Short Stories by Chekhov
"At our lessons before dinner Zinotchka did not look at me, and her
voice faltered. Instead of trying to scare me she tried to propitiate me
in every way, giving me full marks, and not complaining to my father of
my naughtiness. Being intelligent beyond my years I exploited her
secret: I did not learn my lessons, walked into the schoolroom on my
head, and said all sorts of rude things. In fact, if I had remained in
that vein till to-day I should have become a famous blackmailer. Well, a
week passed. Another person's secret irritated and fretted me like a
splinter in my soul. I longed at all costs to blurt it out and gloat
over the effect. And one day at dinner, when we had a lot of visitors, I
gave a stupid snigger, looked fiendishly at Zinotchka and said:
"'I know. Gy-y! I saw! . . .'
"'What do you know?' asked my mother.
"I looked still more fiendishly at Zinotchka and Sasha. You ought to
have seen how the girl flushed up, and how furious Sasha's eyes were! I
bit my tongue and did not go on. Zinotchka gradually turned pale,
clenched her teeth, and ate no more dinner. At our evening lessons that
day I noticed a striking change in Zinotchka's face. It looked sterner,
colder, as it were, more like marble, while her eyes gazed strangely
straight into my face, and I give you my word of honour I have never
seen such terrible, annihilating eyes, even in hounds when they overtake
the wolf. I understood their expression perfectly, when in the middle of
a lesson she suddenly clenched her teeth and hissed through them:
"'I hate you! Oh, you vile, loathsome creature, if you knew how I hate
you, how I detest your cropped head, your vulgar, prominent ears!'
"But at once she took fright and said:
"'I am not speaking to you, I am repeating a part out of a play. . . .'
"Then, my friends, at night I saw her come to my bedside and gaze a long
time into my face. She hated me passionately, and could not exist away
from me. The contemplation of my hated pug of a face had become a
necessity to her. I remember a lovely summer evening . . . with the
scent of hay, perfect stillness, and so on. The moon was shining. I was
walking up and down the avenue, thinking of cherry jam. Suddenly
Zinotchka, looking pale and lovely, came up to me, she caught hold of my
hand, and breathlessly began expressing herself:
"'Oh, how I hate you! I wish no one harm as I do you! Let me tell you
that! I want you to understand that!'
"You understand, moonlight, her pale face, breathless with passion, the
stillness . . . little pig as I was I actually enjoyed it. I listened to
her, looked at her eyes. . . . At first I liked it, and enjoyed the
novelty. Then I was suddenly seized with terror, I gave a scream, and
ran into the house at breakneck speed.
"I made up my mind that the best thing to do was to complain to maman.
And I did complain, mentioning incidentally how Sasha had kissed
Zinotchka. I was stupid, and did not know what would follow, or I should
have kept the secret to myself. . . . After hearing my story maman
flushed with indignation and said:
"'It is not your business to speak about that, you are still very young.
. . . But, what an example for children.'
"My maman was not only virtuous but diplomatic. To avoid a scandal she
did not get rid of Zinotchka at once, but set to work gradually,
systematically, to pave the way for her departure, as one does with
well-bred but intolerable people. I remember that when Zinotchka did
leave us the last glance she cast at the house was directed at the
window at which I was sitting, and I assure you, I remember that glance
to this day.
"Zinotchka soon afterwards became my brother's wife. She is the Zinaida
Nikolaevna whom you know. The next time I met her I was already an
ensign. In spite of all her efforts she could not recognize the hated
Petya in the ensign with his moustache, but still she did not treat me
quite like a relation. . . . And even now, in spite of my good-humoured
baldness, meek corpulence, and unassuming air, she still looks askance
at me, and feels put out when I go to see my brother. Hatred it seems
can no more be forgotten than love. . . .
"Tchoo! I hear the cock crowing! Good-night. Milord! Lie down!"
BAD WEATHER
BIG raindrops were pattering on the dark windows. It was one of those
disgusting summer holiday rains which, when they have begun, last a long
time-for weeks, till the frozen holiday maker grows used to it, and
sinks into complete apathy. It was cold; there was a feeling of raw,
unpleasant dampness. The mother-in-law of a lawyer, called Kvashin, and
his wife, Nadyezhda Filippovna, dressed in waterproofs and shawls, were
sitting over the dinner table in the dining-room. It was written on the
countenance of the elder lady that she was, thank God, well-fed, well-
clothed and in good health, that she had married her only daughter to a
good man, and now could play her game of patience with an easy
conscience; her daughter, a rather short, plump, fair young woman of
twenty, with a gentle an?ic face, was reading a book with her elbows
on the table; judging from her eyes she was not so much reading as
thinking her own thoughts, which were not in the book. Neither of them
spoke. There was the sound of the pattering rain, and from the kitchen
they could hear the prolonged yawns of the cook.
Kvashin himself was not at home. On rainy days he did not come to the
summer villa, but stayed in town; damp, rainy weather affected his
bronchitis and prevented him from working. He was of the opinion that
the sight of the grey sky and the tears of rain on the windows deprived
one of energy and induced the spleen. In the town, where there was
greater comfort, bad weather was scarcely noticed.
After two games of patience, the old lady shuffled the cards and took a
glance at her daughter.
