by Andrei Bely
Sofya Petrovna’s visitors somehow fell of their own accord into two categories: the category of guests from polite society and ‘guests so to speak’. These guests-so-to-speak were not really guests at all: they were all welcome visitors … for the unburdening of her soul; these visitors had not made efforts to be received in the little hothouse; not in the slightest! The Angel dragged them to her flat almost by force; and, having dragged them there by force, at once returned their visit: in their presence the Angel Peri sat with compressed lips: did not laugh, did not indulge in caprice, did not flirt at all, displaying an extreme shyness and an extreme muteness, while the guests-so-to-speak stormily argued one with the other and one heard: ‘revolution-evolution.’ And again: ‘revolution-evolution.’ They only argued about one thing, these guests-so-to-speak; they were neither golden nor even silver youth: they were poor, copper youth who had obtained their education on their own workearned farthings; in a word, they were the studying youth of the higher educational establishments, sporting an abundance of foreign words: ‘social revolution’. And then again: ‘social evolution’. Angel Peri unfailingly got those words mixed up.
The Officer: Sergei Sergeich Likhutin
Among the rest of the studying youth there was a certain respected, radiant person in that circle who was a regular visitor to the Likhutins: the coursiste Varvara Yevgrafovna (here Varvara Yevgrafovna might from time to time encounter Nicolas Ableukhov himself).
One day, under the radiant person’s influence, the Angel Peri illumined with her presence – well, imagine it: a political rally! Under the radiant person’s influence, the Angel Peri placed on the table her very own copper collection box with the nebulous inscription: ‘Charitable Collection’. This box was, of course, intended for the guests; while all the persons who belonged to the guests-so-to-speak had been once and for all exempted by Sofya Petrovna Likhutina from the requisitions; but requisitions were imposed on Count Aven, and Baron Ommau-Ommergau, and Shporyshev, and Verhefden. Under the radiant person’s influence Angel Peri began to go to the municipal school of O.O. in the mornings and repeated Karl Marx’s Manifesto over and over again to no purpose whatever. The point was that at this time she received daily visits from a student, Nikolenka Ableukhov, whom she could without risk introduce both to Varvara Yevgrafovna (who was in love with Nikolenka) and to Her Majesty’s Yellow Cuirassier. Being Ableukhov’s son, Ableukhov was, of course, received everywhere.
As a matter of fact, ever since the time that Nikolenka had suddenly stopped going to visit Angel Peri, that angel had suddenly, in secret from the guests-so-to-speak, gone fluttering off to the spiritualists and to the baroness (oh, what is her name?) who was preparing to enter a nunnery. Ever since, on the table before Sofya Petrovna lay in splendour a magnificently bound little book, Man and His Bodies by some Madame Henri Besançon or other (Sofya Petrovna was again confused: it was not Henri Besançon,9 but Annie Besant).
Sofya Petrovna assiduously concealed her new passion from both Baron Ommau-Ommergau and Varvara Yevgrafovna; in spite of her infectious laughter and her tiny little forehead, the Angel Peri’s secretiveness attained improbable proportions: thus, not once did Varvara Yevgrafovna meet Count Aven, nor even Baron Ommau-Ommergau. On one occasion only did she accidentally catch sight in the hallway of a Leib Hussar’s fur hat with a plume. But to this Leib Hussar’s hat with a plume no reference was thereafter made.
There was something behind all this. God knows!
