‘‘Though they’re unbelievers, they are good people and will be saved,’’ he reassured himself. ‘‘They’ll surely be saved!’’ he said aloud, lighting a cigarette.
By what measure must one measure people’s qualities, to be able to judge them fairly? The deacon recalled his enemy, the inspector of the seminary, who believed in God, and did not fight duels, and lived in chastity, but used to feed the deacon bread with sand in it and once nearly tore his ear off. If human life was so unwisely formed that everyone in the seminary respected this cruel and dishonest inspector, who stole government flour, and prayed for his health and salvation, was it fair to keep away from such people as von Koren and Laevsky only because they were unbelievers? The deacon started mulling over this question but then recalled what a funny figure Samoilenko had cut that day, and that interrupted the course of his thoughts. How they would laugh tomorrow! The deacon imagined himself sitting behind a bush and spying on them, and when von Koren began boasting tomorrow at dinner, he, the deacon, would laugh and tell him all the details of the duel.
‘‘How do you know all that?’’ the zoologist would ask.
‘‘It just so happens. I stayed home, but I know.’’
It would be nice to write a funny description of the duel. His father-in-law would read it and laugh; hearing or reading something funny was better food for him than meat and potatoes.
The valley of the Yellow River opened out. The rain had made the river wider and angrier, and it no longer rumbled as before, but roared. Dawn was breaking. The gray, dull morning, and the clouds racing westward to catch up with the thunderhead, and the mountains girded with mist, and the wet trees—it all seemed ugly and angry to the deacon. He washed in a brook, recited his morning prayers, and wished he could have some tea and the hot puffs with sour cream served every morning at his father-in-law’s table. He thought of his deaconess and ‘‘The Irretrievable,’’ which she played on the piano. What sort of woman was she? They had introduced the deacon to her, arranged things, and married him to her in a week; he had lived with her for less than a month and had been ordered here, so that he had not yet figured out what kind of person she was. But all the same, he was slightly bored without her.
‘‘I must write her a little letter . . .’’ he thought.
The flag on the dukhan was rain-soaked and drooping, and the dukhan itself, with its wet roof, seemed darker and lower than it had before. A cart stood by the door. Kerbalai, a couple of Abkhazians, and a young Tartar woman in balloon trousers, probably Kerbalai’s wife or daughter, were bringing sacks of something out of the dukhan and putting them in the cart on cornhusks. By the cart stood a pair of oxen, their heads lowered. After loading the sacks, the Abkhazians and the Tartar woman began covering them with straw, and Kerbalai hastily began hitching up the donkeys.
‘‘Contraband, probably,’’ thought the deacon.
Here was the fallen tree with its dried needles, here was the black spot from the fire. He recalled the picnic in all its details, the fire, the singing of the Abkhazians, the sweet dreams of a bishopric and a procession with the cross...The Black River had grown blacker and wider from the rain. The deacon cautiously crossed the flimsy bridge, which the muddy waves already reached with their crests, and climbed the ladder into the drying shed.
‘‘A fine head!’’ he thought, stretching out on the straw and recalling von Koren. ‘‘A good head, God grant him health. Only there’s cruelty in him . . .’’
Why did he hate Laevsky, and Laevsky him? Why were they going to fight a duel? If they had known the same poverty as the deacon had known since childhood, if they had been raised in the midst of ignorant, hard-hearted people, greedy for gain, who reproached you for a crust of bread, coarse and uncouth of behavior, who spat on the floor and belched over dinner and during prayers, if they had not been spoiled since childhood by good surroundings and a select circle of people, how they would cling to each other, how eagerly they would forgive each other’s shortcomings and value what each of them did have. For there are so few even outwardly decent people in the world! True, Laevsky was crackbrained, dissolute, strange, but he wouldn’t steal, wouldn’t spit loudly on the floor, wouldn’t reproach his wife: ‘‘You stuff yourself, but you don’t want to work,’’ wouldn’t beat a child with a harness strap or feed his servants putrid salt beef—wasn’t that enough for him to be treated with tolerance? Besides, he was the first to suffer from his own shortcomings, like a sick man from his sores. Instead of seeking, out of boredom or some sort of misunderstanding, for degeneracy, extinction, heredity, and other incomprehensible things in each other, wouldn’t it be better for them to descend a little lower and direct their hatred and wrath to where whole streets resound with the groans of coarse ignorance, greed, reproach, impurity, curses, female shrieks...
