Petersburg (Penguin Classics)

by Bely, Andrei

  An extremely fat man (a Spaniard from Granada) adhered to Sofya Petrovna; she stepped to the side, and the fat man (a Spaniard from Granada) did likewise; for a single moment he was squeezed against her in the crowd, and she fancied that his hands began to rustle over her skirt.

  ‘You are not a barynya: you are a dushkanchik.’

  ‘Lippanchenko!’ And she struck him with her fan.

  ‘Lippanchenko! Now explain to me …’

  But Lippanchenko interrupted her:

  ‘You should know better, madam; do not play at being naïve.’

  And Lippanchenko, adhering to her skirt, squeezed right up close against her: and she began to flounder, striving to tear herself free of him; but the crowd pressed them even closer; what was he doing, this Lippanchenko? Ah, why he was indecent.

  ‘Lippanchenko, you’re not allowed to do that.’

  But he laughed greasily:

  ‘But I saw you delivering …’

  ‘You mustn’t say a word about that.’

  But he laughed greasily:

  ‘Very well, very well! And now come with me into this wonderful night …’

  ‘Lippanchenko! You’re an insolent fellow …’

  She tore herself free of Lippanchenko.

  Clicking his castanets in pursuit of her did the Spaniard from Granada go, performing some kind of passionate Spanish pas.

  Well, but what if the letter was not a joke: what if … if he were doomed. No, no, no! Such horrors do not exist; and neither do the kind of wild beasts that could force an insane son to raise his hand against his father. All that was simply the jokes of his companions. She was stupid – all that had happened was that she had obviously been frightened by the joke of his friends. And as for him, as for him: he too had been frightened by the joke of his friends; why, he was just a little coward: had run away from her there, too (there, by the Winter Canal); she did not consider the Winter Canal as any old prosaic spot from which one could run at the whistle of a policeman …

  He had not behaved like Hermann: had slipped, fallen, showing the straps of his trousers from beneath the silk. And now: he had not laughed at the naïve joke of his revolutionary friends, and he had not recognized her as the one who had delivered the letter: had run through the ballroom, holding his mask in his hands and exposing his face to the laughter of cavaliers and ladies. No, let Sergei Sergeich Likhutin teach the insolent coward a lesson! Let Sergei Sergeich Likhutin challenge the coward to a duel …

  The second lieutenant! … Sergei Sergeich Likhutin! … second lieutenant Likhutin had, ever since yesterday evening, been behaving in a most indecent manner: had been snorting something into his moustache and clenching his fist; had the temerity to come into her bedroom with an explanation in nothing but his long johns; and had then had the effrontery to pace about on the other side of the wall until it was morning.

  Dimly she pictured yesterday’s mad shouts, bloodshot eyes and fist falling on the table: had Sergei Sergeich gone insane? He had long been an object of suspicion to her: the silence of all these three last months was suspicious; these times when he went running off to work were suspicious. Oh, she was lonely, the poor thing: now she needed his firm support; she wanted her husband, second lieutenant Likhutin, to hug her like a child and carry her in his arms …

  Instead of that the Spaniard from Granada again leapt up and whispered in her ear:

  ‘Eh, eh, eh? Won’t you come riding? …’

  Where was Sergei Sergeich now, why was he not at her side; she somehow felt afraid of going back as before to her little flat on the Moika, where, like a wild beast in its lair, her rebellious husband lay feverishly abed.

  And she stamped her little heels:

  ‘I’ll show him!’

  And again:

  ‘I’ll teach him a lesson!’

  And the Spaniard from Granada flew away from her in confusion.

  Sofya Petrovna shuddered as she remembered the grimace with which Sergei Sergeich had handed her cloak, pointing to the exit. How he had stood behind her shoulders there! How contemptuously she had laughed then and, raising her panniered skirt slightly by its festoons, had sailed smoothly away from him amidst curtsies (why had she not curtsied to Nikolai Apollonovich when she had given him the letter – curtsies had been coming to her)! How she had spoken in the doorway, how she had thumbed her nose at the officer, with a sly smile! Yet the only thing was: she was afraid to return home.

