The Little Demon

by Fyodor Sologub

  ‘I dreamed about you last night,’ laughed Lyudmila. ‘You were swimming by the town bridge. I was sitting on it and I fished you out.’

  ‘And did you put me in a jar?’ Sasha asked playfully.

  ‘Why a jar?’

  ‘Where else then?’

  ‘I didn’t put you anywhere. I caught you by the ears and threw you back into the river.’ And she laughed long and noisily.

  ‘You are strange!’ said Sasha. ‘I can’t wait to hear what you have to tell me.’

  Lyudmila laughed long and loud.

  ‘You’ve brought me here on false pretences. You promised to show me something,’ Sasha said reproachfully.

  ‘Oh, I shall! Would you like something to eat?’

  ‘I’ve just had dinner,’ Sasha said. ‘Oh, you’re so deceitful!’

  ‘As if I would want to deceive you! Ugh, is that you reeking of hair oil?’ she suddenly asked. Sasha blushed. ‘I cannot stand hair oil!’ Lyudmila said testily. ‘You’re just like a girl!’ She ran her hand through his shiny hair and slapped his cheek with her greasy palm. ‘Don’t you dare do that again, do you hear?’

  Sasha was quite taken aback. ‘All right, I promise,’ he said. ‘You’re so strict with me! But you sprinkle yourself with perfume!’

  ‘Perfume and hair oil are completely different, you stupid boy! You can’t compare them,’ Lyudmila said persuasively. ‘I never use oil on my hair. Why should I stick my hair with glue? Perfume’s quite different. Let me spray you again. Would you like that? How about lilac?’

  ‘That would be lovely,’ Sasha replied, smiling. It was a pleasant thought, going home smelling sweetly of perfume and surprising Kokovkina again.

  ‘Who wants some?’ she asked again, taking the bottle of jasmine perfume in her hand and giving Sasha a questioning, cunning look.

  ‘I want some,’ Sasha said.

  ‘Then what are you barking* for? Yes, you’re barking for it!’ Lyudmila gaily teased him.

  Sasha and Lyudmila laughed happily.

  ‘Aren’t you scared I might strangle you?’ Lyudmila asked. ‘Do you remember what a coward you were yesterday?’

  ‘I wasn’t a coward at all,’ Sasha said, flaring up.

  Softly laughing and still teasing him, Lyudmila started spraying him with jasmine. Sasha thanked her and kissed her hand again.

  ‘And see you get a haircut!’ Lyudmila said sternly. ‘You’ll frighten the horses with that long hair of yours!’

  ‘All right then, I’ll have it cut,’ Sasha replied. ‘You’re terribly strict! My hair’s very short, only half an inch long. Even the school-inspector’s never passed any comment on it.’

  ‘I love to see young boys with short hair, so don’t forget that,’ Lyudmila said, solemnly threatening him with her finger. ‘I’m not an inspector, but you must still obey me!’

  From that day onwards Lyudmila’s visits to Kokovkina’s became more and more frequent. She tried – particularly at the beginning – to time her visits when Kokovkina would be out and she sometimes resorted to all kinds of cunning to lure the old woman away from the house. Once Darya told her, ‘You’re such a coward! Scared of that old woman! Why don’t you go when she’s there and then take Sasha out for a walk?’

  Lyudmila followed her advice and began to go whenever she felt like it. If Kokovkina happened to be at home she would talk to her for a short while and then she would take Sasha out for a brief walk, never keeping him away for very long.

  Although the friendship between Sasha and Lyudmila soon became deep, it was by no means a tranquil relationship. Lyudmila herself didn’t notice that she excited strange urges and desires in the boy, feelings he was still too young really to understand. Sasha often kissed her hands and her slender, supple wrists covered with soft, pliant skin – through its yellow-pink tissue he could see her delicate twisting blue veins. And it was easy to kiss her long shapely arms right up to the elbows by rolling up her broad sleeves.

  Sometimes Sasha didn’t tell Kokovkina that Lyudmila had called. It wasn’t that he lied – he just didn’t say anything. There was no point in telling lies with a maid around the house. And he found it very difficult not to talk about Lyudmila; all the time her laughter rang in his ears: he wanted to tell everyone about her, but for some reason felt too embarrassed. Sasha soon became very friendly with the other sisters. He kissed their hands as well and before long was calling them Dashenka, Valerochka, Lyudmilochka.

