The Gambler

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

  “Oh, yes.”

  “They’re not worth noticing. To the vexation of the decent public, there’s no lack of them here, at any rate those of them who change thousand-franc notes at the tables every day. However, as soon as they stop changing notes, they’re immediately asked to leave. Mlle Zelmà still went on changing notes; but her game went still more unluckily. Note that these ladies are quite often lucky at gambling; they have astonishing self-control. However, my story is over. One day, exactly like the prince, the count, too, vanished. Mlle Zelmà appeared in the evening to play alone; this time no one appeared to offer her his arm. In two days she lost everything. Having staked her last louis d’or and lost it, she looked around and saw Baron Wurmerhelm nearby, studying her with great attention and deep indignation. But Mlle Zelmà did not perceive the indignation and, turning to the baron with a certain kind of smile, asked him to put ten louis d’or on red for her. As a result of that, on the baroness’s complaint, she received that evening an invitation not to appear in the vauxhall anymore. If it surprises you that I know all these small and completely indecent details, it is because I finally heard them from Mr. Feeder, a relation of mine, who that same evening took Mlle Zelmà in his carriage from Roulettenburg to Spa. Now understand: Mlle Blanche wants to become the general’s wife, probably, so that she will never again receive such invitations as she did two years ago from the vauxhall police. Now she no longer gambles; but that is because, by all tokens, she now has capital, which she lends to local gamblers on interest. That is much more prudent. I even suspect that the unfortunate general owes her money. Maybe des Grieux does, too. Maybe des Grieux is her associate. You must agree that, at least until the wedding, she would not wish to attract the attention of the baron or the baroness for any reason. In short, in her position scandal is the least profitable thing for her. You are connected with their household, and your acts could cause a scandal, the more so as she appears every day in public arm in arm with the general or with Miss Polina. Now do you understand?”

  “No, I don’t!” I cried, banging the table with all my might, so that the frightened garçon came running.

  “Tell me, Mr. Astley,” I repeated in frenzy, “if you know this whole story, and consequently know by heart what Mlle Blanche de Cominges is—how is it that you haven’t warned at least me, the general himself, and above all Miss Polina, who has appeared here in the vauxhall, in public, arm in arm with Mlle Blanche? Can this be possible?”

  “There was no point in warning you, because there was nothing you could do,” Mr. Astley replied calmly. “And anyhow, what was there to warn you about? The general may know more about Mlle Blanche than I do, and all the same he goes strolling with her and Miss Polina. The general is an unfortunate man. Yesterday I saw Mlle Blanche riding a splendid horse with M. des Grieux and that little Russian prince, and the general riding behind them on a chestnut. In the morning he had said that his legs hurt, but he sat his horse well. And at that moment the thought suddenly occurred to me that this was a completely lost man. Moreover, this is all none of my business, and I had the honor of meeting Miss Polina only recently. However,” Mr. Astley suddenly caught himself, “I’ve already told you that I cannot acknowledge your right to certain questions, though I sincerely like you…”

  “Enough,” I said, getting up. “It’s clear as day to me now that Miss Polina also knows all about Mlle Blanche, but she can’t part with her Frenchman, and therefore ventures to stroll with Mlle Blanche. Believe me, no other influence would induce her to stroll with Mlle Blanche and beg me in a note not to touch the baron. Here there must be precisely that influence before which everything bows! And yet it was she who loosed me on the baron! Devil take it, nothing can be sorted out here!”

  “You forget, first, that this Mlle de Cominges is the general’s fiancée, and, second, that Miss Polina, the general’s step-daughter, has a little brother and sister, the general’s own children, totally abandoned by this crazy man and, it seems, robbed as well.”

  “Yes, yes, that’s so! Leaving the children means abandoning them completely, staying means protecting their interests, and maybe saving shreds of the estate as well. Yes, yes, that’s all true! But still, still! Oh, I understand why they’re all now so interested in baboulinka!”

  “In whom?” asked Mr. Astley.

  “In that old witch in Moscow who won’t die and about whom they’re expecting a telegram that she’s dead.”

  “Well, yes, of course, the whole interest converges in her. The whole point lies in the inheritance! When the inheritance is announced, the general will get married; Miss Polina will be unbound, and des Grieux…”

  “Well, and des Grieux?”

  “Des Grieux will be paid his money; that’s all he’s waiting for here.”

