Oblomov (22 page)

‘Well, what is there to tell?’ Luka Savich said, looking put out. ‘Alexey Naumich has invented it all: there was nothing of the kind at all.’

‘Oh!’ they shouted in chorus. ‘What do you mean – nothing happened at all? We’re not dead, are we? And what about that scar on your forehead? You can still see it.’

And they shook with laughter.

‘What are you laughing at?’ Luka Savich tried to put in a word between the outbursts of laughter. ‘I – I’d have been all right if that rascal Vaska had not given me that old toboggan – it came to pieces under me – I – –’

His voice was drowned in the general laughter. In vain did he try to finish the story of his fall: the laughter spread to the hall and the maids’ room, till the whole house was full of it; they all recalled the amusing incident, they all laughed and laughed in unison,
ineffably,
like the Olympian gods. When the laughter began to die down, someone would start it anew and – off they went again.

At last they managed somehow to compose themselves.

‘Will you go tobogganing this Christmas?’ Luka Savich asked Oblomov’s father after a pause.

Another general outburst of laughter which lasted for about ten minutes.

‘Shall I ask Antip to get the hill ready before the holidays?’ Oblomov’s father said suddenly. ‘Luka Savich is dying to have another go – he can’t bear to wait – –’

The laughter of the whole company interrupted him.

‘But is that toboggan still in working order?’ one of them asked, choking with laughter.

There was more laughter.

They all went on laughing for a long time, then gradually began quieting down: one was wiping his tears, another blowing his nose, a third coughing violently and clearing his throat, saying with difficulty: ‘Oh dear, oh dear, this will be the death of me! Dear me, the way he rolled over on his back with the skirts of his coat flying – –’

This was followed by another outburst of laughter, the last and the longest of all, and then all was quiet. One man sighed, another yawned aloud, muttering something under his breath, and everyone fell silent.

As before, the only sounds that could be heard were the ticking of the clock, Oblomov’s father’s footfalls, and the sharp snapping of a thread broken off by one of the ladies. Suddenly
Oblomov’s father stopped in the middle of the room, looking dismayed and touching the tip of his nose.

‘Good heavens,’ he said, ‘what can this mean? Someone’s going to die: the tip of my nose keeps itching.’

‘Goodness,’ his wife cried, throwing up her hands, ‘no one’s going to die if it’s the tip of the nose that’s itching. Someone’s going to die when the bridge of the nose is itching. Really, my dear, you never can remember anything! You’ll say something like this when strangers or visitors are in the house, and you will disgrace yourself!’

‘But what does it mean when the tip of your nose is itching?’ Oblomov’s father asked, looking embarrassed.

‘Looking into a wine-glass! How could you say a thing like that! Someone’s going to die, indeed!’

‘I’m always mixing things up!’ said Oblomov’s father. ‘How is one to remember – the nose itching at the side, or at the tip, or the eyebrows – –’

‘At the side means news,’ Pelageya Ivanovna chimed in. ‘If the eyebrows are itching, it means tears; the forehead, bowing, if it’s on the right – to a man, and if it’s on the left side – to a woman; if the ears are itching, it means that it’s going to rain; lips – kissing; moustache – eating sweets; elbow – sleeping in a new place; soles of the feet – a journey – –’

‘Well done, Pelageya Ivanovna!’ said Oblomov’s father. ‘And I suppose when butter is going to be cheap, your neck will be itching – –’

The ladies began to laugh and whisper to one another; some of the men smiled; it seemed as though they would burst out laughing again, but at that moment there came a sound like a dog growling and a cat hissing when they are about to throw themselves upon each other. That was the clock striking.

‘Good Lord, it’s nine o’clock already!’ Oblomov’s father cried with joyful surprise. ‘Dear me, I never noticed how the time was passing. Hey, there! Vaska! Vanka! Motka!’

Three sleepy faces appeared at the door.

‘Why don’t you lay the table?’ Oblomov’s father asked with surprise and vexation. ‘You never think of your masters! Well, what are you standing there for? Come on, vodka!’

‘That’s why the tip of your nose was itching,’ Pelageya Ivanovna said quickly. ‘When you drink vodka, you’ll be looking into your glass.’

