Short Stories
feet, he made for the exit.
Now I ask my readers to decide, I beg them to judge between me and Ivan
Andreyitch. Was he right at that moment? The Grand Theatre, as we all know,
contains four tiers of boxes and a fifth row above the gallery. Why must he
assume that the note had fallen from one particular box, from that very box
and no other? Why not, for instance, from the gallery where there are often
ladies too? But passion is an exception to every rule, and jealousy is the
most exceptional of all passions.
Ivan Andreyitch rushed into the foyer, stood by the lamp, broke the seal
and read:
"To-day immediately after the performance, in G. Street at the corner of X.
Lane, K. buildings, on the third floor, the first on the right from the
stairs. The front entrance. Be there, _sans faute_; for God's sake."
Ivan Andreyitch did not know the handwriting, but he had no doubt it was an
assignation. "To track it out, to catch it and nip the mischief in the
bud," was Ivan Andreyitch's first idea. The thought occurred to him to
unmask the infamy at once on the spot; but how could it be done? Ivan
Andreyitch even ran up to the second row of boxes, but judiciously came
back again. He was utterly unable to decide where to run. Having nothing
clear he could do, he ran round to the other side and looked through the
open door of somebody else's box at the opposite side of the theatre. Yes,
it was so, it was! Young ladies and young men were sitting in all the seats
vertically one above another in all the five tiers. The note might have
fallen from all tiers at once, for Ivan Andreyitch suspected all of them of
being in a plot against him. But nothing made him any better, no
probabilities of any sort. The whole of the second act he was running up
and down all the corridors and could find no peace of mind anywhere. He
would have dashed into the box office in hope of finding from the attendant
there the names of the persons who had taken boxes on all the four tiers,
but the box office was shut. At last there came an outburst of furious
shouting and applause. The performance was over. Calls for the singers
began, and two voices from the top gallery were particularly deafening--the
leaders of the opposing factions. But they were not what mattered to Ivan
Andreyitch. Already thoughts of what he was to do next flitted through his
mind. He put on his overcoat and rushed off to G. Street to surprise them
there, to catch them unawares, to unmask them, and in general to behave
somewhat more energetically than he had done the day before. He soon found
the house, and was just going in at the front door, when the figure of a
dandy in an overcoat darted forward right in front of him, passed him and
went up the stairs to the third storey. It seemed to Ivan Andreyitch that
this was the same dandy, though he had not been able at the time to
distinguish his features in the theatre. His heart stood still. The dandy
was two flights of stairs ahead of him. At last he heard a door opened on
the third floor, and opened without the ringing of a bell, as though the
visitor was expected. The young man disappeared into the flat. Ivan
Andreyitch mounted to the third floor, before there was time to shut the
door. He meant to stand at the door, to reflect prudently on his next step,
to be rather cautious, and then to determine upon some decisive course of
action; but at that very minute a carriage rumbled up to the entrance, the
doors were flung open noisily, and heavy footsteps began ascending to the
third storey to the sound of coughing and clearing of the throat. Ivan
Andreyitch could not stand his ground, and walked into the flat with all
the majesty of an injured husband. A servant-maid rushed to meet him much
agitated, then a man-servant appeared. But to stop Ivan Andreyitch was
impossible. He flew in like a bomb, and crossing two dark rooms, suddenly
found himself in a bedroom facing a lovely young lady, who was trembling
all over with alarm and gazing at him in utter horror as though she could
not understand what was happening around her. At that instant there was a
sound in the adjoining room of heavy footsteps coming straight towards the
bedroom; they were the same footsteps that had been mounting the stairs.
"Goodness! It is my husband!" cried the lady, clasping her hands and
turning whiter than her dressing-gown.
Ivan Andreyitch felt that he had come to the wrong place, that he had made
a silly, childish blunder, that he had acted without due consideration,
that he had not been sufficiently cautious on the landing. But there was no
help for it. The door was already opening, already the heavy husband, that
is if he could be judged by his footsteps, was coming into the room.... I
don't know what Ivan Andreyitch took himself to be at that moment! I don't
know what prevented him from confronting the husband, telling him that he
had made a mistake, confessing that he had unintentionally behaved in the
most unseemly way, making his apologies and vanishing--not of course with
flying colours, not of course with glory, but at any rate departing in an
open and gentlemanly manner. But no, Ivan Andreyitch again behaved like a
boy, as though he considered himself a Don Juan or a Lovelace! He first hid
himself behind the curtain of the bed, and finally, feeling utterly
dejected and hopeless, he dropped on the floor and senselessly crept under
the bed. Terror had more influence on him than reason, and Ivan Andreyitch,
himself an injured husband, or at any rate a husband who considered himself
such, could not face meeting another husband, but was afraid to wound him
by his presence. Be this as it may, he found himself under the bed, though
he had no idea how it had come to pass. But what was most surprising, the
lady made no opposition. She did not cry out on seeing an utterly unknown
elderly gentleman seek a refuge under her bed. Probably she was so alarmed
that she was deprived of all power of speech.
