Forty Stories (44 page)

“How good!” he thought. “Oh, how good!”

His old mother came into the room. Seeing his wrinkled face and enormous eyes, she was frightened and fell on her knees by the bed and began to kiss his face, his shoulders, and his hands. And to her it seemed that he had grown thinner, weaker, and more insignificant than he had ever been, and she forgot he was a bishop, and she kissed him as though he were a child very close and dear to her.

“Little Paul, my dearest,” she said. “How dear you are to me! My son, my son!… What has happened? Pavlusha, talk to me!”

Katya, pale and serious, stood beside her, and she could not understand what was happening to her uncle or why there was such a look of suffering on her grandmother’s face or why she said such heart-rending things. The Bishop could no longer formulate words, and no longer understood what was happening around him. He imagined he was a simple, ordinary fellow
striding joyfully across the fields, swinging his cane, free as a bird to wander wherever he pleased under the broad spaces of the sunlit sky.

“Pavlusha, my darling, talk to me!” the old woman was saying. “What has happened? My dear boy, my son …”

“You shouldn’t disturb His Eminence,” Father Sisoi exclaimed angrily, striding up and down the room. “Let him sleep! There’s nothing we can do now.…”

Three doctors came, went into consultation, and took their leave. The day grew unbelievably long, and was followed by an excruciatingly long night. Toward dawn on Saturday the lay brother went up to the old woman, who was lying on a couch in the sitting room, and bade her go into the bedroom. The Bishop was dead.

The next day was Easter. There are forty-two churches and two monasteries in the town; and from morning to evening the deep, happy notes of the church bells hovered over the town, never silent, quivering in the spring air. Birds were singing, and the bright sun was shining. The great market square was full of noise: seesaws were swinging, barrel organs were playing, concertinas were screaming, and there was a roar of drunken voices. In a word, everything was lighthearted and frolicsome, just as it had been during the previous year and as it doubtless would be in the years to come.

A month later a new bishop was installed, and no one gave a thought to Bishop Peter. Soon he was completely forgotten. His old mother, who is living today in a remote little country town with her son-in-law the deacon, goes out toward evening to bring her cow in, and sometimes she will pause and talk with the other women in the fields about her children and grandchildren and her son who became a bishop, and she speaks very softly and shyly, afraid that no one will believe her.

And indeed there are some who do not believe her.

April 1902

IT was about ten o’clock in the evening, and a full moon was shining over the garden. In the Shumins’ house the evening service, held because the grandmother, Marfa Mikhailovna, wanted it, was only just over, and now Nadya—who had slipped out into the garden for a minute—could see the table being laid for supper in the dining room, and her grandmother bustling about in a magnificent silk dress, while Father Andrey, the archpresbyter of the cathedral, was discussing something with Nina Ivanovna, Nadya’s mother, who for some reason looked very young when seen through the window in the evening light. Beside Nina Ivanovna stood Andrey Andreyich, Father Andrey’s son, who was listening attentively.

It was quiet and cool in the garden, where the dark peaceful shadows lay on the earth. From a long way away, probably from outside the town, came the croaking of frogs. There was a feeling of May, sweet May, in the air. You found yourself breathing deeply, and you imagined that somewhere else, somewhere beneath the sky and above the treetops, somewhere in the open fields and the forests far from the town—somewhere there the spring was burgeoning with its own mysterious and beautiful life, full of riches and holiness, beyond the comprehension of weak, sinful man. And for some reason you found yourself wanting to cry.

Nadya was already twenty-three, and ever since she was sixteen she had been passionately dreaming of marriage: now at last she was betrothed to Andrey Andreyich, whom she could see clearly through the window. She liked him, the wedding had been arranged for the seventh of July, but she felt no joy in her heart, slept badly at night, and all her happiness had gone from her. Through the open windows of the kitchen in the basement, she heard the servants scurrying about, the clatter of knives, the banging of the swinging door; there was the smell of roast turkey and marinated cherries. And for some reason it seemed to her that it would always be like this, unchanging till the end of time.

