The Petty Demon

by Sologub, Fyodor

  Peredonov was certain that a knave was standing behind the door and that the knave had some kind of power and authority, something like a policeman: he could take him away to some terrible police station.

  Meanwhile the nedotykomka sat under the table. Peredonov was afraid to peer under the table or behind the door.

  The fidgety little boy-eights teased Peredonov. These were the changeling students at the gymnasium. They picked up their legs in a strange, lifeless motion, like the arms of a pair of dividers, only their feet were shaggy, with hooves. Instead of tails they had grown whipping rods. The young boys were brandishing them about with a whistling sound and they themselves were squealing with each swing. From under the table the nedotykomka was grunting while it chuckled at the antics of the eights. Peredonov thought spitefully that the nedotykomka wouldn’t dare try to reach any authority. “I expect it would never be admitted,” he thought with malice. “The lackeys would flay it with mops.”

  Finally Peredonov couldn’t put up with its spiteful, insolently shrill laughter any longer. He brought an axe from the kitchen and chopped up the table under which the nedotykomka was hiding. The nedotykomka gave a plaintive and spiteful squeak, dashed from under the table and rolled away. Peredonov shuddered. “It’ll bite,” he thought, shrieked and cowered. But the nedotykomka disappeared peacefully. But not for long …

  Sometimes Peredonov would take playing cards and with a ferocious expression on his face he would chop off the heads of the playing card figures with a pen knife. Particularly the queens. While beheading the kings he would look around to make sure that no one saw him and accused him of a political crime. But even these kinds of reprisals didn’t help for long. Guests came, fresh cards were brought and wicked spies would once more establish themselves in the new cards.

  By this time Peredonov had begun to consider himself a secret criminal. He imagined that he had been under police surveillance since his student years. For some reason he concluded that they too were following him. This terrified him and made him feel important at the same time.

  The wind was making the wallpaper stir. It whispered with a soft, ominous, rustling sound, and faint semi-shadows slithered over its colorful patterns. “A spy is hiding there, behind the wallpaper,” Peredonov thought. “The wicked people!” he thought with melancholy. “It’s not for nothing that they put up the wallpaper so unevenly and so badly that a villain, resourceful, flat and patient, could crawl behind it and hide there. After all there were similar examples of that even earlier.”

  Vague recollections stirred in his head. Someone had hidden behind the wallpaper, someone had been stabbed either with a dagger or an awl. Peredonov bought an awl. When he returned home, the wallpaper started to stir fitfully and anxiously—the spy sensed danger and perhaps wanted to crawl somewhere farther off. The gloom leapt about and sprang to the ceiling. From there it threatened and made faces.

  Malice welled up in Peredonov. He swiftly plunged the awl into the wallpaper. A convulsion ran over the wall. Peredonov howled in victory and started to dance, flourishing the awl. Varvara came in.

  “What are you doing dancing alone, Ardalyon Borisych?” she asked, dully and insolently, with her usual smirk.

  “I killed a bedbug,” Peredonov explained sullenly.

  His eyes were glittering with savage victory. Only one thing was bad: it smelled vilely. The stabbed spy behind the wallpaper was rotting and reeking. Peredonov was shaken by terror and triumph: he had killed an enemy! The performance of this murder had hardened his heart completely. There was no actual murder committed, but for Peredonov it was the same as committing a murder. The insane terror inside him had fashioned a willingness to commit crime. His depraved will was being oppressed by this state of primitive malevolence, by the depressing urge for murder, by the dark notion of some future murder lurking in the nethermost regions of his spiritual being. Though still constrained—many generations had settled over the ancient Cain—it found satisfaction for itself in the fact that he broke and spoiled things, chopped things with an axe, cut and hacked down trees in the garden so that spies couldn’t peek out from behind them. And in the destruction of things the ancient demon established itself, the spirit of prehistoric confusion, decrepit chaos, while the savage eyes of an insane man reflected the terror which resembled the terrors of monstrous torments on the periphery of death.

