Short Stories by Chekhov
everything; but about my work, my plans, my lectures--mum. And a nice set
they are in Moscow! I got into a tram.... It was packed full; there were
ladies and military men and students of both sexes, creatures of all
sorts in couples.
"'I am told the town council has sent for an engineer to plan such and
such a work!' I said to my neighbor, so loudly that all the tram could
hear. 'Do you know the name of the engineer?'
"My neighbor shook his head. The rest of the public took a cursory
glance at me, and in all their eyes I read: 'I don't know.'
"'I am told that there is someone giving lectures in such and such a
museum?' I persisted, trying to get up a conversation. 'I hear it is
interesting.'
"No one even nodded. Evidently they had not all of them heard of the
lectures, and the ladies were not even aware of the existence of the
museum. All that would not have mattered, but imagine, my dear sir, the
people suddenly leaped to their feet and struggled to the windows. What
was it? What was the matter?
"'Look, look!' my neighbor nudged me. 'Do you see that dark man getting
into that cab? That's the famous runner, King!'
"And the whole tram began talking breathlessly of the runner who was
then absorbing the brains of Moscow.
"I could give you ever so many other examples, but I think that is
enough. Now let us assume that I am mistaken about myself, that I am a
wretchedly boastful and incompetent person; but apart from myself I
might point to many of my contemporaries, men remarkable for their
talent and industry, who have nevertheless died unrecognized. Are
Russian navigators, chemists, physicists, mechanicians, and
agriculturists popular with the public? Do our cultivated masses know
anything of Russian artists, sculptors, and literary men? Some old
literary hack, hard-working and talented, will wear away the doorstep of
the publishers' offices for thirty-three years, cover reams of paper, be
had up for libel twenty times, and yet not step beyond his ant-heap. Can
you mention to me a single representative of our literature who would
have become celebrated if the rumor had not been spread over the earth
that he had been killed in a duel, gone out of his mind, been sent into
exile, or had cheated at cards?"
The first-class passenger was so excited that he dropped his cigar out
of his mouth and got up.
"Yes," he went on fiercely, "and side by side with these people I can
quote you hundreds of all sorts of singers, acrobats, buffoons, whose
names are known to every baby. Yes!"
The door creaked, there was a draught, and an individual of forbidding
aspect, wearing an Inverness coat, a top-hat, and blue spectacles,
walked into the carriage. The individual looked round at the seats,
frowned, and went on further.
"Do you know who that is?" there came a timid whisper from the furthest
corner of the compartment.
"That is N. N., the famous Tula cardsharper who was had up in connection
with the Y. bank affair."
"There you are!" laughed the first-class passenger. "He knows a Tula
cardsharper, but ask him whether he knows Semiradsky, Tchaykovsky, or
Solovyov the philosopher--he'll shake his head.... It swinish!"
Three minutes passed in silence.
"Allow me in my turn to ask you a question," said the vis-a-vis timidly,
clearing his throat. "Do you know the name of Pushkov?"
"Pushkov? H'm! Pushkov.... No, I don't know it!"
"That is my name,..." said the vis-a-vis,, overcome with embarrassment.
"Then you don't know it? And yet I have been a professor at one of the
Russian universities for thirty-five years,... a member of the Academy
of Sciences,... have published more than one work...."
The first-class passenger and the vis-a-vis looked at each other and
burst out laughing.
A TRAGIC ACTOR
IT was the benefit night of Fenogenov, the tragic actor. They were
acting "Prince Serebryany." The tragedian himself was playing Vyazemsky;
Limonadov, the stage manager, was playing Morozov; Madame Beobahtov,
Elena. The performance was a grand success. The tragedian accomplished
wonders indeed. When he was carrying off Elena, he held her in one hand
above his head as he dashed across the stage. He shouted, hissed, banged
with his feet, tore his coat across his chest. When he refused to fight
Morozov, he trembled all over as nobody ever trembles in reality, and
gasped loudly. The theatre shook with applause. There were endless
calls. Fenogenov was presented with a silver cigarette-case and a
bouquet tied with long ribbons. The ladies waved their handkerchiefs and
urged their men to applaud, many shed tears.... But the one who was the
most enthusiastic and most excited was Masha, daughter of Sidoretsky the
police captain. She was sitting in the first row of the stalls beside
her papa; she was ecstatic and could not take her eyes off the stage
even between the acts. Her delicate little hands and feet were
quivering, her eyes were full of tears, her cheeks turned paler and
paler. And no wonder--she was at the theatre for the first time in her
life.
"How well they act! how splendidly!" she said to her papa the police
captain, every time the curtain fell. "How good Fenogenov is!"
And if her papa had been capable of reading faces he would have read on
his daughter's pale little countenance a rapture that was almost
anguish. She was overcome by the acting, by the play, by the
surroundings. When the regimental band began playing between the acts,
she closed her eyes, exhausted.
"Papa!" she said to the police captain during the last interval, "go
behind the scenes and ask them all to dinner to-morrow!"
The police captain went behind the scenes, praised them for all their
fine acting, and complimented Madame Beobahtov.
"Your lovely face demands a canvas, and I only wish I could wield the
brush!"
