Short Stories by Chekhov
woman called Pasha or Spiridonovna--a thin little woman of fifty, in a
black dress with a white kerchief, with keen eyes, sharp nose, and a
sharp chin; she had sly, viperish eyes and she looked as though she
could see right through every one. Her lips were shaped like a heart.
Her viperishness and hostility to every one had earned her the nickname
of the Stinging Beetle.
Going into the dining-room without looking at any one, she made for the
ikons and chanted in a high voice "Thy Holy Birth," then she sang "The
Virgin today gives birth to the Son," then "Christ is born," then she
turned round and bent a piercing gaze upon all of them.
"A happy Christmas," she said, and she kissed Anna Akimovna on the
shoulder. "It's all I could do, all I could do to get to you, my kind
friends." She kissed Auntie on the shoulder. "I should have come to you
this morning, but I went in to some good people to rest on the way.
'Stay, Spiridonovna, stay,' they said, and I did not notice that evening
was coming on."
As she did not eat meat, they gave her salmon and caviare. She ate
looking from under her eyelids at the company, and drank three glasses
of vodka. When she had finished she said a prayer and bowed down to Anna
Akimovna's feet.
They began to play a game of "kings," as they had done the year before,
and the year before that, and all the servants in both stories crowded
in at the doors to watch the game. Anna Akimovna fancied she caught a
glimpse once or twice of Mishenka, with a patronizing smile on his face,
among the crowd of peasant men and women. The first to be king was
Stinging Beetle, and Anna Akimovna as the soldier paid her tribute; and
then Auntie was king and Anna Akimovna was peasant, which excited
general delight, and Agafyushka was prince, and was quite abashed with
pleasure. Another game was got up at the other end of the table--played
by the two Mashas, Varvarushka, and the sewing-maid Marfa Ptrovna, who
was waked on purpose to play "kings," and whose face looked cross and
sleepy.
While they were playing they talked of men, and of how difficult it was
to get a good husband nowadays, and which state was to be preferred--that
of an old maid or a widow.
"You are a handsome, healthy, sturdy lass," said Stinging Beetle to Anna
Akimovna. "But I can't make out for whose sake you are holding back."
"What's to be done if nobody will have me?"
"Or maybe you have taken a vow to remain a maid?" Stinging Beetle went
on, as though she did not hear. "Well, that's a good deed. . . . Remain
one," she repeated, looking intently and maliciously at her cards. "All
right, my dear, remain one. . . . Yes . . . only maids, these saintly
maids, are not all alike." She heaved a sigh and played the king. "Oh,
no, my girl, they are not all alike! Some really watch over themselves
like nuns, and butter would not melt in their mouths; and if such a one
does sin in an hour of weakness, she is worried to death, poor thing! so
it would be a sin to condemn her. While others will go dressed in black
and sew their shroud, and yet love rich old men on the sly. Yes, y-es,
my canary birds, some hussies will bewitch an old man and rule over him,
my doves, rule over him and turn his head; and when they've saved up
money and lottery tickets enough, they will bewitch him to his death."
Varvarushka's only response to these hints was to heave a sigh and look
towards the ikons. There was an expression of Christian meekness on her
countenance.
"I know a maid like that, my bitterest enemy," Stinging Beetle went on,
looking round at every one in triumph; "she is always sighing, too, and
looking at the ikons, the she-devil. When she used to rule in a certain
old man's house, if one went to her she would give one a crust, and bid
one bow down to the ikons while she would sing: 'In conception Thou dost
abide a Virgin . . . !' On holidays she will give one a bite, and on
working days she will reproach one for it. But nowadays I will make
merry over her! I will make as merry as I please, my jewel."
Varvarushka glanced at the ikons again and crossed herself.
"But no one will have me, Spiridonovna," said Anna Akimovna to change
the conversation. "What's to be done?"
"It's your own fault. You keep waiting for highly educated gentlemen,
but you ought to marry one of your own sort, a merchant."
"We don't want a merchant," said Auntie, all in a flutter. "Queen of
Heaven, preserve us! A gentleman will spend your money, but then he will
be kind to you, you poor little fool. But a merchant will be so strict
that you won't feel at home in your own house. You'll be wanting to
fondle him and he will be counting his money, and when you sit down to
meals with him, he'll grudge you every mouthful, though it's your own,
the lout! . . . Marry a gentleman."
They all talked at once, loudly interrupting one another, and Auntie
tapped on the table with the nutcrackers and said, flushed and angry:
"We won't have a merchant; we won't have one! If you choose a merchant I
shall go to an almshouse."
"Sh . . . Sh! . . . Hush!" cried Stinging Beetle; when all were silent
she screwed up one eye and said: "Do you know what, Annushka, my birdie
. . . ? There is no need for you to get married really like every one
else. You're rich and free, you are your own mistress; but yet, my
child, it doesn't seem the right thing for you to be an old maid. I'll
find you, you know, some trumpery and simple-witted man. You'll marry
him for appearances and then have your fling, bonny lass! You can hand
him five thousand or ten maybe, and pack him off where he came from, and
you will be mistress in your own house--you can love whom you like and no
one can say anything to you. And then you can love your highly educated
gentleman. You'll have a jolly time!" Stinging Beetle snapped her
fingers and gave a whistle.
