The Petty Demon (32 page)

S
ASHA LEFT AFTER
dinner and didn’t return at the appointed time: by seven o’clock. Kokovkina grew worried. God forfend that he should run
into any of the teachers on the street at the forbidden time. They would punish him and it would be awkward for her. She had
always had modest boys living with her, they didn’t roam around at night. Kokovkina went to look for Sasha. Naturally enough,
where else should she go than to the Rutilovs.

As bad luck would have it, Lyudmila had forgotten to lock the door that day. Kokovkina entered and what did she see? Sasha
was standing in front of a mirror in a woman’s dress and fanning himself. Lyudmila was roaring with laughter and straightening
the ribbons on his brightly colored sash.

“Ach, goodness gracious me!” Kokovkina exclaimed in horror. “What is going on! I’m worrying and looking while he’s here clowning
about. For shame, he’s outfitted himself in a dress! And you, Lyudmila Platonovna, you should be ashamed!”

At first Lyudmila was dismayed at the surprise, but she quickly regained her senses. With a cheerful laugh, embracing Kokovkina
and sitting her down in a chair, she told her a story that she made up on the spot:

“We want to put on a play at home. I’ll be the boy and he’ll be the girl, and it’ll be terribly amusing.”

Sasha stood there all red, frightened, with tears in his eyes.

“I never heard of such nonsense!” Kokovkina said angrily. “He has to do his lessons and not perform plays. A fine idea! Pray,
get dressed immediately, Alexander, and march straight home with me.”

Lyudmila’s laughter was cheerful and ringing. She kept kissing Kokovkina—and the old woman was thinking that this cheerful
girl was acting just like a child whereas Sasha, out of stupidity, was happy to carry out all her ventures. Lyudmila’s cheerful
laughter made the incident look like a simple childish prank which only demanded a proper rebuke from her. And she grumbled,
putting on an angry face, but already her heart was at ease.

Sasha nimbly changed behind the screen where Lyudmila’s bed stood. Kokovkina took him away and scolded him the entire way
back. Sasha, ashamed and frightened, didn’t even try to excuse himself. “What else is going to happen at home?” he wondered
timidly.

But at home Kokovkina started off by treating him sternly and ordering him to stand on his knees. Sasha was barely on his
knees for a few minutes when she let him go, disarmed by his guilty face and his silent tears. She said grumpily:

“A fine dandy you are, you smell of perfume a mile away!”

Sasha deftly scraped his feet, kissed her hand—and she was even more touched by the politeness of the boy who had been punished.

Meanwhile a storm was gathering over Sasha. Varvara and Grushina wrote an anonymous letter to Khripach which said that the
student Pylnikov had been enticed by a Rutilov girl and was spending entire evenings with her and indulging in depravity.
Khripach recalled a recent conversation. A few days before at a reception at the home of the marshal of the nobility, someone
had made an allusion which escaped everyone about a young woman who had fallen in love with a juvenile. The conversation immediately
went on to other matters: everyone, by virtue of the unspoken accord of people who were accustomed to better society, considered
this an entirely awkward topic for conversation in Khripach’s presence and pretended that the conversation was unsuitable
for ladies and that the subject itself was insignificant and unlikely. Naturally, Khripach noted all of this, but he was not
so naive as to ask anyone. He was utterly certain that he would soon find out everything, that all the news would arrive of
its own accord, one way or another, and would always do so with proper timeliness. This very letter was in fact the piece
of news he had been expecting.

Not for a moment did Khripach believe in Pylnikov’s depravity or that his acquaintance with Lyudmila possessed any unseemly
aspects. “This,” he thought, “is all the result of that same stupid fiction of Peredonov’s and is being nourished by the jealous
spitefulness of Grushina. But this letter,” he thought, “shows that undesirable rumors are circulating which might cast a
shadow on the dignity of the gymnasium which has been entrusted to me.” And for that reason it behove him to take measures.

First of all, Khripach invited Kokovkina in order to discuss with her the circumstances which might have given rise to the
undesirable rumors.

