Petersburg (Penguin Classics)

by Andrei Bely

  Here the person rolled his swift little eyes and walked out of the study.

  It had got dark: there was blackness.

  Darkness had fallen; and it had risen between all the objects in the room; tables, cupboards, armchairs – everything had receded into profound darkness; Aleksandr Ivanovich went on sitting in the darkness – all on his own; the darkness entered his soul: he – wept.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich remembered all the nuances of the person’s discourse and considered that all those nuances had been sincere ones; the person had probably not been lying; and the suspicions, the hatred – all that could be explained by Aleksandr Ivanovich’s morbid condition: some chance midnight nightmare, in which the principal role was played by the person, might by chance become connected with some chance ambiguous remark of the person’s; and the food for a mental illness on a basis of alcoholism was ready; while the hallucination of the Mongol and the meaningless whisper of ‘Enfranshish’ that he had heard in the night – all that had done the rest. Well, what was the Mongol on the wall? Delirium. And that nefarious word.

  ‘Enfranshish, enfranshish …’ – what was it?

  An abracadabra, an association of sounds – no more.

  True, he had harboured uncharitable feelings towards the certain person previously, too; but this was also true: he was obligated to the person; – the person had got him out of trouble; his revulsion and horror were not justified by anything except … delirium: the stain on the wallpaper.

  Oh, then he was ill, he was ill …

  Darkness was falling: had fallen, was all around; with a kind of serious menace emerged – table, armchair, cupboard; the darkness entered his soul – he wept: Nikolai Apollonovich’s moral profile now arose for the first time in its true light. How could he not have understood it?

  He remembered his first meeting with him (Nikolai Apollonovich had given a little talk at the home of some mutual acquaintances in which all values were overthrown): the impression was not a pleasant one; and – further: Nikolai Apollonovich had, to tell the truth, displayed an especial curiosity about all the Party’s secrets; with the absent-minded air of an awkward degenerate, he had poked his nose into everything: after all, that absent-mindedness could be affected. Aleksandr Ivanovich thought for a bit: an agent provocateur of superior type could of course easily possess an outward appearance like that of Ableukhov – that sadly reflective air (avoiding the gaze of the person he was talking to) and the froglike expression of those pursed lips; Aleksandr Ivanovich was slowly becoming convinced: Nikolai Apollonovich had behaved strangely throughout this whole business: and dozens were perishing …

  To the degree in which he became persuaded of Ableukhov’s involvement in the matter concerning the exposure of T.T., so did the terror-laden, oppressive feeling that had gripped him during his conversation with the person die away; something light, almost carefree entered his soul. Aleksandr Ivanovich had for some reason long had an especial hatred of the senator: Apollon Apollonovich inspired him with an especial revulsion, similar to the revulsion inspired in us by a phalanx, or even a tarantula; on the other hand, at times he liked Nikolai Apollonovich; but now the senator’s son had united for him with the senator in a single spasm of revulsion and in a desire to root out, exterminate this tarantula-like breed.

  ‘O, filth! … Dozens are perishing … O, filth …’

  Better even the woodlice, the piece of dark yellow wallpaper, better even the person: in the person there was at least the grandeur of hatred; with the person one could at any rate unite in the desire to exterminate spiders:

  ‘O, filth! …’

  Across the room from him the table was already gleaming hospitably; on the table ‘savouries’ had been laid out: sausage, sig and cold veal cutlets; from afar came the contented humming of the person, who had at last grown tired, and Shishnarfiev’s voice; this latter was taking his leave; at last he left.

  Soon the person came barging into the room, walked up to Aleksandr Ivanovich, and placed a heavy hand on his shoulders:

  ‘Right, then! It’s better if we don’t quarrel, Aleksandr Ivanovich; if our own people are at odds with one another … then how will we ever …’

  ‘Well, let’s go and have something to eat … Eat with us … Only let us not hear a word of all this over supper … It’s all so depressing … And there’s no reason for Zoya Zakharovna to know about it, either: she’s tired of me … And I’m pretty tired, too … We’re all pretty tired … And it’s all just – nerves … You and I are nervous people … Well – to supper, to supper …’

  The table gleamed hospitably.

