their full disposal, and, above all, corresponds
to their vocation. They readily become house-
doctors, assistant house-doctors, clinical assis-
tants, or consulting doctors, and they are pre-
pared to keep these positions until they are
forty, though independence, a sense of freedom,
and personal initiative are quite as necessary in
science, as, for instance, in art or commerce.
I have pupils and listeners, but I have no
helpers or successors. Therefore I love them
and am concerned for them, but I'm not proud
of them . . . and so on.
However great the number of such defects
may be, it's only in a cowardly and timid person
that they give rise to pessimism and distraction.
All of them are by nature accidental and transi-
tory, and are completely dependent on the
conditions of life. Ten years will be enough for
them to disappear or give place to new and
different defects, which are quite indispensable,
but will in their turn give the timid a fright.
Students' shortcomings often annoy me, but the
annoyance is nothing in comparison with the
joy I have had these thirty years in speaking
with my pupils, lecturing to them, studying their
A TEDIOUS STORY 71
relations and comparing them with people of
a different class.
Mikhail Fiodorovich is a slanderer. Katy
listens and neither of them notices how deep is
the pit into which they are drawn by such an
outwardly innocuous recreation as condemning
one's neighbours. They don't realise how a
simple conversation gradually turns into mockery
and derision, or how they both begin even to
employ the manners of calumny.
" There are some queer types to be found,"
says Mikhail Fiodorovich. " Yesterday I went
to see our friend Yegor Pietrovich. There I
found a student, one of your medicos, a third-
year man, I think. His face . . . rather in the
style of Dobroliubov the stamp of profound
thought on his brow. We began to talk. ' My
dear fellow an extraordinary business. I've
just read that some German or other can't
remember his name has extracted a new
alkaloid from the human brain idiotine.'
Do you know he really believed it, and pro-
duced an expression of respect on his face,
as much as to say, ' See, what a power we
are.' "
" The other day I went to the theatre. I sat
down. Just in front of me in the next row two
people were sitting : one, ' one of the chosen,'
evidently a law student, the other a whiskery
medico. The medico was as drunk as a cobbler.
Not an atom of attention to the stage. Dozing
and nodding. But the moment some actor
72 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
began to deliver a loud monologue, or just raised
his voice, my medico thrills, digs his neighbour
in the ribs. ' What's he say ? Something
no ble ? ' ' Noble,' answers * the chosen.'
' Brrravo ! ' bawls the medico. ' No ble.
Bravo.' You see the drunken blockhead didn't
come to the theatre for art, but for something
noble. He wants nobility."
Katy listens and laughs. Her laugh is rather
strange. She breathes out in swift, rhythmic,
and regular alternation with her inward breath-
ing. It's as though she were playing an accor-
dion. Of her face, only her nostrils laugh. My
heart fails me. I don't know what to say. I
lose my temper, crimson, jump up from my seat
and cry :
" Be quiet, won't you ? Why do you sit here
like two toads, poisoning the air with your
breath ? I've had enough."
In vain I wait for them to stop their slanders.
I prepare to go home. And it's time, too.
Past ten o'clock.
"I'll sit here a little longer," says Mikhail
Fiodorovich, " if you give me leave, Ekaterina
Vladimir ovna ? "
" You have my leave," Katy answers.
" Bene. In that case, order another bottle,
please."
Together they escort me to the hall with
candles in their hands. While I'm putting on
my overcoat, Mikhail Fiodorovich says :
" You've grown terribly thin and old lately.
A TEDIOUS STORY 73
Nicolai Stiepanovich. What's the matter with
you? 111?
" Yes, a little."
" And he will not look after himself," Katy
puts in sternly.
" Why don't you look after yourself ? How
can you go on like this ? God helps those who
help themselves, my dear man. Give my regards
to your family and make my excuses for not
coming. One of these days, before I go abroad,
I'll come to say good-bye. Without fail. I'm
off next week."
I came away from Katy's irritated, frightened
by the talk about my illness and discontented
with myself. " And why," I ask myself,
" shouldn't I be attended by one of my col-
leagues ? " Instantly I see how my friend, after
sounding me, will go to the window silently,
think a little while, turn towards me and say,
indifferently, trying to prevent me from reading
the truth in his face : " At the moment I don't
see anything particular ; but still, cher confrere,
I would advise you to break off your work ..."
And that will take my last hope away.
Who doesn't have hopes ? Nowadays, when
I diagnose and treat myself, I sometimes hope
that my ignorance deceives me, that I am mis-
taken about the albumen and sugar which I
find, as well as about my heart, and also about
the anasarca which I have noticed twice in
the morning. While I read over the therapeutic
text-books again with the eagerness of a hypo-
F
74 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
chondriac, and change the prescriptions every
day, I still believe that I will come across some-
thing hopeful. How trivial it all is !
Whether the sky is cloudy all over or the moon
and stars are shining in it, every time I come back
home I look at it and think that death will take
me soon. Surely at that moment my thoughts
should be as deep as the sky, as bright, as striking
. . but no ! I think of myself, of my wife,
Liza, Gnekker, the students, people in general.
My thoughts are not good, they are mean ; I
juggle with myself, and at this moment my atti-
tude towards life can be expressed in the words
the famous Arakheev wrote in one of his intimate
letters : " All good in the world is inseparably
linked to bad, and there is always more bad
than good." Which means that everything is
ugly, there's nothing to live for, and the sixty-
two years I have lived out must be counted as
lost. I surprise myself in these thoughts and
try to convince myself they are accidental iand
temporary and not deeply rooted in me, but I
think immediately :
" If that's true, why am I drawn every evening
to those two toads." And I swear to myself
never to go to Katy any more, though I know I
will go to her again to-morrow.
As I pull my door bell and go upstairs, I feel
already that I have no family and no desire to
return to it. It is plain my new, Arakheev
thoughts are not accidental or temporary in me,
but possess my whole being. With a bad con-
A TEDIOUS STORY 75
science, dull, indolent, hardly able to move my
limbs, as though I had a ten ton weight upon me,
I lie down in my bed and soon fall asleep.
And then insomnia.
IV
The summer comes and life changes.
One fine morning Liza comes in to me and says
in a joking tone :
" Come, Your Excellency. It's all ready."
They lead My Excellency into the street, put
me into a cab and drive me away. For want of
occupation I read the signboards backwards
as I go. The word "Tavern" becomes "Nrevat."
That would do for a baron's name : Baroness
Nrevat. Beyond, I drive across the field by the
cemetery, which produces no impression upon
me whatever, though I'll soon lie there. After a
two hours' drive, My Excellency is led into the
ground-floor of the bungalow, and put into a
small, lively room with a light-blue paper.
Insomnia at night as before, but I am no more
wakeful in the morning and don't listen to my
wife, but lie in bed. I don't sleep, but I am in
a sleepy state, half-forgetfulness, when you know
you are not asleep, but have dreams. I get up
in the afternoon, and sit down at the table by
force of habit, but now I don't work any more
but amuse myself with French yellow-backs
sent me by Katy. Of course it would be more
F 2
76 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
patriotic to read Russian authors, but to tell the
truth I'm not particularly disposed to them.
Leaving out two or three old ones, all the modern
literature doesn't seem to me to be literature
but a unique home industry which exists only
to be encouraged, but the goods are bought
with reluctance. The best of these home-
made goods can't be called remarkable and it's
impossible to praise it sincerely without a saving
" but " ; and the same must be said of all the
literary novelties I've read during the last ten
or fifteen years. Not one remarkable, and you
can't dispense with " but." They have clever-
ness, nobility, and no talent ; talent, nobility>
and no cleverness ; or finally, talent, cleverness,
but no nobility.
I would not say that French books have talent,
cleverness, and nobility. Nor do they satisfy me.
But they are not so boring as the Russian ; and
it is not rare to find in them the chief constituent
of creative genius the sense of personal freedom,
which is lacking to Russian authors. I do not
recall one single new book in which from the
very first page the author did not try to tie
himself up in all manner of conventions and
contracts with his conscience. One is frightened
to speak of the naked body, another is bound
hand and foot by psychological analysis, a
third must have " a kindly attitude to his fellow-
men," the fourth heaps up whole pages with
descriptions of nature on purpose to avoid any
suspicion of a tendency. . . . One desires to be
A TEDIOUS STORY 77
in his books a bourgeois at all costs, another at all
costs an aristocrat. Deliberation, cautiousness,
cunning : but no freedom, no courage to write as
one likes, and therefore no creative genius.
All this refers to belles-lettres, so-called.
As for serious articles in Russian, on sociology,
for instance, or art and so forth, I don't read
them, simply out of timidity. For some reason
in my childhood and youth I had a fear of porters
and theatre attendants, and this fear has re-
mained with me up till now. Even now I am
afraid of them. It is said that only that which
one cannot understand seems terrible. And in-
deed it is very difficult to understand why hall-
porters and theatre attendants are so pompous
and haughty and importantly polite. When I
read serious articles, I have exactly the same
indefinable fear. Their portentous gravity, their
playfulness, like an archbishop's, their over-
familiar attitude to foreign authors, their capa-
city for talking dignified nonsense " filling a
vacuum with emptiness " it is all inconceivable
to me and terrifying, and quite unlike the
modesty and the calm and gentlemanly tone to
which I am accustomed when reading our writers
on medicine and the natural sciences. Not only
articles ; I have difficulty also in reading trans-
lations even when they are edited by serious
Russians. The presumptuous benevolence of the
prefaces, the abundance of notes by the trans-
lator (which prevents one from concentrating),
the parenthetical queries and sics, which are so
78 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
liberally scattered over the book or the article
by the translator seem to me an assault on
the author's person, as well as on my independ-
ence as a reader.
Once I was invited as an expert to the High
Court. In the interval one of my fellow-experts
called my attention to the rude behaviour of
the public prosecutor to the prisoners, among
whom were two women intellectuals. I don't
think I exaggerated at all when I replied to my
colleague that he was not behaving more rudely
than authors of serious articles behave to one
another. Indeed their behaviour is so rude that
one speaks of them with bitterness. They be-
have to each other or to the writers whom they
criticise either with too much deference, careless
of their own dignity, or, on the other hand, they
treat them much worse than I have treated
Gnekker, my future son-in-law, in these notes
and thoughts of mine. Accusations of irresponsi-
bility, of impure intentions, of any kind of
crime even, are the usual adornment of serious
articles. And this, as our young medicos love
to say in their little articles quite ultima ratio.
Such an attitude must necessarily be reflected
in the character of the young generation of
writers, and therefore I'm not at all surprised
that in the new books which have been added
to our belles lettres in the last ten or fifteen years,
the heroes drink a great deal of vodka and the
heroines are not sufficiently chaste.
I read French books and look out of the
A TEDIOUS STORY 79
window, which is open I see the pointed
palings of my little garden, two or three skinny
trees, and there, beyond the garden, the road,
fields, then a wide strip of young pine-forest.
I often delight in watching a little boy and girl,
both white-haired and ragged, climb on the
garden fence and laugh at my baldness. In
their shining little eyes I read, "Come out,
thou baldhead." These are almost the only
people who don't care a bit about my reputation
or my title.
I don't have visitors everyday now. I'll
mention only the visits of Nicolas and Piotr
Ignatievich. Nicolas comes to me usually on
holidays, pretending to come on business, but
really to see me. He is very hilarious, a thing
which never happens to him in the winter.
" Well, what have you got to say ? " I ask
him, coming out into the passage.
" Your Excellency ! " he says, pressing his
hand to his heart and looking at me with a
lover's rapture. " Your Excellency ! So help
me God ! God strike me where I stand !
Gaudeamus igitur juvenestus."
And he kisses me eagerly on the shoulders,
on my sleeves, and buttons.
" Is everything all right over there ? " I ask.
" Your Excellency ! I swear to God ..."
He never stops swearing, quite unnecessarily,
and I soon get bored, and send him to the
kitchen, where they give him dinner. Piotr
Ignatievich also comes on holidays specially
80 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
to visit me and communicate his thoughts to
me. He usually sits by the table in my room,
modest, clean, judicious, without daring to cross
his legs or lean his elbows on the table, all the
while telling me in a quiet, even voice what he
considers very piquant items of news gathered
from journals and pamphlets.
These items are all alike and can be reduced
to the following type : A Frenchman made a
discovery. Another a German exposed him
by showing that this discovery had been made as
long ago as 1870 by some American. Then a
third also a German outwitted them both by
showing that both of them had been confused,
by taking spherules of air under a microscope for
dark pigment. Even when he wants to make
me laugh, Piotr Ignatievich tells his story at
great length, very much as though he were
defending a thesis, enumerating his literary
sources in detail, with every effort to avoid
mistakes in the dates, the particular number of
the journal and the names. Moreover, he does
not say Petit simply but inevitably, Jean
Jacques Petit. If he happens to stay to dinner,
he will tell the same sort of piquant stories and
drive all the company to despondency. If
Gnekker and Liza begin to speak of fugues and
counter-fugues in his presence he modestly
lowers his eyes, and his face falls. He is ashamed
that such trivialities should be spoken of in the
presence of such serious men as him and me.
In my present state of mind five minutes are
A TEDIOUS STORY 81
enough for him to bore me as though I had seen
and listened to him for a whole eternity. I hate
the poor man. I wither away beneath his quiet,
even voice and his bookish language. His
stories make me stupid. . . . He cherishes the
kindliest feelings towards me and talks to me only
to give me pleasure. I reward him by staring
at his face as if I wanted to hypnotise him, and
thinking " Go away. Go, go. . . ." But he
is proof against my mental suggestion and sits,
sits, sits. . . .
While he sits with me I cannot rid myself
of the idea : " When I die, it's quite possible
that he will be appointed in my place." Then
my poor audience appears to me as an oasis
where the stream has dried up, and I am unkind
to Piotr Ignatievich, and silent and morose as
if he were guilty of such thoughts and not I
myself. When he begins, as usual, to glorify
the German scholars, I no longer jest good-
naturedly, but murmur sternly :
" They're fools, your Germans ..."
It's like the late Professor Nikita Krylov when
he was bathing with Pirogov at Reval. He got
angry with the water, which was very cold, and
swore about " These scoundrelly Germans." I
behave badly to Piotr Ignatievich ; and it's
only when he is going away and I see through the
window his grey hat disappearing behind the
garden fence, that I want to call him back and
say : " Forgive me, my dear fellow."
The dinner goes yet more wearily than in
82 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
winter. The same Gnekker, whom I now hate
and despise, dines with me every day. Before, I
used to suffer his presence in silence, but now I
say biting things to him, which make my wife
and Liza blush. Carried away by an evil
feeling, I often say things that are merely
foolish, and don't know why I say them. Thus it
happened once that after looking at Gnekker
contemptuously for a long while, I suddenly
fired off, for no reason at all :
" Eagles than barnyard-fowls may lower
bend ;
But fowls shall never to the heav'ns ascend."
More's the pity that the fowl Gnekker shows
himself more clever than the eagle professor.
Knowing my wife and daughter are on his side
he maintains these tactics. He replies to my
shafts with a condescending silence (" The old
man's off his head. . . . What's the good of
talking to him ? "), or makes good-humoured
fun of me. It is amazing to what depths of
pettiness a man may descend. During the whole
dinner I can dream how Gnekker will be shown
to be an adventurer, how Liza and my wife
will realise their mistake, and I will tease them
ridiculous dreams like these at a time when I
have one foot in the grave.
Now there occur misunderstandings, of a
kind which I formerly knew only by hearsay.
Though it is painful I will describe one which
occurred after dinner the other day.
A TEDIOUS STORY 83
I sit in my room smoking a little pipe. Enters
my wife, as usual, sits down and begins to talk.
What a good idea it would be to go to Kharkov
now while the weather is warm and there is the
time, and inquire what kind of man our Gnekker
is.
" Very well. I'll go," I agree.
My wife gets up, pleased with me, and walks
to the door ; but immediately returns :
" By-the bye, I've one more favour to ask.
I know you'll be angry ; but it's my duty to
warn you . ^ . . Forgive me, Nicolai, but all
our neighbours have begun to talk about the
way you go to Katy's continually. I don't deny
that she's clever and educated. It's pleasant to
spend the time with her. But at your age
and in your position it's rather strange to find
pleasure in her society. . . . Besides she has a
reputation enough to. . . ."
All my blood rushes instantly from my brain.
My eyes flash fire. I catch hold of my hair,
and stamp and cry, in a voice that is not
mine :
" Leave me alone, leave me, leave me. . . ."
My face is probably terrible, and my voice
strange, for my wife suddenly gets pale, and
calls aloud, with a despairing voice, also not her
own. At our cries rush in Liza and Gnekker,
then Yegor.
My feet grow numb, as though they did not
exist. I feel that I am falling into somebody's
arms. Then I hear crying for a little while
84 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
and sink into a faint which lasts for two or three
hours.
Now for Katy. She comes to see me before
evening every day, which of course must be
noticed by my neighbours and my friends. After
a minute she takes me with her for a drive. She
has her own horse and a new buggy she bought
this summer. Generally she lives like a princess.
She has taken an expensive detached bungalow
with a big garden, and put into it all her town
furniture. She has two maids and a coachman.
I often ask her :
" Katy, what will you live on when you've
spent all your father's money ? "
" We'll see, then," she answers.
" But this money deserves to be treated more
seriously, my dear. It was earned by a good
man and honest labour."
" You've told me that before. I know."
First we drive by the field, then by a young
pine forest, which you can see from my window.
Nature seems to me as beautiful as she used,
although the devil whispers to me that all these
pines and firs, the birds and white clouds in the
sky will not notice my absence in three or four
months when I am dead. Katy likes to take
the reins, and it is good that the weather is fine
and I am sitting by her side. She is in a happy
mood, and does not say bitter things.
'* You're a very good man, Nicolai," she says.
" You are a rare bird. There's no actor who
could play your part. Mine or Mikhail's, for
A TEDIOUS STORY 85
instance even a bad actor could manage, but
yours there's nobody. I envy you, envy you
terribly ! What am I ? What ? "
She thinks for a moment, and asks :
" I'm a negative phenomenon, aren't I ? "
" Yes," I answer.
" H'm . . . what's to be done then ? "
What answer can I give ? It's easy to say
" Work," or " Give your property to the poor,"
or " Know yourself," and because it's so easy to
say this I don't know what to answer.
My therapeutist colleagues, when teaching
methods of cure, advise one " to individualise
each particular case." This advice must be
followed in order to convince one's self that the
remedies recommended in the text-books as
the best and most thoroughly suitable as a
general rule, are quite unsuitable in particular
cases. It applies to moral affections as well.
But I must answer something. So I say :
" You've too much time on your hands, my
dear. You must take up something. ... In
fact, why shouldn't you go on the stage again,
if you have a vocation."
" I can't."
" You have the manner and tone of a victim.
I don't like it, my dear. You have yourself to
blame. Remember, you began by getting angry
with people and things in general ; but you never
did anything to improve either of them. You
didn't put up a struggle against the evil. You
got tired. You're not a victim of the struggle
86 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
but of your own weakness. Certainly you were
young then and inexperienced. But now every-
thing can be different. Come on, be an actress.
You will work ; you will serve in the temple of
art."...
" Don't be so clever, Nicolai," she inter-
rupts. " Let's agree once for all : let's speak
about actors, actresses, writers, but let us leave
art out of it. You're a rare and excellent man.
But you don't understand enough about art to
consider it truly sacred. You have no flair, no
ear for art. You've been busy all your life,
and you never had time to acquire the flair.
Really ... I don't love these conversations
about art ! " she continues nervously. " I don't
love them. They've vulgarised it enough already,
thank you."
" Who's vulgarised it ? "
" They vulgarised it by their drunkenness,
newspapers by their over-familiarity, clever
people by philosophy."
" What's philosophy got to do with it ? "
" A great deal. If a man philosophises, it
means he doesn't understand."
So that it should not come to bitter words, I
hasten to change the subject, and then keep
silence for a long while. It's not till we
come out of the forest and drive towards
Katy's bungalow, I return to the subject and
ask :
" Still, you haven't answered me why you
don't want to go on the stage ? "
A TEDIOUS STORY 87
** Really, it's cruel," she cries out, and sud-
denly blushes all over. " You want me to tell
you the truth outright. Very well if . . . if you
will have it ! I've no talent ! No talent and
. . . much ambition ! There you are ! "
After this confession, she turns her face away
from me, and to hide the trembling of her hands,
tugs at the reins.
As we approach her bungalow, from a distance
we see Mikhail already, walking about by the
gate, impatiently awaiting us.
" This Fiodorovich again," Katy says with
annoyance. " Please take him away from
me. I'm sick of him. He's flat. . . . Let him
go to the deuce."
Mikhail Fiodorovich ought to have gone
abroad long ago, but- he has postponed his
departure every week. There have been some
changes in him lately. He's suddenly got
thin, begun to be affected by drink a thing
that never happened to him before, and his
black eyebrows have begun to get grey.
When our buggy stops at the gate he cannot
hide his joy and impatience. Anxiously
he helps Katy and me from the buggy, hastily
asks us questions, laughs, slowly rubs his hands,
and that gentle, prayerful, pure something that
I used to notice only in his eyes is now r poured
over all his face. He is happy and at the same
time ashamed of his happiness, ashamed of his
habit of coming to Katy's every evening, and he
finds it necessary to give a reason for his coming,
88 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
some obvious absurdity, like : "I was passing
on business, and I thought I'd just drop in for a
second."
All three of us go indoors. First we drink tea,
then our old friends, the two packs of cards,
appear on the table, with a big piece of cheese,
some fruit, and a bottle of Crimean champagne.
The subjects of conversation are not new, but
all exactly the same as they were in the winter.
The university, the students, literature, the
theatre all of them come in for it. The air
thickens with slanders, and grows more close.
It is poisoned by the breath, not of two toads as
in winter, but now by all three. Besides the
velvety, baritone laughter and the accordion-
like giggle, the maid who waits upon us hears
also the unpleasant jarring laugh of a musical
comedy general : " He, he, he ! "
There sometimes come fearful nights with
thunder, lightning, rain, and wind, which the
peasants call " sparrow-nights." There was one
such sparrow-night in my own personal life. . . .
I wake after midnight and suddenly leap out
of bed. Somehow it seems to me that I am going
to die immediately. I do not know why, for
there is no single sensation in my body which
points to a quick end ; but a terror presses on
my soul as though I had suddenly seen a huge,
ill-boding fire in the sky.
A TEDIOUS STORY 80
I light the lamp quickly and drink some water
straight out of the decanter. Then I hurry to
the windoM*. The weather is magnificent. The
air smells of hay and some delicious thing
besides. I see the spikes of my garden fence,
the sleepy starveling trees by the window, the
road, the dark strip of forest. There is a calm
and brilliant moon in the sky and not a single
cloud. Serenity. Not a leaf stirs. To me it
seems that everything is looking at me and
listening for me to die.
Dread seizes me. I shut the window and run
to the bed. I feel for my pulse. I cannot find
it in my wrist ; I seek it in my temples, my chin,
my hand again. They are all cold and slippery
with sweat. My breathing comes quicker and
quicker ; my body trembles, all my bowels are
stirred, and my face and forehead feel as though
a cobweb had settled on them.
What shall I do ? Shall I call my family ?
No use. I do not know what my wife and Liza
will do when they come in to me.
I hide my head under the pillow, shut my eyes
and wait, wait . . . My spine is cold. It
almost contracts within me. And I feel that
death will approach me only from behind, very
quietly.
" Kivi, kivi." A squeak sounds in the stillness
of the night. I do not know whether it is in
my heart or in the street.
God, how awful ! I would drink some more
M ater ; but now I dread opening my eyes, and
G
90 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
fear to raise my head. The terror is unaccount-
able, animal. I cannot understand why I am
afraid. Is it because I want to live, or because
a new and unknown pain awaits me ?