Kokovkina already knew what it was about. People had informed her in even plainer terms than they had the headmaster. Grushina
had been lying in wait for her on the street and had started up a conversation and said that Lyudmila had already completely
corrupted Sasha. Kokovkina was stunned. At home she showered reproach on Sasha. She was all the more annoyed because it had
been taking place almost before her eyes and Sasha had been going to the Rutilovs with her consent. Sasha pretended that he
understood nothing and asked:

“But what have I done that’s bad?”

Kokovkina faltered.

“What do you mean, bad? You don’t know yourself? Was it that long ago I found you in a skirt? Have you forgotten, you shameless
boy?”

“You found me like that, but what was particularly bad about that?
Anyway you punished me for that! What’s the matter, you’d think I had put on a stolen skirt!”

“My goodness, the way he reasons!” Kokovkina said distractedly. “I punished you, but obviously it wasn’t enough.”

“Well, punish me some more,” Sasha said obstinately, with a look of someone who is being unjustly offended. “You yourself
forgave me then, but now it’s not good enough. I didn’t beg your forgiveness then, I would even have stayed on my knees the
whole evening. Otherwise, why do you keep reproaching me!”

“Dear father, they’re already talking about you and your Lyudmila in town,” Kokovkina said.

“What are they saying?” Sasha asked in an innocently curious voice.

Kokovkina faltered again.

“What are they saying—you know what! You know yourself what people might say about you. They won’t be saying much that’s good.
You’re getting into a lot of mischief with your Lyudmila, that’s what they’re saying.”

“Well, I won’t get into mischief,” Sasha promised as calmly as though the conversation concerned a game of tag.

He put on an innocent face, but his heart was heavy. He kept asking Kokovkina what people were saying and he was afraid of
hearing any vulgar words. What could they say about them? The windows in Lyudmila’s room look out on the garden, there was
nothing visible from the street and Lyudmila always lowered the curtains. But if someone had been spying, then what could
they have said about that? Perhaps their words only expressed annoyance and insult? Or were they only talking about the fact
that he frequently went there?

Then on the following day Kokovkina received an invitation to see the headmaster. The old lady was completely unnerved by
it. She didn’t say anything to Sasha, quietly got ready and set out at the appointed time. Khripach politely and gently informed
her about the letter he had received. She started to weep.

“Calm yourself, we aren’t blaming you,” Khripach said. “We know you well. Of course, you’ll have to keep a closer eye on him.
But now you just tell me what in fact happened.”

Kokovkina came home from the director with fresh reproaches for Sasha.

“I’ll write your aunt,” she said, weeping.

“I’m not guilty of anything, let my aunt come, I’m not afraid,” Sasha said and also cried.

The following day Khripach invited Sasha to his office and questioned him dryly and sternly:

“I wish to know which acquaintances you’ve taken up in the town.”

Sasha gazed at the headmaster with his falsely innocent and calm eyes.

“What acquaintances?” he said. “Olga Vasilyevna knows that I only go to my schoolmates and to the Rutilovs.”

“Yes, precisely,” Khripach continued his interrogation. “What do you do at the Rutilovs?”

“Nothing in particular, just things,” Sasha replied with the same innocent look. “Mainly we read. The Rutilov ladies like
poetry very much. And I’m always home by seven o’clock.”

“Perhaps not always?” Khripach asked, fastening on Sasha a gaze which he tried to make penetrating.

“Yes, I was late once,” Sasha said with the calm frankness of an innocent boy. “But I caught it from Olga Vasilyevna and then
I was never late.”

Khripach was silent. Sasha’s calm replies had put him in a dilemma. In any case he would have to administer an admonition,
a reprimand, but how and why? In order not to put any bad ideas (which Khripach believed hadn’t been there earlier) into his
head, and in order not to offend the boy and in order to eliminate those troubles which might occur in the future because
of this acquaintance. Khripach thought that the work of the pedagogue was a difficult and responsible work, particularly if
one had the honor of presiding over an educational institution. The difficult and responsible work of the pedagogue! This
banal definition gave wings to Khripach’s thoughts that were on the verge of becoming paralyzed. He started to speak—quickly,
distinctly and casually. Sasha listened with half an ear:

“… your first obligation as a student is to study … you mustn’t get carried away with the company of others even though it
may be pleasant and completely irreproachable … in any event, it must be said that the company of boys your own age is much
more beneficial for you … You must value both your own reputation and that of the educational institution … Finally—and I’ll
say it to you outright—I have reason to believe that your relations with the young ladies possess a loose nature that is inadmissible
at your age, and completely inappropriate with the generally accepted rules of seemliness.”

