The Adolescent (18 page)

“How should I know? Excuse me, but I find it very hard to follow you.”

“Hard?”

“Yes, you tire me.”

“Hm.” He winked and made some sort of gesture with his hand, probably meant to signify something very triumphant and victorious; then, quite solidly and calmly, he drew from his pocket a newspaper, obviously just bought, opened it, and began reading the last page, apparently leaving me completely alone. For some five minutes he didn’t look at me.

“The Brest-Graevs
⁴⁹
didn’t go bust, eh? They took off, they keep going! I know many that went bust straightaway.”

He looked at me from the bottom of his heart.

“I understand little about the stock exchange as yet,” I replied.

“Denial?”

“Of what?”

“Money, sir.”

“I don’t deny money, but . . . but, it seems to me, first comes the idea, and then money.”

“That is, pardon me, sir . . . here stands a man, so to speak, before his own capital . . .”

“First a lofty idea, and then money, but without a lofty idea along with money, society will collapse.”

I don’t know why I began to get heated. He looked at me somewhat dully, as if confused, but suddenly his whole face extended into the merriest and slyest smile:

“That Versilov, eh? He snapped it up, snapped it right up! It was decided yesterday, eh?”

I suddenly and unexpectedly perceived that he had long known who I was, and maybe knew much more as well. Only I don’t understand why I suddenly blushed and stared most stupidly, without taking my eyes off him. He was visibly triumphant, he looked at me merrily, as if he had found me out and caught me at something in the slyest manner.

“No, sir,” he raised both eyebrows, “you’re now going to ask me about Mr. Versilov! What did I just tell you about substantiality? A year and a half ago, on account of that baby, he could have brought off a perfect little deal—yes, sir, but he went bust, yes, sir.”

“On account of what baby?”

“On account of a nursing baby that he’s now nurturing on the side, only he won’t get anything through that . . . because . . .”

“What nursing baby? What is this?”

“His baby, of course, his very own, sir, by Mademoiselle Lydia Akhmakov . . . ‘A lovely maiden did caress me . . .’
⁵⁰
Those phosphorus matches—eh?”

“What nonsense, what wildness! He never had a baby by Miss Akhmakov!”

“Go on! And where have I been then? I’m both a doctor and a male midwife. Name’s Stebelkov, haven’t you heard? True, I had long ceased to practice by then, but I could give practical advice in a practical matter.”

“You’re a male midwife . . . you delivered Miss Akhmakov’s baby?”

“No, sir, I didn’t deliver Miss Akhmakov’s anything. In that suburb there was a Doctor Granz, burdened with a family, they paid him half a thaler, that’s the situation there with doctors, and on top of that nobody knew him, so he was there in my place . . . It was I who recommended him, for the darkness of the unknown. Do you follow? And I only gave one piece of practical advice, to a question from Versilov, sir, Andrei Petrovich, to a most highly secret question, sir, eye to eye. But Andrei Petrovich preferred two birds.”

I was listening in profound amazement.

“You can’t kill two birds with one stone, says a folk, or, more correctly, a simple-folk’s proverb. But I say exceptions that constantly repeat themselves turn into a general rule. He tried to hit a second bird, that is, translating it into Russian, to chase after another lady—and got no results. Once you grab something, hold on to it. Where things need speeding up, he hems and haws. Versilov is a ‘women’s prophet,’ sir—that’s how young Prince Sokolsky beautifully designated him to me then. No, you should come to me! If you want to learn a lot about Versilov, come to me.”

He obviously admired my mouth gaping in astonishment. Never had I heard a thing up till then about a nursing baby. And it was at that moment that the neighbors’ door suddenly banged and somebody quickly went into their room.

“Versilov lives in the Semyonovsky quarter, on Mozhaiskaya Street, at Mrs. Litvinov’s house, number seventeen, I went to the address bureau myself !” an irritated female voice cried loudly. We could hear every word. Stebelkov shot up his eyebrows and raised a finger over his head.