  The Sad and Melancholy One Again

  Aleksandr Ivanovich rang the doorbell a great number of times.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich rang the doorbell outside the gate of his forbidding house; the yardkeeper did not open up for him; when he rang, the only reply from the other side of the gate was the barking of a dog; in the distance a midnight cockerel raised its lonely voice at midnight; and – died away. The Eighteenth Line stretched away – over there: into the depths, into the emptiness.

  Emptiness.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich experienced something that resembled satisfaction, indeed: his arrival within these lamentable walls was being delayed; all night within these lamentable walls there were rustlings, crashes and squeals.

  Eventually – and this was the main thing: he would have to surmount twelve cold steps: and, turning, count their familiar number once again.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich always did this four times.

  In all: ninety-six echoing stone steps; further: he had to stand in front of the felt-covered door; he had with fear to put the half-rusted key in the lock. It was too risky to light a match in this pitch darkness; the light of a match might suddenly illumine the most diverse rubbish; like a mouse; and something else besides …

  Thus did Aleksandr Ivanovich reflect.

  That was why he always lingered before the gate of his forbidding house.

  And – look there, now … –

  – Someone sad and tall, whom Aleksandr Ivanovich had several times seen down by the Neva, again appeared in the depths of the Eighteenth Line. This time he quietly stepped into the bright circle of the street lamp; but it looked as though the bright golden light had begun to stream from his brow, from his stiffening fingers …

  – Thus did the unknown friend appear on this occasion too.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich remembered how one day the charming inhabitant of the Eighteenth Line had been hailed by a little old woman who was passing in a straw hat and bonnet with lilac ribbons.

  Misha, she had called him then.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich shuddered every time the sad, tall figure, as he walked past, turned on him an inexpressible, all-seeing gaze; and as he did so, his sunken cheeks gleamed white in the same way. After these encounters on the Neva, Aleksandr Ivanovich saw without seeing, and heard without hearing.

  ‘If only he would stop! …

  ‘Oh, if only! …

  ‘And, oh, if only he would hear me out! …’

  But the sad, tall figure, without looking, without stopping, had already walked past.

  The sound of his footsteps receded distinctly: this distinct sound proceeded from the fact that the feet of this passer-by were not shod, like those of the others, in galoshes. Aleksandr Ivanovich turned round and tried to say something to him softly; he wanted softly to call out to this unknown Misha …

  But that place to which Misha had already irrevocably gone – that place stood empty now in a bright, shimmering circle; and there was nothing, no one, except wind and slush.

  And from there blinked the fiery yellow tongue of a street lamp.

  None the less, he rang the doorbell again. A Petersburg cockerel answered the bell again: the dampish sea wind whistled through the chinks; the wind moaned in the gateway and on the other side of the street struck with all its might against an iron sign that said ‘Cheap Public Dining-Room’; and the iron fell with a
crash into the darkness.

  Matvei Morzhov

  At last the gate began to creak.

  The bearded yardkeeper, Matvei Morzhov, Aleksandr Ivanovich’s friend of long standing, admitted him over the house’s threshold: retreat was cut off; and the gate closed.

  ‘Why so late?’

  ‘I had business …’

  ‘Is his honour still out looking for a job?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right, I am …’

  ‘Of course you are: there aren’t any jobs now … Except maybe, if there’s a vacancy at the police station …’

  ‘But they won’t have me at the police station, Matvei …’

  ‘Of course: why should you go to the police station …’

  ‘So you see?’