After supper, having kissed and made the sign of the cross over each other, they all went to bed, and sleep descended over
their untroubled heads. In his dream Oblomov saw not one or two such evenings, but weeks, months, and years of days and evenings spent in this way. Nothing interfered with the monotony of their life, and the inhabitants of Oblomovka were not tired of it because they could not imagine any other kind of existence; and if they could, they would have recoiled from it in horror. They did not want any other life, and they would have hated it. They would have been sorry if circumstances had brought any change in their mode of living, whatever its nature. They would have been miserable if to-morrow were not like yesterday and if the day after to-morrow were not like tomorrow. What did they want with variety, change, or unforeseen contingencies, which other people were so keen on? Let others make the best of them if they could; at Oblomovka they did not want to have anything to do with it. Let others live as they liked. For unforeseen contingencies, though they might turn out well in the end, were disturbing: they involved constant worry and trouble, running about, restlessness, buying and selling or writing – in a word, doing something in a hurry, and that was no joking matter: they went on for years snuffling and yawning, or laughing good-humouredly at country jokes or, gathering in a circle, telling each other their dreams. If a dream happened to be frightening, they all looked depressed and were afraid in good earnest; if it were prophetic, they were all unfeignedly glad or sad, according to whether the dream was comforting or ominous. If the dream required the observance of some rite, they took the necessary steps at once. Or they played cards – ordinary games on weekdays, and Boston with their visitors on holy-days – or they played patience, told fortunes for a king of hearts or a queen of clubs, foretelling a marriage. Sometimes Natalya Faddeyevna came to stay for a week or a fortnight. To begin with, the two elderly ladies would tell each other all the latest news in the neighbourhood, what everyone did or how everyone lived; they discussed not only all the details of their family life and what was going on behind the scenes, but also everyone’s most secret thoughts and intentions, prying into their very souls, criticizing and condemning the unworthy, especially the unfaithful husbands, and then they would go over all the important events: name-days, christenings, births, who invited or did not invite whom and how those who had been invited were entertained. Tired of this, they began showing each other their new clothes, dresses, coats, even skirts and stockings. The lady of the house boasted of her linen,
yarn and lace of home manufacture. But that topic, too, would be exhausted. Then they would content themselves with coffee, tea, jam. Only after that would they fall silent. They sat for some time looking at each other and from time to time sighing deeply. Occasionally one of them would burst out crying.

‘What’s the matter, my dear?’ the other one asked anxiously.

‘Oh, I feel so sad, my dear,’ the visitor replied with a heavy sigh. ‘We’ve angered the good Lord, sinners that we are. No good will come of it.’

‘Oh, don’t frighten me, dear, don’t scare me,’ the lady of the house interrupted.

‘Oh, yes, yes,’ Natalya Faddeyevna went on, ‘the day of judgement is coming: nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom – the end of the world is near!’ she exclaimed at last, and the two ladies burst out crying bitterly.

Natalya Faddeyevna had no grounds at all for her final conclusion, no one having risen against anyone and there not having been even a comet that year, but old ladies sometimes have dark forebodings.

Only very seldom was this way of passing the time interrupted by some unexpected event, such as, for instance, the whole household being overcome by the fumes from the stoves. Other sicknesses were practically unknown in the house and the village, except when a man would accidentally stumble in the dark against the sharp end of a stake, or fall off the hay-loft, or be hit on the head by a plank dropping from the roof. But this happened only seldom, and against such accidents there was a score of well-tried domestic remedies: the bruise would be rubbed with a fresh-water sponge or with daphne, the injured man was given holy water to drink or had some spell whispered over him – and he would be well again. But poisoning by charcoal fumes was a fairly frequent occurrence. If that happened, they all took to their beds, moaning and groaning were heard all over the house, some tied pickled cucumbers round their heads, some stuffed cranberries into their ears and sniffed horse-radish, some went out into the frost with nothing but their shirts on, and some simply lay unconscious on the floor. This happened periodically once or twice a month, because they did not like to waste the heat in the chimney and shut the flues while flames like those in
Robert the Devil
still flickered in the stoves. It was impossible to touch a single stove without blistering one’s hand.

