第 七 章 · VOLODYA

. VOLODYA

AT five o'clock one Sunday afternoon in summer, Volodya, a plain, shy,

sickly-looking lad of seventeen, was sitting in the arbour of the

Shumihins' country villa, feeling dreary. His despondent thought flowed

in three directions. In the first place, he had next day, Monday, an

examination in mathematics; he knew that if he did not get through the

written examination on the morrow, he would be expelled, for he had

already been two years in the sixth form and had two and three-quarter

marks for algebra in his annual report. In the second place, his

presence at the villa of the Shumihins, a wealthy family with

aristocratic pretensions, was a continual source of mortification to his

_amour-propre_. It seemed to him that Madame Shumihin looked upon him

and his maman as poor relations and dependents, that they laughed at his

_maman_ and did not respect her. He had on one occasion accidently

overheard Madame Shumihin, in the verandah, telling her cousin Anna

Fyodorovna that his _maman_ still tried to look young and got herself

up, that she never paid her losses at cards, and had a partiality for

other people's shoes and tobacco. Every day Volodya besought his _maman_

not to go to the Shumihins', and drew a picture of the humiliating part

she played with these gentlefolk. He tried to persuade her, said rude

things, but she--a frivolous, pampered woman, who had run through two

fortunes, her own and her husband's, in her time, and always gravitated

towards acquaintances of high rank--did not understand him, and twice a

week Volodya had to accompany her to the villa he hated.

In the third place, the youth could not for one instant get rid of a

strange, unpleasant feeling which was absolutely new to him.... It

seemed to him that he was in love with Anna Fyodorovna, the Shumihins'

cousin, who was staying with them. She was a vivacious, loud-voiced,

laughter-loving, healthy, and vigorous lady of thirty, with rosy cheeks,

plump shoulders, a plump round chin and a continual smile on her thin

lips. She was neither young nor beautiful--Volodya knew that perfectly

well; but for some reason he could not help thinking of her, looking at

her while she shrugged her plump shoulders and moved her flat back as

she played croquet, or after prolonged laughter and running up and down

stairs, sank into a low chair, and, half closing her eyes and gasping

for breath, pretended that she was stifling and could not breathe. She

was married. Her husband, a staid and dignified architect, came once a

week to the villa, slept soundly, and returned to town. Volodya's

strange feeling had begun with his conceiving an unaccountable hatred

for the architect, and feeling relieved every time he went back to town.

Now, sitting in the arbour, thinking of his examination next day, and of

his _maman_, at whom they laughed, he felt an intense desire to see

Nyuta (that was what the Shumihins called Anna Fyodorovna), to hear her

laughter and the rustle of her dress.... This desire was not like the

pure, poetic love of which he read in novels and about which he dreamed

every night when he went to bed; it was strange, incomprehensible; he

was ashamed of it, and afraid of it as of something very wrong and

impure, something which it was disagreeable to confess even to himself.

"It's not love," he said to himself. "One can't fall in love with women

of thirty who are married. It is only a little intrigue.... Yes, an

intrigue...."

Pondering on the "intrigue," he thought of his uncontrollable shyness,

his lack of moustache, his freckles, his narrow eyes, and put himself in

his imagination side by side with Nyuta, and the juxtaposition seemed to

him impossible; then he made haste to imagine himself bold, handsome,

witty, dressed in the latest fashion.

When his dreams were at their height, as he sat huddled together and

looking at the ground in a dark corner of the arbour, he heard the sound

of light footsteps. Some one was coming slowly along the avenue. Soon

the steps stopped and something white gleamed in the entrance.

"Is there any one here?" asked a woman's voice.

Volodya recognised the voice, and raised his head in a fright.

"Who is here?" asked Nyuta, going into the arbour. "Ah, it is you,

Volodya? What are you doing here? Thinking? And how can you go on

thinking, thinking, thinking?... That's the way to go out of your mind!"

