When it wasn’t raining, they would go out and enjoy their honeymoon. Once or twice they went to a shooting range, where Fyodor turned out to be a crack shot, taking down nine of the ten targets. They went to the zoo, where the lioness paced in her cage, stopping only to headbutt the wall, and Fyodor stopped to stroke the camels’ heads. Best of all was the museum, where they pondered the artworks, most of them depicting religious scenes in all the fleshly realism of the European tradition. They were overawed by Raphael’s Sistine Madonna, which Fyodor stood on a chair to see better on account of his myopia. You know, the Sistine Madonna has quite a fantastical face, the face of a mournful holy fool – don’t you think?1 Staring at it sparked off inchoate ideas for a new work of fiction, ideas of the regeneration of all humanity, of eternal beauty, light interspersed with darkness – but there are spots even on the sun!297
They heard that formal proceedings for debts had been issued against Fyodor in St Petersburg, meaning that they were now stuck on an indefinite holiday. They sampled the variable fare that Dresden had to offer, from chopped tongue to ice cream, rarely leaving each other’s side. Fyodor told her she was the most generous creature on earth, but only because she was still young; soon, she would see that she had married a toothless old sinner. Anna replied that there wasn’t a word of truth in it, that she loved him for ever and ever and was the happiest person in the world. After dinner they would take a turn around the gardens, arm in arm under the limes and the chestnuts, with their rose-coloured flowers, or race each other to the jetty on the Elbe, or listen to a concert.298 Fyodor had bought a new brown hat and was delighted when Anna noticed how well it suited him. Each night he would spend an eternity getting ready for bed, as if steeling himself for a journey, and then he would go to kiss her goodnight and they would stay up talking, sometimes for hours. These were the happiest moments of the day for both of them. Fyodor asked Anna to tell him the story of their love and, when she was finished, he told her that he loved her ten times more now than when they had first met.
Anna was certainly pregnant now. People say it’s a trial to have children. Who says that? It is heavenly happiness!299 If it was a girl, they would call her Sonya, the name he had reserved for the heroine of Crime and Punishment,2 and if it was a boy, Misha, in honour of his brother. Mikhail had been dead for three years now, but Fyodor could have sworn he had seen him appear in a doorway after his latest fit.
They squabbled often and made up quickly. Anna was as proud and insecure as Fyodor, and this made each of them alert to any perceived slight. Sometimes one of them would storm off in the park, or the other would refuse to speak until they had received an apology, but neither could bear the uncertainty and they would soon find an excuse to break the tension with a joke or a kind gesture. The only enduring source of conflict was the daily trip to the post office. Katkov still hadn’t sent any money; Pasha had had the nerve to ask Anna’s mother for money; and the spectre of Polina hovered over any letter from an unknown sender.
It was clear by now that Anna must know about Polina’s last letter, which had been quite rude about her. Once, during an argument, Anna told him she was drafting a strongly worded letter to ‘a certain person’ who had hurt her very much and Fyodor demanded to know who while she sat silently writing in the sitting room. Another day, as Anna was leaving to buy envelopes, Fyodor asked which post office she was going to. She told him she wasn’t going to intercept his letters, if that was what he was thinking. As she stood at the front door, he rushed up, chin trembling, and told her she had no right to interfere, even if he were conducting a love affair. She replied coolly that his affairs were no concern of hers, but if he were more open with her she wouldn’t have to conduct her own tedious correspondence. He asked who it was that had dared to annoy her, but she wouldn’t tell him. So they both went to the post office together. There was one letter there marked for Dostoevsky – from Katkov. The money was on its way, which meant that they now had the funds to leave Dresden.
The plan had always been to go to Geneva, where Fyodor would write his next novel, but he wanted to stop at Baden-Baden on the way. I was tormented by a tempting idea of maybe winning 2,000 extra francs. That’s the worst part: I am wicked and too passionate by nature. Everywhere and in everything I go to the very limit; I’ve been overstepping the line my whole life.300 The real problem at Homburg had been that he had left Anna behind, which had distracted him – perhaps if he and Anna were together, the system would work again.
