The Forged Coupon and Other Stories

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"You, my man, ought to have many things which you have not got."

"That is usually the case, isn't it?

"Take plenty of milk, and don't smoke."

"These are days of fasting, and besides we have no cow."

Once in spring he could not get any sleep; he was longing to have a
drink. There was nothing in the house he could lay his hand on to take
to the public-house. He put on his cap and went out. He walked along the
street up to the house where the priest and the deacon lived together.
The deacon's harrow stood outside leaning against the hedge. Prokofy
approached, took the harrow upon his shoulder, and walked to an inn kept
by a woman, Petrovna. She might give him a small bottle of vodka for
it. But he had hardly gone a few steps when the deacon came out of his
house. It was already dawn, and he saw that Prokofy was carrying away
his harrow.

"Hey, what's that?" cried the deacon.

The neighbours rushed out from their houses. Prokofy was seized,
brought to the police station, and then sentenced to eleven months'
imprisonment. It was autumn, and Prokofy had to be transferred to the
prison hospital. He was coughing badly; his chest was heaving from the
exertion; and he could not get warm. Those who were stronger contrived
not to shiver; Prokofy on the contrary shivered day and night, as the
superintendent would not light the fires in the hospital till November,
to save expense.

Prokofy suffered greatly in body, and still more in soul. He was
disgusted with his surroundings, and hated every one--the deacon, the
superintendent who would not light the fires, the guard, and the man
who was lying in the bed next to his, and who had a swollen red lip. He
began also to hate the new convict who was brought into hospital. This
convict was Stepan. He was suffering from some disease on his head,
and was transferred to the hospital and put in a bed at Prokofy's side.
After a time that hatred to Stepan changed, and Prokofy became, on the
contrary, extremely fond of him; he delighted in talking to him. It was
only after a talk with Stepan that his anguish would cease for a while.
Stepan always told every one he met about his last murder, and how it
had impressed him.

"Far from shrieking, or anything of that kind," he said to Prokofy, "she
did not move. 'Kill me! There I am,' she said. 'But it is not my soul
you destroy, it is your own.'"

"Well, of course, it is very dreadful to kill. I had one day to
slaughter a sheep, and even that made me half mad. I have not destroyed
any living soul; why then do those villains kill me? I have done no harm
to anybody . . ."

"That will be taken into consideration."

"By whom?"

"By God, to be sure."

"I have not seen anything yet showing that God exists, and I don't
believe in Him, brother. I think when a man dies, grass will grow over
the spot, and that is the end of it."

"You are wrong to think like that. I have murdered so many people,
whereas she, poor soul, was helping everybody. And you think she and I
are to have the same lot? Oh no! Only wait."

"Then you believe the soul lives on after a man is dead?"

"To be sure; it truly lives."

Prokofy suffered greatly when death drew near. He could hardly breathe.
But in the very last hour he felt suddenly relieved from all pain. He
called Stepan to him. "Farewell, brother," he said. "Death has come, I
see. I was so afraid of it before. And now I don't mind. I only wish it
to come quicker."


XVI

IN the meanwhile, the affairs of Eugene Mihailovich had grown worse and
worse. Business was very slack. There was a new shop in the town; he was
losing his customers, and the interest had to be paid. He borrowed again
on interest. At last his shop and his goods were to be sold up. Eugene
Mihailovich and his wife applied to every one they knew, but they
could not raise the four hundred roubles they needed to save the shop
anywhere.

They had some hope of the merchant Krasnopuzov, Eugene Mihailovich's
wife being on good terms with his mistress. But news came that
Krasnopuzov had been robbed of a huge sum of money. Some said of half
a million roubles. "And do you know who is said to be the thief?" said
Eugene Mihailovich to his wife. "Vassily, our former yard-porter. They
say he is squandering the money, and the police are bribed by him."

"I knew he was a villain. You remember how he did not mind perjuring
himself? But I did not expect it would go so far."

"I hear he has recently been in the courtyard of our house. Cook says
she is sure it was he. She told me he helps poor girls to get married."

"They always invent tales. I don't believe it."

At that moment a strange man, shabbily dressed, entered the shop.

"What is it you want?"

"Here is a letter for you."

"From whom?"

"You will see yourself."

"Don't you require an answer? Wait a moment."

"I cannot." The strange man handed the letter and disappeared.

