"If you wish to go to Righi,You will not need shoes to Wegis,(For you go that far by steamboat),But from Wegis take a stout staff,Also take upon your arm a maiden;Drink a glass of wine on starting,Only do not drink too freely,For if you desire to drink here,You must earn the right to, first."
"If you wish to go to Righi,You will not need shoes to Wegis,(For you go that far by steamboat),But from Wegis take a stout staff,Also take upon your arm a maiden;Drink a glass of wine on starting,Only do not drink too freely,For if you desire to drink here,You must earn the right to, first."
"Oh! a splendid song!" he exclaimed, as he finished.
The servants, evidently, also found the song much to their mind, because they came up closer to us.
"Yes, but who was it composed the music?" I asked.
"Oh, no one at all; you know you must have something new when you are going to sing for strangers."
When the ice was brought, and I had given my comrade a glass of champagne, he seemed somewhat ill at ease, and, glancing at the servants, he turned and twisted on the bench.
We touched our glasses to the health of all artists; he drank half a glass, then he seemed to be collecting his ideas, and knit his brows in deep thought.
"It is long since I have tasted such wine,je ne vous dis que ça. In Italy thevino d'Astiis excellent, but this is still better. Ah! Italy; it is splendid to be there!" he added.
"Yes, there they know how to appreciate music and artists," said I, trying to bring him round to the evening's mischance before the Schweitzerhof.
"No," he replied. "There, as far as music is concerned, I cannot give anybody satisfaction. The Italians are themselves musicians,—none like them inthe world; but I know only Tyrolese songs. They are something of a novelty to them, though."
"Well, you find rather more generous gentlemen there, don't you?" I went on to say, anxious to make him share in my resentment against the guests of the Schweitzerhof. "There it would not be possible to find a big hotel frequented by rich people, where, out of a hundred listening to an artist's singing, not one would give him any thing."
My question utterly failed of the effect that I expected. It did not enter his head to be indignant with them: on the contrary, he saw in my remark an implied slur upon his talent which had failed of its reward, and he hastened to set himself right before me. "It is not every time that you get any thing," he remarked; "sometimes one isn't in good voice, or you are tired; now to-day I have been walking ten hours, and singing almost all the time. That is hard. And these important aristocrats do not always care to listen to Tyrolese songs."
"But still, how can they help giving?" I insisted.
He did not comprehend my remark.
"That's nothing," he said; "but here the principal thing is,on est tres serré pour la police, that's what's the trouble. Here, according to these republican laws, you are not allowed to sing; but in Italy you can go wherever you please, no one says a word. Here, if they want to let you, they let you; but if they don't want to, then they can throw you into jail."
"What? That's incredible!"
"Yes, it is true. If you have been warned once, and are found singing again, they may put you in jail. I was kept there three months once," he said, smiling as though that were one of his pleasantest recollections.
"Oh! that is terrible!" I exclaimed. "What was the reason?"
"That was in consequence of one of the new republican laws," he went on to explain, growing animated. "They cannot comprehend here that a poor fellow must earn his living somehow. If I were not a cripple, I would work. But what harm do I do to any one in the world by my singing? What does it mean? The rich can live as they wish,un pauvre tiaplelike myself can't live at all. What kind of laws are these republican ones? If that is the way they run, then we don't want a republic: isn't that so, my dear sir? We don't want a republic, but we want—we simply want—we want"—he hesitated a little,—"we want natural laws."
I filled up his glass. "You are not drinking," I said.
He took the glass in his hand, and bowed to me.
"I know what you wish," he said, blinking his eyes at me, and threatening me with his finger. "You wish to make me drunk, so as to see what you can get out of me; but no, you sha'n't have that gratification."
"Why should I make you drunk?" I inquired. "All I wished was to give you a pleasure."
He seemed really sorry that he had offended me by interpreting my insistence so harshly. He grew confused, stood up, and touched my elbow.
"No, no," said he, looking at me with a beseeching expression in his moist eyes. "I was only joking."
And immediately after he made use of some horribly uncultivated slang expression, intended to signify that I was, nevertheless, a fine young man. "Je ne vous dis que ça," he said in conclusion. In this fashion the minstrel and I continued to drink and converse;and the waiters continued unceremoniously to stare at us, and, as it seemed, to make ridicule of us.
In spite of the interest which our conversation aroused in me, I could not avoid taking notice of their behavior; and I confess I began to grow more and more angry.
One of the waiters arose, came up to the little man, and, regarding the top of his head, began to smile. I was already full of wrath against the inmates of the hotel, and had not yet had a chance to pour it out on any one; and now I confess I was in the highest degree irritated by this audience of waiters.
The porter, not removing his hat, came into the room, and sat down near me, leaning his elbows on the table. This last circumstance, which was so insulting to my dignity or my vainglory, completely enraged me, and gave an outlet for all the wrath which all the evening long had been boiling within me. I asked myself why he had so humbly bowed when he had met me before, and now, because I was sitting with the travelling minstrel, he came and took his place near me so rudely? I was entirely overmastered by that boiling, angry indignation which I enjoy in myself, which I sometimes endeavor to stimulate when it comes over me, because it has an exhilarating effect upon me, and gives me, if only for a short time, a certain extraordinary flexibility, energy, and strength in all my physical and moral faculties.
I leaped to my feet.
"Whom are you laughing at?" I screamed at the waiter; and I felt my face turn pale, and my lips involuntarily set together.
"I am not laughing," replied the waiter, moving away from me.
"Yes, you are: you are laughing at this gentleman. And what right have you to come, and to take a seat here, when there are guests? Don't you dare to sit down!"
The porter, muttering something, got up, and turned to the door.
"What right have you to make sport of this gentleman, and to sit down by him, when he is a guest, and you are a waiter? Why didn't you laugh at me this evening at dinner, and come and sit down beside me? Because he is meanly dressed, and sings in the streets? Is that the reason? and because I have better clothes? He is poor, but he is a thousand times better than you are; that I am sure of, because he has never insulted any one, but you have insulted him."
"I didn't mean any thing," replied my enemy the waiter. "Perhaps I disturbed him by sitting down."
The waiter did not understand me, and my German was wasted on him. The rude porter was about to take the waiter's part; but I fell upon him so impetuously that the porter pretended not to understand me, and waved his hand.