Volodya got up and looked in a dazed way at Nyuta. She had only just

come back from bathing. Over her shoulder there was hanging a sheet and

a rough towel, and from under the white silk kerchief on her head he

could see the wet hair sticking to her forehead. There was the cool damp

smell of the bath-house and of almond soap still hanging about her. She

was out of breath from running quickly. The top button of her blouse was

undone, so that the boy saw her throat and bosom.

"Why don't you say something?" said Nyuta, looking Volodya up and down.

"It's not polite to be silent when a lady talks to you. What a clumsy

seal you are though, Volodya! You always sit, saying nothing, thinking

like some philosopher. There's not a spark of life or fire in you! You

are really horrid!... At your age you ought to be living, skipping, and

jumping, chattering, flirting, falling in love."

Volodya looked at the sheet that was held by a plump white hand, and

thought....

"He's mute," said Nyuta, with wonder; "it is strange, really.... Listen!

Be a man! Come, you might smile at least! Phew, the horrid philosopher!"

she laughed. "But do you know, Volodya, why you are such a clumsy seal?

Because you don't devote yourself to the ladies. Why don't you? It's

true there are no girls here, but there is nothing to prevent your

flirting with the married ladies! Why don't you flirt with me, for

instance?"

Volodya listened and scratched his forehead in acute and painful

irresolution.

"It's only very proud people who are silent and love solitude," Nyuta

went on, pulling his hand away from his forehead. "You are proud,

Volodya. Why do you look at me like that from under your brows? Look me

straight in the face, if you please! Yes, now then, clumsy seal!"

Volodya made up his mind to speak. Wanting to smile, he twitched his

lower lip, blinked, and again put his hand to his forehead.

"I ... I love you," he said.

Nyuta raised her eyebrows in surprise, and laughed.

"What do I hear?" she sang, as prima-donnas sing at the opera when they

hear something awful. "What? What did you say? Say it again, say it

again...."

"I ... I love you!" repeated Volodya.

And without his will's having any part in his action, without reflection

or understanding, he took half a step towards Nyuta and clutched her by

the arm. Everything was dark before his eyes, and tears came into them.

The whole world was turned into one big, rough towel which smelt of the

bathhouse.

"Bravo, bravo!" he heard a merry laugh. "Why don't you speak? I want you

to speak! Well?"

Seeing that he was not prevented from holding her arm, Volodya glanced

at Nyuta's laughing face, and clumsily, awkwardly, put both arms round

her waist, his hands meeting behind her back. He held her round the

waist with both arms, while, putting her hands up to her head, showing

the dimples in her elbows, she set her hair straight under the kerchief

and said in a calm voice:

"You must be tactful, polite, charming, and you can only become that

under feminine influence. But what a wicked, angry face you have! You

must talk, laugh.... Yes, Volodya, don't be surly; you are young and

will have plenty of time for philosophising. Come, let go of me; I am

going. Let go."

Without effort she released her waist, and, humming something, walked

out of the arbour. Volodya was left alone. He smoothed his hair, smiled,

and walked three times to and fro across the arbour, then he sat down on

the bench and smiled again. He felt insufferably ashamed, so much so

that he wondered that human shame could reach such a pitch of acuteness

and intensity. Shame made him smile, gesticulate, and whisper some

disconnected words.

He was ashamed that he had been treated like a small boy, ashamed of his

shyness, and, most of all, that he had had the audacity to put his arms

round the waist of a respectable married woman, though, as it seemed to

him, he had neither through age nor by external quality, nor by social

position any right to do so.

He jumped up, went out of the arbour, and, without looking round, walked

into the recesses of the garden furthest from the house.

"Ah! only to get away from here as soon as possible," he thought,

clutching his head. "My God! as soon as possible."

The train by which Volodya was to go back with his _maman_ was at

eight-forty. There were three hours before the train started, but he

would with pleasure have gone to the station at once without waiting for

his _maman_.

At eight o'clock he went to the house. His whole figure was expressive

of determination: what would be, would be! He made up his mind to go in

boldly, to look them straight in the face, to speak in a loud voice,

regardless of everything.

He crossed the terrace, the big hall and the drawing-room, and there

stopped to take breath. He could hear them in the dining-room, drinking

tea. Madame Shumihin, _maman_, and Nyuta were talking and laughing about

something.

