Resurrection
by graf Leo Tolstoy · English · Gutenberg #1938 · 991,659 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Resurrection
Author: graf Leo Tolstoy
Translator: Louise Maude
Release date: October 1, 1999 [eBook #1938]
Most recently updated: September 11, 2016
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1938
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RESURRECTION ***
Produced by Jim Tinsley
RESURRECTION
By Leo Tolstoy
Translated by Mrs. Louise Maude
[Transcriber’s Note: The following paragraph is on a page of its own, in
cursive writing, apparently in Tolstoy’s own hand.]
This English version
of “Resurrection” is pub-
lished by Dodd, Mead and
Company by my authority.
Leo Tolstoy
TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE
Opinions about Tolstoy and his work differ, but on one point there
surely might be unanimity. A writer of world-wide reputation should be
at least allowed to know how to spell his own name. Why should any one
insist on spelling it “Tolstoi” (with one, two or three dots over the
“i”), when he himself writes it “Tolstoy”? The only reason I have ever
heard suggested is, that in England and America such outlandish views
are attributed to him, that an outlandish spelling is desirable to match
those views.
This novel, written in the rough by Tolstoy some years ago and founded
upon an actual occurrence, was completely rewritten by him during the
last year and a half, and all the proceeds have been devoted by him
to aiding the Doukhobors, a sect who were persecuted in the Caucasus
(especially from 1895 to 1898) for refusing to learn war. About seven
thousand three hundred of them are settled in Canada, and about a
hundred of the leaders are exiled to the remote parts of Siberia.
Anything I may receive for my work in translating the book will go to
the same cause. “Prevention is better than cure,” and I would rather
help people to abstain from killing and wounding each other than devote
the money to patch up their wounds after the battle.
LOUISE MAUDE
RESURRECTION
CHAPTER I.
MASLOVA IN PRISON.
Though hundreds of thousands had done their very best to disfigure the
small piece of land on which they were crowded together, by paving the
ground with stones, scraping away every vestige of vegetation, cutting
down the trees, turning away birds and beasts, and filling the air with
the smoke of naphtha and coal, still spring was spring, even in the
town.
The sun shone warm, the air was balmy; everywhere, where it did not get
scraped away, the grass revived and sprang up between the paving-stones
as well as on the narrow strips of lawn on the boulevards. The birches,
the poplars, and the wild cherry unfolded their gummy and fragrant
leaves, the limes were expanding their opening buds; crows, sparrows,
and pigeons, filled with the joy of spring, were getting their nests
ready; the flies were buzzing along the walls, warmed by the sunshine.
All were glad, the plants, the birds, the insects, and the children. But
men, grown-up men and women, did not leave off cheating and tormenting
themselves and each other. It was not this spring morning men thought
sacred and worthy of consideration not the beauty of God’s world, given
for a joy to all creatures, this beauty which inclines the heart to
peace, to harmony, and to love, but only their own devices for enslaving
one another.
Thus, in the prison office of the Government town, it was not the fact
that men and animals had received the grace and gladness of spring that
was considered sacred and important, but that a notice, numbered and
with a superscription, had come the day before, ordering that on this
28th day of April, at 9 a.m., three prisoners at present detained in the
prison, a man and two women (one of these women, as the chief criminal,
to be conducted separately), had to appear at Court. So now, on the 28th
of April, at 8 o’clock, a jailer and soon after him a woman warder with
curly grey hair, dressed in a jacket with sleeves trimmed with gold,
with a blue-edged belt round her waist, and having a look of suffering
on her face, came into the corridor.
“You want Maslova?” she asked, coming up to the cell with the jailer who
was on duty.
The jailer, rattling the iron padlock, opened the door of the cell, from
which there came a whiff of air fouler even than that in the corridor,
and called out, “Maslova! to the Court,” and closed the door again.
Even into the prison yard the breeze had brought the fresh vivifying air
from the fields. But in the corridor the air was laden with the germs of
typhoid, the smell of sewage, putrefaction, and tar; every newcomer felt
sad and dejected in it. The woman warder felt this, though she was
used to bad air. She had just come in from outside, and entering the
corridor, she at once became sleepy.
From inside the cell came the sound of bustle and women’s voices, and
the patter of bare feet on the floor.
“Now, then, hurry up, Maslova, I say!” called out the jailer, and in a
minute or two a small young woman with a very full bust came briskly out
of the door and went up to the jailer. She had on a grey cloak over a
white jacket and petticoat. On her feet she wore linen stockings and
prison shoes, and round her head was tied a white kerchief, from under
which a few locks of black hair were brushed over the forehead with
evident intent. The face of the woman was of that whiteness peculiar to
people who have lived long in confinement, and which puts one in mind of
shoots of potatoes that spring up in a cellar. Her small broad hands and
full neck, which showed from under the broad collar of her cloak, were
of the same hue. Her black, sparkling eyes, one with a slight squint,
appeared in striking contrast to the dull pallor of her face.
She carried herself very straight, expanding her full bosom.
With her head slightly thrown back, she stood in the corridor, looking
straight into the eyes of the jailer, ready to comply with any order.
The jailer was about to lock the door when a wrinkled and severe-looking
old woman put out her grey head and began speaking to Maslova. But the
jailer closed the door, pushing the old woman’s head with it. A woman’s
laughter was heard from the cell, and Maslova smiled, turning to the
little grated opening in the cell door. The old woman pressed her face
to the grating from the other side, and said, in a hoarse voice:
“Now mind, and when they begin questioning you, just repeat over the
same thing, and stick to it; tell nothing that is not wanted.”
“Well, it could not be worse than it is now, anyhow; I only wish it was
settled one way or another.”
“Of course, it will be settled one way or another,” said the jailer,
with a superior’s self-assured witticism. “Now, then, get along! Take
your places!”
The old woman’s eyes vanished from the grating, and Maslova stepped out
into the middle of the corridor. The warder in front, they descended
the stone stairs, past the still fouler, noisy cells of the men’s
ward, where they were followed by eyes looking out of every one of the
gratings in the doors, and entered the office, where two soldiers were
waiting to escort her. A clerk who was sitting there gave one of the
soldiers a paper reeking of tobacco, and pointing to the prisoner,
remarked, “Take her.”
The soldier, a peasant from Nijni Novgorod, with a red, pock-marked
face, put the paper into the sleeve of his coat, winked to his
companion, a broad-shouldered Tchouvash, and then the prisoner and the
soldiers went to the front entrance, out of the prison yard, and through
the town up the middle of the roughly-paved street.
Isvostchiks [cabmen], tradespeople, cooks, workmen, and government
clerks, stopped and looked curiously at the prisoner; some shook their
heads and thought, “This is what evil conduct, conduct unlike ours,
leads to.” The children stopped and gazed at the robber with frightened
looks; but the thought that the soldiers were preventing her from doing
more harm quieted their fears. A peasant, who had sold his charcoal, and
had had some tea in the town, came up, and, after crossing himself, gave
her a copeck. The prisoner blushed and muttered something; she noticed
that she was attracting everybody’s attention, and that pleased her. The
comparatively fresh air also gladdened her, but it was painful to step
on the rough stones with the ill-made prison shoes on her feet, which
had become unused to walking. Passing by a corn-dealer’s shop, in front
of which a few pigeons were strutting about, unmolested by any one, the
prisoner almost touched a grey-blue bird with her foot; it fluttered up
and flew close to her ear, fanning her with its wings. She smiled, then
sighed deeply as she remembered her present position.
CHAPTER II.
MASLOVA’S EARLY LIFE.
The story of the prisoner Maslova’s life was a very common one.