  “All! You think that’s all he’s waiting for?”

  “I know nothing more.” Mr. Astley fell stubbornly silent.

  “But I know, I know!” I repeated in a rage. “He’s also waiting for the inheritance, because Polina will get a dowry, and once she gets the money, she’ll immediately throw herself on his neck. Women are all like that! And the proudest of them come out as the most banal slaves! Polina is capable only of loving passionately and nothing more! That’s my opinion of her! Look at her, especially when she’s sitting alone, deep in thought: it’s something predestined, foredoomed, accursed! She’s capable of all the horrors of life and passion…she…she…but who’s that calling me?” I suddenly exclaimed. “Who’s shouting? I heard somebody shout ‘Alexei Ivanovich!’ in Russian. A woman’s voice, listen, listen!”

  At that moment we were approaching our hotel. We had left the café long ago, almost without noticing it.

  “I heard a woman shout, but I don’t know who she’s calling; it was in Russian. Now I can see where it’s coming from,” Mr. Astley was pointing, “it’s that woman shouting, the one sitting in a big armchair and who has just been carried up to the porch by so many footmen. They’re carrying her suitcases behind her; that means the train has just arrived.”

  “But why is she calling me? She’s shouting again; look, she’s waving to us.”

  “I see that she’s waving,” said Mr. Astley.

  “Alexei Ivanovich! Alexei Ivanovich! Ah, Lord, what a dolt!” desperate cries came from the porch of the hotel.

  We almost ran to the entrance. I reached the landing and…my arms dropped in amazement, and my feet became rooted to the stone.

  CHAPTER IX

  ON THE UPPER LANDING of the wide hotel porch, carried up the steps in a chair and surrounded by manservants and maidservants and the numerous, obsequious hotel staff, in the presence of the manager himself, who had come out to meet the exalted guest arriving with so much flurry and noise, with her own servants and with so many suitcases and valises, sat—grandmother! Yes, it was she herself, formidable and rich, seventy-five years old, Antonida Vassilyevna Tarassevichev, a landowner and a Moscow grande dame, la baboulinka, about whom telegrams were sent and received, who was dying and did not die, and who suddenly, herself, in person, appeared like fresh snow on our heads. She appeared, though she couldn’t walk, carried in an armchair as she had always been for the last five years, but, as was her custom, brisk, perky, self-satisfied, straight-backed, shouting loudly and commandingly, scolding everybody—well, exactly as I had had the honor of seeing her twice since the time I was taken into the general’s household as a tutor. Naturally, I stood before her dumbstruck with amazement. But she had made me out with her lynx eyes from a hundred paces away, as they carried her up in her chair, had recognized me and called me by my name and patronymic—which, as was her custom, she had also memorized once and for all. “And she’s the one they expected to see in a coffin, buried, and having left an inheritance,” flitted through my mind, “yet she’ll outlive us all and the whole hotel! But, God, what will become of all our people now, what will become of the general! She’ll stand the whole hotel on its ear!”

  “Well, what are you doin
g, dearie, standing in front of me with your eyes popping out!” grandmother went on yelling at me. “You don’t know how to bow and greet a body, eh? Or you’ve grown proud and don’t want to? Or maybe you don’t recognize me? You hear, Potapych,” she turned to a gray-haired old man in a tailcoat and white tie and with a pink bald spot, her butler, who had accompanied her on her journey, “you hear, he doesn’t recognize me! They’ve got me buried! They send one telegram after another: is she dead or not? I know everything! And here, you see, I’m as alive as can be!”

  “Good heavens, Antonida Vassilyevna, why would I wish you ill?” I answered cheerfully, coming to my senses. “I was only surprised…And how not marvel at such an unexpected…”

  “But what’s so surprising for you? I got on the train and came. It’s a quiet ride, no jolts. You’ve been for a walk, have you?”

  “Yes, I strolled to the vauxhall.”

  “It’s nice here,” said grandmother, looking around, “warm, and there’s a wealth of trees. I like that. Are our people at home? The general?”

  “Oh, yes! at this hour they’re probably all at home.”

  “So they’ve established a schedule here and all the ceremonies? Setting the tone. I’ve heard they keep a carriage, les seigneurs russes![22] Blew all their money and went abroad! Is Praskovya{9} with him?”

  “Yes, Polina Alexandrovna, too.”

