Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (354 page)

“Oh, if you promise to,” cried the general fervently, “I am ready to tell you of my whole life; and I confess I have got my story ready for my turn....”

“And from his excellency’s air alone one may judge of the peculiar creative pleasure with which he has worked up his anecdote,” Ferdyshtchenko ventured to observe with a sarcastic smile, though he was still rather ill at ease.

Nastasya Filippovna glanced at the general, and she too smiled to herself. But her depression and irritability were obviously increasing every moment.

Totsky was more alarmed than ever at her promise to tell something herself.

“It has happened to me, friends, as to every one, to commit actions in my life that were not very pretty,” began the general; “but it’s strange that I regard the brief incident which I’ll describe directly as the basest action of my life. It’s almost thirty-five years ago, yet I can never escape a twinge at heart, so to say, at recalling it. It was an extremely foolish business, however, I was at that time only a lieutenant and was working my way up in the army. Well, we all know what a lieutenant is — young blood and ardour, but a miserable screw. I had an orderly in those days called Nikifor, who was awfully zealous on my behalf. He saved, sewed, scrubbed and cleaned, and even stole right and left anything he could lay his hands on to help our housekeeping. He was a most faithful and honest man. I was strict, of course, but just. We happened to stay for some time in a little town. I had lodgings in a suburb in the house of the widow of a retired sub-lieutenant. The old lady was eighty or thereabouts. She lived in a little ancient tumbledown wooden house, and was so poor she didn’t even keep a servant. What was worse, though, she had at one time had a numerous family and relations. Some had died, others were scattered, while others had forgotten the old woman. Her husband she had buried forty-five years before. Some years previously a niece used to live with her, a hunchback woman, as wicked as a witch, so people said; she had even bitten the old woman’s finger. But she too was dead; so that the old lady had been struggling on for three years quite alone. I was frightfully bored there, and she was so silly one could get nothing out of her. At last she stole a cock of mine. The matter has never been cleared up to this day, but there was no one else could have done it. We quarrelled over the cock — quarrelled in earnest; and it happened that as soon as I asked, I was transferred to other quarters, to a suburb the other side of the town, in the house of a merchant with a large family and a big beard, as I remember him. Nikifor and I were delighted to move. I left the old lady indignantly. Three days later I came in from drill and Nikifor informed me ‘We were wrong, your honour, to leave our bowl at our old lady’s; I have nothing to put the soup in.’ I was surprised, of course. ‘How so? How was it the bowl was left behind?’ Nikifor, surprised, went on to report that when we were leaving the landlady had not given him our bowl, because I had broken her pot; that she had kept our bowl in place of her pot, and that she had pretended I had suggested it. Such meanness on her part naturally made me furious; it would make any young officer’s blood boil. I leapt up and flew out. I was beside myself, so to say, when I got to the old woman’s. I saw her sitting in the passage, huddled up in the corner all alone, as though to get out of the sun, her cheek propped on her hand. I poured out a stream of abuse, calling her all sorts of names, you know, in regular Russian style. Only there seemed something strange as I looked at her: she sat with her face turned to me, her eyes round and staring, and answered not a word. And she looked at me in such a queer way, she seemed to be swaying. At last I calmed down. I looked at her, I questioned her — not a word. I stood hesitating: flies were buzzing, the sun was setting, there was stillness. Completely disconcerted, I walked away. Before I got home I was summoned to the major’s; then I had to go to the company, so I didn’t get home till it was quite evening. Nikifor’s first words were, ‘Do you know, your honour, that our landlady is dead?”When did she die?”Why, this evening, an hour and a half ago. So that at the very time I was abusing her she was passing away. It made such an impression on me that, I assure you, I couldn’t get over it. The thought of it haunted me; I dream of it at night. I am not superstitious, of course, but two days after I went to church to the funeral. In fact, as time goes on it seems to haunt me more. Not that it haunts me exactly, but now and then one pictures it and feels uncomfortable. I’ve come to the conclusion that the sting of it lies in this. In the first place, it was a woman — so to speak, a fellow-creature, a humane creature, as they call it nowadays. She had lived, lived a long life, lived too long. At one time she had had children, a husband, family and relations — all this bubbling, so to say, smiling, so to say, life about her; and then all at once complete blank, everything gone, she left alone like . . . some fly accursed from the beginning of time. And then at last God had brought her to the end, as the sun was setting, on a quiet summer evening my old woman too was passing awav — a theme for pious reflection, to be sure. And then at that very moment, instead of a tear to see her off, so to say, a reckless young lieutenant, swaggering arms akimbo, escorts her from the surface of the earth to the Russian tune of violent swearing over a lost bowl! Of course I was to blame, and, though from the length of years and change in my nature, I’ve long looked at my action as though it had been another man’s, I still regret it. So that, I repeat, it seems positively queer to me; for if I were to blame, I was not altogether so. Why should she have taken it into her head to die at that moment? Of course there is only one explanation, that what I did was in a certain sense pathological. Yet I couldn’t be at peace till, fifteen years ago, I provided for two incurable old women in the almshouse, so as to soften the last days of their earthly existence by comfortable surroundings. I think of bequeathing a sum of money to make it a permanent charity. Well, that’s all about it. I repeat that I may have done wrong in many things in my life, but this incident I honestly consider my worst action.”