Maslova’s mother was the unmarried daughter of a village woman,
employed on a dairy farm, which belonged to two maiden ladies who were
landowners. This unmarried woman had a baby every year, and, as often
happens among the village people, each one of these undesired babies,
after it had been carefully baptised, was neglected by its mother, whom
it hindered at her work, and left to starve. Five children had died in
this way. They had all been baptised and then not sufficiently fed, and
just left to die. The sixth baby, whose father was a gipsy tramp, would
have shared the same fate, had it not so happened that one of the maiden
ladies came into the farmyard to scold the dairymaids for sending up
cream that smelt of the cow. The young woman was lying in the cowshed
with a fine, healthy, new-born baby. The old maiden lady scolded the
maids again for allowing the woman (who had just been confined) to lie
in the cowshed, and was about to go away, but seeing the baby her heart
was touched, and she offered to stand godmother to the little girl, and
pity for her little god-daughter induced her to give milk and a little
money to the mother, so that she should feed the baby; and the little
girl lived. The old ladies spoke of her as “the saved one.” When the
child was three years old, her mother fell ill and died, and the maiden
ladies took the child from her old grandmother, to whom she was nothing
but a burden.
The little black-eyed maiden grew to be extremely pretty, and so full of
spirits that the ladies found her very entertaining.
The younger of the ladies, Sophia Ivanovna, who had stood godmother to
the girl, had the kinder heart of the two sisters; Maria Ivanovna, the
elder, was rather hard. Sophia Ivanovna dressed the little girl in nice
clothes, and taught her to read and write, meaning to educate her like a
lady. Maria Ivanovna thought the child should be brought up to work, and
trained her to be a good servant. She was exacting; she punished, and,
when in a bad temper, even struck the little girl. Growing up under
these two different influences, the girl turned out half servant, half
young lady. They called her Katusha, which sounds less refined than
Katinka, but is not quite so common as Katka. She used to sew, tidy up
the rooms, polish the metal cases of the icons and do other light work,
and sometimes she sat and read to the ladies.
Though she had more than one offer, she would not marry. She felt that
life as the wife of any of the working men who were courting her would
be too hard; spoilt as she was by a life of case.
She lived in this manner till she was sixteen, when the nephew of the
old ladies, a rich young prince, and a university student, came to
stay with his aunts, and Katusha, not daring to acknowledge it even to
herself, fell in love with him.
Then two years later this same nephew stayed four days with his aunts
before proceeding to join his regiment, and the night before he left he
betrayed Katusha, and, after giving her a 100-rouble note, went away.
Five months later she knew for certain that she was to be a mother.
After that everything seemed repugnant to her, her only thought being
how to escape from the shame that awaited her. She began not only to
serve the ladies in a half-hearted and negligent way, but once, without
knowing how it happened, was very rude to them, and gave them notice,
a thing she repented of later, and the ladies let her go, noticing
something wrong and very dissatisfied with her. Then she got a
housemaid’s place in a police-officer’s house, but stayed there only
three months, for the police officer, a man of fifty, began to torment
her, and once, when he was in a specially enterprising mood, she fired
up, called him “a fool and old devil,” and gave him such a knock in the
chest that he fell. She was turned out for her rudeness. It was useless
to look for another situation, for the time of her confinement was
drawing near, so she went to the house of a village midwife, who also
sold wine. The confinement was easy; but the midwife, who had a case of
fever in the village, infected Katusha, and her baby boy had to be sent
to the foundlings’ hospital, where, according to the words of the old
woman who took him there, he at once died. When Katusha went to the
midwife she had 127 roubles in all, 27 which she had earned and 100
given her by her betrayer. When she left she had but six roubles; she
did not know how to keep money, but spent it on herself, and gave to
all who asked. The midwife took 40 roubles for two months’ board and
attendance, 25 went to get the baby into the foundlings’ hospital, and
40 the midwife borrowed to buy a cow with. Twenty roubles went just for
clothes and dainties. Having nothing left to live on, Katusha had to
look out for a place again, and found one in the house of a forester.
The forester was a married man, but he, too, began to annoy her from the
first day. He disgusted her, and she tried to avoid him. But he, more
experienced and cunning, besides being her master, who could send her
wherever he liked, managed to accomplish his object. His wife found it
out, and, catching Katusha and her husband in a room all by themselves,
began beating her. Katusha defended herself, and they had a fight, and
Katusha got turned out of the house without being paid her wages.
Then Katusha went to live with her aunt in town. The aunt’s husband,
a bookbinder, had once been comfortably off, but had lost all his
customers, and had taken to drink, and spent all he could lay hands
on at the public-house. The aunt kept a little laundry, and managed to
support herself, her children, and her wretched husband. She offered
Katusha the place of an assistant laundress; but seeing what a life of
misery and hardship her aunt’s assistants led, Katusha hesitated, and
applied to a registry office for a place. One was found for her with a
lady who lived with her two sons, pupils at a public day school. A
week after Katusha had entered the house the elder, a big fellow with
moustaches, threw up his studies and made love to her, continually
following her about. His mother laid all the blame on Katusha, and gave
her notice.
It so happened that, after many fruitless attempts to find a situation,
Katusha again went to the registry office, and there met a woman with
bracelets on her bare, plump arms and rings on most of her fingers.
Hearing that Katusha was badly in want of a place, the woman gave her
her address, and invited her to come to her house. Katusha went. The
woman received her very kindly, set cake and sweet wine before her,
then wrote a note and gave it to a servant to take to somebody. In the
evening a tall man, with long, grey hair and a white beard, entered the
room, and sat down at once near Katusha, smiling and gazing at her with
glistening eyes. He began joking with her. The hostess called him away
into the next room, and Katusha heard her say, “A fresh one from the
country,” Then the hostess called Katusha aside and told her that the
man was an author, and that he had a great deal of money, and that if
he liked her he would not grudge her anything. He did like her, and gave
her 25 roubles, promising to see her often. The 25 roubles soon went;
some she paid to her aunt for board and lodging; the rest was spent on
a hat, ribbons, and such like. A few days later the author sent for her,
and she went. He gave her another 25 roubles, and offered her a separate
lodging.
Next door to the lodging rented for her by the author there lived a
jolly young shopman, with whom Katusha soon fell in love. She told
the author, and moved to a little lodging of her own. The shopman, who
promised to marry her, went to Nijni on business without mentioning it
to her, having evidently thrown her up, and Katusha remained alone. She
meant to continue living in the lodging by herself, but was informed
by the police that in this case she would have to get a license. She
returned to her aunt. Seeing her fine dress, her hat, and mantle, her
aunt no longer offered her laundry work. As she understood things, her
niece had risen above that sort of thing. The question as to whether she
was to become a laundress or not did not occur to Katusha, either. She
looked with pity at the thin, hard-worked laundresses, some already in
consumption, who stood washing or ironing with their thin arms in the
fearfully hot front room, which was always full of soapy steam and
draughts from the windows, and thought with horror that she might have
shared the same fate.
Katusha had begun to smoke some time before, and since the young shopman
had thrown her up she was getting more and more into the habit of
drinking. It was not so much the flavour of wine that tempted her as the
fact that it gave her a chance of forgetting the misery she suffered,
making her feel more unrestrained and more confident of her own worth,
which she was not when quite sober; without wine she felt sad and
ashamed. Just at this time a woman came along who offered to place her
in one of the largest establishments in the city, explaining all the
advantages and benefits of the situation. Katusha had the choice before
her of either going into service or accepting this offer--and she chose
the latter. Besides, it seemed to her as though, in this way, she could
revenge herself on her betrayer and the shopman and all those who had
injured her. One of the things that tempted her, and was the cause
of her decision, was the woman telling her she might order her own
dresses--velvet, silk, satin, low-necked ball dresses, anything she
liked. A mental picture of herself in a bright yellow silk trimmed with
black velvet with low neck and short sleeves conquered her, and she gave
up her passport. On the same evening the procuress took an isvostchik
and drove her to the notorious house kept by Carolina Albertovna
Kitaeva.
From that day a life of chronic sin against human and divine laws
commenced for Katusha Maslova, a life which is led by hundreds of
thousands of women, and which is not merely tolerated but sanctioned by
the Government, anxious for the welfare of its subjects; a life
which for nine women out of ten ends in painful disease, premature
decrepitude, and death.
Katusha Maslova lived this life for seven years. During these years she
twice changed houses, and had once been to the hospital. In the seventh
year of this life, when she was twenty-six years old, happened that for
which she was put in prison and for which she was now being taken to
be tried, after more than three months of confinement with thieves and
murderers in the stifling air of a prison.