  SEVENTEEN

  One day Lyudmila met Sasha in the street. ‘The headmaster’s wife is giving a birthday party for her elder daughter tomorrow. Is the old girl going?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Sasha replied. And a feeling of joyous hope stirred in his heart – not so much hope as desire. He knew that Lyudmila would come as soon as Kokovkina had gone and would stay with him. That evening he reminded Kokovkina about the party.

  ‘Oh yes, thanks for reminding me,’ Kokovkina said. ‘Of course I’m going. Such a nice girl, the headmaster’s daughter.’

  And as soon as Sasha came home from school Kokovkina went to the Khripachs’. Sasha was overjoyed at the thought that he had helped to get her out of the house. Now he was certain that Lyudmila would find time to come.

  And come she did. She at once kissed Sasha on the cheek and gave him her hand to kiss. She laughed merrily, but he blushed furiously. Her clothes smelled of a mixture of rose and iris – the sensuous, voluptuous iris dissolved in the sweet dreamy fragrance of roses. She had brought a long narrow box wrapped in thin paper, through which Sasha glimpsed a yellowish label. She sat down, placed the box in her lap and gave Sasha an equivocal look.

  ‘Do you like dates?’ she asked.

  ‘I love them,’ Sasha replied with an amused grin.

  ‘Well, I’ve brought you some,’ she said solemnly. Then she unwrapped the box and ordered, ‘Eat up!’ She took out the dates one by one and popped them into Sasha’s mouth: after each one he had to kiss her hand.

  ‘Ooh, my lips are all sweet and sticky!’ he said.

  ‘What’s wrong with that?’ she replied gaily. ‘You may kiss me as much as you like. I shan’t be offended!’

  ‘I’d rather let you have all the kisses at once, right away,’ Sasha laughed. He reached out for a date.

  ‘You’ll cheat me, I know it!’ Lyudmila cried. She shut the box with a bang and slapped him across the fingers.

  ‘I’m an honest boy. I wouldn’t cheat you,’ Sasha assured her.

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘Would you like payment in advance?’ Sasha suggested.

  ‘Now you’re talking business!’ Lyudmila eagerly exclaimed. ‘Kiss me.’

  She held out her hand and Sasha took her long, slender, delicate fingers, kissed them once and asked, artfully smiling and still holding her hand, ‘You promise not to cheat, Lyudmilochka?’

  ‘Do you really think I’m dishonest?’ Lyudmila cheerfully replied. ‘You need have no worries, just go ahead and kiss me. I shan’t cheat you.’

  Sasha bent over her hand and started kissing it all over, making rich smacking sounds with his wide-open lips. He was delighted that there was so much to kiss. Lyudmila carefully counted the kisses and when he reached ten she said, ‘It must be very awkward for you, having to lean over all the time.’

  ‘Yes, I’ll make myself more comfortable.’

  He dropped on to his knees and continued kissing her with great ardour. He loved nice things to eat and was delighted that Lyudmila had brought him something sweet. For this he loved her even more tenderly.

  Lyudmila next sprayed Sasha with a lusciously aromatic perfume. Sasha was amazed at its fragrance, sweet but strange, overpowering, radiantly misty like a sinful golden sunrise glimpsed through a milky haze.

  ‘What a strange perfume!’ he said.

  ‘Try some on your hand.’

  And she gave him an ugly four-cornered jar with rounded edges. Sasha held it up to the light. The liquid was bright yellow and the l
arge gaudy label bore the name Cyclamen Maison de Piveur.* Sasha pulled out the flat glass stopper and sniffed. Yes, cyclamen! Then he did what Lyudmila loved doing: he put his palm over the mouth, turned the jar upside down and then stood it upright again, rubbed the drops of cyclamen between his hands and smelled carefully.

  The spirit had evaporated, leaving the pure aroma. Lyudmila looked at him with nervous excitement.

  Sasha said, rather hesitantly, ‘It smells a bit like candied bedbugs!’

  ‘Don’t talk such nonsense!’ Lyudmila said irritably.

  She too put some perfume on her hand and sniffed it.

  ‘Yes, like bedbugs,’ Sasha repeated.

  Lyudmila suddenly flared up so much that little tears glistened in her eyes. She struck Sasha across the cheek and exclaimed, ‘Ugh, you wicked boy! Take that for your bugs!’

  ‘That was quite a smack!’ Sasha said, laughing and kissing Lyudmila’s hand. ‘Darling Lyudmilochka! Why are you so angry? Well, what does it smell like to you?’ The blow across the cheek didn’t make him angry at all: he was too enchanted with Lyudmila.

