The Petty Demon (30 page)

“I killed a bedbug,” Peredonov explained sullenly.

His eyes were glittering with savage victory. Only one thing was bad: it smelled vilely. The stabbed spy behind the wallpaper
was rotting and
reeking. Peredonov was shaken by terror and triumph: he had killed an enemy! The performance of this murder had hardened his
heart completely. There was no actual murder committed, but for Peredonov it was the same as committing a murder. The insane
terror inside him had fashioned a willingness to commit crime. His depraved will was being oppressed by this state of primitive
malevolence, by the depressing urge for murder, by the dark notion of some future murder lurking in the nethermost regions
of his spiritual being. Though still constrained—many generations had settled over the ancient Cain—it found satisfaction
for itself in the fact that he broke and spoiled things, chopped things with an axe, cut and hacked down trees in the garden
so that spies couldn’t peek out from behind them. And in the destruction of things the ancient demon established itself, the
spirit of prehistoric confusion, decrepit chaos, while the savage eyes of an insane man reflected the terror which resembled
the terrors of monstrous torments on the periphery of death.

The same illusions repeated themselves ceaselessly and tormented him. Varvara, amusing herself at Peredonov’s expense, sometimes
crept up stealthily to the doors of the room where Peredonov was sitting and from there she would speak in strange voices.
He was terrified and he would quietly approach so as to catch the enemy—and he’d find Varvara.

“Who are you talking to in whispers here?” he asked with melancholy.

Varvara would smirk and reply:

“You’re only imagining it, Ardalyon Borisych.”

“I’m not imagining everything,” Peredonov mumbled. “There is some truth in the world.”

Yes, Peredonov was striving for the truth after all, according to the general law of every conscious life and he was oppressed
by that striving. He himself was not conscious of the fact that like all people he was striving for the truth, and for that
reason his anxiety was obscure. He couldn’t find the truth for himself and became muddled and was perishing.

His acquaintances had by now begun to tease Peredonov over the deception. With the rudeness towards the weak that was customary
in our town, they talked about the deception in his presence. Prepolovenskaya would ask with a sly little grin:

“Really now, Ardalyon Borisych, why aren’t you off to your inspector’s post?”

Varvara would answer Prepolovenskaya on Peredonov’s behalf with restrained malice:

“As soon as we get the document, then we’ll go.”

These questions made Peredonov feel melancholy.

“How can I live if they don’t give me the post?” he thought.

He kept devising fresh plans of defense against his enemies. He stole the axe from the kitchen and hid it under the bed. He
bought a Swedish knife and always carried it around in his pocket. He was constantly locking
himself up. He set out traps for the night around the house and inside in the rooms. Afterwards he would look them over. Of
course, these traps were set in such a fashion that no one could have been caught in them. They might pinch, but they wouldn’t
hold, and it was possible to get out of them. Peredonov had no technical knowledge and no keen wit. Every morning when he
saw that no one had fallen into the traps, Peredonov thought that his enemies had spoiled the traps. That frightened him again.

Peredonov paid particular attention to Volodin. From time to time he would go to Volodin’s place when he knew that Volodin
wasn’t at home, and he would rummage around to see whether he had seized any papers.

Peredonov began to suspect that what the Princess wanted was for him to love her again. She was repulsive to him, a decrepit
woman. “After all, she’s a hundred and fifty,” he thought spitefully. “She may be old,” he thought, “but what a powerful woman
she is for all that.” And revulsion became intermingled with fascination. Peredonov imagined that she would be barely lukewarm
and would smell like a corpse, and he almost fainted from a savage lust.

“Perhaps I could get intimate with her and she would take pity. Should I write her a letter?”

This time Peredonov composed a letter to the Princess without giving it much thought. He wrote:

“I love you because you are cold and distant. Varvara sweats, it’s hot sleeping with her, she throws off heat like a stove.
I want to have a lover who is cold and distant. Come and be responsive to me.”

He finished writing it, sent it off—and regretted it. “What if something comes of it? Maybe I shouldn’t have written,” he
thought. “I ought to have waited until the Princess herself came.”

So this letter was produced haphazardly, the way Peredonov did many things haphazardly. He was like a corpse activated by
external forces and it was as though these forces had no desire to spend much time with him. One of them would play with him
for a while and then toss him to another.

The
nedotykomka
soon reappeared. For a long while it rolled around Peredonov as though it were on a lasso and kept teasing him all the while.
Now it made no sound and its laughter was expressed only in the trembling of its entire body. But it would flare up in murky
gold sparks, wicked and shameless. It threatened and burned with unbearable triumph. The cat, too, was threatening Peredonov,
flashing its eyes and miaowing brazenly and threateningly.

“What are they rejoicing at?” Peredonov thought mournfully and suddenly understood that the end was approaching, that the
Princess was already there, close by, quite close by. Perhaps right in that deck of cards.

