The house of the dead or, Prison life in Siberia
“Even though she was aware of our engagement, we acted as if she were
ignorant of it. I wrote a fine letter in which I said to Luisa, ‘If you
don’t come, I will come to your aunt’s for you.’ She was afraid and
came. Then she began to weep, and told me that a German named Schultz, a
distant relation of theirs, a clockmaker by trade, and of a certain age,
but rich, had shown a wish to marry her--in order to make her happy, as
he said, and that he himself might not remain without a wife in his old
age. He had loved her a long time, so she told me, and had been
nourishing this idea for years, but he had kept it a secret, and had
never ventured to speak out. ‘You see, Sasha,’ she said to me, ‘that it
is a question of my happiness; for he is rich, and would you prevent my
happiness?’ I looked her in the face, she wept, embraced me, clasped me
in her arms.
“‘Well, she is quite right,’ I said to myself, ‘what good is there in
marrying a soldier--even a non-commissioned officer? Come, farewell,
Luisa. God protect you. I have no right to prevent your happiness.’
“‘And what sort of a man is he? Is he good-looking?’
“‘No, he is old, and he has such a long nose.’
“She here burst into a fit of laughter. I left her. ‘It was my destiny,’
I said to myself. The next day I passed by Schultz’ shop (she had told
me where he lived). I looked through the window and saw a German, who
was arranging a watch, forty-five years of age, an aquiline nose,
swollen eyes, a dress-coat with a very high collar. I spat with contempt
as I looked at him. At that moment I was ready to break the shop
windows, but ‘What is the use of it?’ I said to myself; ‘there is
nothing more to be done: it is over, all over.’ I got back to the
barracks as the night was falling, and stretched myself out on my bed,
and--will you believe it, Alexander Petrovitch?--began to sob--yes, to
sob. One day passed, then a second, then a third. I saw Luisa no more. I
had learned, however, from an old woman (she was also a washerwoman, and
the girl I loved used sometimes to visit her), that this German knew of
our relations, and that for that reason he had made up his mind to marry
her as soon as possible, otherwise he would have waited two years
longer. He had made Luisa swear that she would see me no more. It
appeared that on account of me he had refused to loosen his
purse-strings, and kept Luisa and her aunt very close. Perhaps he would
yet change his idea, for he was not very resolute. The old woman told me
that he had invited them to take coffee with him the next day, a Sunday,
and that another relation, a former shopkeeper, now very poor, and an
assistant in some liquor store, would also come. When I found that the
business was to be settled on Sunday, I was so furious that I could not
recover my cold blood, and the following day I did nothing but reflect.
I believe I could have devoured that German. On Sunday morning I had not
come to any decision. As soon as the service was over I ran out, got
into my great-coat, and went to the house of this German. I thought I
should find them all there. Why I went to the German, and what I meant
to say to him, I did not know myself.
“I slipped a pistol into my pocket to be ready for everything; a little
pistol which was not worth a curse, with an old-fashioned lock--a thing
I had used when I was a boy, and which was really fit for nothing. I
loaded it, however, because I thought they would try to kick me out, and
that the German would insult me, in which case I would pull out my
pistol to frighten them all. I arrived. There was no one on the
staircase; they were all in the work-room. No servant. The one girl who
waited upon them was absent. I crossed the shop and saw that the door
was closed--an old door fastened from the inside. My heart beat; I
stopped and listened. They were speaking German. I broke open the door
with a kick. I looked round. The table was laid; there was a large
coffee-pot on it, with a spirit lamp underneath, and a plate of
biscuits. On a tray there was a small decanter of brandy, herrings,
sausages, and a bottle of some wine. Luisa and her aunt, both in their
Sunday best, were seated on a sofa. Opposite them, the German was
exhibiting himself on a chair, got up like a bridegroom, and in his coat
with the high collar, and with his hair carefully combed. On the other
side, there was another German, old, fat, and gray. He was taking no
part in the conversation. When I entered, Luisa turned very pale. The
aunt sprang up with a bound and sat down again. The German became angry.
What a rage he was in! He got up, and walking towards me, said:
“‘What do you want?’
“I should have lost my self-possession if anger had not supported me.
“‘What do I want? Is this the way to receive a guest? Why do you not
offer him something to drink? I have come to pay you a visit.’
“The German reflected a moment, and then said, ‘Sit down.’
“I sat down.
“‘Here is some vodka. Help yourself, I beg.’
“‘And let it be good,’ I cried, getting more and more into a rage.
“‘It is good.’
“I was enraged to see him looking at me from top to toe. The most
frightful part of it was, that Luisa was looking on. I took a drink and
said to him:
“‘Look here, German, what business have you to speak rudely to me? Let
us be better acquainted. I have come to see you as friends.’
“‘I cannot be your friend,’ he replied. ‘You are a private soldier.’
“Then I lost all self-command.
“‘Oh, you German! You sausage-seller! You know how much you are in my
power. Look here; do you wish me to break your head with this pistol?’
“I drew out my pistol, got up, and struck him on the forehead. The
women were more dead than alive; they were afraid to breathe. The eldest
of the two men, quite white, was trembling like a leaf.
