Short Stories by Chekhov
duty today, but Zastupov hired you to take his place. When other folks
are enjoying themselves you hire yourself out. It's greediness!"
"Devil a bit of it! Not much to be greedy over--two roubles is all he
gives me; a necktie as an extra.... It's poverty, not greediness. And it
would be jolly, now, you know, to be going with a party to the service,
and then to break the fast.... To drink and to have a bit of supper and
tumble off to sleep.... One sits down to the table, there's an Easter
cake and the samovar hissing, and some charming little thing beside
you.... You drink a glass and chuck her under the chin, and it's first-
rate.... You feel you're somebody.... Ech h-h!... I've made a mess of
things! Look at that hussy driving by in her carriage, while I have to
sit here and brood."
"We each have our lot in life, Ivan Danilitch. Please God, you'll be
promoted and drive about in your carriage one day."
"I? No, brother, not likely. I shan't get beyond a 'titular,' not if I
try till I burst. I'm not an educated man."
"Our General has no education either, but..."
"Well, but the General stole a hundred thousand before he got his
position. And he's got very different manners and deportment from me,
brother. With my manners and deportment one can't get far! And such a
scoundrelly surname, Nevyrazimov! It's a hopeless position, in fact. One
may go on as one is, or one may hang oneself..."
He moved away from the window and walked wearily about the rooms. The
din of the bells grew louder and louder.... There was no need to stand
by the window to hear it. And the better he could hear the bells and the
louder the roar of the carriages, the darker seemed the muddy walls and
the smutty cornice and the more the lamp smoked.
"Shall I hook it and leave the office?" thought Nevyrazimov.
But such a flight promised nothing worth having.... After coming out of
the office and wandering about the town, Nevyrazimov would have gone
home to his lodging, and in his lodging it was even grayer and more
depressing than in the office.... Even supposing he were to spend that
day pleasantly and with comfort, what had he beyond? Nothing but the
same gray walls, the same stop-gap duty and complimentary letters....
Nevyrazimov stood still in the middle of the office and sank into
thought. The yearning for a new, better life gnawed at his heart with an
intolerable ache. He had a passionate longing to find himself suddenly
in the street, to mingle with the living crowd, to take part in the
solemn festivity for the sake of which all those bells were clashing and
those carriages were rumbling. He longed for what he had known in
childhood--the family circle, the festive faces of his own people, the
white cloth, light, warmth...! He thought of the carriage in which the
lady had just driven by, the overcoat in which the head clerk was so
smart, the gold chain that adorned the secretary's chest.... He thought
of a warm bed, of the Stanislav order, of new boots, of a uniform
without holes in the elbows.... He thought of all those things because
he had none of them.
"Shall I steal?" he thought. "Even if stealing is an easy matter, hiding
is what's difficult. Men run away to America, they say, with what
they've stolen, but the devil knows where that blessed America is. One
must have education even to steal, it seems."
The bells died down. He heard only a distant noise of carriages and
Paramon's cough, while his depression and anger grew more and more
intense and unbearable. The clock in the office struck half-past twelve.
"Shall I write a secret report? Proshkin did, and he rose rapidly."
Nevyrazimov sat down at his table and pondered. The lamp in which the
kerosene had quite run dry was smoking violently and threatening to go
out. The stray cockroach was still running about the table and had found
no resting-place.
"One can always send in a secret report, but how is one to make it up? I
should want to make all sorts of innuendoes and insinuations, like
Proshkin, and I can't do it. If I made up anything I should be the first
to get into trouble for it. I'm an ass, damn my soul!"
And Nevyrazimov, racking his brain for a means of escape from his
hopeless position, stared at the rough copy he had written. The letter
was written to a man whom he feared and hated with his whole soul, and
from whom he had for the last ten years been trying to wring a post
worth eighteen roubles a month, instead of the one he had at sixteen
roubles.
"Ah, I'll teach you to run here, you devil!" He viciously slapped the
palm of his hand on the cockroach, who had the misfortune to catch his
eye. "Nasty thing!"
The cockroach fell on its back and wriggled its legs in despair.
Nevyrazimov took it by one leg and threw it into the lamp. The lamp
flared up and spluttered.
And Nevyrazimov felt better.
THE REQUIEM
IN the village church of Verhny Zaprudy mass was just over. The people
had begun moving and were trooping out of church. The only one who did
not move was Andrey Andreyitch, a shopkeeper and old inhabitant of
Verhny Zaprudy. He stood waiting, with his elbows on the railing of the
right choir. His fat and shaven face, covered with indentations left by
pimples, expressed on this occasion two contradictory feelings:
resignation in the face of inevitable destiny, and stupid, unbounded
disdain for the smocks and striped kerchiefs passing by him. As it was
Sunday, he was dressed like a dandy. He wore a long cloth overcoat with
yellow bone buttons, blue trousers not thrust into his boots, and sturdy
goloshes--the huge clumsy goloshes only seen on the feet of practical and
prudent persons of firm religious convictions.