The hunch-backed dish-washer, either because she perceived my wrathful state, and feared a scandal, or possibly because she shared my views, took my part, and, trying to force her way between me and the porter, told him to hold his tongue, saying that I was right, but at the same time urging me to calm myself.
"Der Herr hat Recht; Sie haben Recht," she said over and over again. The minstrel's face presented a most pitiable, terrified expression; and evidently he did not understand why I was angry, and what I wanted: and he urged me to let him go away as soon as possible.
But the eloquence of wrath burned within me more and more. I understood it all,—the throng that had made merry at his expense, and his auditors who had not given him any thing; and not for all the world would I have held my peace.
I believe, that, if the waiters and the porter had not been so submissive, I should have taken delight in having a brush with them, or striking the defenceless English lady on the head with a stick. If at that moment I had been at Sevastópol, I should have taken delight in devoting myself to slaughtering and killing in the English trench.
"And why did you take this gentleman and me into this room, and not into the other? What?" I thundered at the porter, seizing him by the arm so that he could not escape from me. "What right had you to judge by his appearance that this gentleman must be served in this room, and not in that? Have not all guests who pay, equal rights in hotels? Not only in a republic, but in all the world! Your scurvy republic!... Equality, indeed! You would not dare to take an Englishman into this room, not even those Englishmen who have heard this gentleman free of cost; that is, who have stolen from him, each one of them, the few centimes which ought to have been given to him. How did you dare to take us to this room?"
"That room is closed," said the porter.
"No," I cried, "that isn't true; it isn't closed."
"Then you know best."
"I know,—I know that you are lying."
The porter turned his back on me.
"Eh! What is to be said?" he muttered.
"What is to be said?" I cried. "You conduct us instanter into that room!"
In spite of the dish-washer's warning, and the entreaties of the minstrel, who would have preferred to go home, I insisted on seeing the head waiter, and went with my guest into the big dining-room. The head waiter, hearing my angry voice, and seeing my menacing face, avoided a quarrel, and, with contemptuous servility, said that I might go wherever I pleased. I could not prove to the porter that he had lied, because he had hastened out of sight before I went into the hall.
The dining-room was, in fact, open and lighted; and at one of the tables sat an Englishman and a lady, eating their supper. Although we were shown to a special table, I took the dirty minstrel to the very one where the Englishman was, and bade the waiter bring to us there the unfinished bottle.
The two guests at first looked with surprised, then with angry, eyes at the little man, who, more dead than alive, was sitting near me. They talked together in a low tone; then the lady pushed back her plate, her silk dress rustled, and both of them left the room. Through the glass doors I saw the Englishman saying something in an angry voice to the waiter, and pointing with his hand in our direction. The waiter put his head through the door, and looked at us. I waited with pleasurable anticipation for some one to come and order us out, for then I could have found a full outlet for all my indignation. But fortunately, though at the time I felt injured, we were left in peace. The minstrel, who before had fought shy of the wine, now eagerly drank all that was left in the bottle, so that he might make his escape as quickly as possible.
He, however, expressed his gratitude with deep feeling, as it seemed to me, for his entertainment. Histeary eyes grew still more humid and brilliant, and he made use of a most strange and complicated phrase of gratitude. But still very pleasant to me was the sentence in which he said that if everybody treated artists as I had been doing, it would be very good, and ended by wishing me all manner of happiness. We went out into the hall together. There stood the servants, and my enemy the porter apparently airing his grievances against me before them. All of them, I thought, looked at me as though I were a man who had lost his wits. I treated the little man exactly like an equal, before all that audience of servants; and then, with all the respect that I was able to express in my behavior, I took off my hat, and pressed his hand with its dry and hardened fingers.
The servants made believe not pay the slightest attention to me. One of them only indulged in a sarcastic laugh.
As soon as the minstrel had bowed himself out, and disappeared in the darkness, I went up-stairs to my room, intending to sleep off all these impressions and the foolish childish anger which had come upon me so unexpectedly. But finding that I was too much excited to sleep, I once more went down into the street with the intention of walking until I should have recovered my equanimity, and, I must confess, with the secret hope that I might accidentally come across the porter or the waiter or the Englishman, and show them all their rudeness, and, most of all, their unfairness. But beyond the porter, who when he saw me turned his back, I met no one; and I began to promenade in absolute solitude along the quay.
"This is an example of the strange fate of poetry," said I to myself, having grown a little calmer. "Alllove it, all are in search of it; it is the only thing in life that men love and seek, and yet no one recognizes its power, no one prizes this best treasure of the world, and those who give it to men are not rewarded. Ask any one you please, ask all these guests of the Schweitzerhof, what is the most precious treasure in the world, and all, or ninety-nine out of a hundred, putting on a sardonic expression, will say that the best thing in the world is money.
"'Maybe, though, this does not please you, or coincide with your elevated ideas,' it will be urged, 'but what is to be done if human life is so constituted that money alone is capable of giving a man happiness? I cannot force my mind not to see the world as it is,' it will be added, 'that is, to see the truth.'
"Pitiable is your intellect, pitiable the happiness which you desire! And you yourselves, unhappy creatures, not knowing what you desire, ... why have you all left your fatherland, your relatives, your money-making trades and occupations, and come to this little Swiss city of Lucerne? Why did you all this evening gather on the balconies, and in respectful silence listen to the little beggar's song? And if he had been willing to sing longer, you would have been silent and listened longer. What! could money, even millions of it, have driven you all from your country, and brought you all together in this little nook of Lucerne? Could money have gathered you all on the balconies to stand for half an hour silent and motionless? No! One thing compels you to do it, and will forever have a stronger influence than all the other impulses of life: the longing for poetry which you know, which you do not realize, but feel, always will feel so long as you have any human sensibilities. The word'poetry' is a mockery to you; you make use of it as a sort of ridiculous reproach; you regard the love for poetry as something meet for children and silly girls, and you make sport of them for it. For yourselves you must have something more definite.
"But children look upon life in a healthy way: they recognize and love what man ought to love, and what gives happiness. But life has so deceived and perverted you, that you ridicule the only thing that you really love, and you seek for what you hate and for what gives you unhappiness.
"You are so perverted that you did not perceive what obligations you were under to the poor Tyrolese who rendered you a pure delight; but at the same time you feel yourselves needlessly obliged to bow before some lord, which gives you neither pleasure nor profit, but rather causes you to sacrifice your comfort and convenience. What absurdity! what incomprehensible lack of reason!