Volodya listened.

"I assure you!" said Nyuta. "I could not believe my eyes! When he began

declaring his passion and--just imagine!--put his arms round my waist, I

should not have recognised him. And you know he has a way with him! When

he told me he was in love with me, there was something brutal in his

face, like a Circassian."

"Really!" gasped _maman_, going off into a peal of laughter. "Really!

How he does remind me of his father!"

Volodya ran back and dashed out into the open air.

"How could they talk of it aloud!" he wondered in agony, clasping his

hands and looking up to the sky in horror. "They talk aloud in cold

blood ... and _maman_ laughed!... _Maman!_ My God, why didst Thou give

me such a mother? Why?"

But he had to go to the house, come what might. He walked three times up

and down the avenue, grew a little calmer, and went into the house.

"Why didn't you come in in time for tea?" Madame Shumihin asked sternly.

"I am sorry, it's ... it's time for me to go," he muttered, not raising

his eyes. "_Maman_, it's eight o'clock!"

"You go alone, my dear," said his _maman_ languidly. "I am staying the

night with Lili. Goodbye, my dear.... Let me make the sign of the cross

over you."

She made the sign of the cross over her son, and said in French, turning

to Nyuta:

"He's rather like Lermontov ... isn't he?"

Saying good-bye after a fashion, without looking any one in the face,

Volodya went out of the dining-room. Ten minutes later he was walking

along the road to the station, and was glad of it. Now he felt neither

frightened nor ashamed; he breathed freely and easily.

About half a mile from the station, he sat down on a stone by the side

of the road, and gazed at the sun, which was half hidden behind a

barrow. There were lights already here and there at the station, and one

green light glimmered dimly, but the train was not yet in sight. It was

pleasant to Volodya to sit still without moving, and to watch the

evening coming little by little. The darkness of the arbour, the

footsteps, the smell of the bath-house, the laughter, and the waist--all

these rose with amazing vividness before his imagination, and all this

was no longer so terrible and important as before.

"It's of no consequence.... She did not pull her hand away, and laughed

when I held her by the waist," he thought. "So she must have liked it.

If she had disliked it she would have been angry...."

And now Volodya felt sorry that he had not had more boldness there in

the arbour. He felt sorry that he was so stupidly going away, and he was

by now persuaded that if the same thing happened again he would be

bolder and look at it more simply.

And it would not be difficult for the opportunity to occur again. They

used to stroll about for a long time after supper at the Shumihins'. If

Volodya went for a walk with Nyuta in the dark garden, there would be an

opportunity!

"I will go back," he thought, "and will go by the morning train

to-morrow.... I will say I have missed the train."

And he turned back.... Madame Shumihin, _Maman_, Nyuta, and one of the

nieces were sitting on the verandah, playing _vint_. When Volodya told

them the lie that he had missed the train, they were uneasy that he

might be late for the examination day, and advised him to get up early.

All the while they were playing he sat on one side, greedily watching

Nyuta and waiting.... He already had a plan prepared in his mind: he

would go up to Nyuta in the dark, would take her by the hand, then would

embrace her; there would be no need to say anything, as both of them

would understand without words.

But after supper the ladies did not go for a walk in the garden, but

went on playing cards. They played till one o'clock at night, and then

broke up to go to bed.

"How stupid it all is!" Volodya thought with vexation as he got into

bed. "But never mind; I'll wait till to-morrow ... to-morrow in the

arbour. It doesn't matter...."

He did not attempt to go to sleep, but sat in bed, hugging his knees and

thinking. All thought of the examination was hateful to him. He had

already made up his mind that they would expel him, and that there was

nothing terrible about his being expelled. On the contrary, it was a

good thing--a very good thing, in fact. Next day he would be as free as

a bird; he would put on ordinary clothes instead of his school uniform,

would smoke openly, come out here, and make love to Nyuta when he liked;

and he would not be a schoolboy but "a young man." And as for the rest

of it, what is called a career, a future, that was clear; Volodya would

go into the army or the telegraph service, or he would go into a

chemist's shop and work his way up till he was a dispenser.... There

were lots of callings. An hour or two passed, and he was still sitting

and thinking....