Sasha started to weep. He felt sorry that people could talk about his dear Lyudmilochka as about a person with whom it was
possible to act in a loose and unseemly fashion.

“Word of honor, there wasn’t anything bad,” he tried to convince him. “We only read, went for walks and played—well, ran around
a bit—there was nothing loose.”

Khripach patted him on the shoulder and said in a voice that he tried to make warm, but which remained nevertheless dry:

“Just listen now, Pylnikov …” (Why not call the boy Sasha! Was it because it wasn’t formal and there hadn’t been a circular
from the Ministry on the matter as yet?)

“I believe you that nothing bad happened, but nevertheless you’d better curtail these frequent visits. Believe me, it would
be better to do so. It’s not just your tutor and your superior talking to you, but your friend as well.”

There was nothing left for Sasha to do but to bow, thank him and then be obliged to obey. And Sasha started to hurriedly drop
in on Lyudmila for very short visits. But still he tried to be there every day. It was annoying that they had to meet for
such short periods and Sasha vented his anger on Lyudmila herself. More frequently now he called her Lyudmilka, a silly little
fool, a Siamese donkey and beat her. But Lyudmila only laughed at all of that.

A rumor spread through the town that the actors of the local theatre were organizing a masquerade with prizes for the best
costumes, both male and female, that was to be held in the town hall. Exaggerated rumors circulated about the prizes. It was
said that the woman would receive a cow, and the man a bicycle. The townspeople were excited by the rumors. Everyone wanted
to win: the prizes were such substantial ones. Costumes were hurriedly sewn. The money spent was not begrudged. People concealed
the costumes they devised from their closest friends so that no one would filch a brilliant idea.

When the printed notice about the masquerade appeared—large posters pasted on fences and distributed to important citizens—it
turned out that a cow and bicycle weren’t being given as prizes at all, but only a fan for the lady and an album for the man.
That disappointed and irritated everyone who was getting ready for the masquerade. People started to grumble. They said:

“As though it were worth wasting money on!”

“It’s simply ridiculous, prizes like that.”

“They should have announced it at once.”

“It’s only in our town that the public can be treated in such a fashion.”

Nevertheless, the preparations continued. Whatever the prize, it would still be flattering to win it.

Darya and Lyudmila didn’t care about the prize, neither before nor after. A lot they needed a cow! Some wonder, a fan! And
who was going to be the judge for the prizes? What kind of taste would they have, the judges! But both sisters grew enthused
over Lyudmila’s dream of sending Sasha to the masquerade in a woman’s costume, to deceive the entire town in this way and
to arrange it so that he won the prize. Valeriya, too, pretended that she was agreed. Jealous and weak like a child, she was
annoyed—it was Lyudmila’s little friend and after all he didn’t come to visit her. But she couldn’t bring herself to argue
with her two older sisters. She merely said with a scornful little smile:

“He wouldn’t dare.”

“But listen,” Darya said determinedly, “we’ll do it so that no one will know.”

And when the sisters told Sasha about their venture and Lyudmilochka said to him: “We’ll dress you up like a Japanese lady,”
Sasha started to leap about and squeal ecstatically. Let come what may—and especially if no one found out—he was agreed. How
could he not be! After all it would be terribly hilarious to fool everyone.

It was immediately decided that Sasha would be dressed up as a geisha girl. The sisters kept their venture a strict secret.
They didn’t even tell Larisa or their brother. Lyudmila herself created the costume for the geisha girl from a label on a
bottle of corylopsis: a dress of yellow silk on red satin, long and wide; a colorful pattern sewn onto the dress and large
flowers of marvellous design. The girls themselves created the fan out of bamboo sticks and delicate Japanese paper with drawings
and the umbrella was fashioned of delicate pink silk on a bamboo handle as well. For the feet—pink stockings and flat wooden
sandals. The masterful Lyudmila painted the mask for the geisha girl: a yellowish, but sweet, rather thin face with a passive
gentle
smile, slit eyes, and a narrow and small mouth. It was only the wig that they had to order from Petersburg: a black one with
smooth, combed hair.