Notes from the Underground
“You will go from here to something lower, another house; a year
later—to a third, lower and lower, and in seven years you will come to
a basement in the Haymarket. That will be if you were lucky. But it
would be much worse if you got some disease, consumption, say ... and
caught a chill, or something or other. It’s not easy to get over an
illness in your way of life. If you catch anything you may not get rid
of it. And so you would die.”
“Oh, well, then I shall die,” she answered, quite vindictively, and she
made a quick movement.
“But one is sorry.”
“Sorry for whom?”
“Sorry for life.” Silence.
“Have you been engaged to be married? Eh?”
“What’s that to you?”
“Oh, I am not cross-examining you. It’s nothing to me. Why are you so
cross? Of course you may have had your own troubles. What is it to me?
It’s simply that I felt sorry.”
“Sorry for whom?”
“Sorry for you.”
“No need,” she whispered hardly audibly, and again made a faint
movement.
That incensed me at once. What! I was so gentle with her, and she....
“Why, do you think that you are on the right path?”
“I don’t think anything.”
“That’s what’s wrong, that you don’t think. Realise it while there is
still time. There still is time. You are still young, good-looking; you
might love, be married, be happy....”
“Not all married women are happy,” she snapped out in the rude abrupt
tone she had used at first.
“Not all, of course, but anyway it is much better than the life here.
Infinitely better. Besides, with love one can live even without
happiness. Even in sorrow life is sweet; life is sweet, however one
lives. But here what is there but ... foulness? Phew!”
I turned away with disgust; I was no longer reasoning coldly. I began
to feel myself what I was saying and warmed to the subject. I was
already longing to expound the cherished ideas I had brooded over in my
corner. Something suddenly flared up in me. An object had appeared
before me.
“Never mind my being here, I am not an example for you. I am, perhaps,
worse than you are. I was drunk when I came here, though,” I hastened,
however, to say in self-defence. “Besides, a man is no example for a
woman. It’s a different thing. I may degrade and defile myself, but I
am not anyone’s slave. I come and go, and that’s an end of it. I shake
it off, and I am a different man. But you are a slave from the start.
Yes, a slave! You give up everything, your whole freedom. If you want
to break your chains afterwards, you won’t be able to; you will be more
and more fast in the snares. It is an accursed bondage. I know it. I
won’t speak of anything else, maybe you won’t understand, but tell me:
no doubt you are in debt to your madam? There, you see,” I added,
though she made no answer, but only listened in silence, entirely
absorbed, “that’s a bondage for you! You will never buy your freedom.
They will see to that. It’s like selling your soul to the devil.... And
besides ... perhaps, I too, am just as unlucky—how do you know—and
wallow in the mud on purpose, out of misery? You know, men take to
drink from grief; well, maybe I am here from grief. Come, tell me, what
is there good here? Here you and I ... came together ... just now and
did not say one word to one another all the time, and it was only
afterwards you began staring at me like a wild creature, and I at you.
Is that loving? Is that how one human being should meet another? It’s
hideous, that’s what it is!”
“Yes!” she assented sharply and hurriedly.
I was positively astounded by the promptitude of this “Yes.” So the
same thought may have been straying through her mind when she was
staring at me just before. So she, too, was capable of certain
thoughts? “Damn it all, this was interesting, this was a point of
likeness!” I thought, almost rubbing my hands. And indeed it’s easy to
turn a young soul like that!
It was the exercise of my power that attracted me most.
She turned her head nearer to me, and it seemed to me in the darkness
that she propped herself on her arm. Perhaps she was scrutinising me.
How I regretted that I could not see her eyes. I heard her deep
breathing.
“Why have you come here?” I asked her, with a note of authority already
in my voice.
“Oh, I don’t know.”
“But how nice it would be to be living in your father’s house! It’s
warm and free; you have a home of your own.”
“But what if it’s worse than this?”
“I must take the right tone,” flashed through my mind. “I may not get
far with sentimentality.” But it was only a momentary thought. I swear
she really did interest me. Besides, I was exhausted and moody. And
cunning so easily goes hand-in-hand with feeling.
“Who denies it!” I hastened to answer. “Anything may happen. I am
convinced that someone has wronged you, and that you are more sinned
against than sinning. Of course, I know nothing of your story, but it’s
not likely a girl like you has come here of her own inclination....”
“A girl like me?” she whispered, hardly audibly; but I heard it.
Damn it all, I was flattering her. That was horrid. But perhaps it was
a good thing.... She was silent.
“See, Liza, I will tell you about myself. If I had had a home from
childhood, I shouldn’t be what I am now. I often think that. However
bad it may be at home, anyway they are your father and mother, and not
enemies, strangers. Once a year at least, they’ll show their love of
you. Anyway, you know you are at home. I grew up without a home; and
perhaps that’s why I’ve turned so ... unfeeling.”
I waited again. “Perhaps she doesn’t understand,” I thought, “and,
indeed, it is absurd—it’s moralising.”