Towards three o'clock, when it was beginning to get light, the door

creaked cautiously and his _maman_ came into the room.

"Aren't you asleep?" she asked, yawning. "Go to sleep; I have only come

in for a minute.... I am only fetching the drops...."

"What for?"

"Poor Lili has got spasms again. Go to sleep, my child, your

examination's to-morrow...."

She took a bottle of something out of the cupboard, went to the window,

read the label, and went away.

"Marya Leontyevna, those are not the drops!" Volodya heard a woman's

voice, a minute later. "That's convallaria, and Lili wants morphine. Is

your son asleep? Ask him to look for it...."

It was Nyuta's voice. Volodya turned cold. He hurriedly put on his

trousers, flung his coat over his shoulders, and went to the door.

"Do you understand? Morphine," Nyuta explained in a whisper. "There must

be a label in Latin. Wake Volodya; he will find it."

_Maman_ opened the door and Volodya caught sight of Nyuta. She was

wearing the same loose wrapper in which she had gone to bathe. Her hair

hung loose and disordered on her shoulders, her face looked sleepy and

dark in the half-light....

"Why, Volodya is not asleep," she said. "Volodya, look in the cupboard

for the morphine, there's a dear! What a nuisance Lili is! She has

always something the matter."

_Maman_ muttered something, yawned, and went away.

"Look for it," said Nyuta. "Why are you standing still?"

Volodya went to the cupboard, knelt down, and began looking through the

bottles and boxes of medicine. His hands were trembling, and he had a

feeling in his chest and stomach as though cold waves were running all

over his inside. He felt suffocated and giddy from the smell of ether,

carbolic acid, and various drugs, which he quite unnecessarily snatched

up with his trembling fingers and spilled in so doing.

"I believe _maman_ has gone," he thought. "That's a good thing ... a

good thing...."

"Will you be quick?" said Nyuta, drawling.

"In a minute.... Here, I believe this is morphine," said Volodya,

reading on one of the labels the word "morph...." "Here it is!"

Nyuta was standing in the doorway in such a way that one foot was in his

room and one was in the passage. She was tidying her hair, which was

difficult to put in order because it was so thick and long, and looked

absent-mindedly at Volodya. In her loose wrap, with her sleepy face and

her hair down, in the dim light that came into the white sky not yet lit

by the sun, she seemed to Volodya captivating, magnificent....

Fascinated, trembling all over, and remembering with relish how he had

held that exquisite body in his arms in the arbour, he handed her the

bottle and said:

"How wonderful you are!"

"What?"

She came into the room.

"What?" she asked, smiling.

He was silent and looked at her, then, just as in the arbour, he took

her hand, and she looked at him with a smile and waited for what would

happen next.

"I love you," he whispered.

She left off smiling, thought a minute, and said:

"Wait a little; I think somebody is coming. Oh, these schoolboys!" she

said in an undertone, going to the door and peeping out into the

passage. "No, there is no one to be seen...."

She came back.

Then it seemed to Volodya that the room, Nyuta, the sunrise and

himself--all melted together in one sensation of acute, extraordinary,

incredible bliss, for which one might give up one's whole life and face

eternal torments.... But half a minute passed and all that vanished.

Volodya saw only a fat, plain face, distorted by an expression of

repulsion, and he himself suddenly felt a loathing for what had

happened.

"I must go away, though," said Nyuta, looking at Volodya with disgust.

"What a wretched, ugly ... fie, ugly duckling!"

How unseemly her long hair, her loose wrap, her steps, her voice seemed

to Volodya now!...

"'Ugly duckling' ..." he thought after she had gone away. "I really am

ugly ... everything is ugly."

The sun was rising, the birds were singing loudly; he could hear the

gardener walking in the garden and the creaking of his wheelbarrow ...

and soon afterwards he heard the lowing of the cows and the sounds of

the shepherd's pipe. The sunlight and the sounds told him that somewhere

in this world there is a pure, refined, poetical life. But where was it?