Upstairs, above the ceiling, a moan, then a
laugh ... I listen. A little after steps sound
on the staircase. Someone hurries down, then
up again. In a minute steps sound downstairs
again. Someone stops by my door and listens.
" Who's there ? " I call.
The door opens. I open my eyes boldly
and see my wife. Her face is pale and her eyes
red with weeping.
" You're not asleep, Nicolai Stiepanovich ? "
she asks.
" What is it ? "
" For God's sake go down to Liza. Something
is wrong with her."
" Very well . . . with pleasure," I murmur,
very glad that I am not alone. " Very well . . .
immediately."
As I follow my wife I hear what she tells me,
and from agitation understand not a word.
Bright spots from her candle dance over the
steps of the stairs ; our long shadows tremble ;
my feet catch in the skirts of my dressing-
gown. My breath goes, and it seems to me that
someone is chasing me, trying to seize my back.
" I shall die here on the staircase, this second,"
I think, " this second." But we have passed
the staircase, the dark hall with the Italian
window and we go into Liza's room. She sits
A TEDIOUS STORY 91
in bed in her chemise ; her bare legs hang down
and she moans.
" Oh, my God ... oh, my God ! " she mur-
murs, half shutting her eyes from our candles.
" I can't, I can't."
" Liza, my child," I say, " what's the matter ? "
Seeing me, she calls out and falls on my neck.
" Papa darling," she sobs. " Papa dearest . . .
my sweet. I don't know what it is ... It
hurts."
She embraces me, kisses me and lisps endear-
ments which I heard her lisp when she was still
a baby.
" Be calm, my child. God's with you," I
say. " You mustn't cry. Something hurts me
too."
I try to cover her with the bedclothes ; my
wife gives her to drink ; and both of us jostle in
confusion round the bed. My shoulders push
into hers, and at that moment I remember how
we used to bathe our children.
" But help her, help her ! " my wife implores.
" Do something ! " And what can I do ?
Nothing. There is some weight on the girl's
soul ; but I understand nothing, know nothing
and can only murmur :
"It's nothing, nothing ... It will pass . . .
Sleep, sleep."
As if on purpose a dog suddenly howls in the
yard, at first low and irresolute, then aloud, in
two voices. I never put any value on such signs
as dogs' whining or screeching owls ; but now
G 2
92 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
my heart contracts painfully, and I hasten to
explain the howling.
" Nonsense," I think. " It's the influence of
one organism on another. My great nervous
strain was transmitted to my wife, to Liza, and
to the dog. That's all. Such transmissions
explain presentiments and previsions."
A little later when I return to my room to
write a prescription for Liza I no longer think
that I shall die soon. My soul simply feels
heavy and dull, so that I am even sad that I
did not die suddenly. For a long while I stand
motionless in the middle of the room, ponder-
ing what I shall prescribe for Liza ; but the
moans above the ceiling are silent and I decide
not to write a prescription, but stand there
still.
There is a dead silence, a silence, as one man
wrote, that rings in one's ears. The time goes
slowly. The bars of moonshine on the window-
sill do not move from their place, as though
congealed . . . The dawn is still far away.
But the garden-gate creaks ; someone steals
in, and strips a twig from the starveling trees,
and cautiously knocks with it on my window.
" Nicolai Stiepanovich 1 " I hear a whisper.
*' Nicolai Stiepanovich 1 "
I open the window, and I think that I am
dreaming. Under the window, close against the
wall stands a woman in a black dress. She is
brightly lighted by the moon and looks at me
with wide eyes. Her face is pale, stern and
A TEDIOUS STORY 93
fantastic in the moon, like marble. Her chin
trembles.
" It is I . . ." she says, "I ... Katy 1 "
In the moon all women's eyes are big and
black, people are taller and paler. Probably
that is the reason why I did not recognise her
in the first moment.
" What's the matter ? "
" Forgive me," she says. " I suddenly felt
so dreary ... I could not bear it. So I came
here. There's a light in your window . . . and I
decided to knock . . . Forgive me ... Ah, if
you knew how dreary I felt ! What are you
doing now ? "
" Nothing. Insomnia."
Her eyebrows lift, her eyes shine with tears
and all her face is illumined as with light, with
the familiar, but long unseen, look of confidence.
" Nicolai Stiepanovich ! " she says implor-
ingly, stretching out both her hands to me.
" Dear, I beg you ... I implore ... If you
do not despise my friendship and my respect
for you, then do what I implore you."
" W T hat is it ? "
" Take my money."
"What next? What's the good of your
money to me ? "
" You will go somewhere to be Cured. You
must cure yourself. You will take it ? Yes ?
Dear ... Yes ?"
She looks into my face eagerly and repeats :
44 Yes ? You will take it ? "
94 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" No, my dear, I won't take it . . . ", I say.
" Thank you."
She turns her back to me and lowers her head.
Probably the tone of my refusal would not
allow any further talk of money.
" Go home to sleep," I say. " I'll see you to-
morrow."
" It means, you don't consider me your
friend ? " she asks sadly.
" I don't say that. But your money is no
good to me."
" Forgive me," she says lowering her voice
by a full octave. " I understand you. To be
obliged to a person like me ... a retired actress
. . . But good-bye."
And she walks away so quickly that I have no
time even to say " Good-bye."
VI
I am in Kharkov.
Since it would be useless to fight against my
present mood, and I have no power to do it, I
made up my mind that the last days of my life
shall be irreproachable, on the formal side. If I
am not right with my family, which I certainly
admit, I will try at least to do as it wishes.
Besides I am lately become so indifferent that
it's positively all the same to me whether I go
to Kharkov, or Paris, or Berditshev.
A TEDIOUS STORY 95
I arrived here at noon and put up at a hotel
not far from the cathedral. The train made me
giddy, the draughts blew through me, and now
I am sitting on the bed with my head in my hands
waiting for the tic. I ought to go to my pro-
fessor friends to-day, but I have neither the will
nor the strength.
The old hall-porter comes in to ask whether I
have brought my own bed-clothes. I keep him
about five minutes asking him questions about
Gnekker, on whose account I came here. The
porter happens to be Kharkov-born, and knows
the town inside out ; but he doesn't remember
any family with the name of Gnekker. I inquire
about the estate. The answer is the same.
The clock in the passage strikes one, . . . two,
. . . three . . . The last months of my life,
while I wait for death, seem to me far longer
than my whole life. Never before could I
reconcile myself to the slowness of time as I can
now. Before, when I had to wait for a train
at the station, or to sit at an examination, a
quarter of an hour would seem an eternity.
Now I can sit motionless in bed the whole night
long, quite calmly thinking that there will be
the same long, colourless night to-morrow, and
the next day. . . .
In the passage the clock strikes five, six,
seven .... It grows dark. There is dull pain
in my cheek the beginning of the tic. To
occupy myself with thoughts, I return to my
old point of view, when I was not indifferent,
90 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
and ask : Why do I, a famous man, a privy
councillor, sit in this little room, on this bed with
a strange grey blanket ? Why do I look at this
cheap tin washstand and listen to the wretched
clock jarring in the passage ? Is all this worthy
of my fame and my high position among people ?
And I answer these questions with a smile.
My na/ivete seems funny to me the ndivetc with
which as a young man I exaggerated the value of
fame and of the exclusive position which famous
men enjoy. I am famous, my name is spoken
with reverence. My portrait has appeared in
" Niva " and in " The Universal Illustration."
I've even read my biography in a German paper,
but what of that ? I sit lonely, by myself, in a
strange city, on a strange bed, rubbing my
aching cheek with my palm. . . .
Family scandals, the hardness of creditors, the
rudeness of railway men, the discomforts of the
passport system, the expensive and unwholesome
food at the buffets, the general coarseness and
roughness of people, all this and a great deal
more that would take too long to put down,
concerns me as much as it concerns any bourgeois
who is known only in his own little street.
Where is the exclusiveness of my position then ?
We will admit that I am infinitely famous, that
I am a hero of whom my country is proud. All
the newspapers give bulletins of my illness, the
post is already bringing in sympathetic addresses
from my friends, my pupils, and the public.
But all this will not save me from dying in
A TEDIOUS STORY 97
anguish on a stranger's bed in utter loneliness.
Of course there is no one to blame for this.
But I must confess I do not like my popularity.
I feel that it has deceived me.
At about ten I fall asleep, and, in spite of the
tic sleep soundly, and would sleep for a long
while were I not awakened. Just after one there
is a sudden knock at my door.
" Who's there ? "
" A telegram."
" You could have brought it to-morrow," I
storm, as I take the telegram from the porter.
" Now I shan't sleep again."
" I'm sorry. There was a light in your room.
I thought you were not asleep."
I open the telegram and look first at the
signature my wife's. What does she want ?
" Gnekker married Liza secretly yesterday.
Return."
I read the telegram. For a long while I am
not startled. Not Gnekker's or Liza's action
frightens me, but the indifference with which
I receive the news of their marriage. Men say
that philosophers and true savants are indifferent.
It is untrue. Indifference is the paralysis of the
soul, premature death.
I go to bed again and begin to ponder with
what thoughts I can occupy myself. What on
earth shall I think of ? I seem to have thought
over everything, and now there is nothing
powerful enough to rouse my thought.
When the day begins to dawn, I sit in bed
98 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
clasping my knees and, for want of occupation
I try to know myself. " Know yourself " is
good, useful advice ; but it is a pity that the
ancients did not think of showing us the way to
avail ourselves of it.
Before, when I had the desire to understand
somebody else, or myself, I used not to take into
consideration actions, wherein everything is
conditional, but desires. Tell me what you
want, and I will tell you what you are.
And now I examine myself. What do I want ?
I want our wives, children, friends, and
pupils to love in us, not the name or the firm or
the label, but the ordinary human beings. What
besides ? I should like to have assistants and
successors. What more ? I should like to
wake in a hundred years' time, and take a look,
if only with one eye, at what has happened to
science. I should like to live ten years more.
. . . What further ?
Nothing further. I think, think a long while
and cannot make out anything else. However
much I were to think, wherever my thoughts
should stray, it is clear to me that the chief,
all-important something is lacking in my desires.
In my infatuation for science, my desire to live,
my sitting here on a strange bed, my yearning
to know myself, in all the thoughts, feelings,
and ideas I form about anything, there is want-
ing the something universal which could bind
all these together in one whole. Each feeling
and thought lives detached in me, and in all
A TEDIOUS STORY 99
my opinions about science, the theatre, litera-
ture, and my pupils, and in all the little pictures
which my imagination paints, not even the most
cunning analyst will discover what is called the
general idea, or the god of the living man.
And if this is not there, then nothing is there.
In poverty such as this a serious infirmity,
fear of death, influence of circumstances and
people would have been enough to overthrow
and shatter all that I formerly considered as my
conception of the world, and all wherein I saw
the meaning and joy of my life. Therefore, it
is nothing strange that I have darkened the last
months of my life by thoughts and feelings
worthy of a slave or a savage, and that I am now
indifferent and do not nojtice the dawn. If there
is lacking in a man that which is higher and
stronger than all outside influences, then verily
a good cold in the head is enough to upset his
balance and to make him see each bird an owl
and hear a dog's whine in every sound ; and all
his pessimism or his optimism with their attend-
ant thoughts, great and small, seem then to be
merely symptoms and no more.
I am beaten. Then it's no good going on
thinking, no good talking. I shall sit and wait
in silence for what will come.
In the morning the porter brings me tea and
the local paper. Mechanically I read the ad-
vertisements on the first page, the leader, the
extracts from newspapers and magazines, the
local news . . . Among other things I find in
100 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
the local news an item like this : " Our famous
scholar, emeritus professor Nicolai Stiepanovich
arrived in Kharkov yesterday by the express,
and stayed at hotel."
Evidently big names are created to live de-
tached from those who bear them. Now my
name walks in Kharkov undisturbed. In some
three months it will shine as bright as the sun
itself, inscribed in letters of gold on my tomb-
stone at a time when I myself will be under
the sod . . .
A faint knock at the door. Somebody wants
me.
" Who's there ? Come in ! "
The door opens. I step back in astonishment,
and hasten to pull my dressing gown together.
Before me stands Katy.
" How do you do ? " she says, panting from
running up the stairs. " You didn't expect
me ? I ... I've come too."
She sits down and continues, stammering and
looking away from me. " Why don't you say
' Good morning ' ? I arrived too . . . to-day. I
found out you were at this hotel, and came to
see you."
" I'm delighted to see you," I say shrugging
my shoulders. " But I'm surprised. You might
have dropped straight from heaven. What are
you doing here ? "
"!?...! just came."
Silence. Suddenly she gets up impetuously
and comes over to me.
A TEDIOUS STORY 101
" Nicolai Stiepanich ! " she says, growing pale
and pressing her hands to her breast. " Nicolai
Stiepanich ! I can't go on like this any longer.
I can't. For God's sake tell me now, immedi-
ately. What shall I do ? Tell me. what shall
I do ? "
" What can I say ? I am beaten. I can say
nothing."
" But tell me, I implore you," she continues,
out of breath and trembling all over her body.
" I swear to you, I can't go on like this any
longer. I haven't the strength."
She drops into a chair and begins to sob. She
throws her head back, wrings her hands, stamps
with her feet ; her hat falls from her head and
dangles by its string, her hair is loosened.
** Help me, help," she implores. " I can't
bear it any more."
She takes a handkerchief out of her little
travelling bag and with it pulls out some letters
which fall from her knees to the floor. I pick
them up from the floor and recognise on one of
them Mikhail Fiodorovich's hand-writing, and
accidentally read part of a word: " passionat "
" There's nothing that I can say to you,
Katy," I say.
" Help me," she sobs, seizing my hand and
kissing it. " You're my father, my only friend.
You're wise and learned, and you've lived long I
You were a teacher. Tell me what to do."
I am bewildered and surprised, stirred by her
sobbing, and I can hardly stand upright.
102 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" Let's have some breakfast, Katy," I say with
a constrained smile.
Instantly I add in a sinking voice :
" I shall be dead soon, Katy. . . ."
" Only one word, only one word," she weeps
and stretches out her hands to me. " What
shall I do ? "
" You're a queer thing, really . . .", I murmur.
" I can't understand it. Such a clever woman
and suddenly weeping. . . ."
Comes silence. Katy arranges her hair, puts
on her hat, then crumples her letters and stuffs
them in her little bag, all in silence and unhurried.
Her face, her bosom and her gloves are wet with
tears, but her expression is dry already, stern . . .
I look at her and am ashamed that I am happier
than she. It was but a little while before my
death, in the ebb of my life, that I noticed in
myself the absence of what our friends the
philosophers call the general idea ; but this poor
thing's soul has never known and never will
know shelter all her life, all her life.
" Katy, let's have breakfast," I say.
" No, thank you," she answers coldly.
One minute more passes in silence.
" I don't like Kharkov," I say. " It's too
grey. A grey city."
" Yes . . . ugly. . . . I'm not here for long.
... On my way. I leave to-day."
" For where ? "
" For the Crimea ... I mean, the Caucasus."
" So. For long ? "
A TEDIOUS STORY 103
" I don't know."
Katy gets up and gives me her hand with a
cold smile, looking away from me.
I would like to ask her : " That means you
won't be at my funeral ? " But she does not
look at me ; her hand is cold and like a stranger's.
I escort her to the door in silence. . . . She goes
out of my room and walks down the long passage,
without looking back. She knows that my eyes
are following her, and probably on the landing
she will look back.
No, she did not look back. The black dress
showed for the last time, her steps were stilled.
. . . Goodbye, my treasure !
THE FIT
THE medical student Mayer, and Ribnikov, a
student at the Moscow school of painting,
sculpture, and architecture, came one evening
to their friend Vassiliev, law student, and pro-
posed that he should go with them to S v
Street. For a long while Vassiliev did not agree,
but eventually dressed himself and went with
them.
Unfortunate women he knew only by hearsay
and from books, and never once in his life had
he been in the houses where they live. He
knew there were immoral women who were
forced by the pressure of disastrous circum-
stances environment, bad up-bringing, poverty,
and the like to sell their honour for money.
They do not know pure love, have no children
and no legal rights ; mothers and sisters mourn
them for dead, science treats them as an evil,
men are familiar with them. But notwithstand-
ing all this they do not lose the image and like-
ness of God. They all acknowledge their sin
and hope for salvation. They are free to avail
H
106 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
themselves of every means of salvation. True,
Society does not forgive people their past, but
with God Mary of Egypt is not lower than the
other saints. Whenever Vassiliev recognised an
unfortunate woman in the street by her costume
or her manner, or saw a picture of one in a comic
paper, there came into his mind every time a
story he once read somewhere : a pure and
heroic young man falls in love with an unfor-
tunate woman and asks her to be his wife, but
she, considering herself unworthy of such happi-
ness, poisons herself.
Vassiliev lived in one of the streets off the
Tverskoi boulevard. When he and his friends
came out of the house it was about eleven o'clock
the first snow had just fallen and all nature
was under the spell of this new snow. The air
smelt of snow, the snow cracked softly under
foot, the earth, the roofs, the trees, the benches
on the boulevards all were soft, white, and
young. Owing to this the houses had a different
look from yesterday, the lamps burned brighter,
the air was more transparent, the clatter of the
cabs was dulled and there entered into the soul
with the fresh, easy, frosty air a feeling like the
white, young, feathery snow. " To these sad
shores unknowing " the medico began to sing
in a pleasant tenor, "An unknown power entices "
. . . " Behold the mill" ... the painter's
voice took him up, " it is now fall'n to
ruin."
" Behold the mill, it is now fall'n to ruin," the
THE FIT 107
medico repeated, raising his eyebrows and sadly
shaking his head.
He was silent for a while, passed his hand over
his forehead trying to recall the words, and began
to sing in a loud voice and so well that the
passers-by looked back.
" Here, long ago, came free, free love to
me "...
All three went into a restaurant and without
taking off their coats they each had two
thimblefuls of vodka at the bar. Before drink-
ing the second, Vassiliev noticed a piece of cork
in his vodka, lifted the glass to his eye, looked
at it for a long while with a short-sighted frown.
The medico misunderstood his expression and
said
" Well, what are you staring at ? No philo-
sophy, please. Vodka's made to be drunk,
caviare to be eaten, women to sleep with, snow
to walk on. Live like a man for one evening."
" Well, I've nothing to say," said Vassiliev
laughingly, " I'm not refusing ? "
The vodka warmed his breast. He looked at
his friends admiringly, admired and envied them.
How balanced everything is in these healthy,
strong, cheerful people. Everything in their
minds and souls is smooth and rounded off.
They sing, have a passion for the theatre, paint,
talk continually, and drink, and they never have
a headache the next day. They are romantic
and dissolute, sentimental and insolent ; they
H 2
108 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
can work and go on the loose and laugh at no-
thing and talk rubbish ; they are hot-headed,
honest, heroic and as human beings not a bit
worse than Vassiliev, who watches his every step
and word, who is careful, cautious, and able to
give the smallest trifle the dignity of a problem.
And he made up his mind if only for one evening
to live like his friends, to let himself go, and be
free from his own control. Must he drink
vodka ? He'll drink, even if his head falls to
pieces to-morrow. Must he be taken to women ?
He'll go. He'll laugh, play the fool, and give a
joking answer to disapproving passers-by.
He came out of the restaurant laughing. He
liked his friends one in a battered hat with
a wide brim who aped aesthetic disorder ; the
other in a sealskin cap, not very poor, with a
pretence of learned Bohemia. He liked the
snow, the paleness, the lamp-lights, the clear
black prints which the passers' feet left on the
snow. He liked the air, and above all the trans-
parent, tender, naive, virgin tone which can be
seen in nature only twice in the year : when
everything is covered in snow, on the bright
days in spring, and on moonlight nights when
the ice breaks on the river.
" To these sad shores unknowing," he began to
sing sotto-vocc, " An unknown power entices."
And all the way for some reason or other he
and his friends had this melody on their lips.
All three hummed it mechanically out of time
with each other.
THE FIT 109
Vassiliev imagined how in about ten minutes
he and his friends would knock at a door, how
they would stealthily walk through the narrow
little passages and dark rooms to the women,
how he would take advantage of the dark,
suddenly strike a match, and see lit up a suffering
face and a guilty smile. There he will surely
find a fair or a dark woman in a white night-
gown with her hair loose. She will be frightened
of the light, dreadfully confused and say :
** Good God ! What are you doing ? Blow it
out ! " All this was frightening, but curious and
novel.
II
The friends turned out of Trubnoi Square into
the Grachovka and soon arrived at the street
which Vassiliev knew only from hearsay. Seeing
two rows of houses with brightly lighted windows
and wide open doors, and hearing the gay sound
of pianos and fiddles sounds which flew out
of all the doors and mingled in a strange con-
fusion, as if somewhere in the darkness over the
roof-tops an unseen orchestra were tuning,
Vassiliev was bewildered and said :
" What a lot of houses ! "
" What's that ? " said the medico. " There
are ten times as many in London. There are a
hundred thousand of these women there."
The cabmen sat on their boxes quiet and in-
110 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
different as in other streets ; on the pavement
walked the same passers-by. No one was in a
hurry ; no one hid his face in his collar ; no one
shook his head reproachfully. And in this
indifference, in the confused sound of the pianos
and fiddles, in the bright windows and wide-open
doors, something very free, impudent, bold and
daring could be felt. It must have been the
same as this in the old times on the slave-markets,
as gay and as noisy ; people looked and walked
with the same indifference.
" Let's begin right at the beginning," said the
painter.
The friends walked into a narrow little passage
lighted by a single lamp with a reflector. When
they opened the door a man in a black jacket
rose lazily from the yellow sofa in the hall.
He had an unshaven lackey's face and sleepy
eyes. The place smelt like a laundry, and of
vinegar. From the hall a door led into a
brightly lighted room. The medico and
the painter stopped in the doorway, stretched
out their necks and peeped into the room
together :
" Buona sera, signore, Rigoletto huguenote
traviata ! " the painter began, making a
theatrical bow.
"Havanna blackbeetlano pistoletto! " said
the medico, pressing his hat to his heart and
bowing low.
Vassiliev kept behind them. He wanted to
bow theatrically too and say something silly.
THE FIT 111
But he only smiled, felt awkward and ashamed,
and awaited impatiently what was to follow.
In the door appeared a little fair girl of seventeen
or eighteen, with short hair, wearing a short blue
dress with a white bow on her breast.
" What are you standing in the door for ? "
she said. " Take off your overcoats and come
into the salon."
The medico and the painter went into the
salon, still speaking Italian. Vassiliev followed
them irresolutely.
" Gentlemen, take off your overcoats," said
the lackey stiffly. " You're not allowed in as
you are."
Besides the fair girl there was another woman
in the salon, very stout and tall, with a foreign
face and bare arms. She sat by the piano, with
a game of patience spread on her knees. She
took no notice of the guests.
" Where are the other girls ? " asked the
medico.
" They're drinking tea," said the fair one.
" Stiepan," she called out. " Go and tell the
girls some students have come ! "
A little later a third girl entered, in a bright
red dress with blue stripes. Her face was thickly
and unskilfully painted. Her forehead was
hidden under her hair. She stared with dull,
frightened eyes. As she came she immediately
began to sing in a strong hoarse contralto.
After her a fourth girl. After her a fifth.
In all this Vassiliev saw nothing new or
112 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
curious. It seemed to him that he had seen
before, and more than once, this salon, piano,
cheap gilt mirror, the white bow, the dress
with blue stripes and the stupid, indifferent
faces. But of darkness, quiet, mystery, and
guilty smile of all he had expected to meet here
and which frightened him he did not see even
a shadow.
Everything was commonplace, prosaic, and
dull. Only one thing provoked his curiosity
a little, that was the terrible, as it were intentional
lack of taste, which was seen in the overmantels,
the absurd pictures, the dresses and the white
bow. In this lack of taste there was something
characteristic and singular.
