Short Stories by Chekhov
unpunished, and you know in our age one may boldly say in the words of
Shakespeare that in our evil and corrupt age virtue must ask forgiveness
of vice."
"That's very true," the merchant assented. "Owing to these frequent
acquittals, murder and arson have become much more common. Ask the
peasants."
Mihail Karlovitch turned towards us and said:
"As far as I am concerned, gentlemen, I am always delighted to meet with
these verdicts of not guilty. I am not afraid for morality and justice
when they say 'Not guilty,' but on the contrary I feel pleased. Even
when my conscience tells me the jury have made a mistake in acquitting
the criminal, even then I am triumphant. Judge for yourselves,
gentlemen; if the judges and the jury have more faith in man than in
evidence, material proofs, and speeches for the prosecution, is not that
faith in man in itself higher than any ordinary considerations? Such
faith is only attainable by those few who understand and feel Christ."
"A fine thought," I said.
"But it's not a new one. I remember a very long time ago I heard a
legend on that subject. A very charming legend," said the gardener, and
he smiled. "I was told it by my grandmother, my father's mother, an
excellent old lady. She told me it in Swedish, and it does not sound so
fine, so classical, in Russian."
But we begged him to tell it and not to be put off by the coarseness of
the Russian language. Much gratified, he deliberately lighted his pipe,
looked angrily at the laborers, and began:
"There settled in a certain little town a solitary, plain, elderly
gentleman called Thomson or Wilson--but that does not matter; the surname
is not the point. He followed an honorable profession: he was a doctor.
He was always morose and unsociable, and only spoke when required by his
profession. He never visited anyone, never extended his acquaintance
beyond a silent bow, and lived as humbly as a hermit. The fact was, he
was a learned man, and in those days learned men were not like other
people. They spent their days and nights in contemplation, in reading
and in healing disease, looked upon everything else as trivial, and had
no time to waste a word. The inhabitants of the town understood this,
and tried not to worry him with their visits and empty chatter. They
were very glad that God had sent them at last a man who could heal
diseases, and were proud that such a remarkable man was living in their
town. 'He knows everything,' they said about him.
"But that was not enough. They ought to have also said, 'He loves
everyone.' In the breast of that learned man there beat a wonderful
angelic heart. Though the people of that town were strangers and not his
own people, yet he loved them like children, and did not spare himself
for them. He was himself ill with consumption, he had a cough, but when
he was summoned to the sick he forgot his own illness he did not spare
himself and, gasping for breath, climbed up the hills however high they
might be. He disregarded the sultry heat and the cold, despised thirst
and hunger. He would accept no money and strange to say, when one of his
patients died, he would follow the coffin with the relations, weeping.
"And soon he became so necessary to the town that the inhabitants
wondered how they could have got on before without the man. Their
gratitude knew no bounds. Grown-up people and children, good and bad
alike, honest men and cheats--all in fact, respected him and knew his
value. In the little town and all the surrounding neighborhood there was
no man who would allow himself to do anything disagreeable to him;
indeed, they would never have dreamed of it. When he came out of his
lodging, he never fastened the doors or windows, in complete confidence
that there was no thief who could bring himself to do him wrong. He
often had in the course of his medical duties to walk along the
highroads, through the forests and mountains haunted by numbers of
hungry vagrants; but he felt that he was in perfect security.
"One night he was returning from a patient when robbers fell upon him in
the forest, but when they recognized him, they took off their hats
respectfully and offered him something to eat. When he answered that he
was not hungry, they gave him a warm wrap and accompanied him as far as
the town, happy that fate had given them the chance in some small way to
show their gratitude to the benevolent man. Well, to be sure, my
grandmother told me that even the horses and the cows and the dogs knew
him and expressed their joy when they met him.
"And this man who seemed by his sanctity to have guarded himself from
every evil, to whom even brigands and frenzied men wished nothing but
good, was one fine morning found murdered. Covered with blood, with his
skull broken, he was lying in a ravine, and his pale face wore an
expression of amazement. Yes, not horror but amazement was the emotion
that had been fixed upon his face when he saw the murderer before him.
You can imagine the grief that overwhelmed the inhabitants of the town
and the surrounding districts. All were in despair, unable to believe
their eyes, wondering who could have killed the man. The judges who
conducted the inquiry and examined the doctor's body said: 'Here we have
all the signs of a murder, but as there is not a man in the world
capable of murdering our doctor, obviously it was not a case of murder,
and the combination of evidence is due to simple chance. We must suppose
that in the darkness he fell into the ravine of himself and was mortally
injured.'
"The whole town agreed with this opinion. The doctor was buried, and
nothing more was said about a violent death. The existence of a man who
could have the baseness and wickedness to kill the doctor seemed
incredible. There is a limit even to wickedness, isn't there?