"But it was not this that made the most powerful impression upon me this evening. This blindness to all that gives happiness, this unconsciousness of poetic enjoyment, I can almost comprehend, or at least I have become wonted to it, since I have almost everywhere met with it in the course of my life; the harsh, unconscious churlishness of the crowd was no novelty to me: whatever those who argue in favor of popular sentiment may say, the throng is a conglomeration of very possibly good people, but of people who touch each other only on their coarse animal sides, and express only the weakness and harshness of human nature. But how was it that you, children of a humane people, you Christians, you simple people, repaid with coldness and ridicule the poor beggar whogave you a pure enjoyment? But no, in your country there are asylums for beggars. There are no beggars, there can be none; and there can be no feelings of sympathy, since that would be a confession that beggary existed.
"But he labored, he gave you enjoyment, he besought you to give him something of your superfluity in payment for his labor of which you took advantage. But you looked upon him with a cool smile as upon one of the curiosities in your lofty brilliant palaces; and though there were a hundred of you, favored with happiness and wealth, not one man or one woman among you gave him asou. Abashed he went away from you, and the thoughtless throng, laughing, followed and ridiculed not you, but him, because you were cold, harsh, and dishonorable; because you robbed him in receiving the entertainment which he gave you: for this they jeeredhim.
"'On the 19th of July, 1857, before the Schweitzerhof Hotel, in which were lodging very opulent people, a wandering beggar minstrel sang for half an hour his songs, and played his guitar. About a hundred people listened to him. The minstrel thrice asked you all to give him something. No one person gave him a thing, and many made sport of him.'
"This is not an invention, but an actual fact, as those who desire can find out for themselves by consulting the papers for the list of those who were at the Schweitzerhof on the 19th of July.
"This is an event which the historians of our time ought to describe in letters of inextinguishable flame. This event is more significant and more serious, and fraught with far deeper meaning, than the facts that are printed in newspapers and histories. That theEnglish have killed several thousand Chinese because the Chinese would not sell them any thing for money while their land is overflowing with ringing coins; that the French have killed several thousand Kabyles because the wheat grows well in Africa, and because constant war is essential for the drill of an army; that the Turkish ambassador in Naples must not be a Jew; and that the Emperor Napoleon walks about in Plombières, and gives his people the express assurance that he rules only in direct accordance with the will of the people,—all these are words which darken or reveal something long known. But the episode that took place in Lucerne on the 19th of July seems to me something entirely novel and strange, and it is connected not with the everlastingly ugly side of human nature, but with a well-known epoch in the development of society. This fact is not for the history of human activities, but for the history of progress and civilization.
"Why is it that this inhuman fact, impossible in any country,—Germany, France, or Italy,—is quite possible here where civilization, freedom, and equality are carried to the highest degree of development, where there are gathered together the most civilized travellers from the most civilized nations? Why is it that these cultivated human beings, generally capable of every honorable human action, had no hearty, human feeling for one good deed? Why is it that these people who in their palaces, their meetings, and their societies, labor warmly for the condition of the celibate Chinese in India, about the spread of Christianity and culture in Africa, about the formation of societies for attaining all perfection,—why is it that they should not find in their souls the simple, primitive feeling of human sympathy? Has such a feeling entirely disappeared,and has its place been taken by vainglory, ambition, and cupidity, governing these men in their palaces, meetings, and societies? Has the spreading of that reasonable, egotistical association of people, which we call civilization, destroyed and rendered nugatory the desire for instinctive and loving association? And is this that boasted equality for which so much innocent blood has been shed, and so many crimes have been perpetrated? Is it possible that nations, like children, can be made happy by the mere sound of the word 'equality'?
"Equality before the law? Does the whole life of a people revolve within the sphere of law? Only the thousandth part of it is subject to the law: the rest lies outside of it, in the sphere of the customs and intuitions of society.
"But in society the lackey is better dressed than the minstrel, and insults him with impunity. I am better dressed than the lackey, and insult him with impunity. The porter considers me higher, but the minstrel lower, than himself; when I made the minstrel my companion, he felt that he was on an equality with us both, and behaved rudely. I was impudent to the porter, and the porter acknowledged that he was inferior to me. The waiter was impudent to the minstrel, and the minstrel accepted the fact that he was inferior to the waiter.
"And is that government free, even though men seriously call it free, where a single citizen can be thrown into prison because, without harming any one, without interfering with any one, he does the only thing that he can to prevent himself from dying of starvation?
"A wretched, pitiable creature is man with his craving for positive solutions, thrown into this everlastinglytossing, limitless ocean ofgoodandevil, of combinations and contradictions. For centuries men have been struggling and laboring to put thegoodon one side, theevilon the other. Centuries will pass, and no matter how much the unprejudiced mind may strive to decide where the balance lies between thegoodand theevil, the scales will refuse to tip the beam, and there will always be equal quantities of thegoodand theevilon each scale.
"If only man would learn to form judgments, and not to indulge in rash and arbitrary thoughts, and not to make reply to questions that are propounded merely to remain forever unanswered! If only he would learn that every thought is both a lie and a truth!—a lie from the one-sidedness and inability of man to recognize all truth; and true because it expresses one side of mortal endeavor. There are divisions in this everlastingly tumultuous, endless, endlessly confused chaos of thegoodand theevil. They have drawn imaginary lines over this ocean, and they contend that the ocean is really thus divided.
"But are there not millions of other possible subdivisions from absolutely different standpoints, in other planes? Certainly these novel subdivisions will be made in centuries to come, just as millions of different ones have been made in centuries past.
"Civilization isgood, barbarism isevil; freedom,good; slavery,evil. Now, this imaginary knowledge annihilates the instinctive, beatific, primitive craving for thegoodthat is in human nature. And who will explain to me what is freedom, what is despotism, what is civilization, what is barbarism?
"Where are the boundaries that separate them? And whose soul possesses so absolute a standard ofgood and evil as to measure these fleeting, complicated facts? Whose wit is so great as to comprehend and weigh all the facts in the irretrievable past? And who can find any circumstance in which there is no union ofgoodandevil? And because I know that I see more of one than of the other, is it not because my standpoint is wrong? And who has the ability to separate himself so absolutely from life, even for a moment, as to look upon it from above?