CHAPTER III.
NEKHLUDOFF.
When Maslova, wearied out by the long walk, reached the building,
accompanied by two soldiers, Prince Dmitri Ivanovitch Nekhludoff, who
had seduced her, was still lying on his high bedstead, with a feather
bed on the top of the spring mattress, in a fine, clean, well-ironed
linen night shirt, smoking a cigarette, and considering what he had to
do to-day, and what had happened yesterday.
Recalling the evening he had spent with the Korchagins, a wealthy and
aristocratic family, whose daughter every one expected he would marry,
he sighed, and, throwing away the end of his cigarette, was going
to take another out of the silver case; but, changing his mind, he
resolutely raised his solid frame, and, putting down his smooth, white
legs, stepped into his slippers, threw his silk dressing gown over his
broad shoulders, and passed into his dressing-room, walking heavily
and quickly. There he carefully cleaned his teeth, many of which were
filled, with tooth powder, and rinsed his mouth with scented elixir.
After that he washed his hands with perfumed soap, cleaned his long
nails with particular care, then, from a tap fixed to his marble
washstand, he let a spray of cold water run over his face and stout
neck. Having finished this part of the business, he went into a third
room, where a shower bath stood ready for him. Having refreshed his
full, white, muscular body, and dried it with a rough bath sheet, he put
on his fine undergarments and his boots, and sat down before the glass
to brush his black beard and his curly hair, that had begun to get thin
above the forehead. Everything he used, everything belonging to his
toilet, his linen, his clothes, boots, necktie, pin, studs, was of the
best quality, very quiet, simple, durable and costly.
Nekhludoff dressed leisurely, and went into the dining-room. A table,
which looked very imposing with its four legs carved in the shape of
lions’ paws, and a huge side-board to match, stood in the oblong room,
the floor of which had been polished by three men the day before. On
the table, which was covered with a fine, starched cloth, stood a silver
coffeepot full of aromatic coffee, a sugar basin, a jug of fresh cream,
and a bread basket filled with fresh rolls, rusks, and biscuits; and
beside the plate lay the last number of the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, a
newspaper, and several letters.
Nekhludoff was just going to open his letters, when a stout, middle-aged
woman in mourning, a lace cap covering the widening parting of her hair,
glided into the room. This was Agraphena Petrovna, formerly lady’s maid
to Nekhludoff’s mother. Her mistress had died quite recently in this
very house, and she remained with the son as his housekeeper. Agraphena
Petrovna had spent nearly ten years, at different times, abroad with
Nekhludoff’s mother, and had the appearance and manners of a lady. She
had lived with the Nekhludoffs from the time she was a child, and had
known Dmitri Ivanovitch at the time when he was still little Mitinka.
“Good-morning, Dmitri Ivanovitch.”
“Good-morning, Agraphena Petrovna. What is it you want?” Nekhludoff
asked.
“A letter from the princess; either from the mother or the daughter.
The maid brought it some time ago, and is waiting in my room,” answered
Agraphena Petrovna, handing him the letter with a significant smile.
“All right! Directly!” said Nekhludoff, taking the letter and frowning
as he noticed Agraphena Petrovna’s smile.
That smile meant that the letter was from the younger Princess
Korchagin, whom Agraphena Petrovna expected him to marry. This
supposition of hers annoyed Nekhludoff.
“Then I’ll tell her to wait?” and Agraphena Petrovna took a crumb brush
which was not in its place, put it away, and sailed out of the room.
Nekhludoff opened the perfumed note, and began reading it.
The note was written on a sheet of thick grey paper, with rough edges;
the writing looked English. It said:
Having assumed the task of acting as your memory, I take the liberty of
reminding you that on this the 28th day of April you have to appear
at the Law Courts, as juryman, and, in consequence, can on no account
accompany us and Kolosoff to the picture gallery, as, with your habitual
flightiness, you promised yesterday; _a moins que vous ne soyez dispose
a payer la cour d’assise les 300 roubles d’amende que vous vous refusez
pour votre cheval,_ for not appearing in time. I remembered it last
night after you were gone, so do not forget.
Princess M. Korchagin.
On the other side was a postscript.
_Maman vous fait dire que votre convert vous attendra jusqu’a la nuit.
Venez absolument a quelle heure que cela soit._
M. K.
Nekhludoff made a grimace. This note was a continuation of that skilful
manoeuvring which the Princess Korchagin had already practised for two
months in order to bind him closer and closer with invisible threads.
And yet, beside the usual hesitation of men past their youth to marry
unless they are very much in love, Nekhludoff had very good reasons why,
even if he did make up his mind to it, he could not propose at once. It
was not that ten years previously he had betrayed and forsaken Maslova;
he had quite forgotten that, and he would not have considered it a
reason for not marrying. No! The reason was that he had a liaison with a
married woman, and, though he considered it broken off, she did not.
Nekhludoff was rather shy with women, and his very shyness awakened in
this married woman, the unprincipled wife of the marechal de noblesse
of a district where Nekhludoff was present at an election, the desire
of vanquishing him. This woman drew him into an intimacy which entangled
him more and more, while it daily became more distasteful to him. Having
succumbed to the temptation, Nekhludoff felt guilty, and had not the
courage to break the tie without her consent. And this was the reason he
did not feel at liberty to propose to Korchagin even if he had wished to
do so. Among the letters on the table was one from this woman’s husband.
Seeing his writing and the postmark, Nekhludoff flushed, and felt his
energies awakening, as they always did when he was facing any kind of
danger.
But his excitement passed at once. The marechal do noblesse, of the
district in which his largest estate lay, wrote only to let Nekhludoff
know that there was to be a special meeting towards the end of May, and
that Nekhludoff was to be sure and come to “_donner un coup d’epaule_,”
at the important debates concerning the schools and the roads, as a
strong opposition by the reactionary party was expected.
The marechal was a liberal, and was quite engrossed in this fight, not
even noticing the misfortune that had befallen him.
Nekhludoff remembered the dreadful moments he had lived through; once
when he thought that the husband had found him out and was going to
challenge him, and he was making up his mind to fire into the air; also
the terrible scene he had with her when she ran out into the park, and
in her excitement tried to drown herself in the pond.
“Well, I cannot go now, and can do nothing until I get a reply from
her,” thought Nekhludoff. A week ago he had written her a decisive
letter, in which he acknowledged his guilt, and his readiness to atone
for it; but at the same time he pronounced their relations to be at an
end, for her own good, as he expressed it. To this letter he had as yet
received no answer. This might prove a good sign, for if she did not
agree to break off their relations, she would have written at once, or
even come herself, as she had done before. Nekhludoff had heard that
there was some officer who was paying her marked attention, and this
tormented him by awakening jealousy, and at the same time encouraged him
with the hope of escape from the deception that was oppressing him.
The other letter was from his steward. The steward wrote to tell
him that a visit to his estates was necessary in order to enter into
possession, and also to decide about the further management of his
lands; whether it was to continue in the same way as when his mother was
alive, or whether, as he had represented to the late lamented princess,
and now advised the young prince, they had not better increase their
stock and farm all the land now rented by the peasants themselves. The
steward wrote that this would be a far more profitable way of managing
the property; at the same time, he apologised for not having forwarded
the 3,000 roubles income due on the 1st. This money would be sent on by
the next mail. The reason for the delay was that he could not get the
money out of the peasants, who had grown so untrustworthy that he had
to appeal to the authorities. This letter was partly disagreeable, and
partly pleasant. It was pleasant to feel that he had power over so
large a property, and yet disagreeable, because Nekhludoff had been an
enthusiastic admirer of Henry George and Herbert Spencer. Being himself
heir to a large property, he was especially struck by the position
taken up by Spencer in Social Statics, that justice forbids private
landholding, and with the straightforward resoluteness of his age, had
not merely spoken to prove that land could not be looked upon as private
property, and written essays on that subject at the university, but had
acted up to his convictions, and, considering it wrong to hold landed
property, had given the small piece of land he had inherited from his
father to the peasants. Inheriting his mother’s large estates, and thus
becoming a landed proprietor, he had to choose one of two things: either
to give up his property, as he had given up his father’s land ten years
before, or silently to confess that all his former ideas were mistaken
and false.