  ‘And there aren’t any jobs now …’

  The bearded yardkeeper, Matvei Morzhov, sometimes sent his plump wife, who suffered permanently from an illness of the ear, to Aleksandr Ivanovich, now with a piece of pie, now with an invitation to visit; thus, they drank together on holidays, in the yardkeeper’s lodge: as a man who had gone underground, it was proper for Aleksandr Ivanovich to maintain the closest friendship with the house police.

  And besides.

  It was simply a good opportunity to come down from his cold garret without danger (as we have seen, Aleksandr Ivanovich hated his garret, and used to stay in it for weeks on end without going out, when to do so seemed risky).

  Sometimes to their company were added: Voronkov the police clerk and Bessmertny the shoemaker. And of late Styopka had been spending all his time in the yardkeeper’s lodge: Styopka was out of work.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich, finding himself in the little courtyard, distinctly heard the same old song floating to his ears from the yardkeeper’s lodge:

  Some girls

  Don’t like a clerk, –

  But I’d love one

  Any day …

  Eddicated

  People

  Know

  Just what to say …11

  ‘Got visitors again?’

  Matvei Morzhov scratched the nape of his neck with ferocious reflectiveness:

  ‘We’re having a bit of fun …’

  Aleksandr Ivanovich smiled:

  ‘That’s the clerk from the police station, isn’t it? …’

  ‘Who do you mean … Yes, that’s him …’

  Suddenly Aleksandr Ivanovich remembered that the name of Voronkov the clerk had been pressingly mentioned – back there, by the person; how did the person know Voronkov the clerk, and about Voronkov the clerk, and about their meetings? At the time, he was surprised, and had forgotten to ask.

  Mamma buy me

  For a dress

  Some silk

  That’s grey;

  Now I shall

  Respect

  Vasyutka

  Son of Aleksei! …

  Morzhov the yardkeeper, perceiving that Aleksandr Ivanovich was undecided about something, snuffled with his nose, and gloomily snapped out:

  ‘Well, then … Into the lodge … Come on in …’

  And Aleksandr Ivanovich would have gone: in the yardkeeper’s lodge it was warm and crowded and intoxicating; while in his garret it was lonely and cold. And yet – no, no: Voronkov the police clerk was there; the person had spoken ambiguously about Voronkov the police clerk; and – the devil knew what he was! But the main thing was: that to go into the lodge would have been a decided act of cowardice; would have been to run away from his own walls.

  With a sigh, Aleksandr Ivanovich replied:

  ‘No, Matvei: it’s time I went to bed …’

  ‘Of course: as you think best! …’

  But how they were singing in there:

  Mamma buy me

  For a dress

  Some silk

  That’s blue:

  Now it is

  Vasilyev’s son

  To whom I’ll be true!

  ‘Or wouldn’t you like a drink of vodka?’

  And simply with a kind of despair, simply with a kind of fury he shouted out:

  ‘No, no, no!’

  And hurled himself into flight towards the silvery cords of firewood.

  Then Matvei Morzhov, walking away, threw open the door of the lodge for a moment: white vapour, a pencil of rays, a hubbub of voices, and a smell of warmed-up dirt that had been brought in from the street on boots came out from there in a sharp rush for an instant; and then – bang: the door slammed shut behind Matvei Morzhov.

  Retreat was cut off a second time.

  Again the moon lit up the distinct outlines of the little square courtyard and the silvery cords of aspen wood, between which Aleksandr Ivanovich flitted as he steered a course towards the black entrance porch. At his back, words came floating across to him from the yardkeeper’s lodge; that was probably Bessmertny the shoemaker singing.

  The rails of the long railway line! …

  The embankment! … The signal’s hand!

  As the train into washed-away clay

  Flew plunging from sleepers to land.

  A scene of shattered rail coaches!

  A scene of unfortunate folk! …

  The rest was not audible.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich stopped: yes, yes, yes: it was starting; he had not yet managed to shut himself up in his dark yellow cube, yet already: it was starting, emerging – his inevitable, nightly torture. And this time it had started outside the rear entrance door.