Sofya Petrovna Likhutina had yet one more visitor; an officer: Sergei Sergeyevich Likhutin; as a matter of fact, he was her husband; he was in charge of provisions somewhere out there; early in the morning he left the house; reappeared no earlier than midnight; equally meekly greeted the ordinary guests and the guests-so-to-speak, with equal meekness said a ‘fifi’ for the sake of propriety, dropping a twenty-copeck piece into the collection box (if Count Aven or Baron Ommau-Ommergau were present at the time), or modestly nodded his head at the words ‘revolution-evolution’, drank a cup of tea and went to his little room; the young men of polite society privately called him ‘the little army fellow’, while the studying youth called him ‘the Bourbon officer’ (in 1905 Sergei Sergeyevich had had the misfortune to defend the Nikolayevsky Bridge from the workers with his half-company). As a matter of fact, Sergei Sergeich Likhutin would have been best pleased to abstain both from ‘fifis’ and from the words ‘revolution-evolution’. As a matter of fact, he would not have been averse to going to the baroness’s for a little spiritualist seance; but he made absolutely no attempt to insist on his modest wish by using his rights as a husband, for in absolutely no way was he a despot in relation to Sofya Petrovna; he loved Sofya Petrovna with all the strength of his soul; moreover: two and a half years earlier he had married her against the wishes of his parents, very rich landowners in Simbirsk; after that, he had been cursed by his father and deprived of his fortune; after that, to everyone’s surprise, he had entered the Gregorian Regiment.10
There was yet another visitor: the crafty khokhol-Little Russian,11 Lippanchenko;12 this was an individual of thoroughly voluptuary temperament who called Sofya Petrovna not an angel but … dushkan;13 to himself, however, the crafty khokhol-Little Russian Lippanchenko called her quite plainly and simply: brankukan, brankukashka or brankukanchik14 (there are some words, for you, then!) But Lippanchenko kept within the bounds of propriety: and so he was received in that house.
Sofya Petrovna’s most good-natured husband, Sergei Sergeyevich Likhutin, a second lieutenant in the Gregorian Regiment of His Majesty the King of Siam, took a meek attitude towards the revolutionary circle of his better half’s acquaintances; the representatives of the polite society circle he regarded merely with emphasized good humour; while the khokhol-Little Russian he only barely tolerated: this crafty khokhol did not at all, incidentally, resemble a khokhol: he sooner resembled a cross between a Semite and a Mongol; he was both tall and fat; this gentleman’s yellowish face floated unpleasantly in its own chin, which was pushed out by a starched collar; and Lippanchenko wore a yellow and red satin tie, fastened with a paste jewel, sporting a striped dark yellow suit and a pair of shoes the same colour; but on top of this, Lippanchenko shamelessly dyed his hair brown. Of himself Lippanchenko said that he exported Russian pigs and was preparing to get rich once and for all on this swinishness.
Be that as it may, it was Lippanchenko, he alone, for whom second lieutenant Likhutin had no especial liking. But why ask whom second lieutenant Likhutin did not like: second lieutenant Likhutin liked everyone, of course: but if there was one person he had liked especially at one time, that person was Nikolai Apollonovich Ableukhov: after all, they had known each other since the earliest years of their adolescence. In the first place, Nikolai Apollonovich had been best man at Likhutin’s wedding, in the second, a daily visitor to the flat on the Moika for a period of almost one and a half years. But then he had disappeared without trace.
It was not Sergei Sergeyevich, of course, who was to blame for the disappearance of the senator’s son, but the senator’s son, or even Angel Peri herself.
Ah, Sofya Petrovna, Sofya Petrovna! In one word: a lady … And from a lady what may one ask?
The Slim and Handsome Best Man
Even on the first day of her, so to speak, ‘ladyhood’ during the accomplishment of the ritual of marriage, when Nikolai Apollonovich held above her husband, Sergei Sergeyevich, the most solemn crown, Sofya Petrovna Likhutina had been tormentingly struck by the slim and handsome best man, by the colour of his unearthly, dark blue, enormous eyes, the whiteness of his marble face and the godlike quality of his blond flaxen hair: for those eyes did not look, as they often did later, from behind the dim lenses of a pince-nez, and his face was supported by the gold collar of a brand new uniform jacket (not every student has such a collar). Well, and … Nikolai Apollonovich started visiting the Likhutins at first once every two weeks; later it became once a week; two, three, four times a week; in the end he came daily. Soon
Sofya Petrovna noticed under the mask of these daily visits that Nikolai Apollonovich’s face, godlike, stern, had turned into a mask: the little grimaces, the aimless rubbing of his sometimes sweaty hands, and ultimately the unpleasant froglike expression of his smile, which proceeded from the play of every conceivable type that never left his face, obscured that face from her for ever. And as soon as Sofya Petrovna noticed this, to her horror she realized that she was in love with that face, that one, and not this. Angel Peri wanted to be a model wife: and the dreadful thought that, while yet faithful, she had already fallen for someone who was not her husband – this thought completely shattered her. But more, more: from behind the mask, the grimaces, the froglike lips, she unconsciously tried to call forth her irrevocably lost being-in-love: she tormented Ableukhov, showered him with insults; but, concealing it from herself, dogged his footsteps, tried to find out what were his aspirations and tastes, unconsciously followed them in the constant hope of finding in them the authentic, godlike countenance; so she started to put on airs: first meloplastics appeared on the scene, then the cuirassier, Baron Ommau-Ommergau, and finally Varvara Yevgrafovna with the tin box for the collection of ‘fifis’.
