The Petty Demon (31 page)

It was pleasant for Lyudmila to hold him half-naked on her knees, her arms around him and kissing him.

Sasha was alone at home. He was reminiscing about Lyudmila and his naked shoulders under her burning eyes.

“What does she want?” he was thinking. And suddenly he turned a deep crimson and his heart began to pound ever so painfully.
He was seized with an impetuous cheerfulness. He turned several somersaults, collapsed on the floor, leapt up on the furniture—thousands
of crazy movements threw him from one corner to the other, and his cheerful, clear laughter resounded through the house.

Kokovkina had returned home at the time, heard the extraordinary noise and went into Sasha’s room. She stood on the threshold
in perplexity and shook her head.

“What are you doing acting like you’re raving mad, Sashenka!” she said. “At least act silly with your comrades, or else you’ll
be raving by yourself. Dear father, shame on you, you’re not a little boy.”

Sasha stood there and it was as though his arms, heavy and awkward, were frozen, whereas his entire body was still shaking
with excitement.

Once Kokovkina came home to find Lyudmila there—she was feeding sweets to Sasha.

“You’re spoiling him,” Kokovkina said affectionately. “My boy loves to eat sweet things.”

“Well, he calls me a wicked girl,” Lyudmila complained.

“Ai, Sashenka, how could you!” Kokovkina said with affectionate reproach. “Why would you do such a thing?”

“Well, she pesters me,” Sasha said, stammering.

He gave Lyudmila an angry look and turned crimson. Lyudmila burst into laughter.

“Rumor-monger,” Sasha whispered to her.

“How could you be insulting, Sashenka!” Kokovkina upbraided him. “You mustn’t be insulting!”

Sasha looked at Lyudmila with a grin and softly murmured:

“I won’t do it any more.”

Every time when Sasha came now, Lyudmila would lock herself in with him and start to take his clothes off and dress him up
in different outfits. Their sweet shame was dressed up in laughter and jokes. Sometimes Lyudmila would truss Sasha up in a
corset and put her dress on him. When he was wearing a low-necked dress, Sasha’s arms, full and delicately rounded, and his
round shoulders seemed very beautiful. His skin was of a yellowish hue, and, as was rarely the case, it was of an even and
delicate color. Lyudmila’s skirt, shoes and stockings all proved to be just right for Sasha and they all suited him. After
he had put on a woman’s entire wardrobe, Sasha would sit there submissively and fan himself. When he was wearing this attire
he actually did resemble a girl and tried to act like a girl. Only one thing was awkward: Sasha’s cropped hair. Lyudmila didn’t
want to put a wig on him or tie a braid to Sasha’s head—that would be repulsive.

Lyudmila was teaching Sasha to perform curtseys. At first he would squat awkwardly and self-consciously. But he possessed
a gracefulness even though it was mixed with a boyish angularity. Blushing and laughing, he studied diligently how to perform
a curtsey and he flirted recklessly.

Sometimes Lyudmila would take his arms, naked and shapely, and kiss them. Sasha didn’t resist and would look at Lyudmila with
a chuckle. Sometimes he himself would put his arms to her lips and say:

“Kiss them!”

But best of all he liked the other clothing that Lyudmila sewed herself: a fisherman’s outfit with bare legs and the chiton
of an Athenian barelegged boy.

Lyudmila would dress him up and admire him. At the same time she would grow pale and melancholy.

Sasha was sitting on Lyudmila’s bed, picking at the folds of the chiton and dangling his naked legs. Lyudmila stood in front
of him and gazed at him with an expression of happiness and perplexity.

“How silly you are!” Sasha said.

“There’s so much happiness in my silliness!” a pale Lyudmila babbled, crying and kissing Sasha’s arms.

“Why are you crying?” Sasha asked, smiling carefreely.

“My heart has been smitten with joy. My breast has been pierced with the seven swords of happiness. How can I help but cry?”

“You’re a fool, really a fool!” Sasha said with a chuckle.

“And you’re smart!” Lyudmila replied with sudden annoyance, wiped the tears away and sighed. “Try to understand, silly,” she
said in a soft persuasive voice. “Happiness and wisdom can only be found in madness.”

“Really now!” Sasha said mistrustfully.

“You have to forget, forget yourself, and then you’ll understand everything,” Lyudmila whispered. “In your opinion, then,
do wise men think?”

“What else?”

