Poor Folk Anthology

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

  * In the poorer quarters of Russian towns a single room is often let out to several families, each of which occupies a "corner."

  "at that time, from eccentricity. I'm only talking of that period, Varvara Petrovna; as for 'eccentricity,' that's his own expression. He does not conceal much from me. Mile. Lebyadkin, who was thrown in the way of meeting Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch very often, at one time, was fascinated by his appearance. He was, so to say, a diamond set in the dirty background of her life. I am a poor hand at describing feelings, so I'll pass them over; but some of that dirty lot took to jeering at her once, and it made her sad. They always had laughed at her, but she did not seem to notice it before. She wasn't quite right in her head even then, but very different from what she is now. There's reason to believe that in her childhood she received something like an education through the kindness of a benevolent lady. Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch had never taken the slightest notice of her. He used to spend his time chiefly in playing preference with a greasy old pack of cards for stakes of a quarter-farthing with clerks. But once, when she was being ill-treated, he went up (without inquiring into the cause) and seized one of the clerks by the collar and flung him out of a second-floor window. It was not a case of chivalrous indignation at the sight of injured innocence; the whole operation took place in the midst of roars of laughter, and the one who laughed loudest was Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch himself. As it all ended without harm, they were reconciled and began drinking punch. But the injured innocent herself did not forget it. Of course it ended in her becoming completely crazy. I repeat I'm a poor hand at describing feelings. But a delusion was the chief feature in this case. And Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch aggravated that delusion as though he did it on purpose. Instead of laughing at her he began all at once treating Mile. Lebyadkin with sudden respect. Kirillov, who was there (a very original man, Varvara Petrovna, and very abrupt, you'll see him perhaps one day, for he's here now), well, this Kirillov who, as a rule, is perfectly silent, suddenly got hot, and said to Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch, I remember, that he treated the girl as though she were a marquise, and that that was doing for her altogether. I must add that Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch had rather a respect for this Kirillov. What do you suppose was the answer he gave him: 'You imagine, Mr. Kirillov, that I am laughing at her. Get rid of that idea, I really do respect her, for she's better than any of us.' And, do you know, he said it in such a serious tone. Meanwhile, he hadn't really said a word to her for two or three months, except 'good morning' and 'good-bye.' I remember, for I was there, that she came at last to the point of looking on him almost as her betrothed who dared not 'elope with her,' simply because he had many enemies and family difficulties, or something of the sort. There was a great deal of laughter about it. It ended in Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch's making provision for her when he had to come here, and I believe he arranged to pay a considerable sum, three hundred roubles a year, if not more, as a pension for her. In short it was "all a caprice, a fancy of a man prematurely weary on his side, perhaps it may even have been, as Kirillov says, a new experiment of a blase man, with the object of finding out what you can bring a crazy cripple to." (You picked out on purpose, he said, the lowest creature, a cripple, for ever covered with disgrace and blows, knowing, too, that this creature was dying of comic love for you, and set to work to mystify her completely on purpose, simply to see what would come of it.) "Though, how is a man so particularly to blame for the fancies of a crazy woman, to whom he had hardly uttered two sentences the whole time. There are things, Varvara Petrovna, of which it is not only impossible to speak sensibly, but it's even nonsensical to begin speaking of them at all. Well, eccentricity then, let it stand at that. Anyway, there's nothing worse to be said than that; and yet now they've made this scandal out of it… . I am to some extent aware, Varvara Petrovna, of what is happening here."

  The speaker suddenly broke off and was turning to Lebyadkin. But Varvara Petrovna checked him. She was in a state of extreme exaltation.

  "Have you finished?" she asked.

  "Not yet; to complete my story I should have to ask this gentleman one or two questions if you'll allow me … you'll see the point in a minute, Varvara Petrovna."

  "Enough, afterwards, leave it for the moment I beg you. Oh, I was quite right to let you speak!"