He could not choose the former because he had no means but the landed
estates (he did not care to serve); moreover, he had formed luxurious
habits which he could not easily give up. Besides, he had no longer the
same inducements; his strong convictions, the resoluteness of youth, and
the ambitious desire to do something unusual were gone. As to the second
course, that of denying those clear and unanswerable proofs of the
injustice of landholding, which he had drawn from Spencer’s Social
Statics, and the brilliant corroboration of which he had at a later
period found in the works of Henry George, such a course was impossible
to him.
CHAPTER IV.
MISSY.
When Nekhludoff had finished his coffee, he went to his study to look
at the summons, and find out what time he was to appear at the court,
before writing his answer to the princess. Passing through his studio,
where a few studies hung on the walls and, facing the easel, stood an
unfinished picture, a feeling of inability to advance in art, a sense of
his incapacity, came over him. He had often had this feeling, of late,
and explained it by his too finely-developed aesthetic taste; still, the
feeling was a very unpleasant one. Seven years before this he had given
up military service, feeling sure that he had a talent for art, and had
looked down with some disdain at all other activity from the height of
his artistic standpoint. And now it turned out that he had no right
to do so, and therefore everything that reminded him of all this was
unpleasant. He looked at the luxurious fittings of the studio with a
heavy heart, and it was in no cheerful mood that he entered his study,
a large, lofty room fitted up with a view to comfort, convenience,
and elegant appearance. He found the summons at once in a pigeon hole,
labelled “immediate,” of his large writing table. He had to appear at
the court at 11 o’clock.
Nekhludoff sat down to write a note in reply to the princess, thanking
her for the invitation, and promising to try and come to dinner. Having
written one note, he tore it up, as it seemed too intimate. He wrote
another, but it was too cold; he feared it might give offence, so he
tore it up, too. He pressed the button of an electric bell, and his
servant, an elderly, morose-looking man, with whiskers and shaved chin
and lip, wearing a grey cotton apron, entered at the door.
“Send to fetch an isvostchik, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And tell the person who is waiting that I send thanks for the
invitation, and shall try to come.”
“Yes, sir.”
“It is not very polite, but I can’t write; no matter, I shall see her
today,” thought Nekhludoff, and went to get his overcoat.
When he came out of the house, an isvostchik he knew, with india-rubber
tires to his trap, was at the door waiting for him. “You had hardly gone
away from Prince Korchagin’s yesterday,” he said, turning half round,
“when I drove up, and the Swiss at the door says, ‘just gone.’” The
isvostchik knew that Nekhludoff visited at the Korchagins, and called
there on the chance of being engaged by him.
“Even the isvostchiks know of my relations with the Korchagins,” thought
Nekhludoff, and again the question whether he should not marry Princess
Korchagin presented itself to him, and he could not decide it either
way, any more than most of the questions that arose in his mind at this
time.
It was in favour of marriage in general, that besides the comforts
of hearth and home, it made a moral life possible, and chiefly that a
family would, so Nekhludoff thought, give an aim to his now empty life.
Against marriage in general was the fear, common to bachelors past
their first youth, of losing freedom, and an unconscious awe before this
mysterious creature, a woman.
In this particular case, in favour of marrying Missy (her name was Mary,
but, as is usual among a certain set, a nickname had been given her)
was that she came of good family, and differed in everything, manner
of speaking, walking, laughing, from the common people, not by anything
exceptional, but by her “good breeding”--he could find no other term
for this quality, though he prized it very highly---and, besides, she
thought more of him than of anybody else, therefore evidently understood
him. This understanding of him, i.e., the recognition of his superior
merits, was to Nekhludoff a proof of her good sense and correct
judgment. Against marrying Missy in particular, was, that in all
likelihood, a girl with even higher qualities could be found, that she
was already 27, and that he was hardly her first love. This last idea
was painful to him. His pride would not reconcile itself with the
thought that she had loved some one else, even in the past. Of course,
she could not have known that she should meet him, but the thought that
she was capable of loving another offended him. So that he had as many
reasons for marrying as against it; at any rate, they weighed equally
with Nekhludoff, who laughed at himself, and called himself the ass of
the fable, remaining like that animal undecided which haycock to turn
to.
“At any rate, before I get an answer from Mary Vasilievna (the
marechal’s wife), and finish completely with her, I can do nothing,” he
said to himself. And the conviction that he might, and was even obliged,
to delay his decision, was comforting. “Well, I shall consider all that
later on,” he said to himself, as the trap drove silently along the
asphalt pavement up to the doors of the Court.
“Now I must fulfil my public duties conscientiously, as I am in the
habit of always doing, and as I consider it right to do. Besides, they
are often interesting.” And he entered the hall of the Law Courts, past
the doorkeeper.
CHAPTER V.
THE JURYMEN.
The corridors of the Court were already full of activity. The attendants
hurried, out of breath, dragging their feet along the ground without
lifting them, backwards and forwards, with all sorts of messages and
papers. Ushers, advocates, and law officers passed hither and thither.
Plaintiffs, and those of the accused who were not guarded, wandered
sadly along the walls or sat waiting.
“Where is the Law Court?” Nekhludoff asked of an attendant.
“Which? There is the Civil Court and the Criminal Court.”
“I am on the jury.”
“The Criminal Court you should have said. Here to the right, then to the
left--the second door.”
Nekhludoff followed the direction.
Meanwhile some of the Criminal Court jurymen who were late had hurriedly
passed into a separate room. At the door mentioned two men stood
waiting.
One, a tall, fat merchant, a kind-hearted fellow, had evidently partaken
of some refreshments and a glass of something, and was in most pleasant
spirits. The other was a shopman of Jewish extraction. They were talking
about the price of wool when Nekhludoff came up and asked them if this
was the jurymen’s room.
“Yes, my dear sir, this is it. One of us? On the jury, are you?” asked
the merchant, with a merry wink.
“Ah, well, we shall have a go at the work together,” he continued, after
Nekhludoff had answered in the affirmative. “My name is Baklasheff,
merchant of the Second Guild,” he said, putting out his broad, soft,
flexible hand.
“With whom have I the honour?”
Nekhludoff gave his name and passed into the jurymen’s room.
Inside the room were about ten persons of all sorts. They had come but
a short while ago, and some were sitting, others walking up and down,
looking at each other, and making each other’s acquaintance. There was a
retired colonel in uniform; some were in frock coats, others in morning
coats, and only one wore a peasant’s dress.
Their faces all had a certain look of satisfaction at the prospect of
fulfilling a public duty, although many of them had had to leave their
businesses, and most were complaining of it.
The jurymen talked among themselves about the weather, the early spring,
and the business before them, some having been introduced, others just
guessing who was who. Those who were not acquainted with Nekhludoff made
haste to get introduced, evidently looking upon this as an honour, and
he taking it as his due, as he always did when among strangers. Had he
been asked why he considered himself above the majority of people, he
could not have given an answer; the life he had been living of late was
not particularly meritorious. The fact of his speaking English, French,
and German with a good accent, and of his wearing the best linen,
clothes, ties, and studs, bought from the most expensive dealers in
these goods, he quite knew would not serve as a reason for claiming
superiority. At the same time he did claim superiority, and accepted the
respect paid him as his due, and was hurt if he did not get it. In the
jurymen’s room his feelings were hurt by disrespectful treatment. Among
the jury there happened to be a man whom he knew, a former teacher of
his sister’s children, Peter Gerasimovitch. Nekhludoff never knew his
surname, and even bragged a bit about this. This man was now a master
at a public school. Nekhludoff could not stand his familiarity, his
self-satisfied laughter, his vulgarity, in short.
“Ah ha! You’re also trapped.” These were the words, accompanied with
boisterous laughter, with which Peter Gerasimovitch greeted Nekhludoff.
“Have you not managed to get out of it?”
“I never meant to get out of it,” replied Nekhludoff, gloomily, and in a
tone of severity.
“Well, I call this being public spirited. But just wait until you get
hungry or sleepy; you’ll sing to another tune then.”