Yes, no doubt she was the queen of spades or hearts. Perhaps she was hiding in a different deck or behind other cards, but
just which one he couldn’t tell. The trouble was that Peredonov had never seen her. It wasn’t worthwhile asking Varvara—she’d
lie.

Finally Peredonov came up with the idea of burning the entire deck of cards. Let them all burn. If people were creeping into
his cards to spite him, then they themselves were to blame.

Peredonov bided his time until Varvara wasn’t at home and the stove in the front room had been stoked up, and then he tossed
the cards into the stove, the whole deck.

With a crackling sound, mysterious, pale red flowers blossomed and burned, charring along the edges. Peredonov gazed in terror
at these fiery blossoms.

The cards warped, twisted and moved, just as though they wanted to leap out of the stove. Peredonov grabbed a poker and struck
away at the cards. Fine, brilliant sparks scattered in all directions. Suddenly, in a brilliant and wicked flurry of sparks,
the Princess arose out of the fire: a small, ashy gray woman all strewn with fading little fires. She gave a piercing wail
in a thin voice, then hissed and spat on the fire.

Peredonov collapsed backwards and started to howl with terror. The gloom embraced him, tickled him and laughed in cooing voices.

S
ASHA WAS ENCHANTED
with Lyudmila, but something prevented him from talking about her with Kokovkina. It was as though he were afraid. And he
even started to fear her visits. His heart would skip a beat and his brows pull together in a frown whenever he caught sight
of the quick flash of her pinkish yellow hat under the window. Nevertheless he would wait for her with anxiety and impatience
and he would be melancholy if she didn’t come for a long while. Contradictory feelings were all mixed up in his heart, because
they were dark and vague feelings: feelings that were wanton because they were premature, and feelings that were sweet because
they were wanton.

Lyudmila hadn’t come either the day before or today. Sasha had languished in anticipation and had already ceased waiting for
her. Then suddenly she came. He grew radiant and rushed to kiss her hands.

“You disappeared,” he upbraided her vexedly. “I didn’t see you for two whole days.”

She laughed and rejoiced, and the sweet, langorous and heady scent of Japanese fuchsia emanated from her just as though it
were streaming from her reddish-brown curls.

Lyudmila and Sasha went for a walk outside town. They invited Kokovkina—but she didn’t go.

“Where’s an old lady like me to go for a walk!” she said. “I’ll only hold you back. You’d better go for a walk on your own.”

“But we’ll get into mischief,” Lyudmila laughed.

The warm air, melancholy and motionless, caressed them and reminded them of what was irrevocable. The sun, like an invalid,
spread a murky light and turned crimson against a pallid, tired sky. Dry leaves lay submissive and dead on the dark earth.

Lyudmila and Sasha descended into a ravine. There it was cool, fresh, almost damp—a delicate autumn weariness reigned between
its shadowed slopes.

Lyudmila walked in front. She raised her skirt. Delicate shoes and flesh-colored stockings were revealed. Sasha was looking
downward so that he wouldn’t trip over roots and he caught sight of the stockings. It
seemed to him that she was wearing the shoes without any stockings. A shameful and passionate feeling arose in him. He turned
red. His head was spinning. “If only I could fall down at her feet, as though by accident,” he was dreaming, “and pull off
her shoes and kiss her tender foot.”

It was as though Lyudmila had sensed Sasha’s burning gaze on herself, his impatient desire. Chuckling, she turned around to
Sasha and asked:

“Are you looking at my stockings?”

“No, not really,” Sasha mumbled in embarrassment.

“Ach, the kind of stockings I have,” Lyudmila said, laughing and not heeding him. “It’s terrible, the kind they are! One might
think that I had put shoes on bare feet, they’re such a flesh color. It’s true, isn’t it, they really are terribly funny stockings?”

She turned around to face Sasha and raised the edge of her dress.

“Funny?” she asked.

“No, beautiful,” Sasha said, red with embarrassment.

With feigned surprise Lyudmila raised her eyebrows and exclaimed:

“Do tell! What do you understand about beauty?”

Lyudmila laughed and continued on. Burning with embarrassment, Sasha awkwardly picked his way along after her and kept stumbling
every minute.

They made it across the ravine. They sat down on the stump of a birch that had been broken by the wind. Lyudmila said:

“I’ve got so much sand in my shoes that I can’t go any farther.”

She took her shoes off, shook out the sand and glanced slyly at Sasha.

“A pretty foot?” she asked.

Sasha blushed even more and no longer knew what to say. Lyudmila pulled off her stockings.

“Nice little white feet?” she asked once more, with a strange and sly smile. “On your knees! Kiss them!” she said sternly
and an imperious cruelty settled over her face.

Sasha deftly got down on his knees and kissed Lyudmila’s feet.