  "And note this, Varvara Petrovna," Pyotr Stepanovitch said hastily. "Could Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch have explained all this just now in answer to your question, which was perhaps too peremptory?"

  "Oh, yes, it was."

  "And wasn't I right in saying that in some cases it's much easier for a third person to explain things than for the person interested?"

  "Yes, yes … but in one thing you were mistaken, and, I see with regret, are still mistaken."

  "Really, what's that?"

  "You see… . But won't you sit down, Pyotr Stepanovitch?"

  "Oh, as you please. I am tired indeed. Thank you." He instantly moved up an easy chair and turned it so that he had Varvara Petrovna on one side and Praskovya Ivanovna at the table on the other, while he faced Lebyadkin, from whom he did not take his eyes for one minute.

  "You are mistaken in calling this eccentricity… ."

  "Oh, if it's only that… ."

  "No, no, no, wait a little," said Varvara Petrovna, who was obviously about to say a good deal and to speak with enthusiasm. As soon as Pyotr Stepanovitch noticed it, he was all attention.

  "No, it was something higher than eccentricity, and I assure you, something sacred even! A proud man who has suffered humiliation early in life and reached the stage of 'mockery' as you so subtly called itPrince Harry, in fact, to use the capital nickname Stepan Trofimovitch gave him then, which would have been perfectly correct if it were not that he is more like Hamlet, to my thinking at least."

  "Et vous avez raison," Stepan Trofimovitch pronounced, impressively and with feeling.

  "Thank you, Stepan Trofimovitch. I thank you particularly too for your unvarying faith in Nicolas, in the loftiness of his soul and of his destiny. That faith you have even strengthened in me when I was losing heart."

  "Chere, chere." Stepan Trofimovitch was stepping forward, when he checked himself, reflecting that it was dangerous to interrupt.

  "And if Nicolas had always had at his side" (Varvara Petrovna almost shouted) "a gentle Horatio, great in his humilityanother excellent expression of yours, Stepan Trofimovitch-he might long ago have been saved from the sad and 'sudden demon of irony,' which has tormented him all his life. (' The demon of irony' was a wonderful expression of yours again, Stepan Trofimovitch.) But Nicolas has never had an Horatio or an Ophelia. He had no one but his mother, and what can a mother do alone, and in such circumstances? Do you know, Pyotr Stepanovitch, it's perfectly comprehensible to me now that a being like Nicolas could be found even in such filthy haunts as you have described. I can so clearly picture now that 'mockery' of life. (A wonderfully subtle expression of yours!) That insatiable thirst of contrast, that gloomy background against which he stands out like a diamond, to use your comparison again, Pyotr Stepanovitch. And then he meets there a creature ill-treated by every one, crippled, half insane, and at the same time perhaps filled with noble feelings."

  "H'm… . Yes, perhaps."

  "And after that you don't understand that he's not laughing at her like every one. Oh, you people! You can't understand his defending her from insult, treating her with respect 'like a marquise' (this Kirillov must have an exceptionally deep understanding of men, though he didn't understand Nicolas). It was just this contrast, if you like, that led to the trouble. If the unhappy creature had been in different surroundings, perhaps she would never have been brought to entertain such a frantic delusion. Only a woman can understand it, Pyotr Stepanovitch, only a woman. How sorry I am that you … not that you're not a woman, but that you can't be one just for the moment so as to understand."

  "You mean in the sense that the worse things are the better it is. I understand, I understand, Varvara Petrovna. It's rather as it is in r
eligion; the harder life is for a man or the more crushed and poor the people are, the more obstinately they dream of compensation in heaven; and if a hundred thousand priests are at work at it too, inflaming their delusion, and speculating on it, then … I understand you, Varvara Petrovna, I assure you."

  "That's not quite it; but tell me, ought Nicolas to have laughed at her and have treated her as the other clerks, in order to extinguish the delusion in this unhappy organism." (Why Varvara Petrovna used the word organism I couldn't understand.) "Can you really refuse to recognise the lofty compassion, the noble tremor of the whole organism with which Nicolas answered Kirillov: 'I do not laugh at her.' A noble, sacred answer!"