There was the sound of an equipage, and it interrupted the deacon’s thoughts. He peeked out the door and saw a carriage, and in it three people: Laevsky, Sheshkovsky, and the head of the post and telegraph office.
‘‘Stop!’’ said Sheshkovsky.
All three got out of the carriage and looked at each other.
‘‘They’re not here yet,’’ said Sheshkovsky, shaking mud off himself. ‘‘So, then! While the jury’s still out, let’s go and find a suitable spot. There’s hardly room enough to turn around here.’’
They went further up the river and soon disappeared from sight. The Tartar coachman got into the carriage, lolled his head on his shoulder, and fell asleep. Having waited for about ten minutes, the deacon came out of the drying shed and, taking off his black hat so as not to be noticed, cowering and glancing around, began to make his way along the bank among the bushes and strips of corn; big drops fell on him from the trees and bushes, the grass and corn were wet.
‘‘What a shame!’’ he muttered, hitching up his wet and dirty skirts. ‘‘If I’d known, I wouldn’t have come.’’
Soon he heard voices and saw people. Laevsky, hunched over, his hands tucked into his sleeves, was rapidly pacing up and down a small clearing; his seconds stood just by the bank and rolled cigarettes.
‘‘Strange . . .’’ thought the deacon, not recognizing Laevsky’s gait. ‘‘Looks like an old man.’’
‘‘How impolite on their part!’’ said the postal official, looking at his watch. ‘‘Maybe for a learned man it’s a fine thing to be late, but in my opinion it’s swinishness.’’
Sheshkovsky, a fat man with a black beard, listened and said:
‘‘They’re coming.’’
XIX
‘‘THE FIRST TIME in my life I’ve seen it! How nice!’’ said von Koren, emerging into the clearing and holding out both arms to the east. ‘‘Look: green rays!’’
Two green rays stretched out from behind the mountains in the east, and it was indeed beautiful. The sun was rising.
‘‘Good morning!’’ the zoologist went on, nodding to Laevsky’s seconds. ‘‘I’m not late?’’
Behind him came his seconds, two very young officers of the same height, Boiko and Govorovsky, in white tunics, and the lean, unsociable Dr. Ustimovich, who was carrying a bundle of something in one hand and put the other behind him; as usual, he was holding his cane up along his spine. Setting the bundle on the ground and not greeting anyone, he sent his other hand behind his back and began pacing out the clearing.
Laevsky felt the weariness and awkwardness of a man who might die soon and therefore attracted general attention. He would have liked to be killed quickly or else taken home. He was now seeing a sunrise for the first time in his life; this early morning, the green rays, the dampness, and the people in wet boots seemed extraneous to his life, unnecessary, and they embarrassed him; all this had no connection with the night he had lived through, with his thoughts, and with the feeling of guilt, and therefore he would gladly have left without waiting for the duel.
Von Koren was noticeably agitated and tried to conceal it, pretending that he was interested most of all in the gree
n rays. The seconds were confused and kept glancing at each other as if asking why they were there and what they were to do.
‘‘I suppose, gentlemen, that there’s no need to go further,’’ said Sheshkovsky. ‘‘Here is all right.’’
‘‘Yes, of course,’’ agreed von Koren.
Silence ensued. Ustimovich, as he paced, suddenly turned sharply to Laevsky and said in a low voice, breathing in his face:
‘‘They probably haven’t had time to inform you of my conditions. Each side pays me fifteen roubles, and in case of the death of one of the adversaries, the one who is left alive pays the whole thirty.’’
Laevsky had made this man’s acquaintance earlier, but only now did he see distinctly for the first time his dull eyes, stiff mustache, and lean, consumptive neck: a moneylender, not a doctor! His breath had an unpleasant, beefy smell.
‘‘It takes all kinds to make a world,’’ thought Laevsky and replied:
‘‘Very well.’’