  ‘Smell like?’ she asked, seizing his ear. ‘I’ll tell you in a moment. But let me pull this first.’

  ‘Oh! Oh! Please, darling Lyudmilochka, I promise not to say silly things again,’ Sasha said, wincing from the pain.

  Lyudmila let go of the reddened ear, gently drew Sasha towards her and sat him on her knee. ‘Let me tell you all about the three scents that live in the cyclamen,’ she said. ‘The first is ambrosia – that’s for the worker bees. You should know that cyclamen’s called sowbread† in this country.’

  ‘Sowbread,’ Sasha repeated, laughing. ‘What a funny name!’

  ‘Don’t you laugh, you little rascal,’ Lyudmila said, seizing his other ear and continuing, ‘There’s the sweet ambrosia with the bees humming over it – that’s the flower’s joy. Then there’s the scent of mild vanilla, which is not for the bees but for the lover of whom we maidens dream. That is the flower’s desire, with the golden sun shining above. The third scent is of a tender, sweet body – this is the poor flower’s love, in the sultry noonday heat. Bees, sun, sultry heat – do you understand, my precious?’

  Sasha silently nodded. His dark face was burning and his long dark eyelashes trembled. Lyudmila dreamily gazed into the distance, her face flushed. ‘The tender sunny cyclamen brings joy, sweet and shameful desires, and stirs the blood. Do you understand, my treasure, what it is to know sweetness, to feel joy and pain, when one wants to weep, all at once? Do you? Let me show you!’

  And she clung to Sasha’s lips in a long kiss.

  Lyudmila stared straight ahead thoughtfully. Suddenly a cunning smile flickered over her lips. Gently she pushed Sasha away and asked, ‘Do you like roses?’

  Sasha sighed, opened wide his eyes, smiled sweetly and softly whispered, ‘Oh yes!’

  ‘Large ones?’ Lyudmila asked.

  ‘All kinds, large ones, small ones,’ Sasha replied, getting up from her lap with a swift movement, just like a young boy.

  ‘And do you like rozochki?’* Lyudmila tenderly asked, her reasonant voice shaking with suppressed laughter.

  ‘Yes I do,’ Sasha quickly replied.

  Lyudmila laughed and blushed. ‘Stupid! You like rozochki, but there’s no one to whip you!’

  They both laughed and blushed. For Lyudmila the whole charm of the affair lay in its enforced innocence; and though they were stirred by desires, they were yet far from consummating them.

  They had a quarrel as to who was the stronger.

  ‘Well, you may be stronger,’ said Lyudmila, ‘but it’s agility that counts.’

  ‘I’m agile too,’ Sasha boasted.

  ‘As an elephant!’ Lyudmila teased.

  They continued quarrelling for some time, until Lyudmila proposed they had a fight to settle the argument.

  Sasha laughed and cried, ‘You don’t stand a chance with me!’

  Lyudmila replied by tickling him.

  ‘Oh, that’s what you want, is it?’ laughed Sasha and grasped her around the waist.

  A furious tussle commenced. Lyudmila saw at once that Sasha was the stronger, so she resorted to cunning. At the right moment she tripped him and he fell on to the floor, taking Lyudmila with him. With a swift movement Lyudmila wriggled out of his grasp and pressed him to the floor. Sasha cried out in despair, ‘That’s not fair!’ Lyudmila stuck her knees into his stomach and held him pinned down. Sasha made desperate but futile attempts to escape. Lyudmila started tickling him again. Sasha’s sonorous laughter mingled with hers. She laughed so much that she had to let him go.

  He leaped to his feet, red in the face and quite angry. ‘Rusalka!’,* he cried.

  But the nymph simply lay on the floor and laughed.

  Then Lyudmila took him on her knee. Exhausted after the battle, they looked tenderly, joyfully into each other’s eyes and smiled.

  ‘I’m too heavy for you,’ Sasha said, ‘I’ll squash your knees if you don’t let me go.’

  ‘Never mind, sit still,’ Lyudmila replied affectionately. ‘And you told me you liked a cuddle!’ She stroked his hair and Sasha clung close to her. ‘You know, you’re very handsome, Sasha.’

  He blushed and burst out laughing. ‘Tell me more!’ he said. He found it somewhat disconcerting if anyone talked about good looks when he was the subject. As yet he had never been curious enough to find out whether others thought he was handsome or an ugly brute.

