White nights, and other stories
neighbour's son watched for her on the way, declaring that he would love
her as long as he lived, that he would devote his life to her, and when
they vowed to love one another for ever and be married as soon as they
were grown up! No, Liza, it would be happy for you if you were to die
soon of consumption in some corner, in some cellar like that woman just
now. In the hospital, do you say? You will be lucky if they take you,
but what if you are still of use to the madam here? Consumption is a
queer disease, it is not like fever. The patient goes on hoping till the
last minute and says he is all right. He deludes himself. And that just
suits your madam. Don't doubt it, that's how it is; you have sold your
soul, and what is more you owe money, so you daren't say a word. But
when you are dying, all will abandon you, all will turn away from you,
for then there will be nothing to get from you. What's more, they will
reproach you for cumbering the place, for being so long over dying.
However you beg you won't get a drink of water without abuse: 'Whenever
are you going off, you nasty hussy, you won't let us sleep with your
moaning, you make the gentlemen sick.' That's true, I have heard such
things said myself. They will thrust you dying into the filthiest corner
in the cellar--in the damp and darkness; what will your thoughts be,
lying there alone? When you die, strange hands will lay you out, with
grumbling and impatience; no one will bless you, no one will sigh for
you, they only want to get rid of you as soon as may be; they will buy a
coffin, take you to the grave as they did that poor woman to-day, and
celebrate your memory at the tavern. In the grave sleet, filth, wet
snow--no need to put themselves out for you--'Let her down, Vanuha; it's
just like her luck--even here, she is head-foremost, the hussy. Shorten
the cord, you rascal.' 'It's all right as it is.' 'All right, is it?
Why, she's on her side! She was a fellow-creature, after all! But, never
mind, throw the earth on her.' And they won't care to waste much time
quarrelling over you. They will scatter the wet blue clay as quick as
they can and go off to the tavern ... and there your memory on earth
will end; other women have children to go to their graves, fathers,
husbands. While for you neither tear, nor sigh, nor remembrance; no one
in the whole world will ever come to you, your name will vanish from the
face of the earth--as though you had never existed, never been born at
all! Nothing but filth and mud, however you knock at your coffin lid at
night, when the dead arise, however you cry: 'Let me out, kind people,
to live in the light of day! My life was no life at all; my life has
been thrown away like a dish-clout; it was drunk away in the tavern at
the Haymarket; let me out, kind people, to live in the world again.'"
And I worked myself up to such a pitch that I began to have a lump in my
throat myself, and ... and all at once I stopped, sat up in dismay, and
bending over apprehensively, began to listen with a beating heart. I had
reason to be troubled.
I had felt for some time that I was turning her soul upside down and
rending her heart, and--and the more I was convinced of it, the more
eagerly I desired to gain my object as quickly and as effectually as
possible. It was the exercise of my skill that carried me away; yet it
was not merely sport....
I knew I was speaking stiffly, artificially, even bookishly, in fact, I
could not speak except "like a book." But that did not trouble me: I
knew, I felt that I should be understood and that this very bookishness
might be an assistance. But now, having attained my effect, I was
suddenly panic-stricken. Never before had I witnessed such despair! She
was lying on her face, thrusting her face into the pillow and clutching
it in both hands. Her heart was being torn. Her youthful body was
shuddering all over as though in convulsions. Suppressed sobs rent her
bosom and suddenly burst out in weeping and wailing, then she pressed
closer into the pillow: she did not want any one here, not a living
soul, to know of her anguish and her tears. She bit the pillow, bit her
hand till it bled (I saw that afterwards), or, thrusting her fingers
into her dishevelled hair seemed rigid with the effort of restraint,
holding her breath and clenching her teeth. I began saying something,
begging her to calm herself, but felt that I did not dare; and all at
once, in a sort of cold shiver, almost in terror, began fumbling in the
dark, trying hurriedly to get dressed to go. It was dark: though I tried
my best I could not finish dressing quickly. Suddenly I felt a box of
matches and a candlestick with a whole candle in it. As soon as the room
was lighted up, Liza sprang up, sat up in bed, and with a contorted
face, with a half insane smile, looked at me almost senselessly. I sat
down beside her and took her hands; she came to herself, made an
impulsive movement towards me, would have caught hold of me, but did not
dare, and slowly bowed her head before me.
"Liza, my dear, I was wrong ... forgive me, my dear," I began, but she
squeezed my hand in her fingers so tightly that I felt I was saying the
wrong thing and stopped.
"This is my address, Liza, come to me."
"I will come," she answered resolutely, her head still bowed.
"But now I am going, good-bye ... till we meet again."
I got up; she, too, stood up and suddenly flushed all over, gave a
shudder, snatched up a shawl that was lying on a chair and muffled
herself in it to her chin. As she did this she gave another sickly
smile, blushed and looked at me strangely. I felt wretched; I was in
haste to get away--to disappear.