Volodya had never heard a word of it from his _maman_ or any of the

people round about him.

When the footman came to wake him for the morning train, he pretended to

be asleep....

"Bother it! Damn it all!" he thought.

He got up between ten and eleven.

Combing his hair before the looking-glass, and looking at his ugly face,

pale from his sleepless night, he thought:

"It's perfectly true ... an ugly duckling!"

When _maman_ saw him and was horrified that he was not at his

examination, Volodya said:

"I overslept myself, _maman_.... But don't worry, I will get a medical

certificate."

Madame Shumihin and Nyuta waked up at one o'clock. Volodya heard Madame

Shumihin open her window with a bang, heard Nyuta go off into a peal of

laughter in reply to her coarse voice. He saw the door open and a string

of nieces and other toadies (among the latter was his _maman_) file into

lunch, caught a glimpse of Nyuta's freshly washed laughing face, and,

beside her, the black brows and beard of her husband the architect, who

had just arrived.

Nyuta was wearing a Little Russian dress which did not suit her at all,

and made her look clumsy; the architect was making dull and vulgar

jokes. The rissoles served at lunch had too much onion in them--so it

seemed to Volodya. It also seemed to him that Nyuta laughed loudly on

purpose, and kept glancing in his direction to give him to understand

that the memory of the night did not trouble her in the least, and that

she was not aware of the presence at table of the "ugly duckling."

At four o'clock Volodya drove to the station with his _maman_. Foul

memories, the sleepless night, the prospect of expulsion from school,

the stings of conscience--all roused in him now an oppressive, gloomy

anger. He looked at _maman_'s sharp profile, at her little nose, and at

the raincoat which was a present from Nyuta, and muttered:

"Why do you powder? It's not becoming at your age! You make yourself up,

don't pay your debts at cards, smoke other people's tobacco.... It's

hateful! I don't love you ... I don't love you!"

He was insulting her, and she moved her little eyes about in alarm,

flung up her hands, and whispered in horror:

"What are you saying, my dear! Good gracious! the coachman will hear! Be

quiet or the coachman will hear! He can overhear everything."

"I don't love you ... I don't love you!" he went on breathlessly.

"You've no soul and no morals.... Don't dare to wear that raincoat! Do

you hear? Or else I will tear it into rags...."

"Control yourself, my child," _maman_ wept; "the coachman can hear!"

"And where is my father's fortune? Where is your money? You have wasted

it all. I am not ashamed of being poor, but I am ashamed of having such

a mother.... When my schoolfellows ask questions about you, I always

blush."

In the train they had to pass two stations before they reached the town.

Volodya spent all the time on the little platform between two carriages

and shivered all over. He did not want to go into the compartment

because there the mother he hated was sitting. He hated himself, hated

the ticket collectors, the smoke from the engine, the cold to which he

attributed his shivering. And the heavier the weight on his heart, the

more strongly he felt that somewhere in the world, among some people,

there was a pure, honourable, warm, refined life, full of love,

affection, gaiety, and serenity.... He felt this and was so intensely

miserable that one of the passengers, after looking in his face

attentively, actually asked:

"You have the toothache, I suppose?"

In the town _maman_ and Volodya lived with Marya Petrovna, a lady of

noble rank, who had a large flat and let rooms to boarders. _Maman_ had

two rooms, one with windows and two pictures in gold frames hanging on

the walls, in which her bed stood and in which she lived, and a little

dark room opening out of it in which Volodya lived. Here there was a

sofa on which he slept, and, except that sofa, there was no other

furniture; the rest of the room was entirely filled up with wicker

baskets full of clothes, cardboard hat-boxes, and all sorts of rubbish,

which _maman_ preserved for some reason or other. Volodya prepared his

lessons either in his mother's room or in the "general room," as the

large room in which the boarders assembled at dinner-time and in the

evening was called.

