The Queen of Spades, and other stories
in vinegar, and sat down with her needlework by his bedside. In the
presence of the Postmaster the invalid groaned and scarcely said a word.
Nevertheless, he drank two cups of coffee and, still groaning, ordered
a good dinner. Dunia never left him. Every time he asked for a drink
Dunia handed him the jug of lemonade prepared by herself. After
moistening his lips, the patient each time he returned the jug gave her
hand a gentle pressure in token of gratitude.
Towards dinner time the doctor arrived. He felt the patient's pulse,
spoke to him in German and in Russian, declared that all he required
was rest, and said that in a couple of days he would be able to start
on his journey. The hussar handed him twenty-five rubles for his visit,
and gave him an invitation to dinner, which the doctor accepted. They
both ate with a good appetite, and drank a bottle of wine between them.
Then, very pleased with one another, they separated.
Another day passed, and the hussar had quite recovered. He became very
lively, incessantly joking, first with Dunia, then with the Postmaster,
whistling tunes, conversing with the passengers, copying their
travelling certificates into the station book, and so ingratiating
himself that on the third day the good Postmaster regretted parting
with his dear lodger.
It was Sunday, and Dunia was getting ready to attend mass. The hussar's
_kibitka_ was at the door. He took leave of the Postmaster, after
recompensing him handsomely for his board and lodging, wished Dunia
good-bye, and proposed to drop her at the church, which was situated at
the other end of the village. Dunia hesitated.
"What are you afraid of?" asked her father. "His nobility is not a
wolf. He won't eat you. Drive with him as far as the church."
Dunia got into the carriage by the side of the hussar. The servant
jumped on the coach box, the coachman gave a whistle, and the horses
went off at a gallop.
The poor Postmaster could not understand how he came to allow his Dunia
to drive off with the hussar; how he could have been so blind, and what
had become of his senses. Before half-an-hour had passed his heart
misgave him. It ached, and he became so uneasy that he could bear the
situation no longer, and started for the church himself. Approaching
the church, he saw that the people were already dispersing. But Dunia
was neither in the churchyard nor at the entrance. He hurried into
the church; the priest was just leaving the altar, the clerk was
extinguishing the tapers, two old women were still praying in a corner;
but Dunia was nowhere to be seen. The poor father could scarcely summon
courage to ask the clerk if she had been to mass. The clerk replied
that she had not. The Postmaster returned home neither dead nor alive.
He had only one hope left; that Dunia in the flightiness of her youth
had, perhaps, resolved to drive as far as the next station, where her
godmother lived. In patient agitation he awaited the return of the
_troika_ with which he had allowed her to drive off, but the driver did
not come back. At last, towards night, he arrived alone and tipsy, with
the fatal news that Dunia had gone on with the hussar.
The old man succumbed to his misfortune, and took to his bed, the same
bed where, the day before, the young impostor had lain. Recalling all
the circumstances, the Postmaster understood now that the hussar's
illness had been shammed. The poor fellow sickened with severe fever,
he was removed to C------, and in his place another man was temporarily
appointed. The same doctor who had visited the hussar attended him. He
assured the Postmaster that the young man had been perfectly well, that
he had from the first had suspicions of his evil intentions, but that
he had kept silent for fear of his whip.
Whether the German doctor spoke the truth, or was anxious only to prove
his great penetration, his assurance brought no consolation to the poor
patient. As soon as he was beginning to recover from his illness, the
old Postmaster asked his superior postmaster of the town of C------ for
two months' leave of absence, and without saying a word to anyone, he
started off on foot to look for his daughter.
From the station book he discovered that Captain Minsky had left
Smolensk for Petersburg. The coachman who drove him said that Dunia had
wept all the way, though she seemed to be going of her own free will.
"Perhaps," thought the station master, "I shall bring back my strayed
lamb." With this idea he reached St. Petersburg, and stopped with the
Ismailovsky regiment, in the quarters of a non-commissioned officer,
his old comrade in arms. Beginning his search he soon found out that
Captain Minsky was in Petersburg, living at Demuth's Hotel. The
Postmaster determined to see him.
Early in the morning he went to Minsky's antechamber, and asked to
have his nobility informed that an old soldier wished to see him. The
military attendant, in the act of cleaning a boot on a boot-tree,
informed him that his master was asleep, and never received anyone
before eleven o'clock. The Postmaster left to return at the appointed
time. Minsky came out to him in his dressing gown and red skull cap.
"Well, my friend, what do you want?" he inquired.
The old maids heart boiled, tears started to his eyes, and in a
trembling voice he could only say, "Your nobility; be divinely
merciful!"
Minsky glanced quickly at him, flushed, and seizing him by the hand,
led him into his study and locked the door.
"Your nobility!" continued the old man, "what has fallen from the cart
is lost; give me back, at any rate, my Dunia. Let her go. Do not ruin
her entirely."
"What is done cannot be undone," replied the young man, in extreme
confusion. "I am guilty before you, and ready to ask your pardon. But
do not imagine that I could neglect Dunia. She shall be happy, I give
you my word of honour. Why do you want her? She loves me; she has
forsaken her former existence. Neither you nor she can forget what has
happened." Then, pushing something up his sleeve, he opened the door,
and the Postmaster found himself, he knew not how, in the street.