Only once was the monotony of their existence broken by a really unexpected event. Having rested after a heavy dinner,
they had all gathered round the tea-table, when an Oblomov peasant, who had just returned from town, came suddenly into the room and after a great deal of trouble pulled out from the inside of his coat a crumpled letter addressed to Oblomov’s father. They all looked dumbfounded; Mrs Oblomov even turned slightly pale; they all craned their necks towards the letter and fixed their eyes upon it.

‘How extraordinary! Who could it be from?’ Mrs Oblomov said at last, having recovered from her surprise.

Mr Oblomov took the letter and turned it about in bewilderment, not knowing what to do with it.

‘Where did you get it?’ he asked the peasant. ‘Who gave it you?’

‘Why, sir, at the inn where I stopped in town,’ replied the peasant. ‘A soldier came twice from the post office, sir, to ask if there was any peasant there from Oblomovka. He’d got a letter for the master, it seems.’

‘Well?’

‘Well, sir, at first I hid myself, so the soldier, sir, he went away with this here letter. But the sexton from Verkhlyovo had seen me and he told them. So he comes a second time, the soldier, sir. And as he comes the second time, he starts swearing at me and gives me the letter. Charged me five copecks for it, he did. I asks him what I was to do with the letter, and he told me to give it to you, sir.’

‘You shouldn’t have taken it,’ Mrs Oblomov observed vexedly.

‘I didn’t take it, ma’am. I said to him, I said, “What do we want your letter for – we don’t want no letters,” I said. “I wasn’t told to take letters and I durstn’t,” I said. “Take your letter and go away,” I said. But he started cursing me something awful, he did, threatening to go to the police, so I took it.’

‘Fool!’ said Mrs Oblomov.

‘Who could it be from?’ Mr Oblomov said wonderingly, examining the address. ‘The writing seems familiar!’

He passed the letter round and they all began discussing who it could be from and what it was about. They were all completely at a loss. Mr Oblomov asked for his glasses and they spent an hour and a half looking for them. He put them on and was already about to open the letter when his wife stopped him.

‘Don’t open it,’ she said apprehensively. ‘Who knows, it might be something dreadful – some awful trouble. You know
what people are nowadays. There’s plenty of time: you can open it to-morrow or the day after: it won’t run away.’

The letter was locked up in a drawer with the glasses. They all sat down to tea, and the letter might have lain in the drawer for years had they not all been so greatly excited by the extraordinary event. At tea and all next day they talked of nothing but the letter. At last they could not stand it any longer, and on the fourth day, having all gathered in a crowd, they opened it nervously. Mr Oblomov glanced at the signature.

‘Radishchev,’ he read. ‘Why, that’s Filip Matveich.’

‘Oh, so that’s who it is from!’ they cried from all sides. ‘Is he still alive? Good Lord, fancy he’s not dead! Well, thank God! What does he say?’

Mr Oblomov began reading the letter aloud. It seemed that Radishchev was asking for a recipe of beer that was brewed particularly well at Oblomovka.

‘Send it him! Send it him!’ they all shouted. ‘You must write him a letter!’

A fortnight passed.

‘Yes, I must write to him,’ Mr Oblomov kept saying to his wife. ‘Where’s the recipe?’

‘Where is it?’ his wife replied. ‘I must try and find it. But why all this hurry? Wait till the holy-days; the fast will be over, and then you can write to him. There’s plenty of time.…’

‘Yes, indeed, I’d better write during the holy-days,’ said Mr Oblomov.

The question of the letter was raised again during the holy-days. Mr Oblomov made up his mind to write the letter. He withdrew to his study, put on his glasses, and sat down at the table. Dead silence reigned in the house; the servants were told not to stamp their feet or make a noise. ‘The master’s writing,’ everyone said, speaking in a timid and respectful voice as though someone was lying dead in the house. He had just time to write, ‘Dear Sir,’ in a trembling hand, slowly, crookedly, and as carefully as though performing some dangerous operation, when his wife came into the room.

‘I’m very sorry,’ she said, ‘but I can’t find the recipe. I must have a look in the bedroom cupboard. It may be there. But how are you going to send the letter?’

‘By post, I suppose,’ replied Mr Oblomov.

‘And what will the postage be?’

Mr Oblomov produced an old calendar.

‘Forty copecks,’ he said.

‘Waste forty copecks on such nonsense!’ she observed. ‘Let’s rather wait till we can send it by someone. Tell the peasants to find out.’