“They just know. It’s bestowed upon them immediately: one look and all is revealed …”

The autumn evening lingered softly on. From time to time a barely audible rustling sound carried from beyond the window when
the wind in flight would make the branches of the trees shake. Sasha and Lyudmila were alone. Lyudmila had dressed him up
as a bare-legged fisherman in a blue outfit out of fine linen. Then she laid him down on a low couch and sat down on the floor,
barefooted and in just her chemise, beside his naked legs. And over his body and his clothing she sprinkled a perfume with
a dense, herbaceous and brittle scent, like the motionless breath of a strangely flowering valley enclosed by mountains.

Large, brilliant beads gleamed on Lyudmila’s neck; intricate golden bracelets tinkled on her wrists. Her body gave off the
scent of iris—a cloying, sensual and irritating fragrance that induced drowsiness and languor and was sated with the miasma
of turgid waters. She was languishing and sighing, gazing at his swarthy face, at his blue-tinged eyelashes and midnight eyes.
She laid her head on his naked knees, and her light curls caressed his swarthy skin. She kissed Sasha’s body and her head
began to spin from the fragrance, strange and potent, that intermingled with the smell of his youthful skin.

Sasha was lying there and smiling a soft, uncertain smile. Vague desire was being born inside him and it tormented him sweetly.
When Lyudmila was kissing his knees and feet, the tender kisses aroused languid, somnolent reveries. He had the urge to do
something to her, something nice or painful, something thing tender or shameful—but what? Kiss her feet? Or beat her, hard
and at length, with long, supple branches? So that she would laugh for joy or cry from pain? Perhaps she would desire both
of those things, but it wouldn’t be enough. What did she need? There they were the two of them, half-naked, and both desire
and prescriptive shame were attendant on their liberated flesh. Yet what did that mystery of the flesh consist of? How could
he offer his blood and his body in sweetest sacrifice to her desires and his own shame?

Meanwhile, Lyudmila fretted and languished alongside his legs, pale with impossible desires, first fiery, then turning cold.
She whispered passionately:

“Am I not beautiful! Aren’t my eyes burning! Don’t I have luxuriant hair! Caress me! Caress me! Tear my bracelets off, undo
my necklace!”

Sasha grew frightened and he was oppressed by impossible desires.

P
EREDONOV AWOKE TOWARDS
morning. Someone was looking at him with enormous, turbid, rectangular eyes. Was it Pylnikov? Peredonov went up to the window
and doused the ominous spectre.

Everything was spellbound and enchanted. The wild
nedotykomka
went on shrilling, both man and beast regarded Peredonov with spite and deceit. Everything was hostile towards him, he was
alone against everyone.

In his classes at the gymnasium Peredonov spread malignant gossip about his fellow teachers, the headmaster, parents and students.
The students listened to him in perplexity. Some inherently uncouth students were to be found who sought favor with Peredonov
and expressed their sympathy to him. Yet others were strictly silent or, when Peredonov made fun of their parents, defended
them vehemently. Peredonov would give the latter a sullen look and move away from them, muttering something.

In some classes Peredonov would entertain the students with his absurd interpretations.

Once he read the following verses by Pushkin:

With labor’s clamor held at bay

As dawn arises out of morn,

The wolf sets out upon his way

With wolf-bitch hungry and forlorn.

“Stop a moment,” Peredonov said. “One should understand this properly. The allegory is hidden here. Wolves go in pairs: a
male wolf and a hungry wolf-bitch. The male wolf is full, whereas she is hungry. The wife is always supposed to eat after
the husband. The wife is supposed to submit to her husband in everything.”

Pylnikov was cheerful. He smiled and looked at Peredonov with his deceptively pure, black, unfathomable eyes. Sasha’s face
tormented and tempted Peredonov. The accursed boy was casting a spell over him with his perfidious smile.

And was he even a boy? Or perhaps there were two of them: a brother and sister. And it was impossible to figure out who was
where. Or perhaps he even knew how to transform himself from a boy into a girl. It was hardly
a coincidence that he was such a clean little thing—when he was transforming himself he must have rinsed himself in various
magical solutions, otherwise it would have been impossible, one couldn’t become a changeling. And he always smelled so much
of perfume.

“What perfume did you put on, Pylnikov?” Peredonov asked. “Eau de skunk?”

The boys broke into laughter. Sasha blushed from the insult and was silent.