The husband walked in gasping and clearing his throat, said good-evening to
his wife in a singsong, elderly voice, and flopped into an easy chair as
though he had just been carrying up a load of wood. There was a sound of a
hollow and prolonged cough. Ivan Andreyitch, transformed from a ferocious
tiger to a lamb, timid and meek as a mouse before a cat, scarcely dared to
breathe for terror, though he might have known from his own experience that
not all injured husbands bite. But this idea did not enter his head, either
from lack of consideration or from agitation of some sort. Cautiously,
softly, feeling his way he began to get right under the bed so as to lie
more comfortably there. What was his amazement when with his hand he felt
an object which, to his intense amazement, stirred and in its turn seized
his hand! Under the bed there was another person!
"Who's this?" whispered Ivan Andreyitch.
"Well, I am not likely to tell you who I am," whispered the strange man.
"Lie still and keep quiet, if you have made a mess of things!"
"But, I say!..."
"Hold your tongue!"
And the extra gentleman (for one was quite enough under the bed) the extra
gentleman squeezed Ivan Andreyitch's hand in his fist so that the latter
almost shrieked with pain.
"My dear sir...."
"Sh!"
"Then don't pinch me so, or I shall scream."
"All right, scream away, try it on."
Ivan Andreyitch flushed with shame. The unknown gentleman was sulky and
ill-humoured. Perhaps it was a man who had suffered more than once from the
persecutions of fate, and had more than once been in a tight place; but
Ivan Andreyitch was a novice and could not breathe in his constricted
position. The blood rushed to his head. However, there was no help for it;
he had to lie on his face. Ivan Andreyitch submitted and was silent.
"I have been to see Pavel Ivanitch, my love," began the husband. "We sat
down to a game of preference. Khee-khee-khee!" (he had a fit of coughing).
"Yes ... khee! So my back ... khee! Bother it ... khee-khee-khee!"
And the old gentleman became engrossed in his cough.
"My back," he brought out at last with tears in his eyes, "my spine began
to ache.... A damned hæmorrhoid, I can't stand nor sit ... or sit.
Akkhee-khee-khee!"...
And it seemed as though the cough that followed was destined to last longer
than the old gentleman in possession of it. The old gentleman grumbled
something in its intervals, but it was utterly impossible to make out a
word.
"Dear sir, for goodness' sake, move a little," whispered the unhappy Ivan
Andreyitch.
"How can I? There's no room."
"But you must admit that it is impossible for me. It is the first time that
I have found myself in such a nasty position."
"And I in such unpleasant society."
"But, young man!..."
"Hold your tongue!"
"Hold my tongue? You are very uncivil, young man.... If I am not mistaken,
you are very young; I am your senior."
"Hold your tongue!"
"My dear sir! You are forgetting yourself. You don't know to whom you are
talking!"
"To a gentleman lying under the bed."
"But I was taken by surprise ... a mistake, while in your case, if I am not
mistaken, immorality...."
"That's where you are mistaken."
"My dear sir! I am older than you, I tell you...."
"Sir, we are in the same boat, you know. I beg you not to take hold of my
face!"
"Sir, I can't tell one thing from another. Excuse me, but I have no room."
"You shouldn't be so fat!"
"Heavens! I have never been in such a degrading position."
"Yes, one couldn't be brought more low."
"Sir, sir! I don't know who you are, I don't understand how this came
about; but I am here by mistake; I am not what you think...."
"I shouldn't think about you at all if you didn't shove. But hold your
tongue, do!"
"Sir, if you don't move a little I shall have a stroke; you will have to
answer for my death, I assure you.... I am a respectable man, I am the
father of a family. I really cannot be in such a position!..."
"You thrust yourself into the position. Come, move a little! I've made room
for you, I can't do more!"
"Noble young man! Dear sir! I see I was mistaken about you," said Ivan
Andreyitch, in a transport of gratitude for the space allowed him, and
stretching out his cramped limbs. "I understand your constricted condition,
but there's no help for it. I see you think ill of me. Allow me to redeem
my reputation in your eyes, allow me to tell you who I am. I have come here
against my will, I assure you; I am not here with the object you
imagine.... I am in a terrible fright."
"Oh, do shut up! Understand that if we are overheard it will be the worse
for us. Sh!... He is talking."
The old gentleman's cough did, in fact, seem to be over.
"I tell you what, my love," he wheezed in the most lachrymose chant, "I
tell you what, my love ... khee-khee! Oh, what an affliction! Fedosey
Ivanovitch said to me: 'You should try drinking yarrow tea,' he said to me;
do you hear, my love?"
"Yes, dear."
"Yes, that was what he said, 'You should try drinking yarrow tea,' he said.
I told him I had put on leeches. But he said, 'No, Alexandr Demyanovitch,
yarrow tea is better, it's a laxative, I tell you' ... Khee-khee. Oh, dear!
What do you think, my love? Khee! Oh, my God! Khee-khee! Had I better try
yarrow tea?... Khee-khee-khee! Oh ... Khee!" and so on.
"I think it would be just as well to try that remedy," said his wife.
"Yes, it would be! 'You may be in consumption," he said. "Khee-khee! And I
told him it was gout and irritability of the stomach ... Khee-khee! But he
would have it that it might be consumption. What do you think ...
khee-khee! What do you think, my love; is it consumption?"
"My goodness, what are you talking about?"
"Why, consumption! You had better undress and go to bed now, my love ...