Stories (27 page)

It was between four and five in the afternoon, the time when
Andrei Yefimych usually paced his rooms and Daryushka asked him whether it was time for his beer. The weather outside was calm and clear.

“I went for a stroll after dinner and stopped by, as you see,” said the doctor. “Spring has come.”

“What month is it now? March?” asked Ivan Dmitrich.

“Yes, the end of March.”

“Is it muddy outside?”

“No, not very. There are footpaths in the garden already.”

“It would be nice to go for a ride in a carriage somewhere out of town now,” said Ivan Dmitrich, rubbing his red eyes as if he had just woken up, “then come back home to a warm, cozy study and … have a decent doctor treat your headache … I haven’t lived like a human being for so long. It’s vile here! Insufferably vile!”

After yesterday’s agitation he was tired and sluggish and spoke reluctantly. His fingers trembled, and one could see by his face that he had a bad headache.

“There’s no difference between a warm, cozy study and this ward,” said Andrei Yefimych. “A man’s peace and content are not outside but within him.”

“How so?”

“An ordinary man expects the good or the bad from outside, that is, from a carriage and a study, but a thinking man expects them from himself.”

“Go and preach that philosophy in Greece, where it’s warm and smells of wild orange, it doesn’t go with the climate here. Who was I talking about Diogenes with? Was it you, eh?”

“Yes, with me, yesterday.”

“Diogenes didn’t need a study and a warm room; it’s hot there as it is. You can lie in a barrel and eat oranges and olives. But if he lived in Russia, he’d ask for a room not only in December but even in May. He’d be doubled up with cold.”

“No. Like all pain in general, it’s possible not to feel cold. Marcus Aurelius
¹⁴
said: ‘Pain is the living notion of pain: make an effort of will to change this notion, remove it, stop complaining, and the pain will disappear.’ That is correct. The wise man, or simply the thinking, perceptive man, is distinguished precisely by his scorn of suffering; he is always content and is surprised at nothing.”

“Then I’m an idiot, since I suffer, am discontent, and am surprised at human meanness.”

“You needn’t be. If you reflect on it more often, you will understand how insignificant is everything external that troubles us. We must strive for the comprehension of life, therein lies the true blessing.”

“Comprehension …” Ivan Dmitrich winced. “External, internal … Excuse me, but I don’t understand that. I only know,” he said, getting up and looking angrily at the doctor, “I know that God created me out of warm blood and nerves, yes, sir! And organic tissue, if it’s viable, must react to any irritation. And I do react! I respond to pain with cries and tears, to meanness with indignation, to vileness with disgust. In my opinion, this is in fact called life.
The lower the organism, the less sensitive it is and the more weakly it responds to irritation, and the higher, the more susceptible it is and the more energetically it reacts to reality. How can you not know that? You’re a doctor and you don’t know such trifles! To scorn suffering, to be always content and surprised at nothing, you must reach that condition”—and Ivan Dmitrich pointed to the obese, fat-swollen peasant—“or else harden yourself with suffering to such a degree that you lose all sensitivity to it, that is, in other words, stop living. Forgive me, I’m not a wise man or a philosoph
er,” Ivan Dmitrich went on irritably, “and I understand nothing about it. I’m unable to reason.”

“On the contrary, your reasoning is excellent.”

“The Stoics, whom you are parodying, were remarkable people, but their teaching froze two thousand years ago and hasn’t moved a drop further, and it won’t, because it’s neither practical nor vital. It was successful only with the minority who spend their life examining and relishing various teachings, but the majority didn’t understand it. A teaching that preaches indifference to wealth, to the good things in life, scorn of suffering and death, is utterly incomprehensible for the vast majority, since that majority has never known either wealth or the good things in life; and f
or them scorn of suffering would mean scorn of life itself, because the whole essence of man consists in the sensations of hunger, cold, offense, loss, and a Hamletian fear of death. These sensations are the whole of life: you may be oppressed by it, you may hate it, but you cannot scorn it. Yes, so I repeat, the teaching of the Stoics can have no future, and progress, from the beginning of time down to this day, as
you see, belongs to struggle, the sensitivity to pain, the ability to respond to irritation …”

Ivan Dmitrich suddenly lost his train of thought, stopped, and rubbed his forehead vexedly