"One, only one infallible Guide we have,—the universal Spirit which penetrates all collectively and as units, which has endowed each of us with the craving for the right; the Spirit which impels the tree to grow toward the sun, which stimulates the flower in autumn-tide to scatter its seed, and which obliges each one of us unconsciously to draw closer together. And this one unerring, inspiring voice rings out louder than the noisy, hasty development of culture.
"Who is the greater man, and who the greater barbarian,—that lord, who, seeing the minstrel's well-worn clothes, angrily left the table, who gave him not the millionth part of his possessions in payment of his labor, and now lazily sitting in his brilliant, comfortable room, calmly opines about the events that are happening in China, and justifies the massacres that have been done there; or the little minstrel, who, risking imprisonment, with a franc in his pocket, and doing no harm to any one, has been going about for a score of years, up hill and down dale, rejoicing men's hearts with his songs, though they have jeered at him, and almost cast him out of the pale of humanity; and who, in weariness and cold and shame, has gone off to sleep, no one knows where, on his filthy straw?"
At this moment, from the city, through the deadsilence of the night, far, far away, I caught the sound of the little man's guitar and his voice.
"No," something involuntarily said to me, "you have no right to commiserate the little man, or to blame the lord for his well-being. Who can weigh the inner happiness which is found in the soul of each of these men? There he stands somewhere in the muddy road, and gazes at the brilliant moonlit sky, and gayly sings amid the smiling, fragrant night; in his soul there is no reproach, no anger, no regret. And who knows what is transpiring now in the hearts of all these men within those opulent, brilliant rooms? Who knows if they all have as much unencumbered, sweet delight in life, and as much satisfaction with the world, as dwells in the soul of that little man?
"Endless are the mercy and wisdom of Him who has permitted and formed all these contradictions. Only to thee, miserable little worm of the dust, audaciously, lawlessly attempting to fathom His laws, His designs,—only to thee do they seem like contradictions.
"Full of love He looks down from His bright, immeasurable height, and rejoices in the endless harmony in which you all move in endless contradictions. In thy pride thou hast thought thyself able to separate thyself from the laws of the universe. No, thou also, with thy petty, ridiculous anger against the waiters,—thou also hast disturbed the harmonious craving for the eternal and the infinite." ...
FOOTNOTES:[49]Hofbrücke, torn down in 1852.
[49]Hofbrücke, torn down in 1852.
[49]Hofbrücke, torn down in 1852.
Well, it happened about three o'clock. The gentlemen were playing. There was the big stranger, as our men called him. The prince was there,—the two are always together. The whiskered bárin was there; also the little hussar, Oliver, who was an actor, and there was thepan.[50]It was a pretty good crowd.
The big stranger and the prince were playing together. Now, here I was walking up and down around the billiard-table with my stick, keeping tally,—ten and forty-seven, twelve and forty-seven.
Everybody knows it's our business to score. You don't get a chance to get a bite of any thing, and you don't get to bed till two o'clock o' nights, but you're always being screamed at to bring the balls.
I was keeping tally; and I look, and see a new bárin comes in at the door. He gazed and gazed, and then sat down on the sofa. Very well!
"Now, who can that be?" thinks I to myself. "He must be somebody."
His dress was neat,—neat as a pin,—checkered tricot pants, stylish little short coat, plush vest, and gold chain and all sorts of trinkets dangling from it.
He was dressed neat; but there was something about the man neater still; slim, tall, his hair brushed forward in style, and his face fair and ruddy,—well, in a word, a fine young fellow.
You must know our business brings us into contact with all sorts of people. And there's many that ain't of much consequence, and there's a good deal of poor trash. So, though you're only a scorer, you get used to telling folks; that is, in a certain way you learn a thing or two.
I looked at the bárin. I see him sit down, modest and quiet, not knowing anybody; and the clothes on him are so bran-new, that thinks I, "Either he's a foreigner,—an Englishman maybe,—or some count just come. And though he's so young, he has an air of some distinction." Oliver sat down next him, so he moved along a little.
They began a game. The big man lost. He shouts to me. Says he, "You're always cheating. You don't count straight. Why don't you pay attention?"
He scolded away, then threw down his cue, and went out. Now, just look here! Evenings, he and the prince plays for fifty silver rubles a game; and here he only lost a bottle of Makon wine, and got mad. That's the kind of a character he is.
Another time he and the prince plays till two o'clock. They don't bank down any cash; and so I know neither of them's got any cash, but they are simply playing a bluff game.
"I'll go you twenty-five rubles," says he.
"All right."
Just yawning, and not even stopping to place the ball,—you see, he was not made of stone,—now justnotice what he said. "We are playing for money," says he, "and not for chips."
But this man puzzled me worse than all the rest. Well, then, when the big man left, the prince says to the new bárin, "Wouldn't you like," says he, "to play a game with me?"
"With pleasure," says he.
He sat there, and looked rather foolish, indeed he did. He may have been courageous in reality; but, at all events, he got up, went over to the billiard-table, and did not seem flustered as yet. He was not exactly flustered, but you couldn't help seeing that he was not quite at his ease.
Either his clothes were a little too new, or he was embarrassed because everybody was looking at him; at any rate, he seemed to have no energy. He sort of sidled up to the table, caught his pocket on the edge, began to chalk his cue, dropped his chalk.
Whenever he hit the ball, he always glanced around, and reddened. Not so the prince. He was used to it; he chalked and chalked his hand, tucked up his sleeve; he goes and sits down when he pockets the ball, even though he is such a little man.
They played two or three games; then I notice the prince puts up the cue, and says, "Would you mind telling me your name?"
"Nekhliudof," says he.
Says the prince, "Was your father commander in the corps of cadets?"
"Yes," says the other.
Then they began to talk in French, and I could not understand them. I suppose they were talking about family affairs.
"Au revoir," says the prince. "I am very glad tohave made your acquaintance." He washed his hands, and went to get a lunch; but the other stood by the billiard-table with his cue, and was knocking the balls about.
It's our business, you know, when a new man comes along, to be rather sharp: it's the best way. I took the balls, and go to put them up. He reddened, and says, "Can't I play any longer?"
"Certainly you can," says I. "That's what billiards is for." But I don't pay any attention to him. I straighten the cues.
"Will you play with me?"
"Certainly, sir," says I.
I place the balls.
