Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (184 page)

Suchiloff was also one of those who helped me. I had never asked him for his assistance; he attached himself to me of his own accord, and I scarcely remember when he began to do so. His principal duty consisted in washing my linen. For this purpose there was a basin in the middle of the courtyard, round which the convicts washed their clothes in prison buckets.

Suchiloff found means of rendering me a number of small services. He boiled my samovar, ran to perform various commissions for me, got me all kinds of things, mended my clothes, and greased my boots four times a month. He did all this with the utmost zeal, with a business-like air, as if he was conscious of the importance of what he performed. He seemed to have linked his fate to mine, and interested himself in all my affairs. He never said, for instance, ‘You have so many shirts,’ or ‘your waistcoat is torn’; but ‘We have so many shirts,”our waistcoat is torn.’ I had somehow inspired him with admiration, and I really believe I was his sole concern in life. As he knew no trade whatever, his only source of income was from me. It must be understood that I paid him very little, but he was always delighted with whatever he received. He would have been destitute had he not been my servant; he preferred me to others because of my greater affability, and, above all, my larger generosity. He was one of those fellows who never get rich, and never know how to manage their affairs; one of those who were hired by the gamblers to watch all night in the corridor, listening for the least noise that might announce the arrival of the governor, and who, in the event of a night inspection received nothing, unless it were a flogging for their lack of watchfulness. One characteristic of this type is a complete lack of personality, which seems altogether to have deserted them.

Suchiloff was a poor, meek fellow; all the courage seemed to have been beaten out of him, although he had in fact been born like that. On no account whatever would he have raised his hand against anyone in the prison. I always pitied him without knowing why, and I could not look at him without feeling the deepest compassion. If asked to explain this, I should find it impossible to do so. I could never get him to talk, and he never became animated except when, to put an end to all attempts at conversation, I gave him something to do or sent him on an errand. I soon found that he loved to be ordered about. Neither tall nor short, neither ugly nor handsome, neither stupid nor intelligent, neither old nor young, it would be difficult accurately to describe this man, except that his face was slightly pitted after small-pox, and that he had fair hair. He belonged, as far as I could make out, to the same company as Sirotkin. The prisoners sometimes laughed at him because he had ‘exchanged.’ During the march to Siberia he had ‘exchanged’ for a red shirt and a silver rouble. It was thought comic that he should have sold himself for such a small sum, to take the name of another prisoner in place of his own, and consequently to accept the other’s sentence. Strange as it may appear, it was nevertheless true. This custom, which had become traditional and was still practised at the time I was sent to Siberia, I at first refused to believe, but found afterwards that it really existed. This is how the exchange was effected:

A company of prisoners starts for Siberia. Among them there are exiles of all kinds, some condemned to hard labour, others to labour in the mines, others to simple colonization. On the way out, no matter at what stage of the journey, in the Government of Perm, for instance, a prisoner wishes to exchange. Let us say his name is Mikhailoff, that he has been condemned to hard labour for a capital offence and does not like the prospect of passing long years in captivity. He is a cunning fellow and knows just what to do. He looks among his comrades for some simple, weak-minded fellow whose punishment is less severe, who has been condemned for a few years to the mines or hard labour, or has perhaps been simply exiled. At last he finds someone like Suchiloff, a former serf, sentenced only to become a colonist. The man has travelled fifteen hundred versts (about one thousand miles) without a kopeck, for the good reason that he and his kind are always without money. Fatigued and exhausted, he can get nothing to eat beyond the fixed rations, nothing to wear apart from his convict’s uniform.

Mikhailoff strikes up a conversation with Suchiloff; they suit one another, and are soon on friendly terms. Finally, at some station, Mikhailoff makes his comrade drunk, and then asks him to exchange.

‘My name is Mikhailoff,’ he says, ‘I’m condemned to hard labour but in my case it will be nothing of the kind, as I am to enter a particular special section. I’m classed with the hard-labour men, but in this special division the work is not so severe.’

