by Leo Tolstoy
‘The first thing I did was to take off my boots and, in my socks, approach the sofa, on the wall above which guns and daggers were hung. I took down a curved Damascus dagger that had never been used and was very sharp. I drew it out of its scabbard. I remember the scabbard fell behind the sofa, and I remember thinking “I must find it afterwards or it will get lost”. Then I took off my overcoat which I was still wearing, and stepping softly in my socks I went there.94
XXVII
‘HAVING crept up stealthily to the door, I suddenly opened it.95 I remember the expression of their faces. I remember that expression because it gave me a painful pleasure – it was an expression of terror. That was just what I wanted. I shall never forget the look of desperate terror that appeared on both their faces the first instant they saw me. He I think was sitting at the table, but on seeing or hearing me he jumped to his feet and stood with his back to the cupboard. His face expressed nothing but quite unmistakable terror. Her face too expressed terror but there was something else besides. If it had expressed only terror, perhaps what happened might not have happened; but on her face there was, or at any rate so it seemed to me at the first moment, also an expression of regret and annoyance that love’s raptures and her happiness with him had been disturbed. It was as if she wanted nothing but that her present happiness should not be interfered with. These expressions remained on their faces but an instant. The look of terror on his changed immediately to one of inquiry: might he, or might he not, begin lying? If he might, he must begin at once; if not, something else would happen. But what?… He looked inquiringly at her face. On her face the look of vexation and regret changed as she looked at him (so it seemed to me) to one of solicitude for him.
‘For an instant I stood in the doorway holding the dagger behind my back.
‘At that moment he smiled, and in a ridiculously indifferent tone remarked: “And we have been having some music.”
‘ “What a surprise!” she began, falling into his tone. But neither of them finished; the same fury I had experienced the week before overcame me. Again I felt that need of destruction, violence, and a transport of rage, and yielded to it. Neither finished what they were saying. That something else began which he had feared and which immediately destroyed all they were saying. I rushed towards her, still hiding the dagger that he might not prevent my striking her in the side under her breast. I selected that spot from the first. Just as I rushed at her he saw it, and – a thing I never expected of him – seized me by the arm and shouted: “Think what you are doing!… Help, someone!…”
‘I snatched my arm away and rushed at him in silence. His eyes met mine and he suddenly grew as pale as a sheet to his very lips. His eyes flashed in a peculiar way, and – what again I had not expected – he darted under the piano and out at the door. I was going to rush after him, but a weight hung on my left arm. It was she. I tried to free myself, but she hung on yet more heavily and would not let me go. This unexpected hindrance, the weight, and her touch which was loathsome to me, inflamed me still more. I felt that I was quite mad and that I must look frightful, and this delighted me. I swung my left arm with all my might, and my elbow hit her straight in the face. She cried out and let go my arm. I wanted to run after him, but remembered that it is ridiculous to run after one’s wife’s lover in one’s socks; and I did not wish to be ridiculous but terrible. In spite of the fearful frenzy I was in, I was all the time aware of the impression I might produce on others, and was even partly guided by that impression. I turned towards her. She fell on the couch, and holding her hand to her bruised eyes, looked at me. Her face showed fear and hatred of me, the enemy, as a rat’s does when one lifts the trap in which it has been caught. At any rate I saw nothing in her expression but this fear and hatred of me. It was just the fear and hatred of me which would be evoked by love for another. But still I might perhaps have restrained myself and not done what I did had she remained silent. But she suddenly began to speak and to catch hold of the hand in which I held the dagger.
‘ “Come to yourself! What are you doing? What is the matter? There has been nothing, nothing, nothing.… I swear it!”
‘I might still have hesitated, but those last words of hers, from which I concluded just the opposite – that everything had happened – called forth a reply. And the reply had to correspond to the temper to which I had brought myself, which continued to increase and had to go on increasing. Fury, too, has its laws.
‘ “Don’t lie, you wretch!” I howled, and seized her arm with my left hand, but she wrenched herself away. Then, still without letting go of the dagger, I seized her by the throat with my left hand, threw her backwards, and began throttling her. What a firm neck it was …! She seized my hand with both hers trying to pull it away from her throat, and as if I had only waited for that, I struck her with all my might with the dagger in the side below the ribs.
‘When people say they don’t remember what they do in a fit of fury, it is rubbish, falsehood. I remembered everything and did not for a moment lose consciousness of what I was doing. The more frenzied I became the more brightly the light of consciousness burnt in me, so that I could not help knowing everything I did. I knew what I was doing every second. I cannot say that I knew beforehand what I was going to do; but I knew what I was doing when I did it, and even I think a little before, as if to make repentance possible and to be able to tell myself that I could stop. I knew I was hitting below the ribs and that the dagger would enter. At the moment I did it I knew I was doing an awful thing such as I had never done before, which would have terrible consequences. But that consciousness passed like a flash of lightning and the deed immediately followed the consciousness. I realized the action with extraordinary clearness. I felt, and remember, the momentary resistance of her corset and of something else, and then the plunging of the dagger into something soft. She seized the dagger with her hands, and cut them, but could not hold it back.