"It's sinful," said Auntie.
"Oh, sinful," laughed Stinging Beetle. "She is educated, she
understands. To cut some one's throat or bewitch an old man-- that's a
sin, that's true; but to love some charming young friend is not a sin at
all. And what is there in it, really? There's no sin in it at all! The
old pilgrim women have invented all that to make fools of simple folk.
I, too, say everywhere it's a sin; I don't know myself why it's a sin."
Stinging Beetle emptied her glass and cleared her throat. "Have your
fling, bonny lass," this time evidently addressing herself. "For thirty
years, wenches, I have thought of nothing but sins and been afraid, but
now I see I have wasted my time, I've let it slip by like a ninny! Ah, I
have been a fool, a fool!" She sighed. "A woman's time is short and
every day is precious. You are handsome, Annushka, and very rich; but as
soon as thirty-five or forty strikes for you your time is up. Don't
listen to any one, my girl; live, have your fling till you are forty,
and then you will have time to pray forgiveness--there will be plenty of
time to bow down and to sew your shroud. A candle to God and a poker to
the devil! You can do both at once! Well, how is it to be? Will you make
some little man happy?"
"I will," laughed Anna Akimovna. "I don't care now; I would marry a
working man."
"Well, that would do all right! Oh, what a fine fellow you would choose
then!" Stinging Beetle screwed up her eyes and shook her head. "O--o--oh!"
"I tell her myself," said Auntie, "it's no good waiting for a gentleman,
so she had better marry, not a gentleman, but some one humbler; anyway
we should have a man in the house to look after things. And there are
lots of good men. She might have some one out of the factory. They are
all sober, steady men. . . ."
"I should think so," Stinging Beetle agreed. "They are capital fellows.
If you like, Aunt, I will make a match for her with Vassily Lebedinsky?"
"Oh, Vasya's legs are so long," said Auntie seriously. "He is so lanky.
He has no looks."
There was laughter in the crowd by the door.
"Well, Pimenov? Would you like to marry Pimenov?" Stinging Beetle asked
Anna Akimovna.
"Very good. Make a match for me with Pimenov."
"Really?"
"Yes, do!" Anna Akimovna said resolutely, and she struck her fist on the
table. "On my honour, I will marry him."
"Really?"
Anna Akimovna suddenly felt ashamed that her cheeks were burning and
that every one was looking at her; she flung the cards together on the
table and ran out of the room. As she ran up the stairs and, reaching
the upper story, sat down to the piano in the drawing-room, a murmur of
sound reached her from below like the roar of the sea; most likely they
were talking of her and of Pimenov, and perhaps Stinging Beetle was
taking advantage of her absence to insult Varvarushka and was putting no
check on her language.
The lamp in the big room was the only light burning in the upper story,
and it sent a glimmer through the door into the dark drawing-room. It
was between nine and ten, not later. Anna Akimovna played a waltz, then
another, then a third; she went on playing without stopping. She looked
into the dark corner beyond the piano, smiled, and inwardly called to
it, and the idea occurred to her that she might drive off to the town to
see some one, Lysevitch for instance, and tell him what was passing in
her heart. She wanted to talk without ceasing, to laugh, to play the
fool, but the dark corner was sullenly silent, and all round in all the
rooms of the upper story it was still and desolate.
She was fond of sentimental songs, but she had a harsh, untrained voice,
and so she only played the accompaniment and sang hardly audibly, just
above her breath. She sang in a whisper one song after another, for the
most part about love, separation, and frustrated hopes, and she imagined
how she would hold out her hands to him and say with entreaty, with
tears, "Pimenov, take this burden from me!" And then, just as though her
sins had been forgiven, there would be joy and comfort in her soul, and
perhaps a free, happy life would begin. In an anguish of anticipation
she leant over the keys, with a passionate longing for the change in her
life to come at once without delay, and was terrified at the thought
that her old life would go on for some time longer. Then she played
again and sang hardly above her breath, and all was stillness about her.
There was no noise coming from downstairs now, they must have gone to
bed. It had struck ten some time before. A long, solitary, wearisome
night was approaching.
Anna Akimovna walked through all the rooms, lay down for a while on the
sofa, and read in her study the letters that had come that evening;
there were twelve letters of Christmas greetings and three anonymous
letters. In one of them some workman complained in a horrible, almost
illegible handwriting that Lenten oil sold in the factory shop was
rancid and smelt of paraffin; in another, some one respectfully informed
her that over a purchase of iron Nazaritch had lately taken a bribe of a
thousand roubles from some one; in a third she was abused for her
inhumanity.
The excitement of Christmas was passing off, and to keep it up Anna
Akimovna sat down at the piano again and softly played one of the new
waltzes, then she remembered how cleverly and creditably she had spoken
at dinner today. She looked round at the dark windows, at the walls with
the pictures, at the faint light that came from the big room, and all at
once she began suddenly crying, and she felt vexed that she was so
lonely, and that she had no one to talk to and consult. To cheer herself
she tried to picture Pimenov in her imagination, but it was
unsuccessful.
It struck twelve. Mishenka, no longer wearing his swallow-tail but in
his reefer jacket, came in, and without speaking lighted two candles;