"How extraordinary!" said Eugene Mihailovich, and tore open the
envelope. To his great amazement several hundred rouble notes fell out.
"Four hundred roubles!" he exclaimed, hardly believing his eyes. "What
does it mean?"

The envelope also contained a badly-spelt letter, addressed to Eugene
Mihailovich. "It is said in the Gospels," ran the letter, "do good for
evil. You have done me much harm; and in the coupon case you made me
wrong the peasants greatly. But I have pity for you. Here are four
hundred notes. Take them, and remember your porter Vassily."

"Very extraordinary!" said Eugene Mihailovich to his wife and to
himself. And each time he remembered that incident, or spoke about it to
his wife, tears would come to his eyes.


XVII

FOURTEEN priests were kept in the Suzdal friary prison, chiefly for
having been untrue to the orthodox faith. Isidor had been sent to that
place also. Father Missael received him according to the instructions he
had been given, and without talking to him ordered him to be put into a
separate cell as a serious criminal. After a fortnight Father Missael,
making a round of the prison, entered Isidor's cell, and asked him
whether there was anything he wished for.

"There is a great deal I wish for," answered Isidor; "but I cannot
tell you what it is in the presence of anybody else. Let me talk to you
privately."

They looked at each other, and Missael saw he had nothing to be afraid
of in remaining alone with Isidor. He ordered Isidor to be brought into
his own room, and when they were alone, he said,--"Well, now you can
speak."

Isidor fell on his knees.

"Brother," said Isidor. "What are you doing to yourself! Have mercy on
your own soul. You are the worst villain in the world. You have offended
against all that is sacred . . ."

A month after Missael sent a report, asking that Isidor should be
released as he had repented, and he also asked for the release of the
rest of the prisoners. After which he resigned his post.


XVIII

TEN years passed. Mitia Smokovnikov had finished his studies in the
Technical College; he was now an engineer in the gold mines in Siberia,
and was very highly paid. One day he was about to make a round in the
district. The governor offered him a convict, Stepan Pelageushkine, to
accompany him on his journey.

"A convict, you say? But is not that dangerous?"

"Not if it is this one. He is a holy man. You may ask anybody, they will
all tell you so."

"Why has he been sent here?"

The governor smiled. "He had committed six murders, and yet he is a holy
man. I go bail for him."

Mitia Smokovnikov took Stepan, now a bald-headed, lean, tanned man, with
him on his journey. On their way Stepan took care of Smokovnikov, like
his own child, and told him his story; told him why he had been sent
here, and what now filled his life.

And, strange to say, Mitia Smokovnikov, who up to that time used to
spend his time drinking, eating, and gambling, began for the first time
to meditate on life. These thoughts never left him now, and produced
a complete change in his habits. After a time he was offered a very
advantageous position. He refused it, and made up his mind to buy an
estate with the money he had, to marry, and to devote himself to the
peasantry, helping them as much as he could.


XIX

HE carried out his intentions. But before retiring to his estate he
called on his father, with whom he had been on bad terms, and who had
settled apart with his new family. Mitia Smokovnikov wanted to make it
up. The old man wondered at first, and laughed at the change he noticed
in his son; but after a while he ceased to find fault with him, and
thought of the many times when it was he who was the guilty one.




AFTER THE DANCE


"--AND you say that a man cannot, of himself, understand what is good
and evil; that it is all environment, that the environment swamps the
man. But I believe it is all chance. Take my own case . . ."

Thus spoke our excellent friend, Ivan Vasilievich, after a conversation
between us on the impossibility of improving individual character
without a change of the conditions under which men live. Nobody had
actually said that one could not of oneself understand good and evil;
but it was a habit of Ivan Vasilievich to answer in this way the
thoughts aroused in his own mind by conversation, and to illustrate
those thoughts by relating incidents in his own life. He often quite
forgot the reason for his story in telling it; but he always told it
with great sincerity and feeling.

He did so now.

"Take my own case. My whole life was moulded, not by environment, but by
something quite different."

"By what, then?" we asked.

"Oh, that is a long story. I should have to tell you about a great many
things to make you understand."

"Well, tell us then."

Ivan Vasilievich thought a little, and shook his head.

"My whole life," he said, "was changed in one night, or, rather,
morning."

"Why, what happened?" one of us asked.