"Shall we play for odds?"
"What do you mean,—'play for odds'?"
"Well," says I, "you give me a half-ruble, and I crawl under the table."
Of course, as he had never seen that sort of thing, it seemed strange to him: he laughs.
"Go ahead," says he.
"Very well," says I, "only you must give me odds."
"What!" says he, "are you a worse player than I am?"
"Most likely," says I. "We have few players who can be compared with you."
We began to play. He certainly had the idea that he was a crack shot. It was a caution to see him shoot; but the Pole sat there, and kept shouting out every time,—
"Ah, what a chance! ah, what a shot!"
But what a man he was! His ideas were good enough, but he didn't know how to carry them out.Well, as usual I lost the first game, crawled under the table, and grunted.
Thereupon Oliver and the Pole jumped down from their seats, and applauded, thumping with their cues.
"Splendid! Do it again," they cried, "once more."
Well enough to cry "once more," especially for the Pole. That fellow would have been glad enough to crawl under the billiard-table, or even under the Blue bridge, for a half-ruble! Yet he was the first to cry, "Splendid! but you haven't wiped off all the dust yet."
I, Petrushka the marker, was pretty well known to everybody.
Only, of course, I did not care to show my hand yet. I lost my second game.
"It does not become me at all to play with you, sir," says I.
He laughs. Then, as I was playing the third game, he stood forty-nine and I nothing. I laid the cue on the billiard-table, and said, "Bárin, shall we play off?"
"What do you mean by playing off?" says he. "How would you have it?"
"You make it three rubles or nothing," says I.
"Why," says he, "have I been playing with you for money?" The fool!
He turned rather red.
Very good. He lost the game. He took out his pocket-book,—quite a new one, evidently just from the English shop,—opened it: I see he wanted to make a little splurge. It is stuffed full of bills,—nothing but hundred-ruble notes.
"No," says he, "there's no small stuff here."
He took three rubles from his purse. "There,"says he, "there's your two rubles; the other pays for the games, and you keep the rest for vodka."
"Thank you, sir, most kindly." I see that he is a splendid fellow. For such a one I would crawl under any thing. For one thing, it's a pity that he won't play for money. For then, thinks I, I should know how to work him for twenty rubles, and maybe I could stretch it out to forty.
As soon as the Pole saw the young man's money, he says, "Wouldn't you like to try a little game with me? You play so admirably." Such sharpers prowl around.
"No," says the young man, "excuse me: I have not the time." And he went out.
I don't know who that man was, that Pole. Some one called himPanor the Pole, and so it stuck to him. Every day he used to sit in the billiard-room, and always look on. He was no longer allowed to take a hand in any game whatever; but he always sat by himself, and got out his pipe, and smoked. But then he could play well.
Very good. Nekhliudof came a second time, a third time; he began to come frequently. He would come morning and evening. He learned to play French carom and pyramid pool,—every thing in fact. He became less bashful, got acquainted with everybody, and played tolerably well. Of course, being a young man of a good family, with money, everybody liked him. The only exception was the "big guest:" he quarrelled with him.
And the whole thing grew out of a trifle.
They were playing pool,—the prince, the big guest, Nekhliudof, Oliver, and some one else. Nekhliudof was standing near the stove talking with some one. When it came the big man's turn to play, ithappened that his ball was just opposite the stove. There was very little space there, and he liked to have elbow-room.
Now, either he didn't see Nekhliudof, or he did it on purpose; but, as he was flourishing his cue, he hit Nekhliudof in the chest, a tremendous rap. It actually made him groan. What then? He did not think of apologizing, he was so boorish. He even went further: he didn't look at him; he walks off grumbling,—
"Who's jostling me there? It made me miss my shot. Why can't we have some room?"
Then the other went up to him, pale as a sheet, but quite self-possessed, and says so politely,—
"You ought first, sir, to apologize: you struck me," says he.
"Catch me apologizing now! I should have won the game," says he, "but now you have spoiled it for me."
Then the other one says, "You ought to apologize."
"Get out of my way! I insist upon it, I won't."
And he turned away to look after his ball.
Nekhliudof went up to him, and took him by the arm.
"You're a boor," says he, "my dear sir."
Though he was a slender young fellow, almost like a girl, still he was all ready for a quarrel. His eyes flash fire; he looks as if he could eat him alive. The big guest was a strong, tremendous fellow, no match for Nekhliudof.
"Wha-at!" says he, "you call me a boor?" Yelling out these words, he raises his hand to strike him.
Then everybody there rushed up, and seized them both by the arms, and separated them.
After much talk, Nekhliudof says, "Let him give me satisfaction: he has insulted me."
"Not at all," said the other. "I don't care a whit about any satisfaction. He's nothing but a boy, a mere nothing. I'll pull his ears for him."
"If you aren't willing to give me satisfaction, then you are no gentleman."
And, saying this, he almost cried.
"Well, and you, you are a little boy: nothing you say or do can offend me."
Well, we separated them,—led them off, as the custom is, to different rooms. Nekhliudof and the prince were friends.
"Go," says the former; "for God's sake make him listen to reason."
The prince went. The big man says, "I ain't afraid of any one," says he. "I am not going to have any explanation with such a baby. I won't do it, and that's the end of it."
Well, they talked and talked, and then the matter died out, only the big guest ceased to come to us any more.
As a result of this,—this row, I might call it,—he was regarded as quite the cock of the walk. He was quick to take offence,—I mean Nekhliudof,—as to so many other things, however, he was as unsophisticated as a new-born babe.
I remember once, the prince says to Nekhliudof, "Whom do you keep here?"
"No one," says he.
"What do you mean,—'no one'!"
"Why should I?" says Nekhliudof.
"How so,—why should you?"
"I have always lived thus. Why shouldn't I continue to live the same way?"
"You don't say so? Did you ever!"
And saying this, the prince burst into a peal of laughter, and the whiskered bárin also roared. They couldn't get over it.
"What, never?" they asked.
"Never!"
They were dying with laughter. Of course I understood well enough what they were laughing at him for. I keep my eyes open. "What," thinks I, "will come of it?"
"Come," says the prince, "come right off."
"No; not for any thing," was his answer.
"Now, that is absurd," says the prince. "Come along!"
They went out.