"Wait a minute," she said suddenly, in the passage just at the doorway,
stopping me with her hand on my overcoat. She put down the candle in hot
haste and ran off; evidently she had thought of something or wanted to
show me something. As she ran away she flushed, her eyes shone, and
there was a smile on her lips--what was the meaning of it? Against my
will I waited: she came back a minute later with an expression that
seemed to ask forgiveness for something. In fact, it was not the same
face, not the same look as the evening before: sullen, mistrustful and
obstinate. Her eyes now were imploring, soft, and at the same time
trustful, caressing, timid. The expression with which children look at
people they are very fond of, of whom they are asking a favour. Her eyes
were a light hazel, they were lovely eyes, full of life, and capable of
expressing love as well as sullen hatred.
Making no explanation, as though I, as a sort of higher being, must
understand everything without explanations, she held out a piece of
paper to me. Her whole face was positively beaming at that instant with
naïve, almost childish, triumph. I unfolded it. It was a letter to her
from a medical student or some one of that sort--a very high-flown and
flowery, but extremely respectful, love-letter. I don't recall the words
now, but I remember well that through the high-flown phrases there was
apparent a genuine feeling, which cannot be feigned. When I had finished
reading it I met her glowing, questioning, and childishly impatient eyes
fixed upon me. She fastened her eyes upon my face and waited impatiently
for what I should say. In a few words, hurriedly, but with a sort of joy
and pride, she explained to me that she had been to a dance somewhere in
a private house, a family of "very nice people, _who knew nothing_,
absolutely nothing, for she had only come here so lately and it had all
happened ... and she hadn't made up her mind to stay and was certainly
going away as soon as she had paid her debt ... and at that party there
had been the student who had danced with her all the evening. He had
talked to her, and it turned out that he had known her in old days at
Riga when he was a child, they had played together, but a very long time
ago--and he knew her parents, but _about this_ he knew nothing, nothing
whatever, and had no suspicion! And the day after the dance (three days
ago) he had sent her that letter through the friend with whom she had
gone to the party ... and ... well, that was all."
She dropped her shining eyes with a sort of bashfulness as she finished.
The poor girl was keeping that student's letter as a precious treasure,
and had run to fetch it, her only treasure, because she did not want me
to go away without knowing that she, too, was honestly and genuinely
loved; that she, too, was addressed respectfully. No doubt that letter
was destined to lie in her box and lead to nothing. But none the less, I
am certain that she would keep it all her life as a precious treasure,
as her pride and justification, and now at such a minute she had thought
of that letter and brought it with naïve pride to raise herself in my
eyes that I might see, that I, too, might think well of her. I said
nothing, pressed her hand and went out. I so longed to get away.... I
walked all the way home, in spite of the fact that the melting snow was
still falling in heavy flakes. I was exhausted, shattered, in
bewilderment. But behind the bewilderment the truth was already
gleaming. The loathsome truth.
VIII
It was some time, however, before I consented to recognize that truth.
Waking up in the morning after some hours of heavy, leaden sleep, and
immediately realizing all that had happened on the previous day, I was
positively amazed at my last night's _sentimentality_ with Liza, at all
those "outcries of horror and pity." "To think of having such an attack
of womanish hysteria, pah!" I concluded. And what did I thrust my
address upon her for? What if she comes? Let her come, though; it
doesn't matter.... But _obviously_, that was not now the chief and the
most important matter: I had to make haste and at all costs save my
reputation in the eyes of Zverkov and Simonov as quickly as possible;
that was the chief business. And I was so taken up that morning that I
actually forgot all about Liza.
First of all I had at once to repay what I had borrowed the day before
from Simonov. I resolved on a desperate measure: to borrow fifteen
roubles straight off from Anton Antonitch. As luck would have it he was
in the best of humours that morning, and gave it to me at once, on the
first asking. I was so delighted at this that, as I signed the I O U
with a swaggering air, I told him casually that the night before "I had
been keeping it up with some friends at the Hôtel de Paris; we were
giving a farewell party to a comrade, in fact, I might say a friend of
my childhood, and you know--a desperate rake, fearfully spoilt--of
course, he belongs to a good family, and has considerable means, a
brilliant career; he is witty, charming, a regular Lovelace, you
understand; we drank an extra 'half-dozen' and...."
And it went off all right; all this was uttered very easily,
unconstrainedly and complacently.
On reaching home I promptly wrote to Simonov.
To this hour I am lost in admiration when I recall the truly
gentlemanly, good-humoured, candid tone of my letter. With tact and
good-breeding, and, above all, entirely without superfluous words, I
blamed myself for all that had happened. I defended myself, "if I really
may be allowed to defend myself," by alleging that being utterly
unaccustomed to wine, I had been intoxicated with the first glass, which
I said, I had drunk before they arrived, while I was waiting for them at
the Hôtel de Paris between five and six o'clock. I begged Simonov's
pardon especially; I asked him to convey my explanations to all the
others, especially to Zverkov, whom "I seemed to remember as though in a
dream" I had insulted. I added that I would have called upon all of them
myself, but my head ached, and besides I had not the face to. I was