" How poor and foolish it all is ! " thought
Vassiliev. " What is there in all this rubbish
to tempt a normal man, to provoke him into
committing a frightful sin, to buy a living soul
for a rouble ? I can understand anyone sin-
ning for the sake of splendour, beauty, grace,
passion ; but what is there here ? What
tempts people here ? But . . . it's no good
thinking ! "
" Whiskers, stand me champagne." The fail-
one turned to him.
Vassiliev suddenly blushed.
" With pleasure," he said, bowing politely.
" But excuse me if I ... I don't drink with
you. I don't drink."
Five minutes after the friends were off to
another house.
THE FIT 113
" Why did you order drinks ? " stormed the
medico. " What a millionaire, flinging six
roubles into the gutter like that for nothing at
all."
" Why shouldn't I give her pleasure if she
wants it ? " said Vassiliev, justifying himself.
" You didn't give her any pleasure. Madame
got that. It's Madame who tells them to ask
the guests for drinks. She makes by it."
" Behold the mill," the painter began to sing,
" Now fall'n to ruin. . . ."
When they came to another house the friends
stood outside in the vestibule, but did not enter
the salon. As in the first house, a figure rose
up from the sofa in the hall, in a black jacket,
with a sleepy lackey's .face. As he looked at
this lackey, at his face and shabby jacket,
Vassiliev thought : " What must an ordinary
simple Russian go through before Fate casts
him up here ? Where was he before, and what
was he doing ? What awaits him ? Is he
married, where's his mother, and does she know
he's a lackey here ? " Thenceforward in every
house Vassiliev involuntarily turned his attention
to the lackey first of all.
In one of the houses, it seemed to be the fourth,
the lackey was a dry little, puny fellow, with a
chain across his waistcoat. He was reading a
newspaper and took no notice of the guests at
all. Glancing at his face, Vassiliev had the
idea that a fellow with a face like that could
steal and murder and perjure. And indeed the
114 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
face was interesting : a big forehead, grey eyes,
a flat little nose, small close-set teeth, and the
expression on his face dull and impudent at once,
like a puppy hard on a hare. Vassiliev had the
thought that he would like to touch this lackey's
hair : is it rough or soft ? It must be rough
like a dog's.
Ill
Because he had had two glasses the painter
suddenly got rather drunk, and unnaturally
lively.
" Let's go to another place," he added, waving
his hands. " I'll introduce you to the best ! "
When he had taken his friends into the house
which was according to him the best, he pro-
claimed a persistent desire to dance a quadrille.
The medico began to grumble that they would
have to pay the musicians a rouble but agreed
to be his vis-b-vis. The dance began.
It was just as bad in the best house as in the
worst. Just the same mirrors and pictures were
here, the same coiffures and dresses. Looking
round at the furniture and the costumes Vassiliev
now understood that it was not lack of taste,
but something that might be called the particular
taste and style of S v Street, quite impossible
to find anywhere else, something complete, not
accidental, evolved in time. After he had been
THE FIT 115
to eight houses he no longer wondered at the
colour of the dresses or the long trains, or at the
bright bows, or the sailor dresses, or the thick
violent painting of the cheeks ; he understood
that all this was in harmony, that if only one
woman dressed herself humanly, or one decent
print hung on the wall, then the general tone of
the whole street would suffer.
How badly they manage the business ? Can't
they really understand that vice is only fascin-
ating when it is beautiful and secret, hidden under
the cloak of virtue ? Modest black dresses, pale
faces, sad smiles, and darkness act more strongly
than this clumsy tinsel. Idiots ! If they don't
understand it themselves, their guests ought to
teach them. ...
A girl in a Polish costume trimmed with white
fur came up close to him and sat down by his
side.
" Why don't you dance, my brown-haired
darling ? " she asked. " What do you feel so
bored about ? "
" Because it is boring."
" Stand me a Chateau Lafitte, then you won't
be bored."
Vassiliev made no answer. For a little while
he was silent, then he asked :
" What time do you go to bed as a rule ? "
" Six."
" When do you get up ? "
" Sometimes two, sometimes three."
" And after you get up what do you do ? "
116 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" We drink coffee. We have dinner at
seven."
" And what do you have for dinner ? "
" Soup or schi as a rule, beef-steak, dessert.
Our madame keeps the girls well. But what are
you asking all this for ? "
" Just to have a talk. ..."
Vassiliev wanted to ask about all sorts of
things. He had a strong desire to find out where
she came from, were her parents alive, and did
they know she was here ; how she got into the
house ; was she happy and contented, or gloomy
and depressed with dark thoughts. Does she
ever hope to escape. . . . But he could not
possibly think how to begin, or how to put his
questions without seeming indiscreet. He
thought for a long while and asked :
" How old are you ? "
" Eighty," joked the girl, looking and laughing
at the tricks the painter was doing with his hands
and feet.
She suddenly giggled and uttered a long filthy
expression aloud so that every one could hear.
Vassiliev, terrified, not knowing how to look,
began to laugh uneasily. He alone smiled : all
the others, his friends, the musicians and the
women paid no attention to his neighbour.
They might never have heard.
" Stand me a Lafitte," said the girl again.
Vassiliev was suddenly repelled by her white
trimming and her voice and left her. It seemed
THE FIT 117
to him cloie and hot. His heart began to beat
slowly and violently, like a hammer, one, txro,
three.
" Let's get out of here," he said, pulling the
painter's sleeve.
" Wait. Let's finish it."
While the medico and the painter were
finishing their quadrille, Vassiliev, in order to
avoid the women, eyed the musicians. The
pianist was a nice old man with spectacles, with
a face like Marshal Basin ; the fiddler a young
man with a short, fair beard dressed in the latest
fashion. The young man was not stupid or
starved, on the contrary he looked clever,
young and fresh. He was dressed with a touch of
originality, and played with emotion. Problem :
how did he and the decent old man get here ?
Why aren't they ashamed to sit here ? What do
they think about when they look at the women ?
If the piano and the fiddle were played by
ragged, hungry, gloomy, drunken creatures,
with thin stupid faces, then their presence would
perhaps be intelligible. As it was, Vassiliev
could understand nothing. Into his memory
came the story that he had read about the un-
fortunate woman, and now he found that the
human figure with the guilty smile had nothing
to do with this. It seemed to him that they were
not unfortunate women that he saw, but they
belonged to another, utterly different world,
foreign and inconceivable to him ; if he had seen
this world on the stage or read about it in a book
118 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
he would never have believed it. ... The girl
with the white trimming giggled again and said
something disgusting aloud. He felt sick,
blushed, and went out :
" Wait. We're coming too," cried the painter.
IV
" I had a talk with my mam'selle while we
were dancing," said the medico when all three
came into the street. " The subject was her
first love. He was a bookkeeper in Smolensk
with a wife and five children. She was seven-
teen and lived with her pa and ma who kept a
soap and candle shop."
" How did he conquer her heart ? " asked
Vassiliev.
" He bought her fifty roubles' -worth of under-
clothes Lord knows what ! "
" However could he get her love-story out of
his girl ? " thought Vassiliev. " I can't. My
dear chaps, I'm off home," he said.
44 Why ? "
" Because I don't know how to get on here.
I'm bored and disgusted. What is there amusing
about it ? If they were only human beings ;
but they're savages and beasts. I'm going,
please."
" Grisha darling, please," the painter said with
a sob in his voice, pressing close to Vassiliev,
THE FIT 119
"let's go to one more then to Hell with
them. Do come, Grigor."
They prevailed on Vassiliev and led him up a
staircase. The carpet and the gilded balustrade,
the porter who opened the door, the panels
which decorated the hall, were still in the same
S v Street style, but here it was perfected
and imposing.
" Really I'm going home," said Vassiliev,
taking off his overcoat.
" Darling, please, please," said the painter
and kissed him on the neck. " Don't be so
faddy, Grigri be a pal. Together we came,
together we go. What a beast you are though ! "
*' I can wait for you in the street. My God,
it's disgusting here."
" Please, please . . . You just look on, see,
just look on."
" One should look at things objectively," said
the medico seriously.
Vassiliev entered the salon and sat down.
There were many more guests besides him and
his friends : two infantry officers, a grey,
bald-headed gentleman with gold spectacles,
two young clean-shaven men from the Sur-
veyors' Institute, and a very drunk man with an
actor's face. All the girls were looking after
these guests and took no notice of Vassiliev.
Only one of them dressed like Ai'da glanced at
him sideways, smiled at something and said with
a yawn :
" So the dark one's come."
120 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
Vassiliev's heart was beating and his face was
burning. He felt ashamed for being there, dii-
gusted and tormented. He was tortured by the
thought that he, a decent and affectionate man
(so he considered himself up till now), despised
these women and felt nothing towards them but
repulsion. He could not feel pity for them or for
the musicians or the lackeys.
" It's because I don't try to understand them,"
he thought. " They're all more like beasts than
human beings ; but all the same they are human
beings. They've got souls. One should under-
stand them first, then judge them."
" Grisha, don't go away. Wait for us," called
the painter; and he disappeared somewhere.
Soon the medico disappeared also.
'* Yes, one should try to understand. It's no
good, otherwise," thought Vassiliev, and he
began to examine intently the face of each girl,
looking for the guilty smile. But whether he
could not read faces or because none of these
women felt guilty he saw in each face only a
dull look of common, vulgar boredom and
satiety. Stupid eyes, stupid smiles, harsh,
stupid voices, impudent gestures and nothing
else. Evidently every woman had in her past
a love romance with a bookkeeper and fifty
roubles' -worth of underclothes. And in the
present the only good things in life were coffee,
a three-course dinner, wine, quadrilles, and
sleeping till two in the afternoon . . .
Finding not one guilty smile, Vassiliev began
THE FIT 121
to examine them to see if even one looked
clever and his attention was arrested by
one pale, rather tired face. It was that of a
dark woman no longer young, wearing a dress
scattered with spangles. She sat in a chair
staring at the floor and thinking of something.
Vassiliev paced up and down and then sat down
beside her as if by accident.
" One must begin with something trivial," he
thought, " and gradually pass on to serious con-
versation . . ."
" What a beautiful little dress you have on,"
he said, and touched the gold fringe of her scarf
with his finger.
"It's all right," said the dark woman.
" Where do you come -from ? "
" I ? A long way. From Tchernigov."
" It's a nice part."
" It always is, where you don't happen to
be."
"What a pity I can't describe nature," thought
Vassiliev. '' I'd move her by descriptions of
Tchernigov. She must love it if she was born
there."
" Do you feel lonely here ? " he asked.
" Of course I'm lonely."
" Why don't you go away from here, if you're
lonely ? "
" Where shall I go to ? Start begging, eh ? "
" It's easier to beg than to live here."
" Where did you get that idea ? Have you
been a beggar ? "
i
122 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" I begged, when I hadn't enough to pay my
university fees ; and even if I hadn't begged it's
easy enough to understand. A beggar is a free
man, at any rate, and you're a slave."
The dark woman stretched herself, and fol-
lowed with sleepy eyes the lackey who carried
a tray of glasses and soda-water.
" Stand us a champagne," she said, and yawned
again.
" Champagne," said Vassiliev. " What would
happen if your mother or your brother suddenly
came in ? What would you say ? And what
would they say ? You would say ' cham-
pagne' then."
Suddenly the noise of crying was heard. From
the next room where the lackey had carried the
soda-water, a fair man rushed out with a red
face and angry eyes. He was followed by the
tall, stout madame, who screamed in a squeaky
voice :
" No one gave you permission to slap the
girls in the face. Better class than you come
here, and never slap a girl. You bounder ! "
Followed an uproar. Vassiliev was scared
and went white. In the next room some one
wept, sobbing, sincerely, as only the insulted
weep. And he understood that indeed human
beings lived here, actually human beings, who
get offended, suffer, weep, and ask for help.
The smouldering hatred, the feeling of repulsion,
gave way to an acute sense of pity and anger
against the wrong-doer. He rushed into the
THE FIT 123
room from which the weeping came. Through
the rows of bottles which stood on the marble
table-top he saw a suffering tear-stained face,
stretched out his hands towards this face, stepped
to the table and instantly gave a leap back in
terror. The sobbing woman was dead-drunk.
As he made his way through the noisy crowd,
gathered round the fair man, his heart failed
him, he lost his courage like a boy, and it seemed
to him that in this foreign, inconceivable world,
they wanted to run after him, to beat him, to
abuse him with foul words. He tore down his
coat from the peg and rushed headlong down the
stairs.
V
Pressing close to the fence, he stood near to
the house and waited for his friends to come out.
The sounds of the pianos and fiddles, gay, bold,
impudent and sad, mingled into chaos in the
air, and this confusion was, as before, as if an
unseen orchestra were tuning in the dark over
the roof-tops. If he looked up towards the
darkness, then all the background was scattered
with white, moving points : it was snowing.
The flakes, coming into the light, spun lazily in
the air like feathers, and still more lazily fell.
Flakes of snow crowded whirling about Vassiliev,
and hung on his beard, his eyelashes, his eye-
brows. The cabmen, the horses, and the passers-
by, all were white.
I 2
124 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" How dare the snow fall in this street ? "
thought Vassiliev. " A curse on these houses."
Because of his headlong rush down the stair-
case his feet failed him from weariness ; he was
out of breath as if he had climbed a mountain.
His heart beat so loud that he could hear it. A
longing came over him to get out of this street
as soon as possible and go home ; but still
stronger was his desire to wait for his friends and
to vent upon them his feeling of heaviness.
He had not understood many things in the
houses. The souls of the perishing women were
to him a mystery as before ; but it was clear to
him that the business was much worse than
one would have thought. If the guilty woman
who poisoned herself was called a prostitute,
then it was hard to find a suitable name for all
these creatures, who danced to the muddling
music and said long, disgusting phrases. They
were not perishing ; they were already done for.
" Vice is here," he thought ; " but there is
neither confession of sin nor hope of salvation.
They are bought and sold, drowned in wine and
torpor, and they are dull and indifferent as sheep
and do not understand. My God, my God ! "
It was so clear to him that all that which is
called human dignity, individuality, the image
and likeness of God, was here dragged down to
the gutter, as they say of drunkards, and that
not only the street and the stupid women were
to blame for it.
A crowd of students white with snow, talking
THE FIT 125
and laughing gaily, passed by. One of them, a
tall, thin man, peered into Vassiliev's face and
said drunkenly, " He's one of ours. Logged,
old man ? Aha ! my lad. Never mind. Walk
up, never say die, uncle."
He took Vassiliev by the shoulders and pressed
his cold wet moustaches to his cheek, then slipped,
staggered, brandished his arms, and cried out :
" Steady there don't fall."
Laughing, he ran to join his comrades.
Through the noise the painter's voice became
audible.
" You dare beat women ! I won't have it.
Go to Hell. You're regular swine."
The medico appeared at the door of the house.
He glanced round and o'n seeing Vassiliev, said
in alarm :
" Is that you ? My God, it's simply impos-
sible to go anywhere with Yegor. I can't under-
stand a chap like that. He kicked up a row
can't you hear ? Yegor," he called from the
door. " Yegor ! "
" I won't have you hitting women." The
painter's shrill voice was audible again from
upstairs.
Something heavy and bulky tumbled down
the staircase. It was the painter coming head
over heels. He had evidently been thrown out.
He lifted himself up from the ground, dusted
his hat, and with an angry indignant face,
shook his fist at the upstairs.
" Scoundrels ! Butchers ! Bloodsuckers ! I
126 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
won't have you hitting a weak, drunken woman.
Ah, you. . . ."
" Yegor . . . Yegor ! " the medico began to
implore, " I give my word I'll never go out with
you again. Upon my honour, I won't."
The painter gradually calmed, and the friends
went home.
"To these sad shores unknowing " the medico
began " An unknown power entices. . . ."
" Behold the mill," the painter sang with him
after a pause, " Now fallen into ruin." How
the snow is falling, most Holy Mother. Why did
you go away, Grisha ? You're a coward ;
you're only an old woman."
Vassiliev was walking behind his friends.
He stared at their backs and thought : " One of
two things : either prostitution only seems to us
an evil and we exaggerate it, or if prostitution is
really such an evil as is commonly thought, these
charming friends of mine are just as much
slavers, violators, and murderers as the in-
habitants of Syria and Cairo whose photographs
appear in ' The Field.' They're singing, laugh-
ing, arguing soundly now, but haven't they just
been exploiting starvation, ignorance, and
stupidity? They have, I saw them at it. Where
does their humanity, their science, and their
painting come in, then ? The science, art, and
lofty sentiments of these murderers remind
me of the lump of fat in the story. Two
robbers killed a beggar in a forest ; they began
to divide his clothes between themselves and
THE FIT 127
found in his bag a lump of pork fat. ' In the
nick of time,' said one of them. ' Let's have a
bite ! ' ' How can you ? ' the other cried in
terror. 'Have you forgotten to-day's Friday?'
So they refrained from eating. After having cut
the man's throat they walked out of the forest
confident that they were pious fellows. These
two are just the same. When they've paid for
women they go and imagine they're painters and
scholars. . . .
" Listen, you two," he said angrily and
sharply. " Why do you go to those places ?
Can't you understand how horrible they are ?
Your medicine tells you every one of these
women dies prematurely from consumption or
something else ; your arts tell you that she died
morally still earlier. Each of them dies because
during her lifetime she accepts on an average,
let us say, five hundred men. Each of them is
killed by five hundred men, and you're amongst
the five hundred. Now if each of you comes here
and to places like this two hundred and fifty
times in his lifetime, then it means that between
you you have killed one woman. Can't you
understand that ? Isn't it horrible ? "
" Ah, isn't this awful, my God ? "
" There, I knew it would end like this," said
the painter frowning. " We oughtn't to have
had anything to do with this fool of a blockhead.
I suppose you think your head's full of great
thoughts and great ideas now. Devil knows
what they are, but they're not ideas. You're
128 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
staring at me now with hatred and disgust;
but if you want my opinion you'd better build
twenty more of the houses than look like that.
There's more vice in your look than in the whole
street. Let's clear out, Volodya, damn him !
He's a fool. He's a blockhead, and that's all
he is."
" Human beings are always killing each other,"
said the medico. " That is immoral, of course.
But philosophy won't help you. Good-bye ! "
The friends parted at Trubnoi Square and
went their way. Left alone, Vassiliev began to
stride along the boulevard. He was frightened
of the dark, frightened of the snow, which fell
to the earth in little flakes, but seemed to long
to cover the whole world ; he was frightened of
the street-lamps, which glimmered faintly
through the clouds of snow. An inexplicable
faint-hearted fear possessed his soul. Now and
then people passed him ; but he gave a start
and stepped aside. It seemed to him that from
everywhere there came and stared at him
women, only women. . . .
" It's coming on," he thought, " I'm going to
have a fit."
VI
At home he lay on his bed and began to talk,
shivering all over his body.
" Live women, live. . . . My God, they're
alive."
THE FIT 129
He sharpened the edge of his imagination in
every possible way. Now he was the brother
of an unfortunate, now her father. Now he was
himself a fallen woman, with painted cheeks ;
and all this terrified him.
It seemed to him somehow that he must solve
this question immediately, at all costs, and that
the problem was not strange to him, but was his
own. He made a great effort, conquered his
despair, and, sitting on the side of the bed, his
head clutched in his hands, he began to think :
How could all the women he had seen that
night be saved ? The process of solving a
problem was familiar to him as to a learned
person ; and notwithstanding all his excitement
he kept strictly to this process. He recalled
to mind the history of the question, its litera-
ture, and just after three o'clock he was pacing
up and down, trying to remember all the
experiments which are practised nowadays for
the salvation of women. He had a great many
good friends who lived in furnished rooms,
Falzfein, Galyashkin, Nechaiev, Yechkin . . .
not a few among them were honest and self-
sacrificing, and some of them had attempted to
save these women. . . .
All these few attempts, thought Vassiliev,
rare attempts, may be divided into three groups.
Some having rescued a woman from a brothel
hired a room for her, bought her a sewing-
machine and she became a dressmaker, and the
man who saved her kept her for his mistress,
130 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
openly or otherwise, but later when he had
finished his studies and was going away, he would
hand her over to another decent fellow. So the
fallen woman remained fallen. Others after
having bought her out also hired a room for her,
bought the inevitable sewing-machine and started
her off reading and writing and preached at her.
The woman sits and sews as long as it is novel
and amusing, but later, when she is bored, she
begins to receive men secretly, or runs back to
where she can sleep till three in the afternoon,
drink coffee, and eat till she is full. Finally, the
most ardent and self-sacrificing take a bold,
determined step. They marry, and when the
impudent, self-indulgent, stupefied creature
becomes a wife, a lady of the house, and then a
mother, her life and outlook are utterly changed,
and in the wife and mother it is hard to recognise
the unfortunate woman. Yes, marriage is the
best, it may be the only, resource.
" But it's impossible," Vassiliev said aloud
and threw himself down on his bed. " First of
all, I could not marry one. One would have to
be a saint to be able to do it, unable to hate,
not knowing disgust. But let us suppose that
the painter, the medico, and I got the better of
our feelings and married, that all these women
got married, what is the result ? What kind of
effect follows? The result is that while the
women get married here in Moscow, the Smolensk
bookkeeper seduces a fresh lot, and these will
pour into the empty places, together with
THE FIT 131
women from Saratov, Nijni-Novgorod, Warsaw.
. . . And what happens to the hundred thousand
in London ? What can be done with those in
Hamburg ?
The oil in the lamp was used up and the lamp
began to smell. Vassiliev did not notice it.
Again he began to pace up and down, thinking.
Now he put the question differently. What can
be done to remove the demand for fallen women ?
For this it is necessary that the men who buy
and kill them should at once begin to feel all the
immorality of their role of slaveowners, and
this should terrify them. It is necessary to
save the men.
Science and art apparently won't do, thought
Vassiliev. There is only one way out to be an
apostle.
And he began to dream how he would stand
to-morrow evening at the corner of the street
and say to each passer-by : " Where are you
going and what for ? Fear God ! "
He would turn to the indifferent cabmen and
say to them :
" Why are you standing here ? Why don't
you revolt ? You do believe in God, don't you ?
And you do know that this is a crime, and that
people will go to Hell for this ? Why do you
keep quiet, then ? True, the women are
strangers to you, but they have fathers and
brothers exactly the same as you. ..."
Some friend of Vassiliev's once said of him
that he was a man of talent. There is a talent
132 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
for writing, for the theatre, for painting ; but
Vassiliev's was peculiar, a talent for humanity.
He had a fine and noble flair for every kind of
suffering. As a good actor reflects in himself
the movement and voice of another, so Vassiliev
could reflect in himself another's pain. Seeing
tears, he wept. With a sick person, he himself
became sick and moaned. If he saw violence
done, it seemed to him that he was the victim.
He was frightened like a child, and, frightened,
ran for help. Another's pain roused him, excited
him, threw him into a state of ecstasy. . . .
Whether the friend was right I do not know,
but what happened to Vassiliev when it seemed
to him that the question was solved was very
much like an ecstasy. He sobbed, laughed,
said aloud the things he would say to-morrow,
felt a burning love for the men who would listen
to him and stand by his side at the corner of the
street, preaching. He sat down to write to
them ; he made vows.
All this was the more like an ecstasy in that
it did not last. Vassiliev was soon tired. The
London women, the Hamburg women, those
from Warsaw, crushed him with their mass, as
the mountains crush the earth. He quailed
before this mass ; he lost himself ; he remem-
bered he had no gift for speaking, that he was
timid and faint-hearted, that strange people
would hardly want to listen to and understand
him, a law-student in his third year, a frightened
and insignificant figure. The true apostleship
THE FIT 133
consisted, not only in preaching, but also in
deeds. . . .