“We talk about him here, and there he’s already . . . There’s those exceptions that constantly repeat themselves!
Quand on parle d’une corde
²⁶
. . .”

With a quick jump, he sat up on the sofa and began listening at the door where the sofa stood.

I was also terribly struck. I realized that this woman shouting was probably the same one who had run out earlier in such agitation. But how did Versilov figure in it? Suddenly someone shrieked again as earlier, the furious shriek of a person turned savage with wrath, who is not being given something or is being held back from something. The only difference from the previous time was that the cries and shrieks went on longer. A struggle could be heard, some words, rapid, quick: “I don’t want to, I don’t want to, give it back to me, give it back to me right now!” or something like that—I can’t quite remember. Then, as the other time, someone rushed swiftly to the door and opened it. Both women ran out to the corridor, one of them, as earlier, obviously holding the other back. Stebelkov, who had long ago jumped up from the sofa and was listening delightedly, now darted to the door and quite frankly jumped out to the corridor, right onto the neighbors. Naturally, I also ran to the door. But his appearance in the corridor was like a bucket of cold water: the women quickly disappeared and noisily slammed the door behind them. Stebelkov was about to leap after them, but paused, raising his finger, smiling, and thinking; this time I discerned something extremely bad, dark, and sinister in his smile. Having spotted the landlady, who was again standing by her door, he quickly ran to her on tiptoe down the corridor; after exchanging whispers with her for about two minutes and certainly receiving information, he came back to the room, imposingly and resolutely now, took his top hat from the table, looked fleetingly in the mirror, ruffled up his hair, and, with self-confident dignity, not even glancing at me, went to the neighbors. He listened at the door for a moment, putting his ear to it and winking victoriously to the landlady, who shook her finger at him and wagged her head as if to say, “Ah, naughty boy, naughty boy!” Finally, with a resolute but most delicate look, even as if hunched over with delicacy, he rapped with his knuckles on the neighbors’ door. A voice was heard:

“Who’s there?”

“Will you allow me to come in on most important business?” Stebelkov pronounced loudly and imposingly.

They did open, albeit slowly, just a little at first, a quarter; but Stebelkov firmly seized the handle at once and would not have let the door close again. A conversation began. Stebelkov spoke loudly, trying all the while to push his way into the room; I don’t remember his words, but he spoke about Versilov, saying that he could inform them, could explain everything—“no, ma’am, just ask me,” “no, ma’am, just come to me”—along that line. They very soon let him in. I went back to the sofa and tried to eavesdrop, but I couldn’t make out everything, I only heard that Versilov was mentioned frequently. By the tone of his voice, I guessed that Stebelkov was already in control of the conversation, was already speaking not insinuatingly but peremptorily, and sprawling as earlier with me: “do you follow,” “now kindly get this,” and so on. However, he must have been extraordinarily affable with the women. Twice already I had heard him guffaw loudly and, probably, quite inappropriately, because along with his voice, and sometimes overpowering his voice, I heard the voices of the two women, which expressed no gaiety at all, mainly the young woman’s, the one who had shrieked earlier; she spoke a lot, nervously, quickly, apparently denouncing something and complaining, seeking justice and a judge. But Stebelkov would not leave off, raised his voice more and more, and guffawed more and more often; such people cannot listen to others. I soon left the sofa, because it seemed shameful to me to eavesdrop, and moved to my old place on the wicker chair by the window. I was convinced that Vasin considered this man as nothing, but that if I were to declare the same opinion, he would at once defend him with serious dignity and observe didactically that he was “a practical man, one of those present-day businesslike people, who cannot be judged from our general and abstract points of view.” At that moment, however, I remember that I was all somehow morally shattered, my heart was pounding, and I was undoubtedly expecting something. Some ten minutes went by, and suddenly, right in the middle of a rolling burst of laughter, someone shot up from the chair, exactly as earlier, then I heard the cries of the two women, I heard Stebelkov jump up as well and start saying something in a completely different voice, as if vindicating himself, as if persuading them to listen to him . . . But they didn’t listen; wrathful shouts came: “Out! you blackguard, you shameless man!” In short, it was clear that he was being driven out. I opened the door just at the moment when he leaped into the corridor from the neighbors’ room, literally pushed, it seemed, by their hands. Seeing me, he suddenly shouted, pointing at me:

“Here’s Versilov’s son! If you don’t believe me, then here’s his son, his own son! If you please!” And he seized me peremptorily by the arm.

