Short Stories by Chekhov
him inside the front of his coat, while Fyodor Timofeyitch appeared
completely unconcerned, and did not even trouble to open his eyes. To
him it was apparently a matter of absolute indifference whether he
remained lying down, or were lifted up by his paws, whether he rested on
his mattress or under his master's fur-coat.
"Come along, Auntie," said her master.
Wagging her tail, and understanding nothing, Auntie followed him. A
minute later she was sitting in a sledge by her master's feet and heard
him, shrinking with cold and anxiety, mutter to himself:
"We shall be disgraced! We shall come to grief!"
The sledge stopped at a big strange-looking house, like a soup-ladle
turned upside down. The long entrance to this house, with its three
glass doors, was lighted up with a dozen brilliant lamps. The doors
opened with a resounding noise and, like jaws, swallowed up the people
who were moving to and fro at the entrance. There were a great many
people, horses, too, often ran up to the entrance, but no dogs were to
be seen.
The master took Auntie in his arms and thrust her in his coat, where
Fyodor Timofeyirch already was. It was dark and stuffy there, but warm.
For an instant two green sparks flashed at her; it was the cat, who
opened his eyes on being disturbed by his neighbour's cold rough paws.
Auntie licked his ear, and, trying to settle herself as comfortably as
possible, moved uneasily, crushed him under her cold paws, and casually
poked her head out from under the coat, but at once growled angrily, and
tucked it in again. It seemed to her that she had seen a huge, badly
lighted room, full of monsters; from behind screens and gratings, which
stretched on both sides of the room, horrible faces looked out: faces of
horses with horns, with long ears, and one fat, huge countenance with a
tail instead of a nose, and two long gnawed bones sticking out of his
mouth.
The cat mewed huskily under Auntie's paws, but at that moment the coat
was flung open, the master said, "Hop!" and Fyodor Timofeyitch and
Auntie jumped to the floor. They were now in a little room with grey
plank walls; there was no other furniture in it but a little table with
a looking-glass on it, a stool, and some rags hung about the corners,
and instead of a lamp or candles, there was a bright fan-shaped light
attached to a little pipe fixed in the wall. Fyodor Timofeyitch licked
his coat which had been ruffled by Auntie, went under the stool, and lay
down. Their master, still agitated and rubbing his hands, began
undressing. . . . He undressed as he usually did at home when he was
preparing to get under the rug, that is, took off everything but his
underlinen, then he sat down on the stool, and, looking in the looking-
glass, began playing the most surprising tricks with himself. . . .
First of all he put on his head a wig, with a parting and with two tufts
of hair standing up like horns, then he smeared his face thickly with
something white, and over the white colour painted his eyebrows, his
moustaches, and red on his cheeks. His antics did not end with that.
After smearing his face and neck, he began putting himself into an
extraordinary and incongruous costume, such as Auntie had never seen
before, either in houses or in the street. Imagine very full trousers,
made of chintz covered with big flowers, such as is used in working-
class houses for curtains and covering furniture, trousers which
buttoned up just under his armpits. One trouser leg was made of brown
chintz, the other of bright yellow. Almost lost in these, he then put on
a short chintz jacket, with a big scalloped collar, and a gold star on
the back, stockings of different colours, and green slippers.
Everything seemed going round before Auntie's eyes and in her soul. The
white-faced, sack-like figure smelt like her master, its voice, too, was
the familiar master's voice, but there were moments when Auntie was
tortured by doubts, and then she was ready to run away from the parti-
coloured figure and to bark. The new place, the fan-shaped light, the
smell, the transformation that had taken place in her master--all this
aroused in her a vague dread and a foreboding that she would certainly
meet with some horror such as the big face with the tail instead of a
nose. And then, somewhere through the wall, some hateful band was
playing, and from time to time she heard an incomprehensible roar. Only
one thing reassured her--that was the imperturbability of Fyodor
Timofeyitch. He dozed with the utmost tranquillity under the stool, and
did not open his eyes even when it was moved.
A man in a dress coat and a white waistcoat peeped into the little room
and said:
"Miss Arabella has just gone on. After her--you."
Their master made no answer. He drew a small box from under the table,
sat down, and waited. From his lips and his hands it could be seen that
he was agitated, and Auntie could hear how his breathing came in gasps.
"Monsieur George, come on!" someone shouted behind the door. Their
master got up and crossed himself three times, then took the cat from
under the stool and put him in the box.
"Come, Auntie," he said softly.
Auntie, who could make nothing out of it, went up to his hands, he
kissed her on the head, and put her beside Fyodor Timofeyitch. Then
followed darkness. . . . Auntie trampled on the cat, scratched at the
walls of the box, and was so frightened that she could not utter a
sound, while the box swayed and quivered, as though it were on the
waves. . . .
"Here we are again!" her master shouted aloud: "here we are again!"
Auntie felt that after that shout the box struck against something hard
and left off swaying. There was a loud deep roar, someone was being
slapped, and that someone, probably the monster with the tail instead of
a nose, roared and laughed so loud that the locks of the box trembled.
In response to the roar, there came a shrill, squeaky laugh from her
master, such as he never laughed at home.