In a word, Sofya Petrovna began to grow confused: hating, she loved; loving, she hated.
Ever since then, her real husband had become no more than a visitor to the little flat on the Moika: began to take charge of provisions somewhere out there; left the house early in the morning; reappeared at around midnight: said a ‘fifi’ for the sake of propriety, dropping a twenty-copeck piece into the collection box, or modestly nodding his head at the words ‘revolution-evolution’, drinking a cup of tea and going off to his room to sleep: for he had to get up as early as possible in the morning and walk to somewhere out there in order to take charge of provisions. Sergei Sergeich had only begun, somewhere out there, to take charge of provisions because he did not want to hamper his wife’s freedom.
But Sofya Petrovna could not endure freedom: after all, she had such a tiny, tiny little forehead; together with the tiny forehead there lay concealed within her volcanoes of the most profound emotions: because she was a lady; and in ladies one must not stir up chaos: in this chaos ladies keep concealed all manner of cruelties, crimes, degradations, all manner of violent furies, as well as all manner of heroic actions such as have not been seen on the earth before; in every lady a criminal is concealed: but let a crime be committed, and nothing but holiness will remain in the truly ladylike soul.
Soon we shall without doubt demonstrate to the reader the division that also existed in Nikolai Apollonovich’s soul into two independent values: a godlike ice – and a simply froglike slush; this duality is a typical characteristic of all ladies: duality is in essence not a masculine, but a ladylike property; the number two is the symbol of the lady; the symbol of the man is unity. Only thus is the triality obtained without which it is questionable whether the domestic hearth would be possible.
We have noted Sofya Petrovna’s duality above: a nervousness in her movements – and an awkward languor; an insufficiency of forehead and an excessive profusion of hair; Fujiyama, Wagner, the faithfulness of the female heart – and ‘Henri Besançon’, the gramophone, Baron Ommergau and even Lippanchenko. Were Sergei Sergeich Likhutin or Nikolai Apollonovich real unities, and not dualities, there would have been a triality; and Sofya Petrovna would have found life’s harmony in a union with a man; the gramophone, meloplastics, Henri Besançon, Lippanchenko, even Ommau-Ommergau would have flown to the devil.
But there was not just one Ableukhov: there was Ableukhov number one, the godlike one, and Ableukhov number two, the little frog. It all happened because of that.
But what happened?
In Sofya Petrovna, Nikolai Apollonovich-the-little-frog fell for her deep little heart that was raised above all the fuss and bustle; not her tiny little forehead or her hair; while Nikolai Apollonovich’s godlike nature, despising love, was cynically intoxicated by meloplastics; both argued within him about whom they should love: the little female or the angel? The angel, Sofya Petrovna, as naturally befitted an angel, loved only the god: while the little female got confused: at first she was indignant at the unpleasant smile, but subsequently she came to love precisely her own indignation; then, having come to love hatred, she came to love the nasty smile, but with a strange (everyone would say, depraved) love: there was in all this something unnaturally burning, unfathomably sweet and fateful.
Had the criminal awoken within Sofya Petrovna Likhutina then? Ah, Sofya Petrovna, Sofya Petrovna! In a word: a lady and a lady …
And from a lady what may one ask?