And with a scrape, he thereupon invited the company to dinner.
"All except the fair sex," he whispered. "I don't want the actresses,
for I have a daughter."
Next day the actors dined at the police captain's. Only three turned up,
the manager Limonadov, the tragedian Fenogenov, and the comic man
Vodolazov; the others sent excuses. The dinner was a dull affair.
Limonadov kept telling the police captain how much he respected him, and
how highly he thought of all persons in authority; Vodolazov mimicked
drunken merchants and Armenians; and Fenogenov (on his passport his name
was Knish), a tall, stout Little Russian with black eyes and frowning
brow, declaimed "At the portals of the great," and "To be or not to be."
Limonadov, with tears in his eyes, described his interview with the
former Governor, General Kanyutchin. The police captain listened, was
bored, and smiled affably. He was well satisfied, although Limonadov
smelt strongly of burnt feathers, and Fenogenov was wearing a hired
dress coat and boots trodden down at heel. They pleased his daughter and
made her lively, and that was enough for him. And Masha never took her
eyes off the actors. She had never before seen such clever, exceptional
people!
In the evening the police captain and Masha were at the theatre again. A
week later the actors dined at the police captain's again, and after
that came almost every day either to dinner or supper. Masha became more
and more devoted to the theatre, and went there every evening.
She fell in love with the tragedian. One fine morning, when the police
captain had gone to meet the bishop, Masha ran away with Limonadov's
company and married her hero on the way. After celebrating the wedding,
the actors composed a long and touching letter and sent it to the police
captain.
It was the work of their combined efforts.
"Bring out the motive, the motive!" Limonadov kept saying as he dictated
to the comic man. "Lay on the respect.... These official chaps like it.
Add something of a sort... to draw a tear."
The answer to this letter was most discomforting. The police captain
disowned his daughter for marrying, as he said, "a stupid, idle Little
Russian with no fixed home or occupation."
And the day after this answer was received Masha was writing to her
father.
"Papa, he beats me! Forgive us!"
He had beaten her, beaten her behind the scenes, in the presence of
Limonadov, the washerwoman, and two lighting men. He remembered how,
four days before the wedding, he was sitting in the London Tavern with
the whole company, and all were talking about Masha. The company were
advising him to "chance it," and Limonadov, with tears in his eyes
urged: "It would be stupid and irrational to let slip such an
opportunity! Why, for a sum like that one would go to Siberia, let alone
getting married! When you marry and have a theatre of your own, take me
into your company. I shan't be master then, you'll be master."
Fenogenov remembered it, and muttered with clenched fists:
"If he doesn't send money I'll smash her! I won't let myself be made a
fool of, damn my soul!"
At one provincial town the company tried to give Masha the slip, but
Masha found out, ran to the station, and got there when the second bell
had rung and the actors had all taken their seats.
"I've been shamefully treated by your father," said the tragedian; "all
is over between us!"
And though the carriage was full of people, she went down on her knees
and held out her hands, imploring him:
"I love you! Don't drive me away, Kondraty Ivanovitch," she besought
him. "I can't live without you!"
They listened to her entreaties, and after consulting together, took her
into the company as a "countess"--the name they used for the minor
actresses who usually came on to the stage in crowds or in dumb parts.
To begin with Masha used to play maid-servants and pages, but when
Madame Beobahtov, the flower of Limonadov's company, eloped, they made
her ingenue. She acted badly, lisped, and was nervous. She soon grew
used to it, however, and began to be liked by the audience. Fenogenov
was much displeased.
"To call her an actress!" he used to say. "She has no figure, no
deportment, nothing whatever but silliness."
In one provincial town the company acted Schiller's "Robbers." Fenogenov
played Franz, Masha, Amalie. The tragedian shouted and quivered. Masha
repeated her part like a well-learnt lesson, and the play would have
gone off as they generally did had it not been for a trifling mishap.
Everything went well up to the point where Franz declares his love for
Amalie and she seizes his sword. The tragedian shouted, hissed,
quivered, and squeezed Masha in his iron embrace. And Masha, instead of
repulsing him and crying "Hence!" trembled in his arms like a bird and
did not move,... she seemed petrified.
"Have pity on me!" she whispered in his ear. "Oh, have pity on me! I am
so miserable!"
"You don't know your part! Listen to the prompter!" hissed the
tragedian, and he thrust his sword into her hand.
After the performance, Limonadov and Fenogenov were sitting in the
ticket box-office engaged in conversation.
"Your wife does not learn her part, you are right there," the manager
was saying. "She doesn't know her line.... Every man has his own
line,... but she doesn't know hers...."
Fenogenov listened, sighed, and scowled and scowled.
Next morning, Masha was sitting in a little general shop writing:
"Papa, he beats me! Forgive us! Send us some money!"
A TRANSGRESSION
A COLLEGIATE assessor called Miguev stopped at a telegraph-post in the
course of his evening walk and heaved a deep sigh. A week before, as he
was returning home from his evening walk, he had been overtaken at that
very spot by his former housemaid, Agnia, who said to him viciously:
"Wait a bit! I'll cook you such a crab that'll teach you to ruin
innocent girls! I'll leave the baby at your door, and I'll have the law