"Good-bye, good-bye," Latkin kept repeating, still with the same bow.
I went up to Raissa and stood directly facing her.
"Raissa, dear, what's the matter with you?"
She made no answer, she seemed not to notice me. Her face had not
grown pale, had not changed--but had turned somehow stony and there
was a look in it as though she were just falling asleep.
"She is cross-eyed, cross-eyed," Latkin muttered in my ear.
I took Raissa by the hand. "David is alive," I cried, more loudly than
before. "Alive and well; David's alive, do you understand? He was
pulled out of the water; he is at home now and told me to say that he
will come to you to-morrow; he is alive!" As it were with effort
Raissa turned her eyes on me; she blinked several times, opening them
wider and wider, then leaned her head on one side and flushed slightly
all over while her lips parted ... she slowly drew in a deep breath,
winced as though in pain and with fearful effort articulated:
"Da ... Dav ... a ... alive," got up impulsively and rushed away.
"Where are you going?" I exclaimed. But with a faint laugh she ran
staggering across the waste-ground....
I, of course, followed her, while behind me a wail rose up in unison
from the old man and the child.... Raissa darted straight to our
house.
"Here's a day!" I thought, trying not to lose sight of the black dress
that was fluttering before me. "Well!"
XXII
Passing Vassily, my aunt, and even Trankvillitatin, Raissa ran into
the room where David was lying and threw herself on his neck. "Oh...
oh ... Da ... vidushka," her voice rang out from under her loose
curls, "oh!"
Flinging wide his arms David embraced her and nestled his head against
her.
"Forgive me, my heart," I heard his voice saying.
And both seemed swooning with joy.
"But why did you go home, Raissa, why didn't you stay?" I said to
her.... She still kept her head bowed. "You would have seen that he
was saved...."
"Ah, I don't know! Ah, I don't know. Don't ask. I don't know, I don't
remember how I got home. I only remember: I saw you in the air ...
something seemed to strike me... and what happened afterwards..."
"Seemed to strike you," repeated David, and we all three suddenly
burst out laughing together. We were very happy.
"What may be the meaning of this, may I ask," we heard behind us a
threatening voice, the voice of my father. He was standing in the
doorway. "Will there ever be an end to these fooleries? Where are we
living? Are we in the Russian Empire or the French Republic?"
He came into the room.
"Anyone who wants to be rebellious and immoral had better go to France!
And how dare you come here?" he said, turning to Raissa, who,
quietly sitting up and turning to face him, was evidently taken aback but
still smiled as before, a friendly and blissful smile.
"The daughter of my sworn enemy! How dare you? And hugging him, too!
Away with you at once, or ..."
"Uncle," David brought out, and he sat up in bed. "Don't insult Raissa.
She is going away, only don't insult her."
"And who are you to teach me? I am not insulting her, I am not in ...
sul ... ting her! I am simply turning her out of the house. I have an
account to settle with you, too, presently. You have made away with
other people's property, have attempted to take your own life, have put
me to expense."
"To what expense?" David interrupted.
"What expense? You have ruined your clothes. Do you count that as
nothing? And I had to tip the men who brought you. You have given the
whole family a fright and are you going to be unruly now? And if this
young woman, regardless of shame and honour itself ..."
David made a dash as though to get out of bed.
"Don't insult her, I tell you."
"Hold your tongue."
"Don't dare ..."
"Hold your tongue!"
"Don't dare to insult my betrothed," cried David at the top of his
voice, "my future wife!"
"Betrothed!" repeated my father, with round eyes. "Betrothed! Wife!
Ho, ho, ho! ..." ("Ha, ha, ha," my aunt echoed behind the door.) "Why,
how old are you? He's been no time in the world, the milk is hardly
dry on his lips, he is a mere babe and he is going to be married! But
I ... but you ..."
"Let me go, let me go," whispered Raissa, and she made for the door.
She looked more dead than alive.
