Short Stories by Chekhov
Tchervyakov, looking suspiciously at the general. "And he doesn't want
to talk. I ought to explain to him . . . that I really didn't intend . .
. that it is the law of nature or else he will think I meant to spit on
him. He doesn't think so now, but he will think so later!"
On getting home, Tchervyakov told his wife of his breach of good
manners. It struck him that his wife took too frivolous a view of the
incident; she was a little frightened, but when she learned that
Brizzhalov was in a different department, she was reassured.
"Still, you had better go and apologise," she said, "or he will think
you don't know how to behave in public."
"That's just it! I did apologise, but he took it somehow queerly . . .
he didn't say a word of sense. There wasn't time to talk properly."
Next day Tchervyakov put on a new uniform, had his hair cut and went to
Brizzhalov's to explain; going into the general's reception room he saw
there a number of petitioners and among them the general himself, who
was beginning to interview them. After questioning several petitioners
the general raised his eyes and looked at Tchervyakov.
"Yesterday at the Arcadia, if you recollect, your Excellency," the
latter began, "I sneezed and . . . accidentally spattered . . . Exc. . .
."
"What nonsense. . . . It's beyond anything! What can I do for you," said
the general addressing the next petitioner.
"He won't speak," thought Tchervyakov, turning pale; "that means that he
is angry. . . . No, it can't be left like this. . . . I will explain to
him."
When the general had finished his conversation with the last of the
petitioners and was turning towards his inner apartments, Tchervyakov
took a step towards him and muttered:
"Your Excellency! If I venture to trouble your Excellency, it is simply
from a feeling I may say of regret! . . . It was not intentional if you
will graciously believe me."
The general made a lachrymose face, and waved his hand.
"Why, you are simply making fun of me, sir," he said as he closed the
door behind him.
"Where's the making fun in it?" thought Tchervyakov, "there is nothing
of the sort! He is a general, but he can't understand. If that is how it
is I am not going to apologise to that fanfaron any more! The devil take
him. I'll write a letter to him, but I won't go. By Jove, I won't."
So thought Tchervyakov as he walked home; he did not write a letter to
the general, he pondered and pondered and could not make up that letter.
He had to go next day to explain in person.
"I ventured to disturb your Excellency yesterday," he muttered, when the
general lifted enquiring eyes upon him, "not to make fun as you were
pleased to say. I was apologising for having spattered you in sneezing.
. . . And I did not dream of making fun of you. Should I dare to make
fun of you, if we should take to making fun, then there would be no
respect for persons, there would be. . . ."
"Be off!" yelled the general, turning suddenly purple, and shaking all
over.
"What?" asked Tchervyakov, in a whisper turning numb with horror.
"Be off!" repeated the general, stamping.
Something seemed to give way in Tchervyakov's stomach. Seeing nothing
and hearing nothing he reeled to the door, went out into the street, and
went staggering along. . . . Reaching home mechanically, without taking
off his uniform, he lay down on the sofa and died.
A PINK STOCKING
A DULL, rainy day. The sky is completely covered with heavy clouds, and
there is no prospect of the rain ceasing. Outside sleet, puddles, and
drenched jackdaws. Indoors it is half dark, and so cold that one wants
the stove heated.
Pavel Petrovitch Somov is pacing up and down his study, grumbling at the
weather. The tears of rain on the windows and the darkness of the room
make him depressed. He is insufferably bored and has nothing to do. . .
. The newspapers have not been brought yet; shooting is out of the
question, and it is not nearly dinner-time . . . .
Somov is not alone in his study. Madame Somov, a pretty little lady in a
light blouse and pink stockings, is sitting at his writing table. She is
eagerly scribbling a letter. Every time he passes her as he strides up
and down, Ivan Petrovitch looks over her shoulder at what she is
writing. He sees big sprawling letters, thin and narrow, with all sorts
of tails and flourishes. There are numbers of blots, smears, and finger-
marks. Madame Somov does not like ruled paper, and every line runs
downhill with horrid wriggles as it reaches the margin. . . .
"Lidotchka, who is it you are writing such a lot to?" Somov inquires,
seeing that his wife is just beginning to scribble the sixth page.
"To sister Varya."
"Hm . . . it's a long letter! I'm so bored--let me read it!"
"Here, you may read it, but there's nothing interesting in it."
Somov takes the written pages and, still pacing up and down, begins
reading. Lidotchka leans her elbows on the back of her chair and watches
the expression of his face. . . . After the first page his face
lengthens and an expression of something almost like panic comes into
it. . . . At the third page Somov frowns and scratches the back of his
head. At the fourth he pauses, looks with a scared face at his wife, and
seems to ponder. After thinking a little, he takes up the letter again
with a sigh. . . . His face betrays perplexity and even alarm. . . ."
"Well, this is beyond anything!" he mutters, as he finishes reading the
letter and flings the sheets on the table, "It's positively incredible!"
"What's the matter?" asks Lidotchka, flustered.
"What's the matter! You've covered six pages, wasted a good two hours
scribbling, and there's nothing in it at all! If there were one tiny
idea! One reads on and on, and one's brain is as muddled as though one
were deciphering the Chinese wriggles on tea chests! Ough!"