When daylight came and the carts rattled on
the streets, Vassiliev lay motionless on the sofa,
staring at one point. He did not think any
more of women, or men, or apostles. All his
attention was fixed on the pain of his soul which
tormented him. It was a dull pain, indefinite,
vague ; it was like anguish and the most acute
fear and despair. He could say where the
pain was. It was in his breast, under the heart.
It could not be compared to anything. Once
on a time he used to have violent toothache.
Once, he had pleurisy and neuralgia. But all
these pains were as nothing beside the pain of
his soul. Beneath this pain life seemed repulsive.
The thesis, his brilliant work already written,
the people he loved, the salvation of fallen
women, all that which only yesterday he loved
or was indifferent to, remembered now, irritated
him in the same way as the noise of the carts,
the running about of the porters and the daylight
... If someone now were to perform before
his eyes a deed of mercy or an act of revolt-
ing violence, both would produce upon him
an equally repulsive impression. Of all the
thoughts which roved lazily in his head, two
only did not irritate him : one at any moment
he had the power to kill himself, the other
that the pain would not last more than three
days. The second he knew from experience.
After having lain down for a while he got up
184 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
and walked wringing his hands, not from corner
to corner as usually, but in a square along the
walls. He caught a glimpse of himself in the
glass. His face was pale and haggard, his temples
hollow, his eyes bigger, darker, more immobile,
as if they were not his own, and they expressed
the intolerable suffering of his soul.
In the afternoon the painter knocked at the
door.
" Gregory, are you at home ? " he asked.
Receiving no answer, he stood musing for a
while, and said to himself good-naturedly :
" Out. He's gone to the University. Damn
him."
And went away.
Vassiliev lay down on his bed and burying
his head in the pillow he began to cry with the
pain. But the faster his tears flowed, the more
terrible was the pain. When it was dark, he got
into his mind the idea of the horrible night which
was awaiting him and awful despair seized him.
He dressed quickly, ran out of his room, leaving
the door wide open, and into the street without
reason or purpose. Without asking himself
where he was going, he walked quickly to
Sadovaia Street.
Snow was falling as yesterday. It was thaw-
ing. Putting his hands into his sleeves, shiver-
ing, and frightened of the noises and the bells
of the trams and of passers-by, Vassiliev walked
from Sadovaia to Sukhariev Tower then to the
Red Gates, and from here he turned and went to
THE FIT 135
Basmannaia. He went into a public-house and
gulped down a big glass of vodka, but felt no
better. Arriving at Razgoulyai, he turned to
the right and began to stride down streets that
he had never in his life been down before. He
came to that old bridge under which the river
Yaouza roars and from whence long rows of
lights are seen in the windows of the Red
Barracks. In order to distract the pain of his
soul by a new sensation or another pain, not
knowing what to do, weeping and trembling,
Vassiliev unbuttoned his coat and jacket, baring
his naked breast to the damp snow and the wind.
Neither lessened the pain. Then he bent over
the rail of the bridge and stared down at the
black, turbulent Yaouza, and he suddenly
wanted to throw himself head-first, not from
hatred of life, not for the sake of suicide, but
only to hurt himself and so to kill one pain by
another. But the black water, the dark, de-
serted banks covered with snow were frighten-
ing. He shuddered and went on. He walked
as far as the Red Barracks, then back and into
a wood, from the wood to the bridge again.
"No! Home, home," he thought. "At
home I believe it's easier."
And he went back. On returning home he
tore off his wet clothes and hat, began to pace
along the walls, and paced incessantly until
the very morning.
136 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
VII
The next morning when the painter and the
medico came to see him, they found him in a
shirt torn to ribbons, his hands bitten all over,
tossing about in the room and moaning with
pain.
" For God's sake ! " he began to sob, seeing
his comrades, " Take me anywhere you like,
do what you like, but save me, for God's sake
now, now ! I'll kill myself."
The painter went pale and was bewildered.
The medico, too, nearly began to cry ; but,
believing that medical men must be cool and
serious on every occasion of life, he said coldly :
" It's a fit you've got. But never mind.
Come to the doctor, at once."
" Anywhere you like, but quickly, for God's
sake ! "
" Don't be agitated. You must struggle with
yourself."
The painter and the medico dressed Vassiliev
with trembling hands and led him into the
street.
" Mikhail Sergueyich has been wanting to
make your acquaintance for a long while," the
medico said on the way. " He's a very nice
man, and knows his job splendidly. He took his
degree in '82, and has got a huge practice
already. He keeps friends with the students."
" Quicker, quicker . . ." urged Vassiliev.
THE FIT 137
Mikhail Sergueyich, a stout doctor with fair
hair, received the friends politely, firmly, coldly,
and smiled with one cheek only.
" The painter and Mayer have told me of your
disease already," he said. " Very glad to be of
service to you. Well ? Sit down, please."
He made Vassiliev sit down in a big chair by
the table, and put a box of cigarettes in front of
him.
" Well ? " he began, stroking his knees.
" Let's make a start. How old are you ? "
He put questions and the medico answered.
He asked whether Vassiliev's father suffered
from any peculiar diseases, if he had fits of
drinking, was he distinguished by his severity
or any other eccentricities. He asked the same
questions about his grandfather, mother, sisters,
and brothers. Having ascertained that his
mother had a fine voice and occasionally appeared
on the stage, he suddenly brightened up and
asked :
" Excuse me, but could you recall whether the
theatre was not a passion with your mother ? "
About twenty minutes passed. Vassiliev was
bored by the doctor stroking his knees and talking
of the same thing all the while.
" As far as I can understand your questions,
Doctor," he said. " You want to know whether
my disease is hereditary or not. It is not
hereditary."
The doctor went on to ask if Vassiliev had not
any se, ret vices in his early youth, any blows on
K
188 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
the head, any love passions, eccentricities, or
exceptional infatuations. To half the questions
habitually asked by careful doctors you may
return no answer without any injury to your
health ; but Mikhail Sergueyich, the medico
and the painter looked as though, if Vassiliev
failed to answer even one single question, every-
thing would be ruined. For some reason the
doctor wrote down the answers he received on a
scrap of paper. Discovering that Vassiliev had
already passed through the faculty of natural
science and was now in the Law faculty, the
doctor began to be pensive. . . .
" He wrote a brilliant thesis last year ..."
said the medico.
" Excuse me. You mustn't interrupt me ;
you prevent me from concentrating," the doctor
said, smiling with one cheek. " Yes, certainly
that is important for the anamnesis. . . . Yes,
yes. . . . And do you drink vodka ? " he
turned to Vassiliev.
" Very rarely."
Another twenty minutes passed. The medico
began sotto voce to give his opinion of the
immediate causes of the fit and told how he, the
painter and Vassiliev went to S v Street the
day before yesterday.
The indifferent, reserved, cold tone in which his
friends and the doctor were speaking of the
women and the miserable street seemed to him
in the highest degree strange. . . .
" Doctor, tell me this one thing," he said,
THE FIT 189
restraining himself from being rude. " Is prosti-
tution an evil or not ? "
" My dear fellow, who disputes it ? " the
doctor said with an expression as though he had
long ago solved all these questions for himself.
" Who disputes it ? "
" Are you a psychiatrist ? "
" Yes-s, a psychiatrist."
" Perhaps all of you are right," said Vassiliev,
rising and beginning to walk from corner to
corner. " It may be. But to me all this seems
amazing. They see a great achievement in my
having passed through two faculties at the
university ; they praise me to the skies because
I have written a work .that will be thrown away
and forgotten in three years' time, but because I
can't speak of prostitutes as indifferently as I
can about these chairs, they send me to doctors,
call me a lunatic, and pity me."
For some reason Vassiliev suddenly began to
feel an intolerable pity for himself, his friends,
and everybody whom he had seen the day before
yesterday, and for the doctor. He began to sob
and fell into the chair.
The friends looked interrogatively at the
doctor. He, looking as though he magni-
ficently understood the tears and the despair,
and knew himself a specialist in this line,
approached Vassiliev and gave him some drops
to drink, and then when Vassiliev grew calm
undressed him and began to examine the sensi-
tiveness of his skin, of the knee reflexes, ....
K 2
140 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
And Vassiliev felt better. When he was
coming out of the doctor's he was already
ashamed ; the noise of the traffic did not seem
irritating, and the heaviness beneath his heart
became easier and easier as though it were
thawing. In his hand were two prescriptions.
One was for kali-bromatum, the other morphia.
He used to take both before.
He stood still in the street for a while, pensive,
and then, taking leave of his friends, lazily
dragged on towards the university.
MISFORTUNE
SOPHIA PIETROVNA, the wife of the solicitor
Loubianzev, a handsome young woman of about
twenty-five, was walking quickly along a forest
path with her bungalow neighbour, the barrister
Ilyin. It was just after four. In the distance,
above the path, white feathery clouds gathered ;
from behind them some bright blue pieces of
cloud showed through. The clouds were motion-
less, as if caught on the tops of the tall, aged fir
trees. It was calm and warm.
In the distance the path was cut across by
a low railway embankment, along which at
this hour, for some reason or other, a sentry
strode. Just behind the embankment a big,
six-towered church with a rusty roof shone
white.
" I did not expect to meet you here," Sophia
Pietrovna was saying, looking down and touch-
ing the last year's leaves with the end of her
parasol. " But now I am glad to have met you.
I want to speak to you seriously and finally.
142 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
Ivan Mikhailovich, if you really love and respect
me I implore you to stop pursuing me ! You
follow me like a shadow there's such a wicked
look in your eye you make love to me write
extraordinary letters and ... I don't know
how all this is going to end Good Heavens !
What can all this lead to ? "
Ilyin was silent. Sophia Pietrovna took a
few steps and continued :
" And this sudden complete change has hap-
pened in two or three weeks after five years of
friendship. I do not know you any more, Ivan
Mikhailovich."
Sophia Pietrovna glanced sideways at her
companion. He was staring intently, screwing
up his eyes at the feathery clouds. The ex-
pression of his face was angry, capricious
and distracted, like that of a man who suffers
and at the same time must listen to non-
sense.
" It is annoying that you yourself can't realise
it ! " Madame Loubianzev continued, shrugging
her shoulders. " Please understand that you're
not playing a very nice game. I am married,
I love and respect my husband. I have a
daughter. Don't you really care in the slightest
for all this ? Besides, as an old friend, you know
my views on family life ... on the sanctity of
the home, generally."
Ilyin gave an angry grunt and sighed :
" The sanctity of the home," he murmured,
" Good Lord ! "
MISFORTUNE 148
" Yes, yes. I love and respect my husband
and at any rate the peace of my family life is
precious to me. I'd sooner let myself be killed
than be the cause of Audrey's or his daughter's
unhappiness. So, please, Ivan Mikhailovich, for
goodness' sake, leave me alone. Let us be good
and dear friends, and give up these sighings and
gaspings which don't suit you. It's settled and
done with ! Not another word about it. Let
us talk of something else ! "
Sophia Pietrovna again glanced sideways at
Ilyin. He was looking up. He was pale, and
angrily he bit his trembling lips. Madame
Loubianzev could not understand why he was
disturbed and angry ? but his pallor moved
her.
" Don't be cross. Let's be friends," she said,
sweetly.
" Agreed ! Here is my hand."
Ilyin took her tiny plump hand in both
his, pressed it and slowly raised it to his
lips.
" I'm not a schoolboy," he murmured. " I'm
not in the least attracted by the idea of friend-
ship with the woman I love."
" That's enough. Stop ! It is all settled and
done with. We have come as far as the bench.
Let us sit down ..."
A sweet sense of repose filled Sophia Pietro-
vna's soul. The most difficult and delicate
thing was already said. The tormenting ques-
tion was settled and done with. Now she could
144 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
breathe easily and look straight at Ilyin. She
looked at him, and the egotistical sense of
superiority that a woman feels over her lover
caressed her pleasantly. She liked the way this
big strong man with a virile angry face and a
huge black beard sat obediently at her side
and hung his head. They were silent for a
little while. " Nothing is yet settled and done
with," Ilyin began. " You are reading me a
sermon. ' I love and respect my husband . . .
the sanctity of the home. . . .' I know all that
for myself and I can tell you more. Honestly
and sincerely I confess that I consider my conduct
as criminal and immoral. What else ? But
why say what is known already ? Instead of
sermonizing you had far better tell me what I
am to do."
" I have already told you. Go away."
" I have gone. You know quite well. I
have started five times and half-way there
I have come back again. I can show you the
through tickets. I have kept them all safe.
But I haven't the power to run away from you. I
struggle frightfully, but what in Heaven's name
is the use ? If I cannot harden myself, if I'm
weak and faint-hearted. I can't fight nature.
Do you understand ? I cannot ! I run away
from her and she holds me back by my coat-
tails. Vile, vulgar weakness."
Ilyin blushed, got up, and began walking by
the bench :
" How I hate and despise myself. Good Lord,
MISFORTUNE 145
I'm like a vicious boy running after another
man's wife, writing idiotic letters, degrading
myself. Ach ! " He clutched his head, grunted
and sat down.
" And now comes your lack of sincerity into
the bargain," he continued with bitterness. " If
you don't think I am playing a nice game
why are you here ? What drew you ? In my
letters I only ask you for a straightforward
answer : Yes, or No ; and instead of giving it
me, every day you contrive that we shall meet
' by chance ' and you treat me to quotations
from a moral copy-book."
Madame Loubianzev reddened and got fright-
ened. She suddenly felt the kind of awkwardness
that a modest woman would feel at being sud-
denly discovered naked.
" You seem to suspect some deceit on my side,"
she murmured. " I have always given you a
straight answer ; and I asked you for one to-
day."
" Ah, does one ask such things ? If you had
said to me at once ' Go away,' I would have
gone long ago, but you never told me to.
Never once have you been frank. Strange
irresolution. My God, either you're playing
with me, or. . . ."
Ilyin did not finish, and rested his head in
his hands. Sophia Pietrovna recalled her be-
haviour all through. She remembered that she
had felt all these days not only in deed but even
in her most intimate thoughts opposed to Ilyin's
146 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
love. But at the same moment she knew that
there was a grain of truth in the barrister's
words. And not knowing what kind of truth
it was she could not think, no matter how
much she thought about it, what to say to
him in answer to his complaint. It was
awkward being silent, so she said shrugging
her shoulders :
" So I'm to blame for that too ? "
" I don't blame you for your insincerity,"
sighed Ilyin. " It slipped out unconsciously.
Your insincerity is natural to you, in the natural
order of things as well. If all mankind were to
agree suddenly to become serious, everything
would go to the Devil, to ruin."
Sophia Pietrovna was not in the mood for
philosophy ; but she was glad of the opportunity
to change the conversation and asked :
" Why indeed ? "
" Because only savages and animals are sincere.
Since civilisation introduced into society the
demand, for instance, for such a luxury as
woman's virtue, sincerity has been out of
place."
Angrily Ilyin began to thrust his stick into
the sand. Madame Loubianzev listened without
understanding much of it ; she liked the con-
versation. First of all, she was pleased that a
gifted man should speak to her, an average
woman, about intellectual things ; also it gave
her great pleasure to watch how the pale, lively,
still angry, young face was working. Much she
MISFORTUNE 147
did not understand ; but the fine courage of
modern man was revealed to her, the courage
by which he without reflection or surmise solves
the great questions and constructs his simple
conclusions.
Suddenly she discovered that she was admir-
ing him, and it frightened her.
" Pardon, but I don't really understand," she
hastened to say. " Why did you mention in-
sincerity ? I entreat you once more, be a dear,
good friend and leave me alone. Sincerely, I
ask it."
" Good I'll do my best. But hardly any-
thing will come of it. Either I'll put a bullet
through my brains or . -. . I'll start drinking in
the stupidest possible way. Things will end
badly for me. Everything has its limit, even
a struggle with nature. Tell me now, how can
one struggle with madness ? If you've drunk
wine, how can you get over the excitement ?
What can I do if your image has grown into my
soul, and stands incessantly before my eyes,
night and day, as plain as that fir tree there ?
Tell me then what thing I must do to get out of
this wretched, unhappy state, when all my
thoughts, desires, and dreams belong, not to me,
but to some devil that has got hold of me ? I
love you, I love you so much that I've turned
away from my path, given up my career and my
closest friends, forgot my God. Never in my
life have I loved so much."
Sophia Pietrovna, who was not expecting this
148 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
turn, drew her body away from Ilyin, and glanced
at him frightened. Tears shone in his eyes. His
lips trembled, and a hungry, suppliant expres-
sion showed over all his face.
" I love you," he murmured, bringing his own
eyes near to her big, frightened ones. " You are
so beautiful. I'm suffering now ; but I swear I
could remain so all my life, suffering and looking
into your eyes, but . . . Keep silent, I implore
you."
Sophia Pietrovna as if taken unawares began,
quickly, quickly, to think out words with which
to stop him. " I shall go away," she decided,
but no sooner had she moved to get up, than
Ilyin was on his knees at her feet already. He
embraced her knees, looked into her eyes and
spoke passionately, ardently, beautifully. She
did not hear his words, for her fear and agitation.
Somehow now at this dangerous moment when
her knees pleasantly contracted, as in a warm
bath, she sought with evil intention to read some
meaning into her sensation. She was angry
because the whole of her instead of protesting
virtue was filled with weakness, laziness, and
emptiness, like a drunken man to whom the
ocean is but knee-deep ; only in the depths of
her soul, a little remote malignant voice teased :
" Why don't you go away ? Then this is right,
is it ? "
Seeking in herself an explanation she could not
understand why she had not withdrawn the
hand to which Ilyin's lips clung like a leech, nor
MISFORTUNE 148
why, at the same time as Ilyin, she looked hur-
riedly right and left to see that they wert not
observed.
The fir-trees and the clouds stood motionless,
and gazed at them severely like broken-down
masters who see something going on, but have
been bribed not to report to the head. The
sentry on the embankment stood like a stick
and seemed to be staring at the bench. " Let
him look ! " thought Sophia Pietrovna.
" But . . . But listen," she said at last with
despair in her voice. " What will this lead to ?
What will happen afterwards ? "
" I don't know. I don't know," he began to
whisper, waving these unpleasant questions aside.
The hoarse, jarring whistle of a railway engine
became audible. This cold, prosaic sound of the
everyday world made Madame Loubianzev
start.
"It's time, I must go," she said, getting up
quickly. " The train is coming. Andrey is
arriving. He will want his dinner."
Sophia Pietrovna turned her blazing cheeks to
the embankment. First the engine came slowly
into sight, after it the carriages. It was not a
bungalow train, but a goods train. In a long
row, one after another like the days of man's
life, the cars drew past the white background of
the church, and there seemed to be no end to
them.
But at last the train disappeared, and the end
car with the guard and the lighted lamps dis-
150 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
appeared into the green. Sophia Pietrovna
turned sharply and not looking at Ilyin began to
walk quickly back along the path. She had
herself in control again. Red with shame,
offended, not by Ilyin, no ! but by the cowardice
and shamelessness with which she, a good,
respectable woman allowed a stranger to embrace
her knees. She had only one thought now, to
reach her bungalow and her family as quickly
as possible. The barrister could hardly keep
up with her. Turning from the path on to a
little track, she glanced at him so quickly
that she noticed only the sand on his knees,
and she motioned with her hand at him to let
her be.
Running into the house Sophia Pietrovna stood
for about five minutes motionless in her room,
looking now at the window then at the writing
table. ..." You disgraceful woman," she
scolded herself ; " disgraceful ! " In spite of
herself she recollected every detail, hiding
nothing, how all these days she had been against
Ilyin's love-making, yet she was somehow drawn
to meet him and explain ; but besides this
when he was lying at her feet she felt an extra-
ordinary pleasure. She recalled everything, not
sparing herself, and now, stifled with shame, she
could have slapped her own face.
" Poor An drey," she thought, trying, as she
remembered her husband, to give her face the
tenderest possible expression " Varya, my poor
darling child, does not know what a mother she
MISFORTUNE 151
has. Forgive me, my dears. I love you very
much . . . very much ! . . ."
And wishing to convince herself that she was
still a good wife and mother, that corruption
had not yet touched those " sanctities " of hers,
of which she had spoken to Ilyin, Sophia Pietro-
vna ran into the kitchen and scolded the cook
for not having laid the table for Andrey Ilyitch.
She tried to imagine her husband's tired, hungry
look, and pitying him aloud, she laid the table
herself, a thing which she had never done
before. Then she found her daughter Varya,
lifted her up in her hands and kissed her passion-
ately ; the child seemed to her heavy and cold,
but she would not own it to herself, and she
began to tell her what a good, dear, splendid
father she had.
But when, soon after, Andrey Ilyitch arrived,
she barely greeted him. The flow of imaginary
feelings had ebbed away without convincing her
of anything ; she was only exasperated and
enraged by the lie. She sat at the window,
suffered, and raged. Only in distress can people
understand how difficult it is to master their
thoughts and feelings. Sophia Pietrovna said
afterwards a confusion was going on inside her
as hard to define as to count a cloud of swiftly
flying sparrows. Thus from the fact that she
was delighted at her husband's arrival and
pleased with the way he behaved at dinner,
she suddenly concluded that she had begun to
hate him. Andrey Ilyitch, languid with hunger
152 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
and fatigue, while waiting for the soup, fell upon
the sausage and ate it greedily, chewing loudly
and moving his temples.
" My God," thought Sophia Pietrovna. " I
do love and respect him, but . . . why does he
chew so disgustingly."
Her thoughts were no less disturbed than her
feelings. Madame Loubianzev, like all who have
no experience of the struggle with unpleasant
thought, did her best not to think of her un-
happiness, and the more zealously she tried, the
more vivid Ilyin became to her imagination, the
sand on his knees, the feathery clouds, the
train. . . .
" Why did I idiot go to-day ? " she teased
herself. " And am I really a person who can't
answer for herself ? "
Fear has big eyes. When Andrey Ilyitch
had finished the last course, she had already
resolved to tell him everything and so escape
from danger.
" Andrey, I want to speak to you seriously,"
she began after dinner, when her husband was
taking off his coat and boots in order to have a
lie down.
" Well ? "
" Let's go away from here ! "
" How where to ? It's still too early to go
to town."
" No. Travel or something like that."
" Travel," murmured the solicitor, stretching
himself. " I dream of it myself, but where shall
MISFORTUNE 158
I get the money, and who'll look after my
business."
After a little reflection he added :
" Yes, really you are bored. Go by yourself
if you want to."
Sophia Pietrovna agreed ; but at the same
time she saw that Ilyin would be glad of the
opportunity to travel in the same train with
her, in the same carriage. . . .
She pondered and looked at her husband, who
was full fed but still languid. For some reason
her eyes stopped on his feet, tiny, almost woman-
ish, in stupid socks. On the toe of both socks
little threads were standing out. Under the
drawn blind a bumfele bee was knocking against
the window pane and buzzing. Sophia Piet-
rovna stared at the threads, listened to the
bumble bee and pictured her journey . . . Day
and night Ilyin sits opposite, without taking
his eyes from her, angry with his weakness and
pale with the pain of his soul. He brands him-
self as a libertine, accuses her, tears his hair ; but
when the dark comes he seizes the chance when
the passengers go to sleep or alight at a station
and falls on his knees before her and clasps her
feet, as he did by the bench . . .
She realised that she was dreaming . . .
" Listen. I am not going by myself," she
said. " You must come, too ! "
" Sophochka, that's all imagination ! " sighed
Loubianzev. " You must be serious and only
ask for the possible . . ."
L
154 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" You'll come when you find out ! " thought
Sophia Pietrovna.
Having decided to go away at all costs, she
began to feel free from danger ; her thoughts
fell gradually into order, she became cheerful
and even allowed herself to think about every-
thing. Whatever she may think or dream about,
she is going all the same. While her husband
still slept, little by little, evening came . . .