Peredonov could not comprehend the pure desire to be liked, not to be repulsive. He considered any manifestation of that sort,
even on the part of the boy, as an attempt to trap him. If someone got dressed up, it meant that the person was plotting to
flatter Peredonov. Otherwise why get dressed up? Smart dress and cleanliness were repulsive to Peredonov and perfume seemed
foul-smelling. He preferred the smell of a manured field to any kind of perfume—in his opinion the former was beneficial to
health. To get dressed up, to clean oneself, to wash—all of these things required time and labor. And the thought of labor
induced a melancholy and frightening feeling in Peredonov. It would be nice to do nothing, just to eat, drink and sleep—and
nothing more!

His schoolmates teased Sasha because he perfumed himself with “eau de skunk” and because Lyudmilochka was in love with him.
He would flare up and protest vehemently. Nothing of the sort, he would say, she wasn’t in love with him, all that was just
the invention of Peredonov. He was the one who had proposed to Lyudmilochka, but Lyudmilochka had tweaked his nose and so
he was angry at her and was spreading ugly rumors about her. His schoolmates believed him. It was Peredonov, as everyone knew,
but still they didn’t stop teasing him. It was so pleasant to tease people.

Peredonov persisted in telling everyone about Pylnikov’s depravity.

“He’s mixed up with Lyudmilochka,” he said. “They kiss so zealously that she’s already given birth to one prep student and
now she’s carrying another around.”

The talk in the town about Lyudmila’s love for a student at the gymnasium was exaggerated and filled with stupid and unseemly
details. But few people believed it—Peredonov had overdone it. However the dilettantes—of whom there were a great many in
our town—asked Lyudmila teasingly:

“What are you doing falling madly in love with a young boy? That’s insulting to the rest of the eligible young bachelors.”

Lyudmila laughed and said:

“Rubbish!”

The townsfolk gave Sasha looks of vile curiosity. The widow of General Poluyanov, a rich woman from a merchant background,
made inquiries about his age and discovered that he was still too young, but that in about two years she could invite him
and concern herself with his development.

By now Sasha had begun to reproach Lyudmila at times because people were teasing him over her. It even happened at times that
he would beat her—in response to which Lyudmila would merely laugh.

However, in order to put an end to the silly gossip and to protect Lyudmila from an unpleasant business, all the Rutilovs
and their numerous friends, relatives and relations took energetic action against Peredonov and tried to prove that all these
stories were just the fantasy of a madman. Peredonov’s wild antics forced many people to believe the explanations.

At the same time the district educational trustee was beset by denunciations against Peredonov. An inquiry was sent to the
headmaster from the district officials. Khripach referred to his previous reports and added that Peredonov’s continuing presence
in the gymnasium was becoming positively dangerous inasmuch as his mental illness was noticeably progressing.

By now Peredonov was totally in the power of his wild notions. Spectres had divorced Peredonov from the world. His eyes, crazed
and dull, wandered without pausing on objects, just as though he were constantly seeking to look beyond them, beyond the objective
world, and was searching for the apertures.

When he was left on his own he would talk to himself, shouting out senseless threats at someone:

“I’ll kill you! I’ll slit your throat! I’ll caulk you up!”

Varvara would listen and smirk.

“Go ahead and fly into a rage!” she thought maliciously.

It seemed to her that it was only anger because he had guessed that he had been deceived and was furious. He wasn’t losing
his mind, a fool had nothing to lose. And if he were to lose his mind, what did it matter? Madness cheers up the stupid!

“You know, Ardalyon Borisych,” Khripach once said, “You look very unhealthy.”

“I have a headache,” Peredonov said sullenly.

“You know, my esteemed sir,” Khripach continued in a cautious voice, “I would advise you not to come to the gymnasium for
the time being. You ought to recuperate, take care of your nerves which, apparently, are really rather disturbed.”

“Not go to the gymnasium! Of course,” thought Peredonov. “That would be the best thing. Why didn’t I think of it earlier!
Pretend to be sick, sit at home, watch and see what comes of this.”

“Yes, yes, I won’t come. I’m sick,” he said joyfully to Khripach.

Meanwhile, the director wrote once more to the district officials and was waiting from one day to the next for them to appoint
the doctors who would carry out the examination. But the officials were in no hurry. That was why they were officials.

Peredonov didn’t go to the gymnasium and was also waiting for something. Lately he had been sticking to Volodin, It was frightening
to let him out of his sight—he might do some harm. From the morning on, as soon as he awoke, Peredonov would think of Volodin
with a melancholy feeling. Where was he then? What was he doing? Sometimes he fancied that he was seeing Volodin: the clouds
flying through the skies like a flock of sheep and Volodin was running along in their midst with his bowler hat on his head
and producing his bleating laughter; or sometimes he would fly swiftly past, in the smoke rising out of chimneys, making grotesque
faces and leaping up and down in the air.