His torpid eyes, sunk in fat, were fixed upon the ikon stand. He saw the
long familiar figures of the saints, the verger Matvey puffing out his
cheeks and blowing out the candles, the darkened candle stands, the
threadbare carpet, the sacristan Lopuhov running impulsively from the
altar and carrying the holy bread to the churchwarden.... All these
things he had seen for years, and seen over and over again like the five
fingers of his hand.... There was only one thing, however, that was
somewhat strange and unusual. Father Grigory, still in his vestments,
was standing at the north door, twitching his thick eyebrows angrily.
"Who is it he is winking at? God bless him!" thought the shopkeeper.
"And he is beckoning with his finger! And he stamped his foot! What
next! What's the matter, Holy Queen and Mother! Whom does he mean it
for?"
Andrey Andreyitch looked round and saw the church completely deserted.
There were some ten people standing at the door, but they had their
backs to the altar.
"Do come when you are called! Why do you stand like a graven image?" he
heard Father Grigory's angry voice. "I am calling you."
The shopkeeper looked at Father Grigory's red and wrathful face, and
only then realized that the twitching eyebrows and beckoning finger
might refer to him. He started, left the railing, and hesitatingly
walked towards the altar, tramping with his heavy goloshes.
"Andrey Andreyitch, was it you asked for prayers for the rest of
Mariya's soul?" asked the priest, his eyes angrily transfixing the
shopkeeper's fat, perspiring face.
"Yes, Father."
"Then it was you wrote this? You?" And Father Grigory angrily thrust
before his eyes the little note.
And on this little note, handed in by Andrey Andreyitch before mass, was
written in big, as it were staggering, letters:
"For the rest of the soul of the servant of God, the harlot Mariya."
"Yes, certainly I wrote it,..." answered the shopkeeper.
"How dared you write it?" whispered the priest, and in his husky whisper
there was a note of wrath and alarm.
The shopkeeper looked at him in blank amazement; he was perplexed, and
he, too, was alarmed. Father Grigory had never in his life spoken in
such a tone to a leading resident of Verhny Zaprudy. Both were silent
for a minute, staring into each other's face. The shopkeeper's amazement
was so great that his fat face spread in all directions like spilt
dough.
"How dared you?" repeated the priest.
"Wha... what?" asked Andrey Andreyitch in bewilderment.
"You don't understand?" whispered Father Grigory, stepping back in
astonishment and clasping his hands. "What have you got on your
shoulders, a head or some other object? You send a note up to the altar,
and write a word in it which it would be unseemly even to utter in the
street! Why are you rolling your eyes? Surely you know the meaning of
the word?"
"Are you referring to the word harlot?" muttered the shopkeeper,
flushing crimson and blinking. "But you know, the Lord in His mercy...
forgave this very thing,... forgave a harlot.... He has prepared a place
for her, and indeed from the life of the holy saint, Mariya of Egypt,
one may see in what sense the word is used--excuse me..."
The shopkeeper wanted to bring forward some other argument in his
justification, but took fright and wiped his lips with his sleeve.
"So that's what you make of it!" cried Father Grigory, clasping his
hands. "But you see God has forgiven her--do you understand? He has
forgiven, but you judge her, you slander her, call her by an unseemly
name, and whom! Your own deceased daughter! Not only in Holy Scripture,
but even in worldly literature you won't read of such a sin! I tell you
again, Andrey, you mustn't be over-subtle! No, no, you mustn't be over-
subtle, brother! If God has given you an inquiring mind, and if you
cannot direct it, better not go into things.... Don't go into things,
and hold your peace!"
"But you know, she,... excuse my mentioning it, was an actress!"
articulated Andrey Andreyitch, overwhelmed.
"An actress! But whatever she was, you ought to forget it all now she is
dead, instead of writing it on the note."
"Just so,..." the shopkeeper assented.
"You ought to do penance," boomed the deacon from the depths of the
altar, looking contemptuously at Andrey Andreyitch's embarrassed face,
"that would teach you to leave off being so clever! Your daughter was a
well-known actress. There were even notices of her death in the
newspapers.... Philosopher!"
"To be sure,... certainly," muttered the shopkeeper, "the word is not a
seemly one; but I did not say it to judge her, Father Grigory, I only
meant to speak spiritually,... that it might be clearer to you for whom
you were praying. They write in the memorial notes the various callings,
such as the infant John, the drowned woman Pelagea, the warrior Yegor,
the murdered Pavel, and so on.... I meant to do the same."
"It was foolish, Andrey! God will forgive you, but beware another time.
Above all, don't be subtle, but think like other people. Make ten bows
and go your way."
"I obey," said the shopkeeper, relieved that the lecture was over, and
allowing his face to resume its expression of importance and dignity.
"Ten bows? Very good, I understand. But now, Father, allow me to ask you
a favor.... Seeing that I am, anyway, her father,... you know yourself,
whatever she was, she was still my daughter, so I was,... excuse me,
meaning to ask you to sing the requiem today. And allow me to ask you,
Father Deacon!"
"Well, that's good," said Father Grigory, taking off his vestments.
"That I commend. I can approve of that! Well, go your way. We will come
out immediately."
Andrey Andreyitch walked with dignity from the altar, and with a solemn,
requiem-like expression on his red face took his stand in the middle of
the church. The verger Matvey set before him a little table with the
memorial food upon it, and a little later the requiem service began.
There was perfect stillness in the church. Nothing could be heard but
the metallic click of the censer and slow singing.... Near Andrey