"All at once, would you believe it, chance led them to discovering the
murderer. A vagrant who had been many times convicted, notorious for his
vicious life, was seen selling for drink a snuff-box and watch that had
belonged to the doctor. When he was questioned he was confused, and
answered with an obvious lie. A search was made, and in his bed was
found a shirt with stains of blood on the sleeves, and a doctor's lancet
set in gold. What more evidence was wanted? They put the criminal in
prison. The inhabitants were indignant, and at the same time said:
"'It's incredible! It can't be so! Take care that a mistake is not made;
it does happen, you know, that evidence tells a false tale.'
"At his trial the murderer obstinately denied his guilt. Everything was
against him, and to be convinced of his guilt was as easy as to believe
that this earth is black; but the judges seem to have gone mad: they
weighed every proof ten times, looked distrustfully at the witnesses,
flushed crimson and sipped water.... The trial began early in the
morning and was only finished in the evening.
"'Accused!' the chief judge said, addressing the murderer, 'the court
has found you guilty of murdering Dr. So-and-so, and has sentenced you
to....'
"The chief judge meant to say 'to the death penalty,' but he dropped
from his hands the paper on which the sentence was written, wiped the
cold sweat from his face, and cried out:
"'No! May God punish me if I judge wrongly, but I swear he is not
guilty. I cannot admit the thought that there exists a man who would
dare to murder our friend the doctor! A man could not sink so low!'
"'There cannot be such a man!' the other judges assented.
"'No,' the crowd cried. 'Let him go!'
"The murderer was set free to go where he chose, and not one soul blamed
the court for an unjust verdict. And my grandmother used to say that for
such faith in humanity God forgave the sins of all the inhabitants of
that town. He rejoices when people believe that man is His image and
semblance, and grieves if, forgetful of human dignity, they judge worse
of men than of dogs. The sentence of acquittal may bring harm to the
inhabitants of the town, but on the other hand, think of the beneficial
influence upon them of that faith in man--a faith which does not remain
dead, you know; it raises up generous feelings in us, and always impels
us to love and respect every man. Every man! And that is important."
Mihail Karlovitch had finished. My neighbor would have urged some
objection, but the head-gardener made a gesture that signified that he
did not like objections; then he walked away to the carts, and, with an
expression of dignity, went on looking after the packing.
THE BEAUTIES I
I REMEMBER, when I was a high school boy in the fifth or sixth class, I
was driving with my grandfather from the village of Bolshoe Kryepkoe in
the Don region to Rostov-on-the-Don. It was a sultry, languidly dreary
day of August. Our eyes were glued together, and our mouths were parched
from the heat and the dry burning wind which drove clouds of dust to
meet us; one did not want to look or speak or think, and when our drowsy
driver, a Little Russian called Karpo, swung his whip at the horses and
lashed me on my cap, I did not protest or utter a sound, but only,
rousing myself from half-slumber, gazed mildly and dejectedly into the
distance to see whether there was a village visible through the dust. We
stopped to feed the horses in a big Armenian village at a rich
Armenian's whom my grandfather knew. Never in my life have I seen a
greater caricature than that Armenian. Imagine a little shaven head with
thick overhanging eyebrows, a beak of a nose, long gray mustaches, and a
wide mouth with a long cherry-wood chibouk sticking out of it. This
little head was clumsily attached to a lean hunch-back carcass attired
in a fantastic garb, a short red jacket, and full bright blue trousers.
This figure walked straddling its legs and shuffling with its slippers,
spoke without taking the chibouk out of its mouth, and behaved with
truly Armenian dignity, not smiling, but staring with wide-open eyes and
trying to take as little notice as possible of its guests.
There was neither wind nor dust in the Armenian's rooms, but it was just
as unpleasant, stifling, and dreary as in the steppe and on the road. I
remember, dusty and exhausted by the heat, I sat in the corner on a
green box. The unpainted wooden walls, the furniture, and the floors
colored with yellow ocher smelt of dry wood baked by the sun. Wherever I
looked there were flies and flies and flies.... Grandfather and the
Armenian were talking about grazing, about manure, and about oats.... I
knew that they would be a good hour getting the samovar; that
grandfather would be not less than an hour drinking his tea, and then
would lie down to sleep for two or three hours; that I should waste a
quarter of the day waiting, after which there would be again the heat,
the dust, the jolting cart. I heard the muttering of the two voices, and
it began to seem to me that I had been seeing the Armenian, the cupboard
with the crockery, the flies, the windows with the burning sun beating
on them, for ages and ages, and should only cease to see them in the
far-off future, and I was seized with hatred for the steppe, the sun,
the flies....
A Little Russian peasant woman in a kerchief brought in a tray of tea-
things, then the samovar. The Armenian went slowly out into the passage
and shouted: "Mashya, come and pour out tea! Where are you, Mashya?"
Hurried footsteps were heard, and there came into the room a girl of
sixteen in a simple cotton dress and a white kerchief. As she washed the
crockery and poured out the tea, she was standing with her back to me,
and all I could see was that she was of a slender figure, barefooted,
and that her little bare heels were covered by long trousers.
The Armenian invited me to have tea. Sitting down to the table, I