The doctor nodded and again began pacing, and it was clear that he did not need the money at all, but was asking for it simply out of hatred. Everyone felt that it was time to begin, or to end what had been begun, yet they did not begin or end, but walked about, stood, and smoked. The young officers, who were present at a duel for the first time in their lives and now had little faith in this civil and, in their opinion, unnecessary duel, attentively examined their tunics and smoothed their sleeves. Sheshkovsky came up to them and said quietly:
‘‘Gentlemen, we should make every effort to keep the duel from taking place. They must be reconciled.’’
He blushed and went on:
‘‘Last night Kirilin came to see me and complained that Laevsky had caught him last night with Nadezhda Fyodorovna and all that.’’
‘‘Yes, we also know about that,’’ said Boiko.
‘‘Well, so you see...Laevsky’s hands are trembling and all that... He won’t even be able to hold up a pistol now. It would be as inhuman to fight with him as with a drunk man or someone with typhus. If the reconciliation doesn’t take place, then, gentlemen, we must at least postpone the duel or something . . . It’s such a devilish thing, I don’t even want to look.’’
‘‘Speak with von Koren.’’
‘‘I don’t know the rules of dueling, devil take them all, and I don’t want to know them; maybe he’ll think Laevsky turned coward and sent me to him. But anyhow, he can think what he likes, I’ll go and speak with him.’’
Irresolutely, limping slightly, as though his foot had gone to sleep, Sheshkovsky went over to von Koren, and as he walked and grunted, his whole figure breathed indolence.
‘‘There’s something I’ve got to tell you, sir,’’ he began, attentively studying the flowers on the zoologist’s shirt. ‘‘It’s confidential . . . I don’t know the rules of dueling, devil take them all, and I don’t want to know them, and I’m reasoning not as a second and all that but as a human being, that’s all.’’
‘‘Right. So?’’
‘‘When seconds suggest making peace, usually nobody listens to them, looking on it as a formality. Amour propre and nothing more. But I humbly beg you to pay attention to Ivan Andreich. He’s not at all in a normal state today, so to speak, not in his right mind, and quite pitiful. A misfortune has befallen him. I can’t bear gossip,’’ Sheshkovsky blushed and looked around, ‘‘but in view of the duel, I find it necessary to tell you. Last night, in Miuridov’s house, he found his lady with . . . a certain gentleman.’’
‘‘How revolting!’’ murmured the zoologist; he turned pale, winced, and spat loudly: ‘‘Pah!’’
His lower lip trembled; he stepped away from Sheshkovsky, not wishing to hear any more, and, as if he had accidentally sampled something bitter, again spat loudly, and for the first time that morning looked at Laevsky with hatred. His agitation and awkwardness passed; he shook his head and said loudly:
‘‘Gentlemen, what are we waiting for, may I ask? Why don’t we begin?’’
Sheshkovsky exchanged glances with the officers and shrugged his shoulders.
‘‘Gentlemen!’’ he said loudly, not addressing anyone. ‘‘Gentlemen! We suggest that you make peace!’’
‘‘Let’s get through the formalities quickly,’’ said von Koren. ‘‘We’ve already talked about making peace. What’s the next formality now? Let’s hurry up, gentlemen, time won’t wait.’’
‘‘But we still insist on making peace,’’ Sheshkovsky said in a guilty voice, like a man forced to interfere in other people’s business; he blushed, put his hand to his heart, and went on: ‘‘Gentlemen, we see no causal connection between the insult and the duel. An offense that we, in our human weakness, sometimes inflict on each other and a duel have nothing in common. You’re university and cultivated people, and, of course, you yourselves see nothing in dueling but an outdated and empty formality and all that. We look at it the same way, otherwise we wouldn’t have come, because we can’t allow people to shoot at each other in our presence, that’s all.’’ Sheshkovsky wiped the sweat from his face and went on: ‘‘Let’s put an end to your misunderstanding, gentlemen, offer each other your hands, and go home and drink to peace. Word of honor, gentlemen!’’
Von Koren was silent. Laevsky, noticing that they were looking at him, said:
‘‘I have nothing against Nikolai Vassilievich. If he finds me to blame, I’m ready to apologize to him.’’
Von Koren became offended.