"I have been trying with the cards whether it will be fine to-morrow,
and whether our Alexey Stepanovitch will come," she said. "It is five
days since he was here. . . . The weather is a chastisement from God."
Nadyezhda Filippovna looked indifferently at her mother, got up, and
began walking up and down the room.
"The barometer was rising yesterday," she said doubtfully, "but they say
it is falling again to-day."
The old lady laid out the cards in three long rows and shook her head.
"Do you miss him?" she asked, glancing at her daughter.
"Of course."
"I see you do. I should think so. He hasn't been here for five days. In
May the utmost was two, or at most three days, and now it is serious,
five days! I am not his wife, and yet I miss him. And yesterday, when I
heard the barometer was rising, I ordered them to kill a chicken and
prepare a carp for Alexey Stepanovitch. He likes them. Your poor father
couldn't bear fish, but he likes it. He always eats it with relish."
"My heart aches for him," said the daughter. "We are dull, but it is
duller still for him, you know, mamma."
"I should think so! In the law-courts day in and day out, and in the
empty flat at night alone like an owl."
"And what is so awful, mamma, he is alone there without servants; there
is no one to set the samovar or bring him water. Why didn't he engage a
valet for the summer months? And what use is the summer villa at all if
he does not care for it? I told him there was no need to have it, but
no, 'It is for the sake of your health,' he said, and what is wrong with
my health? It makes me ill that he should have to put up with so much on
my account."
Looking over her mother's shoulder, the daughter noticed a mistake in
the patience, bent down to the table and began correcting it. A silence
followed. Both looked at the cards and imagined how their Alexey
Stepanovitch, utterly forlorn, was sitting now in the town in his
gloomy, empty study and working, hungry, exhausted, yearning for his
family. . . .
"Do you know what, mamma?" said Nadyezhda Filippovna suddenly, and her
eyes began to shine. "If the weather is the same to-morrow I'll go by
the first train and see him in town! Anyway, I shall find out how he is,
have a look at him, and pour out his tea."
And both of them began to wonder how it was that this idea, so simple
and easy to carry out, had not occurred to them before. It was only half
an hour in the train to the town, and then twenty minutes in a cab. They
said a little more, and went off to bed in the same room, feeling more
contented.
"Oho-ho-ho. . . . Lord, forgive us sinners!" sighed the old lady when
the clock in the hall struck two. "There is no sleeping."
"You are not asleep, mamma?" the daughter asked in a whisper. "I keep
thinking of Alyosha. I only hope he won't ruin his health in town.
Goodness knows where he dines and lunches. In restaurants and taverns."
"I have thought of that myself," sighed the old lady. "The Heavenly
Mother save and preserve him. But the rain, the rain!"
In the morning the rain was not pattering on the panes, but the sky was
still grey. The trees stood looking mournful, and at every gust of wind
they scattered drops. The footprints on the muddy path, the ditches and
the ruts were full of water. Nadyezhda Filippovna made up her mind to
go.
"Give him my love," said the old lady, wrapping her daughter up. "Tell
him not to think too much about his cases. . . . And he must rest. Let
him wrap his throat up when he goes out: the weather-God help us! And
take him the chicken; food from home, even if cold, is better than at a
restaurant."
The daughter went away, saying that she would come back by an evening
train or else next morning.
But she came back long before dinner-time, when the old lady was sitting
on her trunk in her bedroom and drowsily thinking what to cook for her
son-in-law's supper.
Going into the room her daughter, pale and agitated, sank on the bed
without uttering a word or taking off her hat, and pressed her head into
the pillow.
"But what is the matter," said the old lady in surprise, "why back so
soon? Where is Alexey Stepanovitch?"
Nadyezhda Filippovna raised her head and gazed at her mother with dry,
imploring eyes.
"He is deceiving us, mamma," she said.
"What are you saying? Christ be with you!" cried the old lady in alarm,
and her cap slipped off her head. "Who is going to deceive us? Lord,
have mercy on us!"
"He is deceiving us, mamma!" repeated her daughter, and her chin began
to quiver.
"How do you know?" cried the old lady, turning pale.
"Our flat is locked up. The porter tells me that Alyosha has not been
home once for these five days. He is not living at home! He is not at
home, not at home!"
She waved her hands and burst into loud weeping, uttering nothing but:
"Not at home! Not at home!"
She began to be hysterical.
"What's the meaning of it?" muttered the old woman in horror. "Why, he
wrote the day before yesterday that he never leaves the flat! Where is
he sleeping? Holy Saints!"
Nadyezhda Filippovna felt so faint that she could not take off her hat.
She looked about her blankly, as though she had been drugged, and
convulsively clutched at her mother's arms.
"What a person to trust: a porter!" said the old lady, fussing round her
daughter and crying. "What a jealous girl you are! He is not going to
deceive you, and how dare he? We are not just anybody. Though we are of
the merchant class, yet he has no right, for you are his lawful wife! We
can take proceedings! I gave twenty thousand roubles with you! You did
not want for a dowry!"
And the old lady herself sobbed and gesticulated, and she felt faint,
too, and lay down on her trunk. Neither of them noticed that patches of
blue had made their appearance in the sky, that the clouds were more
transparent, that the first sunbeam was cautiously gliding over the wet