The Petty Demon (26 page)

“They brought the cat back!”

Frightened, she didn’t notice Volodin right off. As usual, her dress was slovenly: a greasy blouse over a gray filthy skirt
and battered shoes. Her hair was uncombed and dishevelled. She said excitedly to Peredonov:

“It’s that Irishka! Out of spite
she’s come up with a fresh trick. A boy ran up again, brought the cat and dumped it. And the cat had rattles on its tail and
it’s making a racket. The cat’s crawled under the divan and won’t come out.

Peredonov felt terrified.(b)

“What should we do
now?” he asked.

“Pavel Vasilyevich,” Varvara asked, “you’re younger, chase him out from under the divan,”(c)

“We’ll chase
him out, yes we will,” Volodin said with a giggle and went into the front room.

Somehow or other they dragged the cat out
and removed the rattles from its tail. Peredonov searched for some burdocks and once more started to stick them on the cat.
The cat hissed ferociously and ran off into the kitchen.(d) Tired from the commotion over the cat, Peredonov sat down in his
usual pose: elbows on the arms of an easy chair, fingers intertwined, one leg crossed over the other, his face impassive and
sullen.(e)

Peredonov guarded the second letter from the Princess more zealously than the first. He always carried it around
with himself in his wallet, but he showed it to everyone and assumed a mysterious look when he did so. He watched, sharp-eyed,
to see whether anyone was about to take the
letter away and he wouldn’t hand i over to anyone. After each showing he would hide it in his wallet, stuff his wallet into
his jacket, in the inner side pocket, button up his jacket and sternly and significantly regard his companions.

“Why are you running around with it like that?” Rutilov once asked with a laugh.

“Just in case,” Peredonov explained sullenly. “Who knows what you’ll do! You might try and snatch it.”

“This business of yours is pure Siberia,” Rutilov said, roared with laughter and slapped Peredonov on the back.

But Peredonov preserved an imperturbable pompousness. In general he had begun of late to act more pompously than was customary.
He frequently boasted:

“I’m going to be an inspector. The rest of you here will be rotting away, but I’ll have two regions under my authority. Or
even three. Oh-ho-ho!”

He was completely convinced that in the very shortest time he would get an inspector’s post. He said more than once to the
teacher, Falastov:

“I’ll get you out of here, brother.”

And the teacher, Falastov, became very respectful in the way he treated Peredonov.

P
EREDONOV STARTED TO
attend church regularly. He would stand in an obvious spot and either cross himself more often than necessary, or suddenly
grow rigid as a post and gaze dully in front of himself. It seemed to him that some spies were hiding behind the columns,
peeking out from there and trying to make him laugh. But he didn’t give in.

Laughter, with quiet chuckling, giggling and whispering from the Rutilov girls, rang in Peredonov’s ears, growing at times
to extraordinary proportions. It was just as though those sly girls were laughing right in his ears so that they would make
him laugh and ruin him. But Peredonov didn’t give in.

The
nedotykomka
, smoky and bluish, would appear from time to time amid the puffs of incense smoke. The little eyes gleamed with fires and
it sometimes floated around through the air, but not for long. Most frequently it scurried about at the feet of the parishioners,
making fun of Peredonov and tormenting him relentlessly. Of course, it wanted to frighten Peredonov so that he would leave
the church before the end of mass. But he realized what its devious plan was and didn’t submit.

The church service, not in its words and rites, but in its innermost movement which was so dear to such a multitude of people,
was incomprehensible to Peredonov and therefore frightened him. The swinging of the censers terrified him like superstitious
spells.

“What’s he swinging it around for?” he thought.

The priests’ attire seemed like coarse, annoyingly colorful rags, and when he looked at a priest in his sacerdotal robes he
felt like tearing up the robes and smashing the holy vessels. He imagined the rites and mysteries of the church to be a wicked
form of sorcery that was directed towards the enslavement of the simple folk.

“He dropped crumbs from the holy wafer into the wine,” he thought angrily of the priest. “It’s the cheapest wine and they
turn the heads of the people so that they bring more money for the offerings.”

The mystery of the eternal transformation of impotent matter into a force that annulled the bonds of death was forever veiled
from him. A walking corpse! He was possessed of an incongruous combination of non-belief in the living God and Christ with
a belief in sorcery!

People started to leave the church. The village teacher, Machigin, an unassuming young man, went up to the girls, smiled and
chatted energetically. Peredonov thought that it was unseemly of him to act so freely in front of a future inspector. Machigin
was wearing a straw hat. But Peredonov recalled that at some time during the summer he had seen him outside the town wearing
an official cap with a cockade. Peredonov decided to complain. In the event, inspector Bogdanov was there as well. Peredonov
went up to him and said:

“Your Machigin wears a cap with a cockade. He’s playing the aristocrat.”

Bogdanov was frightened, started to tremble, and shook his grayish little beard.

“He has no right, no right whatsoever does he have,” he said with concern, blinking his little red eyes.