"Yes, that's true, Vanya, . . ." says Lidotchka, reddening. "I wrote it
carelessly. . . ."
"Queer sort of carelessness! In a careless letter there is some meaning
and style--there is sense in it--while yours . . . excuse me, but I don't
know what to call it! It's absolute twaddle! There are words and
sentences, but not the slightest sense in them. Your whole letter is
exactly like the conversation of two boys: 'We had pancakes to-day! And
we had a soldier come to see us!' You say the same thing over and over
again! You drag it out, repeat yourself . . . . The wretched ideas dance
about like devils: there's no making out where anything begins, where
anything ends. . . . How can you write like that?"
"If I had been writing carefully," Lidotchka says in self defence, "then
there would not have been mistakes. . . ."
"Oh, I'm not talking about mistakes! The awful grammatical howlers!
There's not a line that's not a personal insult to grammar! No stops nor
commas--and the spelling . . . brrr! 'Earth' has an a in it!! And the
writing! It's desperate! I'm not joking, Lida. . . . I'm surprised and
appalled at your letter. . . . You mustn't be angry, darling, but,
really, I had no idea you were such a duffer at grammar. . . . And yet
you belong to a cultivated, well-educated circle: you are the wife of a
University man, and the daughter of a general! Tell me, did you ever go
to school?"
"What next! I finished at the Von Mebke's boarding school. . . ."
Somov shrugs his shoulders and continues to pace up and down, sighing.
Lidotchka, conscious of her ignorance and ashamed of it, sighs too and
casts down her eyes. . . . Ten minutes pass in silence.
"You know, Lidotchka, it really is awful!" says Somov, suddenly halting
in front of her and looking into her face with horror. "You are a mother
. . . do you understand? A mother! How can you teach your children if
you know nothing yourself? You have a good brain, but what's the use of
it if you have never mastered the very rudiments of knowledge?
There--never mind about knowledge . . . the children will get that at
school, but, you know, you are very shaky on the moral side too! You
sometimes use such language that it makes my ears tingle!"
Somov shrugs his shoulders again, wraps himself in the folds of his
dressing-gown and continues his pacing. . . . He feels vexed and
injured, and at the same time sorry for Lidotchka, who does not protest,
but merely blinks. . . . Both feel oppressed and miserable . . . .
Absorbed in their woes, they do not notice how time is passing and the
dinner hour is approaching.
Sitting down to dinner, Somov, who is fond of good eating and of eating
in peace, drinks a large glass of vodka and begins talking about
something else. Lidotchka listens and assents, but suddenly over the
soup her eyes fill with tears and she begins whimpering.
"It's all mother's fault!" she says, wiping away her tears with her
dinner napkin. "Everyone advised her to send me to the high school, and
from the high school I should have been sure to go on to the
University!"
"University . . . high school," mutters Somov. "That's running to
extremes, my girl! What's the good of being a blue stocking! A blue
stocking is the very deuce! Neither man nor woman, but just something
midway: neither one thing nor another. . . I hate blue stockings! I
would never have married a learned woman. . . ."
"There's no making you out . . .", says Lidotchka. "You are angry
because I am not learned, and at the same time you hate learned women;
you are annoyed because I have no ideas in my letter, and yet you
yourself are opposed to my studying. . . ."
"You do catch me up at a word, my dear," yawns Somov, pouring out a
second glass of vodka in his boredom.
Under the influence of vodka and a good dinner, Somov grows more good-
humoured, lively, and soft. . . . He watches his pretty wife making the
salad with an anxious face and a rush of affection for her, of
indulgence and forgiveness comes over him.
"It was stupid of me to depress her, poor girl . . . ," he thought. "Why
did I say such a lot of dreadful things? She is silly, that's true,
uncivilised and narrow; but . . . there are two sides to the question,
and audiatur et altera pars. . . . Perhaps people are perfectly right
when they say that woman's shallowness rests on her very vocation.
Granted that it is her vocation to love her husband, to bear children,
and to mix salad, what the devil does she want with learning? No,
indeed!"
At that point he remembers that learned women are usually tedious, that
they are exacting, strict, and unyielding; and, on the other hand, how
easy it is to get on with silly Lidotchka, who never pokes her nose into
anything, does not understand so much, and never obtrudes her criticism.
There is peace and comfort with Lidotchka, and no risk of being
interfered with.
"Confound them, those clever and learned women! It's better and easier
to live with simple ones," he thinks, as he takes a plate of chicken
from Lidotchka.
He recollects that a civilised man sometimes feels a desire to talk and
share his thoughts with a clever and well-educated woman. "What of it?"
thinks Somov. "If I want to talk of intellectual subjects, I'll go to
Natalya Andreyevna . . . or to Marya Frantsovna. . . . It's very simple!
But no, I shan't go. One can discuss intellectual subjects with men," he
finally decides.
AT A SUMMER VILLA
"I LOVE YOU. You are my life, my happiness--everything to me! Forgive the
avowal, but I have not the strength to suffer and be silent. I ask not
for love in return, but for sympathy. Be at the old arbour at eight
o'clock this evening. . . . To sign my name is unnecessary I think, but
do not be uneasy at my being anonymous. I am young, nice-looking . . .
what more do you want?"
When Pavel Ivanitch Vyhodtsev, a practical married man who was spending