by Leo Tolstoy
All the way this man had carefully avoided making acquaintance or having any intercourse with his fellow passengers. When spoken to by those near him he gave short and abrupt answers, and at other times read, looked out of the window, smoked, or drank tea and ate something he took out of an old bag.
It seemed to me that his loneliness depressed him, and I made several attempts to converse with him, but whenever our eyes met, which happened often as he sat nearly opposite me, he turned away and took up his book or looked out of the window.
Towards the second evening, when our train stopped at a large station, this nervous man fetched himself some boiling water and made tea. The man with the neat new things – a lawyer as I found out later – and his neighbour, the smoking lady with the mannish coat, went to the refreshment-room to drink tea.
During their absence several new passengers entered the carriage, among them a tall, shaven, wrinkled old man, evidently a tradesman, in a coat lined with skunk fur, and a cloth cap with an enormous peak. The tradesman sat down opposite the seats of the lady and the lawyer, and immediately started a conversation with a young man who had also entered at that station and, judging by his appearance, was a tradesman’s clerk.2
I was sitting the other side of the gangway and as the train was standing still I could hear snatches of their conversation when nobody was passing between us. The tradesman began by saying that he was going to his estate which was only one station farther on; then as usual the conversation turned to prices and trade, and they spoke of the state of business in Moscow and then of the Nízhni-Nóvgorod Fair. The clerk began to relate how a wealthy merchant, known to both of them, had gone on the spree at the fair, but the old man interrupted him by telling of the orgies he had been at in former times at Kunávin Fair. He evidently prided himself on the part he had played in them, and3 recounted with pleasure how he and some acquaintances, together with the merchant they had been speaking of, had once got drunk at Kunávin and played such a trick that he had to tell of it in a whisper. The clerk’s roar of laughter filled the whole carriage; the old man laughed also, exposing two yellow teeth.
Not expecting to hear anything interesting, I got up to stroll about the platform till the train should start. At the carriage door I met the lawyer and the lady who were talking with animation as they approached.
‘You won’t have time,’ said the sociable lawyer, ‘the second bell will ring in a moment.’1
And the bell did ring before I had gone the length of the train. When I returned, the animated conversation between the lady and the lawyer was proceeding. The old tradesman sat silent opposite to them, looking sternly before him, and occasionally mumbled disapprovingly as if chewing something.
‘Then she plainly informed her husband,’ the lawyer was smilingly saying as I passed him, ‘that she was not able, and did not wish, to live with him since …’
He went on to say something I could not hear. Several other passengers came in after me. The guard passed, a porter hurried in, and for some time the noise made their voices inaudible. When all was quiet again the conversation had evidently turned from the particular case to general considerations.
The lawyer was saying that public opinion in Europe was occupied with the question of divorce, and that cases of ‘that kind’ were occurring more and more often in Russia. Noticing that his was the only voice audible, he stopped his discourse and turned to the old man.4
‘Those things did not happen in the old days, did they?’ he said, smiling pleasantly.
The old man was about to reply, but the train moved and he took off his cap, crossed himself, and whispered a prayer. The lawyer turned away his eyes and waited politely. Having finished his prayer and crossed himself three times the old man set his cap straight, pulled it well down over his forehead, changed his position, and began to speak.
‘They used to happen even then, sir, but less often,’ he said. ‘As times are now they can’t help happening. People have got too educated.’
The train moved faster and faster and jolted over the joints of the rails, making it difficult to hear, but being interested I moved nearer. The nervous man with the glittering eyes opposite me, evidently also interested, listened without changing his place.
‘What is wrong with education?’ said the lady, with a scarcely perceptible smile. ‘Surely it can’t be better to marry as they used to in the old days when the bride and bridegroom did not even see one another before the wedding,’ she continued, answering not what her interlocutor had said but what she thought he would say, in the way many ladies have. ‘Without knowing whether they loved, or whether they could love, they married just anybody, and were wretched all their lives. And you think that was better?’ she said, evidently addressing me and the lawyer chiefly and least of all the old man with whom she was talking.
‘They’ve got so very educated,’ the tradesman reiterated, looking contemptuously at the lady and leaving her question unanswered.
‘It would be interesting to know how you explain the connexion between education and matrimonial discord,’ said the lawyer, with a scarcely perceptible smile.
The tradesman was about to speak, but the lady interrupted him.
‘No,’ she said, ‘those times have passed.’ But the lawyer stopped her.
‘Yes, but allow the gentleman to express his views.’
‘Foolishness comes from education,’ the old man said categorically.
‘They make people who don’t love one another marry, and then wonder that they live in discord,’ the lady hastened to say, turning to look at the lawyer, at me, and even at the clerk, who had got up and, leaning on the back of the seat, was smilingly listening to the conversation. ‘It’s only animals, you know, that can be paired off as their master likes; but human beings have their own inclinations and attachments,’ said the lady, with an evident desire to annoy the tradesman.
‘You should not talk like that, madam,’ said the old man, ‘animals are cattle, but human beings have a law given them.’