She sat in the drawing-room playing the piano.
Outside the window the evening animation, the
sound of music, but chiefly the thought of her
own cleverness in mastering her misery gave the
final touch to her joy. Other women, her easy
conscience told her, in a position like her own
would surely not resist, they would spin round
like a whirlwind ; but she was nearly burnt up
with shame, she suffered and now she had
escaped from a danger which perhaps was non-
existent ! Her virtue and resolution moved her
so much that she even glanced at herself in the
glass three times.
When it was dark visitors came. The men
sat down to cards in the dining-room, the ladies
were in the drawing room and on the terrace.
Ilyin came last, he was stern and gloomy and
looked ill. He sat down on a corner of the sofa
and did not get up for the whole evening.
Usually cheerful and full of conversation, he was
now silent, frowning, and rubbing his eyes.
When he had to answer a question he smiled
with difficulty and only with his upper lip,
MISFORTUNE 155
answering abruptly and spitefully. He made
about five jokes in all, but his jokes seemed crude
and insolent. It seemed to Sophia Pietrovna
that he was on the brink of hysteria. But only
now as she sat at the piano did she acknowledge
that the unhappy man was not in the mood to
joke, that he was sick in his soul, he could find
no place for himself. It was for her sake he
was ruining the best days of his career and his
youth, wasting his last farthing on a bungalow,
had left his mother and sisters uncared for,
and, above all, was breaking down under the
martyrdom of his struggle. From simple,
common humanity she ought to take him
seriously. . . .
All this was clear to her, even to paining her.
If she were to go up to Ilyin now and say to him
" No," there would be such strength in her voice
that it would be hard to disobey. But she did
not go up to him and she did not say it, did not
even think it ... The petty selfishness of a
young nature seemed never to have been re-
vealed in her as strongly as that evening. She
admitted that Ilyin was unhappy and that he
sat on the sofa as if on hot coals. She was
sorry for him, but at the same time the presence
of the man who loved her so desperately filled
her with a triumphant sense of her own power.
She felt her youth, her beauty, her inaccessi-
bility, and since she had decided to go away
she gave herself full rein this evening. She
coquetted, laughed continually, she sang with
L 2
156 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
singular emotion, and as one inspired. Every-
thing made her gay and everything seemed funny.
It amused her to recall the incident of the bench,
the sentry looking on. The visitors seemed
funny to her, Ilyin's insolent jokes, his tie pin
which she had never seen before. The pin was
a little red snake with tiny diamond eyes ; the
snake seemed so funny that she was ready to
kiss and kiss it.
Sophia Pietrovna, nervously sang romantic
songs, with a kind of half-intoxication, and as if
jeering at another's sorrow she chose sad,
melancholy songs that spoke of lost hopes, of
the past, of old age. ... " And old age is
approaching nearer and nearer," she sang.
What had she to do with old age ?
" There's something wrong going on in me,"
she thought now and then through laughter and
singing.
At twelve o'clock the visitors departed.
Ilyin was the last to go. She still felt warm
enough about him to go with him to the lower
step of the terrace. She had the idea of telling
him that she was going away with her husband,
just to see what effect this news would have
upon him.
The moon was hiding behind the clouds, but
it was so bright that Sophia Pietrovna could see
the wind playing with the tails of his overcoat
and with the creepers on the terrace. It was
also plain how pale Ilyin was, and how he
twisted his upper-lip, trying to smile.
MISFORTUNE 157
" Sonia, Sonichka, my dear little woman,"
he murmured, not letting her speak. " My
darling, my pretty one."
In a paroxysm of tenderness with tears in his
voice, he showered her with endearing words
each tenderer than the other, and was already
speaking to her as if she were his wife or his
mistress. Suddenly and unexpectedly to her,
he put one arm round her and with the other
hand he seized her elbow.
" My dear one, my beauty," he began to
whisper, kissing the nape of her neck ; " be
sincere, come to me now."
She slipped out pf his embrace and lifted her
head to break out in indignation and revolt.
But indignation did not come, and of all her
praiseworthy virtue and purity, there was left
only enough for her to say that which all average
women say in similar circumstances :
" You must be mad."
" But really let us go," continued Ilyin.
" Just now and over there by the bench I felt
convinced that you, Sonia, were as helpless
as myself. You too will be all the worse for it.
You love me, and you are making a useless
bargain with your conscience."
Seeing that she was leaving him he seized her
by her lace sleeve and ended quickly :
" If not to-day, then to-morrow ; but you
will have to give in. What's the good of
putting if off ? My dear, my darling Sonia,
the verdict has been pronounced. Why post-
158 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
pone the execution ? Why deceive your-
self?"
Sophia Pietrovna broke away from him and
suddenly disappeared inside the door. She
returned to the drawing-room, shut the piano
mechanically, stared for a long time at the cover
of a music book, and sat down. She could
neither stand nor think. . . . From her agitation
and passion remained only an awful weakness
mingled with laziness and tiredness. Her con-
science whispered to her that she had behaved
wickedly and foolishly to-night, like a mad-
woman ; that just now she had been kissed on
the terrace, and even now she had some strange
sensation in her waist and in her elbow. Not a
soul was in the drawing-room. Only a single
candle was burning. Madame Loubianzev sat
on a little round stool before the piano without
strirring as if waiting for something, and as if
taking advantage of her extreme exhaustion
and the dark a heavy unconquerable desire
began to possess her. Like a boa-constrictor,
it enchained her limbs and soul. It grew every
second and was no longer threatening, but stood
clear before her in all its nakedness.
She sat thus for half an hour, not moving, and
not stopping herself from thinking of Ilyin.
Then she got up lazily and went slowly into the
bed-room. Andrey Ilyitch was in bed already.
She sat by the window and gave herself to her
desire. She felt no more "confusion." All her
feelings and thoughts pressed lovingly round
MISFORTUNE 159
some clear purpose. She still had a mind to
struggle, but instantly she waved her hand
impotently, realising the strength and the deter-
mination of the foe. To fight him power and
strength were necessary, but her birth, upbringing
and life had given her nothing on which to
lean.
" You're immoral, you're horrible," she
tormented herself for her weakness. " You're
a nice sort, you are ! "
So indignant was her insulted modesty at this
weakness that she called herself all the bad
names that she knew and she related to herself
many insulting, degrading truths. Thus she
told herself that she never was moral, and she had
not fallen before only because there was no pre-
text, that her day-long struggle had been
nothing but a game and a comedy. . . .
" Let us admit that I struggled," she thought,
" but what kind of a fight was it ? Even
prostitutes struggle before they sell themselves,
and still they do sell themselves. It's a pretty
sort of fight. Like milk, turns in a day." She
realised that it was not love that drew her from
her home nor Ilyin's personality, but the sen-
sations which await her. ... A little week-end
type like the rest of them.
" When the young bird's mother was killed,"
a hoarse tenor finished singing.
If I am going, it's time, thought Sophia
Pietrovna. Her heart began to beat with a
frightful force.
100 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" Andrey," she almost cried. " Listen. Shall
we go away ? Shall we ? Yes ? "
" Yes. . . . I've told you already. You go
alone."
" But listen," she said, " if you don't come too,
you may lose me. I seem to be in love already."
" Who with ? " Andrey Ilyitch asked.
" It must be all the same for you, who with,"
Sophia Pietrovna cried out.
Andrey Ilyitch got up, dangled his feet over
the side of the bed, with a look of surprise at
the dark form of his wife.
" Imagination," he yawned.
He could not believe her, but all the same he
was frightened. After having thought for a
while, and asked his wife some unimportant
questions, he gave his views of the family, of
infidelity. . . . He spoke sleepily for about ten
minutes and then lay down again. His remarks
had no success. There are a great many
opinions in this world, and more than half of
them belong to people who have never known
misery.
In spite of the late hour, the bungalow people
were still moving behind their windows. Sophia
Pietrovna put on a long coat and stood for a
while, thinking. She still had force of mind to
say to her sleepy husband :
" Are you asleep ? I'm going for a little
walk. Would you like to come with me ? "
That was her last hope. Receiving no answer,
he walked out. It wa breezy and cool. She
MISFORTUNE 161
did not feel the breeze or the darkness but
walked on and on An irresistible power
drove her, and it seemed to her that if she
stopped that power would push her in the back.
"You're an immoral woman," she murmured
mechanically. " You're horrible."
She was choking for breath, burning with
shame, did not feel her feet under her, for that
which drove her along was stronger than her
shame, her reason, her fear. . . .
AFTER THE THEATRE
NADYA ZELENINA had just returned with her
mother from the theatre, where they had been
to see a performance of " Eugene Oniegin."
Entering her room, she quickly threw off her
dress, loosened her hair, and sat down hurriedly
in her petticoat and a white blouse to write a
letter in the style of Tatiana.
" I love you," she wrote " but you don't
love me ; no, you don't ! "
The moment she had written this, she smiled.
She was only sixteen years old, and so far she
had not been in love. She knew that Gorny,
the officer, and Gronsdiev, the student, loved her ;
but now, after the theatre, she wanted to doubt
their love. To be unloved and unhappy how
interesting. There is something beautiful, affect-
ing, romantic in the fact that one loves deeply
while the other is indifferent. Oniegin is inter-
esting because he does not love at all, and
Tatiana is delightful because she is very much
in love ; but if they loved each other equally
and were happy, they would seem boring, in-
stead.
163
164 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" Don't go on protesting that you love me,"
Nadya wrote on, thinking of Gorny, the officer,
" I can't believe you. You're very clever,
educated, serious ; you have a great talent, and
perhaps, a splendid future waiting, but I am an
uninteresting poor-spirited girl, and you yourself
know quite well that I shall only be a drag upon
your life. It's true I carried you off your feet,
and you thought you had met your ideal in me,
but that was a mistake. Already you are asking
yourself in despair, ' Why did I meet this girl ? '
Only your kindness prevents you from confessing
it."
Nadya pitied herself. She wept and went on.
" If it were not so difficult for me to leave
mother and brother I would put on a nun's
gown and go where my eyes direct me. You
would then be free to love another. If I were
to die ! "
Through her tears she could not make out what
she had written. Brief rainbows trembled on
the table, on the floor and the ceiling, as though
Nadya were looking through a prism. Impossible
to write. She sank back in her chair and began
to think of Gorny.
Oh, how fascinating, how interesting men are !
Nadya remembered the beautiful expression of
Gorny's face, appealing, guilty, and tender,
when someone discussed music with him, the
efforts he made to prevent the passion from
sounding in his voice. Passion must be con-
cealed in a society where cold reserve and in-
AFTER THE THEATRE 165
difference are the signs of good breeding. And
he does try to conceal it, but he does not succeed,
and everybody knows quite well that he has a
passion for music. Never-ending discussions
about music, blundering pronouncements by
men who do not understand keep him in in-
cessant tension. He is scared, timid, silent. He
plays superbly, as an ardent pianist. If he were
not an officer, he would be a famous musician.
The tears dried in her eyes. Nadya remem-
bered how Gorny told her of his love at a sym-
phony concert, and again downstairs by the
cloak-room.
" I am so glad you have at last made the
acquaintance of the student Gronsdiev," she
continued to write. " He is a very clever man,
and you are sure to love him. Yesterday he
was sitting with us till two o'clock in the morn-
ing. We were all so happy. I was sorry that
you hadn't come to us. He said a lot of re-
markable things."
Nadya laid her hands on the table and lowered
her head. Her hair covered the letter. She
remembered that Gronsdiev also loved her, and
that he had the same right to her letter as
Gorny. Perhaps she had better write to Grons-
diev ? For no cause, a happiness began to
quicken in her breast. At first it was a little
one, rolling about in her breast like a rubber
ball. Then it grew broader and bigger, and
broke forth like a wave. Nadya had already
forgotten about Gorny and Gronsdiev. Her
166 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
thoughts became confused. The happiness grew
more and more. From her breast it ran into her
arms and legs, and it seemed that a light fresh
breeze blew over her head, stirring her hair.
Her shoulders trembled with quiet laughter.
The table and the lampglass trembled. Tears
from her eyes splashed the letter. She was
powerless to stop her laughter ; and to convince
herself that she had a reason for it, she hastened
to remember something funny.
" What a funny poodle ! " she cried, feeling
that she was choking with laughter. " What
a funny poodle ! "
She remembered how Gronsdiev was playing
with Maxim the poodle after tea yesterday ;
how he told a story afterwards of a very clever
poodle who was chasing a crow in the yard. The
crow gave him a look and said :
" Oh, you swindler ! "
The poodle did not know he had to do with
a learned crow. He was terribly confused, and
ran away dumfounded. Afterwards he began
to bark.
" No, I'd better love Gronsdiev," Nadya de-
cided and tore up the letter.
She began to think of the student, of his
love, of her own love, with the result that
the thoughts in her head swam apart and she
thought about everything, about her mother,
the street, the pencil, the piano. She was
happy thinking, and found that everything
was good, magnificent. Her happiness told
AFTER THE THEATRE 167
her that this was not all, that a little later
it would be still better. Soon it will be
spring, summer. They will go with mother to
Gorbiki in the country. Gorny will come for
his holidays. He will walk in the orchard with
her, and make love to her. Gronsdiev will come
too. He will play croquet with her and bowls.
He will tell funny, wonderful stories. She
passionately longed for the orchard, the dark-
ness, the pure sky, the stars. Again her shoulders
trembled with laughter and she seemed to awake
to a smell of wormwood in the room ; and a
branch was tapping at the window.
She went to her bed and sat down. She did
not know what to do with her great happiness.
It overwhelmed her. She stared at the crucifix
which hung at the head of her bed and saying :
" Dear God, dear God, dear God."
THAT WRETCHED BOY
IVAN IVANICH LAPKIN, a pleasant looking
young man, and Anna Zamblizky, a young girl
with a little snub nose, walked down the sloping
bank and sat down on the bench. The bench
was close to the water's edge, among thick
bushes of young willow. A heavenly spot !
You sat down, and you were hidden from the
world. Only the fish could see you and the
catspaws which flashed over the water like
lightning. The two young persons were equipped
with rods, fish hooks, bags, tins of worms and
everything else necessary. Once seated, they
immediately began to fish.
" I am glad that we're left alone at last," said
Lapkin, looking round. I've got a lot to tell
you, Anna tremendous . . . when I saw you for
the first time . . . you've got a nibble ... I under-
stood then why I am alive, I knew where my
idol was, to whom I can devote my honest, hard-
working life. . . It must be a big one ... it is
biting . . . When I saw you for the first time
in my life I fell in love fell in love passionately !
Don't pull. Let it go on biting . . . Tell me,
170 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
darling, tell me will you let me hope ? No !
I'm not worth it. I dare not even think of it
may I hope for ... Pull !
Anna lifted her hand that held the rod pulled,
cried out. A silvery green fish shone in the air.
" Goodness ! it's a perch ! Help quick !
It's slipping off." The perch tore itself from the
hook danced in the grass towards its native
element and . . . leaped into the water.
But instead of the little fish that he was
chasing, Lapkin quite by accident caught hold
of Anna's hand quite by accident pressed it to
his lips. She drew back, but it was too late ;
quite by accident their lips met and kissed ; yes,
it was an absolute accident ! They kissed and
kissed. Then came vows and assurances. . . .
Blissful moments ! But there is no such thing
as absolute happiness in this life. If happiness
itself does not contain a poison, poison will enter
in from without. Which happened this time.
Suddenly, while the two were kissing, a laugh
was heard. They looked at the river and were
paralysed. The schoolboy Kolia, Anna's
brother, was standing in the water, watching the
young people and maliciously laughing.
" Ah ha ! Kissing ! " said he. " Right O,
I'll tell Mother."
" I hope that you as a man of honour,"
Lapkin muttered, blushing. " It's disgusting to
spy on us, it's loathsome to tell tales, it's rotten.
As a man of honour . . ."
" Give me a shilling, then I'll shut up ! " the
THAT WRETCHED BOY 171
man of honour retorted. "If you don't, I'll
tell."
Lapkin took a shilling out of his pocket and
gave it to Kolia, who squeezed it in his wet fist,
whistled, and swam away. And the young
people did not kiss any more just then.
Next day Lapkin brought Kolia some paints
and a ball from town, and his sister gave him all
her empty pill boxes. Then they had to present
him with a set of studs like dogs' heads. The
wretched boy enjoyed this game immensely, and
to keep it going he began to spy on them.
Wherever Lapkin and Anna went, he was there
too. He did not leave them alone for a single
moment. -
" Beast ! " Lapkin gnashed his teeth. *' So
young and yet such a full fledged scoundrel.
What on earth will become of him later ! "
During the whole of July the poor lovers had
no life apart from him. He threatened to tell
on them ; he dogged them and demanded more
presents. Nothing satisfied him finally he
hinted at a gold watch. All right, they had to
promise the watch.
Once, at table, when biscuits were being
handed round, he burst out laughing and said
to Lapkin : " Shall I let on ? Ah ha ! "
Lapkin blushed fearfully and instead of a
biscuit he began to chew his table napkin.
Anna jumped up from the table and rushed out
of the room.
And this state of things went on until the end
M 2
172 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
of August, up to the day when Lapkin at last
proposed to Anna. Ah ! What a happy day
that was ! When he had spoken to her parents
and obtained their consent Lapkin rushed into
the garden after Kolia. When he found him he
nearly cried for joy and caught hold of the
wretched boy by the ear. Anna, who was also
looking for Kolia came running up and grabbed
him by the other ear. You should have seen the
happiness depicted on their faces while Kolia
roared and begged them :
" Darling, precious pets, I won't do it again.
O-oh 0-oh ! Forgive me ! " And both of them
confessed afterwards that during all the time
they were in love with each other they never
experienced such happiness, such overwhelming
joy as during those moments when they
pulled the wretched boy's ears.
ENEMIES
ABOUT ten o'clock of a dark September evening
the Zemstvo doctor Kirilov's only son, six-year-
old Andrey, died of diphtheria. As the doctor's
wife dropped on to her knees before the dead
child's cot and the first paroxysm of despair
took hold of her, the bell rang sharply in the
hall.
When the diphtheria came all the servants were
sent away from the house, that very morning.
Kirilov himself went to the door, just as he was,
in his shirt-sleeves with his waistcoat un-
buttoned, without wiping his wet face or hands,
which had been burnt with carbolic acid. It
was dark in the hall, and of the person who
entered could be distinguished only his middle
height, a white scarf and a big, extraordinarily
pale face, so pale that it seemed as though its
appearance made the hall brighter. . . .
" Is the doctor in ? " the visitor asked abruptly.
" I'm at home," answered Kirilov. " What
do you want ? "
" Oh, you're the doctor ? I'm so glad ! "
The visitor was overjoyed and began to seek for
174 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
the doctor's hand in the darkness. He found it
and squeezed it hard in his own. " I'm very
. . . very glad ! We were introduced ... I
am Aboguin . . . had the pleasure of meeting
you this summer at Mr. Gnouchev's. I am very
glad to have found you at home. . . . For God's
sake, don't say you won't come with me imme-
diately. . . . My wife has been taken danger-
ously ill ... I have the carriage with me. . . ."
From the visitor's voice and movements it
was evident that he had been in a state of violent
agitation. Exactly as though he had been
frightened by a fire or a mad dog, he could
hardly restrain his hurried breathing, and he
spoke quickly in a trembling voice. In his
speech there sounded a note of real sincerity,
of childish fright. Like all men who are fright-
ened and dazed, he spoke in short, abrupt
phrases and uttered many superfluous, quite
unnecessary, words.
" I was afraid I shouldn't find you at home,"
he continued. " While I was coming to you
I suffered terribly. . . . Dress yourself and let us
go, for God's sake. ... It happened like this.
Papchinsky came to me Alexander Siemiono-
vich, you know him. . . . We were chatting.
. . . Then we sat down to tea. Suddenly my
wife cries out, presses her hands to her heart,
and falls back in her chair. We carried her off
to her bed and . . . and I rubbed her forehead
with sal-volatile, and splashed her with water.
. . . She lies like a corpse. . . . I'm afraid that
ENEMIES 175
her heart's failed. . . . Let us go ... Her
father too died of heart-failure."
Kirilov listened in silence as though he did not
understand the Russian language.
When Aboguin once more mentioned Pap-
chinsky and his wife's father, and once more
began to seek for the doctor's hand in the dark-
ness, the doctor shook his head and said, drawling
each word listlessly :
" Excuse me, but I can't go. . . . Five minutes
ago my . . . my son died."
" Is that true ? " Aboguin whispered, step-
ping back. " My God, what an awful moment
to come! It's a terribly fated day . . . terribly!
What a coincidence . . . and it might have been
on purpose ! "
Aboguin took hold of the door handle and
drooped his head in meditation. Evidently he
was hesitating, not knowing whether to go away,
or to ask the doctor once more.
"Listen," he said eagerly, seizing Kirilov by
the sleeve. " I fully understand your state !
God knows I'm ashamed to try to hold your
attention at such a moment, but what can I do ?
Think yourself who can I go to ? There isn't
another doctor here besides you. For heaven's
sake; come. I'm not asking for myself. It's
not I that's ill ! "
Silence began. Kirilov turned his back to
Aboguin, stood still for a while and slowly went
out of the hall into the drawing-room. To judge
by his uncertain, machine-like movement, and
176 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
by the attentiveness with which he arranged the
hanging shade on the unlighted lamp in the
drawing-room and consulted a thick book which
lay on the table at such a moment he had
neither purpose nor desire, nor did he think of
anything, and probably had already forgotten
that there was a stranger standing in his hall.
The gloom and the quiet of the drawing-room
apparently increased his insanity. As he went
from the drawing-room to his study he raised
his right foot higher than he need, felt with his
hands for the door-posts, and then one felt a
certain perplexity in his whole figure, as though
he had entered a strange house by chance, or
for the first time in his life had got drunk, and
now was giving himself up in bewilderment to
the new sensation. A wide line of light stretched
across the bookshelves on one wall of the study ;
this light, together with the heavy stifling smell
of carbolic acid and ether came from the door
ajar that led from the study into the bedroom . . .
The doctor sank into a chair before the table ;
for a while he looked drowsily at the shining
books, then rose and went into the bedroom.
Here, in the bedroom, dead quiet reigned.
Everything, down to the last trifle, spoke elo-
quently of the tempest undergone, of weariness,
and everything rested. The candle which stood
among a close crowd of phials, boxes and jars on
the stool and the big lamp on the chest of drawers
brightly lit the room. On the bed, by the win-
dow, the boy lay open-eyed, with a look of
ENEMIES 177
wonder on his face. He did not move, but it
seemed that his open eyes became darker and
darker every second and sank into his skull.
Having laid her hands on his body and hid her
face in the folds of the bed-clothes, the mother
now was on her knees before the bed. Like the
boy she did not move, but how much living
movement was felt in the coil of her body and
in her hands ! She was pressing close to the bed
with her whole being, with eager vehemence, as
though she were afraid to violate the quiet and
comfortable pose which she had found at last
for her weary body. Blankets, cloths, basins,
splashes on the floor, brushes and spoons scat-
tered everywhere, a white bottle of lime-water,
the stifling heavy air itself everything died
away, and as it were plunged into quietude.
The doctor stopped by his wife, thrust his
hands into his trouser pockets and bending
his head on one side looked fixedly at his son.
His face showed indifference ; only the drops
which glistened on his beard revealed that he
had been lately weeping.
The repulsive terror of which we think when
we speak of death was absent from the bed-room.
In the pervading dumbness, in the mother's
pose, in the indifference of the doctor's face was
something attractive that touched the heart, the
subtle and elusive beauty of human grief, which
it will take men long to understand and describe,
and only music, it seems, is able to express.