They came back at one o'clock. They sat down to supper; quite a crowd of them were assembled. Some of our very best customers,—Atánof, Prince Razin, Count Shustakh, Mirtsof. And all congratulate Nekhliudof, laughing as they do so. They call me in: I see that they are pretty jolly.
"Congratulate the bárin," they shout.
"What on?" I ask.
How did he call it? His initiation or his enlightenment; I can't remember exactly.
"I have the honor," says I, "to congratulate you."
And he sits there very red in the face, yet he smiles. Didn't they have fun with him though!
Well and good. They went afterwards to the billiard-room, all very gay; and Nekhliudof went up to the billiard-table, leaned on his elbow, and said,—
"It's amusing to you, gentlemen," says he, "but it's sad for me. Why," says he, "did I do it?Prince," says he, "I shall never forgive you or myself as long as I live."
And he actually burst into tears. Evidently he did not know himself what he was saying. The prince went up to him with a smile.
"Don't talk nonsense," says he. "Let's go home, Anatoli."
"I won't go anywhere," says the other. "Why did I do that?"
And the tears poured down his cheeks. He would not leave the billiard-table, and that was the end of it. That's what it means for a young and inexperienced man to....
In this way he used often to come to us. Once he came with the prince, and the whiskered man who was the prince's crony; the gentlemen always called him "Fedotka." He had prominent cheek-bones, and was homely enough, to be sure; but he used to dress neatly and ride in a carriage. What was the reason that the gentlemen were so fond of him? I really could not tell.
"Fedotka! Fedotka!" they'd call, and ask him to eat and to drink, and they'd spend their money paying up for him; but he was a thorough-going beat. If ever he lost, he would be sure not to pay; but if he won, you bet he wouldn't fail to collect his money. Often too he came to grief: yet there he was, walking arm in arm with the prince.
"You are lost without me," he would say to the prince. "I am, Fedot,"[51]says he; "but not a Fedot of that sort."
And what jokes he used to crack, to be sure! Well, as I said, they had already arrived that time, and oneof them says, "Let's have the balls for three-handed pool."
"All right," says the other.
They began to play at three rubles a stake. Nekhliudof and the prince play, and chat about all sorts of things meantime.
"Ah!" says one of them, "you mind only what a neat little foot she has."
"Oh," says the other, "her foot is nothing; her beauty is her wealth of hair."
Of course they paid no attention to the game, only kept on talking to one another.
As to Fedotka, that fellow was alive to his work; he played his very best, but they didn't do themselves justice at all.
And so he won six rubles from each of them. God knows how many games he had won from the prince, yet I never knew them to pay each other any money; but Nekhliudof took out two greenbacks, and handed them over to him.
"No," says he, "I don't want to take your money. Let's square it: play 'quits or double,'[52]—either double or nothing."
I set the balls. Fedotka began to play the first hand. Nekhliudof seemed to play only for fun: sometimes he would come very near winning a game, yet just fail of it. Says he, "It would be too easy a move, I won't have it so." But Fedotka did not forget what he was up to. Carelessly he proceeded with the game, and thus, as if it were unexpectedly, won.
"Let us play double stakes once more," says he.
"All right," says Nekhliudof.
Once more Fedotka won the game.
"Well," says he, "it began with a mere trifle. I don't wish to win much from you. Shall we make it once more or nothing?"
"Yes."
Say what you may, but fifty rubles is a pretty sum, and Nekhliudof himself began to propose, "Let us make it double or quit." So they played and played.
It kept going worse and worse for Nekhliudof. Two hundred and eighty rubles were written up against him. As to Fedotka, he had his own method: he would lose a simple game, but when the stake was doubled, he would win sure.
As for the prince, he sits by and looks on. He sees that the matter is growing serious.
"Enough!"[53]says he, "hold on."
My! they keep increasing the stake.
At last it went so far that Nekhliudof was in for more than five hundred rubles. Fedotka laid down his cue, and said,—
"Aren't you satisfied for to-day? I'm tired," says he.
Yet I knew he was ready to play till dawn of day, provided there was money to be won. Stratagem, of course. And the other was all the more anxious to go on. "Come on! Come on!"
"No,—'pon my honor, I'm tired. Come," says Fedot; "let's go up-stairs; there you shall have your revanche."
Up-stairs with us meant the place where the gentlemen used to play cards. From that very day, Fedotka wound his net round him so that he began to come every day. He would play one or two games of billiards, and then proceed up-stairs,—every day up-stairs.
What they used to do there, God only knows; but it is a fact that from that time he began to be an entirely different kind of man, and seemed hand in glove with Fedotka. Formerly he used to be stylish, neat in his dress, with his hair slightly curled even; but now it would be only in the morning that he would be any thing like himself; but as soon as he had paid his visit up-stairs, he would not be at all like himself.
Once he came down from up-stairs with the prince, pale, his lips trembling, and talking excitedly.
"I cannot permit such a one asheis," says he, "to say that I am not"—How did he express himself? I cannot recollect, something like "not refined enough," or what,—"and that he won't play with me any more. I tell you I have paid him ten thousand, and I should think that he might be a little more considerate, before others, at least."
"Oh, bother!" says the prince, "is it worth while to lose one's temper with Fedotka?"
"No," says the other, "I will not let it go so."
"Why, old fellow, how can you think of such a thing as lowering yourself to have a row with Fedotka?"
"That is all very well; but there were strangers there, mind you."
"Well, what of that?" says the prince; "strangers? Well, if you wish, I will go and make him ask your pardon."
"No," says the other.
And then they began to chatter in French, and I could not understand what it was they were talking about.
And what would you think of it? That very evening he and Fedotka ate supper together, and they became friends again.
Well and good. At other times again he would come alone.
"Well," he would say, "do I play well?"
It's our business, you know, to try to make everybody contented, and so I would say, "Yes, indeed;" and yet how could it be called good play, when he would poke about with his cue without any sense whatever?
And from that very evening when he took in with Fedotka, he began to play for money all the time. Formerly he didn't care to play for stakes, either for a dinner or for champagne. Sometimes the prince would say,—
"Let's play for a bottle of champagne."
"No," he would say. "Let us rather have the wine by itself. Hollo there! bring a bottle!"
And now he began to play for money all the time; he used to spend his entire days in our establishment. He would either play with some one in the billiard-room, or he would go "up-stairs."
Well, thinks I to myself, every one else gets something from him, why don't I get some advantage out of it?
