“Most Esteemed Ardalyon Borisych! My husband went off to the club and now I am free of his barbarity until one a.m. Be so kind as to come as quickly as possible to render me assistance in dealing with my criminal son. I realize that he must be rid of his vices while he’s still young, whereas afterwards it will be too late.
With sincere respect, Yuliya Gudaevskaya. P.S. Please come quickly, otherwise Antosha will go to bed and he’ll have to be awakened.”
Peredonov dressed in haste, wrapped his neck up with his scarf and set out.
“Ardalyon Borisych, where are you off to for the night?” Varvara asked.
“On business,” Peredonov replied sullenly, hurrying off.
Varvara had the melancholy thought that once again she wouldn’t get much sleep. If only she could get him to marry her as soon as possible! Then she could sleep day and night—now that would be bliss!
Out on the street Peredonov was overcome with doubt. What if it were a trap? And suddenly it turns out that Gudaevsky is at home and they grab him and start to beat him? Wasn’t it better to turn back?
“No, I have to go to their house and I’ll see how things are there.”
Night, quiet, cool and dark, had set in from all sides and forced him to slow his steps. A fresh breeze was blowing from the distant fields. Gentle rustling sounds and noises came from the grass along the fences and all around everything seemed suspicious and strange. Perhaps someone was lurking behind him on his trail. All things were strangely and surprisingly concealed behind the darkness as though a different nocturnal life, that was incomprehensible and hostile to man, had awakened in them. Peredonov walked softly along the streets and muttered:
“You’re wasting your time following me. I’m not going to do anything bad. Brother, I’m only concerned about the good of my work. Really.”
Finally he arrived at the dwelling of the Gudaevskys. There was only light to be seen in one window facing the street, the other four were dark. Peredonov went up on the porch just as quietly as he could, stood for a while, pressed his ear to the door and listened—everything was quiet. He gently tugged the bronze handle of the bell. A weak reverberating sound echoed somewhere far off. But however weak it was, it frightened Peredonov as though all the hostile forces ought to be awakened after the bell and hasten to these doors. Peredonov quickly ran off the porch and cowered against the wall, hiding behind a column.
A few brief moments passed. Peredonov’s heart went faint and then started to pound heavily.
Light steps were heard, the sound of a door being opened—and Yuliya peered out on the street, her black passionate eyes flashing.
“Who’s there?” she asked in a loud whisper.
Peredonov moved slightly away from the wall and peering up into the narrow opening of the door where it was dark and quiet, he asked in a whisper as well—and his voice was trembling:
“Has Nikolai Mikhailovich gone?”
“He’s gone, he’s gone,” Yuliya whispered joyfully and nodded.
Looking timidly around, Peredonpv followed her into the dark entry way.
“Excuse me,” Yuliya said. “I don’t have a light, otherwise someone might see and gossip.”
She proceeded Peredonov up the staircase and into a corridor where a small lamp hung, casting a murky light on the top steps. Yuliya was laughing softly and joyfully and her ribbons were trembling convulsively from the laughter.
“He’s gone,” she whispered joyfully, looking around and giving Peredonov the once-over with her passionately burning eyes. “I was almost afraid that he would stay at home today because he had put up such a fierce struggle. But he couldn’t get by without playing cards. I sent the servant away. Only Liza’s nurse is left. We don’t want to be disturbed. You know the kind of people there are today.”
Heat emanated from Yuliya and she was all hot and dry like a piece of kindling. At times she would grab Peredonov by the sleeve and it was as though these quick dry touches made quick dry fires run up and down his entire body. As quietly as could be, on tip-toe, they walked along the corridor past several closed doors and stopped by the last one—the door into the nursery …10
Peredonov left Yuliya at midnight when she was beginning to expect her husband to return soon. He walked along the dark streets, sullen and gloomy. It seemed to him that someone was still standing near the house and was following him now. He muttered:
“I went on official business. I’m not guilty. She wanted to do it herself. You won’t pull one on me, you’ve got the wrong person.”