“This son of a priest will be saying ‘thou’ [in Russian, as in many
other languages, ‘thou’ is used generally among people very familiar
with each other, or by superiors to inferiors] to me next,” thought
Nekhludoff, and walked away, with such a look of sadness on his face,
as might have been natural if he had just heard of the death of all
his relations. He came up to a group that had formed itself round a
clean-shaven, tall, dignified man, who was recounting something with
great animation. This man was talking about the trial going on in the
Civil Court as of a case well known to himself, mentioning the judges
and a celebrated advocate by name. He was saying that it seemed
wonderful how the celebrated advocate had managed to give such a clever
turn to the affair that an old lady, though she had the right on her
side, would have to pay a large sum to her opponent. “The advocate is a
genius,” he said.
The listeners heard it all with respectful attention, and several of
them tried to put in a word, but the man interrupted them, as if he
alone knew all about it.
Though Nekhludoff had arrived late, he had to wait a long time. One
of the members of the Court had not yet come, and everybody was kept
waiting.
CHAPTER VI.
THE JUDGES.
The president, who had to take the chair, had arrived early. The
president was a tall, stout man, with long grey whiskers. Though
married, he led a very loose life, and his wife did the same, so they
did not stand in each other’s way. This morning he had received a note
from a Swiss girl, who had formerly been a governess in his house, and
who was now on her way from South Russia to St. Petersburg. She wrote
that she would wait for him between five and six p.m. in the Hotel
Italia. This made him wish to begin and get through the sitting as soon
as possible, so as to have time to call before six p.m. on the little
red-haired Clara Vasilievna, with whom he had begun a romance in the
country last summer. He went into a private room, latched the door, took
a pair of dumb-bells out of a cupboard, moved his arms 20 times upwards,
downwards, forwards, and sideways, then holding the dumb-bells above his
head, lightly bent his knees three times.
“Nothing keeps one going like a cold bath and exercise,” he said,
feeling the biceps of his right arm with his left hand, on the third
finger of which he wore a gold ring. He had still to do the moulinee
movement (for he always went through those two exercises before a long
sitting), when there was a pull at the door. The president quickly put
away the dumb-bells and opened the door, saying, “I beg your pardon.”
One of the members, a high-shouldered, discontented-looking man, with
gold spectacles, came into the room. “Matthew Nikitich has again not
come,” he said, in a dissatisfied tone.
“Not yet?” said the president, putting on his uniform. “He is always
late.”
“It is extraordinary. He ought to be ashamed of himself,” said the
member, angrily, and taking out a cigarette.
This member, a very precise man, had had an unpleasant encounter with
his wife in the morning, because she had spent her allowance before the
end of the month, and had asked him to give her some money in advance,
but he would not give way to her, and they had a quarrel. The wife told
him that if he were going to behave so, he need not expect any dinner;
there would be no dinner for him at home. At this point he left, fearing
that she might carry out her threat, for anything might be expected from
her. “This comes of living a good, moral life,” he thought, looking at
the beaming, healthy, cheerful, and kindly president, who, with elbows
far apart, was smoothing his thick grey whiskers with his fine white
hands over the embroidered collar of his uniform. “He is always
contented and merry while I am suffering.”
The secretary came in and brought some document.
“Thanks, very much,” said the president, lighting a cigarette. “Which
case shall we take first, then?”
“The poisoning case, I should say,” answered the secretary, with
indifference.
“All right; the poisoning case let it be,” said the president, thinking
that he could get this case over by four o’clock, and then go away. “And
Matthew Nikitich; has he come?”
“Not yet.”
“And Breve?”
“He is here,” replied the secretary.
“Then if you see him, please tell him that we begin with the poisoning
case.” Breve was the public prosecutor, who was to read the indictment
in this case.
In the corridor the secretary met Breve, who, with up lifted shoulders,
a portfolio under one arm, the other swinging with the palm turned to
the front, was hurrying along the corridor, clattering with his heels.
“Michael Petrovitch wants to know if you are ready?” the secretary
asked.
“Of course; I am always ready,” said the public prosecutor. “What are we
taking first?”
“The poisoning case.”
“That’s quite right,” said the public prosecutor, but did not think it
at all right. He had spent the night in a hotel playing cards with a
friend who was giving a farewell party. Up to five in the morning they
played and drank, so he had no time to look at this poisoning case,
and meant to run it through now. The secretary, happening to know this,
advised the president to begin with the poisoning case. The secretary
was a Liberal, even a Radical, in opinion.
Breve was a Conservative; the secretary disliked him, and envied him his
position.
“Well, and how about the Skoptzy?” [a religious sect] asked the
secretary.
“I have already said that I cannot do it without witnesses, and so I
shall say to the Court.”
“Dear me, what does it matter?”
“I cannot do it,” said Breve; and, waving his arm, he ran into his
private room.
He was putting off the case of the Skoptzy on account of the absence
of a very unimportant witness, his real reason being that if they were
tried by an educated jury they might possibly be acquitted.
By an agreement with the president this case was to be tried in the
coming session at a provincial town, where there would be more peasants,
and, therefore, more chances of conviction.
The movement in the corridor increased. The people crowded most at
the doors of the Civil Court, in which the case that the dignified man
talked about was being heard.
An interval in the proceeding occurred, and the old woman came out of
the court, whose property that genius of an advocate had found means of
getting for his client, a person versed in law who had no right to it
whatever. The judges knew all about the case, and the advocate and his
client knew it better still, but the move they had invented was such
that it was impossible not to take the old woman’s property and not to
hand it over to the person versed in law.
The old woman was stout, well dressed, and had enormous flowers on her
bonnet; she stopped as she came out of the door, and spreading out her
short fat arms and turning to her advocate, she kept repeating. “What
does it all mean? just fancy!”
The advocate was looking at the flowers in her bonnet, and evidently not
listening to her, but considering some question or other.
Next to the old woman, out of the door of the Civil Court, his broad,
starched shirt front glistening from under his low-cut waistcoat, with
a self-satisfied look on his face, came the celebrated advocate who had
managed to arrange matters so that the old woman lost all she had, and
the person versed in the law received more than 100,000 roubles. The
advocate passed close to the old woman, and, feeling all eyes directed
towards him, his whole bearing seemed to say: “No expressions of
deference are required.”
CHAPTER VII.
THE OFFICIALS OF THE COURT.
At last Matthew Nikitich also arrived, and the usher, a thin man, with a
long neck and a kind of sideways walk, his nether lip protruding to one
side, which made him resemble a turkey, came into the jurymen’s room.
This usher was an honest man, and had a university education, but could
not keep a place for any length of time, as he was subject to fits of
drunkenness. Three months before a certain countess, who patronised his
wife, had found him this place, and he was very pleased to have kept it
so long.
“Well, sirs, is everybody here?” he asked, putting his pince-nez on his
nose, and looking round.
“Everybody, I think,” said the jolly merchant.
“All right; we’ll soon see.” And, taking a list from his pocket, he
began calling out the names, looking at the men, sometimes through and
sometimes over his pince-nez.
“Councillor of State, [grades such as this are common in Russia, and
mean very little] J. M. Nikiforoff!”
“I am he,” said the dignified-looking man, well versed in the habits of
the law court.
“Ivan Semionovitch Ivanoff, retired colonel!”
“Here!” replied a thin man, in the uniform of a retired officer.
“Merchant of the Second Guild, Peter Baklasheff!”
“Here we are, ready!” said the good-humoured merchant, with a broad
smile.
“Lieutenant of the Guards, Prince Dmitri Nekhludoff!”
“I am he,” answered Nekhludoff.
The usher bowed to him, looking over his pince-nez, politely and
pleasantly, as if wishing to distinguish him from the others.
“Captain Youri Demitrievitch-Dantchenko, merchant; Grigori Euphimitch
Kouleshoff,” etc. All but two were present.
“Now please to come to the court, gentlemen,” said the usher, pointing
to the door, with an amiable wave of his hand.
All moved towards the door, pausing to let each other pass. Then they
went through the corridor into the court.