"Well, sir," says I one day, "it's a long time since you have had a game with me."
And so we began to play. Well, when I won ten half-rubles of him, I says,—
"Don't you want to make it double or quit, sir?"
He said nothing. Formerly, if you remember, he would call me a fool for such a boldness. And we went to playing "quit or double."
I won eighty rubles of him.
Well, what would you think? Since that first time he used to play with me every day. He would wait tillthere was no one about, for of course he would have been ashamed to play with a mere marker in presence of others. Once he had got rather warmed up by the play (he already owed me sixty rubles), and so he says,—
"Do you want to stake all you have won?"
"All right," says I.
I won. "One hundred and twenty to one hundred and twenty?"
"All right," says I.
Again I won. "Two hundred and forty against two hundred and forty?"
"Isn't that too much?" I ask.
He made no reply. We played the game. Once more it was mine. "Four hundred and eighty against four hundred and eighty?"
I says, "Well, sir, I don't want to wrong you. Let us make it a hundred rubles that you owe me, and call it square."
You ought to have heard how he yelled at this, and yet he was not a proud man at all. "Either play, or don't play!" says he.
Well, I see there's nothing to be done. "Three hundred and eighty, then, if you please," says I.
I really wanted to lose. I allowed him forty points in advance. He stood fifty-two to my thirty-six. He began to cut the yellow one, and missed eighteen points; and I was standing just at the turning-point. I made a stroke so as to knock the ball off of the billiard-table. No—so luck would have it. Do what I might, he even missed the doublet. I had won again.
"Listen," says he. "Peter,"—he did not call mePetrushkathen,—"I can't pay you the whole rightaway. In a couple of months I could pay three thousand even, if it were necessary."
And there he stood just as red, and his voice kind of trembled.
"Very good, sir," says I.
With this he laid down the cue. Then he began to walk up and down, up and down, the perspiration running down his face.
"Peter," says he, "let's try it again, double or quit."
And he almost burst into tears.
"What, sir, what! would you play against such luck?"
"Oh, let us play, I beg of you." And he brings the cue, and puts it in my hand.
I took the cue, and I threw the balls on the table so that they bounced over on to the floor; I could not help showing off a little, naturally. I say, "All right, sir."
But he was in such a hurry that he went and picked up the balls himself, and I thinks to myself, "Anyway, I'll never be able to get the seven hundred rubles from him, so I can lose them to him all the same." I began to play carelessly on purpose. But no—he won't have it so. "Why," says he, "you are playing badly on purpose."
But his hands trembled, and when the ball went towards a pocket, his fingers would spread out and his mouth would screw up to one side, as if he could by any means force the ball into the pocket. Even I couldn't stand it, and I say, "That won't do any good, sir."
Very well. As he won this game I says, "This will make it one hundred and eighty rubles you owe me, andfifty games; and now I must go and get my supper." So I laid down my cue, and went off.
I went and sat down all by myself, at a small table opposite the door; and I look in and see, and wonder what he will do. Well, what would you think? He began to walk up and down, up and down, probably thinking that no one's looking at him; and then he would give a pull at his hair, and then walk up and down again, and keep muttering to himself; and then he would pull his hair again.
After that he wasn't seen for a week. Once he came into the dining-room as gloomy as could be, but he didn't enter the billiard-room. The prince caught sight of him.
"Come," says he, "let's have a game."
"No," says the other, "I am not going to play any more."
"Nonsense! come along."
"No," says he, "I won't come, I tell you. For you it's all one whether I go or not, yet for me it's no good to come here."
And so he did not come for ten days more. And then, it being the holidays, he came dressed up in a dress suit: he'd evidently been into company. And he was here all day long; he kept playing, and he came the next day, and the third....
And it began to go in the old style, and I thought it would be fine to have another trial with him.
"No," says he, "I'm not going to play with you; and as to the one hundred and eighty rubles that I owe you, if you'll come at the end of a month, you shall have it."
Very good. So I went to him at the end of a month.
"By God," says he, "I can't give it to you; but come back on Thursday."
Well, I went on Thursday. I found that he had a splendid suite of apartments.
"Well," says I, "is he at home?"
"He hasn't got up yet," I was told.
"Very good, I will wait."
For a body-servant he had one of his own serfs, such a gray-haired old man! That servant was perfectly single-minded, he didn't know any thing about beating about the bush. So we got into conversation.
"Well," says he, "what is the use of our living here, master and I? He's squandered all his property, and it's mighty little honor or good that we get out of this Petersburg of yours. As we started from the country, I thought it would be as it was with the last bárin (may his soul rest in peace!), we would go about with princes and counts and generals; he thought to himself, 'I'll find a countess for a sweetheart, and she'll have a big dowry, and we'll live on a big scale.' But it's quite a different thing from what he expected; here we are, running about from one tavern to another as bad off as we could be! The Princess Rtishcheva, you know, is his own aunt, and Prince Borotintsef is his godfather. What do you think? He went to see them only once, that was at Christmas-time; he never shows his nose there. Yes, and even their people laugh about it to me. 'Why,' says they, 'your bárin is not a bit like his father!' And once I take it upon myself to say to him,—
"'Why wouldn't you go, sir, and visit your aunt? They are feeling bad because you haven't been for so long.'
"'It's stupid there, Demyánitch,' says he. Just to think, he found his only amusement here in the saloon! If he only would enter the service! yet, no: he hasgot entangled with cards and all the rest of it. When men get going that way, there's no good in any thing; nothing comes to any good....E-ekh!we are going to the dogs, and no mistake.... The late mistress (may her soul rest in peace!) left us a rich inheritance: no less than a thousand souls, and about three hundred thousand rubles worth of timber-lands. He has mortgaged it all, sold the timber, let the estate go to rack and ruin, and still no money on hand. When the master is away, of course, the overseer is more than the master. What does he care? He only cares to stuff his own pockets.
"A few days ago, a couple of peasants brought complaints from the whole estate. 'He has wasted the last of the property,' they say. What do you think? he pondered over the complaints, and gave the peasants ten rubles apiece. Says he, 'I'll be there very soon. I shall have some money, and I will settle all accounts when I come,' says he.