Someone came out of the house and stood on the steps. It was Alexander Timofeyich, known as Sasha, who had arrived from Moscow about ten days before for a visit. Many years ago there had come to the grandmother’s house a certain distant relative, Maria Petrovna, a widowed gentlewoman, begging charity. She was small and thin, and suffered from some illness, and was very poor. Sasha was her son. For some reason people said of him that he would make a fine artist, and when his mother died, Grandmother, for the salvation of her own soul, sent him to study at the Komissarov school in Moscow. A year or so later he went on to study at a school of painting, where he remained for about fifteen years, just managing to scrape through his final examinations in architecture, but he never practiced as an architect. Instead he went to work at a lithography shop in Moscow. He used to spend nearly every summer with Nadya’s grandmother, usually very ill, to rest and recuperate.

He wore a tightly buttoned frock coat and shabby canvas trousers crumpled at the hems. His shirt had not been ironed, and there was something soiled about him. He wore a beard, was very thin, with enormous eyes, long lean fingers, and his skin was dark; in spite of this, he was handsome. At the Shumins’ he was regarded as one of the family, and felt himself
at home. For a long time the room where he lived when he visited them had been known as Sasha’s room.

Standing on the porch, he caught sight of Nadya and went up to her.

“It’s nice here,” he said.

“It’s really nice. You ought to stay until the autumn.”

“Yes, I know. Probably I’ll have to. I may stay with you till September.”

He burst out laughing for no reason at all, and then sat down beside her.

“I’ve been sitting here and gazing at Mother,” said Nadya. “She looks so young from here. Of course, she has her weaknesses,” she added after a pause, “but she is still a most unusual woman.”

“Yes, she’s very nice,” Sasha agreed. “In her own way, of course. She’s good and kind, but somehow … How shall I put it? Early this morning I went down to your kitchen. I saw four maidservants sleeping right there on the floor, no beds, just a few rags for bedclothes, stench, bedbugs, cockroaches.… It was like that twenty years ago, and since then there’s been no change at all. It’s no use blaming your grandmother, God bless her soul, but your mother speaks French and acts in amateur theatricals.… You’d think she’d understand about these things.”

While Sasha talked, he held out two long bony fingers in front of Nadya’s face.

“Everything here looks strange to me,” he went on. “Maybe it’s because I’m not used to it. God in heaven, no one ever does anything! Your mother does nothing all day but walk about like a duchess, your grandmother does nothing either, and you’re the same. And your fiancé, Andrey Andreyich, does nothing either!”

Nadya had heard all this the year before, and she thought she had heard it the year before that: she knew that was how
Sasha’s mind worked. Once these speeches had amused her, but now for some reason they irritated her.

“It’s old stuff,” she said, and got up. “I wish you’d say something new.”

He laughed and got up too, and they walked together to the house. She was tall, beautiful, well formed, and looked almost offensively healthy and stylishly dressed beside him; she was even conscious of this herself, and felt sorry for him, and strangely awkward.

“You talk a lot of nonsense!” she said. “Look what you just said about my Andrey—you really don’t know him at all!”

“
My
Andrey!… Never mind
your
Andrey!… It’s your youth I’m sorry for!”

When they reached the dining room, everyone was already at supper. The grandmother—“Granny” to everyone in the house—was a very corpulent, plain old lady with thick eyebrows and a tiny mustache, who talked in a loud voice: from her voice and manner of speaking it was obvious that she was the most important woman in the household. She owned a row of stalls in the market place, the old house with its pillars and garden was hers, and every morning she prayed tearfully to God to spare her from ruin. Her daughter-in-law, Nadya’s mother, Nina Ivanovna, was a tightly corseted blonde who wore pince-nez and rings on all her fingers. Father Andrey was a lean toothless old man who wore an expression which suggested that he was always about to say something amusing, and his son Andrey Andreyich, Nadya’s fiancé, was a plump handsome creature with curly hair, who resembled an actor or a painter. They were all talking about hypnotism.

“You’ll be well again in a week here,” Granny said, turning to Sasha. “Only you must eat more. Just look at you,” she sighed. “You look dreadful! Why, you look like the Prodigal Son, and that’s the truth!”

“He wasted his substance in riotous living,” Father Andrey
said slowly, his eyes lighting up with amusement. “And it was his curse to feed with the unmitigated swine!”