  The same thing was still going on: they were keeping an eye on Aleksandr Ivanovich … It had started like this: once, as he returned home, he had seen a man whom he did not know coming down the staircase, and the man had said to him:

  ‘You are connected with Him …’

  Who the man coming down the staircase was, and who He (with a capital letter) was, Who connected people to Himself, Aleksandr Ivanovich had not waited to find out, and had instead rushed up the staircase away from the stranger. The stranger had not pursued him.

  And – it had happened to Dudkin a second time: he had encountered in the street a man in a peaked cap pulled deep down over his eyes, and with a face so dreadful (inexpressibly dreadful) that a lady whom he did not know and who happened to be passing at the time had seized Aleksandr Ivanovich by the coat-sleeve in alarm:

  ‘Did you see? That is horrible, why, it is horrible … That does not happen! … Oh, what is it? …’

  Meanwhile, the man had passed by.

  But in the evening, on the third-floor landing, Aleksandr Ivanovich had been seized by some kind of arms and shoved against the railings, in a manifest attempt to push him – there, down there … Aleksandr Ivanovich had defended himself, struck a match, and … there was no one on the staircase: footsteps neither descending nor ascending. It was deserted.

  Finally at night of late Aleksandr Ivanovich had heard inhuman shrieking … from the staircase: how someone shrieked! … Shrieked, and then cried out no more.

  But the tenants did not hear the shrieking.

  Only once had he heard that shrieking – there, by the Bronze Horseman: that was exactly what the shrieking sounded like. But that had been a motor car, lit up by reflectors. Only once had Stepan, who was out of work, and sometimes whiled away the nights with him, heard … the shrieking. But in response to all Aleksandr Ivanovich’s pestering, all he would say, morosely, was:

  ‘That’s them looking for you …’

  As to who they were, about that Styopka kept mum. And said not another word. Only this Styopka began to avoid Aleksandr Ivanovich’s company, and came to see him less frequently; and as for spending the night – not on your life … And neither to the yardkeeper, nor to Voronkov the police clerk, nor to the shoemaker did Styopka say a word. And neither did Aleksandr Ivanovich …

  But to be forcibly dragooned into all this, and not to be able to tell anyone about it!

  ‘That’s them looking for you …’

  Who were they, and why were they looking? …

  There, right now, for ex
ample.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich involuntarily cast his gaze aloft: to a small window on the fifth, attic floor; and there was light in the window: one could see some kind of angular shadow restlessly slouching about in the window. In an instant he felt about in his pocket for the key to his room: he had the key with him. Then who was up there in his locked room?

  Was it perhaps a search? Oh, if only that were all it were: he would fly to the search, like the happiest of men; even if they were to arrest him and put him in … the Peter and Paul Fortress, they would at least be human beings – not them.

  ‘That’s them looking for you …’

  Aleksandr Ivanovich drew a deep breath and vowed to himself in advance not to be excessively frightened, because the events in which he might now be involved were simply an idle, cerebral game.

  Aleksandr Ivanovich went in through the back entrance.

  A Lifeless Ray Was Falling through the Window

  Yes, yes, yes: there they stood; that was how they had stood at the time of his last nocturnal return. And they were waiting for him. Who they were, it was positively impossible to say: two outlines. A lifeless ray was falling through the window from the third floor; it lay whitishly on the grey steps.

  And in the most total darkness the whitish blotches lay there so horribly calmly – dauntlessly.

  It was into this particular whitish blotch that the railings of the staircase ran; and next to the railings they stood: two outlines; they let Aleksandr Ivanovich through, standing to the right and the left of him; this was how they had let Aleksandr Ivanovich through on that occasion, too; had said nothing, had not moved a muscle, had not flinched; all he felt was someone’s evil eye, screwed up, but not blinking, trained on him out of the darkness.

  Should he approach them, whisper in their ears the incantation that had arisen in his memory out of a dream?