  "Sublime," muttered Stepan Trofimovitch.

  "And observe, too, that he is by no means so rich as you suppose. The money is mine and not his, and he would take next to nothing from me then."

  "I understand, I understand all that, Varvara Petrovna," said Pyotr Stepanovitch, with a movement of some impatience.

  "Oh, it's my character! I recognise myself in Nicolas. I recognise that youthfulness, that liability to violent, tempestuous impulses. And if we ever come to be friends, Pyotr Stepanovitch, and, for my part, I sincerely hope we may, especially as I am so deeply indebted to you, then, perhaps you'll understand… ."

  "Oh, I assure you, I hope for it too," Pyotr Stepanovitch muttered jerkily.

  "You'll understand then the impulse which leads one in the blindness of generous feeling to take up a man who is unworthy of one in every respect, a man who utterly fails to understand one, who is ready to torture one at every opportunity and, in contradiction to everything, to exalt such a man into a sort of ideal, into a dream. To concentrate in him all one's hopes, to bow down before him; to love him all one's life, absolutely without knowing whyperhaps just because he was unworthy of it… . Oh, how I've suffered all my life, Pyotr Stepanovitch!"

  Stepan Trofimovitch, with a look of suffering on his face, began trying to catch my eye, but I turned away in time.

  "… And only lately, only latelyoh, how unjust I've been to Nicolas! … You would not believe how they have been worrying me on all sides, all, all, enemies, and rascals, and friends, friends perhaps more than enemies. When the first contemptible anonymous letter was sent to me, Pyotr Stepanovitch, you'll hardly believe it, but I had not strength enough to treat all this wickedness with contempt… . I shall never, never forgive myself for my weakness."

  "I had heard something of anonymous letters here already," said Pyotr Stepanovitch, growing suddenly more lively, "and I'll find out the writers of them, you may be sure."

  "But you can't imagine the intrigues that have been got up here. They have even been pestering our poor Praskovya Ivanovna, and what reason can they have for worrying her? I was quite unfair to you to-day perhaps, my dear Praskovya Ivanovna," she added in a generous impulse of kindliness, though not without a certain triumphant irony.

  "Don't say any more, my dear," the other lady muttered reluctantly. "To my thinking we'd better make an end of all this; too much has been said."

  And again she looked timidly towards Liza, but the latter was looking at Pyotr Sterjanovitch.

  "And I intend now to adopt this poor unhappy creature, this insane woman who has lost everything and kept only her heart," Varvara Petrovna exclaimed suddenly. "It's a sacred duty I intend to carry out. I take her under my protection from this day."

  "And that will be a very good thing in one way," Pyotr Stepanovitch cried, growing quite eager again. "Excuse me, I did not finish just now. It's just the care of her I want to speak of. Would you believe it, that as soon as Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch had gone (I'm beginning from where I left off, Varvara Petrovna), this gentleman here, this Mr. Lebyadkin, instantly imagined he had the right to dispose of the whole pension that was provided for his sister. And he did dispose of it. I don't know exactly how it had been arranged by Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch at that time. But a year later, when he learned from abroad what had happened, he was obliged to make other arrangements. Again, I don't know the details; he'll tell you them himself. I only know that the interesting young person was placed somewhere in a remote nunnery, in very comfortable surroundings, but under friendly superintendenceyou understand? But what do you think Mr. Lebyadkin made up his mind to do I He exerted himself to the utmost, to begin with, to find where his source of income, that is his sister, was hidden. Only lately he attained his object, took her from the nunnery, asserting some claim to her, and brought her straight here. Here he doesn't feed her properly, beats her, and bullies her. As soon as by some means he gets a considerable sum from Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch, he does nothing but get drunk, and instead of gratitude ends by impudently defying Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch, making senseless demands, threatening him with proceedings if the pension is not paid straight into his hands. So he takes what is a voluntary gift from Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch as a taxcan you imagine it? Mr. Lebyadkin, is that all true that I have said just now?"

