I pathetically fell silent, upon concluding my pathetic exclamations. I remember that I wanted terribly somehow to force myself to burst out laughing, because I already sensed that a hostile little demon had begun to stir inside me, that I was about to choke, that my chin was beginning to quiver and that my eyes were watering more and more … I expected Nastenka, who was listening to me with her intelligent eyes wide open, to burst into her childish, irrepressibly merry laughter, and was already regretting that I had gone too far, that I had been wrong to tell her about what had long seethed in my heart, about which I could talk as though I were reading a written text, because I had long ago passed sentence on myself and now could not resist reading it, to confess, without expecting that I should be understood; but to my surprise, she kept silent; after waiting a little bit she gently pressed my hand and with a timid concern asked:
‘Can you really have lived your whole life like that?’
‘My whole life, Nastenka,’ I replied, ‘my whole life and I believe that’s how I’ll end my days!’
‘No, that’s impossible,’ she said uneasily, ‘it won’t be like that – that would mean I would likely live out my whole life by Grandmother’s side. Listen, you do know that it’s bad for you to live like that?’
‘I know, Nastenka, I know!’ I exclaimed, no longer holding my feelings in check. ‘And now I know more than ever that I’ve wasted all my best years for nothing! I know this now, and I feel it all the more painfully now that I see that God himself has sent you, my good angel, to me, in order to tell me this and prove it to me. As I sit beside you and talk to you now, I’m terrified even to think about the future, because the future is once again loneliness, once again this stagnant, useless life; and what will there be for me to dream about when I have already been so happy in real life beside you! Oh, bless you, dear girl, for not turning me away from the very first, for making it possible that I can now say that I have lived at least two evenings in my life!’
‘Oh, no, no!’ Nastenka cried out, and little tears began to glisten in her eyes. ‘No, it won’t be like that any more; we won’t part like that! What are two evenings!’
‘Oh, Nastenka, Nastenka! Do you know you have reconciled me with myself for a good long time? Do you know that now I will not think so badly of myself as I sometimes have done? Do you know that now, perhaps, I will no longer suffer anguish for having committed a crime and sin in my life, because a life like that is a crime and sin? And don’t think that I have been exaggerating anything to you, for God’s sake, Nastenka, don’t think that, because sometimes I am overcome by moments of such anguish, such anguish … Because at those moments it begins to seem that I will never be able to begin living a real life; because it already seems that I have lost all sense, all feeling for the genuine, the real; because, in the end, I curse myself; because after my fantastic nights I am visited by sobering moments that are horrible! Meanwhile, you hear all around you how the throng of humanity thunders and spins in the whirlwind of life; you hear, you see how people live – they live in reality; you see that life for them is not forbidden, that their life doesn’t vanish like a dream, like a vision, that their life is eternally renewing, eternally young, and not a single hour of it resembles any other; whereas how cheerless and monotonously banal is the timorous fantasy, the slave of a shadow, of an idea, the slave of the first cloud that suddenly obscures the sun and fills with anguish the heart of every true Petersburger, which holds its sun so dear – but what sort of fantasy is there to be found in anguish! You sense that this inexhaustible fantasy is finally growing tired, that it is becoming exhausted under constant strain; because, you see, you are growing into manhood, you are outgrowing your former ideals: they are being smashed to dust, to bits and pieces; and if there is no other life, then you must build it from these bits and pieces. But meanwhile your soul yearns and pleads for something else! And in vain does the dreamer rake through his old dreams, as if they were ashes, searching in these ashes for at least some little spark, in order to fan it into flames, and with this rekindled fire warm his heart, which has grown cold, and resurrect in himself once again everything that he had held dear, that had touched his soul, that had made his blood boil, that had brought tears to his eyes and had so splendidly deceived him! Do you know, Nastenka, how low I have fallen? Do you know that I’m compelled now to celebrate the anniversary of my own sensations, the anniversary of that which was formerly so dear, of that which in essence never took place – because this anniversary is celebrated in honour of those same foolish, phantom dreams – and to do it because even those foolish dreams are no more, because I have nothing with which to replenish them: you see, even dreams need to be replenished! Do you know that I now like to recall and visit at certain times places where I was once happy in my own way, I like to fashion my present so that it’s in harmony with the irrevocable past, and I often wander like a shadow, without need or purpose, downcast and sad, through the alleys and streets of Petersburg. And what memories! You recall, for instance, that exactly a year ago now, exactly at this very same time, at this very same hour, you wandered along this very sidewalk just as lonely, just as downcast as you are now! And you recall that your dreams were sad then as well, and even though it was not better then, nevertheless, you somehow feel that it was easier, that you lived more comfortably, that there wasn’t this black brooding that troubles you now; that you didn’t have these pangs of conscience, these gloomy, dismal pangs that now give you no peace night or day. And you ask yourself: Where are your dreams? And you shake your head and say: How quickly do the years fly by! And again you ask yourself: What have you done with your years? Where have you buried your best days? Did you live or not? Look, you say to yourself, look how cold the world is becoming. More years will pass, followed by gloomy solitude, and then doddering old age will come on a walking-stick, to be followed by anguish and despondency. Your fantastic world will grow pale, your dreams will wither, die and scatter like yellow leaves from the trees … Oh, Nastenka! It will be sad, you know, to be left alone, quite alone, and not even have something to regret – nothing, absolutely nothing … because all that I have lost, all this, it was all nothing, a stupid, round zero – it was merely a dream!’