Varvara still wasn’t asleep when he returned. The cards were spread out in front of her.
It seemed to Peredonov that someone might have snuck in when he entered. Perhaps Varvara herself had let the enemy in. Peredonov said:
“I want to go to bed and you’re casting spells conjuring with your cards. Give me the cards here, otherwise you’ll be casting a spell on me.”
He took the cards away and hid them under his pillow. Varvara smirked and said:
“You and your tomfoolery. I don’t know how to cast spells. As though I needed it.”
It annoyed him and frightened him that she was smirking: he thought it meant that she could do it without cards. Then the cat squeezed under the bed and flashed its green eyes—one could cast spells on its fur by rubbing it the wrong way to make sparks leap up. And there was the gray nedotykomka flitting under the commode again—maybe it was Varvara summoning it at nights with a soft whistle resembling a snore? Peredonov had a foul and terrible dream.
Pylnikov had come, stood in the doorway, beckoned to him and smiled. It was as though someone were drawing Peredonov on and Pylnikov led him through the dark, filthy streets while the cat ran alongside with shining green pupils …11
XIX
THE ECCENTRICITIES IN Peredonov’s behavior worried Khripach more and more from day to day. He consulted with the gymnasium doctor to see whether Peredonov had gone crazy. With a laugh the doctor replied that nothing would make Peredonov crazy but that he was simply acting foolishly out of stupidity. Complaints came as well. First was Adamenko who sent the director her brother’s workbook in which he had received a grade of one for work that was well done.
During one of the recesses the director invited Peredonov into his study.
“He really does look like a madman,” Khripach thought when he caught sight of the traces of perturbation and terror in the dull gloomy face of Peredonov.
“I have a complaint to make against you,” Khripach began in his dry rapid speech. “Every time I have to give a lesson next to you, my head literally splits—there’s such laughter coming out of your class. Could I ask you not to give lessons that are so humorous in content? ‘Joking, always joking. When will you ever stop?’”*.
“I’m not to blame,” Peredonov said angrily. “They laugh by themselves. And it’s impossible to go on talking about orthography and the satires of Kantemir* * all the time. Sometimes you say something and they immediately start grinning. They’re badly disciplined. They need to be reined in.”
“It’s desirable and even essential that classroom work possess a serious character,” Khripach said. “And there’s something else.”
Khripach showed Peredonov two notebooks and said:
“Here are two notebooks in your subject, both are by students in the same class, Adamenko and my son. I have been obliged to compare them and I am forced to take the opinion that you do not have a sufficiently attentive attitude towards your work. The last piece of work by Adamenko, which was executed with complete satisfaction, was given the grade of one, whereas the work of my son, which was more poorly written, earned a four. Obviously you made a mistake: you gave the grade of one student to the other and vice versa. Although a person is bound to make mistakes, nevertheless I request you to forego similar mistakes. They provoke a well-grounded dissatisfaction in the parents and the students themselves.”
Peredonov muttered something indistinct.
With renewed vig
or he spitefully started to tease the young boys who had been recently punished because of his complaints.
He especially attacked Kramarenko. The latter was silent and grew pale beneath his dark suntan and his eyes were glittering.
Emerging from the gymnasium, Kramarenko was in no hurry to get home that day. He stood by the gates, and kept glancing at the entrance. When Peredonov came out, Kramarenko followed him at some distance, waiting for the rare passers-by to disappear.
Peredonov was walking slowly. The gloomy weather had induced a melancholy feeling in him. During recent days his face had assumed more and more of a dull expression. Either his gaze would be fixed on something far off, or it would wander strangely. It seemed as though he were constantly scrutinizing an object. This caused the objects to double before his eyes, freeze and then pulsate.