  And she stamped her little heels in vexation.

  ‘I’ll show him!’

  And again:

  ‘I’ll teach him a lesson!’

  Yet still she was afraid to go back.

  She was even more afraid of staying here; nearly everyone had now dispersed: the young people and the maskers had dispersed; with a bewildered air the good-natured host was going up now to this person, now to another with a little anecdote; finally he cast a forlorn glance round the emptying ballroom, cast a forlorn glance at the crowd of buffoons and harlequins, openly advising them with his gaze to spare the glittering room any further jollity.

  But the harlequins, swarming together into a gaudy little flock, were behaving in a most indecent fashion. One brazen fellow stepped forth from their midst, began to dance and sing:

  The von Sulitzes have gone,

  Ableukhov too we lack …

  The prospects, harbour and the streets

  are full of rumours black! …

  Filled to the top with treachery,

  the senator you praise …

  But there’s no law of emergency,

  No law at all these days!

  He is a patriotic dog –

  with medals tight he’s packed;

  But anyone can now commit

  A terroristic act.

  Nikolai Petrovich Tsukatov perceived in the twinkling of an eye how the decency of his merry house was violated by the venomous little poem. Nikolai Petrovich Tsukatov flushed deeply, looked at the cheeky harlequin in a most good-natured manner, turned his back and walked away from the door.

  The White Domino

  Now it was time to leave. Most of the guests had already dispersed: Sofya Petrovna Likhutina was loitering solitarily about the emptying rooms; only the Spaniard from Granada clicked in response to her agitation his resonant castanets. There in the empty enfilade she unexpectedly saw a solitary, white domino; the white domino seemed to emerge at once from nowhere, and – now, look:

  someone sad and tall, whom she thought she had seen a large number of times, quite recently, today – someone sad and tall, entirely swathed in white satin, was coming towards her through the emptying rooms; from behind the slits of his mask the bright light of his eyes was looking at her; it seemed to her that the light had begun to stream so sadly from his forehead, from his stiffening fingers …

  Sofya Petrovna trustingly called out to the domino’s dear possessor:

  ‘Sergei Sergeyevich! … Oh, Sergei Sergeyevich! …’

  Yes, there could be no doubt: it was Sergei Sergeich Likhutin; he had repented of yesterday’s scandal; he had come for her – to take her away.

  Sofya Petrovna again called out to the domino’s dear possessor – sad and tall:

  ‘It is you, isn’t it? … It’s you?’

  But the tall, sad domino shook his head, put a finger to his lips and told her to be silent.

  Trustingly she held out her hand to the white domino: how the satin gleamed, how cool the satin was! And her azure little hand began to rustle, having touched this white arm, and hung helplessly on it (the arm of the domino’s possessor proved to be hard as wood); for a moment above her little head a radiant mask inclined, displaying from beneath the white lace a handful of beard, like a sheaf of ripe grain.20

  Never had she seen Sergei Sergeyevich in this dazzling guise before; and she whispered:

  ‘Have you forgiven me?’

  From behind the mask a sigh responded to her.

  ‘Shall we make it up now?’

&nb
sp; But the tall, sad figure slowly shook its head.

  ‘Is it … you, Sergei Sergeyevich?’

  But the tall, sad figure slowly shook its head.

  Now they were going through into the vestibule: the inexpressible surrounded them, the inexpressible stood all around. Sofya Petrovna Likhutina, taking off her little black mask, buried her face in her caressing furs, but the tall, sad figure, who had put on his coat, did not take off his mask. With amazement Sofya Petrovna looked at the tall, sad figure: was surprised that he had not been handed an officer’s jacket; instead of that jacket he put on a torn little coat, from which his elongated hands peeped somehow strangely, reminding her of lilies. With the whole of herself she rushed towards him amidst the astonished lackeys, who were watching the spectacle; the inexpressible surrounded them, the inexpressible stood all around.

  But the tall, sad figure in the lighted doorway slowly shook its head and told her to be silent.