"I am not going to ask permission of you," David went on shouting,
propping himself up with his fists on the edge of the bed, "but of my
own father who is bound to be here one day soon; he is a law to me,
but you are not; but as for my age, if Raissa and I are not old
enough ... we will bide our time whatever you may say...."
"Aië, aië, Davidka, don't forget yourself," my father interrupted.
"Just look at yourself. You are not fit to be seen. You have lost all
sense of decency."
David put his hand to the front of his shirt.
"Whatever you may say..." he repeated.
"Oh, shut his mouth, Porfiry Petrovitch," piped my aunt from behind
the door, "shut his mouth, and as for this hussy, this baggage ...
this ..."
But something extraordinary must have cut short my aunt's eloquence at
that moment: her voice suddenly broke off and in its place we heard
another, feeble and husky with old age....
"Brother," this weak voice articulated, "Christian soul."
XXIII
We all turned round.... In the same costume
in which I had just seen him, thin, pitiful
and wild looking, Latkin stood before us like an
apparition.
"God!" he pronounced in a sort of childish way, pointing upwards with
a bent and trembling finger and gazing impotently at my father, "God
has chastised me, but I have come for Va ... for Ra ... yes, yes, for
Raissotchka.... What ... tchoo! what is there for me? Soon
underground--and what do you call it? One little stick, another ...
cross-beam--that's what I ... want, but you, brother, diamond-merchant
... mind ... I'm a man, too!"
Raissa crossed the room without a word and taking his arm buttoned his
vest.
"Let us go, Vassilyevna," he said; "they are all saints here, don't
come to them and he lying there in his case"--he pointed to David--"is
a saint, too, but you and I are sinners, brother. Come. Tchoo....
Forgive an old man with a pepper pot, gentleman! We have stolen
together!" he shouted suddenly; "stolen together, stolen together!" he
repeated, with evident satisfaction that his tongue had obeyed him at
last.
Everyone in the room was silent. "And where is ... the ikon here," he
asked, throwing back his head and turning up his eyes; "we must
cleanse ourselves a bit."
He fell to praying to one of the corners, crossing himself fervently
several times in succession, tapping first one shoulder and then the
other with his fingers and hurriedly repeating:
"Have mercy me, oh, Lor ... me, oh, Lor ... me, oh, Lor ..." My
father, who h
ad not taken his eyes off Latkin, and had not uttered a
word, suddenly started, stood beside him and began crossing himself,
too. Then he turned to him, bowed very low so that he touched the
floor with one hand, saying, "You forgive me, too, Martinyan
Gavrilitch," kissed him on the shoulder. Latkin in response smacked
his lips in the air and blinked: I doubt whether he quite knew what he
was doing. Then my father turned to everyone in the room, to David, to
Raissa and to me:
"Do as you like, act as you think best," he brought out in a soft and
mournful voice, and he withdrew.
My aunt was running up to him, but he cried out sharply and gruffly to
her. He was overwhelmed.
"Me, oh, Lor ... me, oh, Lor ... mercy!" Latkin repeated. "I am a
man."
"Good-bye, Davidushka," said Raissa, and she, too, went out of the
room with the old man.
"I will be with you tomorrow," David called after her, and, turning
his face to the wall, he whispered: "I am very tired; it will be as
well to have some sleep now," and was quiet.
It was a long while before I went out of the room. I kept in hiding. I
could not forget my father's threats. But my apprehensions turned out
to be unnecessary. He met me and did not utter a word. He seemed to
feel awkward himself. But night soon came on and everything was quiet
in the house.
XXIV
Next morning David got up as though nothing were the matter and not
long after, on the same day, two important events occurred: in the
morning old Latkin died, and towards evening my uncle, Yegor, David's
father, arrived in Ryazan. Without sending any letter in advance,
without warning anyone, he descended on us like snow on our heads. My
father was completely taken aback and did not know what to offer to
his dear guest and where to make him sit. He rushed about as though
delirious, was flustered as though he were guilty; but my uncle did
not seem to be much touched by his brother's fussy solicitude; he kept
repeating: "What's this for?" or "I don't want anything." His manner
with my aunt was even colder; she had no great liking for him, indeed.