On reaching home he lay down on his sofa and put the quilt over him to

stop his shivering. The cardboard hat-boxes, the wicker baskets, and the

other rubbish, reminded him that he had not a room of his own, that he

had no refuge in which he could get away from his mother, from her

visitors, and from the voices that were floating up from the "general

room." The satchel and the books lying about in the corners reminded him

of the examination he had missed.... For some reason there came into his

mind, quite inappropriately, Mentone, where he had lived with his father

when he was seven years old; he thought of Biarritz and two little

English girls with whom he ran about on the sand.... He tried to recall

to his memory the colour of the sky, the sea, the height of the waves,

and his mood at the time, but he could not succeed. The English girls

flitted before his imagination as though they were living; all the rest

was a medley of images that floated away in confusion....

"No; it's cold here," thought Volodya. He got up, put on his overcoat,

and went into the "general room."

There they were drinking tea. There were three people at the samovar:

_maman_; an old lady with tortoiseshell pince-nez, who gave music

lessons; and Avgustin Mihalitch, an elderly and very stout Frenchman,

who was employed at a perfumery factory.

"I have had no dinner to-day," said _maman_. "I ought to send the maid

to buy some bread."

"Dunyasha!" shouted the Frenchman.

It appeared that the maid had been sent out somewhere by the lady of the

house.

"Oh, that's of no consequence," said the Frenchman, with a broad smile.

"I will go for some bread myself at once. Oh, it's nothing."

He laid his strong, pungent cigar in a conspicuous place, put on his hat

and went out. After he had gone away _maman_ began telling the music

teacher how she had been staying at the Shumihins', and how warmly they

welcomed her.

"Lili Shumihin is a relation of mine, you know," she said. "Her late

husband, General Shumihin, was a cousin of my husband. And she was a

Baroness Kolb by birth...."

"_Maman_, that's false!" said Volodya irritably. "Why tell lies?"

He knew perfectly well that what his mother said was true; in what she

was saying about General Shumihin and about Baroness Kolb there was not

a word of lying, but nevertheless he felt that she was lying. There was

a suggestion of falsehood in her manner of speaking, in the expression

of her face, in her eyes, in everything.

"You are lying," repeated Volodya; and he brought his fist down on the

table with such force that all the crockery shook and _maman_'s tea was

spilt over. "Why do you talk about generals and baronesses? It's all

lies!"

The music teacher was disconcerted, and coughed into her handkerchief,

affecting to sneeze, and _maman_ began to cry.

"Where can I go?" thought Volodya.

He had been in the street already; he was ashamed to go to his

schoolfellows. Again, quite incongruously, he remembered the two little

English girls.... He paced up and down the "general room," and went into

Avgustin Mihalitch's room. Here there was a strong smell of ethereal

oils and glycerine soap. On the table, in the window, and even on the

chairs, there were a number of bottles, glasses, and wineglasses

containing fluids of various colours. Volodya took up from the table a

newspaper, opened it and read the title _Figaro_ ... There was a strong

and pleasant scent about the paper. Then he took a revolver from the

table....

"There, there! Don't take any notice of it." The music teacher was

comforting _maman_ in the next room. "He is young! Young people of his

age never restrain themselves. One must resign oneself to that."

"No, Yevgenya Andreyevna; he's too spoilt," said _maman_ in a singsong

voice. "He has no one in authority over him, and I am weak and can do

nothing. Oh, I am unhappy!"

Volodya put the muzzle of the revolver to his mouth, felt something like

a trigger or spring, and pressed it with his finger.... Then felt

something else projecting, and once more pressed it. Taking the muzzle

out of his mouth, he wiped it with the lapel of his coat, looked at the

lock. He had never in his life taken a weapon in his hand before....

"I believe one ought to raise this ..." he reflected. "Yes, it seems

so."

Avgustin Mihalitch went into the "general room," and with a laugh began

telling them about something. Volodya put the muzzle in his mouth again,

pressed it with his teeth, and pressed something with his fingers. There

was a sound of a shot.... Something hit Volodya in the back of his head

with terrible violence, and he fell on the table with his face downwards

among the bottles and glasses. Then he saw his father, as in Mentone, in

a top-hat with a wide black band on it, wearing mourning for some lady,

suddenly seize him by both hands, and they fell headlong into a very

deep, dark pit.

Then everything was blurred and vanished.