The Red Buffoon15
As a matter of fact, in recent months Sofya Petrovna Likhutina had been behaving extremely provocatively with the object of her affections: in front of the gramophone horn that belched forth ‘The Death of Siegfried’, she had studied body movement (and how!), raising almost to her knees her rustling silk skirt; moreover: from beneath the table her foot had, more than once or twice, touched Ableukhov. It was not surprising that the latter had more than once endeavoured to embrace the Angel; but then the Angel had slipped away, first showering her admirer with cold; and then again resumed her old ways. But when one day, defending Greek art, she proposed to form a nudist circle, Nikolai Apollonovich could hold out no longer: all his hopeless passion of many days rushed to his head (Nikolai Apollonovich dropped her on the sofa in the struggle) … But Sofya Petrovna agonizingly bit to blood the lips that sought her lips, and as Nikolai Apollonovich went out of his mind with pain, a slap to his face resounded in the Japanese room.
‘Ooo … Freak, frog16 … Ooo – red buffoon.’
Nikolai Apollonovich replied calmly and coldly:
‘If I am a red buffoon, then you are a Japanese doll …’
With exceeding dignity did he draw himself erect by the door; at that moment his face took on precisely that remote expression that had once captivated her, and remembering it, she imperceptibly fell in love with him; and when Nikolai Apollonovich left, she crashed to the floor, both scratching, and biting the carpet as she wept; suddenly she leapt to her feet and extended her arms through the doorway:
‘Come to me, come back – god!’
But in reply to her the exit door banged: Nikolai Apollonovich fled to the large St Petersburg Bridge. Later on we shall see him take by the Bridge a certain fateful decision (upon the completion of a certain act, to destroy his own life). The expression ‘Red Buffoon’ had wounded him in the extreme.
Sofya Petrovna Likhutina did not see him any more: in a kind of wild protest against Ableukhov’s passion for ‘revolution-evolution’ Angel Peri involuntarily flew away from the studying youth, flying instead to Baroness R.R. for a spiritualist seance. And Varvara Yevgrafovna began to call more rarely. On the other hand, frequent visits were once again made by: Count Aven, Baron Ommau-Ommergau, Shporyshev, Verhefden, and even … Lippanchenko: and Lippanchenko’s visits were more frequent than those of the others. With Count Aven, Baron Ommau-Ommergau, Shporyshev, Verhefden, and even … Lippanchenko she laughed without growing tired of it; suddenly, breaking off her laughter, she would ask perkily:
‘After all, I’m a doll – am I not?’
And they replied to her with ‘fifis’, poured silver into the little tin box with the inscription ‘Charitable Collection’. And Lippanchenko replied to her: ‘You are a dushkan, a brankukan, a brankukashka.’ And brought her a small yellow-faced doll as a present.
But when she said this same thing to her husband, her husband made her no reply. Sergei Sergeich Likhutin, second lieutenant in the Gregorian Regiment of His Majesty the King of Siam, went off as though he were going to bed: he was in charge, somewhere out there, of provisions; but going into his room, he sat down to write Nikolai Apollonovich a meek little letter: in the letter he made so bold as to inform Ableukhov that he, Sergei Sergeyevich, second lieutenant in the Gregorian Regiment, most humbly requested the following: while not wishing to meddl
e for reasons of principle in Nikolai Apollonovich’s relations with his preciously beloved spouse, he none the less urgently requested (the word urgently was thrice underlined) to cease visiting their home for ever, as the nerves of his preciously beloved spouse were upset. As far as his behaviour was concerned, Sergei Sergeyevich resorted to concealment; his behaviour did not change one iota; as before, he left very early in the morning; returned towards midnight; said a ‘fifi’ for propriety’s sake if he saw Baron Ommau-Ommergau, frowned ever so slightly if he saw Lippanchenko, nodded his head in most good-humoured fashion at the words ‘evolution-revolution’, drank a cup of tea and quietly disappeared: he was in charge – somewhere out there – of provisions.