Fifty-Two Stories

“Well, thank God. That’s excellent! I’m glad for you. Very, very glad, Lushkov! You’re my godson in a certain sense. It was I who pushed you onto the proper path. Remember how I reprimanded you, eh? You almost fell through the floor then. Well, thank you, my dear fellow, for not forgetting my words.”

“And thank you,” said Lushkov. “If I hadn’t come to you then, I’d probably still call myself a teacher or a student. Yes, I was saved through you, I jumped out of the pit.”

“I’m very, very glad.”

“Thank you for your kind words and deeds. You spoke very well then. I’m grateful to you and to your cook—God grant good health to that kind, generous woman. You spoke very well then, I’m obliged to you till my dying day, but in fact it was your cook Olga who saved me.”

“How so?”

“Here’s how. I’d come to you to chop wood, and she’d start on me: ‘Ah, you drunkard! Cursed as you are! There’s no punishment good enough for you!’ And then she’d sit down, turn sad, look me in the face and lament: ‘Miserable man that you are! There’s no joy for you in this world, and in the next, you drunkard, you’ll burn in hell! Poor wretch!’ And all in the same vein, you know. How much she grieved over me and how many tears she shed, I can’t even tell you. But the main thing was—she chopped the wood for me! I didn’t split a single piece of your wood, sir, she did it all! Why she saved me, why I changed, looking at her, and stopped drinking, I can’t tell you. I only know that from her words and generous acts, a change took place in my soul, she set me right, and I’ll never forget it. But it’s time, the curtain bell’s already ringing.”

Lushkov bowed and went to the gallery.

1887

ENEMIES

TOWARDS TEN O’CLOCK on a dark September evening, the only son of the district doctor Kirilov, six-year-old Andrei, died of diphtheria. Just as the doctor’s wife sank to her knees before the dead child’s little bed and was overcome by the first onslaught of despair, the doorbell in the front hall rang out sharply.

On account of the diphtheria, all the servants had been sent away in the morning. Kirilov, just as he was, without his frock coat and with an unbuttoned waistcoat, not wiping his wet face and his hands scalded with carbolic acid, went to open the door himself. It was dark in the front hall, and all that could be seen of the man coming in was his medium height, his white scarf, and his large, extremely pale face, so pale that its appearance seemed to make the front hall lighter…

“Is the doctor at home?” the man asked quickly.

“Yes, I am,” Kirilov replied. “What can I do for you?”

“Ah, it’s you? I’m very glad!” the man said happily and began feeling in the dark for the doctor’s hand, found it, and pressed it firmly in his own. “Very…very glad! We know each other!…I’m Abogin…had the pleasure of meeting you last summer at the Gnuchevs’. I’m very glad to find you at home…For God’s sake, don’t refuse to come with me now…My wife is dangerously ill…I have a carriage with me…”

From the man’s voice and movements it was evident that he was in an extremely agitated state. As if frightened by a fire or a rabid dog, he could barely control his rapid breathing and spoke quickly, in a trembling voice, and something unfeignedly candid, something childishly fearful sounded in his speech. Like all frightened and stunned people, he spoke in short, abrupt sentences and used many unnecessary, totally irrelevant words.

“I was afraid I wouldn’t find you at home,” he went on. “My soul suffered so much on the way here…Get dressed and let’s go, for God’s sake…It happened like this. Papchinsky, Alexander Semyonovich, whom you know, comes to see me…We talked…then sat down to tea; suddenly my wife cries out, puts her hand to her heart, and falls back in her chair. We carried her to her bed and…I rubbed her temples with sal-ammoniac, sprinkled her with water…she lay as if dead…I’m afraid it’s an aneurysm…Let’s go…Her father also died of an aneurysm…”

Kirilov listened and said nothing, as if he did not understand Russian.

When Abogin again referred to Papchinsky and to his wife’s father and again began searching for his hand in the darkness, the doctor shook his head and said, apathetically drawing out each word:

“Forgive me, I can’t go…Five minutes ago…my son died…”

“Can it be?” Abogin whispered, taking a step back. “My God, what an evil hour I’ve hit on! An amazingly unfortunate day…amazingly! What a coincidence…as if on purpose!”

Abogin took hold of the door handle and hung his head, pondering. He evidently hesitated, not knowing what to do: to leave or to go on entreating the doctor.

“Listen,” he said heatedly, catching Kirilov by the sleeve, “I understand your position perfectly! God knows, I’m ashamed to be trying to hold your attention at such a moment, but what can I do? Judge for yourself, who can I go to? Besides you, there’s no other doctor here. Come, for God’s sake! I’m not asking for myself…It’s not me who’s sick!”