Beauty too was felt in the stern stillness. Kirilov
178 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
and his wife were silent and did not weep, as
though they confessed all the poetry of their
condition. As once the season of their youth
passed away, so now in this boy their right to
bear children had passed away, alas ! for ever
to eternity. The doctor is forty-four years old,
already grey and looks like an old man ; his
faded sick wife is thirty-five. Andrey was not
merely the only son but the last.
In contrast to his wife the doctor's nature be-
longed to those which feel the necessity of move-
ment when their soul is in pain. After standing
by his wife for about five minutes, he passed from
the bed-room, lifting his right foot too high,
into a little room half filled with a big broad
divan. From there he went to the kitchen.
After wandering about the fireplace and the
cook's bed, he stooped through a little door and
came into the hall.
Here he saw the white scarf and the pale face
again.
" At last," sighed Aboguin, seizing the door-
handle. " Let us go, please."
The doctor shuddered, glanced at him and
remembered.
" Listen. I've told you already that I can't
go," he said, livening. " What a strange idea ! "
" Doctor, I'm made of flesh and blood, too.
I fully understand your condition. I sympathise
with you," Aboguin said in an imploring voice,
putting his hand to his scarf. " But I am not
asking for myself. My wife is dying. If you
ENEMIES 179
had heard her cry, if you'd seen her face, you
would understand my insistence ! My God
and I thought that you'd gone to dress your-
self. The time is precious, Doctor ! Let us go,
I beg of you."
" I can't come," Kirilov said after a pause,
and stepped into his drawing-room.
Aboguin followed him and seized him by the
sleeve.
" You're in sorrow. I understand. But
I'm not asking you to cure a toothache, or to
give expert evidence, but to save a human
life." He went on imploring like a beggar.
" This life is more than any personal grief. I
ask you for courage, for a brave deed in the
name of humanity."
" Humanity cuts both ways," Kirilov said
irritably. " In the name of the same humanity
I ask you not to take me away. My God, what
a strange idea ! I can hardly stand on my feet
and you frighten me with humanity. I'm not
fit for anything now. I won't go for anything.
With whom shall I leave my wife ? No, no. . . ."
Kirilov flung out his open hands and drew back.
" And . . . and don't ask me," he con-
tinued, disturbed. " I'm sorry. . . . Under the
Laws, Volume XIII., I'm obliged to go and you
have the right to drag me by the neck. . . .
Well, drag me, but ... I'm not fit. ... I'm
not even able to speak. Excuse me."
" It's quite unfair to speak to me in that tone,
Doctor," said Aboguin, again taking the doctor
180 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
by the sleeve. " The thirteenth volume be
damned ! I have no right to do violence to your
will. If you want to, come ; if you don't, then
God be with you ; but it's not to your mil that
I apply, but to your feelings. A young woman
is dying ! You say your son died just now. Who
could understand my terror better than you ? "
Aboguin's voice trembled with agitation.
His tremor and his tone were much more con-
vincing than his words. Aboguin was sincere,
but it is remarkable that every phrase he used
came out stilted, soulless, inopportunely florid,
and as it were insulted the atmosphere of the
doctor's house and the woman who was dying.
He felt it himself, and in his fear of being mis-
understood he exerted himself to the utmost to
make his voice soft and tender so as to con-
vince by the sincerity of his tone at least, if not
by his words. As a rule, however deep and
beautiful the words they affect only the un-
concerned. They cannot always satisfy those
who are happy or distressed because the highest
expression of happiness or distress is most often
silence. Lovers understand each other best
when they are silent, and a fervent passionate
speech at the graveside affects only outsiders.
To the widow and children it seems cold and
trivial.
Kirilov stood still and was silent. When
Aboguin uttered some more words on the higher
vocation of a doctor, and self-sacrifice, the doctor
sternly asked :
ENEMIES 181
" Is it far ? "
" Thirteen or fourteen versts. I've got good
horses, doctor. I give you my word of honour
that I'l take you there and back in an hour.
Only an hour."
The last words impressed the doctor more
strongly than the references to humanity or
the doctor's vocation. He thought for a while
and said with a sigh.
" Well, let us go ! "
He went off quickly, with a step that was now
sure, to his study and soon after returned in a
long coat. Aboguin, delighted, danced im-
patiently round him, helped him on with his
overcoat, and accompanied him out of the house.
Outside it was dark, but brighter than in the
hall. Now in the darkness the tall stooping
figure of the doctor was clearly visible with
the long, narrow beard and the aquiline nose.
Besides his pale face Aboguin's big face could
now be seen and a little student's cap which
hardly covered the crown of his head. The
scarf showed white only in front, but behind it
was hid under his long hair.
" Believe me, I'm able to appreciate your
magnanimity, "murmured Aboguin, as he helped
the doctor to a seat in the carriage. " We'll
whirl away. Luke, dear man, drive as fast as
you can, do ! "
The coachman drove quickly. First appeared
a row of bare buildings, which stood along the
hospital yard. It was dark everywhere, save
182 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
that at the end of the yard a bright light from
someone's window broke through the garden
fence, and three windows in the upper story of the
separate house seemed to be paler than the air.
Then the carriage drove into dense obscurity
where you could smell mushroom damp, and hear
the whisper of the trees. The noise of the wheels
awoke the rooks who began to stir in the leaves
and raised a doleful, bewildered cry as if they
knew that the doctor's son was dead and Abog-
uin's wife ill. Then began to appear separate
trees, a shrub. Sternly gleamed the pond,
where big black shadows slept. The carriage
rolled along over an even plain. Now the cry
of the rooks was but faintly heard far away
behind. Soon it became completely still.
Almost all the way Kirilov and Aboguin were
silent ; save that once Aboguin sighed pro-
foundly and murmured.
" It's terrible pain. One never loves his
nearest so much as when there is the risk of
losing them."
And when the carriage was quietly passing
through the river, Kirilov gave a sudden start,
as though the dashing of the water frightened
him, and he began to move impatiently.
" Let me go," he said in anguish. " I'll
come to you later. I only want to send the
attendant to my wife. She is all alone."
Aboguin was silent. The carriage, swaying
and rattling against the stones, drove over the
sandy bank and went on. Kirilov began to toss
ENEMIES 183
about in anguish, and glanced around. Behind
the road was visible in the scant light of the stars
and the willows that fringed the bank disappear-
ing into the darkness. To the right the plain
stretched smooth and boundless as heaven. On
it in the distance here and there dim lights were
burning, probably on the turf-pits. To the
left, parallel with the road stretched a little hill,
tufted with tiny shrubs, and on the hill a big
half-moon stood motionless, red, slightly veiled
with a mist, and surrounded with fine clouds
which seemed to be gazing upon it from every
side, and guarding it, lest it should disappear.
In all nature one felt something hopeless and
sick. Like a fallen woman who sits alone in a
dark room trying not to think of her past, the
earth languished with reminiscence of spring and
summer and waited in apathy for ineluctable
winter. Wherever one's glance turned nature
showed everywhere like a dark, cold, bottomless
pit, whence neither Kirilov nor Aboguin nor the
red half-moon could escape. . . .
The nearer the carriage approached the
destination the more impatient did Aboguin
become. He moved about, jumped up and
stared over the driver's shoulder in front of him.
And when at last the carriage drew up at the
foot of the grand staircase, nicely covered with a
striped linen awning and he looked up at the
lighted windows of the first floor one could hear
his breath trembling.
" If anything happens ... I shan't survive
184 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
it," he said entering the hall with the doctor
and slowly rubbing his hands in his agitation.
" But I can't hear any noise. That means it's
all right so far," he added, listening to the
stillness.
No voices or steps were heard in the hall.
For all the bright illumination the whole house
seemed asleep. Now the doctor and Aboguin
who had been in darkness up tilj. now could
examine each other. The doctor was tall, with
a stoop, slovenly dressed, and his face was plain.
There was something unpleasantly sharp, un-
gracious, and severe in his thick negro lips, his
aquiline nose and his faded, indifferent look.
His tangled hair, his sunken temples, the early
grey in his long thin beard, that showed his
shining chin, his pale grey complexion and the
slipshod awkwardness of his manners the
hardness of it all suggested to the mind bad times
undergone, an unjust lot and weariness of life
and men. To look at the hard figure of the man,
you could not believe that he had a wife and
could weep over his child. Aboguin revealed
something different. He was robust, solid and
fair-haired, with a big head and large, yet soft,
features, exquisitely dressed in the latest fashion.
In his carriage, his tight-buttoned coat and his
mane of hair you felt something noble and leonine.
He walked with his head straight and his chest
prominent, he spoke in a pleasant baritone, and
in his manner of removing his scarf or arranging
his hair there appeared a subtle, almost feminine,
ENEMIES 185
elegance. Even his pallor and childish fear as
he glanced upwards to the staircase while taking
off his coat, did not disturb his carriage or take
from the satisfaction, the health and aplomb
which his figure breathed.
" There's no one about, nothing I can hear,"
he said walking upstairs. " No commotion.
May God be good ! "
He accompanied the doctor through the hall
to a large salon, where a big piano showed dark
and a lustre hung in a white cover. Thence
they both passed into a small and beautiful
drawing-room, very cosy, filled with a pleasant,
rosy half-darkness.
" " Please sit here a moment, Doctor," said
Aboguin, "I ... I won't be a second. I'll
just have a look and tell them."
Kirilov was left alone. The luxury of the
drawing-room, the pleasant half-darkness, even
his presence in a stranger's unfamiliar house
evidently did not move him. He sat in a chair
looking at his hands burnt with carbolic acid.
He had no more than a glimpse of the bright red
lampshade, the 'cello case, and when he looked
sideways across the room to where the clock was
ticking, he noticed a stuffed wolf, as solid and
satisfied as Aboguin himself.
It was still. . . . Somewhere far away in the
other rooms someone uttered a loud " Ah ! " A
glass door, probably a cupboard door, rang, and
again everything was still. After five minutes
had passed, Kirilov did not look at his hands
N
186 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
any more. He raised his eyes to the door
through which Aboguin had disappeared.
Aboguin was standing on the threshold, but
not the same man as went out. The expres-
sion of satisfaction and subtle elegance had dis-
appeared from him. His face and hands, the
attitude of his body were distorted with a dis-
gusting expression either of horror or of torment-
ing physical pain. His nose, lips, moustache,
all his features were moving and as it were
trying to tear themselves away from his face,
but the eyes were as though laughing from pain.
Aboguin took a long heavy step into the middle
of the room, stooped, moaned, and shook his fists.
" Deceived!" he cried, emphasising the syllable
cei. " She deceived me ! She's gone ! She fell
ill and sent me for the doctor only to run away
with this fool Papchinsky. My God ! "
Aboguin stepped heavily towards the doctor,
thrust his white soft fists before his face, and
went on wailing, shaking his fists the while.
" She's gone off ! She's deceived me ! But
why this lie ? My God, my God ! Why this
dirty, foul trick, this devilish, serpent's game ?
What have I done to her ? She's gone off."
Tears gushed from his eyes. He turned on
his heel and began to pace the drawing-room.
Now in his short jacket and his fashionable
narrow trousers in which his legs seemed too
thin for his body, he was extraordinarily like a
lion. Curiosity kindled in the doctor's impassive
face. He rose and eyed Aboguin.
ENEMIES 187
" Well, where's the patient ? "
" The patient, the patient," cried Aboguin,
laughing, weeping, and still shaking his fists.
" She's not ill, but accursed. Vile dastardly.
The Devil himself couldn't have planned a fouler
trick. She sent me so that she could run away
with a fool, an utter clown, an Alphonse ! My
God, far better she should have died. I'll not
bear it. I shall not bear it."
The doctor stood up straight. His eyes began
to blink, filled with tears ; his thin beard began
to move with his jaw right and left.
" What's this ? " he asked, looking curiously
about. " My child's dead. My wife in anguish,
alone in all the house ... I can hardly stand
on my feet, I haven't slept for three nights . . .
and I'm made to play in a vulgar comedy, to
play the part of a stage property ! I don't . . .
I don't understand it ! "
Aboguin opened one fist, flung a crumpled
note on the floor and trod on it, as upon an insect
he wished to crush.
" And I didn't see ... didn't understand,"
he said through his set teeth, brandishing one
fist round his head, with an expression as though
someone had trod on a corn. " I didn't notice
how he came to see us every day. I didn't notice
that he came in a carriage to-day ! What was
the carriage for ? And I didn't see ! Innocent ! "
" I don't ... I don't understand," the
doctor murmured. " What's it all mean ? It's
jeering at a man, laughing at a man's suffering !
N 2
188 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
That's impossible . . . I've never seen it in my
life before 1 "
With the dull bewilderment of a man who has
just begun to understand that someone has
bitterly offended him, the doctor shrugged his
shoulders, waved his hands and not knowing what
to say or do, dropped exhausted into a chair.
" Well, she didn't love me any more. She
loved another man. Very well. But why the
deceit, why this foul treachery ? " Aboguin
spoke with tears in his voice. " Why, why ?
What have I done to you ? Listen, doctor,"
he said passionately approaching Kirilov. " You
were the unwilling witness of my misfortune, and
I am not going to hide the truth from you. I
swear I loved this woman. I loved her with
devotion, like a slave. I sacrificed everything
for her. I broke with my family, I gave up
the service and my music. I forgave her things
I could not have forgiven my mother and sister
... I never once gave her an angry look . . .
I never gave her any cause. Why this lie then ?
I do not demand love, but why this abominable
deceit ? If you don't love any more then speak
out honestly, above all when you know what I
feel about this matter ..."
With tears in his eyes and trembling in all his
bones, Aboguin was pouring out his soul to the
doctor. He spoke passionately, pressing both
hands to his heart. He revealed all the family
secrets without hesitation, as though he were
glad that these secrets were being torn from his
ENEMIES 18d
heart. Had he spoken thus for an hour or two
and poured out all his soul, he would surely
have been easier.
Who can say whether, had the doctor listened
and given him friendly sympathy, he would not,
as so often happens, have been reconciled to his
grief unprotesting, without turning to un-
profitable follies ? But it happened otherwise.
While Aboguin was speaking the offended doctor
changed countenance visibly. The indifference
and amazement in his face gradually gave way
to an expression of bitter outrage, indignation,
and anger. His features became still sharper,
harder, and more forbidding. When Aboguin
put before his eyes the photograph of his young
wife, with a pretty, but dry, inexpressive face
like a nun's, and asked if it were possible to look
at that face and grant that it could express a lie,
the doctor suddenly started away, with flashing
eyes, and said, coarsely forging out each several
word :
" Why do you tell me all this ? I do not want
to hear ! I don't want to," he cried and banged
his fist upon the table. " I don't want your
trivial vulgar secrets to Hell with them. You
dare not tell me such trivialities. Or do you
think I have not yet been insulted enough !
That I'm a lackey to whom you can give the last
insult ? Yes ? "
Aboguin drew back from Kirilov and stared
at him in surprise.
" Why did you bring me here ? " the doctor
190 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
went on, shaking his beard. " You marry out of
high spirits, get angry out of high spirits, and
make a melodrama but where do I come in ?
What have I got to do with your romances ?
Leave me alone ! Get on with your noble grab-
bing, parade your humane ideas, play " the
doctor gave a side-glance at the 'cello-case " the
double-bass and the trombone, stuff yourselves
like capons, but don't dare to jeer at a real man !
If you can't respect him, then you can at least
spare him your attentions."
" What does all this mean ? " Aboguin asked,
blushing.
" It means that it's vile and foul to play with
a man ! I'm a doctor. You consider doctors
and all men who work and don't reek of scent and
harlotry, your footmen, your mauvais tons.
Very well, but no one gave you the right to turn
a man who suffers into a property."
" How dare you say that ? " Aboguin asked
quietly. Again his face began to twist about,
this time in visible anger.
" How dare you bring me here to listen to
trivial rubbish, when you know that I'm in
sorrow ? " the doctor cried and banged his fists
on the table once more. " Who gave you the
right to jeer at another's grief ? "
" You're mad," cried Aboguin. " You're
ungenerous. I too am deeply unhappy and
... and ..."
" Unhappy " the doctor gave a sneering
laugh " Don't touch the word, it's got nothing
ENEMIES 191
to do with you. Wasters who can't get money
on a bill call themselves unhappy too. A capon's
unhappy, oppressed with all its superfluous fat.
You worthless lot ! "
" Sir, you're forgetting yourself," Aboguin
gave a piercing scream. " For words like those,
people are beaten. Do you understand ? "
Aboguin thrust his hand into his side pocket,
took out a pocket-book, found two notes and
flung them on the table.
" There's your fee," he said, and his nostrils
trembled. " You're paid."
" You dare not offer me money," said the
doctor, and brushed the notes from the table to
the floor. " You don't settle an insult with
money."
Aboguin and the doctor stood face to face,
heaping each other with undeserved insults.
Never in their lives, even in a frenzy, had they
said so much that was unjust and cruel and
absurd. In both the selfishness of the unhappy
is violently manifest. Unhappy men are selfish,
wicked, unjust, and less able to understand each
other than fools. Unhappiness does not unite
people, but separates them ; and just where one
would imagine that people should be united by the
community of grief, there is more injustice and
cruelty done than among the comparatively
contented.
" Send me home, please," the doctor cried, out
of breath.
Aboguin rang the bell violently. Nobody
192 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
came. He rang once more ; then flung the bell
angrily to the floor. It struck dully on the carpet
and gave out a mournful sound like a death-
moan. The footman appeared.
" Where have you been hiding, damn you ? "
The master sprang upon him with clenched fists.
" Where have you been just now ? Go away
and tell them to send the carriage round for this
gentleman, and get the brougham ready for me.
Wait," he called out as the footman turned to go.
" Not a single traitor remains to-morrow. Pack
off all of you ! I will engage new ones . . .
Rabble ! "
W T hile they waited Aboguin and the doctor
were silent. Already the expression of satis-
faction and the subtle elegance had returned to
the former. He paced the drawing-room, shook
his head elegantly and evidently was planning
something. His anger was not yet cool, but he
tried to make as if he did not notice his enemy.
. . . The doctor stood with one hand on the edge
of the table, looking at Aboguin with that deep,
rather cynical, ugly contempt with which only
grief and an unjust lot can look, when they see
satiety and elegance before them.
A little later, when the doctor took his seat in
the carriage and drove away, his eyes still
glanced contemptuously. It was dark, much
darker than an hour ago. The red half-moon
had now disappeared behind the little hill, and
the clouds which watched it lay in dark spots
round the stars. The brougham with the red
ENEMIES 198
lamps began to rattle on the road and passed the
doctor. It was Aboguin on his way to protest,
to commit all manner of folly.
All the way the doctor thought not of his wife
or Andrey, but only of Aboguin and those who
lived in the house he just left. His thoughts were
unjust, inhuman, and cruel. He passed sentence
on Aboguin, his wife, Papchinsky, and all those
who live in rosy semi-darkness and smell of scent.
All the way he hated them, and his heart ached
with his contempt for them. The conviction he
formed about them would last his life long.
Time will pass and Kirilov's sorrow, but this
conviction, unjust and unworthy of the human
heart, will not pass, but will remain in the
doctor's mind until the grave.
A TRIFLING OCCURRENCE
NICOLAI ILYICH BYELYAEV, a Petersburg
landlord, very fond of the racecourse, a well fed,
pink young man of about thirty-two, once called
tpwards evening on Madame Irnin Olga Ivan-
ovna with whom he had a liaison, or, to use
his own phrase, spun out a long and tedious
romance. And indeed the first pages of this
romance, pages of interest and inspiration, had
been read long ago ; now they dragged on and
on, and presented neither novelty nor interest.
Finding that Olga Ivanovna was not at home,
my hero lay down a moment on the drawing-
room sofa and began to wait.
" Good evening, Nicolai Ilyich," he suddenly
heard a child's voice say. " Mother will be in in
a moment. She's gone to the dressmaker's with
Sony a."
In the same drawing-room on the sofa lay
Olga Vassilievna's son, Alyosha, a boy about
eight years old, well built, well looked after,
dressed up like a picture in a velvet jacket and
long black stockings. He lay on a satin pillow,
196 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
and apparently imitating an acrobat whom he
had lately seen in the circus, lifted up first one
leg then the other. When his elegant legs
began to be tired, he moved his hands, or he
jumped up impetuously and then went on all
fours, trying to stand with his legs in the air.
All this he did with a most serious face, breathing
heavily, as if he himself found no happiness in
God's gift of such a restless body.
" Ah, how do you do, my friend ? " said
Byelyaev. "Is it you ? I didn't notice you.
Is your mother well ? "
At the moment Alyosha had just taken hold
of the toe of his left foot in his right hand and
got into a most awkward pose. He turned
head over heels, jumped up, and glanced from
under the big, fluffy lampshade at Byelyaev.
" How can I put it ? " he said, shrugging his
shoulders. " As a matter of plain fact mother
is never well. You see she's a woman, and
women, Nicolai Ilyich, have always some pain
or another."
For something to do, Byelyaev began to
examine Alyosha' s face. All the time he had
been acquainted with Olga Ivanovna he had
never once turned his attention to the boy and
had completely ignored his existence. A boy
is stuck in front of your eyes, but what is he
doing here, what is his role ? you don't want to
give a single thought to the question.
In the evening dusk Alyosha's face with a
pale forehead and steady black eyes unexpectedly
A TRIFLING OCCURRENCE 197
reminded Byelyaev of Olga Vassilievna as she
was in the first pages of the romance. He had
the desire to be affectionate to the boy.
" Come here, whipper-snapper," he said.
" Come and let me have a good look at you,
quite close."
The boy jumped off the sofa and ran to Bye-
lyaev.
" Well ? " Nicolai Ilyich began, putting his
hand on the thin shoulders. " And how are
things with you ? "
" How shall I put it ? ... They used to be
much better before."
. " How ? "
" Quite simple. Before, Sonya and I only had
to do music and reading, and now we're given
French verses to learn. You've had your hair
cut lately ? "
" Yes, just lately."
" That's why I noticed it. Your beard's
shorter. May I touch it ... doesn't it hurt ? "
" No, not a bit."
" Why is it that it hurts if you pull one hair,
and when you pull a whole lot, it doesn't hurt
a bit ? Ah, ah ! You know it's a pity you
don't have side-whiskers. You should shave
here, and at the sides . . . and leave the hair
just here."
The boy pressed close to Byelyaev and began
to play with his watch-chain.
" When I go to the gymnasium," he said,
" Mother is going to buy me a watch. I'll ask
198 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
her to buy me a chain just like this. What a
fine locket ! Father has one just the same, but
yours has stripes, here, and his has got letters . . .
Inside it's mother's picture. Father has another
chain now, not in links, but like a ribbon ..."
" How do you know ? Do you see your
father ? "
" I ? Mm ... no ... I ..."
Alyosha blushed and in the violent confusion
of being detected in a lie began to scratch the
locket busily with his finger-nail. Byelyaev
looked steadily at his face and asked :
"Do you see your father ? "
" No ... no 1 "
" But, be honest on your honour. By your
face I can see you're not telling me the truth.
If you made T a slip of the tongue by mistake,
what's the use of shuffling. Tell me, do you
see him ? As one friend to another."
Alyosha mused.
" And you won't tell Mother ? " he asked.
" What next."
" On your word of honour."
" My word of honour."
" Swear an oath."
" What a nuisance you are ! What do you
take me f or ? "
Alyosha looked round, made big eyes and
began to whisper.
" Only for God's sake don't tell Mother !
Never tell it to anyone at all, because it's a
secret. God forbid that Mother should ever get
A TRIFLING OCCURRENCE 199
to know ; then I and Sonya and Pelagueia will
pay for it ... Listen. Sonya and I meet Father
every Tuesday and Friday. When Pelagueia
takes us for a walk before dinner, we go into
Apfel's sweet-shop and Father's waiting for us.