‘For a long time afterwards, in prison when the moral change had taken place in me, I thought of that moment, recalled what I could of it, and considered it. I remembered that for an instant, only an instant, before the action I had a terrible consciousness that I was killing, had killed, a defenceless woman, my wife! I remember the horror of that consciousness and conclude from that, and even dimly remember, that having plunged the dagger in I pulled it out immediately, trying to remedy what had been done and to stop it. I stood for a second motionless waiting to see what would happen, and whether it could be remedied.
‘She jumped to her feet and screamed: “Nurse! He has killed me.”
‘Having heard the noise the nurse was standing by the door. I continued to stand waiting, and not believing the truth. But the blood rushed from under her corset.96 Only then did I understand that it could not be remedied, and I immediately decided that it was not necessary it should be, that I had done what I wanted and had to do. I waited till she fell down, and the nurse, crying “Good God!” ran to her, and only then did I throw away the dagger and leave the room.
‘ “I must not be excited; I must know what I am doing,” I said to myself without looking at her and at the nurse. The nurse was screaming – calling for the maid. I went down the passage, sent the maid, and went into my study. “What am I to do now?” I asked myself, and immediately realized what it must be. On entering the study I went straight to the wall, took down a revolver and examined it – it was loaded – I put it on the table. Then I picked up the scabbard from behind the sofa and sat down there.
‘I sat thus for a long time. I did not think of anything or call anything to mind. I heard the sounds of bustling outside. I heard someone drive up, then someone else. Then I heard and saw Egór bring into the room my wicker trunk he had fetched. As if anyone wanted that!
‘ “Have you heard what has happened?” I asked. “Tell the yard-porter to inform the police.” He did not reply, and went away. I rose, locked the door, got out my cigarettes and matches and began to smoke. I had not finished the cig
arette before sleep overpowered me. I must have slept for a couple of hours. I remember dreaming that she and I were friendly together, that we had quarrelled but were making it up, there was something rather in the way, but we were friends. I was awakened by someone knocking at the door. “That is the police!” I thought, waking up. “I have committed murder, I think. But perhaps it is she, and nothing has happened.” There was again a knock at the door. I did not answer, but was trying to solve the question whether it had happened or not. Yes, it had! I remembered the resistance of the corset and the plunging in of the dagger, and a cold shiver ran down my back. “Yes, it has. Yes, and now I must do away with myself too,” I thought. But I thought this knowing that I should not kill myself. Still I got up and took the revolver in my hand. But it is strange: I remember how I had many times been near suicide, how even that day on the railway it had seemed easy, easy just because I thought how it would stagger her – now I was not only unable to kill myself but even to think of it. “Why should I do it?” I asked myself, and there was no reply. There was more knocking at the door. “First I must find out who is knocking. There will still be time for this.” I put down the revolver and covered it with a newspaper. I went to the door and unlatched it. It was my wife’s sister, a kindly, stupid widow. “Vásya, what is this?” and her ever ready tears began to flow.
‘ “What do you want?” I asked rudely. I knew I ought not to be rude to her and had no reason to be, but I could think of no other tone to adopt.
‘ “Vásya, she is dying! Iván Zakhárych says so.” Iván Zakhárych was her doctor and adviser.
‘ “Is he here?” I asked, and all my animosity against her surged up again. “Well, what of it?”
‘ “Vásya, go to her. Oh, how terrible it is!” said she.
‘ “Shall I go to her?” I asked myself, and immediately decided that I must go to her. Probably it is always done, when a husband has killed his wife, as I had – he must certainly go to her. “If that is what is done, then I must go,” I said to myself. “If necessary I shall always have time,” I reflected, referring to the shooting of myself, and I went to her. “Now we shall have phrases, grimaces, but I will not yield to them,” I thought. “Wait,” I said to her sister, “it is silly without boots, let me at least put on slippers.”
XXVIII
‘WONDERFUL to say, when I left my study and went through the familiar rooms, the hope that nothing had happened again awoke in me; but the smell of that doctor’s nastiness – iodoform and carbolic – took me aback. “No, it had happened.” Going down the passage past the nursery I saw little Lisa. She looked at me with frightened eyes. It even seemed to me that all the five children were there and all looked at me. I approached the door, and the maid opened it from inside for me and passed out. The first thing that caught my eye was her light-grey dress thrown on a chair and all stained black with blood. She was lying on one of the twin beds (on mine because it was easier to get at), with her knees raised. She lay in a very sloping position supported by pillows, with her dressing jacket unfastened. Something had been put on the wound. There was a heavy smell of iodoform in the room. What struck me first and most of all was her swollen and bruised face, blue on part of the nose and under the eyes. This was the result of the blow with my elbow when she had tried to hold me back. There was nothing beautiful about her, but something repulsive as it seemed to me. I stopped on the threshold. “Go up to her, do,” said her sister. “Yes, no doubt she wants to confess,” I thought. “Shall I forgive her? Yes, she is dying and may be forgiven,” I thought, trying to be magnanimous. I went up close to her. She raised her eyes to me with difficulty, one of them was black, and with an effort said falteringly:
‘ “You’ve got your way, killed …” and through the look of suffering and even the nearness of death her face had the old expression of cold animal hatred that I knew so well.