“I wanted to say something important, but I got confused,” he said. “What was it about? Yes! So, I was saying: one of the Stoics sol
d himself into slavery in order to buy off his neighbor. You see, so the Stoic, too, reacted to an irritation, because for such a magnanimous act as destroying yourself for the sake of your neighbor, you must have an indignant, compassionate soul. Here in prison I’ve forgotten everything I studied, otherwise I’d remember more. But take Christ? Christ responded to reality by weeping, smiling, grieving, being wrathful, even anguished; he didn’t go to meet suffering with a smile, nor did he scorn death, but he prayed in the garden of Gethsemane for this cup to pass from him.”
¹⁵

Ivan Dmitrich laughed and sat down.

“Suppose that man’s peace and content are not outside but within him,” he said. “Suppose that we ought to scorn suffering and be surprised at nothing. But what is your basis for preaching it? Are you a wise man? A philosopher?”

“No, I’m not a philosopher, but everyone ought to preach it, because it’s reasonable.”

“No, I want to know why you consider yourself competent in matters of comprehension, scorn of suffering, and the rest. Have you ever suffered? Do you have any notion of suffering? Excuse me: were you ever birched as a child?”

“No, my parents detested corporal punishment.”

“Well, my father whipped me cruelly. My father was a tough, hemorrhoidal official with a long nose and a yellow neck. But let’s talk about you. In all your life nobody ever laid a finger on you, nobody frightened you, nobody beat you; you’re sturdy as an ox. You grew up under your father’s wing and studied at his expense, and then at once grabbed a sinecure. For more than twenty years you’ve had free quarters, with heat, light, servants, besides having the right to work as you want and as much as you want, or even not to work at all. By nature you’re a lazy man, a soft man, and therefore you
tried to shape your life so that nothing w
ould trouble you or make you stir from your place. You shifted all the work onto your assistant and other scum, and you yourself sat around, warm and peaceful, saving up money, reading books, delighting yourself
with thoughts about all sorts of nonsense, and” (Ivan Dmitrich looked at the doctor’s red nose) “tippling away. In short, you’ve never seen life, you don’t know anything about it, and you’re only theoretically acquainted with reality And you scorn suffering and are surprised at nothing for a very simple reason: vanity of vanities, external and internal scorn of life, of suffering, and
of death, comprehension, the true blessing—all that is a most suitable philosophy for a Russian lie-about. You see a peasant beating his wife, for instance. Why interfere? Let him beat her, they’ll both die sooner or later anyway; and besides, the man who beats someone only insults himself, not the one he beats. To be a drunkard is stupid, indecent, but one drinks and dies, or does not drink and dies. A peasant woman comes with a toothache … So what? Pain is the notion of pain, and besides, one cannot live in this world without sickness, and we’ll all die, so go away, woman, don’t interfere with my t
hinking and my vodka drinking. A young man asks for advice, what to do, how to live; another man would stop and think before answering, but here the answer is ready: strive for comprehension, that is, for the true blessing. And what is this fantastic ‘true blessing’? There is no answer, of course. We’re kept behind bars here, to rot and be tortured, but that’s beautiful and reasonable, because there’s no difference between this ward and a warm, cozy study. A convenient philosophy: no need to do anything, and your conscience is clear, and you feel yourself a wise man … No, sir, that’s not philos
ophy, not thinking, not breadth of vision, it’s laziness, fakirism, a dreamy stupor … Yes!” Ivan Dmitrich became angry again. “You scorn suffering, but I suppose if you pinched your finger in the door, you’d howl your head off!”

“Maybe I wouldn’t,” said Andrei Yefimych, smiling meekly.

“Oh, surely! And if you were suddenly slapped with paralysis or, say, some brazen fool, taking advantage of his position
and rank, insulted you publicly, and you knew he’d go unpunished—well, then you’d understand how it is to fob others off with comprehension and the true blessing.”