“This is his son, his own son!” he repeated, bringing me to the ladies, adding nothing more, however, by way of explanation.

The young woman was standing in the corridor, the elderly one a step behind her, in the doorway. I only remember that this poor girl was not bad-looking, about twenty years old, but thin and sickly, with reddish hair and a face that somewhat resembled my sister’s; this feature flashed and remained in my memory; only Liza had never been and certainly never could be in such a wrathful frenzy as this person who now stood before me: her lips were white, her pale gray eyes flashed, she was trembling all over with indignation. I also remember that I myself was in an extremely stupid and undignified position, because I was decidedly unable to find anything to say, thanks to this insolent fellow.

“So what if he’s his son! If he’s with you, he’s a blackguard. If you are Versilov’s son,” she suddenly turned to me, “tell your father from me that he’s a blackguard, that he’s an unworthy, shameless man, that I don’t need his money . . . Take it, take it, take it, give him this money at once!”

She quickly pulled several banknotes out of her pocket, but the elderly woman (that is, her mother, as it turned out later) seized her by the hand:

“Olya, maybe it’s not true, maybe he’s not his son!”

Olya quickly looked at her, understood, looked at me scornfully, and went back into the room, but before slamming the door, standing on the threshold, she once again shouted in frenzy at Stebelkov:

“Out!”

And she even stamped her foot at him. Then the door slammed and this time was locked. Stebelkov, still holding me by the shoulder, raised his finger and, extending his mouth into a long and pensive smile, rested his questioning gaze on me.

“I find your action with me ridiculous and unworthy,” I muttered in indignation.

But he wasn’t listening to me, though he didn’t take his eyes off me.

“This ought to be in-ves-tigated!” he said pensively.

“But, anyhow, how dared you drag me out? What is this? Who is that woman? You seized me by the shoulder and led me—what’s going on here?”

“Eh, the devil! Some sort of lost innocence . . . ‘the oft-repeated exception’—do you follow?”

And he rested his finger on my chest.

“Eh, the devil!” I pushed his finger away.

But he suddenly and quite unexpectedly laughed softly, inaudibly, lengthily, merrily. In the end he put on his hat and, his face changed and now glum, observed, furrowing his brows:

“And the landlady ought to be instructed . . . they ought to be driven out of the apartment—that’s what, and as soon as possible, otherwise they’ll . . . You’ll see! Remember my words, you’ll see! Eh, the devil!” he suddenly cheered up again, “so you’re waiting for Grisha?”

“No, I won’t wait any longer,” I answered resolutely.

“Well, it’s all one . . .”

And without adding another sound, he turned, walked out, and went down the stairs without even deigning to look at the landlady, who was obviously waiting for explanations and news. I also took my hat and, after asking the landlady to report that I, Dolgoruky, had been there, ran down the stairs.