He stood long motionless, at last catching sight of a roll of papers
inside his cuff, he pulled them out and unrolled several crumpled-up
fifty ruble notes. His eyes again filled with tears, tears of
indignation! He crushed the notes into a ball, threw them on the
ground, and, stamping on them with his heel, walked away. After a few
steps he stopped, reflected a moment, and turned back.
But the notes were gone. A well-dressed young man, who had observed
him, ran towards an _isvoshtchick_, got in hurriedly, and called to the
driver to be "off."
The Postmaster did not pursue him. He had resolved to return home to
his post-house; but before doing so he wished to see his poor Dunia
once more. With this view, a couple of days afterwards he returned to
Minsky's lodgings. But the military servant told him roughly that his
master received nobody, pushed him out of the antechamber, and slammed
the door in his face. The Postmaster stood and stood, and at last went
away.
That same day, in the evening, he was walking along the Leteinaia,
having been to service at the Church of the All Saints, when a smart
_drojki_ flew past him, and in it the Postmaster recognised Minsky.
The _drojki_ stopped in front of a three-storeyed house at the very
entrance, and the hussar ran up the steps. A happy thought occurred to
the Postmaster. He retraced his steps.
"Whose horses are these?" he inquired of the coachman. "Don't they
belong to Minsky?"
"Exactly so," replied the coachman. "Why do you ask?"
"Why! your master told me to deliver a note for him to his Dunia, and I
have forgotten where his Dunia lives."
"She lives here on the second floor; but you are too late, my friend,
with your note; he is there himself now."
"No matter," answered the Postmaster, who had an undefinable sensation
at his heart. "Thanks for your information; I shall be able to manage
my business." With these words he ascended the steps.
The door was locked; he rang. There were several seconds of painful
delay. Then the key jingled, and the door opened.
"Does Avdotia Simeonovna live here?" he inquired.
"She does," replied the young maid-servant, "What do you want with her?"
The Postmaster did not reply, but walked on.
"You must not, must not," she called after him; "Avdotia Simeonovna has
visitors." But the Postmaster, without listening, went on. The first
two rooms were dark. In the third there was a light. He approached the
open door and stopped. In the room, which was beautifully furnished,
sat Minsky in deep thought. Dunia, dressed in all the splendour of
the latest fashion, sat on the arm of his easy chair, like a rider
on an English side saddle. She was looking tenderly at Minsky, while
twisting his black locks round her glittering fingers. Poor Postmaster!
His daughter had never before seemed so beautiful to him. In spite of
himself, he stood admiring her.
"Who is there?" she asked, without raising her head.
He was silent.
Receiving no reply Dunia looked up, and with a cry she fell on the
carpet.
Minsky, in alarm, rushed to pick her up, when suddenly seeing the old
Postmaster in the doorway, he left Dunia and approached him, trembling
with rage.
"What do you want?" he inquired, clenching his teeth. "Why do you steal
after me everywhere, like a burglar? Or do you want to murder me?
Begone!" and with a strong hand he seized the old man by the scruff of
the neck and pushed him down the stairs.
The old man went back to his rooms. His friend advised him to take
proceedings, but the Postmaster reflected, waved his hand, and decided
to give the matter up. Two days afterwards he left Petersburg for his
station and resumed his duties.
"This is the third year," he concluded, "that I am living without my
Dunia; and I have had no tidings whatever of her. Whether she is alive
or not God knows. Many tilings happen. She is not the first, nor the
last, whom a wandering blackguard has _enticed_ away, kept for a time,
and then dropped. There are many such young fools in Petersburg to-day,
in satins and velvets, and to-morrow you see them sweeping the streets
in the company of drunkards in rags. When I think sometimes that Dunia,
too, may end in the same way, then, in spite of myself, I sin, and wish
her in her grave."
Such was the story of my friend, the old Postmaster, the story more
than once interrupted by tears, which he wiped away picturesquely
with the flap of his coat like the faithful Terentieff in Dmitrieff's
beautiful ballad. The tears were partly caused by punch, of which he
had consumed five tumblers in the course of his narrative. But whatever
their origin, I was deeply affected by them. After parting with him, it
was long before I could forget the old Postmaster, and I thought long
of poor Dunia.
Lately, again passing through the small place of ------, I remembered
my friend. I heard that the station over which he ruled had been done
away with. To my inquiry, "Is the Postmaster alive?" no one could give
a satisfactory answer. Having resolved to pay a visit to the familiar
place, I hired horses of my own, and started for the village of N----.
It was autumn. Grey clouds covered the sky; a cold wind blew from the
close reaped fields, carrying with it the brown and yellow leaves
of the trees which it met. I arrived in the village at sunset, and
stopped at the station house. In the passage (where once Dunia had
kissed me) a stout woman met me; and to my inquiries, replied that the
old Postmaster had died about a year before; that a brewer occupied
his house; and that she was the wife of that brewer. I regretted my
fruitless journey, and my seven roubles of useless expense.