“And, instead of the worst, your excellency has described one of your good actions. You’ve cheated Ferdyshtchenko,” commented Ferdyshtchenko.

“Yes, general, I never imagined you had such a good heart after all. I am almost sorry,” Nastasya Filippovna dropped carelessly.

“Sorry! What for?” asked the general with an affable laugh, and not without complacency he sipped his champagne.

But it was Totsky’s turn, and he too had prepared himself. Every one thought that he would not, like Ptitsyn, refuse, and every one for certain reasons awaited his confession with curiosity; at the same time they were watching Nastasya Filippovna.

With an extraordinary air of dignity, which was in keeping with his stately appearance, Afanasy Ivanovitch began in his quiet, polite voice to tell one of his “charming anecdotes.” He was, by the way, a man of fine appearance and dignified carriage, tall, rather stout, a little bald and turning grey. He had soft, pendulous, rosy cheeks and false teeth. He wore his clothes loose and well cut, and his linen was always exquisite. His plump white hands were pleasant to look at. On the first finger of his right hand he wore a costly diamond ring.

All the while he was telling his story, Nastasya Filippovna was staring intently at the lace frill of her sleeve, and kept pinching it with two fingers of her left hand. She didn’t even once glance at the speaker.

“What makes my task easier,” began Afanasy Ivanovitch, “is the absolute obligation of describing the very basest action of my life. In that case there can be no hesitation; conscience and the prompting of the heart dictate at once what one must tell. I confess with bitterness that among all the innumerable, perhaps frivolous and thoughtless actions of my life there is one the impression of which has lain almost too heavily on my mind. It happened nearly twenty years ago. I was staying then in the country with Platon Ordyntsev. He had just been elected marshal of nobility and had come down with his young wife, Anfisa Alexeyevna, to spend his winter holidays there. It was a few days before her birthday and two dances had been arranged. At that time that charming novel of Dumas fils, ‘La Dame aux Camelias,’ was in the height of fashion and was just making a great sensation in society. It’s a work which, in my opinion, is not destined to die or tarnish with aqe. In the provinces all the ladies were in ecstasies over it — those, at least, who had read it. The charm of the novel, the originality of the situation of the principal character, that enchanting world analysed so subtly, and all the fascinating incidents scattered about the book (for instance, the use of the nosegays of white and pink camellias alternately) — all these charming details, in fact, and the whole ensemble made an overwhelming sensation. Camellias became extraordinarily fashionable, every one wanted them, everyone was trying to get them. I ask you, is it possible to get many camellias in a country district when every one is asking for them for dances, even when there are not many dances? Petya Vorhovsky was breaking his heart at the time, poor fellow, over Anfisa Alexeyevna. I really don’t know whether there was anything between them — that is, I mean whether he had any real grounds for hope. The poor fellow was crazy to get camellias for Anfisa Alexeyevna by the night of the ball. The Countess Sotsky, a visitor from Petersburg staying with the governor’s wife, and Sofya Bezpalov were, we knew for certain, coming with nosegays of white ones. Anfisa Alexeyevna longed to create a special sensation with red ones. Poor Piaton was almost driven distracted — of course, he was the husband. He promised to procure the flowers; and what do you think? On the very eve of the ball they were snapped up by Katerina Alexandrovna, a terrible rival of Anfisa Alexeyevna in everything. They were at daggers drawn. Of course it was a case of hysterics and fainting fits. It was all over with Piaton. “Vbu may well believe that if Petya had been able to contrive a bouquet somehow at that interesting moment, his chances would have greatly improved. A woman’s gratitude in such cases is boundless. He flew about like a madman; but it was an impossible achievement, and