III

I HAD MERELY wasted time. On coming out, I set off at once to look for an apartment; but I was distracted, I wandered the streets for several hours and, though I stopped at five or six places with rooms to let, I’m sure I went past twenty without noticing them. To my still greater vexation, I had never imagined that renting lodgings was so difficult. The rooms everywhere were like Vasin’s, and even much worse, and the prices were enormous, that is, not what I had reckoned on. I directly requested a corner,
⁵¹
merely to be able to turn around, and was given to know that in that case I should go “to the corners.” Besides, there was a multitude of strange tenants everywhere, whom by their looks alone I would have been unable to live next to; I would even have paid not to live next to them. Some gentlemen without frock coats, in waist-coats only, with disheveled beards, casual and curious. There were about ten of them sitting in one tiny room over cards and beer, and I was offered the room next door. In other places, I myself gave such absurd answers to the landlords’ questions that they looked at me in astonishment, and in one apartment I even had a quarrel. However, I can’t really describe all these worthless things; I only want to say that, having gotten very tired, I ate something in some cookshop when it was already almost dark. I made a final resolve that I would go right now, by myself and alone, give Versilov the letter about the inheritance (without any explanations), pack my things upstairs into a suitcase and a bundle, and move at least for that night to a hotel. I knew that at the end of Obukhovsky Prospect, by the Triumphal Arch, there were inns where I could even get a separate little room for thirty kopecks; I decided to sacrifice for one night, only so as not to spend it at Versilov’s. And then, going past the Technological Institute, it suddenly occurred to me for some reason to call on Tatyana Pavlovna, who lived just there, across from the Institute. In fact, the pretext for calling was the same letter of inheritance, but the insuperable impulse to call on her had, of course, other reasons, which, however, I’m unable to explain even now: there was some confusion of mind here about a “nursing baby,” about “exceptions that make up the general rule.” Whether I wanted to tell, or to show off, or to fight, or even to weep—I don’t know, only I did go up to Tatyana Pavlovna’s. Till then I had only visited her once, when I had just come from Moscow, on some errand from my mother, and I remember that, having come and given what I was charged with, I left after a minute, without even sitting down, and without her inviting me to.

I rang the bell, and the cook opened for me at once and silently let me in. All these details are precisely needed, to make it possible to understand how the crazy adventure could take place, which had such enormous influence on all that came afterwards. And, first, about the cook. She was a spiteful, snub-nosed Finn, who seemed to hate her mistress, Tatyana Pavlovna, who, on the contrary, could not part with her, owing to some sort of partiality, something like what old maids feel for wet-nosed pugs or eternally sleeping cats. The Finn was either angry and rude, or, having quarreled, would be silent for weeks on end in order to punish her lady. I must have hit on one of those silent days, because even to my question, “Is the lady at home?”—which I positively remember having asked her—she gave no reply and silently went to her kitchen. After which, naturally convinced that the lady was at home, I went in and, finding no one, began to wait, supposing that Tatyana Pavlovna would presently come out of the bedroom; otherwise why would the cook have let me in? I did not sit down and waited for two or three minutes; it was almost evening, and Tatyana Pavlovna’s dark little apartment looked still more cheerless because of the endless chintz that hung everywhere. Two words about this vile little apartment, in order to understand the terrain where the thing happened. Tatyana Pavlovna, with her stubborn and imperious character, and as a result of her old landowning preferences, could not have lived in furnished rooms along with other tenants, and rented this parody of an apartment only so as to live separately and be her own mistress. These two rooms were exactly like two canary cages placed side by side, one smaller than the other, on the third floor, with windows facing the courtyard. Entering the apartment, you stepped directly into a narrow little corridor less than four feet wide, to the left were the above-mentioned canary cages, and straight down the corridor, at the bottom of it, was the door to the tiny kitchen. There might have been in these little rooms the ten cubic feet of air a man needs for twelve hours, but hardly more. They were grotesquely low, but the stupidest thing was that the windows, the doors, the furniture—all, all of it was hung or upholstered with chintz, fine French chintz, and adorned with little festoons; but this made the room seem twice as dark and like the interior of a traveling coach. In the room where I was waiting, you could still turn around, though it was all cluttered with furniture, and, by the way, not bad furniture: there were various little inlaid tables with bronze fittings, chests, an elegant and even costly toilet table. But the next room, from which I expected her to come, the bedroom, separated from this room by a heavy curtain, consisted, as it turned out later, literally of nothing but a bed. All these details are necessary in order to understand the stupid thing I did.