  Since evening the sky had become a continuous, dirty slush; since nightfall the continuous, dirty slush had descended to earth; fog had descended to earth, becoming for a time a blackish gloom, through which the reddish blotches of the streetlights horribly emerged. Sofya Petrovna Likhutina saw how above a reddish blotch, hunched, the caryatid of the entrance porch fell, and how it hung; how in the blotch a piece of the little house next door with bay windows and small carved wooden sculptures protruded. The tall outline of her unknown companion loomed before her. And she whispered to him imploringly:

  ‘I’d like a cab!’

  The tall outline of her unknown companion with the flaxen-white beard, who had lowered his red-stained little peaked cap on to his mask, waved his arm into the fog:

  ‘Cab!’

  Sofya Petrovna Likhutina understood everything now: the sad outline had a beautiful, caressing voice –

  – a voice she had heard a large number of times, had heard quite recently, last night: yes, last night in a dream; but she had forgotten it, as she had forgotten altogether the dream of the night that had passed – …

  He had a beautiful, caressing voice, but … – there could be no doubt, his voice was not Sergei Sergeyevich’s. And yet she hoped, and yet she wished that this (so she wished) beautiful and caressing but alien person was her husband. But her husband had not come for her, had not led her out of hell: a stranger had led her out of hell.

  Who could he be?

  The unknown outline raised its voice several times: its voice grew stronger, stronger and stronger, and it seemed that behind the mask, too, someone was growing stronger, immensely huge. The silence merely threw itself upon the voice; on the other side of someone else’s gate a dog responded. A street ran off that way.

  ‘Well then, who are you?’

  ‘You all deny me: I look after you all. You deny me, and then you call on me …’

  At this point Sofya Petrovna Likhutina realized for an instant what was standing before her: tears constricted her throat; she wanted to fall at these slender feet and suddenly entwine the unknown figure’s slender knees in her arms, but at that moment a carriage began prosaically to clatter and a sleepy, round-shouldered Vanka21 moved forward into the street lamp’s bright light. The wondrous outline helped her into the carriage, but when she stretched forth her trembling arms to it beseechingly from the carriage, the outline slowly put a finger to its lips and told her to be silent.

  But the carriage had already moved off: if only it had stopped and, oh, if only it had turned back – turned back to that bright place where for an instant before her the tall, sad figure had stood and where he was no longer, since from there now only the yellow eye of the street lamp gleamed on the flagstones.

  She Forgot What Had Happened

  Sofya Petrovna forgot what had happened. Her future sank away into the blackish night. The irremediable came crawling towards her; the irremediable embraced her; and at this point receded: house, flat and husband. And she did not know where the cab driver was taking her. Into the blackish-grey night behind her a piece of the recent past fell away: the masked ball, the harlequins; and even (imagine!) – even the tall, sad figure. She did not know where the cab driver was taking her away from.

  After the piece of the recent past, the whole of that day fell away, too: the scrape she had got into with her husband and the scrapes she had got into with Madame Farnois on account of ‘Maison Tricotons’. Scarcely had she moved on, seeking a support for her consciousness, than she wanted to summon up the impressions of yesterday, – and yesterday also fell away, like a piece of an enormous road that was paved with granite; it fell away and struck against some utterly dark bottom. And somewhere the impact resounded, shattering the stones.

  Before her fleeted the love of this unhappy summer; and the love of the unhappy summer, like everything else, fell away from her memory; and again an impact resounded, shattering the stones. Having fleeted past, they sank away: her springtime conversations with Nicolas Ableukhov; having fleeted past, they sank away: the years of her marriage, her wedding: some kind of void tore them off and devoured them, piece by piece. And she could hear the blow of the metal, shattering the stones. Her whole life fleeted past, and her whole life sank away, as though her life had never been, and as though she herself were a soul that had not been born into life. Some kind of void began directly behind her back (for everything was falling into it, striking against some bottom); the void extended into the ages, and in the ages all one could hear was impact upon impact; those were the pieces of her lives falling as they plunged towards some bottom. As though some metal horse, clopping resonantly on the stone, were trampling the past behind her back; as though there behind her back, clopping resonantly on the stone, a metal horseman was pursuing her.