  Lyudmila pinched his cheek so hard that a red spot appeared: it looked quite pretty. Sasha smiled. Lyudmila did the same to his other cheek. Sasha didn’t resist but took her hand, kissed it and said, ‘Please stop pinching, it hurts. And you’ll spoil your fingers.’

  ‘Of course it hurts,’ Lyudmila said, ‘but you’ve become quite the little flatterer!’

  ‘I must be going, I’ve so much homework. Give me one more cuddle, just for luck, so that I get a five for Greek.’

  ‘So you’re throwing me out!’ Lyudmila said. She seized his hand and rolled the sleeve up above the elbow.

  ‘Are you going to slap me?’ Sasha asked, blushing with guilt and embarrassment. But Lyudmila was content to admire his arm and turned it this way and that.

  ‘What a beautiful arm!’ she said in her resonant voice – and suddenly she kissed it near the elbow. Sasha turned red and tried to pull it away. But Lyudmila held on and kissed it several times more before letting go. Sasha didn’t say a word and looked down at the floor. His bright half-smiling lips took on a strange look and his burning cheeks began to turn pale beneath the shadow of his luxuriant eyelashes.

  They said goodbye and Sasha saw her to the gate – as far as she would let him go with her this time.

  ‘Please come more often, dear, and don’t forget to bring some nice sweet gingerbread.’

  Impulsively she embraced him once more, kissed him and ran off. Sasha stood there as if stunned.

  Sasha had promised to go and see her. The appointed time had arrived, but not Sasha. Lyudmila impatiently fidgeted and fretted, her eyes glued to the window. Whenever she heard footsteps in the street she would look out. Her sisters laughed and she angrily and excitedly told them, ‘To hell with you! Leave me alone!’ And she hurled reproaches at them for laughing at her.

  It was obvious by now that Sasha wasn’t coming and Lyudmila wept with grief and disappointment.

  ‘Oy, oy, oy! Where’s your little boy?’ teased Darya.

  As she sobbed her heart out, Lyudmila was so grief-stricken that she forgot all about being angry with her sisters and softly told them, ‘The old bitch is keeping him in to do his Greek homework.’

  In a crude attempt to be sympathetic Darya said, ‘He’s such a country bumpkin he doesn’t know how to get out of it!’

  ‘Fancy getting involved with a little boy!’ Valeriya said disdainfully.

  Despite their laughter, both sisters felt sorry for Lyudmila. They loved one another tenderly, but not deeply. Tender love is never
deep!

  ‘Why on earth are you crying your eyes out over a little milksop?’ Darya said. ‘One could say it’s an affair between the boy and the devil.’

  ‘Who’s the devil?’ Lyudmila cried heatedly and turned deep purple.

  ‘Why you, dear,’ Darya calmly replied. ‘Granted you’re young, but still …’ She didn’t finish and broke into a piercing whistle.

  ‘Rubbish!’ Lyudmila said in a strangely resonant voice.

  A peculiar cruel smile shone through her tears, lighting up her face as a fiery ray at sunset shines through the last weary rainfall.

  ‘Please tell me what you find so interesting about him?’ Darya asked irritably.

  With that same peculiar smile Lyudmila replied slowly and deliberately, ‘He’s … beautiful! So full of untapped possibilities!’

  ‘That’s nothing,’ Darya said determinedly. ‘All boys are like that.’

  ‘I don’t agree,’ Lyudmila indignantly replied. ‘Other boys are disgusting.’

  ‘And is he so pure?’ asked Valeriya, contemptuously dragging out ‘pure’.

  ‘A fat lot you understand!’ Lyudmila cried, but then immediately slipped back into her soft, dreamy voice. ‘He’s … innocent!’

  ‘Go on!’ Darya scoffed.

  ‘The best age for boys is between fourteen and fifteen,’ Lyudmila said. ‘At that age they can’t do anything, nor do they understand anything, yet they are just beginning to respond. And they don’t have revolting beards.’

  ‘That’s a lot to be thankful for, I’m sure,’ Valeriya said with a disdainful grin. She was sad: she was conscious of being so small, frail and delicate, and envied her sisters – Darya her cheerful laugh and even Lyudmila her tears.

  ‘You don’t understand at all,’ Lyudmila repeated. ‘I don’t love him the way you think. Anyway, a boy’s better than some monstrosity with whiskers. My love is pure and innocent. I want nothing from him.’