And so I was waiting and suspecting nothing, when the bell rang. I heard the cook pass through the corridor with unhurried steps and silently, exactly as with me earlier, let the people in. They were two ladies, and both were talking loudly, but what was my amazement when I recognized by their voices that one of them was Tatyana Pavlovna and the other precisely the woman whom I was least of all prepared to meet now, and in such circumstances at that! I couldn’t be mistaken: I had heard that sonorous, strong, metallic voice yesterday, for only three minutes, true, but it had remained in my soul. Yes, it was “yesterday’s woman.” What was I to do? I’m not asking the reader this question, I’m only imagining that moment to myself, and I’m utterly unable to explain even now how it happened that I suddenly rushed behind the curtain and found myself in Tatyana Pavlovna’s bedroom. In short, I hid, and barely had time to jump there as they came in. Why I didn’t go to meet them, but hid myself—I don’t know. It all happened accidentally, in the highest degree unaccountably.

Having jumped into the bedroom and stumbled over the bed, I noticed at once that there was a door from the bedroom to the kitchen, which meant a way out of my trouble and a possibility of escape, but—oh, horror!—the door was locked and the key was not in the lock. I lowered myself onto the bed in despair; I saw clearly that it meant I would now be eavesdropping, and from the first phrases, from the first sounds of the conversation, I realized that it was a secret and ticklish one. Oh, of course, an honest and noble person ought to have gotten up, even now, come out and said loudly, “I’m here, wait!”—and, despite his ridiculous position, walked past; but I did not get up and come out; I didn’t dare, I turned coward in the meanest way.

“My dear Katerina Nikolaevna, you upset me deeply,” Tatyana Pavlovna implored. “Calm yourself once and for all, it doesn’t even suit your character. Wherever you are, there is joy, and now suddenly . . . At least me, I think, you continue to trust, knowing how devoted I am to you. Surely no less than to Andrei Petrovich, to whom, once again, I do not conceal my eternal devotion . . . Well, believe me, then, I swear to you on my honor, he doesn’t have this document in his hands, and maybe no one does; and he’s incapable of such skulduggery, it’s sinful of you even to suspect it. The two of you have simply invented this hostility . . .”

“The document exists, and he is capable of anything. Why, I came in yesterday and the first thing I met was
ce petit espion
²⁷
that he foisted on the prince.”

“Eh,
ce petit espion
. First of all, he’s not an
espion
at all, because it was I, I who insisted on placing him with the prince, otherwise he’d go crazy in Moscow, or starve to death—that was how they attested him from there; and above all, the crude brat is even a perfect little fool, how could he be a spy?”

“Yes, some little fool, which, however, doesn’t prevent him from becoming a scoundrel. I was vexed yesterday, otherwise I’d have died of laughter: he turned pale, rushed to me, bowed and scraped, spoke French. And in Moscow, Marya Ivanovna assured me he was a genius. That this unfortunate letter has survived and exists somewhere in a most dangerous place—that I concluded mainly from Marya Ivanovna’s face.”

“My beauty! But you yourself said she had nothing!”

“The thing is that she has, she’s merely lying, and what a crafty one she is, let me tell you! Back before Moscow I still had hopes that no papers had been left, but here, here . . .”

“Ah, my dear, on the contrary, they say she’s a kind and sensible being, Andronikov valued her above any of his nieces. True, I don’t know her that well, but—you could seduce her, my beauty! It’s nothing for you to win people over, I’m an old woman and here I am in love with you, and in a minute I’ll start kissing you . . . Well, what would it cost you to seduce her!”

“I tried to seduce her, Tatyana Pavlovna, I did, I even sent her into raptures, but she’s also very clever . . . No, there’s a whole character here, and a special one, a Moscow one . . . And imagine, she advised me to address a certain man here, Kraft, Andronikov’s former assistant, she said he might know something. I already have an idea of this Kraft, and I even remember him fleetingly; but when she told me about this Kraft, I became convinced at once that it wasn’t simply that she didn’t know, but that she was lying and knew everything.”

“But why, why? Anyway, perhaps it might be possible to consult him! He’s German, this Kraft, not a babbler, and, as I recall, a most honest man—really, why not question him! Only it seems he’s not in Petersburg now . . .”