"What happened was that I was very much in love. I have been in love
many times, but this was the most serious of all. It is a thing of
the past; she has married daughters now. It was Varinka B----." Ivan
Vasilievich mentioned her surname. "Even at fifty she is remarkably
handsome; but in her youth, at eighteen, she was exquisite--tall,
slender, graceful, and stately. Yes, stately is the word; she held
herself very erect, by instinct as it were; and carried her head high,
and that together with her beauty and height gave her a queenly air in
spite of being thin, even bony one might say. It might indeed have
been deterring had it not been for her smile, which was always gay and
cordial, and for the charming light in her eyes and for her youthful
sweetness."

"What an entrancing description you give, Ivan Vasilievich!"

"Description, indeed! I could not possibly describe her so that you
could appreciate her. But that does not matter; what I am going to
tell you happened in the forties. I was at that time a student in a
provincial university. I don't know whether it was a good thing or no,
but we had no political clubs, no theories in our universities then.
We were simply young and spent our time as young men do, studying and
amusing ourselves. I was a very gay, lively, careless fellow, and had
plenty of money too. I had a fine horse, and used to go tobogganing
with the young ladies. Skating had not yet come into fashion. I went to
drinking parties with my comrades--in those days we drank nothing but
champagne--if we had no champagne we drank nothing at all. We never
drank vodka, as they do now. Evening parties and balls were my favourite
amusements. I danced well, and was not an ugly fellow."

"Come, there is no need to be modest," interrupted a lady near him.
"We have seen your photograph. Not ugly, indeed! You were a handsome
fellow."

"Handsome, if you like. That does not matter. When my love for her was
at its strongest, on the last day of the carnival, I was at a ball at
the provincial marshal's, a good-natured old man, rich and hospitable,
and a court chamberlain. The guests were welcomed by his wife, who was
as good-natured as himself. She was dressed in puce-coloured velvet, and
had a diamond diadem on her forehead, and her plump, old white shoulders
and bosom were bare like the portraits of Empress Elizabeth, the
daughter of Peter the Great.

"It was a delightful ball. It was a splendid room, with a gallery for
the orchestra, which was famous at the time, and consisted of serfs
belonging to a musical landowner. The refreshments were magnificent, and
the champagne flowed in rivers. Though I was fond of champagne I did not
drink that night, because without it I was drunk with love. But I made
up for it by dancing waltzes and polkas till I was ready to drop--of
course, whenever possible, with Varinka. She wore a white dress with a
pink sash, white shoes, and white kid gloves, which did not quite reach
to her thin pointed elbows. A disgusting engineer named Anisimov robbed
me of the mazurka with her--to this day I cannot forgive him. He asked
her for the dance the minute she arrived, while I had driven to the
hair-dresser's to get a pair of gloves, and was late. So I did not dance
the mazurka with her, but with a German girl to whom I had previously
paid a little attention; but I am afraid I did not behave very politely
to her that evening. I hardly spoke or looked at her, and saw nothing
but the tall, slender figure in a white dress, with a pink sash, a
flushed, beaming, dimpled face, and sweet, kind eyes. I was not alone;
they were all looking at her with admiration, the men and women alike,
although she outshone all of them. They could not help admiring her.

"Although I was not nominally her partner for the mazurka, I did as a
matter of fact dance nearly the whole time with her. She always came
forward boldly the whole length of the room to pick me out. I flew to
meet her without waiting to be chosen, and she thanked me with a smile
for my intuition. When I was brought up to her with somebody else, and
she guessed wrongly, she took the other man's hand with a shrug of her
slim shoulders, and smiled at me regretfully.

"Whenever there was a waltz figure in the mazurka, I waltzed with
her for a long time, and breathing fast and smiling, she would say,
'Encore'; and I went on waltzing and waltzing, as though unconscious of
any bodily existence."

"Come now, how could you be unconscious of it with your arm round her
waist? You must have been conscious, not only of your own existence, but
of hers," said one of the party.

Ivan Vasilievich cried out, almost shouting in anger: "There you are,
moderns all over! Nowadays you think of nothing but the body. It was
different in our day. The more I was in love the less corporeal was she
in my eyes. Nowadays you think of nothing but the body. It was different
in our day. The more I was in love the less corporeal was she in my
eyes. Nowadays you set legs, ankles, and I don't know what. You undress
the women you are in love with. In my eyes, as Alphonse Karr said--and
he was a good writer--' the one I loved was always draped in robes of
bronze.' We never thought of doing so; we tried to veil her nakedness,
like Noah's good-natured son. Oh, well, you can't understand."

