The possessed or, The devils
think I can say with certainty that there was a moment at dusk when he
wanted to get up, go out and tell everything. What that _everything_ was,
no one but he could say. Of course he would have achieved nothing, and
would have simply betrayed himself. He had no proofs whatever with which
to convict the perpetrators of the crime, and, indeed, he had nothing
but vague conjectures to go upon, though to him they amounted to
complete certainty. But he was ready to ruin himself if he could only
"crush the scoundrels"--his own words. Pyotr Stepanovitch had guessed
fairly correctly at this impulse in him, and he knew himself that he
was risking a great deal in putting off the execution of his new
awful project till next day. On his side there was, as usual, great
self-confidence and contempt for all these "wretched creatures" and for
Shatov in particular. He had for years despised Shatov for his "whining
idiocy," as he had expressed it in former days abroad, and he was
absolutely confident that he could deal with such a guileless creature,
that is, keep an eye on him all that day, and put a check on him at the
first sign of danger. Yet what saved "the scoundrels" for a short time
was something quite unexpected which they had not foreseen....
Towards eight o'clock in the evening (at the very time when the quintet
was meeting at Erkel's, and waiting in indignation and excitement for
Pyotr Stepanovitch) Shatov was lying in the dark on his bed with a
headache and a slight chill; he was tortured by uncertainty, he was
angry, he kept making up his mind, and could not make it up finally, and
felt, with a curse, that it would all lead to nothing. Gradually he sank
into a brief doze and had something like a nightmare. He dreamt that
he was lying on his bed, tied up with cords and unable to stir, and
meantime he heard a terrible banging that echoed all over the house, a
banging on the fence, at the gate, at his door, in Kirillov's lodge,
so that the whole house was shaking, and a far-away familiar voice that
wrung his heart was calling to him piteously. He suddenly woke and sat
up in bed. To his surprise the banging at the gate went on, though
not nearly so violent as it had seemed in his dream. The knocks were
repeated and persistent, and the strange voice "that wrung his heart"
could still be heard below at the gate, though not piteously but angrily
and impatiently, alternating with another voice, more restrained and
ordinary. He jumped up, opened the casement pane and put his head out.
"Who's there?" he called, literally numb with terror.
"If you are Shatov," the answer came harshly and resolutely from below,
"be so good as to tell me straight out and honestly whether you agree to
let me in or not?"
It was true: he recognised the voice!
"Marie!... Is it you?"
"Yes, yes, Marya Shatov, and I assure you I can't keep the driver a
minute longer."
"This minute... I'll get a candle," Shatov cried faintly. Then he rushed
to look for the matches. The matches, as always happens at such moments,
could not be found. He dropped the candlestick and the candle on the
floor and as soon as he heard the impatient voice from below again, he
abandoned the search and dashed down the steep stairs to open the gate.
"Be so good as to hold the bag while I settle with this blockhead," was
how Madame Marya Shatov greeted him below, and she thrust into his hands
a rather light cheap canvas handbag studded with brass nails, of Dresden
manufacture. She attacked the driver with exasperation.
"Allow me to tell you, you are asking too much. If you've been driving
me for an extra hour through these filthy streets, that's your fault,
because it seems you didn't know where to find this stupid street and
imbecile house. Take your thirty kopecks and make up your mind that
you'll get nothing more."
"Ech, lady, you told me yourself Voznesensky Street and this is
Bogoyavlensky; Voznesensky is ever so far away. You've simply put the
horse into a steam."
"Voznesensky, Bogoyavlensky--you ought to know all those stupid names
better than I do, as you are an inhabitant; besides, you are unfair, I
told you first of all Filipov's house and you declared you knew it. In
any case you can have me up to-morrow in the local court, but now I beg
you to let me alone."
"Here, here's another five kopecks." With eager haste Shatov pulled a
five-kopeck piece out of his pocket and gave it to the driver.
"Do me a favour, I beg you, don't dare to do that!" Madame Shatov flared
up, but the driver drove off and Shatov, taking her hand, drew her
through the gate.
"Make haste, Marie, make haste... that's no matter, and... you are wet
through. Take care, we go up here--how sorry I am there's no light--the
stairs are steep, hold tight, hold tight! Well, this is my room. Excuse
my having no light... One minute!"
He picked up the candlestick but it was a long time before the matches
were found. Madame Shatov stood waiting in the middle of the room,
silent and motionless.
"Thank God, here they are at last!" he cried joyfully, lighting up the
room. Marya Shatov took a cursory survey of his abode.
"They told me you lived in a poor way, but I didn't expect it to be
as bad as this," she pronounced with an air of disgust, and she moved
towards the bed.
"Oh, I am tired!" she sat down on the hard bed, with an exhausted air.
"Please put down the bag and sit down on the chair yourself. Just as you
like though; you are in the way standing there. I have come to you for
a time, till I can get work, because I know nothing of this place and I
have no money. But if I shall be in your way I beg you again, be so good
as to tell me so at once, as you are bound to do if you are an honest
man. I could sell something to-morrow and pay for a room at an hotel,
but you must take me to the hotel yourself.... Oh, but I am tired!"