“I admire my old man,” Andrey Andreyich said, patting his father’s shoulder. “He’s really a splendid old fellow. Very decent.”

They were silent for a while. Sasha suddenly burst out laughing, and covered his mouth with his napkin.

“So you believe in hypnotism?” Father Andrey asked Nina Ivanovna.

“No, I can’t exactly say I believe in it,” Nina Ivanovna replied, assuming a very grave, almost harsh expression. “Still, I must admit there is a good deal that remains mysterious and incomprehensible in nature.”

“I am entirely of your opinion, though I would add that for us faith decidedly narrows the sphere of the mysterious.”

A huge, immensely fat turkey was being served. Father Andrey and Nina Ivanovna continued their conversation. The diamonds on Nina Ivanovna’s fingers sparkled, but soon tears came to gleam in her eyes, and she was overcome with emotion.

“Yes, yes,” she said. “I wouldn’t dream of arguing with you, but you must agree that there are many insoluble riddles to life!”

“Well, I don’t know
one
insoluble riddle!”

After supper Andrey Andreyich played the violin, Nina Ivanovna accompanying him on the piano. Ten years previously he had graduated from the faculty of philology at the university, but he never entered government service, never worked at a definite occupation; he merely played at occasional concerts given for charity. In the town, people spoke of him as an artist.

Andrey Andreyich played, and they listened in silence. The samovar steamed quietly on the table, but Sasha was the only one to drink tea. When it struck twelve, a violin string suddenly snapped, and they all laughed. Then they bustled about, and soon they were saying good-by.

After taking leave of her fiancé, Nadya went upstairs to the
apartment she shared with her mother—the lower floor was occupied by her grandmother. Down below, in the drawing room, they were putting out the lights, but Sasha was still there, drinking tea. He always spent a long time over his tea, in the Moscow fashion, drinking up to seven glasses at a sitting. Long after she had undressed and gone to bed, Nadya could hear the servants clearing away and Granny talking angrily. At last silence reigned over the house, and there was no sound except the occasional coughing which came from somewhere below, from Sasha’s room.

It must have been about two o’clock when Nadya awoke. The dawn was coming up. The night watchman’s rattle could be heard in the distance. Nadya could not sleep: her bed felt soft and uncomfortable. She sat up in bed and gave herself up to her thoughts, as she had done during all the previous nights of May. Her thoughts were the same as on the night before: monotonous, futile, insistent—thoughts of how Andrey Andreyich courted and proposed to her, and how she had accepted him and gradually learned to appreciate this good and intelligent man. Yet for some reason, now, a month before the wedding, she began to experience a sense of fear and uneasiness, as though something vague and oppressive lay in wait for her.

“Tick-tock, tick-tock …” came the lazy tapping of the night watchman. “Tick-tock …”

Through the big old-fashioned window she could see the garden, and beyond the garden lay the lilac bushes heavy with bloom, drowsy and languid in the cold air, and a heavy white mist suddenly swept up to the lilacs, as though determined to drown them. The drowsy rooks were cawing in the distant trees.

“My God, why am I so depressed?”

Perhaps all brides feel the same before their weddings? Who knows? Or could it be the influence of Sasha? But for several years now Sasha had been repeating the same outworn phrases,
like a copybook, and when he spoke to her now, he seemed naive and strange to her. Why couldn’t she get the thought of Sasha out of her head? Why?

The night watchman had stopped tapping long ago. The birds were twittering beneath her window, and in the garden the mist vanished, so that everything glittered and seemed to be smiling in the spring sunshine. Soon the whole garden, warmed and caressed by the sun, sprang to life, and drops of dew gleamed like jewels on the leaves; and the ancient, long-neglected garden looked young and beautifully arrayed in the morning light.

Granny was already awake. Sasha’s deep coughing could be heard. From below came the sound of the servants setting up the samovar and arranging the chairs.

The hours passed slowly. Nadya had risen long ago, and for a long time she had been walking about the garden, and still the morning dragged on.

Then Nina Ivanovna appeared, her face tear-stained, a glass of mineral water in her hand. She went in for spiritualism and homeopathy, read a great deal, and loved talking about the doubts which continually assailed her, and Nadya supposed that all this possessed a profound and mysterious significance. She kissed her mother and walked beside her.