‘Now, stop trying to make me feel sorry for you!’ Nastenka said, wiping away a tear which had rolled down from her eye. ‘That’s all over now! The two of us will be together now; now, no matter what happens to me, we will never part. Listen. I’m a simple girl, without much education, although my grandmother did hire a teacher for me; but I truly do understand you, because everything that you’ve told me just now, I experienced myself when Grandmother pinned me to her dress. Of course, I couldn’t have told it so well as you have done; I’m not educated,’ she added timidly, because she was still feeling some sort of respect for my pathetic speech and my lofty style, ‘but I’m very happy that you have confided in me so completely. Now I know you, through and through, I know everything about you. And do you know what? I want to tell you my story now, all of it, frankly, and afterwards you’ll give me your advice. You’re a very sensible man; do you promise to give me your advice?’
‘Ah, Nastenka,’ I replied, ‘although I’ve never been an adviser, much less a sensible adviser, I see now that it would somehow be very sensible if we were to always live like this, and we would give each other a lot of sensible advice! Well, my pretty Nastenka, what advice should I give you? Tell me frankly; I’m so cheerful, happy, bold and sensible now that I won’t be at a loss for words.’
‘No, no,’ Nastenka interrupted, laughing, ‘it’s not only sensible advice that I need; I need advice that is heartfelt and brotherly, as though you had loved me all your life!’
‘All right, Nastenka, all right!’ I cried out in delight, ‘and if I’d already loved you for twenty years, I still couldn’t have loved you more than I do right now!’
‘Give me your hand!’ Nastenka said.
‘Here it is!’ I answered, as I gave her my hand.
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br /> ‘And so, let’s begin my story!’
NASTENKA’S STORY
‘Half of my story you already know, that is, you know that I have an old grandmother …’
‘If the other half is as short as this one …’ I interrupted, laughing.
‘Keep quiet and listen. First of all, a condition: you’re not to interrupt me, or else I’ll very likely get muddled. Now, listen quietly.
‘I have an old grandmother. I found myself with her when I was still a very little girl, because my mother and father had died. It’s fair to suppose that Grandmother had been richer at one time, because even now she recalls better days. It was she who taught me French and then later hired a teacher for me. When I was fifteen years old (I’m seventeen now), the lessons stopped. And it was at this time that I got into a lot of mischief; but I won’t tell you what I did; it’s enough to say that my misdeed was minor. But Grandmother called me one morning and said that since she was blind she couldn’t keep an eye on me, so she took a pin and fastened my dress to hers, and then she said that we would sit like that for the rest of our lives if, of course, I didn’t behave better. In a word, at first it was quite impossible to get away: I did all my work, reading and studying right beside Grandmother. I once tried to trick her and talked Fyokla into sitting in my place. Fyokla is our maid, she’s deaf. Fyokla sat down instead of me; Grandmother had fallen asleep in her armchair at the time, and I set off for my girlfriend’s not far away. Well, it ended badly. Grandmother woke up when I was away and asked about something, thinking that I was still sitting quietly in my place. Fyokla could see that Grandmother was asking for something, but she couldn’t hear what it was, she thought and thought about what she should do, undid the pin, and took to her heels …’
Here Nastenka paused and laughed. I started to laugh with her. She stopped at once.
‘Now listen, don’t you laugh at my grandmother. I’m laughing, because it’s funny … What can I do when Grandmother really is like that, but I love her all the same. Well, that time I certainly got what for: I was sat down in my place at once and wasn’t allowed to budge an inch.
‘Oh, yes, I also forgot to tell you that we have, that is, Grandmother has her own house, that is, a tiny little house, with only three windows, all made of wood and as old as Grandmother herself; and there’s an attic upstairs; and so a new lodger moved into our attic …’
‘Consequently, there must have been an old lodger?’ I noted in passing.
‘Well, of course there was,’ Nastenka replied, ‘and one who knew how to keep quiet better than you do. True, he could barely move his tongue. He was a little old man, withered, mute, blind, lame, so that it finally became impossible for him to live in this world, and he died; then we needed a new lodger, because we can’t live without a lodger: that together with Grandmother’s pension is practically our entire income. The new lodger, as luck would have it, was a young man, not from around here, from out of town. Since he didn’t try to bargain with her, Grandmother took him in, but later she asked: “So, Nastenka, is our lodger young or not?” I didn’t want to lie: “Now,” I say, “Grandmother, it’s not as though he’s very young, but then he’s not an old man.” “Well, and is he good-looking?” Grandmother asks.
‘Again, I don’t wish to lie. “Yes,” I say, “he’s good-looking, Grandmother!” And Grandmother says: “Oh, what a nuisance, what a nuisance! I’m saying this, Granddaughter, so that you don’t get carried away by him. Oh, what times we live in! Who would have thought it possible, such a piddling lodger – and he has to be good-looking as well: things were different in the old days!”
‘It’s always the old days with Grandmother! She was younger in the old days, and the sun was warmer in the old days, and cream didn’t go sour so quickly in the old days – it’s always the old days! And so I sit and keep quiet, and think to myself: why is Grandmother filling my head with ideas and asking whether our lodger is handsome or whether he’s young? But that was all there was to it; I just gave it a thought and there and then began counting my stitches again – I was knitting stockings – and then completely forgot about it.
The Gambler and Other Stories (Penguin ed.) Page 7