  “And the little Frenchman? Well, I’ll see them all for myself, Alexei Ivanovich, show me the way straight to him. Do you find it nice here?”

  “So so, Antonida Vassilyevna.”

  “And you, Potapych, tell that dolt of a manager to give me comfortable quarters, nice ones, not too high up, and carry my things there at once. Why is everybody in a rush to carry me? Why are they getting at me? Eh, what slaves! Who’s that with you?” she turned to me again.

  “This is Mr. Astley,” I replied.

  “Who is this Mr. Astley?”

  “A traveler, my good acquaintance; he also knows the general.”

  “An Englishman. That’s why he’s staring at me and doesn’t unclench his teeth. I like Englishmen, though. Well, drag me upstairs, straight to their place; where are they?”

  Grandmother was carried; I walked ahead up the wide hotel stairway. Our procession was very impressive. Everyone who came our way stopped and looked at us all eyes. Our hotel was considered the best, the most expensive, and the most aristocratic at the spa. On the stairs and in the corridors one always met magnificent ladies and important Englishmen. Many made inquiries downstairs of the manager, who, for his own part, was deeply impressed. He, of course, replied to all who asked that this was an important foreign lady, une russe, une comtesse, grande dame, and that she would occupy the same suite which a week before had been occupied by la grande duchesse de N. Grandmother’s commanding and imperious figure, borne up in her chair, was the cause of the main effect. Each time she met a new person, she at once measured him with a curious gaze, and she loudly questioned me about them all. Grandmother belonged to a large breed, and though she never got up from her chair, one could tell, looking at her, that she was quite tall. She held her back straight as a board, and did not recline in the chair. Her big gray head, with its large and sharp features, was held erect; her glance was somehow even haughty and defiant; and one could see that her gaze and gestures were perfectly natural. Despite her seventy-five years, her face was quite fresh, and even her teeth had not suffered much. She was dressed in a black silk gown and a white bonnet.

  “She interests me greatly,” Mr. Astley whispered to me, going up the stairs beside me.

  “She knows about the telegrams,” I thought, “she’s also been informed about des Grieux, but it seems she still knows little about Mlle Blanche.” I immediately communicated this to Mr. Astley.

  Sinful man! My first surprise had no sooner passed, than I rejoiced terribly at the thunderbolt we were about to produce at the general’s. It was as if something was egging me on, and I led the way extremely cheerfully.

  Our people were quartered on the second floor. I made no announcement, did not even knock at the door, but simply thrust it open, and grandmother was carried in in triumph. As if on purpose, they were all gathered in the general’s study. It was twelve o’clock, and they seemed to be planning an excursion—some were going in carriages, others on horseback, the entire company; besides that, other acquaintances had been invited. Besides the general, Polina with the children, their nanny, there were in the study: des Grieux, Mlle Blanche, again in a riding habit, her mother Mme la veuve Cominges, the little prince, and also some learned traveler, a German, whom I saw with them for the first time. The chair with grandmother was set down right in the middle of the study, three paces from the general. God, I’ll never forget this impression! Before we came in, the general had been telling some story, and des Grieux had been correcting him. It should be noted that for two or three days Mlle Blanche and des Grieux had for some reason been paying much court to the little prince—à la barbe du pauvre général,[23] and the company was tuned, though perhaps artificially, to the most merry and cordially familial pitch. At the sight of grandmother, the general was suddenly dumbfounded, opened his mouth, and stopped in the middle of a phrase. He stared at her, his eyes popping, as though spellbound by a basilisk’s gaze. Grandmother also looked at him silently, fixedly—but what a triumphant, defiant, and mocking gaze it was! They stared at each other like that for a whole ten seconds, amid the profound silence of everyone around them. Des Grieux was petrified at first, but soon an extraordinary uneasiness flashed in his face. Mlle Blanche raised her eyebrows, opened her mouth, and gazed wildly at grandmother. The prince and the scholar contemplated the whole picture in deep perplexity. Polina’s gaze expressed great astonishment and perplexity, but suddenly she turned white as a sheet; a moment later the blood quickly rushed to her face and suffused her cheeks. Yes, this was a catastrophe for them all! The only thing I did was shift my eyes from grandmother to everyone around and back. Mr. Astley stood to one side, as was his custom, calmly and decorously.