Whom was he trying to discover? Denouncers. They were hiding behind all objects, speaking in hushed whispers and laughing. His enemies were besieging Peredonov with an entire army of denouncers. Sometimes Peredonov tried to catch them unawares. But they always managed to flee in time, just as though the earth had swallowed them up …
Peredonov caught the sound of quick, bold steps along the wooden sidewalk behind him and he looked around in fear—Kramarenko was coming up abreast of him and was staring at him spitefully and resolutely with burning eyes, pale, slender, like a young savage ready to pounce on his enemy. That look frightened Peredonov.
“What if he suddenly bites me?” he thought.
He walked faster, but Kramarenko didn’t fall back. Peredonov stopped and said angrily:
“What are you hanging about for, you scruffy black imp! I’ll take you off to your father right this minute.”
Kramarenko also stopped and still went on staring at Peredonov. Now they were standing opposite each other on the rickety wooden sidewalk in the deserted street beside a gray fence that was indifferent to everything living. Trembling all over, Kramarenko said in a hissing voice:
“You scoundrel!”
He grinned and turned around to leave. He took about three steps, stopped, looked back and repeated more loudly:
“What a scoundrel! A foul reptile!”
He spat and set off. Peredonov sullenly watched him go and then headed home as well. Vague, fearful thoughts slowly filed through his mind.
Vershina hailed him. She was standing behind the fence of her garden by the gate, wrapped up in a large black kerchief and smoking. Peredonov did not recognize Vershina at once. In her figure he had the illusion of something ominous: a black witch standing there, emitting a spellbinding smoke and casting spells. He spat and uttered a counter-spell. Vershina laughed and asked:
“What’s the matter, Ardalyon Borisych?”
Peredonov looked at her dully and finally said:
“Oh, it’s you! I didn’t recognize you.”
“That’s a good sign. It means that I’m going to be rich soon,” Vershina said.
Peredonov didn’t like that. He felt like getting rich himself.
“Sure,” he said angrily. “What do you need to get rich for! You’ve got enough as it is.”
“I’m going to win two hundred thousand,” Vershina said with a crooked smile.
“No, I’m going to win the two hundred thousand,” Peredonov argued.
“I’ll win in one lottery and you’ll win in another one,” Vershina said.
“Well, you’re lying,” Peredonov said rudely. “It never happens that there are two winners in one town. I’m the one who’ll win.”
Vershina noticed that he was getting angry. She stopped arguing. She opened the gate and lured Peredonov, saying:
“What are we standing here for? Come in, please, Murin is here.”
Murin’s name had a pleasant association for him: food and drink. He went in.
In the sitting room which was somewhat dark because of the trees, sat Marta, with contented eyes and a red kerchief tied around her neck, Murin, more dishevelled than usual, seemingly pleased about something, and the grown-up gymnasium student, Vitkevich, who was courting Vershina, thinking that she was in love with him and dreaming of leaving the gymnasium, marrying Vershina and managing her estate.
Murin stood up to greet Pereddnov, who was entering the room, with exaggeratedly joyful exclamations. His face grew even sweeter, his little eyes turned oily—and none of it suited his hefty body with his tousled hair wherein pieces of straw were visible here and there.
“I’m cultivating my business,” he said in a loud and hoarse voice. “I have business everywhere, but my dear hostesses here decided to treat me to tea as well.”
“Business, sure,” Peredonov answered angrily. “What kind of business do you have! You don’t have official business, you just make money. I’m the one who has business.”
“Well, business is business—it’s all other people’s money,” Murin protested with a loud burst of laughter.
Vershina smiled crookedly and sat Peredonov down at the table. The round table in front of the divan was covered with glasses and cups of tea, rum, cloudberry jam, an open-work silver basket covered with a woven napkin and filled with sweet rolls and homemade almond spice cake.
Murin’s glass smelled strongly of rum, whereas Vitkevich had put a lot of jam on his glass plate which was in the shape of a crab. Marta was eating a sweet roll in small pieces with obvious pleasure. Vershina wanted to treat Peredonov as well, but he refused tea.
“They might have poisoned it,” he thought. “It’d be the easiest thing of all to poison it—you’d drink it and you wouldn’t notice it, there are sweet-tasting poisons, but once you got home you’d kick the bucket.”