  And when she turned round, she was presented with a spectacle: the outline of the Mighty Horseman … There – two equine nostrils penetrated the fog, flaming, like a white-hot column.

  Bronze-wreathed Death was overtaking her.

  At this point Sofya Petrovna came to her senses: overtaking the carriage, an orderly flew past, holding a torch into the fog. For an instant his heavy bronze helmet flashed by; and after him, rumbling, flaming, a fire brigade went hurtling into the fog.

  ‘What’s that over there – a fire?’ Sofya Petrovna asked, turning to the cab driver.

  ‘It seems to be: they were saying the islands are on fire.’

  The cab driver announced this to her out of the fog: the carriage stood outside her entrance porch on the Moika.

  Sofya Petrovna remembered everything: everything came floating out before her with a horribly prosaic quality; as though this hell, these dancing maskers and the Horseman had not existed. Now the maskers seemed to her mere pranksters, who were probably acquaintances who visited their house, too; and the tall, sad figure – he was probably one of the comrades (she thanked him for seeing her to her cab). Only now Sofya Petrovna bit her plump little lip in vexation: how could she have made a mistake and mixed up an acquaintance with her husband? And whispered into his ears confessions about some quite nonsensical guilt? Why, now the unknown acquaintance (and she thanked him for seeing her to her cab) would tell everyone utter rubbish, saying she was afraid of her husband. And gossip would start going round the town … Oh, Sergei Sergeich Likhutin: soon you will recompense me for this unnecessary disgrace!

  She struck the entrance-porch door with her little foot in indignation; in indignation the entrance-porch door banged behind her lowered little head. Darkness engulfed her, for a moment the inexpressible seized hold of her (thus it is, probably, in the first instant after death); but Sofya Petrovna Likhutina was not thinking about death at all: on the contrary – she was thinking about something very simple. She was thinking about how in a moment she was going to tell Mavrushka to get the samovar ready for her; while the samovar was being got ready she would nag and lecture her husband (she was, after all, able to nag for more than four hours at a stretch); and when Mavrushka brought her the samovar, she and her husband wo
uld have a reconciliation.

  Now Sofya Petrovna Likhutina rang the doorbell. The loud ringing informed the nocturnal flat of her return. In a moment or two she would hear Mavrushka’s hurried step near the vestibule. But the hurried step was not heard. Sofya Petrovna felt offended, and rang again.

  Mavrushka was evidently asleep: she had only to go out of the house, and that silly woman fell on her bed … But her husband, Sergei Sergeich, was a fine one, too: he had, of course, been waiting for her with impatience for more than hour or two; and, of course, he had heard the doorbell, and had, of course, realized that the maid had fallen asleep. And – he didn’t budge! Oh! Tell me, if you please! He was still offended!

  Well, then let him do without tea and reconciliation! …

  Sofya Petrovna began to ring the doorbell again: the doorbell tinkled – again and again … No one, nothing! And she lowered her little head right down to the keyhole; and when she lowered her little head right down to the keyhole, then on the other side of the keyhole, just an inch or so away from her ear, she plainly heard: someone jerkily, heavily and noisily breathing through their nose, and the striking of a match. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, who could be breathing like that in there? And Sofya Petrovna stepped back from the door in amazement, having stretched forth her little head.

  Was it Mavrushka? No, it was not Mavrushka … Was it Sergei Sergeich Likhutin? Yes, it was he. But why was he so silent in there, why did he not open the door, why had he put his head to the keyhole, breathing so jerkily?

  In anticipation of something unpleasant, Sofya Petrovna began to hammer desperately at the prickly felt of the door. In anticipation of something unpleasant Sofya Petrovna exclaimed:

  ‘Open up, I say!’

  But whoever it was went on standing behind the door, saying nothing and breathing so frightenedly, so horribly jerkily.