  The same illusions repeated themselves ceaselessly and tormented him. Varvara, amusing herself at Peredonov’s expense, sometimes crept up stealthily to the doors of the room where Peredonov was sitting and from there she would speak in strange voices. He was terrified and he would quietly approach so as to catch the enemy—and he’d find Varvara.

  “Who are you talking to in whispers here?” he asked with melancholy.

  Varvara would smirk and reply:

  “You’re only imagining it, Ardalyon Borisych.”

  “I’m not imagining everything,” Peredonov mumbled. “There is some truth in the world.”

  Yes, Peredonov was striving for the truth after all, according to the general law of every conscious life and he was oppressed by that striving. He himself was not conscious of the fact that like all people he was striving for the truth, and for that reason his anxiety was obscure. He couldn’t find the truth for himself and became muddled and was perishing.

  His acquaintances had by now begun to tease Peredonov over the deception. With the rudeness towards the weak that was customary in our town, they talked about the deception in his presence. Prepolovenskaya would ask with a sly little grin:

  “Really now, Ardalyon Borisych, why aren’t you off to your inspector’s post?”

  Varvara would answer Prepolovenskaya on Peredonov’s behalf with restrained malice:

  “As soon as we get the document, then we’ll go.”

  These questions made Peredonov feel melancholy.

  “How can I live if they don’t give me the post?” he thought.

  He kept devising fresh plans of defense against his enemies. He stole the axe from the kitchen and hid it under the bed. He bought a Swedish knife and always carried it around in his pocket. He was constantly locking himself up. He set out traps for the night around the house and inside in the rooms. Afterwards he would look them over. Of course, these traps were set in such a fashion that no one could have been caught in them. They might pinch, but they wouldn’t hold, and it was possible to get out of them. Peredonov had no technical knowledge and no keen wit. Every morning when he saw that no one had fallen into the traps, Peredonov thought that his enemies had spoiled the traps. That frightened him again.

  Peredonov paid particular attention to Volodin. From time to time he would go to Volodin’s place when he knew that Volodin wasn’t at home, and he would rummage around to see whether he had seized any papers.

  Peredonov began to suspect that what the Princess wanted was for him to love her again. She was repulsive to him, a decrepit woman. “After all, she’s a hundred and fifty,” he thought spitefully. “She may be old,” he thought, “but what a powerful woman she is for all that.” And revulsion became intermingled with fascination. Peredonov imagined that she would be barely lukewarm and would smell like a corpse, and he almost fainted from a savage lust.

  “Perhaps I could get intimate with her and she would take pity. Should I write her a letter?”

  This time Peredonov composed a letter to the Princess without giving it much thought. He wrote:

  “I love you because you are cold and distant. Varvara sweats, it’s hot sleeping with her, she throws off heat like a stove. I want to have a lover who is cold and distant. Come and be responsive to me.”

  He finished writing it, sent it off—and regretted it. “What if something comes of it? Maybe I shouldn’t have written,” he thought. “I ought to have waited until the Princess herself came.”

  So this letter was produced haphazardly, the way Peredonov did many things haphazardly. He was like a corpse activated by external forces and it was
as though these forces had no desire to spend much time with him. One of them would play with him for a while and then toss him to another.

  The nedotykomka soon reappeared. For a long while it rolled around Peredonov as though it were on a lasso and kept teasing him all the while. Now it made no sound and its laughter was expressed only in the trembling of its entire body. But it would flare up in murky gold sparks, wicked and shameless. It threatened and burned with unbearable triumph. The cat, too, was threatening Peredonov, flashing its eyes and miaowing brazenly and threateningly.

  “What are they rejoicing at?” Peredonov thought mournfully and suddenly understood that the end was approaching, that the Princess was already there, close by, quite close by. Perhaps right in that deck of cards.

  Yes, no doubt she was the queen of spades or hearts. Perhaps she was hiding in a different deck or behind other cards, but just which one he couldn’t tell. The trouble was that Peredonov had never seen her. It wasn’t worthwhile asking Varvara—she’d lie.

  Finally Peredonov came up with the idea of burning the entire deck of cards. Let them all burn. If people were creeping into his cards to spite him, then they themselves were to blame.