“He doesn’t have the right, but he wears one,” Peredonov complained. “They have to be reined in, I’ve told you that long ago.
Otherwise any uncouth peasant will start wearing a cockade and then what’ll happen!”

Bogdanov, who had already been frightened by Peredonov earlier, became even more overwrought.

“How could he dare to do it, eh?” he said in a whining voice. “I shall summon him immediately, immediately I say, and I shall
forbid it most sternly.”

He took leave of Peredonov and hastily trotted off home.

Volodin walked alongside Peredonov and said in a reproachfully bleating voice:

“He’s wearing a cockade. Do tell, for goodness sake! As though he’s been awarded ranks! How could it be!”

“Neither are you allowed to wear a cockade,” Peredonov said.

“Not allowed and not necessary,” Volodin protested. “Only sometimes I too put a cockade on—but I alone know where and when
it’s allowed. If I go off by myself outside the city then I put it on there. It gives me a lot of pleasure and no one would
forbid it. If you run into a peasant, all the same there’s more respect.”

“A cockade doesn’t suit your mug, Pavlushka,” Peredonov said. “And move away from me—you’re getting me dusty with your hooves.”

Volodin fell into an offended silence, but continued to walk alongside. Peredonov said with concern:

“Those Rutilov girls still ought to be reported. They only go to church to gossip and laugh. They powder themselves up, get
all dressed up and off they go. But they’re stealing the incense and making perfume out of it—they always reek of it.”

“Do tell, for goodness sake!” Volodin said, shaking his head and rolling his dull eyes.

A shadow from a cloud crept swiftly over the ground and provoked an attack of fear in Peredonov. The gray
nedotykomka
flitted from time to time through the puffs of dust in the air. If the grass started to rustle in the wind, it would seem
to Peredonov as though the
nedotykomka
was running around in it, biting it and eating its fill.

“Why do they have grass in the town?” he thought. “A disgrace! It ought to be pulled out.”

A branch on a tree started to rustle, shrank into itself, turned black, cawed and flew off into the distance. Peredonov shuddered,
cried wildly and ran off home. Volodin trotted along behind him anxiously with a perplexed expression in his goggling eyes,
holding his bowler hat on his head and waving his stick.

On that very same day Bogdanov summoned Machigin. Before entering the inspector’s apartment, Machigin stood in the street
with his back to the sun, removed his hat and used his shadow to comb his hair with his fingers.

“What are you up to, young man, eh? What’s this you’ve contrived, eh?” Bogdanov let loose at Machigin.

“What’s the matter?” Machigin asked in an unduly free manner, playing with his straw hat and shuffling his left foot.

Bogdanov didn’t sit him down, because he intended to give him a tongue-lashing.

“What are you up to, what’s this you’re up to, young man, wearing a cockade, eh? How could you bring yourself to commit such
an infringement, eh?” he asked, assuming an air of severity and vehemently shaking his little gray beard.

Machigin blushed, but he replied pertly:

“What’s wrong, am I not in the right?”

“Well are you really an official, eh? An official?” Bogdanov grew more agitated. “What kind of official are you, eh? An ABC
registrar, eh?”

“It’s a sign of the teaching profession,” Machigin said pertly and suddenly smiled sweetly, recollecting the importance of
his teaching profession.

“You carry a stick in your hands, a stick, that’s your sign of the teaching profession,” Bogdanov advised, shaking his head.

“For goodness sake, Sergei Potapovich.” Machigin said with injury in his voice. “What good is a stick! Anyone can carry a
stick, but a cockade is for prestige.”

“For what kind of prestige, eh? For what kind of prestige, what kind?” Bogdanov flew at the young man. “What kind of prestige
do you require, eh? Are you one of the authorities?”

“For goodness sake, Sergei Potapovich,” Machigin attempted to prove in a reasonable fashion, “in the uncultured peasant class
it immediately arouses a wave of respect—this year they’re bowing down much lower.”

Machigin smoothed his reddish moustache with self-satisfaction.

“It’s not allowed, young man, not allowed at all,” Bogdanov said, dolefully shaking his head.

“For goodness sake, Sergei Potapovich, a teacher without a cockade is the same as the British lion without a tail,” Machigin
sought to persuade him. “Nothing but a caricature.”

“What’s a tail got to do with this, eh? What’s this about a tail, eh?”
Bogdanov said with agitation. “Why are you starting up on politics, eh? Is it any of your affair to start making judgments
on politics, eh? No, you be so kind as to take that cockade off, young man. It’s not allowed, how could you! Heaven forfend,
the number of people that could find out!”

Machigin shrugged his shoulders, wanted to protest further, but Bogdanov interrupted him. What he considered to be a brilliant
idea had flashed through his mind.

“Here you’ve come to see me without a cockade, eh? Without a cockade? You yourself feel that it isn’t allowed.”

Machigin almost faltered, but this time he found a reason for protest:

“Because we’re country teachers, we need a country privilege, whereas in the town we’re considered to be second-class members
of the intelligentsia.”

“No, just you understand, young man,” Bogdanov said angrily, “that is not allowed and if I hear once more of this, then we’ll
dismiss you.”