The court was a large, long room. At one end there was a raised
platform, with three steps leading up to it, on which stood a table,
covered with a green cloth trimmed with a fringe of a darker shade. At
the table were placed three arm-chairs, with high-carved oak backs; on
the wall behind them hung a full-length, brightly-coloured portrait of
the Emperor in uniform and ribbon, with one foot in advance, and holding
a sword. In the right corner hung a case, with an image of Christ
crowned with thorns, and beneath it stood a lectern, and on the same
side the prosecuting attorney’s desk. On the left, opposite the desk,
was the secretary’s table, and in front of it, nearer the public, an
oak grating, with the prisoners’ bench, as yet unoccupied, behind
it. Besides all this, there were on the right side of the platform
high-backed ashwood chairs for the jury, and on the floor below tables
for the advocates. All this was in the front part of the court, divided
from the back by a grating.
The back was all taken up by seats in tiers. Sitting on the front seats
were four women, either servant or factory girls, and two working men,
evidently overawed by the grandeur of the room, and not venturing to
speak above a whisper.
Soon after the jury had come in the usher entered, with his sideward
gait, and stepping to the front, called out in a loud voice, as if he
meant to frighten those present, “The Court is coming!” Every one got
up as the members stepped on to the platform. Among them the president,
with his muscles and fine whiskers. Next came the gloomy member of the
Court, who was now more gloomy than ever, having met his brother-in-law,
who informed him that he had just called in to see his sister (the
member’s wife), and that she had told him that there would be no dinner
there.
“So that, evidently, we shall have to call in at a cook shop,” the
brother-in-law added, laughing.
“It is not at all funny,” said the gloomy member, and became gloomier
still.
Then at last came the third member of the Court, the same Matthew
Nikitich, who was always late. He was a bearded man, with large, round,
kindly eyes. He was suffering from a catarrh of the stomach, and,
according to his doctor’s advice, he had begun trying a new treatment,
and this had kept him at home longer than usual. Now, as he was
ascending the platform, he had a pensive air. He was in the habit of
making guesses in answer to all sorts of self-put questions by different
curious means. Just now he had asked whether the new treatment would be
beneficial, and had decided that it would cure his catarrh if the number
of steps from the door to his chair would divide by three. He made 26
steps, but managed to get in a 27th just by his chair.
The figures of the president and the members in their uniforms, with
gold-embroidered collars, looked very imposing. They seemed to feel this
themselves, and, as if overpowered by their own grandeur, hurriedly sat
down on the high backed chairs behind the table with the green cloth,
on which were a triangular article with an eagle at the top, two glass
vases--something like those in which sweetmeats are kept in refreshment
rooms--an inkstand, pens, clean paper, and good, newly-cut pencils of
different kinds.
The public prosecutor came in with the judges. With his portfolio under
one arm, and swinging the other, he hurriedly walked to his seat near
the window, and was instantly absorbed in reading and looking through
the papers, not wasting a single moment, in hope of being ready when the
business commenced. He had been public prosecutor but a short time, and
had only prosecuted four times before this. He was very ambitious,
and had firmly made up his mind to get on, and therefore thought it
necessary to get a conviction whenever he prosecuted. He knew the chief
facts of the poisoning case, and had already formed a plan of action. He
only wanted to copy out a few points which he required.
The secretary sat on the opposite side of the platform, and, having
got ready all the papers he might want, was looking through an article,
prohibited by the censor, which he had procured and read the day before.
He was anxious to have a talk about this article with the bearded
member, who shared his views, but wanted to look through it once more
before doing so.
CHAPTER VIII.
SWEARING IN THE JURY.
The president, having looked through some papers and put a few questions
to the usher and the secretary, gave the order for the prisoners to be
brought in.
The door behind the grating was instantly opened, and two gendarmes,
with caps on their heads, and holding naked swords in their hands,
came in, followed by the prisoners, a red-haired, freckled man, and two
women. The man wore a prison cloak, which was too long and too wide for
him. He stuck out his thumbs, and held his arms close to his sides, thus
keeping the sleeves, which were also too long, from slipping over his
hands. Without looking at the judges he gazed steadfastly at the form,
and passing to the other side of it, he sat down carefully at the very
edge, leaving plenty of room for the others. He fixed his eyes on the
president, and began moving the muscles of his cheeks, as if whispering
something. The woman who came next was also dressed in a prison cloak,
and had a prison kerchief round her head. She had a sallow complexion,
no eyebrows or lashes, and very red eyes. This woman appeared perfectly
calm. Having caught her cloak against something, she detached it
carefully, without any haste, and sat down.
The third prisoner was Maslova.
As soon as she appeared, the eyes of all the men in the court turned
her way, and remained fixed on her white face, her sparklingly-brilliant
black eyes and the swelling bosom under the prison cloak. Even the
gendarme whom she passed on her way to her seat looked at her fixedly
till she sat down, and then, as if feeling guilty, hurriedly turned
away, shook himself, and began staring at the window in front of him.
The president paused until the prisoners had taken their seats, and when
Maslova was seated, turned to the secretary.
Then the usual procedure commenced; the counting of the jury, remarks
about those who had not come, the fixing of the fines to be exacted
from them, the decisions concerning those who claimed exemption, the
appointing of reserve jurymen.
Having folded up some bits of paper and put them in one of the glass
vases, the president turned up the gold-embroidered cuffs of his uniform
a little way, and began drawing the lots, one by one, and opening them.
Nekhludoff was among the jurymen thus drawn. Then, having let down his
sleeves, the president requested the priest to swear in the jury.
The old priest, with his puffy, red face, his brown gown, and his gold
cross and little order, laboriously moving his stiff legs, came up to
the lectern beneath the icon.
The jurymen got up, and crowded towards the lectern.
“Come up, please,” said the priest, pulling at the cross on his breast
with his plump hand, and waiting till all the jury had drawn near. When
they had all come up the steps of the platform, the priest passed his
bald, grey head sideways through the greasy opening of the stole, and,
having rearranged his thin hair, he again turned to the jury. “Now,
raise your right arms in this way, and put your fingers together, thus,”
he said, with his tremulous old voice, lifting his fat, dimpled hand,
and putting the thumb and two first fingers together, as if taking a
pinch of something. “Now, repeat after me, ‘I promise and swear, by the
Almighty God, by His holy gospels, and by the life-giving cross of
our Lord, that in this work which,’” he said, pausing between each
sentence--“don’t let your arm down; hold it like this,” he remarked to a
young man who had lowered his arm--“‘that in this work which . . . ’”
The dignified man with the whiskers, the colonel, the merchant, and
several more held their arms and fingers as the priest required of
them, very high, very exactly, as if they liked doing it; others did it
unwillingly and carelessly. Some repeated the words too loudly, and with
a defiant tone, as if they meant to say, “In spite of all, I will and
shall speak.” Others whispered very low, and not fast enough, and
then, as if frightened, hurried to catch up the priest. Some kept their
fingers tightly together, as if fearing to drop the pinch of invisible
something they held; others kept separating and folding theirs. Every
one save the old priest felt awkward, but he was sure he was fulfilling
a very useful and important duty.
After the swearing in, the president requested the jury to choose
a foreman, and the jury, thronging to the door, passed out into
the debating-room, where almost all of them at once began to smoke
cigarettes. Some one proposed the dignified man as foreman, and he was
unanimously accepted. Then the jurymen put out their cigarettes and
threw them away and returned to the court. The dignified man informed
the president that he was chosen foreman, and all sat down again on the
high-backed chairs.
Everything went smoothly, quickly, and not without a certain solemnity.
And this exactitude, order, and solemnity evidently pleased those
who took part in it: it strengthened the impression that they were
fulfilling a serious and valuable public duty. Nekhludoff, too, felt
this.
As soon as the jurymen were seated, the president made a speech on
their rights, obligations, and responsibilities. While speaking he kept
changing his position; now leaning on his right, now on his left hand,
now against the back, then on the arms of his chair, now putting the
papers straight, now handling his pencil and paper-knife.