  Peredonov bided his time until Varvara wasn’t at home and the stove in the front room had been stoked up, and then he tossed the cards into the stove, the whole deck.

  With a crackling sound, mysterious, pale red flowers blossomed and burned, charring along the edges. Peredonov gazed in terror at these fiery blossoms.

  The cards warped, twisted and moved, just as though they wanted to leap out of the stove. Peredonov grabbed a poker and struck away at the cards. Fine, brilliant sparks scattered in all directions. Suddenly, in a brilliant and wicked flurry of sparks, the Princess arose out of the fire: a small, ashy gray woman all strewn with fading little fires. She gave a piercing wail in a thin voice, then hissed and spat on the fire.

  Peredonov collapsed backwards and started to howl with terror. The gloom embraced him, tickled him and laughed in cooing voices.

  XXVI

  SASHA WAS ENCHANTED with Lyudmila, but something prevented him from talking about her with Kokovkina. It was as though he were afraid. And he even started to fear her visits. His heart would skip a beat and his brows pull together in a frown whenever he caught sight of the quick flash of her pinkish yellow hat under the window. Nevertheless he would wait for her with anxiety and impatience and he would be melancholy if she didn’t come for a long while. Contradictory feelings were all mixed up in his heart, because they were dark and vague feelings: feelings that were wanton because they were premature, and feelings that were sweet because they were wanton.

  Lyudmila hadn’t come either the day before or today. Sasha had languished in anticipation and had already ceased waiting for her. Then suddenly she came. He grew radiant and rushed to kiss her hands.

  “You disappeared,” he upbraided her vexedly. “I didn’t see you for two whole days.”

  She laughed and rejoiced, and the sweet, langorous and heady scent of Japanese fuchsia emanated from her just as though it were streaming from her reddish-brown curls.

  Lyudmila and Sasha went for a walk outside town. They invited Kokovkina—but she didn’t go.

  “Where’s an old lady like me to go for a walk!” she said. “I’ll only hold you back. You’d better go for a walk on your own.”

  “But we’ll get into mischief,” Lyudmila laughed.

  The warm air, melancholy and motionless, caressed them and reminded them of what was irrevocable. The sun, like an invalid, spread a murky light and turned crimson against a pallid, tired sky. Dry leaves lay submissive and dead on the dark earth.

  Lyudmila and Sasha descended into a ravine. There it was cool, fresh, almost damp—a delicate autumn weariness reigned between its shadowed slopes.

  Lyudmila walked in front. She raised her skirt. Delicate shoes and flesh-colored stockings were revealed. Sasha was looking downward so that he wouldn’t trip over roots and he caught sight of the stockings. It seemed to him that she was wearing the shoes without any stockings. A shameful and passionate feeling arose in him. He turned red. His head was spinning. “If only I could fall down at her feet, as though by accident,” he was dreaming, “and pull off her shoes and kiss her tender foot.”

  It was as though Lyudmila had sensed Sasha’s burning gaze on herself, his impatient desire. Chuckling, she turned around to Sasha and asked:

  “Are you looking at my stockings?”

  “No, not really,” Sasha mumbled in embarrassment.

  “Ach, the kind of stockings I have,” Lyudmila said, laughing and not heeding him. “It’s terrible, the kind they are! One might think that I had put shoes on bare feet, they’re such a flesh color. It’s true, isn’t it, they really are terribly funny stockings?”

  She turned around to face Sasha and raised the edge of her dress.

  “Funny?” she asked.

  “No, beautiful,” Sasha said, red with embarrassment.

  With feigned surprise Lyudmila raised her eyebrows and exclaimed:

  “Do tell! What do you understand about beauty?”

  Lyudmila laughed and continued on. Burning with embarrassment, Sasha awkwardly picked his way along after her and kept stumbling every minute.

  They made it across the ravine. They sat down on the stump of a birch that had been broken by the wind. Lyudmila said:

  “I’ve got so much sand in my shoes that I can’t go any farther.”

  She took her shoes off, shook out the sand and glanced slyly at Sasha.

  “A pretty foot?” she asked.

  Sasha blushed even more and no longer knew what to say. Lyudmila pulled off her stockings.