He was annoyed over the thought of why they had put jam out for Murin, but when he had come they hadn’t bothered to bring a fresh jar with better jam. They had more than cloudberry jam because they made all sorts of jam.
As for Vershina, it was certain that she was chasing after Murin. Seeing that there wasn’t much hope for Peredonov, she was trying to round up other prospective husbands for Marta. Now she was luring Murin. This landowner, who had sunk to a semi-civilized state in his pursuit of profits that were not easily come by, was willingly going for the bait: he liked Marta.
Marta was happy. After all it had been her constant dream that a prospective husband would be found for her, she would get married and she would have a fine household and live in plenty. She looked at Murin with eyes of love. This forty-year-old, enormous man with a coarse voice and with an ingenuous expression seemed to her the very model of male strength, bravado, handsomeness and goodness.
Peredonov noted the loving looks which Murin and Marta were exchanging. He noted them because he was expecting admiration from Marta for himself. He said angrily to Murin:
“You’re sitting there just like a prospective husband, your whole phiz is glowing.”
“It’s because of happiness,” Murin said in a cheerful voice. “I’ve settled my business well here.”
He winked at the hostesses. They both smiled happily. Peredonov asked in an angry voice, screwing up his eyes scornfully:
“Have you found yourself a bride, or something? Are they giving much of a dowry?”
Murin spoke as though he hadn’t heard the questions:
“Natalya Afanasyevna, may God grant her everything nice, has just agreed to give lodgings to my Vanyushka. He’ll be living here as though in the bosom of Christ and my heart will rest in peace that he won’t be corrupted.”
“He’ll play pranks together with Vladya,” Peredonov said sullenly. “They’ll burn the house down.”
“He wouldn’t dare!” Murin cried resolutely. “You, my dear old Natalya Afanasyevna, need not worry about that. He’ll keep to the straight and narrow with you.”
In order to interrupt this conversation Vershina said with a crooked smile:
“I feel like something tart to eat.”
“Would you like some bilberries and apple? I’ll bring it,” Marta said, quickly getting up
.
“Yes, please bring some.”
Marta ran out of the room. Vershina didn’t even watch her go. She had grown so accustomed to calmly accepting Marta’s obliging ways as something to be expected. She sat calmly and deeply sunk into the divan, exhaled blue puffs of smoke and compared the men who were talking. Peredonov was angry and dispirited, Murin was cheerful and animated.
She liked Murin much more. He had a good-natured face whereas Peredonov didn’t even know how to smile. She liked everything about Murin: he was big, fat, attractive, spoke in a pleasant low voice and was very respectful towards her. There were even times when Vershina thought that maybe she ought to turn things around so that Murin proposed not to Marta but to her. But she always concluded her musings by magnanimously giving him to Marta.
“Everyone,” she thought to herself, “will be proposing to me once I have money and then I can choose whom I wish. Maybe I’ll take this youth,” she thought and fixed her gaze with a certain pleasure on the greenish, rude, but nevertheless attractive face of Vitkevich who was not saying much, eating a great deal and glancing at Vershina with an insolent smile all the while.
Marta brought the bilberries with apple in a clay bowl and started to relate what she had dreamt that night. She had been with friends at a wedding and was eating pineapple and bliny with honey when she found a hundred rouble note in one of the bliny. The money had been taken from her and she had wept. She had woken up in tears.
“You should have hid it on the sly so that no one would see,” Peredonov said angrily. “If you couldn’t hang on to the money in your dream, what kind of lady of the house are you!”
“There’s no point in feeling sorry about that money,” Vershina said. “That’s the least of what people see in their dreams.”
“But I felt so terribly sorry about the money,” Marta said naively. “A whole hundred roubles!”
Tears started to well up in her eyes and she gave a forced laugh so that she wouldn’t start to cry. Murin fussed in his pocket, exclaiming:
“Dear mother, Marta Stanislavovna, now don’t you go on feeling sorry, we’ll fix that right now!”
The Petty Demon Page 24