"But how can he settle accounts when we are getting into debt all the time? Money or no money, yet the winter here has cost eighty thousand rubles, and now there isn't a silver ruble in the house. And all owing to his kind-heartedness. You see, he's such a simple bárin that it would be hard to find his equal: that's the very reason that he's going to ruin,—going to ruin, all for nothing." And the old man almost wept.
Nekhliudof woke up about eleven, and called me in.
"They haven't sent me any money yet," says he. "But it isn't my fault. Shut the door," says he.
I shut the door.
"Here," says he, "take my watch or this diamondpin, and pawn it. They will give you more than one hundred and eighty rubles for it, and when I get my money I will redeem it," says he.
"No matter, sir," says I. "If you don't happen to have any money, it's no consequence; let me have the watch if you don't mind. I can wait for your convenience."
I can see that the watch is worth more than three hundred.
Very good. I pawned the watch for a hundred rubles, and carried him the ticket. "You will owe me eighty rubles," says I, "and you had better redeem the watch."
And so it happened that he still owed me eighty rubles.
After that he began to come to us again every day. I don't know how matters stood between him and the prince, but at all events he kept coming with him all the time, or else they would go and play cards up-stairs with Fedotka. And what queer accounts those three men kept between them! this one would lend money to the other, the other to the third, yet who it was that owed the money you never could find out.
And in this way he kept on coming our way for well-nigh two years; only it was to be plainly seen that he was a changed man, such a devil-may-care manner he assumed at times. He even went so far at times as to borrow a ruble of me to pay a hack-driver; and yet he would still play with the prince for a hundred rubles stake.
He grew gloomy, thin, sallow. As soon as he came he used to order a little glass of absinthe, take a bite of something, and drink some port wine, and then he would grow more lively.
He came one time before dinner; it happened to be carnival time, and he began to play with a hussar.
Says he, "Do you want to play for a stake?"
"Very well," says he. "What shall it be?"
"A bottle of Claude Vougeaux? What do you say?"
"All right."
Very good. The hussar won, and they went off for their dinner. They sat down at table, and then Nekhliudof says, "Simon, a bottle of Claude Vougeaux, and see that you warm it to the proper point."
Simon went out, brought in the dinner, but no wine.
"Well," says he, "where's the wine?"
Simon hurried out, brought in the roast.
"Let us have the wine," says he.
Simon makes no reply.
"What's got into you? Here we've almost finished dinner, and no wine. Who wants to drink with dessert?"
Simon hurried out. "The landlord," says he, "wants to speak to you."
Nekhliudof turned scarlet. He sprang up from the table.
"What's the need of calling me?"
The landlord is standing at the door.
Says he, "I can't trust you any more, unless you settle my little bill."
"Well, didn't I tell you that I would pay the first of the month?"
"That will be all very well," says the landlord, "but I can't be all the time giving credit, and having no settlement. There are more than ten thousand rubles of debts outstanding now," says he.
"Well, that'll do,monshoor, you know that youcan trust me! Send the bottle, and I assure you that I will pay you very soon."
And he hurried back.
"What was it? Why did they call you out?" asked the hussar.
"Oh, some one wanted to ask me a question."
"Now it would be a good time," says the hussar, "to have a little warm wine to drink."
"Simon, hurry up!"
Simon came back, but still no wine, nothing. Too bad! He left the table, and came to me.
"For God's sake," says he, "Petrushka, let me have six rubles!"
He was pale as a sheet. "No, sir," says I: "by God, you owe me quite too much now."
"I will give forty rubles for six, in a week's time."
"If only I had it," says I, "I should not think of refusing you, but I haven't."
What do you think! He rushed away, his teeth set, his fist doubled up, and ran down the corridor like one mad, and all at once he gave himself a knock on the forehead.
"O my God!" says he, "what has it come to?"
But he did not return to the dining-room; he jumped into a carriage, and drove away. Didn't we have our laugh over it! The hussar asks,—
"Where is the gentleman who was dining with me?"
"He has gone," said some one.
"Where has he gone? What message did he leave?"
"He didn't leave any; he just took to his carriage, and went off."
"That's a fine way of entertaining a man!" says he.
Now, thinks I to myself, it'll be a long time before he comes again after this; that is, on account of this scandal. But no. On the next day he came about evening. He came into the billiard-room. He had a sort of a box in his hand. Took off his overcoat.
"Now let us have a game," says he.
He looked out from under his eyebrows, rather fierce like.
We played a game. "That's enough now," says he: "go and bring me a pen and paper; I must write a letter."
Not thinking any thing, not suspecting any thing, I bring some paper, and put it on the table in the little room.
"It's all ready, sir," says I.
"Very good." He sat down at the table. He kept on writing and writing, and muttering to himself all the time: then he jumps up, and, frowning, says, "Look and see if my carriage has come yet."
It was on a Friday, during carnival time, and so there weren't any of the customers on hand; they were all at some ball. I went to see about the carriage, and just as I was going out of the door, "Petrushka! Petrushka!" he shouted, as if something suddenly frightened him.
I turn round. I see he's pale as a sheet, standing here and looking at me.
"Did you call me, sir?" says I.
He makes no reply.
"What do you want?" says I.
He says nothing. "Oh, yes!" says he. "Let's have another game."
Then says he, "Haven't I learned to play pretty well?"
He had just won the game. "Yes," says I.
"All right," says he; "go now, and see about my carriage." He himself walked up and down the room.
Without thinking any thing, I went down to the door. I didn't see any carriage at all. I started to go up again.
Just as I am going up, I hear what sounds like the thud of a billiard-cue. I go into the billiard-room. I notice a peculiar smell.
I look around; and there he is lying on the floor in a pool of blood, with a pistol beside him. I was so scared that I could not speak a word.
He keeps twitching, twitching his leg; and stretched himself a little. Then he sort of snored, and stretched out his full length in such a strange way. And God knows why such a sin came about,—how it was that it occurred to him to ruin his own soul,—but as to what he left written on this paper, I don't understand it at all. Truly, you can never account for what is going on in the world.
"God gave me all that a man can desire,—wealth, name, intellect, noble aspirations. I wanted to enjoy myself, and I trod in the mire all that was best in me. I have done nothing dishonorable, I am not unfortunate, I have not committed any crime; but I have done worse: I have destroyed my feelings, my intellect, my youth. I became entangled in a filthy net, from which I could not escape, and to which I could not accustom myself. I feel that I am falling lower and lower every moment, and I cannot stop my fall.