According to his words, they had the right of interrogating the
prisoners through the president, to use paper and pencils, and to
examine the articles put in as evidence. Their duty was to judge not
falsely, but justly. Their responsibility meant that if the secrecy of
their discussion were violated, or communications were established with
outsiders, they would be liable to punishment. Every one listened with
an expression of respectful attention. The merchant, diffusing a smell
of brandy around him, and restraining loud hiccups, approvingly nodded
his head at every sentence.
CHAPTER IX.
THE TRIAL--THE PRISONERS QUESTIONED.
When he had finished his speech, the president turned to the male
prisoner.
“Simeon Kartinkin, rise.”
Simeon jumped up, his lips continuing to move nervously and inaudibly.
“Your name?”
“Simon Petrov Kartinkin,” he said, rapidly, with a cracked voice, having
evidently prepared the answer.
“What class do you belong to?”
“Peasant.”
“What government, district, and parish?”
“Toula Government, Krapivinskia district, Koupianovski parish, the
village Borki.”
“Your age?”
“Thirty-three; born in the year one thousand eight--”
“What religion?”
“Of the Russian religion, orthodox.”
“Married?”
“Oh, no, sir.”
“Your occupation?”
“I had a place in the Hotel Mauritania.”
“Have you ever been tried before?”
“I never got tried before, because, as we used to live formerly--”
“So you never were tried before?”
“God forbid, never.”
“Have you received a copy of the indictment?”
“I have.”
“Sit down.”
“Euphemia Ivanovna Botchkova,” said the president, turning to the next
prisoner.
But Simon continued standing in front of Botchkova.
“Kartinkin, sit down!” Kartinkin continued standing.
“Kartinkin, sit down!” But Kartinkin sat down only when the usher, with
his head on one side, and with preternaturally wide-open eyes, ran up,
and said, in a tragic whisper, “Sit down, sit down!”
Kartinkin sat down as hurriedly as he had risen, wrapping his cloak
round him, and again began moving his lips silently.
“Your name?” asked the president, with a weary sigh at being obliged to
repeat the same questions, without looking at the prisoner, but glancing
over a paper that lay before him. The president was so used to his task
that, in order to get quicker through it all, he did two things at a
time.
Botchkova was forty-three years old, and came from the town of Kalomna.
She, too, had been in service at the Hotel Mauritania.
“I have never been tried before, and have received a copy of the
indictment.” She gave her answers boldly, in a tone of voice as if she
meant to add to each answer, “And I don’t care who knows it, and I won’t
stand any nonsense.”
She did not wait to be told, but sat down as soon as she had replied to
the last question.
“Your name?” turning abruptly to the third prisoner. “You will have to
rise,” he added, softly and gently, seeing that Maslova kept her seat.
Maslova got up and stood, with her chest expanded, looking at the
president with that peculiar expression of readiness in her smiling
black eyes.
“What is your name?”
“Lubov,” she said.
Nekhludoff had put on his pince-nez, looking at the prisoners while they
were being questioned.
“No, it is impossible,” he thought, not taking his eyes off the
prisoner. “Lubov! How can it be?” he thought to himself, after hearing
her answer. The president was going to continue his questions, but
the member with the spectacles interrupted him, angrily whispering
something. The president nodded, and turned again to the prisoner.
“How is this,” he said, “you are not put down here as Lubov?”
The prisoner remained silent.
“I want your real name.”
“What is your baptismal name?” asked the angry member.
“Formerly I used to be called Katerina.”
“No, it cannot be,” said Nekhludoff to himself; and yet he was now
certain that this was she, that same girl, half ward, half servant to
his aunts; that Katusha, with whom he had once been in love, really
in love, but whom he had betrayed and then abandoned, and never again
brought to mind, for the memory would have been too painful, would
have convicted him too clearly, proving that he who was so proud of his
integrity had treated this woman in a revolting, scandalous way.
Yes, this was she. He now clearly saw in her face that strange,
indescribable individuality which distinguishes every face from all
others; something peculiar, all its own, not to be found anywhere else.
In spite of the unhealthy pallor and the fulness of the face, it was
there, this sweet, peculiar individuality; on those lips, in the slight
squint of her eyes, in the voice, particularly in the naive smile, and
in the expression of readiness on the face and figure.
“You should have said so,” remarked the president, again in a gentle
tone. “Your patronymic?”
“I am illegitimate.”
“Well, were you not called by your godfather’s name?”
“Yes, Mikhaelovna.”
“And what is it she can be guilty of?” continued Nekhludoff, in his
mind, unable to breathe freely.
“Your family name--your surname, I mean?” the president went on.
“They used to call me by my mother’s surname, Maslova.”
“What class?”
“Meschanka.” [the lowest town class or grade]
“Religion--orthodox?”
“Orthodox.”
“Occupation. What was your occupation?”
Maslova remained silent.
“What was your employment?”
“You know yourself,” she said, and smiled. Then, casting a hurried look
round the room, again turned her eyes on the president.
There was something so unusual in the expression of her face, so
terrible and piteous in the meaning of the words she had uttered, in
this smile, and in the furtive glance she had cast round the room, that
the president was abashed, and for a few minutes silence reigned in the
court. The silence was broken by some one among the public laughing,
then somebody said “Ssh,” and the president looked up and continued:
“Have you ever been tried before?”
“Never,” answered Maslova, softly, and sighed.
“Have you received a copy of the indictment?”
“I have,” she answered.
“Sit down.”
The prisoner leant back to pick up her skirt in the way a fine lady
picks up her train, and sat down, folding her small white hands in the
sleeves of her cloak, her eyes fixed on the president. Her face was calm
again.
The witnesses were called, and some sent away; the doctor who was to act
as expert was chosen and called into the court.
Then the secretary got up and began reading the indictment. He read
distinctly, though he pronounced the “I” and “r” alike, with a loud
voice, but so quickly that the words ran into one another and formed one
uninterrupted, dreary drone.
The judges bent now on one, now on the other arm of their chairs, then
on the table, then back again, shut and opened their eyes, and whispered
to each other. One of the gendarmes several times repressed a yawn.
The prisoner Kartinkin never stopped moving his cheeks. Botchkova sat
quite still and straight, only now and then scratching her head under
the kerchief.
Maslova sat immovable, gazing at the reader; only now and then she gave
a slight start, as if wishing to reply, blushed, sighed heavily, and
changed the position of her hands, looked round, and again fixed her
eyes on the reader.
Nekhludoff sat in the front row on his high-backed chair, without
removing his pince-nez, and looked at Maslova, while a complicated and
fierce struggle was going on in his soul.
CHAPTER X.
THE TRIAL--THE INDICTMENT.
The indictment ran as follows: On the 17th of January, 18--, in the
lodging-house Mauritania, occurred the sudden death of the Second Guild
merchant, Therapont Emilianovich Smelkoff, of Kourgan.
The local police doctor of the fourth district certified that death was
due to rupture of the heart, owing to the excessive use of alcoholic
liquids. The body of the said Smelkoff was interred. After several days
had elapsed, the merchant Timokhin, a fellow-townsman and companion
of the said Smelkoff, returned from St. Petersburg, and hearing the
circumstances that accompanied the death of the latter, notified his
suspicions that the death was caused by poison, given with intent to
rob the said Smelkoff of his money. This suspicion was corroborated on
inquiry, which proved:
1. That shortly before his death the said Smelkoff had received the sum
of 3,800 roubles from the bank. When an inventory of the property of the
deceased was made, only 312 roubles and 16 copecks were found.
2. The whole day and night preceding his death the said Smelkoff spent
with Lubka (alias Katerina Maslova) at her home and in the lodging-house
Mauritania, which she also visited at the said Smelkoff’s request during
his absence, to get some money, which she took out of his portmanteau in
the presence of the servants of the lodging-house Mauritania, Euphemia
Botchkova and Simeon Kartinkin, with a key given her by the said
Smelkoff. In the portmanteau opened by the said Maslova, the said
Botchkova and Kartinkin saw packets of 100-rouble bank-notes.
3. On the said Smelkoff’s return to the lodging-house Mauritania,
together with Lubka, the latter, in accordance with the attendant
Kartinkin’s advice, gave the said Smelkoff some white powder given to
her by the said Kartinkin, dissolved in brandy.