“If I were a father and had a daughter, I believe I should love my
daughter more than my sons, really,” I began indirectly, as though
talking of something else, to distract her attention. I must confess I
blushed.
“Why so?” she asked.
Ah! so she was listening!
“I don’t know, Liza. I knew a father who was a stern, austere man, but
used to go down on his knees to his daughter, used to kiss her hands,
her feet, he couldn’t make enough of her, really. When she danced at
parties he used to stand for five hours at a stretch, gazing at her. He
was mad over her: I understand that! She would fall asleep tired at
night, and he would wake to kiss her in her sleep and make the sign of
the cross over her. He would go about in a dirty old coat, he was
stingy to everyone else, but would spend his last penny for her, giving
her expensive presents, and it was his greatest delight when she was
pleased with what he gave her. Fathers always love their daughters more
than the mothers do. Some girls live happily at home! And I believe I
should never let my daughters marry.”
“What next?” she said, with a faint smile.
“I should be jealous, I really should. To think that she should kiss
anyone else! That she should love a stranger more than her father! It’s
painful to imagine it. Of course, that’s all nonsense, of course every
father would be reasonable at last. But I believe before I should let
her marry, I should worry myself to death; I should find fault with all
her suitors. But I should end by letting her marry whom she herself
loved. The one whom the daughter loves always seems the worst to the
father, you know. That is always so. So many family troubles come from
that.”
“Some are glad to sell their daughters, rather than marrying them
honourably.”
Ah, so that was it!
“Such a thing, Liza, happens in those accursed families in which there
is neither love nor God,” I retorted warmly, “and where there is no
love, there is no sense either. There are such families, it’s true, but
I am not speaking of them. You must have seen wickedness in your own
family, if you talk like that. Truly, you must have been unlucky. H’m!
... that sort of thing mostly comes about through poverty.”
“And is it any better with the gentry? Even among the poor, honest
people who live happily?”
“H’m ... yes. Perhaps. Another thing, Liza, man is fond of reckoning up
his troubles, but does not count his joys. If he counted them up as he
ought, he would see that every lot has enough happiness provided for
it. And what if all goes well with the family, if the blessing of God
is upon it, if the husband is a good one, loves you, cherishes you,
never leaves you! There is happiness in such a family! Even sometimes
there is happiness in the midst of sorrow; and indeed sorrow is
everywhere. If you marry _you will find out for yourself_. But think of
the first years of married life with one you love: what happiness, what
happiness there sometimes is in it! And indeed it’s the ordinary thing.
In those early days even quarrels with one’s husband end happily. Some
women get up quarrels with their husbands just because they love them.
Indeed, I knew a woman like that: she seemed to say that because she
loved him, she would torment him and make him feel it. You know that
you may torment a man on purpose through love. Women are particularly
given to that, thinking to themselves ‘I will love him so, I will make
so much of him afterwards, that it’s no sin to torment him a little
now.’ And all in the house rejoice in the sight of you, and you are
happy and gay and peaceful and honourable.... Then there are some women
who are jealous. If he went off anywhere—I knew one such woman, she
couldn’t restrain herself, but would jump up at night and run off on
the sly to find out where he was, whether he was with some other woman.
That’s a pity. And the woman knows herself it’s wrong, and her heart
fails her and she suffers, but she loves—it’s all through love. And how
sweet it is to make up after quarrels, to own herself in the wrong or
to forgive him! And they both are so happy all at once—as though they
had met anew, been married over again; as though their love had begun
afresh. And no one, no one should know what passes between husband and
wife if they love one another. And whatever quarrels there may be
between them they ought not to call in their own mother to judge
between them and tell tales of one another. They are their own judges.
Love is a holy mystery and ought to be hidden from all other eyes,
whatever happens. That makes it holier and better. They respect one
another more, and much is built on respect. And if once there has been
love, if they have been married for love, why should love pass away?
Surely one can keep it! It is rare that one cannot keep it. And if the
husband is kind and straightforward, why should not love last? The
first phase of married love will pass, it is true, but then there will
come a love that is better still. Then there will be the union of
souls, they will have everything in common, there will be no secrets
between them. And once they have children, the most difficult times
will seem to them happy, so long as there is love and courage. Even
toil will be a joy, you may deny yourself bread for your children and
even that will be a joy, They will love you for it afterwards; so you
are laying by for your future. As the children grow up you feel that
you are an example, a support for them; that even after you die your
children will always keep your thoughts and feelings, because they have
received them from you, they will take on your semblance and likeness.
So you see this is a great duty. How can it fail to draw the father and
mother nearer? People say it’s a trial to have children. Who says that?
It is heavenly happiness! Are you fond of little children, Liza? I am
awfully fond of them. You know—a little rosy baby boy at your bosom,
and what husband’s heart is not touched, seeing his wife nursing his
child! A plump little rosy baby, sprawling and snuggling, chubby little
hands and feet, clean tiny little nails, so tiny that it makes one