‘Yes, but how is one to live with a man when there is no love?’ the lady again hastened to express her argument, which probably seemed very new to her.5
‘They used not to go into that,’ said the old man in an impressive tone, ‘it is only now that all this has sprung up. The least thing makes them say: “I will leave you!” The fashion has spread even to the peasants. “Here you are!” she says, “Here, take your shirts and trousers and I will go with Vánka; his head is curlier than yours.” What can you say? The first thing that should be required of a woman is fear!’
The clerk glanced at the lawyer, at the lady, and at me, apparently suppressing a smile and prepared to ridicule or to approve of the tradesman’s words according to the reception they met with.
‘Fear of what?’ asked the lady.
‘Why this: Let her fear her husband! That fear!’
‘Oh, the time for that, sir, has passed,’ said the lady with a certain viciousness.
‘No, madam, that time cannot pass. As she, Eve, was made from the rib of a man, so it will remain to the end of time,’ said the old man, jerking his head with such sternness and such a victorious look that the clerk at once concluded that victory was on his side, and laughed loudly.
‘Ah yes, that’s the way you men argue,’ said the lady unyieldingly, and turned to us. ‘You have given yourselves freedom but want to shut women up in a tower.2 You no doubt permit yourselves everything.’
‘6No one is permitting anything, but a man does not bring offspring into the home; while a woman – a wife – is a leaky vessel,’ the tradesman continued insistently. His tone was so impressive that it evidently vanquished his hearers, and even the lady felt crushed but still did not give in.
‘Yes, but I think you will agree that a woman is a human being and has feelings as a man has. What is she to do then, if she does not love her husband?’
‘Does not love!’ said the tradesman severely, moving his brows and lips. ‘She’ll
love, no fear!’ This unexpected argument particularly pleased the clerk, and he emitted a sound of approval.
‘Oh, no, she won’t!’ the lady began, ‘and when there is no love you can’t enforce it.’
‘Well, and supposing the wife is unfaithful, what then?’ asked the lawyer.
‘That is not admissible,’ said the old man. ‘One has to see to that.’
‘But if it happens, what then? You know it does occur.’
‘It happens among some, but not among us,’ said the old man.7
All were silent. The clerk moved, came still nearer, and, evidently unwilling to be behindhand, began with a smile.
‘Yes, a young fellow of ours had a scandal. It was a difficult case to deal with. It too was a case of a woman who was a bad lot. She began to play the devil, and the young fellow is respectable and cultured. At first it was with one of the office-clerks. The husband tried to persuade her with kindness. She would not stop, but played all sorts of dirty tricks. Then she began to steal his money. He beat her, but she only grew worse. Carried on intrigues, if I may mention it, with an unchristened Jew. What was he to do? He turned her out altogether and lives as a bachelor, while she gads about.’
‘Because he is a fool,’ said the old man. ‘If he’d pulled her up properly from the first and not let her have her way, she’d be living with him, no fear! It’s giving way at first that counts. Don’t trust your horse in the field, or your wife in the house.’
At that moment the guard entered to collect the tickets for the next station. The old man gave up his.
‘Yes, the female sex must be curbed in time or else all is lost!’
‘Yes, but you yourself just now were speaking about the way married men amuse themselves at the Kunávin Fair,’ I could not help saying.8
‘That’s a different matter,’ said the old man and relapsed into silence.
When the whistle sounded the tradesman rose, got out his bag from under the seat, buttoned up his coat, and slightly lifting his cap went out of the carriage.
II
AS soon as the old man had gone several voices were raised.
‘A daddy of the old style!’ remarked the clerk.
‘A living Domostróy!’3 said the lady. ‘What barbarous views of women and marriage!’
‘Yes, we are far from the European understanding of marriage,’ said the lawyer.4
‘The chief thing such people do not understand,’ continued the lady, ‘is that marriage without love is not marriage; that love alone sanctifies marriage, and that real marriage is only such as is sanctified by love.’
The clerk listened smilingly, trying to store up for future use all he could of the clever conversation.
In the midst of the lady’s remarks we heard, behind me, a sound like that of a broken laugh or sob; and on turning round we saw my neighbour, the lonely grey-haired man with the glittering eyes, who had approached unnoticed during our conversation, which evidently interested him. He stood with his arms on the back of the seat, evidently much excited; his face was red9 and a muscle twitched in his cheek.
‘What kind of love … love … is it that sanctifies marriage?’ he asked hesitatingly.10
Noticing the speaker’s agitation, the lady tried to answer him as gently and fully as possible.
‘True love … When such love exists between a man and a woman, then marriage is possible,’ she said.
‘Yes, but how is one to understand what is meant by “true love”?’ said the gentleman with the glittering eyes timidly and with an awkward smile.
‘Everybody knows what love is,’ replied the lady, evidently wishing to break off her conversation with him.
‘But I don’t,’ said the man. ‘You must define what you understand …’
‘Why? It’s very simple,’ she said, but stopped to consider. ‘Love? Love is an exclusive preference for one above everybody else,’ said the lady.