He always sits in a separate room, you know,
where there's a splendid marble table and an
ash-tray shaped like a goose without a back ..."
" And what do you do there ? "
" Nothing ! First, we welcome one another,
then we sit down at a little table and Father
begins to treat us to coffee and cakes. You
know, Sonya eats meat-pies, and I can't bear
pies with meat in them ! I like them made of
cabbage and eggs. We eat so much that after-
wards at dinner we try to eat as much as we
possibly can so that Mother shan't notice."
" What do you talk about there ? "
" To Father ? About anything. He kisses
us and cuddles us, tells us all kinds of funny
stories. You know, he says that he will take
us to live with him when we are grown up.
Sonya doesn't want to go, but I say ' Yes.' Of
course, it'll be lonely without Mother ; but I'll
write letters to her. How funny : we could
go to her for our holidays then couldn't we ?
Besides, Father says that he'll buy me a horse.
He's a splendid man. I can't understand why
Mother doesn't invite him to live with her or
why she says we mustn't meet him. He loves
Mother very much indeed. He's always asking
us how she is and what she's doing. When she
200 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
was ill, he took hold of his head like this . . . and
ran, ran, all the time. He is always telling us
to obey and respect her. Tell me, is it true
that we're unlucky ? "
" H'm . . . how ? "
" Father says so. He says : ' You are un-
lucky children.' It's quite strange to listen to
him. He says : ' You are unhappy, I'm un-
happy, and Mother's unhappy.' He says :
' Pray to God for yourselves and for her.' "
Alyosha's eyes rested upon the stuffed bird
and he mused.
" Exactly . . ." snorted Byelyaev. " This is
what you do. You arrange conferences in
sweet-shops. And your mother doesn't know ? "
" N no . . . How could she know ? Pela-
gueia won't tell for anything. The day before
yesterday Father stood us pears. Sweet, like
jam. I had two."
" H'm . . . well, now . . . tell me, doesn't your
father speak about me ? "
" About you ? How shall I put it ?"
Alyosha gave a searching glance to Byelyaev's
face and shrugged his shoulders.
" He doesn't say anything in particular."
" What does he say, for instance ? "
" You won't be offended ? "
" What next ? Why, does he abuse me ? "
" He doesn't abuse you, but you know ... he
is cross with you. He says that it's through you
that Mother's unhappy and that you . . . ruined
Mother. But he is so queer ! I explain to him
A TRIFLING OCCURRENCE 201
that you are good and never shout at Mother,
but he only shakes his head."
" Does he say those very words : that I
ruined her ? "
" Yes. Don't be offended, Nicolai Ilyich ! "
Byelyaev got up, stood still a moment, and
then began to walk about the drawing-
room.
" This is strange, and . . . funny," he mur-
mured, shrugging his shoulders and smiling
ironically. " He is to blame all round, and now
I've ruined her, eh ? What an innocent lamb !
Did he say those very words to you : that I
ruined your mother ? "
" Yes, but . . . you said that you wouldn't
get offended."
" I'm not offended, and . . . and it's none of
your business ! No, it ... it's quite funny
though. I fell into the trap, yet I'm to be
blamed as well."
The bell rang. The boy dashed from his place
and ran out. In a minute a lady entered the
room with a little girl. It was Olga Ivanovna,
Alyosha's mother. After her, hopping, hum-
ming noisily, and waving his hands, followed
Alyosha.
" Of course, who is there to accuse except
me ? " he murmured, sniffing. " He's right, he's
the injured husband."
" What's the matter ? " asked Olga Ivanovna.
" What's the matter ! Listen to the kind of
sermon your dear husband preaches. It appears
o
202 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
I'm a scoundrel and a murderer, I've ruined you
and the children. All of you are unhappy, and
only I am awfully happy ! Awfully, awfully
happy ! "
" I don't understand, Nicolai ! What is it ? "
" Just listen to this young gentleman,"
Byelyaev said, pointing to Alyosha.
Alyosha blushed, then became pale suddenly
and his whole face was twisted in fright.
" Nicolai Ilyich," he whispered loudly.
" Shh ! "
Olga Ivanovna glanced in surprise at Alyosha,
at Byelyaev, and then again at Alyosha.
" Ask him, if you please," went on Byelyaev.
" That stupid fool Pelagueia of yours, takes them
to sweet-shops and arranges meetings with their
dear father there. But that's not the point.
The point is that the dear father is a martyr,
and I'm a murderer, I'm a scoundrel, who broke
the lives of both of you. ..."
" Nicolai Ilyich ! " moaned Alyosha. " You
gave your word of honour ! "
" Ah, let me alone ! " Byelyaev waved his
hand. " This is something more important
than any words of honour. The hypocrisy
revolts me, the lie ! "
" I don't understand," muttered Olga Ivan-
ovna, and tears began to glimmer in her eyes.
" Tell me, Lyolka,'" she turned to her son,
" Do you see your father ? "
Alyosha did not hear and looked with horror
at Byelyaev.
A TRIFLING OCCURRENCE 203
" It's impossible," said the mother. " I'll
go and ask Pelagueia."
Olga Ivanovna went out.
" But, but you gave me your word of honour,"
Alyosha said trembling all over.
Byelyaev waved his hand at him and went
on walking up and down. He was absorbed in
his insult, and now, as before, he did not notice
the presence of the boy. He, a big serious man,
had nothing to do with boys. And Alyosha
sat down in a corner and in terror told Sonya
how he had been deceived. He trembled,
stammered, wept. This was the first time in his
life that he had been set, roughly, face to face
with a lie. He had never known before that in
this world besides sweet pears and cakes and
expensive watches, there exist many other things
which have no name in children's language.
o 2
A GENTLEMAN FRIEND
WHEN she came out of the hospital the charm-
ing Vanda, or, according to her passport, " the
honourable lady-citizen Nastasya Kanavkina,"
found herself in a position in which she had
never been before : without a roof and without
a sou. What was to be done ?
First of all, she went to a pawnshop to pledge
her turquoise ring, her only jewellery. They
gave her a rouble for the ring . . . but what
can you buy for a rouble ? For that you can't
get a short jacket a la mode, or an elaborate hat,
or a pair of brown shoes ; yet without these
things she felt naked. She felt as though, not
only the people, but even the horses and dogs
were staring at her and laughing at the plain-
ness of her clothes. And her only thought was
for her clothes ; she did not care at all what she
ate or where she slept.
" If only I were to meet a gentleman friend . . ."
she thought. " I could get some money . . .
Nobody would say ' No,' because . . ."
But she came across no gentleman friends.
It's easy to find them of nights in the Renaissance,
206 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
but they wouldn't let her go into the Renaissance
in that plain dress and without a hat. What's
to be done ? After a long time of anguish,
vexed and weary with walking, sitting, and
thinking, Vanda made up her mind to play her
last card : to go straight to the rooms of some
gentleman friend and ask him for money.
" But who shall I go to ? " she pondered. " I
can't possibly go to Misha . . . he's got a family
. . . The ginger-headed old man is at his
office . . ."
Vanda recollected Finkel, the dentist, the
converted Jew, who gave her a bracelet three
months ago. Once she poured a glass of beer
on his head at the German club. She was
awfully glad that she had thought of Finkel.
" He'll be certain to give me some, if only I
find him in . . ." she thought, on her way to
him. " And if he won't, then I'll break every
single thing there."
She had her plan already prepared. She
approached the dentist's door. She would run
up the stairs, with a laugh, fly into his private
room and ask for twenty-five roubles . . . But
when she took hold of the bell-pull, the plan
went clean out of her head. Vanda suddenly
began to be afraid and agitated, a thing which
had never happened to her before. She was
never anything but bold and independent in
drunken company ; but now, dressed in common
clothes, and just like any ordinary person begging
a favour, she felt timid and humble.
A GENTLEMAN FRIEND 207
" Perhaps he has forgotten me . . ." she
thought, not daring to pull the bell. " And
how can I go up to him in a dress like this ?
As if I were a pauper, or a dowdy respectable . . ."
She rang the bell irresolutely.
There were steps behind the door. It was the
porter.
" Is the doctor at home ? " she asked.
She would have been very pleased now if the
porter had said " No," but instead of answering
he showed her into the hall, and took her jacket.
The stairs seemed to her luxurious and magni-
ficent, but what she noticed first of all in all the
luxury was a large mirror in which she saw a
ragged creature without an elaborate hat, with-
out a modish jacket, and without a pair of brown
shoes. And Vanda found it strange that, now
that she was poorly dressed and looking more
like a seamstress or a washerwoman, for the
first time she felt ashamed, and had no more
assurance or boldness left. In her thoughts she
began to call herself Nastya Kanavkina, instead
of Vanda as she used.
" This way, please ! " said the maid-servant,
leading her to the private room. " The doctor
will be here immediately . . . Please, take a seat."
Vanda dropped into an easy chair.
" I'll say : ' Lend me . . .' " she thought.
" That's the right thing, because we are ac-
quainted. But the maid must go out of the
room . . . It's awkward in front of the maid . . .
What is she standing there for ? "
208 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
In five minutes the door opened and Finkel
entered a tall, swarthy, convert Jew, with fat
cheeks and goggle-eyes. His cheeks, eyes, belly,
fleshy hips were all so full, repulsive, and
coarse ! At the Renaissance and the German
club he used always to be a little drunk, to
spend a lot of money on women, patiently put
up with all their tricks for instance, when
Vanda poured the beer on his head, he only
smiled and shook his finger at her but now he
looked dull and sleepy ; he had the pompous,
chilly expression of a superior, and he was
chewing something.
" What is the matter ? " he asked, without
looking at Vanda. Vanda glanced at the maid's
serious face, at the blown-out figure of Finkel,
who obviously did not recognise her, and she
blushed.
" What's the matter ? " the dentist repeated,
irritated.
"To ... oth ache . . ." whispered Vanda.
"Ah ... which tooth . . . where ? "
Vanda remembered she had a tooth with a
hole.
" At the bottom ... to the right," she said.
" H'm . . . open your mouth."
Finkel frowned, held his breath, and began
to work the aching tooth loose.
" Do you feel any pain ? " he asked, picking
at her tooth with some instrument.
" Yes, I do . . ." Vanda lied. " Shall I re-
mind him ? " she thought, " he'll be sure to
A GENTLEMAN FRIEND 209
remember . . . But ... the maid . . . what is she
standing there for ? "
Finkel suddenly snorted like a steam-engine,
straight into her mouth, and said :
" I don't advise you to have a stopping . . .
Anyhow the tooth is quite useless."
Again he picked at the tooth for a little, and
soiled Vanda's lips and gums with his tobacco-
stained fingers. Again he held his breath and
dived into her mouth with something cold . . .
Vanda suddenly felt a terrible pain, shrieked
and seized Finkel's hand . . .
" Never mind . . ." he murmured. " Don't
be frightened . . . This tooth isn't any use."
And his tobacco-stained fingers, covered with
blood, held up the extracted tooth before her
eyes. The maid came forward and put a bowl
to her lips.
" Rinse your mouth with cold water at home,"
said Finkel. " That will make the blood stop."
He stood before her in the attitude of a man
impatient to be left alone at last.
" Good-bye ..." she said, turning to the door.
" H'm ! And who's to pay me for the work ? "
Finkel asked laughingly.
"Ah ... yes ! " Vanda recollected, blushed
and gave the dentist the rouble she had got for
the turquoise ring.
When she came into the street she felt still
more ashamed than before, but she was not
ashamed of her poverty any more. Nor did
she notice any more that she hadn't an elaborate
210 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
hat or a modish jacket. She walked along the
street spitting blood and each red spittle told
her about her life, a bad, hard life ; about the
insults she had suffered and had still to suffer
to-morrow, a week, a year hence her whole
life, till death . . .
" Oh, how terrible it is ! " she whispered.
" My God, how terrible ! "
But the next day she was at the Renaissance
and she danced there. She wore a new, immense
red hat, a new jacket a la mode and a pair of
brown shoes. She was treated to supper by a
young merchant from Kazan.
OVERWHELMING
SENSATIONS
THIS happened not so very long ago in the
Moscow Circuit Court. The jurymen, left in
court for the night, before going to bed, began
a conversation about overwhelming sensations.
It was occasioned by someone's recollection of
a witness who became a stammerer and turned
grey, owing, as he said, to one dreadful moment.
The jurymen decided before going to bed that
each one of them should dig into his memories
and tell a story. Life is short ; but still there
is not a single man who can boast that he had
not had some dreadful moments in his past.
One juryman related how he was nearly
drowned. A second told how one night he
poisoned his own child, in a place where there
was neither doctor nor chemist, by giving the
child white copperas in mistake for soda. The
child did not die, but the father nearly went mad.
A third, not an old man, but sickly, described
his two attempts to commit suicide. Once he
212 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
shot himself ; the second time he threw himself
in front of a train.
The fourth, a short, stout man, smartly
dressed, told the following story:
" I was no more than twenty- two or twenty-
three years old, when I fell head over heels in
love with my present wife and proposed to her.
Now, I would gladly give myself a thrashing for
that early marriage ; but then well, I don't
know what would have happened to me if
Natasha had refused. My love was most ardent,
the kind described in novels as mad, passionate,
and so on. My happiness choked me, and I did
not know how to escape from it. I bored my
father, my friends, the servants by continually
telling them how desperately I was in love.
Happy people are quite the most tiresome and
boring. I used to be awfully exasperating.
Even now I'm ashamed.
" At the time I had a newly-called barrister
among my friends. The barrister is now known
all over Russia, but then he was only at the begin-
ning of his popularity, and he was not rich or
famous enough to have the right not to recognise
a friend when he met him or not to raise his
hat. I used to go and see him once or twice a
week.
" When I came, we used both to stretch our-
selves upon the sofas and begin to philosophise.
" Once I lay on the sofa, harping on the theme
that there is no more ungrateful profession than
a barrister's. I tried to show that after the
OVERWHELMING SENSATIONS 213
witnesses have been heard the Court can easily
dispense with the Crown Prosecutor and the
barrister, because they are equally unnecessary
and only hindrances. If an adult juryman,
sound in spirit and mind, is convinced that this
ceiling is white, or that Ivanov is guilty, no
Demosthenes has the power to fight and over-
come his conviction. Who can convince me
that my moustache is carroty when I know it
is black ? When I listen to an orator I may
perhaps get sentimental and even shed a tear,
but my rooted convictions, for the most part
based on the obvious and on facts, will not be
changed an atom. My friend the barrister con-
tended that I was still young and silly and was
talking childish nonsense. In his opinion an
obvious fact when illumined by conscientious
experts became still more obvious. That was
his first point. His second was that a talent is
a force, an elemental power, a hurricane, that is
able to turn even stones to dust, not to speak
of such trifles as the convictions of householders
and small shopkeepers. It is as hard for human
frailty to struggle against a talent as it is to
look at the sun without being blinded or to stop
the wind. By the power of the word one single
mortal converts thousands of convinced savages
to Christianity. Ulysses was the most convinced
person in the world, but he was all submission
before the Syrens, and so on. All history is
made up of such instances. In life we meet
them at every turn. And so it ought to be ;
214 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
otherwise a clever person of talent would not
be preferred before the stupid and untalented.
" I persisted and continued to argue that a
conviction is stronger than any talent, though,
speaking frankly, I myself could not define what
exactly is a conviction and what is a talent.
Probably I talked only for the sake of talking.
" ' Take even your own case ' . . . said the
barrister. ' You are convinced that your fiancee
is an angel and that there's not a man in all the
town happier than you. I tell you, ten or
twenty minutes would be quite enough for me
to make you sit down at this very table and write
to break off the engagement.'
" I began to laugh.
" ' Don't laugh. I'm talking seriously,' said
my friend. ' If I only had the desire, in twenty
minutes you would be happy in the thought that
you have been saved from marriage. My talent
is not great, but neither are you strong ? '
" ' Well, try, please,' I said.
" ' No, why should I ? I only said it in
passing. You're a good boy. It would be a
pity to expose you to such an experiment.
Besides, I'm not in the mood, to-day.'
" We sat down to supper. The wine and
thoughts of Natasha and my love utterly filled
me with a sense of youth and happiness. My
happiness was so infinitely great that the green-
eyed barrister opposite me seemed so unhappy,
so little, so grey ! "
" ' But do try,' I pressed him. ' I beg you.'
OVERWHELMING SENSATIONS 215
" The barrister shook his head and knit his
brows. Evidently I had begun to bore him.
" ' I know,' he said, ' that when the experi-
ment is over you will thank me and call me
saviour, but one must think of your sweetheart
too. She loves you, and your refusal would
make her suffer. But what a beauty she is!
I envy you.'
" The barrister sighed, swallowed some wine,
and began to speak of what a wonderful creature
my Natasha was. He had an uncommon gift
for description. He could pour out a whoie
heap of words about a woman's eyelashes or
her little finger. I listened to him with
delight.
" ' I've seen many women in my life-time,'
he said, ' but I give you my word of honour, I
tell you a\s a friend, your Natasha Andreevna is a
gem, a rare girl ! Of course, there are defects,
even a good many, I grant you, but still she is
charming.'
" And the barrister began to speak of the
defects of my sweetheart. Now I quite under-
stand it was a general conversation about women,
one about their weak points in general ; but it
appeared to me then as though he was speaking
only of Natasha. He went into raptures about
her snub-nose, her excited voice, her shrill
laugh, her affectation indeed, about everything
I particularly disliked in her. All this was in his
opinion infinitely amiable, gracious and feminine.
Imperceptibly he changed from enthusiasm first
216 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
to paternal edification, then to a light, sneering
tone. . . . There was no Chairman of the Bench
with us to stop the barrister riding the high horse.
I hadn't a chance of opening my mouth and
what could I have said ? My friend said nothing
new, his truths were long familiar. The poison
was not at all in what he said, but altogether in
the devilish form in which he said it. A form of
Satan's own invention ! As I listened to him
I was convinced that one and the same word had
a thousand meanings and nuances according to
the way it is pronounced and the turn given to
the sentence. I certainly cannot reproduce the
tone or the form. I can only say that as I
listened to my friend and paced from corner to
corner of my room, I was revolted, exasperated,
contemptuous according as he felt. I even
believed him when, with tears in his eyes, he
declared to me that I was a great man, deserving
a better fate, and destined in the future to
accomplish some remarkable exploit, from which
I might be prevented by my marriage.
" ' My dear friend,' he exclaimed, firmly
grasping my hand, ' I implore you, I command
you : stop before it is too late. Stop ! God
save you from this strange and terrible mistake !
My friend, don't ruin your youth.'
" Believe me or not as you will, but finally I
sat down at the table and wrote to my sweet-
heart breaking off the engagement. I wrote and
rejoiced that there was still time to repair my
mistake. When the envelope was sealed I
OVERWHELMING SENSATIONS 217
hurried into the street to put it in a pillar box.
The barrister came with me.
" ' Splendid ! Superb ! ' he praised me when
my letter to Natasha disappeared into the dark-
ness of the pillar-box. ' I congratulate you with
all my heart. I'm delighted for your sake.'
" After we had gone about ten steps together,
the barrister continued :
" ' Of course, marriage has its bright side too.
I, for instance, belong to the kind of men for
whom marriage and family life are everything.'
" He was already describing his life : all the
ugliness of a lonely bachelor existence appeared
before me.
" He spoke with enthusiasm of his future wife,
of the pleasures of an ordinary family life, and
his transports were so beautiful and sincere that
I was in absolute despair by the time we reached
his door.
" ' What are you doing with me, you damnable
man ? ' I said panting. ' You've ruined me !
Why did you make me write that cursed letter ?
I love her ! I love her ! '
" And I swore that I was in love. I was
terrified of my action. It already seemed wild
and absurd to me. Gentlemen, it is quite im-
possible to imagine a more overwhelming sensa-
tion than mine at that moment ! If a kind man
had happened to slip a revolver into my hand I
would have put a bullet through my head gladly.
" ' Well, that's enough, enough ! ' the advocate
said, patting my shoulder and beginning to
p
218 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
laugh. ' Stop crying ! The letter won't reach
your sweetheart. It was I, not you, wrote the
address on the envelope, and I muddled it up
so that they won't be able to make anything of it
at the post-office. But let this be a lesson to
you. Don't discuss things you don't under-
stand.' "
" Now, gentlemen, next, please."
The fifth juryman had settled himself com-
fortably and already opened his mouth to begin
his story, when we heard the clock striking from
Spaisky Church-tower.
" Twelve . . ." one of the jurymen counted.
" To which class, gentlemen, would you assign
the sensations which our prisoner at the bar is
now feeling ? The murderer passes the night
here in a prisoner's cell, either lying or sitting,
certainly without sleeping and all through the
sleepless night listens to the striking of the hours.
What does he think of ? What dreams visit
him ? "
And all the jurymen suddenly forgot about
overwhelming sensations. The experience of
their friend, who once wrote the letter to his
Natasha, seemed unimportant, and not even
amusing. Nobody told any more stories ; but
they began to go to bed quietly, in silence.
EXPENSIVE LESSONS
IT is a great bore for an educated person not
to know foreign languages. Vorotov felt it
strongly, when on leaving the university after
he had got his degree he occupied himself with
a little scientific research.
"It's awful ! " he used to say, losing his
breath (for although only twenty-six he was
stout, heavy, and short of breath). "It's awful.
Without knowing languages I'm like a bird with-
out wings. I'll simply have to chuck the work."
So he decided, come what might, to conquer
his natural laziness and to study French and
German, and he began to look out for a teacher.
One winter afternoon, as Vorotov sat working
in his study, the servant announced a lady to
see him.
" Show her in," said Vorotov.
And a young lady, exquisitely dressed in the
latest fashion, entered the study. She intro-
duced herself as Alice Ossipovna Enquette, a
teacher of French, and said that a friend of
Vorotov's had sent her to him.
" Very glad ! Sit down ! " said Vorotov,
P 2
220 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
losing his breath, and clutching at the collar of
his night shirt. (He always worked in a night
shirt in order to breathe more easily.) " You
were sent to me by Peter Sergueyevich ? Yes
... Yes ... I asked him ... Very glad ! "
While he discussed the matter with Mademoi-
selle Enquette he glanced at her shyly, with
curiosity. She was a genuine Frenchwoman,
very elegant, and still quite young. From her
pale and languid face, from her short, curly
hair and unnaturally small waist, you would
not think her more than eighteen, but looking
at her broad, well-developed shoulders, her
charming back and severe eyes, Vorotov decided
that she was certainly not less than twenty-three,
perhaps even twenty-five ; but then again it
seemed to him that she was only eighteen. Her
face had the cold, business-like expression of
one who had come to discuss a business matter.
Never once did she smile or frown, and only
once a look of perplexity flashed into her eyes,
when she discovered that she was not asked to
teach children but a grown up, stout young man.
" So, Alice Ossipovna," Vorotov said to her,
" you will give me a lesson daily from seven to
eight o'clock in the evening. With regard to
your wish to receive a rouble a lesson, I have no
objection at all. A rouble well, let it be a
rouble. . . ."
And he went on asking her if she wanted tea
or coffee, if the weather was fine, and, smiling
good naturedly, stroking the tablecloth with
EXPENSIVE LESSONS 221
the palm of his hand, he asked her kindly who
she was, where she had completed her education,
and how she earned her living.
In a cold, business-like tone Alice Ossipovna
answered that she had completed her education
at a private school, and had then qualified as a
domestic teacher, that her father had died recently
of scarlet fever, her mother was alive and made
artificial flowers, that she, Mademoiselle Enquette,
gave private lessons at a pension in the morning,
and from one o'clock right until the evening she
taught in respectable private houses.
She went, leaving a slight and almost imper-
ceptible perfume of a woman's dress behind her.
Vorotov did not work for a long time afterwards
but sat at the table stroking the green cloth and
thinking.