Volodin thought, and related to everyone with pride, that Peredonov loved him a great deal—he simply couldn’t live without
him.

“Varvara has tricked him,” Volodin said, “and he sees that I’m his only true friend and that’s why he’s sticking to me.”

Peredonov would be coming out of the house to go and see Volodin, but the latter would already be coming to greet him, wearing
a bowler hat, carrying a walking stick, springing cheerfully up and down and happily bursting with his bleating laughter.

“What are you wearing a bowler for?” Peredonov once asked him.

“Why shouldn’t I wear a bowler, Ardalyon Borisych?” Volodin replied cheerfully and reasonably. “It’s modest and proper enough.
I’m not supposed to wear an official cap with a cockade, and as far as a top hat is concerned, let the aristocrats indulge
in that practice, it doesn’t suit us.”

“You’ll boil in that pot,” Peredonov said sullenly.

Volodin giggled.

They went to Peredonov’s.

“What a lot of walking to do,” Peredonov said angrily.

“Ardalyon Borisych, it’s beneficial to get yourself moving,” Volodin tried to convince him. “You work a little, walk a little,
eat a little—and you’ll be healthy.”

“Sure,” Peredonov objected. “You think that in two or three hundred years people will be working?”

“What else? If you don’t work, then you won’t eat. You get bread for money and you have to work for money.”

“I don’t want bread.”

“There won’t be any rolls or pies either,” Volodin said with a giggle. “And you won’t be able to buy vodka and there won’t
be anything to make brandy out of.”

“No, people won’t be doing the work themselves,” Peredonov said. “There’ll be machines for everything: you turn a handle,
like the hand organ, and it’s ready. But it’ll be boring to turn the handle for long.”

Volodin grew pensive, bowed his head, puffed out his lips and said musingly:

“Yes, that will be very good. Only we won’t be there any more.”

Peredonov gave him a spiteful look and grumbled:

“You won’t be there, but I’ll live that long.”

“God willing,” Volodin said cheerfully. “May you live two hundred years and crawl around on all fours for three hundred years.”

Peredonov no longer pronounced his counter-spells—let come what may. He would conquer everyone, he only had to keep his eyes
peeled and not give in.

At home, sitting in the dining room and drinking with Volodin, Peredonov told him about the Princess. In Peredonov’s imagination
there
wasn’t a day that went by that she didn’t grow even more decrepit and even more terrible: yellow, wrinkled, hunched over,
long in the tooth and wicked—that was how Peredonov invariably fancied he saw her.

“She’s two hundred years old,” Peredonov said and stared straight ahead in a strange and melancholy fashion. “And she wants
us to get cozy with each other again. Until then she doesn’t want to give me the post.”

“You don’t say, the things she wants!” Volodin said, shaking his head. “What an old matriarch!”

The murder was making Peredonov rave. He said to Volodin, knitting his brows ferociously:

“There’s already one hidden there behind my wallpaper. And there’s another one I’m going to clobber under the floor.”

But Volodin wasn’t afraid and giggled.

“Do you smell it behind the wallpaper?” Peredonov asked.

“No, I don’t,” Volodin said, giggling and clowning.

“Your nose is stuffed,” Peredonov said. “It’s no coincidence that your nose has turned red. It’s rotting over there behind
the wallpaper.”

“The bedbug!” Varvara cried and burst into laughter. Peredonov looked on, dully and gravely.

Plunging ever deeper into his derangement, Peredonov began to write denunciations: against the figures in the playing cards;
against the
nedotykomka;
and against the sheep who was an imposter and who was pretending to be Volodin and was aiming to get a high position, but
in fact was just a sheep; against the wood-poachers—they had chopped down all the birch, there was nothing left for the steam
baths and it was difficult to educate the children, but they had left the aspen and what good was the aspen?

When he met students from the gymnasium on the street Peredonov would terrify the younger ones and amuse the older ones with
his shameless and absurd words. The older ones would walk in a crowd behind him, scattering whenever they caught sight of
any other teacher. But the younger ones would run away from him of their own accord.

Peredonov fancied he saw spells and enchantments in everything. He was terrified by his hallucinations and they wrung an insane
howling and shrieking out of his breast. The
nedotykomka
would appear before him bloody at one moment and fiery the next. It would moan and howl and its howling made Peredonov’s
head burst with an unbearable pain. The cat grew to frightening proportions, stomped around in boots and pretended to be a
grown man with a red moustache.