  “Well, here I am! Instead of a telegram!” grandmother burst out at last, breaking the silence. “What, you didn’t expect me?”

  “Antonida Vassilyevna…auntie…but how on earth…” the unfortunate general murmured. If grandmother hadn’t begun speaking for a few seconds more, he might have had a stroke.

  “What do you mean, how? I got on the train and came. What’s the railroad for? And you all thought I’d stretched out my bones and left you an inheritance? I know how you sent telegrams from here. Paid a lot of money for them, I suppose. It’s not cheap from here. But I shouldered my old bones and came here. Is this that Frenchman? M. des Grieux, I believe?”

  “Oui, madame,” des Grieux picked up, “et croyez, je suis si enchanté…vôtre santé…c’est un miracle…vous voir ici, une surprise charmante…”[24]

  “Hm, charmante. I know you, you mountebank, only I don’t believe you even that much!” and she showed her little finger. “Who’s this?” she turned, pointing to Mlle Blanche. The showy Frenchwoman in the riding habit, with a crop in her hand, apparently impressed her. “Are you a local, or what?”

  “This is Mlle Blanche de Cominges, and this is her mother, Mme de Cominges; they’re staying at this hotel,” I reported.

  “Is the daughter married?” grandmother inquired without ceremony.

  “Mlle de Cominges is unmarried,” I replied as respectfully as I could, purposely lowering my voice.

  “A merry girl?”

  I didn’t understand the question at first.

  “She’s not boring to be with? Does she understand Russian? This des Grieux picked up a smattering of it with us in Moscow.”

  I explained to her that Mlle de Cominges had never been to Russia.

  “Bonjour! ” said grandmother, suddenly and abruptly addressing Mlle Blanche.

  “Bonjour, madame,” Mlle Blanche curtsied decorously and gracefully, hastening, under the cover of extraordi
nary modesty and politeness, to display with the whole expression of her face and figure her extreme astonishment at such a strange question and manner of address.

  “Ah, she’s lowered her eyes, she’s mincing and prancing; you can tell the bird at once; some sort of actress. I’m staying downstairs in this hotel,” she suddenly turned to the general, “I shall be your neighbor; are you glad or not?”

  “Oh, auntie! Believe in the sincere feeling…of my pleasure,” the general picked up. He had already recovered somewhat, and since he was capable on occasion of speaking aptly, imposingly, and with a claim to a certain effect, he began expatiating now as well. “We were so alarmed and struck by the news of your ill health…We received such hopeless telegrams, and suddenly…”

  “Lies, lies!” grandmother interrupted at once.

  “But how is it,” the general also hastened to interrupt and raised his voice, trying to ignore this “lies,” “how is it, though, that you ventured upon such a journey? You must agree that at your age and with your health…at any rate it’s all so unexpected that our astonishment is comprehensible. But I’m so glad…and we all”(he started smiling sweetly and rapturously) “will try as hard as we can to make your season here pass most pleasantly…”

  “Well, enough empty chatter; laying it on thick as usual; I can get along by myself. However, I have nothing against you; I don’t bear any grudges. How, you ask? What’s so surprising? In the simplest way. Why are they all so surprised? Hello, Praskovya. What are you doing here?”

  “Hello, grandmother,” said Polina, going up to her. “Was it a long trip?”

  “Well, this one has asked the smartest question, none of this oh and ah! You see, I lay and lay, got treated and treated, then I chased the doctors away and summoned the sacristan from St. Nicholas’s. He had cured one woman of the same illness with hay dust. Well, and he helped me; on the third day I sweated all over and got up. Then all my Germans gathered again, put on their spectacles, and began to opinionate: ‘If you were to go abroad now to a spa and take a cure,’ they said, ‘your gripes would go away completely.’ And why not? I thought. The Fool-Blazers start their oh-ing: ‘You can’t go so far!’ they say. Well, so there! In one day I got ready and on Friday last week I took my maid, and Potapych, and the footman Fyodor, only in Berlin I chased this Fyodor home, because I saw there was simply no need for him, I could get here all by myself…I’m riding in a separate compartment, and there are porters at all the stations, they’ll carry me wherever I like for twenty kopecks. Look, what quarters you occupy!” she concluded, glancing around. “With what money are you paying for it, dearie? Everything you’ve got is mortgaged. You owe quite a lump to this little Frenchman alone! I know everything, everything!”