" It's very pleasant to see girls earning their
own living," he thought. " On the other hand
it is very unpleasant to realise that poverty
does not spare even such elegant and pretty
girls as Alice Ossipovna ; she, too, must struggle
for her existence. Rotten luck ! ..."
Having never seen virtuous Frenchwomen he
also thought that this exquisitely dressed Alice
Ossipovna, with her well-developed shoulders
and unnaturally small waist was in all proba-
bility, engaged in something else besides teaching.
Next evening when the clock pointed to five
minutes to seven, Alice Ossipovna arrived, rosy
from the cold ; she opened Margot (an elementary
text-book) and began without any preamble :
222 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" The French grammar has twenty-six letters.
The first is called A, the second B . . ."
" Pardon," interrupted Vorotov, smiling, " I
must warn you, Mademoiselle, that you will
have to change your methods somewhat in my
case. The fact is that I know Russian, Latin
and Greek very well. I have studied compara-
tive philology, and it seems to me that we may
leave out Margot and begin straight off to read
some author." And he explained to the
Frenchwoman how grown-up people study
languages.
" A friend of mine," said he, " who wished to
know modern languages put a French, German
and Latin gospel in front of him and then
minutely analysed one word after another. The
result he achieved his purpose in less than a
year. Let us take some author and start
reading."
The Frenchwoman gave him a puzzled look.
It was evident that Vorotov's proposal appeared
to her naive and absurd. If he had not been
grown up she would certainly have got angry and
stormed at him, but as he was a very stout,
adult man at whom she could not storm, she
only shrugged her shoulders half-perceptibly
and said :
" Just as you please."
Vorotov ransacked his bookshelves and pro-
duced a ragged French book.
" Will this do ? " he asked.
" It's all the same."
EXPENSIVE LESSONS 223
" In that case let us begin. Let us start from
the title, Memoir es."
" Reminiscences ..." translated Mademoi-
selle Enquette.
" Reminiscences . . ." repeated Vorotov.
Smiling good naturedly and breathing heavily,
he passed a quarter of an hour over the word
mSmoires and the same with the word de. This
tired Alice Ossipovna out. She answered his
questions carelessly, got confused and evidently
neither understood her pupil nor tried to.
Vorotov asked her questions, and at the same
time glanced furtively at her fair hair, thinking :
" The hair is not naturally curly. She waves
it. Marvellous ! She works from morning till
night and yet she finds time to wave her hair."
At eight o'clock sharp she got up, gave him a
dry, cold " Au revoir, Monsieur," and left the
study. After her lingered the same sweet,
subtle, agitating perfume. The pupil again did
nothing for a long time, but sat by the table
and thought.
During the following days he became con-
vinced that his teacher was a charming girl
serious and punctual, but very uneducated and
incapable of teaching grown up people ; so he
decided he would not waste his time, but part
with her and engage someone else. When she
came for the seventh lesson he took an envelope
containing seven roubles out of his pocket.
Holding it in his hands and blushing furiously,
he began :
224 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" I am sorry, Alice Ossipovna, but I must
tell you. ... I am placed in an awkward
position. . . ."
The Frenchwoman glanced at the envelope
and guessed what was the matter. For the first
time during the lessons a shiver passed over her
face and the cold, business-like expression dis-
appeared. She reddened faintly, and casting
her eyes down, began to play absently with her
thin gold chain. And Vorotov, noticing her
confusion, understood how precious this rouble
was to her, how hard it would be for her to lose
this money.
" I must tell you," he murmured, getting still
more confused. His heart gave a thump.
Quickly he put the envelope back into his pocket
and continued :
" Excuse me. I ... I will leave you for ten
minutes. ..."
And as though he did not want to dismiss
her at all, but had only asked permission to retire
for a moment he went into another room and
sat there for ten minutes. Then he returned,
more confused than ever ; he thought that his
leaving her like that would be explained by her
in a certain way and this made him awkward.
The lessons began again.
Vorotov wanted them no more. Knowing
that they would lead to nothing he gave the
Frenchwoman a free hand ; he did not question
or interrupt her any more. She translated at
her own sweet will, ten pages a lesson, but he
EXPENSIVE LESSONS 225
did not listen. He breathed heavily and for
want of occupation gazed now and then at her
curly little head, her neck, her soft white hands,
and inhaled the perfume of her dress.
He caught himself thinking about her as he
ought not and it shamed him, or admiring her,
and then he felt aggrieved and angry because she
behaved so coldly towards him, in such a business-
like way, never smiling and as if afraid that he
might suddenly touch her. All the while he
thought : How could he inspire her with
confidence in him, how could he get to know her
better, to help her, to make her realise how
badly she taught, poor little soul ?
Once Alice Ossipovna came to the lesson in a
dainty pink dress, a little decollett, and such a
sweet scent came from her that you might have
thought she was wrapped in a cloud, that you
had only to blow on her for her to fly away or
dissolve like smoke. She apologised, saying she
could only stay for half an hour, because she had
to go straight from the lesson to a ball.
He gazed at her neck, at her bare shoulders
and he thought he understood why Frenchwomen
were known to be light-minded and easily won ;
he was drowned in this cloud of scent, beauty,
and nudity, and she, quite unaware of his
thoughts and probably not in the least interested
in them, read over the pages quickly and trans-
lated full steam ahead :
" He walked over the street and met the
gentleman of his friend and said : where do you
226 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
rush? seeing your face so pale it makes me
pain."
The Memoires had been finished long ago ;
Alice was now translating another book. Once
she came to the lesson an hour earlier, apolo-
gising because she had to go to the Little Theatre
at seven o'clock. When the lesson was over
Vorotov dressed and he too went to the theatre.
It seemed to him only for the sake of rest and
distraction, and he did not even think of Alice.
He would not admit that a serious man, preparing
for a scientific career, a stay-at-home, should
brush aside his book and rush to the theatre
for the sake of meeting an unintellectual, stupid
girl whom he hardly knew.
But somehow, during the intervals his heart
beat, and, without noticing it, he ran about the
foyer and the corridors like a boy, looking im-
patiently for someone. Every time the interval
was over he was tired, but when he discovered
the familiar pink dress and the lovely shoulders
veiled with tulle his heart jumped as if from a
presentiment of happiness, he smiled joyfully,
and for the first time in his life he felt jealous.
Alice was with two ugly students and an
officer. She was laughing, talking loudly and
evidently flirting. Vorotov had never seen her
like that. Apparently she was happy, contented,
natural, warm. Why ? What was the reason ?
Perhaps because these people were dear to her
and belonged to the same class as she. Vorotov
felt the huge abyss between him and that class.
EXPENSIVE LESSONS 227
He bowed to his teacher, but she nodded coldly
and quietly passed by. It was plain she did
not want her cavaliers to know that she had
pupils and gave lessons because she was poor.
After the meeting at the theatre Vorotov
knew that he was in love. During lessons that
followed he devoured his elegant teacher with
his eyes, and no longer struggling, he gave full
rein to his pure and impure thoughts. Alice's
face was always cold. Exactly at eight o'clock
every evening she said calmly, " Au revoir,
Monsieur," and he felt that she was indifferent
to him and would remain indifferent, that his
position was hopeless.
Sometimes in the middle of a lesson he would
begin dreaming, hoping, building plans ; he
composed an amorous declaration, remembering
that Frenchwomen were frivolous and com-
plaisant, but he had only to give his teacher one
glance for his thoughts to be blown out like a
candle, when you carry it on to the verandah of
a bungalow and the wind is blowing. Once,
overcome, forgetting everything, in a frenzy, he
could stand it no longer. He barred her way
when she came from the study into the hall
after the lesson and, losing his breath and
stammering, began to declare his love :
" You are dear to me ! . . . I love you.
Please let me speak ! "
Alice grew pale : probably she was afraid
that after this declaration she would not be able
to come to him any more and receive a rouble
228 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
a lesson. She looked at him with terrified eyes
and began in a loud whisper :
" Ah, it's impossible ! Do not speak, I beg
you! Impossible ! "
Afterwards Vorotov did not sleep all night ;
he tortured himself with shame, abused him-
self, thinking feverishly. He thought that his
declaration had offended the girl and that she
would not come any more. He made up his
mind to find out where she lived from the
Address Bureau and to write her an apology.
But Alice came without the letter. For a
moment she felt awkward, and then opened the
book and began to translate quickly, in an
animated voice, as always :
" ' Oh, young gentleman, do not rend these
flowers in my garden which I want to give to
my sick daughter.' "
She still goes. Four books have been trans-
lated by now but Vorotov knows nothing
beyond the word memoires, and when he is
asked about his scientific research work he waves
his hand, leaves the question unanswered, and
begins to talk about the weather.
A LIVING CALENDAR
STATE-COUNCILLOR SHARAMYKIN'S drawing-
room is wrapped in a pleasant half-darkness.
The big bronze lamp with the green shade, makes
the walls, the furniture, the faces, all green,
couleur " Nuit ^Ukraine" Occasionally a
smouldering log flares up in the dying fire and
for a moment casts a red glow over the faces ;
but this does not spoil the general harmony of
light. The general tone, as the painters say,
is well sustained.
Sharamykin sits in a chair in front of the fire-
place, in the attitude of a man who has just
dined. He is an elderly man with a high official's
grey side whiskers and meek blue eyes. Tender-
ness is shed over his face, and his lips are set in a
melancholy smile. At his feet, stretched out
lazily, with his legs towards the fire-place, Vice-
Governor Lopniev sits on a little stool. He is a
brave-looking man of about forty. Sharamy-
kin's children are moving about round the
piano ; Nina, Kolya, Nadya, and Vanya. The
door leading to Madame Sharamykin's room is
230 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
slightly open and the light breaks through
timidly. There behind the door sits Sharamy-
kin's wife, Anna Pavlovna, in front of her
writing-table. She is president of the local
ladies' committee, a lively, piquant lady of
thirty years and a little bit over. Through her
pince-nez her vivacious black eyes are running
over the pages of a French novel. Beneath the
novel lies a tattered copy of the report of the
committee for last year.
" Formerly our town was much better off in
these things," says Sharamykin, screwing up his
meek eyes at the glowing coals. " Never a
winter passed but some star would pay us a
visit. Famous actors and singers used to
come . . . but now, besides acrobats and organ-
grinders, the devil only knows what comes.
There's no aesthetic pleasure at all. . . . We
might be living in a forest. Yes. . . . And does
your Excellency remember that Italian tragedian?
. . . What's his name ? ... He was so dark,
and tall. . . . Let me think. . . . Oh, yes !
Luigi Ernesto di Ruggiero. . . . Remarkable
talent. . . . And strength. He had only to
say one word and the whole theatre was on the
qui vive. My darling Anna used to take a great
interest in his talent. She hired the theatre for
him and sold tickets for the performances in
advance. ... In return he taught her elocution
and gesture. A first-rate fellow ! He came
here ... to be quite exact . . . twelve years
ago. . . . No, that's not true. . . . Less, ten
A LIVING CALENDAR 231
years. . . . Anna dear, how old is our Nina ? "
" She'll be ten next birthday," calls Anna
Pavlovna from her room. " Why ? "
" Nothing in particular, my dear. I was just
curious. . . . And good singers used to come.
Do you remember Prilipchin, the tenore di
grazia ? What a charming fellow he was ! How
good looking ! Fair ... a very expressive face,
Parisian manners. . . . And what a voice, your
Excellency ! Only one weakness : he would
sing some notes with his stomach and would
take re falsetto otherwise everything was good.
Tamberlik, he said, had taught him. . . . My
dear Anna and I hired a hall for him at the Social
Club, and in gratitude for that he used to sing
to us for whole days and nights. ... He taught
dear Anna to sing. He came I remember it as
though it were last night in Lent, some twelve
years ago. No, it's more .... How bad my
memory is getting, Heaven help me ! Anna
dear, how old is our darling Nadya ?
" Twelve."
" Twelve . . . then we've got to add ten
months. . . . That makes it exact . . . thirteen.
Somehow there used to be more life in our town
then. . . . Take, for instance, the charity soirees.
What enjoyable soirees we used to have before !
How elegant ! There were singing, playing,
and recitation. . . . After the war, I remember,
when the Turkish prisoners were here, dear Anna
arranged a soiree on behalf of the wounded. We
collected eleven hundred roubles. I remember
232 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
the Turkish officers were passionately fond of
dear Anna's voice, and kissed her hand in-
cessantly. He-he ! Asiatics, but a grateful
nation. Would you believe me, the soiree was
such a success that I wrote an account of it in
my diary ? It was, I remember it as though
it had only just happened, in '76, . . . no,
in '77. ... No ! Pray, when were the Turks
here ? Anna dear, how old is our little Kolya ? "
" I'm seven, Papa ! " says Kolya, a brat with
a swarthy face and coal black hair.
" Yes, we're old, and we've lost the energy
we used to have," Lopniev agreed with a sigh.
" That's the real cause. Old age, my friend.
No new moving spirits arrive, and the old ones
grow old. . . . The old fire is dull now. When
I was younger I did not like company to be
bored. ... I was your Anna Pavlovna's first
assistant. Whether it was a charity soiree or a
tombola to support a star who was going to
arrive, whatever Anna Pavlovna was arranging,
I used to throw over everything and begin to
bustle about. One winter, I remember, I
bustled and ran so much that I even got
ill. ... I shan't forget that winter. . . . Do
you remember what a performance we arranged
with Anna Pavlovna in aid of the victims of the
fire ? "
" What year was it ? "
" Not so very long ago. ... In '79. No, in
'80, 1 believe ! Tell me how old is your Vanya ? "
" Five," Anna Pavlovna calls from the study.
A LIVING CALENDAR 233
" Well, that means it was six years ago. Yes,
my dear friend, that was a time. It's all over
now. The old fire's quite gone."
Lopniev and Sharamykin grew thoughtful.
The smouldering log flares up for the last time,
and then is covered in ash.
OLD AGE
STATE-COUNCILLOR USIELKOV, architect, ar-
rived in his native town, where he had been
summoned to restore the cemetery church. He
was born in the town, he had grown up and been
married there, and yet when he got out of the
train he hardly recognised it. Everything was
changed. For instance, eighteen years ago,
when he left the town to settle in Petersburg,
where the railway station is now boys used to
hunt for marmots : now as you come into the
High Street there is a four storied " Hotel
Vienna," with apartments, where there was of
old an ugly grey fence. But not the fence or
the houses, or anything had changed so much
as the people. Questioning the hall-porter,
Usielkov discovered that more than half of the
people he remembered were dead or paupers or
forgotten.
" Do you remember Usielkov ? " he asked the
porter. " Usielkov, the architect, who divorced
his wife. ... He had a house in Sviribev Street.
. . . Surely you remember."
" No, I don't remember anyone of the name."
235 Q 2
286 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" Why, it's impossible not to remember. It
was an exciting case. All the cabmen knew,
even. Try to remember. His divorce was
managed by the attorney, Shapkin, the swindler
. . . the notorious sharper, the man who was
thrashed at the club. . . ."
" You mean Ivan Nicolaich ? "
" Yes. ... Is he alive ? dead ? "
" Thank heaven, his honour's alive. His
honour's a notary now, with an office. Well-to-
do. Two houses in Kirpichny Street. Just
lately married his daughter off."
Usielkov strode from one corner of the room
to another. An idea flashed into his mind.
From boredom, he decided to see Shapkin. It
was afternoon when he left the hotel and quietly
walked to Kirpichny Street. He found Shapkin
in his office and hardly recognised him. From
the well-built, alert attorney with a quick, im-
pudent, perpetually tipsy expression, Shapkin
had become a modest, grey-haired, shrunken
old man.
" You don't recognise me . . . You have for-
gotten ..." Usielkov began. " I'm your old
client, Usielkov."
" Usielkov ? Which Usielkov ? Ah ! "
Remembrance came to Shapkin : he recog-
nised him and was confused. Began exclama-
tions, questions, recollections.
" Never expected . . . never thought ..."
chuckled Shapkin. " What will you have ?
W T ould you like champagne ? Perhaps you'd
OLD AGE 287
like oysters. My dear man, what a lot of money
I got out of you in the old days so much that
I can't think what I ought to stand you."
" Please don't trouble," said Usielkov. " I
haven't time. I must go to the cemetery and
examine the church. I have a commission."
" Splendid. We'll have something to eat and
a drink and go together. I've got some splendid
horses ! I'll take you there and introduce you
to the churchwarden. . . . I'll fix up everything.
. . . But what's the matter, my dearest man ?
You're not avoiding me, not afraid ? Please
sit nearer. There's nothing to be afraid of now.
. . . Long ago, I really was pretty sharp, a bit
of a rogue . . . but now I'm quieter than water,
humbler than grass. I've grown old ; got a
family. There are children. . . . Time to die ! "
The friends had something to eat and
drink, and went in a coach and pair to the
cemetery.
" Yes, it was a good time," Shapkin was
reminiscent, sitting in the sledge. " I remember,
but I simply can't believe it. Do you remember
how you divorced your wife? It's almost twenty
years ago, and you've probably forgotten every-
thing, but I remember it as though I conducted
the petition yesterday. My God, how rotten I
was ! Then I was a smart, casuistical devil,
full of sharp practice and devilry. . . and I
used to run into some shady affairs, particularly
when there was a good fee, as in your case, for
instance. What was it you paid me then ?
288 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
Five six hundred. Enough to upset anybody !
By the time you left for Petersburg you'd left
the whole affair completely in my hands. ' Do
what you like ! ' And your former wife, Sophia
Mikhailovna, though she did come from a merchant
family, was proud and selfish. To bribe her to
take the guilt on herself was difficult extremely
difficult. I used to come to her for a business
talk, and when she saw me, she would say to her
maid : ' Masha, surely I told you I wasn't at
home to scoundrels.' I tried one way, then
another . . . wrote letters to her, tried to meet
her accidentally no good. I had to work
through a third person. For a long time I had
trouble with her, and she only yielded when you
agreed to give her ten thousand. She could
not stand out against ten thousand. She suc-
cumbed. . . . She began to weep, spat in my
face, but she yielded and took the guilt on her-
self."
" If I remember it was fifteen, not ten thou-
sand she took from me," said Usielkov.
" Yes, of course . . . fifteen, my mistake."
Shapkin was disconcerted. " Anyway it's all
past and done with now. Why shouldn't I
confess, frankly ? Ten I gave to her, and the
remaining five I bargained out of you for my
own share. I deceived both of you. . . . It's
all past, why be ashamed of it ? And who else
was there to take from, Boris Pietrovich, if not
from you ? I ask you . . . You were rich and
well-to-do. You married in caprice : you were
OLD AGE 239
divorced in caprice. You were making a fortune.
I remember you got twenty thousand out of a
single contract. Whom was I to tap, if not
you ? And I must confess, I was tortured by
envy. If you got hold of a nice lot of money,
people would take off their hats to you : but the
same people would beat me for shillings and
smack my face in the club. But why recall it ?
It's time to forget."
" Tell me, please, how did Sophia Mikhailovna
live afterwards ? "
" With her ten thousand ? On ne pent plus
badly. . . . God knows whether it was frenzy
or pride and conscience that tortured her,
because she had sold herself for money or
perhaps she loved you ; but, she took to drink,
you know. She received the money and began
to gad about with officers in troikas. . . .
Drunkenness, philandering, debauchery. . . .
She would come into a tavern with an officer,
and instead of port or a light wine, she would
drink the strongest cognac to drive her into a
frenzy."
" Yes, she was eccentric. I suffered enough
with her. She would take offence at some trifle
and then get nervous. . . . And what happened
afterwards ? "
" A week passed, a fortnight. ... I was
sitting at home writing. Suddenly, the door
opened and she comes in. ' Take your cursed
money,' she said, and threw the parcel in my
face. . . She could not resist it. ... Five
240 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
hundred were missing. She had only got rid of
five hundred."
" And what did you do with the money ? "
" It's all past and done with. What's the
good of concealing it ? ... I certainly took it.
What are you staring at me like that for ?
Wait for the sequel. It's a complete novel, the
sickness of a soul ! Two months passed by.
One night I came home drunk, in a wicked mood.
... I turned on the light and saw Sophia Mikhai-
lovna sitting on my sofa, drunk too, wandering a
bit, with something savage in her face as if she
had just escaped from the mad-house. ' Give me
my money back,' she said. ' I've changed my
mind. If I'm going to the dogs, I want to go
madly, passionately. Make haste, you scoundrel,
give me the money.' How indecent it was ! "
" And you . . . did you give it her ? "
" I remember. ... I gave her ten roubles."
" Oh ... is it possible ? " Usielkov frowned.
" If you couldn't do it yourself, or you didn't
want to, you could have written to me. . . .
And I didn't know ... I didn't know."
" My dear man, why should I write, when she
wrote herself afterwards when she was in
hospital ? "
" I was so taken up with the new marriage that
I paid no attention to letters. . . . But you were
an outsider ; you had no antagonism to Sophia
Mikhailovna. . . . Why didn't you help her ? "
** We can't judge by our present standards,
Boris Pietrovich. Now we think in this way ;
OLD AGE 241
but then we thought quite differently. . . .
Now I might perhaps give her a thousand
roubles ; but then even ten roubles . . . she
didn't get them for nothing. It's a terrible
story. It's time to forget. . . . But here you
are ! "
The sledge stopped at the churchyard gate.
Usielkov and Shapkin got out of the sledge,
went through the gate and walked along a long,
broad avenue. The bare cherry trees, the
acacias, the grey crosses and monuments sparkled
with hoar-frost. In each flake of snow the bright
sunny day was reflected. There was the smell
you find in all cemeteries of incense and fresh-
dug earth.
" You have a beautiful cemetery," said Usiel-
kov. " It's almost an orchard."
" Yes, but it's a pity the thieves steal the
monuments. Look, there, behind that cast-iron
memorial, on the right, Sophia Mikhailovna is
buried. Would you like to see ? "
The friends turned to the right, stepping in
deep snow towards the cast-iron memorial.
" Down here," said Shapkin, pointing to a
little stone of white marble. "Some subaltern
or other put up the monument on her grave."
Usielkov slowly took off his hat and showed
his bald pate to the snow. Eying him, Shapkin
also took off his hat, and another baldness shone
beneath the sun. The silence round about was
like the tomb, as though the air were dead, too.
The friends looked at the stone, silent, thinking.
242 THE BET AND OTHER STORIES
" She is asleep ! " Shapkin broke the silence.
" And she cares very little that she took the guilt
upon herself and drank cognac. Confess, Boris
Pietrovich ! "
" \Vhat ? " asked Usielkov, sternly.
" That, however loathsome the past may be,
it's better than this." And Shapkin pointed to
his grey hairs.
" In the old days I did not even think of
death. ... If I'd met her, I would have cir-
cumvented her, but now . . . well, now ! "
Sadness took hold of Usielkov. Suddenly he
wanted to cry, passionately, as he once desired to
love. . . . And he felt that these tears would be
exquisite, refreshing. Moisture came out of his
eyes and a lump rose in his throat, but . . .
Shapkin was standing by his side, and Usielkov
felt ashamed of his weakness before a witness.
He turned back quickly and walked towards the
church.
Two hours later, having arranged with the
churchwarden and examined the church, he
seized the opportunity while Shapkin was talking
away to the priest, and ran to shed a tear.
He walked to the stone surreptitiously, with
stealthy steps, looking round all the time. The
little white monument stared at him absently,
so sadly and innocently, as though a girl and not
a wanton divorcee were beneath.
" If I could weep, could weep ! " thought
Usielkov.
But the moment for weeping had been lost.
OLD AGE 243
Though the old man managed to make his eyes
shine, and tried to bring himself to the right
pitch, the tears did not flow and the lump did
not rise in his throat. . . . After waiting for
about ten minutes, Usielkov waved his arm
and went to look for Shapkin.
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