Short Stories by Chekhov
"Influenza and possibly fever. There's typhus in the town now. Well, the
old woman has lived her life, thank God. . . . How old is she?"
"She'll be seventy in another year, Maxim Nikolaitch."
"Well, the old woman has lived her life, it's time to say good-bye."
"You are quite right in what you say, of course, Maxim Nikolaitch," said
Yakov, smiling from politeness, "and we thank you feelingly for your
kindness, but allow me to say every insect wants to live."
"To be sure," said the assistant, in a tone which suggested that it
depended upon him whether the woman lived or died. "Well, then, my good
fellow, put a cold compress on her head, and give her these powders
twice a day, and so good-bye. Bonjour."
From the expression of his face Yakov saw that it was a bad case, and
that no sort of powders would be any help; it was clear to him that
Marfa would die very soon, if not to-day, to-morrow. He nudged the
assistant's elbow, winked at him, and said in a low voice:
"If you would just cup her, Maxim Nikolaitch."
"I have no time, I have no time, my good fellow. Take your old woman and
go in God's name. Goodbye."
"Be so gracious," Yakov besought him. "You know yourself that if, let us
say, it were her stomach or her inside that were bad, then powders or
drops, but you see she had got a chill! In a chill the first thing is to
let blood, Maxim Nikolaitch."
But the assistant had already sent for the next patient, and a peasant
woman came into the consulting room with a boy.
"Go along! go along," he said to Yakov, frowning. "It's no use to-"
"In that case put on leeches, anyway! Make us pray for you for ever."
The assistant flew into a rage and shouted:
"You speak to me again! You blockhead. . . ."
Yakov flew into a rage too, and he turned crimson all over, but he did
not utter a word. He took Marfa on his arm and led her out of the room.
Only when they were sitting in the cart he looked morosely and
ironically at the hospital, and said:
"A nice set of artists they have settled here! No fear, but he would
have cupped a rich man, but even a leech he grudges to the poor. The
Herods!"
When they got home and went into the hut, Marfa stood for ten minutes
holding on to the stove. It seemed to her that if she were to lie down
Yakov would talk to her about his losses, and scold her for lying down
and not wanting to work. Yakov looked at her drearily and thought that
to-morrow was St. John the Divine's, and next day St. Nikolay the
Wonder-worker's, and the day after that was Sunday, and then Monday, an
unlucky day. For four days he would not be able to work, and most likely
Marfa would die on one of those days; so he would have to make the
coffin to-day. He picked up his iron rule, went up to the old woman and
took her measure. Then she lay down, and he crossed himself and began
making the coffin.
When the coffin was finished Bronze put on his spectacles and wrote in
his book: "Marfa Ivanov's coffin, two roubles, forty kopecks."
And he heaved a sigh. The old woman lay all the time silent with her
eyes closed. But in the evening, when it got dark, she suddenly called
the old man.
"Do you remember, Yakov," she asked, looking at him joyfully. "Do you
remember fifty years ago God gave us a little baby with flaxen hair? We
used always to be sitting by the river then, singing songs . . . under
the willows," and laughing bitterly, she added: "The baby girl died."
Yakov racked his memory, but could not remember the baby or the willows.
"It's your fancy," he said.
The priest arrived; he administered the sacrament and extreme unction.
Then Marfa began muttering something unintelligible, and towards morning
she died. Old women, neighbours, washed her, dressed her, and laid her
in the coffin. To avoid paying the sacristan, Yakov read the psalms over
the body himself, and they got nothing out of him for the grave, as the
grave-digger was a crony of his. Four peasants carried the coffin to the
graveyard, not for money, but from respect. The coffin was followed by
old women, beggars, and a couple of crazy saints, and the people who met
it crossed themselves piously. . . . And Yakov was very much pleased
that it was so creditable, so decorous, and so cheap, and no offence to
anyone. As he took his last leave of Marfa he touched the coffin and
thought: "A good piece of work!"
But as he was going back from the cemetery he was overcome by acute
depression. He didn't feel quite well: his breathing was laboured and
feverish, his legs felt weak, and he had a craving for drink. And
thoughts of all sorts forced themselves on his mind. He remembered again
that all his life he had never felt for Marfa, had never been
affectionate to her. The fifty-two years they had lived in the same hut
had dragged on a long, long time, but it had somehow happened that in
all that time he had never once thought of her, had paid no attention to
her, as though she had been a cat or a dog. And yet, every day, she had
lighted the stove, had cooked and baked, had gone for the water, had
chopped the wood, had slept with him in the same bed, and when he came
home drunk from the weddings always reverently hung his fiddle on the
wall and put him to bed, and all this in silence, with a timid, anxious
expression.
Rothschild, smiling and bowing, came to meet Yakov.
"I was looking for you, uncle," he said. "Moisey Ilyitch sends you his
greetings and bids you come to him at once."
Yakov felt in no mood for this. He wanted to cry.
"Leave me alone," he said, and walked on.
"How can you," Rothschild said, fluttered, running on in front. "Moisey
Ilyitch will be offended! He bade you come at once!"
Yakov was revolted at the Jew's gasping for breath and blinking, and
having so many red freckles on his face. And it was disgusting to look
at his green coat with black patches on it, and all his fragile, refined
figure.