“I shan’t … let you have … the children, all the same.… She (her sister) will take …”
‘Of what to me was the most important matter, her guilt, her faithlessness, she seemed to consider it beneath her to speak.
‘ “Yes, look and admire what you have done,” she said looking towards the door, and she sobbed. In the doorway stood her sister with the children. “Yes, see what you have done.”
‘I looked at the children and at her bruised disfigured face, and for the first time I forgot myself, my rights, my pride, and for the first time saw a human being in her.97 And so insignificant did all that had offended me, all my jealousy, appear, and so important what I had done, that I wished to fall with my face to her hand, and say: “Forgive me,” but dared not do so.
‘She lay silent with her eyes closed, evidently too weak to say more. Then her disfigured face trembled and puckered. She pushed me feebly away.
‘ “Why did it all happen? Why?”
‘ “Forgive me,” I said.
98‘ “Forgive! That’s all rubbish!… Only not to die!…” she cried, raising herself, and her glittering eyes were bent on me. “Yes, you have had your way!… I hate you! Ah! Ah!” she cried, evidently already in delirium and frightened at something. “Shoot! I’m not afraid!… Only kill everyone …! He has gone …! Gone …!”
‘After that the delirium continued all the time. She did not recognize99 anyone. She died towards noon that same day. Before that they had taken me to the police-station and from there to prison. There, during the eleven months I remained awaiting trial, I examined myself and my past, and understood it. I began to understand it on the third day: on the third day they took me there …’
He was going on but, unable to repress his sobs, he stopped. When he recovered himself he continued:
‘I only began to understand when I saw her in her coffin …’
He gave a sob, but immediately continued hurriedly:
‘Only when I saw her dead face did I understand all that I had done. I realized that I, I, had killed her; that it was my doing that she, living, moving, warm, had now become motionless, waxen, and cold, and that this could never, anywhere, or by any means, be remedied. He who has not lived through it cannot understand.… Ugh! Ugh! Ugh!…’ he cried several times and then was silent.
We sat in silence a long while. He kept sobbing and trembling as he sat opposite me without speaking. His face had grown narrow and elongated and his mouth seemed to stretch right across it.
‘Yes,’ he suddenly said. ‘Had I then known what I know now, everything would have been different. Nothing would have induced me to marry her.… I should not have married at all.’
Again we remained silent for a long time.
100‘Well, forgive me.…’14 He turned away from me and lay down on the seat, covering himself up with his plaid. At the station where I had to get out (it was at eight o’clock in the morning) I went up to him to say good-bye. Whether he was asleep or only pretended to be, at any rate he did not move. I touched him with my hand. He uncovered his face, and I could see he had not been asleep.
‘Good-bye,’ I said, holding out my hand. He gave me his and smiled slightly, but so piteously that I felt ready to weep.
‘Yes, forgive me …’ he said, repeating the same words with which he had concluded his story.
1 It was customary in Russia for a first, second and third bell to ring before a train left a station.
2 Literally ‘in the terem’, the terem being the woman’s quarter where in older times the women of a Russian family used to be secluded in oriental fashion.
3 The Housebuilder, a sixteenth-century manual, by the monk Silvester, on religion and household management.
4 One Russian edition adds: ‘First women’s rights, the civil marriage, and then divorce, come as unsettled questions.’
5 Tea in Russia is usually drank out of tumblers.
6 In Russia, as in other continental countries and formerly in England, the maisons de tolérance were under the supervision of the government; doctors were employed to examine the women, and, as far as pos
sible, see that they did not continue their trade when diseased.
7 A notorious Parisian cancanière.
8 Streets in Moscow in which brothels were numerous.
9 In the printed and censored Russian edition the word ‘Court’ was changed to ‘most refined’.
10 In Russia wet-nurses were usually provided with an elaborate national costume by their employers.
11 The practice of employing wet-nurses was very much more general in Russia than in the English-speaking countries.
12 The card-game named in the original, and then much played in Russia, was vint, which resembles bridge.
13 Vánka the Steward is the subject and name of some old Russian poems. Vánka seduces his master’s wife, boasts of having done so, and is hanged.
14 In Russian the word for ‘forgive me’ is very similar to that for ‘good-bye’, and is sometimes used in place of the latter.
APPENDIX
The following are the readings of the lithograph:
1 Add: with remarkable glittering eyes of an indefinite colour, which attracted attention. Some of the description that follows is omitted.
2 Read: At first the clerk said that the place opposite was engaged; to which the old man replied that he was only going as far as the next station.
3 Read: considering probably that this did not at all infringe the dignity his figure and manner denoted, …
4 For the above paragraph read: ‘And then come discord, financial troubles, mutual recrimination, and the married couple separate,’ said the lawyer.