Baden-Baden was quiet for this time of year, since most tourists were off seeing the Paris Exposition.3 The newlyweds checked into the grand Hotel Zum Goldenen Ritter in the centre of town and Fyodor wandered off to have a little look at the casino tables. I am still convinced that, by keeping a completely cool head, and preserving your intelligence and calculation in gambling, it must be possible to overcome the crudity of blind chance and win.301 A day later, he had lost substantially and they moved into a more modest apartment on the outskirts of the city with an enthusiastic and useless maid. It was much cheaper on account of the ceaseless hammering of the blacksmith at his anvil, which began at 4 a.m. in the room below them. All that night I dreamed of roulette, of play, of gold. I seemed in my dreams to be calculating something at the gambling table, some take, some chance, and it oppressed me all night like a nightmare.302
Anna’s morning sickness continued all the next day and she lay motionless on the sofa. Fyodor went out to buy her peppermints and currant juice, then took five of their remaining 45 ducats off to the tables. When he had spent those, he came back and took another ten, leaving them with 30 ducats. When he lost those too, he came back and sat sadly on the edge of the sofa where Anna was sleeping. He threw away his purse, which had brought him nothing but bad luck. A hellish thought occurred to me: why not, when all’s said and done, borrow more after my confession? So I prepared my confession as a sort of fricassee with a sauce of tears, to soften her up. The two thoughts came together; it is awfully difficult to struggle against these double thoughts.303 Waking Anna up, Fyodor began to tell her everything. Anna reassured Fyodor that she understood, and that he could have more money. She gave him another five ducats. He returned late. He had been up by as much as 400 francs, but stayed far longer than he had intended, and he begged her forgiveness, saying he was not worthy of her.
It went on like this the next day. Fyodor took another five ducats to offer up at the tables and lost them. Anna was crying, though she refused to criticise Fyodor himself. He asked for more money and she said no; he begged her and she gave him two ducats. He went and lost them. They agreed it would be best if they went to Geneva sooner rather than later. She gave him a last three ducats, leaving them with only 15, and Fyodor suggested it might have been better if she told him off instead of indulging him, and that it was painful to him, the way she was so sweet.
That day, they bumped into Ivan Goncharov, author of the novel Oblomov, who told Fyodor that Turgenev had spotted him at the tables the day before but hadn’t said hello because he knew that gamblers don’t like being interrupted.4 Their relationship had cooled considerably since Fyodor had slighted him over ‘Phantoms’. Fyodor had just read Turgenev’s new novel Smoke in the March 1867 issue of Katkov’s Russian Herald and hated it. It’s so artificial and confected. There’s a terrible decline in artistry and he doesn’t know Russia.304 As so often, Turgenev’s most notable achievement in publishing the book was to unite both the radicals and the reactionaries in universal condemnation. In these turbulent times the deplorability of Turgenev was perhaps the only common ground among Russian intellectuals, though they all read every word he wrote. But this time, Fyodor wasn’t going to come to his defence; on the contrary, he felt that Turgenev had spent too long in Europe and was losing touch with the motherland. He is a spiteful old woman whose day is over.305 But propriety demanded that Fyodor pay a visit, lest he seem to be avoiding repaying the 50 thalers he still owed Turgenev from two years ago.
Turgenev now lived in the house n
ext door to the love of his life, Pauline Viardot, and her husband Louis, with whom he was on good terms. Although he earned more than Fyodor from his writing, there was also the 5,000 francs a year he now received from his estate at Spasskoe, near the Tolstoys. He had always been better known, better paid and better connected. In his more generous moments, Fyodor even had to concede that Turgenev wrote better prose. But when he called on Turgenev at noon on 10 July, their often productive antagonism now threatened to brim over into open hostility.
He was wearing a sort of indoor wadded jacket with pearl buttons, but it was too short, which was far from becoming to his rather comfortable stomach and the solid curves of his hips. But tastes differ. Over his knees he had a checkered woollen plaid reaching to the floor, though it was warm in the room.306 I knew from experience that, although he made a show of kissing me, he really only proffered his cheek, and so this time I did the same and our cheeks met. He did not show that he noticed it, sat down on the sofa, and affably offered me an easy chair.307
Turgenev immediately began to complain, in his high-pitched voice, about the reception of Smoke. The main idea had ruffled feathers: if Russia were to suddenly vanish from the face of the earth, it wouldn’t be any great loss; indeed, the world would go on exactly as it had before. Apparently the rest of Russia had taken it badly and the English Club in Moscow was even collecting signatures to have him expelled. But Fyodor was the wrong person to complain to. A staunch patriot, he couldn’t stand the liberal game of insulting Russia in the name of love. One can’t listen to such criticism of Russia from a Russian turncoat who might have been useful.308
Fyodor picked up a copy of the book.