"Don't pay any attention to him. Go on," said one of them.

"Well, I danced for the most part with her, and did not notice how time
was passing. The musicians kept playing the same mazurka tunes over and
over again in desperate exhaustion--you know what it is towards the end
of a ball. Papas and mammas were already getting up from the card-tables
in the drawing-room in expectation of supper, the men-servants were
running to and fro bringing in things. It was nearly three o'clock.
I had to make the most of the last minutes. I chose her again for the
mazurka, and for the hundredth time we danced across the room.

"'The quadrille after supper is mine,' I said, taking her to her place.

"'Of course, if I am not carried off home,' she said, with a smile.

"'I won't give you up,' I said.

"'Give me my fan, anyhow,' she answered.

"'I am so sorry to part with it,' I said, handing her a cheap white fan.

"'Well, here's something to console you,' she said, plucking a feather
out of the fan, and giving it to me.

"I took the feather, and could only express my rapture and gratitude
with my eyes. I was not only pleased and gay, I was happy, delighted;
I was good, I was not myself but some being not of this earth, knowing
nothing of evil. I hid the feather in my glove, and stood there unable
to tear myself away from her.

"'Look, they are urging father to dance,' she said to me, pointing
to the tall, stately figure of her father, a colonel with silver
epaulettes, who was standing in the doorway with some ladies.

"'Varinka, come here!' exclaimed our hostess, the lady with the diamond
ferronniere and with shoulders like Elizabeth, in a loud voice.

"'Varinka went to the door, and I followed her.

"'Persuade your father to dance the mazurka with you, ma chere.--Do,
please, Peter Valdislavovich,' she said, turning to the colonel.

"Varinka's father was a very handsome, well-preserved old man. He had
a good colour, moustaches curled in the style of Nicolas I., and
white whiskers which met the moustaches. His hair was combed on to his
forehead, and a bright smile, like his daughter's, was on his lips and
in his eyes. He was splendidly set up, with a broad military chest, on
which he wore some decorations, and he had powerful shoulders and long
slim legs. He was that ultra-military type produced by the discipline of
Emperor Nicolas I.

"When we approached the door the colonel was just refusing to dance,
saying that he had quite forgotten how; but at that instant he smiled,
swung his arm gracefully around to the left, drew his sword from its
sheath, handed it to an obliging young man who stood near, and smoothed
his suede glove on his right hand.

"'Everything must be done according to rule,' he said with a smile. He
took the hand of his daughter, and stood one-quarter turned, waiting for
the music.

"At the first sound of the mazurka, he stamped one foot smartly, threw
the other forward, and, at first slowly and smoothly, then buoyantly
and impetuously, with stamping of feet and clicking of boots, his tall,
imposing figure moved the length of the room. Varinka swayed gracefully
beside him, rhythmically and easily, making her steps short or long,
with her little feet in their white satin slippers.

"All the people in the room followed every movement of the couple. As
for me I not only admired, I regarded them with enraptured sympathy. I
was particularly impressed with the old gentleman's boots. They were
not the modern pointed affairs, but were made of cheap leather,
squared-toed, and evidently built by the regimental cobbler. In order
that his daughter might dress and go out in society, he did not buy
fashionable boots, but wore home-made ones, I thought, and his square
toes seemed to me most touching. It was obvious that in his time he
had been a good dancer; but now he was too heavy, and his legs had not
spring enough for all the beautiful steps he tried to take. Still, he
contrived to go twice round the room. When at the end, standing with
legs apart, he suddenly clicked his feet together and fell on one
knee, a bit heavily, and she danced gracefully around him, smiling and
adjusting her skirt, the whole room applauded.

"Rising with an effort, he tenderly took his daughter's face between his
hands. He kissed her on the forehead, and brought her to me, under the
impression that I was her partner for the mazurka. I said I was not.
'Well, never mind, just go around the room once with her,' he said,
smiling kindly, as he replaced his sword in the sheath.