it was no use talking about it. All at once I met him at eleven o’clock on the evening before the birthday and the ball given by Madame Zubkov, a neighbor of Ordyntsev’s. He was beaming. ‘What is it?”I have found it. Eureka!”Well, my dear boy, you do surprise me! Where? How?”At “Vfekshaisk, a little town fifteen miles away, not in our district. There’s a merchant of the old style, a rich man called Trepalov, living there with his old wife. Instead of children they keep canaries. They’ve both a passion for flowers, and he has camellias.”Why, it may not be true. And what if he won’t give you them?”I shall fall on my knees and grovel at his feet till he does. I won’t go away without!”When are you going?”To-morrow at daybreak, at five o’clock.”Well, good luck to you!’ And, you know, I felt so pleased on his account. I went back to the Ordyntsevs’. One o’clock at night came and, you know, I was still thinking about it. I meant to go to bed, when suddenly a very original idea came to me. I made my way to the kitchen. I waked Savely, the coachman, gave him fifteen roubles, and said, ‘Let me have the horses in half an hour.’ Half an hour later, of course, the sledge was at the gate. Anfisa Alexeyevna, I was told, had a migraine; she was feverish and delirious. I got in and drove off. Before five o’clock I was at “Vfekshaisk, at the inn. I waited till daybreak, and only till daybreak. By seven o’clock I was at Trepalov’s. I said this and that, and asked, ‘Have you any camellias? My good kind sir, help me, save me! I bow down at your feet!’ The old man was tall, grey-headed, severe — a terrible old man. ‘No, no! On no account. I can’t consent.’ I plumped down at his feet. I positively flopped on the floor. ‘What are you doing, sir? What are you about?’ He was almost alarmed. ‘A human life is at stake!’ I shouted to him. ‘Well, take them if that’s so, in God’s name.’ I did cut those red camellias! They were wonderful, exquisite; there was a little greenhouse full of them. The old man sighed. I pulled out a hundred roubles. ‘No, sir, don’t insult me in such a way.”In that case, my worthy sir, devote that hundred roubles to the hospital here for the food and expenses there.”Well, that,’ said the old man, ‘is a different matter; that’s a good and noble work and pleasing to God. I will present that money to the hospital as a health-offering for you.’ And, you know, I liked that old Russian; he was, so to speak, Russian to the backbone, de la vraie souche! Delighted at my success, I set off homewards. I went back a roundabout way to avoid meeting Petya. As soon as I arrived I sent the bouquet up to Anfisa Alexeyevna to greet her when she waked. “Vbu can imagine her delight, her gratitude, her tears of gratitude. Piaton, who the day before had been at his last gasp, was sobbing on my breast. Alas! all husbands have been the same since the creation of . . . lawful matrimony. I won’t venture to say more, but poor Petya’s chances were completely over after that episode. I expected at first that he would murder me when he found out, and made ready to meet him; but what happened I would never have believed. He fainted; by the evening he was delirious, and next day he had brain fever and was sobbing like a child and in convulsions. A month later, as soon as he was well again, he volunteered for the Caucasus. It turned out quite a romance. It ended by his being killed in the Crimea. By that time his brother, Stepan Vorhovsky, was in command of a regiment; he had distinguished himself. I confess I had pricks of conscience even many years afterwards. Why, with what object had I dealt him such a blow? And it’s not as though I’d been in love myself at the time. It was simple mischief for the sake of flirtation, nothing more. If I hadn’t snatched that bouquet from him — who knows? — the man might have been alive to this day; he might have been happy, he might have been successful, and it would not have entered his head to go to fight the Turks!”

Afanasy Ivanovitch ceased speaking with the same stately dignity with which he had begun his story. The company noticed that there was a peculiar light in Nastasya Filippovna’s eyes and her lips quivered as he finished. Every one was watching them with curiosity.