Before the special section was abolished many persons, even in the official world of St Petersburg, were unaware of its existence. It was stationed in some remote corner of one of the most distant regions of Siberia, and one was unlikely to hear much about it. It was insignificant, moreover, on account of its limited numbers, which in my time did not exceed seventy. I have since met men who have served in Siberia and know the country well, and yet have never heard of the ‘special section.’ In the rules and regulations there are only six lines about this institution.

Now, attached to the convict establishment at  is a special section reserved for the most dangerous criminals, and where the severest forms of labour await them. The prisoners themselves know nothing of this section. Was it a temporary or permanent institution? Neither Suchiloff nor any of his companions, nor Mikhailoff himself even can guess the significance of those two words. Mikhailoff, however, has his suspicions as to the true character of the section: from the gravity of the crime for which he is forced to march three or four thousand versts on foot. It is certain he is on his way to no soft spot. Suchiloff, on the other hand, is to be a colonist, and what could Mikhailoff desire better than that?

‘ Won’t you exchange? ‘ he asks. Suchiloff is a little drunk, he is a simple-minded man, full of gratitude to the comrade who entertains him, and dare not refuse; he has heard, moreover, from other prisoners, that these exchanges are made, and understands, therefore, that there is nothing extraordinary or outlandish in the proposition made to him. An agreement is reached: the cunning Mikhailoff, profiting by Suchiloff’s simplicity, buys his name for a red shirt and a silver rouble which are handed over before witnesses. Next day Suchiloff is sober, but he is given more liquor; he drinks up his own rouble, and after a while the red shirt suffers the same fate.

‘If you don’t like the bargain we made, give me back my money,’ says Mikhailoff. But where is Suchiloff to get a rouble? If he does not give it back, the convicts’ association will force him to keep his promise. The prisoners are most sensitive on such points; he must carry out his obligations. The association requires it, and in case of disobedience woe to the offender! He will be killed, or at least seriously intimidated. Indeed, if the association once showed mercy to men who had broken their word, it would cease to exist. if a promise can be revoked, and a contract voided after the stipulated sum has been paid, who would be bound by such an agreement? It is a question of life or death for the association, and prisoners in consequence adhere strictly to the rule.

Suchiloff accordingly finds it impossible to with draw, that nothing can save him, and he therefore agrees to all that is required of him. The bargain is then made known to the whole convoy, and if denunciation is feared those whose loyalty is suspect are liberally treated. In any case, what does it matter to others whether Mikhailoff or Suchiloff goes to the devil? They have had free drinks, they have been entertained without cost to themselves, and none reveals the secret.

At the next station there is a roll-call. When Mikhailoff’s name is called, Suchiloff answers ‘Present,’ Mikhailoff does the same for Suchiloff, and the journey is continued. The matter is now as good as forgotten. At Tobolsk the convoy breaks up: Mikhailoff becomes a colonist, while Suchiloff is sent to the special section under double escort. It would be useless now to cry out and protest. What proof would there be? It would take years to decide the case, and what benefit would the complainant derive? Where, moreover, are the witnesses? They would deny everything, even if they could be found.

This is how Suchiloff, for a silver rouble and a red shirt, landed up in the special section. He was a laughing-stock, not because he had exchanged-though in general the convicts despised a man who had been foolish enough to exchange an easy task for a harder one-but simply because he had received nothing for the bargain except a red shirt and a rouble, which was certainly a ridiculous consideration.

As a rule those exchanges were made for relatively large sums: several ten-rouble notes sometimes changed hands. But Suchiloff was so devoid of character, so insignificant, such a perfect nonentity, that one could scarcely even laugh at him. He and I had lived a considerable time together, I had grown accustomed to him, and he had formed an attach-ment for me, when one day-I can never forgive myself for what I did-he failed to carry out an order. When he came to ask for his money I had the cruelty to say: ‘You don’t forget to ask for your money, but you don’t do what you’re told.’ Suchiloff remained silent and hastened to do as he was bid, but he suddenly became very sad. Two days passed, and I could scarcely believe that my remark had affected him so deeply. I knew that someone named Vassilieff was con-stantly dunning him for a small debt; he was probably short of money, and dared not ask me for any.