“The German seemed much astonished. But he soon recovered himself.
“‘I am not afraid of you,’ he said, ‘and I beg of you, as a well-bred
man, to put an end to this pleasantry. I am not afraid of you!’
“‘You are afraid! You dare not move while this pistol is presented at
you.’
“‘You dare not do such a thing!’ he cried.
“‘And why should I not dare?’
“‘Because you would be severely punished.’
“May the devil take that idiot of a German! If he had not urged me on,
he would have been alive now.
“‘So you think I dare not?’
“‘No.’
“‘I dare not, you think?’
“‘You would not dare!’
“‘Wouldn’t I, sausage-maker?’ I fired the pistol, and down he sank on
his chair. The others uttered shrieks. I put back my pistol in my
pocket, and when I returned to the fortress, threw it among some weeds
near the principal entrance.
“Inside the barracks I laid on my bed, and said to myself, ‘I shall be
taken away soon.’ One hour passed, then another, but I was not arrested.
“Towards evening I felt so sad, I went out at all hazards to see Luisa;
I passed before the house of the clockmaker’s. There were a number of
people there, including the police. I ran on to the old woman’s and
said:
“‘Call Luisa!’
“I had only a moment to wait. She came immediately, and threw herself on
my neck in tears.
“‘It is my fault,’ she said. ‘I should not have listened to my aunt.’
“She then told me that her aunt, immediately after the scene, had gone
back home. She was in such a fright that she fell and did not speak a
word; she had uttered nothing. On the contrary, she ordered her niece
to be as silent as herself.
“‘No one has seen her since,’ said Luisa.
“The clockmaker had previously sent his servant away, for he was afraid
of her. She was jealous, and would have scratched his eyes out had she
known that he wished to get married.
“There were no workmen in the house, he had sent them all away; he had
himself prepared the coffee and collation. As for the relation, who had
scarcely spoken a word all his life, he took his hat, and, without
opening his mouth, went away.
“‘He is quite sure to be silent,’ added Luisa.
“So, indeed, he was. For two weeks no one arrested me nor suspected me
the least in the world.
“You need not believe me unless you choose, Alexander Petrovitch.
“These two weeks were the happiest in my life. I saw Luisa every day.
And how much she had become attached to me!
“She said to me through her tears: ‘If you are exiled, I will go with
you. I will leave everything to follow you.’
“I thought of making away with myself, so much had she moved me; but
after two weeks I was arrested. The old man and the aunt had agreed to
denounce me.”
“But,” I interrupted, “Baklouchin, for that they would only have given
you from ten to twelve years’ hard labour, and in the civil section; yet
you are in the special section. How does that happen?”
“That is another affair,” said Baklouchin. “When I was taken before the
Council of War, the captain appointed to conduct the case began by
insulting me, and calling me names before the Tribunal. I could not
stand it, and shouted out to him: ‘Why do you insult me? Don’t you see,
you scoundrel! that you are only looking at yourself in the glass?’
“This brought a new charge against me. I was tried a second time, and
for the two things was condemned to four thousand strokes, and to the
special section. When I was taken out to receive my punishment in the
_Green Street_, the captain was at the same time sent away. He had been
degraded from his rank, and was despatched to the Caucasus as a private
soldier. Good-bye, Alexander Petrovitch. Don’t fail to come to our
performance.”
CHAPTER XI.
THE CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS
The holidays were approaching. On the eve of the great day the convicts
scarcely ever went to work. Those who had been assigned to the sewing
workshops, and a few others, went to work as usual; but they went back
almost immediately to the convict prison, separately, or in parties.
After dinner no one worked. From the early morning the greater part of
the convicts were occupied with their own affairs, and not with those of
the administration. Some were making arrangements for bringing in
spirits, while others were seeking permission to see their friends, or
to collect small accounts due to them for the work they had already
executed. Baklouchin, and the convicts who were to take part in the
performance, were endeavouring to persuade some of their acquaintances,
nearly all officers’ servants, to procure for them the necessary
costumes. Some of them came and went with a business-like air, solely
because others were really occupied. They had no money to receive, and
yet seemed to expect a payment. Every one, in short, seemed to be
looking for a change of some kind. Towards evening the old soldiers,
who executed the convicts’ commissions, brought them all kinds of
victuals--meat, sucking-pigs, and geese. Many prisoners, even the most
simple and most economical, after saving up their kopecks throughout the
year, thought they ought to spend some of them that day, so as to
celebrate Christmas Eve in a worthy manner. The day afterwards was for
the convicts a still greater festival, one to which they had a right, as
it was recognised by law. The prisoners could not be sent to work that
day. There were not three days like it in all the year.
And, moreover, what recollections must have been agitating the souls of
those reprobates at the approach of such a solemn day! The common people
from their childhood kept the great festival in their memory. They must
have remembered with anguish and torments these days which, work being
laid aside, are passed in the bosom of the family. The respect of the
convicts for that day had something imposing about it. The drunkards
were not at all numerous; nearly every one was serious, and, so to say,
preoccupied, though they had for the most part nothing to do. Even those