  The captain, who had till that moment stood in silence looking down, took two rapid steps forward and turned crimson.

  "Pyotr Stepanovitch, you've treated me cruelly," he brought out abruptly.

  "Why cruelly? How? But allow us to discuss the question of cruelty or gentleness later on. Now answer my first question; is it true all that I have said or not? If you consider it's false you are at liberty to give your own version at once."

  "I … you know yourself, Pyotr Stepanovitch," the captain muttered, but he could not go on and relapsed into silence. It must be observed that Pyotr Stepanovitch was sitting in an easy chair with one leg crossed over the other, while the captain stood before him in the most respectful attitude.

  Lebyadkin's hesitation seemed to annoy Pyotr Stepanovitch; a spasm of anger distorted his face.

  "Then you have a statement you want to make?" he said, looking subtly at the captain. "Kindly speak. We're waiting for you."

  "You know yourself Pyotr Stepanovitch, that I can't say anything."

  "No, I don't know it. It's the first time I've heard it. Why can't you speak?"

  The captain was silent, with his eyes on the ground.

  "Allow me to go, Pyotr Stepanovitch," he brought out resolutely.

  "No, not till you answer my question: is it all true that I've said?"

  "It is true," Lebyadkin brought out in a hollow voice, looking at his tormentor. Drops of perspiration stood out on his forehead.

  "Is it all true?"

  "It's all true."

  "Have you nothing to add or to observe? If you think that we've been unjust, say so; protest, state your grievance aloud."

  "No, I think nothing."

  "Did you threaten Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch lately?"

  "It was … it was more drink than anything, Pyotr Stepanovitch." He suddenly raised his head. "If family honour and undeserved disgrace cry out among men thenthen is a man to blame?" he roared suddenly, forgetting himself as before.

  "Are you sober now, Mr. Lebyadkin?"

  Pyotr Stepanovitch looked at him penetratingly.

  "I am … sober."

  "What do you mean by family honour and undeserved disgrace?"

  "I didn't mean anybody, anybody at all. I meant myself," the captain said, collapsing again.

  "You seem to be very much offended by what I've said about you and your conduct? You are very irritable, Mr. Lebyadkin. But let me tell you I've hardly begun yet what I've got to say about your conduct, in its real sense. I'll begin to discuss your conduct in its real sense. I shall begin, that may very well happen, but so far I've not begun, in a real sense."

  Lebyadkin started and stared wildly at Pyotr Stepanovitch.

  "Pyotr Stepanovitch, I am just beginning to wake up."

  "H'm! And it's I who have waked you up?"

  "Yes, it's you who have waked me, Pyotr Stepanovitch; and I've been asleep for the last four years with a storm-cloud hanging over me. May I withdraw at last, Pyotr Stepanovitch?"

  "Now you may, unless Varvara
Petrovna thinks it necessary … "

  But the latter dismissed him with a wave of her hand.

  The captain bowed, took two steps towards the door, stopped suddenly, laid his hand on his heart, tried to say something, did not say it, and was moving quickly away. But in the doorway he came face to face with Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch; the latter stood aside. The captain shrank into himself, as it were, before him, and stood as though frozen to the spot, his eyes fixed upon him like a rabbit before a boa-constrictor. After a little pause Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch waved him aside with a slight motion of his hand, and walked into the drawing-room.

  He was cheerful and serene. Perhaps something very pleasant had happened to him, of which we knew nothing as yet; but he seemed particularly contented.

  "Do you forgive me, Nicolas?" Varvara Petrovna hastened to say, and got up suddenly to meet him.

  But Nicolas positively laughed.

  "Just as I thought," he said, good-humouredly and jestingly. "I see you know all about it already. When I had gone from here I reflected in the carriage that I ought at least to have told you the story instead of going off like that. But when I remembered that Pyotr Stepanovitch was still here, I thought no more of it."