"Ha!" he shouted, trying to shout above the roar. "Honoured friends! I
have only just come from the station! My granny's kicked the bucket and
left me a fortune! There is something very heavy in the box, it must be
gold, ha! ha! I bet there's a million here! We'll open it and look. . .
."
The lock of the box clicked. The bright light dazzled Auntie's eyes, she
jumped out of the box, and, deafened by the roar, ran quickly round her
master, and broke into a shrill bark.
"Ha!" exclaimed her master. "Uncle Fyodor Timofeyitch! Beloved Aunt,
dear relations! The devil take you!"
He fell on his stomach on the sand, seized the cat and Auntie, and fell
to embracing them. While he held Auntie tight in his arms, she glanced
round into the world into which fate had brought her and, impressed by
its immensity, was for a minute dumbfounded with amazement and delight,
then jumped out of her master's arms, and to express the intensity of
her emotions, whirled round and round on one spot like a top. This new
world was big and full of bright light; wherever she looked, on all
sides, from floor to ceiling there were faces, faces, faces, and nothing
else.
"Auntie, I beg you to sit down!" shouted her master. Remembering what
that meant, Auntie jumped on to a chair, and sat down. She looked at her
master. His eyes looked at her gravely and kindly as always, but his
face, especially his mouth and teeth, were made grotesque by a broad
immovable grin. He laughed, skipped about, twitched his shoulders, and
made a show of being very merry in the presence of the thousands of
faces. Auntie believed in his merriment, all at once felt all over her
that those thousands of faces were looking at her, lifted up her fox-
like head, and howled joyously.
"You sit there, Auntie," her master said to her, "while Uncle and I will
dance the Kamarinsky."
Fyodor Timofeyitch stood looking about him indifferently, waiting to be
made to do something silly. He danced listlessly, carelessly, sullenly,
and one could see from his movements, his tail and his ears, that he had
a profound contempt for the crowd, the bright light, his master and
himself. When he had performed his allotted task, he gave a yawn and sat
down.
"Now, Auntie!" said her master, "we'll have first a song, and then a
dance, shall we?"
He took a pipe out of his pocket, and began playing. Auntie, who could
not endure music, began moving uneasily in her chair and howled. A roar
of applause rose from all sides. Her master bowed, and when all was
still again, went on playing. . . . Just as he took one very high note,
someone high up among the audience uttered a loud exclamation:
"Auntie!" cried a child's voice, "why it's Kashtanka!"
"Kashtanka it is!" declared a cracked drunken tenor. "Kashtanka! Strike
me dead, Fedyushka, it is Kashtanka. Kashtanka! here!"
Someone in the gallery gave a whistle, and two voices, one a boy's and
one a man's, called loudly: "Kashtanka! Kashtanka!"
Auntie started, and looked where the shouting came from. Two faces, one
hairy, drunken and grinning, the other chubby, rosy-cheeked and
frightened-looking, dazed her eyes as the bright light had dazed them
before. . . . She remembered, fell off the chair, struggled on the sand,
then jumped up, and with a delighted yap dashed towards those faces.
There was a deafening roar, interspersed with whistles and a shrill
childish shout: "Kashtanka! Kashtanka!"
Auntie leaped over the barrier, then across someone's shoulders. She
found herself in a box: to get into the next tier she had to leap over a
high wall. Auntie jumped, but did not jump high enough, and slipped back
down the wall. Then she was passed from hand to hand, licked hands and
faces, kept mounting higher and higher, and at last got into the
gallery. . . .
----
Half an hour afterwards, Kashtanka was in the street, following the
people who smelt of glue and varnish. Luka Alexandritch staggered and
instinctively, taught by experience, tried to keep as far from the
gutter as possible.
"In sin my mother bore me," he muttered. "And you, Kashtanka, are a
thing of little understanding. Beside a man, you are like a joiner
beside a cabinetmaker."
Fedyushka walked beside him, wearing his father's cap. Kashtanka looked
at their backs, and it seemed to her that she had been following them
for ages, and was glad that there had not been a break for a minute in
her life.
She remembered the little room with dirty wall-paper, the gander, Fyodor
Timofeyitch, the delicious dinners, the lessons, the circus, but all
that seemed to her now like a long, tangled, oppressive dream.
A CHAMELEON
THE police superintendent Otchumyelov is walking across the market
square wearing a new overcoat and carrying a parcel under his arm. A
red-haired policeman strides after him with a sieve full of confiscated
gooseberries in his hands. There is silence all around. Not a soul in
the square. . . . The open doors of the shops and taverns look out upon
God's world disconsolately, like hungry mouths; there is not even a
beggar near them.
"So you bite, you damned brute?" Otchumyelov hears suddenly. "Lads,
don't let him go! Biting is prohibited nowadays! Hold him! ah . . . ah!"
There is the sound of a dog yelping. Otchumyelov looks in the direction
of the sound and sees a dog, hopping on three legs and looking about
her, run out of Pitchugin's timber-yard. A man in a starched cotton
shirt, with his waistcoat unbuttoned, is chasing her. He runs after her,
and throwing his body forward falls down and seizes the dog by her hind
legs. Once more there is a yelping and a shout of "Don't let go!" Sleepy
countenances are protruded from the shops, and soon a crowd, which seems
to have sprung out of the earth, is gathered round the timber-yard.