‘Preference for how long? A month, two days, or half an hour?’ said the grey-haired man and began to laugh.
‘Excuse me, we are evidently not speaking of the same thing.’
‘Oh, yes! Exactly the same.’
‘She means,’ interposed the lawyer, pointing to the lady, ‘that in the first place marriage must be the outcome of attachment – or love, if you please – and only where that exists is marriage sacred, so to speak. Secondly, that marriage when not based on natural attachment – love, if you prefer the word – lacks the element that makes it morally binding. Do I understand you rightly?’ he added, addressing the lady.
The lady indicated her approval of his explanation by a nod of her head.
‘It follows …’ the lawyer continued – but the nervous man whose eyes now glowed as if aflame and who had evidently restrained himself with difficulty, began without letting the lawyer finish:
‘Yes, I mean exactly the same thing, a preference for one person over everybody else, and I am only asking: a preference for how long?’
‘For how long? For a long time; for life sometimes,’ replied the lady, shrugging her shoulders.
‘Oh, but that happens only in novels and never in real life. In real life this preference for one may last for years (that happens very rarely), more often for months, or perhaps for weeks, days, or hours,’ he said, evidently aware that he was astonishing everybody by his views and pleased that it was so.
‘Oh, what are you saying?’ ‘But no …’ ‘No, allow me we all three began at once. Even the clerk uttered an indefinite sound of disapproval.
‘Yes, I know,’ the grey-haired man shouted above our voices, ‘you are talking about what is supposed to be, but I am speaking of what is. Every man experiences what you call love for every pretty woman11.’
‘Oh, what you say is awful! But the feeling that is called love does exist among people, and is given not for months or years, but for a lifetime!’
‘No, it does not! Even if we should grant that a man might prefer a certain woman all his life, the woman in all probability would prefer someone else;12 and so it always has been and still is in the world,’ he said, and taking out his cigarette-case he began to smoke.
‘But the feeling may be reciprocal,’ said the lawyer.
‘No, sir, it can’t!’ rejoined the other. ‘Just as it cannot be that in a cartload of peas, two marked peas will lie side by side. Besides, it is not merely this impossibility, but the inevitable satiety.13 To love one person for a whole lifetime is like saying that one candle will burn a whole life,’ he said, greedily inhaling the smoke.
‘But you are talking all the time about physical love. Don’t you acknowledge love based on identity of ideals, on spiritual affinity?’ asked the lady.
‘Spiritual affinity! Identity of ideals!’ he repeated, emitting his peculiar sound. ‘But in that case why go to bed together? (Excuse my coarseness!) Or do people go to bed together because of the identity of their ideals?’ he said, bursting into a nervous laugh.14
‘But permit me,’ said the lawyer. ‘Facts contradict you. We do see that matrimony exists, that all mankind, or the greater part of it, lives in wedlock, and many people honourably live long married lives.’
The grey-haired man again laughed.
‘First you say that marriage is based on love, and when I express a doubt as to the existence of a love other than sensual, you prove the existence of love by the fact that marriages exist. But marriages in our days are mere deception!’
‘No, allow me!’ said the lawyer. ‘I only say that marriages have existed and do exist.’
‘They do! But why? They have existed and do exist among people who see in marriage something sacramental, a mystery binding them in the sight of God. Among them marriages do exist. Among us, people marry regarding marriage as nothing but copulation, and the result is either deception or coercion.15 When it is deception it is easier to bear. The husband and wife merely deceive people by pretending to be monogamists, while living polygamously. That is bad, but still bearable. But when, as m
ost frequently happens, the husband and wife have undertaken the external duty of living together all their lives,16 and begin to hate each other after a month, and wish to part but still continue to live together, it leads to that terrible hell which makes people take to drink, shoot themselves, and kill or poison themselves or one another,’ he went on, speaking more and more rapidly, not allowing anyone to put in a word and becoming more and more excited. We all felt embarrassed.
‘Yes, undoubtedly there are critical episodes in married life,’ said the lawyer, wishing to end this disturbingly heated conversation.
‘I see you have found out who I am!’ said the grey-haired man softly, and with apparent calm.
‘No, I have not that pleasure.’
‘It is no great pleasure. I am that Pózdnyshev in whose life that critical episode occurred to which you alluded; the episode when he killed his wife,’ he said, rapidly glancing at each of us.
No one knew what to say and all remained silent.
‘Well, never mind,’ he said with that peculiar sound of his. ‘However, pardon me. Ah!… I won’t intrude on you.’
‘Oh, no, if you please …’ said the lawyer, himself not knowing ‘if you please’ what.
But Pózdnyshev, without listening to him, rapidly turned away and went back to his seat. The lawyer and the lady whispered together. I sat down beside Pózdnyshev in silence, unable to think of anything to say. It was too dark to read, so I shut my eyes pretending that I wished to go to sleep. So we travelled in silence to the next station.
At that station the lawyer and the lady moved into another car, having some time previously consulted the guard about it. The clerk lay down on the seat and fell asleep. Pózdnyshev kept smoking and drinking tea which he had made at the last station.