"Why are you pestering me, garlic?" shouted Yakov. "Don't persist!"
The Jew got angry and shouted too:
"Not so noisy, please, or I'll send you flying over the fence!"
"Get out of my sight!" roared Yakov, and rushed at him with his fists.
"One can't live for you scabby Jews!"
Rothschild, half dead with terror, crouched down and waved his hands
over his head, as though to ward off a blow; then he leapt up and ran
away as fast as his legs could carry him: as he ran he gave little skips
and kept clasping his hands, and Yakov could see how his long thin spine
wriggled. Some boys, delighted at the incident, ran after him shouting
"Jew! Jew!" Some dogs joined in the chase barking. Someone burst into a
roar of laughter, then gave a whistle; the dogs barked with even more
noise and unanimity. Then a dog must have bitten Rothschild, as a
desperate, sickly scream was heard.
Yakov went for a walk on the grazing ground, then wandered on at random
in the outskirts of the town, while the street boys shouted:
"Here's Bronze! Here's Bronze!"
He came to the river, where the curlews floated in the air uttering
shrill cries and the ducks quacked. The sun was blazing hot, and there
was a glitter from the water, so that it hurt the eyes to look at it.
Yakov walked by a path along the bank and saw a plump, rosy-cheeked lady
come out of the bathing-shed, and thought about her: "Ugh! you otter!"
Not far from the bathing-shed boys were catching crayfish with bits of
meat; seeing him, they began shouting spitefully, "Bronze! Bronze!" And
then he saw an old spreading willow-tree with a big hollow in it, and a
crow's nest on it. . . . And suddenly there rose up vividly in Yakov's
memory a baby with flaxen hair, and the willow-tree Marfa had spoken of.
Why, that is it, the same willow-tree-green, still, and sorrowful. . . .
How old it has grown, poor thing!
He sat down under it and began to recall the past. On the other bank,
where now there was the water meadow, in those days there stood a big
birchwood, and yonder on the bare hillside that could be seen on the
horizon an old, old pine forest used to be a bluish patch in the
distance. Big boats used to sail on the river. But now it was all smooth
and unruffled, and on the other bank there stood now only one birch-
tree, youthful and slender like a young lady, and there was nothing on
the river but ducks and geese, and it didn't look as though there had
ever been boats on it. It seemed as though even the geese were fewer
than of old. Yakov shut his eyes, and in his imagination huge flocks of
white geese soared, meeting one another.
He wondered how it had happened that for the last forty or fifty years
of his life he had never once been to the river, or if he had been by it
he had not paid attention to it. Why, it was a decent sized river, not a
trumpery one; he might have gone in for fishing and sold the fish to
merchants, officials, and the bar-keeper at the station, and then have
put money in the bank; he might have sailed in a boat from one house to
another, playing the fiddle, and people of all classes would have paid
to hear him; he might have tried getting big boats afloat again-that
would be better than making coffins; he might have bred geese, killed
them and sent them in the winter to Moscow. Why, the feathers alone
would very likely mount up to ten roubles in the year. But he had wasted
his time, he had done nothing of this. What losses! Ah! What losses! And
if he had gone in for all those things at once-catching fish and playing
the fiddle, and running boats and killing geese-what a fortune he would
have made! But nothing of this had happened, even in his dreams; life
had passed uselessly without any pleasure, had been wasted for nothing,
not even a pinch of snuff; there was nothing left in front, and if one
looked back-there was nothing there but losses, and such terrible ones,
it made one cold all over. And why was it a man could not live so as to
avoid these losses and misfortunes? One wondered why they had cut down
the birch copse and the pine forest. Why was he walking with no reason
on the grazing ground? Why do people always do what isn't needful? Why
had Yakov all his life scolded, bellowed, shaken his fists, ill-treated
his wife, and, one might ask, what necessity was there for him to
frighten and insult the Jew that day? Why did people in general hinder
each other from living? What losses were due to it! what terrible
losses! If it were not for hatred and malice people would get immense
benefit from one another.
In the evening and the night he had visions of the baby, of the willow,
of fish, of slaughtered geese, and Marfa looking in profile like a bird
that wants to drink, and the pale, pitiful face of Rothschild, and faces
moved down from all sides and muttered of losses. He tossed from side to
side, and got out of bed five times to play the fiddle.
In the morning he got up with an effort and went to the hospital. The
same Maxim Nikolaitch told him to put a cold compress on his head, and
gave him some powders, and from his tone and expression of face Yakov
realized that it was a bad case and that no powders would be any use. As
he went home afterwards, he reflected that death would be nothing but a
benefit; he would not have to eat or drink, or pay taxes or offend
people, and, as a man lies in his grave not for one year but for
hundreds and thousands, if one reckoned it up the gain would be
enormous. A man's life meant loss: death meant gain. This reflection
was, of course, a just one, but yet it was bitter and mortifying; why
was the order of the world so strange, that life, which is given to man
only once, passes away without benefit?
He was not sorry to die, but at home, as soon as he saw his fiddle, it
sent a pang to his heart and he felt sorry. He could not take the fiddle