  “Nice little white feet?” she asked once more, with a strange and sly smile. “On your knees! Kiss them!” she said sternly and an imperious cruelty settled over her face.

  Sasha deftly got down on his knees and kissed Lyudmila’s feet.

  “It’s nicer without stockings,” Lyudmila said, hid the stockings in a pocket and stuck her feet into her shoes.

  Once again her face grew calm and cheerful, as though Sasha hadn’t just been kneeling down before her, caressing her naked feet.

  Sasha asked:

  “Dearest, won’t you catch cold?”

  His voice had a tender and quivering ring to it. Lyudmila laughed.

  “Hardly, I’m used to it. I’m not such a sissy.”

  Once Lyudmila came to Kokovkina’s towards evening and summoned Sasha:

  “Let’s go and hang a new shelf at my place.”

  Sasha loved to hammer nails and had once promised Lyudmila to help her with the organization of her furnishings. So now he agreed, happy over the fact that there was an innocent pretext for being with Lyudmila and going to Lyudmila’s place. And the innocent, somewhat tart fragrance of extra-muguet that wafted from Lyudmila’s greenish dress, had a tender, calming effect on him.

  Lyudmila changed clothing for work behind a screen and appeared to Sasha in a short, dressy skirt, her arms bare and scented with sweet, languid, heady Japanese fuchsia.

  “Just look at you, all dressed up!” Sasha said.

  “Well, hardly dressed up. You see,” Lyudmila said, grinning “bare feet.” She pronounced the words with a shamefully provocative drawl.

  Sasha shrugged his shoulders and said:

  “You’re always all dressed up. Well, then, let’s start hammering. Do you have the nails?” he asked seriously.

  “Just wait a little bit,” Lyudmila replied. “Sit down with me at least for a little, otherwise, it’s as though you’re just coming on business and you find it boring to talk with me.”

  Sasha blushed and said tenderly.

  “Dearest Lyudmilochka, I’d sit with you for as long as you like, until you chased me away, only I have to do my lessons.”

  Lyudmila sighed gently and slowly said:

  “You get better looking all the time, Sasha.”

  Sasha turned red, laughed an
d stuck out the end of his tongue rolled up like a tube.

  “You’re just making it up,” he said. “As though I were a young lady. Better looking, really!”

  “You have a beautiful face, and your body! Show it to me at least down to the waist,” Lyudmila said, cuddling up to Sasha and embracing him by the shoulder.

  “Really, the things you think of!” Sasha said with shame and annoyance. “What’s the matter?” Lyudmila asked in a light-hearted voice. “You’d think you had something to hide!”

  “Someone might come in,” Sasha said.

  “Who’s going to come in?” Lyudmila said just as easily and carefreely. “We’ll lock the door, then no one can surprise us.”

  Lyudmila deftly went up to the door and locked it with the bolt. Sasha guessed that Lyudmila was not joking. He said, turning red all over, so that beads of sweat stood out on his forehead:

  “Don’t, Lyudmila.”

  “Silly, why not?” Lyudmila asked in a persuasive voice.

  She pulled Sasha to herself and started to unbutton his blouse. Sasha struggled free, gripping on to her hands. His face grew frightened and a shame that was akin to fright took hold of him. And it suddenly seemed to weaken him. Lyudmila knitted her brows and was undressing him with determination. She removed his belt, pulled his blouse off somehow. Sasha struggled even more desperately to break free. They scuffled and circled their way around the room, bumping into tables and chairs. The heady scent wafting from Lyudmila was intoxicating Sasha and enervating him.

  With a quick shove to his chest, Lyudmila toppled Sasha onto the divan. A button popped off the undershirt that she was tearing at. Lyudmila quickly bared Sasha’s shoulder and started to pull his arm out of the sleeve. Breaking free, Sasha inadvertently struck Lyudmila on the cheek with the palm of his hand. He didn’t mean to hit her, of course, but the blow, strong and ringing, fell solidly on Lyudmila’s cheek. Lyudmila shuddered, stumbled, and turned red with a bloody glow on her cheek but she didn’t let go of Sasha.