“That’s original,” Andrei Yefimych said, laughing with pleasure and rubbing his hands. “I’m pleasantly surprised by your inclination to generalize, and the characterization of me that you’ve just produced is simply brilliant. I confess, conversation with you gives me great pleasure. Well, sir, I’ve heard you out, now you kindly hear me out …”

This conversation went on for another hour or so and evidently made a deep impression on Andrei Yefimych. He began visiting the annex every day He went in the morning and after dinner, and often the evening darkness found him conversing with Ivan Dmitrich. At first Ivan Dmitrich was shy with him, suspected him of evil intentions, and openly expressed his animosity, but then he got used to him and changed his cutting manner to a condescendingly ironic one.

The rumor soon spread through the hospital that Dr. Andrei Yefimych had begun visiting Ward No. 6. No one, neither his assistant, nor Nikita, nor the nurses, could understand why he went there, why he sat there for hours at a time, what he talked about, why he did not make any prescriptions. His behavior seemed strange. Mikhail Averyanych often did not find him at home, something that had never happened before, and Daryushka was very confused, because the doctor no longer drank his beer at a certain time and occasionally was even late for dinner.

Once—this was already at the end of June—Dr. Khobotov came to see Andrei Yefimych on some business; not finding him at home, he went to look for him in the yard; there he was told that the old doctor had gone to visit the mental patients. K
hobotov went into the annex and, stopping in the front hall, heard the following conversation:

“We’ll never see eye to eye, and you won’t succeed in converting me to your faith,” Ivan Dmitrich was saying vexedly “You’re totally unacquainted with reality, and you’ve never suffered, but, like a leech, have only fed on the sufferings of others, while I have suffered constantly from the day of my birth to this very day. Therefore I tell you frankly that I consider myself superior to you and more competent in all respects. It’s not for you to teach me.”

“I make no pretense of converting you to my faith,” Andrei Yefimych said softly, regretting that the other refused to understand him. “And that is not the point, my friend. The point is not that you have suffered and I have not. Sufferings and joys are transient; let’s drop them, with God’s blessing. The point is that you and I think; we see in each other people who are able to think and reason, and that makes for solidarity between us, however different our
views may be. If you knew, my friend, how tired I am of the general madness, giftlessness, obtuseness, and with what joy I tal
k with you each time! You’re an intelligent man, and I delight in you.”

Khobotov opened the door an inch and peeked into the room. Dr. Andrei Yefimych and Ivan Dmitrich in his nightcap were sitting side by side on the bed. The madman grimaced, twitched, and convulsively wrapped his robe around him, while the doctor sat motionless, his head bowed, his face red, helpless, and sad. Khobotov shrugged, grinned, and exchanged glances with Nikita. Nikita also shrugged.

The next day Khobotov came to the annex together with the assistant doctor. The two stood in the front hall and eavesdropped.

“It seems our grandpa’s gone completely loony,” said Khobotov, leaving the annex.

“God have mercy on us sinners!” sighed the beauteous Sergei Sergeich, carefully sidestepping the puddles to avoid muddying his brightly polished boots. “I confess, my esteemed Evgeny Fyodorych, I’ve long been expecting that!”

After that Andrei Yefimych began to notice a certain mysteriousness around him. The peasants, the nurses, and the patients, when they met him, glanced at him inquisitively and then whispered. The little girl Masha, the superintendent’s daughter, whom he enjoyed meeting in the hospital garden, now, when he came up to her with a smile to pat her on the head, for some reason ran away from him. The postmaster, Mikhail Averyanych, listening to him, no longer said: “Quite right,” but muttered in inexplicable embarrassment: “Yes, yes, yes …” and looked at him wistfully and sadly. For some reason
he began advising his friend to give up vodka and beer, but, being a delicate man, spoke not directly but in hints, telling now about a certain battalion commander, an excellent man, now about a regimental priest, a nice fellow, both of whom drank themselves sick, but when they stopped drinking became completely well. Two or three times Andrei Yefimych’s colleague Khobotov came to see him; he, too, advised him to give up alcohol and, for no apparent reason, recommended that he take potassium bromide.

In August Andrei Yefimych received a letter from the mayor with a request that he kindly come on a very important matter. Arriving at the town hall at the appointed time, Andrei Yefimych found there the military commander, the inspector of the district high school, a member of the town council, Khobotov, and yet another stout, blond gentleman, who was introduced to him as a doctor. This doctor, who had a Polish name that was very hard to pronounce, lived on a stud farm twenty miles away and was just passing through town.