In her eyes he was an infidel, a heretic, a Voltairian ... (he had in
fact learnt French to read Voltaire in the original). I found my Uncle
Yegor just as David had described him. He was a big heavy man with a
broad pock-marked face, grave and serious. He always wore a hat with
feathers in it, cuffs, a frilled shirt front and a snuff-coloured vest
and a sword at his side. David was unspeakably delighted to see him--he
actually looked brighter in the face and better looking, and his
eyes looked different: merrier, keener, more shining; but he did his
utmost to moderate his joy and not to show it in words: he was afraid
of being too soft. The first night after Uncle Yegor's arrival, father
and son shut themselves up in the room that had been assigned to my
uncle and spent a long time talking together in a low voice; next
morning I saw that my uncle looked particularly affectionately and
trustfully at his son: he seemed very much pleased with him. David
took him to the requiem service for Latkin; I went to it, too, my
father did not hinder my going but remained at home himself. Raissa
impressed me by her calm: she looked pale and much thinner but did not
shed tears and spoke and behaved with perfect simplicity; and with all
that, strange to say, I saw a certain grandeur in her; the unconscious
grandeur of sorrow forgetful of itself! Uncle Yegor made her
acquaintance on the spot, in the church porch; from his manner to her,
it was evident that David had already spoken of her. He was as pleased
with her as with his son: I could read that in David's eyes when he
looked at them both. I remember how his eyes sparkled when his father
said, speaking of her: "She's a clever girl; she'll make a capable
woman." At the Latkins' I was told that the old man had quietly
expired like a candle that has burnt out, and that until he had lost
power and consciousness, he kept stroking his daughter's head and
saying something unintelligible but not gloomy, and he was smiling to
the end. My father went to the funeral and to the service in the
church and prayed very devoutly; Trankvillitatin actually sang in the
choir.
Beside the grave Raissa suddenly broke into sobs and sank forward on
the ground; but she soon recovered herself. Her little deaf and dumb
sister stared at everyone and everything with big, bright, rather
wild-looking eyes; from time to time she huddled up to Raissa, but
there was no sign of terror about her. The day after the funeral Uncle
Yegor, who, judging from appearances, had not come back from Siberia
with empty hands (he paid for the funeral and liberally rewarded
David's rescuer) but who told us nothing of his doings there or of his
plans for the future, Uncle Yegor suddenly informed my father that he
did not intend to remain in Ryazan, but was going to Moscow with his
son. My father, from a feeling of propriety, expressed regret and even
tried--very faintly it is true--to induce my uncle to alter his
decision, but at the bottom of his heart, I think he was really much
relieved.
The presence of his brother with whom he had very little in common,
who did not even condescend to reproach him, whose feeling for him was
more one of simple disgust than disdain--oppressed him ... and parting
with David could not have caused him much regret. I, of course, was
utterly crushed by the separation; I was utterly desolate at first and
lost all support in life and all interest in it.
And so my uncle went away and took with him not only David but, to the
great astonishment and even indignation of our whole street, Raissa
and her little sister, too.... When she heard of this, my aunt
promptly called him a Turk, and called him a Turk to the end of her
days.
And I was left alone, alone ... but this story is not about me.
XXV
So this is the end of my tale of the watch. What more have I to tell
you? Five years after David was married to his Black-lip, and in 1812,
as a lieutenant of artillery, he died a glorious death on the
battlefield of Borodino in defence of the Shevardinsky redoubt.
Much water has flowed by since then and I have had many watches; I
have even attained the dignity of a real repeater with a second hand
and the days of the week on it. But in a secret drawer of my writing
table there is preserved an old-fashioned silver watch with a rose on
the face; I bought it from a Jewish pedlar, struck by its likeness to
the watch which was once presented to me by my godfather. From time to
time, when I am alone and expect no one, I take it out of the drawer
and looking at it remember my young days and the companion of those
days that have fled never to return.
Paris.--1875.
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Document authors :
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Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories Page 25