“It’s nicer without stockings,” Lyudmila said, hid the stockings in a pocket and stuck her feet into her shoes.

Once again her face grew calm and cheerful, as though Sasha hadn’t just been kneeling down before her, caressing her naked
feet.

Sasha asked:

“Dearest, won’t you catch cold?”

His voice had a tender and quivering ring to it. Lyudmila laughed.

“Hardly, I’m used to it. I’m not such a sissy.”

Once Lyudmila came to Kokovkina’s towards evening and summoned Sasha:

“Let’s go and hang a new shelf at my place.”

Sasha loved to hammer nails and had once promised Lyudmila to help her with the organization of her furnishings. So now he
agreed, happy over the fact that there was an innocent pretext for being with Lyudmila and going to Lyudmila’s place. And
the innocent, somewhat tart fragrance of
extra-muguet that wafted from Lyudmila’s greenish dress, had a tender, calming effect on him.

Lyudmila changed clothing for work behind a screen and appeared to Sasha in a short, dressy skirt, her arms bare and scented
with sweet, languid, heady Japanese fuchsia.

“Just look at you, all dressed up!” Sasha said.

“Well, hardly dressed up. You see,” Lyudmila said, grinning “bare feet.” She pronounced the words with a shamefully provocative
drawl.

Sasha shrugged his shoulders and said:

“You’re always all dressed up. Well, then, let’s start hammering. Do you have the nails?” he asked seriously.

“Just wait a little bit,” Lyudmila replied. “Sit down with me at least for a little, otherwise, it’s as though you’re just
coming on business and you find it boring to talk with me.”

Sasha blushed and said tenderly.

“Dearest Lyudmilochka, I’d sit with you for as long as you like, until you chased me away, only I have to do my lessons.”

Lyudmila sighed gently and slowly said:

“You get better looking all the time, Sasha.”

Sasha turned red, laughed and stuck out the end of his tongue rolled up like a tube.

“You’re just making it up,” he said. “As though I were a young lady. Better looking, really!”

“You have a beautiful face, and your body! Show it to me at least down to the waist,” Lyudmila said, cuddling up to Sasha
and embracing him by the shoulder.

“Really, the things you think of!” Sasha said with shame and annoyance. “What’s the matter?” Lyudmila asked in a light-hearted
voice. “You’d think you had something to hide!”

“Someone might come in,” Sasha said.

“Who’s going to come in?” Lyudmila said just as easily and carefreely. “We’ll lock the door, then no one can surprise us.”

Lyudmila deftly went up to the door and locked it with the bolt. Sasha guessed that Lyudmila was not joking. He said, turning
red all over, so that beads of sweat stood out on his forehead:

“Don’t, Lyudmila.”

“Silly, why not?” Lyudmila asked in a persuasive voice.

She pulled Sasha to herself and started to unbutton his blouse. Sasha struggled free, gripping on to her hands. His face grew
frightened and a shame that was akin to fright took hold of him. And it suddenly seemed to weaken him. Lyudmila knitted her
brows and was undressing him with determination. She removed his belt, pulled his blouse off somehow. Sasha struggled even
more desperately to break free. They scuffled and circled their way around the room, bumping into tables and chairs. The heady
scent wafting from Lyudmila was intoxicating Sasha and enervating him.

With a quick shove to his chest, Lyudmila toppled Sasha onto the divan. A button popped off the undershirt that she was tearing
at. Lyudmila quickly bared Sasha’s shoulder and started to pull his arm out of the sleeve. Breaking free, Sasha inadvertently
struck Lyudmila on the cheek with the palm of his hand. He didn’t mean to hit her, of course, but the blow, strong and ringing,
fell solidly on Lyudmila’s cheek. Lyudmila shuddered, stumbled, and turned red with a bloody glow on her cheek but she didn’t
let go of Sasha.

“You wicked boy, fighting!” she cried in a choking voice.

Sasha was horribly dismayed, lowered his hands and peered guiltily at the whitish stripes, the traces of his fingers, imprinted
on Lyudmila’s left cheek. Lyudmila took advantage of his distraction. She quickly pulled the undershirt from both shoulders
down to his elbows. Sasha regained his senses, tore free from her, but it turned out for the worse. Lyudmila deftly yanked
the sleeves off his arms—and the shirt fell down to his waist. Sasha felt the cold and a fresh attack of shame that was clear
and merciless and that made his head spin. Now Sasha was bared down to the waist. Lyudmila took firm hold of his arm and with
her trembling hand patted him on his bare back, peering into his dazed, strangely glowing eyes beneath the bluish-black eyelashes.

And suddenly these eyelashes trembled, the face twisted into a pitiful, childish grimace—and he began to sob, suddenly and
violently.

“Wicked girl!” he cried in a sobbing voice. “Let me go!”