Shatov was all of a tremor.
"You mustn't, Marie, you mustn't go to an hotel! An hotel! What for?
What for?"
He clasped his hands imploringly....
"Well, if I can get on without the hotel... I must, any way, explain the
position. Remember, Shatov, that we lived in Geneva as man and wife for
a fortnight and a few days; it's three years since we parted, without
any particular quarrel though. But don't imagine that I've come back
to renew any of the foolishness of the past. I've come back to look for
work, and that I've come straight to this town is just because it's all
the same to me. I've not come to say I am sorry for anything; please
don't imagine anything so stupid as that."
"Oh, Marie! This is unnecessary, quite unnecessary," Shatov muttered
vaguely.
"If so, if you are so far developed as to be able to understand that, I
may allow myself to add, that if I've come straight to you now and am
in your lodging, it's partly because I always thought you were far
from being a scoundrel and were perhaps much better than other...
blackguards!"
Her eyes flashed. She must have had to bear a great deal at the hands of
some "blackguards."
"And please believe me, I wasn't laughing at you just now when I told
you you were good. I spoke plainly, without fine phrases and I can't
endure them. But that's all nonsense. I always hoped you would have
sense enough not to pester me.... Enough, I am tired."
And she bent on him a long, harassed and weary gaze. Shatov stood
facing her at the other end of the room, which was five paces away, and
listened to her timidly with a look of new life and unwonted radiance
on his face. This strong, rugged man, all bristles on the surface,
was suddenly all softness and shining gladness. There was a thrill
of extraordinary and unexpected feeling in his soul. Three years of
separation, three years of the broken marriage had effaced nothing from
his heart. And perhaps every day during those three years he had dreamed
of her, of that beloved being who had once said to him, "I love you."
Knowing Shatov I can say with certainty that he could never have allowed
himself even to dream that a woman might say to him, "I love you."
He was savagely modest and chaste, he looked on himself as a perfect
monster, detested his own face as well as his character, compared
himself to some freak only fit to be exhibited at fairs. Consequently
he valued honesty above everything and was fanatically devoted to his
convictions; he was gloomy, proud, easily moved to wrath, and sparing
of words. But here was the one being who had loved him for a fortnight
(that he had never doubted, never!), a being he had always considered
immeasurably above him in spite of his perfectly sober understanding of
her errors; a being to whom he could forgive everything, _everything_ (of
that there could be no question; indeed it was quite the other way, his
idea was that he was entirely to blame); this woman, this Marya Shatov,
was in his house, in his presence again... it was almost inconceivable!
He was so overcome, there was so much that was terrible and at the same
time so much happiness in this event that he could not, perhaps would
not--perhaps was afraid to--realise the position. It was a dream. But
when she looked at him with that harassed gaze he suddenly understood
that this woman he loved so dearly was suffering, perhaps had been
wronged. His heart went cold. He looked at her features with anguish:
the first bloom of youth had long faded from this exhausted face. It's
true that she was still good-looking--in his eyes a beauty, as she had
always been. In reality she was a woman of twenty-five, rather strongly
built, above the medium height (taller than Shatov), with abundant dark
brown hair, a pale oval face, and large dark eyes now glittering with
feverish brilliance. But the light-hearted, naïve and good-natured
energy he had known so well in the past was replaced now by a sullen
irritability and disillusionment, a sort of cynicism which was not yet
habitual to her herself, and which weighed upon her. But the chief thing
was that she was ill, that he could see clearly. In spite of the awe in
which he stood of her he suddenly went up to her and took her by both
hands.
"Marie... you know... you are very tired, perhaps, for God's sake, don't
be angry.... If you'd consent to have some tea, for instance, eh? Tea
picks one up so, doesn't it? If you'd consent!"
"Why talk about consenting! Of course I consent, what a baby you are
still. Get me some if you can. How cramped you are here. How cold it
is!"
"Oh, I'll get some logs for the fire directly, some logs... I've got
logs." Shatov was all astir. "Logs... that is... but I'll get tea
directly," he waved his hand as though with desperate determination and
snatched up his cap.
"Where are you going? So you've no tea in the house?"
"There shall be, there shall be, there shall be, there shall be
everything directly.... I..." he took his revolver from the shelf, "I'll
sell this revolver directly... or pawn it...."
"What foolishness and what a time that will take! Take my money if
you've nothing, there's eighty kopecks here, I think; that's all I have.
This is like a madhouse."
"I don't want your money, I don't want it I'll be here directly, in one
instant. I can manage without the revolver...."
And he rushed straight to Kirillov's. This was probably two hours before
the visit of Pyotr Stepanovitch and Liputin to Kirillov. Though Shatov
and Kirillov lived in the same yard they hardly ever saw each other, and
when they met they did not nod or speak: they had been too long "lying
side by side" in America....
"Kirillov, you always have tea; have you got tea and a samovar?"
Kirillov, who was walking up and down the room, as he was in the habit
of doing all night, stopped and looked intently at his hurried visitor,
though without much surprise.