"As the contents of a bottle flow readily when the first drop has been
poured, so my love for Varinka seemed to set free the whole force of
loving within me. In surrounding her it embraced the world. I loved
the hostess with her diadem and her shoulders like Elizabeth, and her
husband and her guests and her footmen, and even the engineer Anisimov
who felt peevish towards me. As for Varinka's father, with his home-made
boots and his kind smile, so like her own, I felt a sort of tenderness
for him that was almost rapture.

"After supper I danced the promised quadrille with her, and though I had
been infinitely happy before, I grew still happier every moment.

"We did not speak of love. I neither asked myself nor her whether she
loved me. It was quite enough to know that I loved her. And I had only
one fear--that something might come to interfere with my great joy.

"When I went home, and began to undress for the night, I found it quite
out of the question. I held the little feather out of her fan in my hand,
and one of her gloves which she gave me when I helped her into the
carriage after her mother. Looking at these things, and without closing
my eyes I could see her before me as she was for an instant when she had
to choose between two partners. She tried to guess what kind of person
was represented in me, and I could hear her sweet voice as she said,
'Pride--am I right?' and merrily gave me her hand. At supper she took
the first sip from my glass of champagne, looking at me over the rim
with her caressing glance. But, plainest of all, I could see her as she
danced with her father, gliding along beside him, and looking at the
admiring observers with pride and happiness.

"He and she were united in my mind in one rush of pathetic tenderness.

"I was living then with my brother, who has since died. He disliked
going out, and never went to dances; and besides, he was busy preparing
for his last university examinations, and was leading a very regular
life. He was asleep. I looked at him, his head buried in the pillow and
half covered with the quilt; and I affectionately pitied him, pitied him
for his ignorance of the bliss I was experiencing. Our serf Petrusha
had met me with a candle, ready to undress me, but I sent him away. His
sleepy face and tousled hair seemed to me so touching. Trying not to
make a noise, I went to my room on tiptoe and sat down on my bed. No, I
was too happy; I could not sleep. Besides, it was too hot in the rooms.
Without taking off my uniform, I went quietly into the hall, put on my
overcoat, opened the front door and stepped out into the street.

"It was after four when I had left the ball; going home and stopping
there a while had occupied two hours, so by the time I went out it
was dawn. It was regular carnival weather--foggy, and the road full
of water-soaked snow just melting, and water dripping from the eaves.
Varinka's family lived on the edge of town near a large field, one end
of which was a parade ground: at the other end was a boarding-school for
young ladies. I passed through our empty little street and came to the
main thoroughfare, where I met pedestrians and sledges laden with
wood, the runners grating the road. The horses swung with regular paces
beneath their shining yokes, their backs covered with straw mats
and their heads wet with rain; while the drivers, in enormous boots,
splashed through the mud beside the sledges. All this, the very
horses themselves, seemed to me stimulating and fascinating, full of
suggestion.

"When I approached the field near their house, I saw at one end of it,
in the direction of the parade ground, something very huge and black,
and I heard sounds of fife and drum proceeding from it. My heart had
been full of song, and I had heard in imagination the tune of the
mazurka, but this was very harsh music. It was not pleasant.

"'What can that be?' I thought, and went towards the sound by a slippery
path through the centre of the field. Walking about a hundred paces,
I began to distinguish many black objects through the mist. They were
evidently soldiers. 'It is probably a drill,' I thought.

"So I went along in that direction in company with a blacksmith, who
wore a dirty coat and an apron, and was carrying something. He walked
ahead of me as we approached the place. The soldiers in black uniforms
stood in two rows, facing each other motionless, their guns at rest.
Behind them stood the fifes and drums, incessantly repeating the same
unpleasant tune.

"'What are they doing?' I asked the blacksmith, who halted at my side.

"'A Tartar is being beaten through the ranks for his attempt to desert,'
said the blacksmith in an angry tone, as he looked intently at the far
end of the line.

"I looked in the same direction, and saw between the files something
horrid approaching me. The thing that approached was a man, stripped
to the waist, fastened with cords to the guns of two soldiers who were
leading him. At his side an officer in overcoat and cap was walking,
whose figure had a familiar look. The victim advanced under the blows
that rained upon him from both sides, his whole body plunging, his
feet dragging through the snow. Now he threw himself backward, and the
subalterns who led him thrust him forward. Now he fell forward, and they
pulled him up short; while ever at his side marched the tall officer,
with firm and nervous pace. It was Varinka's father, with his rosy face
and white moustache.