From time to time Grushina organized parties for young people from whose number she was hoping to catch herself a husband.
As a decoy she would invite family friends as well.(f)

This was one of those kinds of parties. The guests arrived early.

Paintings that were completely covered over with muslin hung on the walls of Grushina’s sitting room. In any event there was
nothing indecent in them. When Grushina lifted the muslin coverings with a sly and immodest little grin, the guests would
admire the poorly painted naked women.

“What’s this, a crooked woman?” Peredonov said sullenly.

“There’s nothing crooked about her,” Grushina defended the painting vehemently. “She’s just bent over like that.”

“She’s crooked,” Peredonov repeated. “And her eyes don’t match, like yours.”

“Well, a lot you understand!” Grushina said in an offended voice. “These paintings are very fine and expensive. Artists have
to paint those kind of pictures.”

Suddenly Peredonov burst into laughter. He had remembered the advice which he had given to Vladya the other day.

“What are you neighing for?” Grishina asked.

“Nartanovich, a student at the gymnasium, is going to set fire to his sister Marta’s dress,” he explained. “I advised him
to do so.”

“If he does that, then you’ve found a fool!” Grushina objected.

“Of course he will,” Peredonov said confidently, “Brothers and sisters are always fighting. When I was little, that’s how
I always played nasty tricks on my sisters. I beat up the young ones and I ruined the clothing of the older ones.”

“Not all of them fight,” Rutilov said. “I don’t fight with my sisters.”

“What do you do with them, make up to them, or something?” Peredonov asked.

“You, Ardalyon Borisych, are a swine and a scoundrel, and I’m going to slap your face,” Rutilov said very calmly.

“Well, I don’t care for those kinds of jokes,” Peredonov replied and moved away from Rutilov.

“Otherwise,” he thought, “he’ll really do it, there’s something ominous in his face.”

“She only has the one black dress,” he continued, in reference to Marta.

“Vershina will sew her a new one,” Varvara said with malicious envy. “She’ll make her entire dowry for her wedding. Some beauty,
even horses are spooked,” she grumbled softly and looked maliciously at Murin.

“It’s time for you to get married,” Prepolovenskaya said. “What are you waiting for, Ardalyon Borisych?”

The Prepolovenskys had seen by now that after the second letter Peredonov had firmly decided to marry Varvara. They themselves
had believed the letter. They had begun to say that they had always been in favor of Varvara. There was nothing for them to
gain by embroiling Varvara and Peredonov—it was advantageous for them to go on playing cards. As for Genya, there was nothing
to be done, let her wait. They’d have to look for another prospective husband.

Prepolovensky started to speak:

“Of course, you have to get married. You’ll be doing the good deed and obliging the Princess. The Princess will be pleased
that you’re getting married, so you’ll be obliging her and doing the good deed, and that’ll be good, otherwise, in general,
you’ll be doing the good deed and the Princess will be pleased.”

“That’s what I would say as well,” Prepolovenskaya said.

But Prepolovensky couldn’t stop and seeing that everyone was already moving away from him, he sat down beside a young official
and started to expound on the same topic to him.

“I’ve made up my mind to get married,” Peredonov said. “Only Varvara and I don’t know what’s necessary to get married. Something
has to be done, but I don’t know what.”

“Well, it’s not a tricky business,” Prepolovenskaya said. “But if you wish, my husband and I will arrange everything for you,
you just sit quiet and don’t think about a thing.”

“Fine,” Peredonov said. “I’m agreed. Only make sure that everything will be nice and decent. I don’t begrudge the money.”

“Everything will be just fine, don’t you worry,” Prepolovenskaya assured him.

Peredonov continued to set down his conditions:

“Out of miserliness others buy thin wedding rings, silver ones with gold plating, but I don’t want that, I want real gold
ones. And instead of wedding rings I even want to order wedding bracelets—that would be more expensive and prestigious.”

Everyone laughed.

“You can’t have bracelets,” Prepolovenskaya said, grinning slightly. “You have to have rings.”

“Why can’t I?” Peredonov asked with annoyance.

“Because it’s not done like that.”

“Well maybe it is done,” Peredonov said mistrustfully. “I’m going to ask the priest about it as well. He knows better.”

Giggling, Rutilov advised:

“Ardalyon Borisych, better you order wedding belts.”

“Well, I don’t have enough money for that,” Peredonov replied without noticing the sarcasm. “I’m not a banker.(g) But just
the other day I had a dream in which I was getting married. I had a satin dress coat on and Varvara and I were wearing gold
bracelets. And two headmasters were standing behind us, holding wedding wreaths over our heads and singing hallelujah.”

“I had an interesting dream last night,” Volodin declared. “But I don’t know what the meaning of it was. Supposedly I was
sitting on a throne and wearing a golden crown. In front of me was grass and there were sheep on the grass, nothing but sheep
and more sheep—baa-baa-baa. So all the sheep were walking around doing this with their heads, and going baa-baabaa all the
while.”