‘Smoke should go in the fire,’ he said.309
Turgenev had the nerve to ask why he should do such a thing, and Fyodor told him that he hated Russia and did not believe in its future. Turgenev saw only one way towards civilisation, and couldn’t see any special purpose for Russia – indeed, he had mentioned that he was planning to write an article condemning all Slavophiles and Russophiles.
‘For the sake of convenience, you should order a telescope from Paris,’ Fyodor told him.310
‘What for?’ asked Turgenev.
‘It’s a long way. You can train your telescope on Russia and examine us – otherwise we’ll be hard to make out.’ Turgenev had begun to flush with anger. Fyodor continued with assumed naivety, ‘But I really didn’t expect all this criticism and the failure of Smoke to irritate you so much. Honest to God, it isn’t worth it, forget about it.’
‘But I’m not at all irritated. What do you mean?’
Fyodor changed the subject and they talked a little about their personal lives, but when the subject of Germany came up Fyodor let loose, berating German people as dishonest and questioning the idea that they were any more civilised than the Russians.
If he was red before, Turgenev was now very pale.
‘In talking like that, you are offending me personally. You should know that I have settled here permanently, that I consider myself a German, not a Russian, and I am proud of that!’
‘Although I’ve read Smoke, and have been speaking with you now for a whole hour, I could not at all have expected you to say that,’ replied Fyodor somewhat disingenuously. ‘Please forgive me for having offended you.’
Their parting was stiff. I vowed to myself never again to set foot at Turgenev’s.5 According to custom, Turgenev offered to call on Fyodor in return and Fyodor mentioned that he would not be ready to receive anyone before noon. Turgenev left his card the next day at 10 a.m.
It is impossible to speak of Anna’s goodness and her patience without understanding the pit of addiction and desperation that Fyodor dug for them that year.6 Soon, their 12 ducats had dwindled to five. Fyodor pawned his wedding ring. They were down to two gold pieces; he gambled his way back to 21 gold pieces and redeemed the ring. Fyodor would go out all day while Anna lay on the sofa at home, staring at the wall, or attempting to satisfy cravings for particular foods. He was so well known to the casino that the attendants would bring him an armchair when he arrived, and the other gamblers had marked him out as the man who picked fights when he was jostled. I did, of course, derive acute enjoyment from it, but this enjoyment was at the cost of torture: the whole thing, the people, the gambling, and, most of all, myself in the middle of them, seemed horribly nasty.311 One day he won big and came home with a fruit basket and a bouquet of red and yellow roses for Anna. She often felt queasy, and Fyodor brought lemons and sugar to make her lemonade. For her cravings he tracked down caviar, French mustard, bilberries, ryzhiki mushrooms.7 Even amid the gambling, he was besotted with Anna. Some women fascinate by their beauty or charm in a minute, while you may ruminate over another for six months before you understand what is in her.312
At times, the gambling seemed like a brute fact in much the way that fish swim; at others, it seemed to be a desperate leap at a life that was hopelessly out of reach. At one point, they had as many as 166 gold pieces, but of course the only reliable rule in gambling is that your pot trends towards zero. By 18 July they had only one gold piece left. Fyodor returned to Anna for the fifth time in as many hours and asked her to hand over anything he could pawn. Anna took off the earrings and brooch that he had given her and looked at them, sadly, for a long time, and then kissed them, before handing them to Fyodor. He pulled her onto his lap, told her she was the sweetest person in the whole world, and kissed her breasts and her hands. Then he took off to gamble.8 Whenever I have found myself in some exceptionally shameful position, some more than usually humiliating, despicable and, above all, ridiculous situation, it has always aroused in me not only boundless anger, but at one and the same time an incredible sense of pleasure, an intoxication that came from the agonising awareness of my own depravity. I confess that I often sought it out, because for me it was the most powerful of all such sensations.313 Three hours later, he had lost everything again. He slumped down in a chair at home, covered his face with his hands, and wept.