“Oh, he came back yesterday, I was just at his place . . . I’ve come precisely to you in such anxiety, my arms and legs are trembling, I wanted to ask you, my angel, Tatyana Pavlovna, since you know everybody, couldn’t we find out from his papers at least, because surely he left some papers, so where would they go now from him? Perhaps they’ll fall into dangerous hands again? I’ve come running to ask your advice.”

“What papers do you mean?” Tatyana Pavlovna did not understand. “And you say you yourself were just at Kraft’s?”

“I was, I was, just now, but he shot himself. Yesterday evening.”

I jumped up from the bed. I could sit it out when they called me a spy and an idiot; and the further they went in their conversation, the less possible it seemed for me to appear. It would have been unimaginable! I had decided to myself that I would sit it out, with a sinking heart, until Tatyana Pavlovna sent her visitor away (if I was lucky and she didn’t come into the bedroom earlier for something), and later, once Mme. Akhmakov was gone, I might just have a fight then with Tatyana Pavlovna! . . . But suddenly now, when I heard about Kraft, I jumped up from the bed, I was all seized as if by a convulsion. Not thinking of anything, not reasoning or imagining, I took a step, raised the portière, and appeared before the two of them. There was still enough light for them to make me out, pale and trembling . . . They both screamed. How could they not?

“Kraft?” I murmured, addressing Mme. Akhmakov. “Shot himself? Yesterday? At sunset?”

“Where were you? Where did you come from?” shrieked Tatyana Pavlovna, and she literally clutched my shoulder. “Have you been spying? Eavesdropping?”

“What was I just telling you?” Katerina Nikolaevna got up from the sofa, pointing at me.

I lost my temper.

“Lies, nonsense!” I interrupted her furiously. “You just called me a spy, oh, God! Is it worth not only spying, but even living in the world alongside such people as you? A magnanimous man commits suicide; Kraft has shot himself—because of an idea, because of Hecuba . . . However, you don’t know about Hecuba!
⁵²
. . . And here—go and live amidst your intrigues, hang around with your lies, deceptions, snares . . . Enough!”

“Slap his face! Slap his face!” cried Tatyana Pavlovna, and since Katerina Nikolaevna, though she looked at me (I remember it all down to the smallest trace) without taking her eyes away, didn’t move from her place, Tatyana Pavlovna would probably have carried out her own advice in a moment, so that I inadvertently raised my hand to protect my face; and from this gesture it seemed to her that I was swinging my own arm.

“Yes, hit me, hit me! Prove you’re a born lout! You’re stronger than women, why stand on ceremony!”

“Enough of your slander, enough!” I cried. “I’ve never raised my hand against a woman! You’re shameless, Tatyana Pavlovna, you’ve always despised me. Oh, one must deal with people without respecting them! You, Katerina Nikolaevna, are probably laughing at my figure; yes, God hasn’t given me a figure like your adjutants. And, nevertheless, I don’t feel humiliated before you, but, on the contrary, exalted . . . Well, it makes no difference how it’s expressed, only I’m not to blame! I wound up here accidentally, Tatyana Pavlovna, the one to blame is your Finnish cook, or, better to say, your partiality for her: why did she refuse to answer my question and bring me straight here? And then, you must agree, it seemed so
monstrueuse
²⁸
to me to come jumping out of a woman’s bedroom, that I decided sooner to endure your spitting silently than to show myself . . . You’re laughing again, Katerina Nikolaevna?”

“Get out, get out, go away!” cried Tatyana Pavlovna, almost pushing me. “Don’t take his pack of lies for anything, Katerina Nikolaevna, I told you they attested him as crazy there!”

“As crazy? There? Who would that be, and from where? Enough, it makes no difference. Katerina Nikolaevna! I swear to you by all that’s holy, this conversation and all that I’ve heard will remain between us . . . Is it my fault that I learned your secrets? The more so as I’m ending my work with your father tomorrow, so that, as regards the document you’re looking for, you may be at peace!”