‘‘Obviously, gentlemen,’’ he said, ‘‘you would like Mr. Laevsky to return home a magnanimous and chivalrous man, but I cannot give you and him that pleasure. And there was no need to get up early and go seven miles out of town only to drink to peace, have a bite to eat, and explain to me that dueling is an outdated formality. A duel is a duel, and it ought not to be made more stupid and false than it is in reality. I want to fight!’’
Silence ensued. Officer Boiko took two pistols from a box; one was handed to von Koren, the other to Laevsky, and after that came perplexity, which briefly amused the zoologist and the seconds. It turned out that of all those present, not one had been at a duel even once in his life, and no one knew exactly how they should stand and what the seconds should say and do. But then Boiko remembered and, smiling, began to explain.
‘‘Gentlemen, who remembers how it’s described in Lermontov?’’ von Koren asked, laughing. ‘‘In Turgenev, too, Bazarov exchanged shots with somebody or other . . .’’
‘‘What is there to remember?’’ Ustimovich said impatiently, stopping. ‘‘Measure out the distance—that’s all.’’
And he made three paces, as if showing them how to measure. Boiko counted off the paces, and his comrade drew his saber and scratched the ground at the extreme points to mark the barrier.
In the general silence, the adversaries took their places.
‘‘Moles,’’ recalled the deacon, who was sitting in the bushes.
Sheshkovsky was saying something, Boiko was explaining something again, but Laevsky did not hear or, more precisely, heard but did not understand. When the time for it came, he cocked and raised the heavy, cold pistol, barrel up. He forgot to unbutton his coat, and it felt very tight in the shoulder and armpit, and his arm was rising as awkwardly as if the sleeve was made of tin. He remembered his hatred yesterday for the swarthy forehead and curly hair, and thought that even yesterday, in a moment of intense hatred and wrath, he could not have shot at a man. Fearing that the bullet might somehow accidentally hit von Koren, he raised the pistol higher and higher, and felt that this much too ostentatious magnanimity was neither delicate nor magnanimous, but he could not and would not do otherwise. Looking at the pale, mockingly smiling face of von Koren, who had evidently been sure from the very beginning that his adversary would fire into the air, Laevsky thought that soon, thank God, it would all be over, and that he had only to squeeze the trigger harder . . .
There was a strong kick in his shoulder, a shot rang out, and in the mountains the ech
o answered: ka-bang!
Von Koren, too, cocked his pistol and glanced in the direction of Ustimovich, who was pacing as before, his hands thrust behind him, paying no attention to anything.
‘‘Doctor,’’ said the zoologist, ‘‘kindly do not walk like a pendulum. You flash in my eyes.’’
The doctor stopped. Von Koren started aiming at Laevsky.
‘‘It’s all over!’’ thought Laevsky.
The barrel of the pistol pointing straight at his face, the expression of hatred and contempt in the pose and the whole figure of von Koren, and this murder that a decent man was about to commit in broad daylight in the presence of decent people, and this silence, and the unknown force that made Laevsky stand there and not run away—how mysterious, and incomprehensible, and frightening it all was! The time von Koren took to aim seemed longer than a night to Laevsky. He glanced imploringly at the seconds; they did not move and were pale.
‘‘Shoot quickly!’’ thought Laevsky, and felt that his pale, quivering, pitiful face must arouse still greater hatred in von Koren.
‘‘Now I’ll kill him,’’ thought von Koren, aiming at the forehead and already feeling the trigger with his finger. ‘‘Yes, of course, I’ll kill him . . .’’
‘‘He’ll kill him!’’ a desperate cry was suddenly heard somewhere very nearby.
Just then the shot rang out. Seeing that Laevsky was standing in the same place and did not fall, everyone looked in the direction the cry had come from, and saw the deacon. Pale, his wet hair stuck to his forehead and cheeks, all wet and dirty, he was standing on the other bank in the corn, smiling somehow strangely and waving his wet hat. Sheshkovsky laughed with joy, burst into tears, and walked away...
XX
A LITTLE LATER, von Koren and the deacon came together at the little bridge. The deacon was agitated, breathed heavily, and avoided looking him in the eye. He was ashamed both of his fear and of his dirty, wet clothes.
The Complete Short Novels Page 25