‘ Suchiloff,’ I said, ‘you’re in need of cash, to pay Vassilieff. Take this.’

I was seated on my camp-bedstead. Suchiloff remained standing before me, amazed that I had myself proposed giving him money, and that I had remembered his difficult position; the more so as he had recently on several occasions asked me to advance him money, and scarcely hoped that I would oblige him once again. He stared at the paper I held out to him, then looked at me, turned sharply on his heel, and went out. Astonished at his behaviour, I followed, and discovered him behind the barrack. He was standing with his head against the palisade and his arms resting on the stakes.

‘What’s the matter, Suchiloff?’ I asked.

He made no reply, and to my great surprise I saw that he was on the verge of tears.

‘You think, Alexander Petrovitch,’ he said, in a trembling voice and trying not to look at me, ‘that I care only for your money, but I’

He turned away from me, laid his forehead against the palisade, and began to sob. It was the first time I had seen a man weep in prison. I had much trouble consoling him, and thenceforward he served me, if possible, more diligently than ever. He was always on the alert for my orders, but by almost imperceptible signs I could tell that in his heart he would never forgive my reproach. The others continued to laugh at him, pull his leg, and even insult him at every opportunity. But he never lost his temper; on the contrary, he remained on good terms with all. It is indeed difficult really to know a man, even when you have lived with him for years.

It was some time before I began to understand the significance of prison life. Although I kept my eyes open I did not at first appreciate a number of facts that stared me in the face: I was looking at them from the wrong angle, and the only impression I received was one of unmitigated gloom. What contributed more than anything else to this view was

my meeting with Af, a convict who had entered the prison

before me, and whose character had shocked me in those first few days. His baseness increased my mental suffering, which was already sufficiently acute. He offered the most repulsive example of that degradation to which a man may fall when all feeling of honour has died within him. This young man of noble birth-I have spoken of him before-used to inform the governor, through his servant Fedka, of everything that went on in barracks. Here is the man’s history.

While still a student, his evil ways had led to a quarrel with his parents. He went to St Petersburg and earned his living as a common informer, never hesitating to sell the blood of ten men in order to gratify his insatiable thirst for the grossest and most licentious pleasures. He was not without intelligence; but he gradually became so perverted in the taverns and brothels of St Petersburg that he finally took part in an affair which he knew must lead to disaster. He was condemned to exile and ten years’ hard labour in Siberia. One might have thought that such a frightful blow would have brought him to his senses, that it would have caused some reaction, some change of heart, and brought about a crisis; but he accepted his fate without the least concern. It did not frighten him; the only thing he disliked was the necessity of working and of abandoning for ever his evil life. The label of convict had no effect but to prepare him for new acts of baseness and more hideous villainies than any of which he had previously been guilty.

‘ I am now a convict, and can crawl at ease, without shame.’ That was the light in which he regarded his new condition. I think of this disgusting creature as of some monstrous! phenomenon. During the many years I lived with murderers, debauchees, and proved rascals, I never met a case of such complete moral abasement, determined corruption, and shameless wickedness. Among us there was a parricide of noble birth, to whom I have already alluded. Yet there was plenty of evidence that he was much better, far more humane than Af. During the whole term of my imprisonment, Af was never anything more in my eyes than a lump of flesh furnished with teeth and stomach, greedy for the most vile and bestial enjoyments, for the satisfaction of which he was prepared even to commit murder I do not exaggerate in the least. I recognized in him one of the most perfect specimens of animal passion, restrained by no principles, no rule. How his eternal smile disgusted me! He was a monster-a moral Quasimodo. At the same time he was intelligent, cunning, good-looking, had received some education, and possessed considerable ability. Fire, plague, famine, no matter what scourge, is preferable to the presence of such a man in human society. I have already said that espionage and denunciation flourished in prison as the natural product of degradation, without the convicts thinking much of it. On the contrary, they maintained friendly relations with A-f. They were more affable with him than with anyone