“He’s whimpering! The little baby!” Lyudmila said with anger and dismay and pushed him away.

Sasha turned away, wiping away the tears with his palms. He felt ashamed because he was crying. He tried to restrain himself.
Lyudmila gazed hungrily at his naked back.

“So much delight in the world!” she thought. “People hide so much beauty from themselves, but why?”

Hunching his shoulders up in shame, Sasha was trying to put on his undershirt, but it only got balled up and strained under
his trembling hands and there was no way he could get his arms into the sleeves. Sasha grabbed his blouse—let the undershirt
stay as it was for the time being.

“Ach, you’re afraid for your property. I won’t steal it!” Lyudmila said in a voice that was spiteful and ringing with tears.

She tossed him his belt impetuously and turned away to the window. A lot she needed him, wrapped up in his gray blouse, a
vile young boy, a revolting, affected creature.

Sasha quickly put his blouse on, somehow or other straightened out the undershirt and looked at Lyudmila timidly, uncertainly
and shamefully. He saw that she was wiping her cheeks with her hands, timidly went up to her and looked into her face—and
the tears that were flowing down her cheeks suddenly poisoned him with a tender pity for her, and he was no longer ashamed
or annoyed.

“Why are you crying, dearest Lyudmilochka?” he asked softly.

And suddenly he turned red—he had remembered his blow.

“I struck you, forgive me. I didn’t do it on purpose,” he said timidly.

“You think you’ll melt, silly boy, if you sit a while with bare shoulders?” Lyudmila said in a plaintive voice. “You’re afraid
you’ll get sunburnt. Your beauty and innocence will get tarnished.”

“But why are you doing it, Lyudmilochka?” Sasha asked with a shameful grimace.

“Why?” Lyudmila said passionately. “I love beauty. I’m a pagan, a sinner. I ought to have been born in ancient Greece. I love
flowers, perfume, brilliant clothes, the naked body. They say there’s a soul. I don’t know, I’ve never seen it. And what do
I need it for? Let me die completely, like a
rusalka
, I’ll melt like a cloud beneath the sun. I love the body, strong, dexterous, naked, which is able to take its own pleasure.”

“And which is able to suffer,” Sasha said softly.

“And suffer, that’s good too,” Lyudmila whispered passionately. “It’s sweet even when it’s painful—as long as one can feel
the body, as long as one can see the body’s nakedness and beauty.”

“But isn’t it shameful without clothing?” Sasha said timidly.

Lyudmila fell abruptly on her knees before him. Breathlessly she kissed his hands and whispered:

“Dearest, my idol, my godlike youth, if only I could feast my eyes on your dear shoulders for a single moment.”

Sasha sighed, lowered his eyes, blushed and awkwardly removed his blouse. Lyudmila seized him with burning hands and showered
kisses over his shoulders that were convulsed with shame.

“See how submissive I am!” Sasha said, smiling with an effort so that he could banish his embarrassment with a jest.

Lyudmila was hastily kissing Sasha’s arms from the shoulders to the fingers, and Sasha, plunged into a passionate and cruel
reverie, did not attempt to remove them. Lyudmila’s kisses were infused with the warmth of adoration, and it was as though
her burning lips were kissing not a boy, but a god-youth in some thrilling and mysterious ritual of the blossoming Flesh.

Meanwhile Darya and Valeriya were standing behind the door, pushing each other, and taking turns looking through the key-hole
and almost fainting from passionate and searing excitement.

“It’s time to get dressed,” Sasha said finally.

Lyudmila sighed and with the same reverential expression in her eyes she put his undershirt and blouse on him, waiting on
him carefully and respectfully.

“So you’re a pagan?” Sasha asked in puzzlement.

Lyudmila laughed cheerfully.

“What about you?” she asked.

“What next!” Sasha replied confidently. “I know the entire catechism thoroughly.”

Lyudmila laughed. Eyeing her, Sasha smiled and asked:

“If you’re a pagan, then why do you go to church?”

Lyudmila stopped laughing, grew pensive.

“Well,” she said, “one has to pray. You have to pray, weep, light a candle, commemorate the dead. And I love all of it, the
candles, the icon lamps, the incense, the vestments, the singing—if the singers are good—the icons, their mountings, the ribbons.
Yes, it’s all so beautiful. And I also love … Him … you know … the One who was crucified …”

Lyudmila uttered the last words quite softly, almost in a whisper, blushed like one who was guilty and lowered her eyes.

“You know, sometimes I dream about Him—He’s on the cross and there are little drops of blood on his body.”

From that time on, Lyudmila more than once would start to unbutton his jacket when she took him off to her room. At first
he was embarrassed to tears, but he soon grew used to it. And then he would gaze clearly and calmly as Lyudmila pulled down
his undershirt, bared his shoulders, fondled and patted his back. And finally, he himself started to undress himself.