‘Now I have stolen your last things from you and played them away!’ he cried.314
Anna kneeled by him and tried to comfort him, but they were both miserable beyond words. Fyodor told her that he had gambled for the last time. They lay on the sofa together, went to get cigarettes and then lay down on the bed, Fyodor running through acquaintances who might lend him money. At 11 p. m. he decided that the only thing for it was to try his luck again the next day, one last time. Fyodor told Anna that he loved her unspeakably, loved her and worshipped their growing child.
The next day Fyodor pawned his wedding ring and lost the money. He spent most of that day trudging around in the rain trying to find someone who would take Anna’s scarf. After dinner, he took her wedding ring to pawn instead. He won some money and redeemed the rings. The pawnbroker told him not to play any more, but Fyodor didn’t listen. By the end of the week the rings were back in pawn. Fyodor pawned Anna’s fur. He borrowed money from Goncharov, while Anna wrote to her mother, whose finances were hardly better. Meanwhile, they restricted themselves to free activities to pass the time. They wandered around the grounds of an old castle, taking breaks for Anna to rest, and up some little stone steps to a high fort from which they had a magnificent view of the town and the forested mountains. Fyodor stood at the edge of the precipice.
‘Goodbye now, Anna,’ he said. ‘I’m going to throw myself down.’315
Anna didn’t smile.
Their poverty began to grate. Anna would cry often and it got on Fyodor’s nerves. Her shoes were torn and they couldn’t afford to replace them. She was clearly enervated by the heat, the sound of the smithy, the landlady’s children, who woke them up every morning at six o’clock, Fyodor’s coughing fits and his attacks. One late afternoon in early August, he had a severe fit, during which he could speak only in German. Anna tried to wedge him, half-standing, half-sitting, between the bed and the wall, but his convulsions were too violent. He bashed his right foot painfully against the
wall as Anna eased him back onto two pillows on the floor and undid his buttons. His lips went blue as he fell unconscious. When he woke some time later, he apologised in French, still disoriented, and put on his hat to go out. Anna insisted on accompanying him. Deserted by language, Fyodor kissed her hand over and over, and they drank hot chocolate together.
Anna’s mother came through for them, sending 172 francs. Fyodor lost a little of it, then won a little more. Once they had paid a couple of the bills that had heaped up, and Fyodor had lost some more, they had 30 francs left. He won quite a sum one day. Most days he lost. Anna began to beg him not to return to the casino on the same day, not to go at all, and Fyodor punched the wall in frustration. They soon had no money for breakfast, let alone rent. Fyodor pawned some of their clothes and gambled away most of that.
Anna had picked up a deck of fortune-telling cards, and no matter how many times she shuffled them she kept getting the coffin, which signified either death or loss of property. One day Fyodor told Anna he hated her; another, Anna told him the very idea of him winning money at roulette was utterly ridiculous. Once, Fyodor caught Anna at the tables and scolded her, telling her that she would only lose whatever she won. Later, he told her he only wanted to make sure that she didn’t get overexcited, given her condition.
When Anna’s mother sent another letter containing 150 roubles, they began planning to leave for Geneva. Fyodor hit a streak of luck and before long they had 1,300 francs! They were both over the moon and went to buy sausages and doughnuts. Fyodor thought that if he could get as many as 3,000 gulden they might even send for Anna’s mother. He started staking big money. He lost. He asked for some of the money that Anna’s mother had sent to redeem the brooch, the earrings and the ring. Anna was distraught, but she gave him the money. He returned that night inconsolable, having lost it all.
They decided to leave the next day. Anna escorted Fyodor to the pawnshop to redeem their things, but he then continued gambling and pawning. An hour and a half before their train left, Fyodor went back to the tables, returning twenty minutes later having lost everything he had with him. Anna told him curtly not to be hysterical but to help her fasten the trunks. At the train platform, Turgenev was there, but the two men didn’t so much as bow to one another.
Dostoevsky in Love Page 16