4. The next morning the said Lubka (alias Katerina Maslova) sold to her
mistress, the witness Kitaeva, a brothel-keeper, a diamond ring given to
her, as she alleged, by the said Smelkoff.
5. The housemaid of the lodging-house Mauritania, Euphemia Botchkova,
placed to her account in the local Commercial Bank 1,800 roubles. The
postmortem examination of the body of the said Smelkoff and the chemical
analysis of his intestines proved beyond doubt the presence of poison
in the organism, so that there is reason to believe that the said
Smelkoff’s death was caused by poisoning.
When cross-examined, the accused, Maslova, Botchkova, and Kartinkin,
pleaded not guilty, deposing--Maslova, that she had really been sent by
Smelkoff from the brothel, where she “works,” as she expresses it, to
the lodging-house Mauritania to get the merchant some money, and that,
having unlocked the portmanteau with a key given her by the merchant,
she took out 40 roubles, as she was told to do, and that she had taken
nothing more; that Botchkova and Kartinkin, in whose presence she
unlocked and locked the portmanteau, could testify to the truth of the
statement.
She gave this further evidence--that when she came to the lodging-house
for the second time she did, at the instigation of Simeon Kartinkin,
give Smelkoff some kind of powder, which she thought was a narcotic,
in a glass of brandy, hoping he would fall asleep and that she would be
able to get away from him; and that Smelkoff, having beaten her, himself
gave her the ring when she cried and threatened to go away.
The accused, Euphemia Botchkova, stated that she knew nothing about the
missing money, that she had not even gone into Smelkoff’s room, but
that Lubka had been busy there all by herself; that if anything had
been stolen, it must have been done by Lubka when she came with the
merchant’s key to get his money.
At this point Maslova gave a start, opened her mouth, and looked at
Botchkova. “When,” continued the secretary, “the receipt for 1,800
roubles from the bank was shown to Botchkova, and she was asked where
she had obtained the money, she said that it was her own earnings for
12 years, and those of Simeon, whom she was going to marry. The accused
Simeon Kartinkin, when first examined, confessed that he and Botchkova,
at the instigation of Maslova, who had come with the key from the
brothel, had stolen the money and divided it equally among themselves
and Maslova.” Here Maslova again started, half-rose from her seat, and,
blushing scarlet, began to say something, but was stopped by the usher.
“At last,” the secretary continued, reading, “Kartinkin confessed also
that he had supplied the powders in order to get Smelkoff to sleep. When
examined the second time he denied having had anything to do with the
stealing of the money or giving Maslova the powders, accusing her of
having done it alone.”
Concerning the money placed in the bank by Botchkova, he said the same
as she, that is, that the money was given to them both by the lodgers in
tips during 12 years’ service.
The indictment concluded as follows:
In consequence of the foregoing, the peasant of the village Borki,
Simeon Kartinkin, 33 years of age, the meschanka Euphemia Botchkova, 43
years of age, and the meschanka Katerina Maslova, 27 years of age, are
accused of having on the 17th day of January, 188--, jointly stolen from
the said merchant, Smelkoff, a ring and money, to the value of 2,500
roubles, and of having given the said merchant, Smelkoff, poison to
drink, with intent of depriving him of life, and thereby causing his
death. This crime is provided for in clause 1,455 of the Penal Code,
paragraphs 4 and 5.
CHAPTER XI.
THE TRIAL--MASLOVA CROSS-EXAMINED.
When the reading of the indictment was over, the president, after having
consulted the members, turned to Kartinkin, with an expression that
plainly said: Now we shall find out the whole truth down to the minutest
detail.
“Peasant Simeon Kartinkin,” he said, stooping to the left.
Simeon Kartinkin got up, stretched his arms down his sides, and leaning
forward with his whole body, continued moving his cheeks inaudibly.
“You are accused of having on the 17th January, 188--, together with
Euphemia Botchkova and Katerina Maslova, stolen money from a portmanteau
belonging to the merchant Smelkoff, and then, having procured some
arsenic, persuaded Katerina Maslova to give it to the merchant Smelkoff
in a glass of brandy, which was the cause of Smelkoff’s death. Do you
plead guilty?” said the president, stooping to the right.
“Not nohow, because our business is to attend on the lodgers, and--”
“You’ll tell us that afterwards. Do you plead guilty?”
“Oh, no, sir. I only,--”
“You’ll tell us that afterwards. Do you plead guilty?” quietly and
firmly asked the president.
“Can’t do such a thing, because that--”
The usher again rushed up to Simeon Kartinkin, and stopped him in a
tragic whisper.
The president moved the hand with which he held the paper and placed the
elbow in a different position with an air that said: “This is finished,”
and turned to Euphemia Botchkova.
“Euphemia Botchkova, you are accused of having, on the 17th of January,
188-, in the lodging-house Mauritania, together with Simeon Kartinkin
and Katerina Maslova, stolen some money and a ring out of the merchant
Smelkoff’s portmanteau, and having shared the money among yourselves,
given poison to the merchant Smelkoff, thereby causing his death. Do you
plead guilty?”
“I am not guilty of anything,” boldly and firmly replied the prisoner.
“I never went near the room, but when this baggage went in she did the
whole business.”
“You will say all this afterwards,” the president again said, quietly
and firmly. “So you do not plead guilty?”
“I did not take the money nor give the drink, nor go into the room. Had
I gone in I should have kicked her out.”
“So you do not plead guilty?”
“Never.”
“Very well.”
“Katerina Maslova,” the president began, turning to the third prisoner,
“you are accused of having come from the brothel with the key of the
merchant Smelkoff’s portmanteau, money, and a ring.” He said all this
like a lesson learned by heart, leaning towards the member on his left,
who was whispering into his ear that a bottle mentioned in the list
of the material evidence was missing. “Of having stolen out of the
portmanteau money and a ring,” he repeated, “and shared it. Then,
returning to the lodging house Mauritania with Smelkoff, of giving
him poison in his drink, and thereby causing his death. Do you plead
guilty?”
“I am not guilty of anything,” she began rapidly. “As I said before
I say again, I did not take it--I did not take it; I did not take
anything, and the ring he gave me himself.”
“You do not plead guilty of having stolen 2,500 roubles?” asked the
president.
“I’ve said I took nothing but the 40 roubles.”
“Well, and do you plead guilty of having given the merchant Smelkoff a
powder in his drink?”
“Yes, that I did. Only I believed what they told me, that they were
sleeping powders, and that no harm could come of them. I never thought,
and never wished. . . God is my witness; I say, I never meant this,” she
said.
“So you do not plead guilty of having stolen the money and the ring from
the merchant Smelkoff, but confess that you gave him the powder?” said
the president.
“Well, yes, I do confess this, but I thought they were sleeping powders.
I only gave them to make him sleep; I never meant and never thought of
worse.”
“Very well,” said the president, evidently satisfied with the results
gained. “Now tell us how it all happened,” and he leaned back in his
chair and put his folded hands on the table. “Tell us all about it. A
free and full confession will be to your advantage.”
Maslova continued to look at the president in silence, and blushing.
“Tell us how it happened.”
“How it happened?” Maslova suddenly began, speaking quickly. “I came to
the lodging-house, and was shown into the room. He was there, already
very drunk.” She pronounced the word _he_ with a look of horror in her
wide-open eyes. “I wished to go away, but he would not let me.” She
stopped, as if having lost the thread, or remembered some thing else.
“Well, and then?”
“Well, what then? I remained a bit, and went home again.”
At this moment the public prosecutor raised himself a little, leaning on
one elbow in an awkward manner.
“You would like to put a question?” said the president, and having
received an answer in the affirmative, he made a gesture inviting the
public prosecutor to speak.
“I want to ask, was the prisoner previously acquainted with Simeon
Kartinkin?” said the public prosecutor, without looking at Maslova, and,
having put the question, he compressed his lips and frowned.
The president repeated the question. Maslova stared at the public
prosecutor, with a frightened look.
“With Simeon? Yes,” she said.
“I should like to know what the prisoner’s acquaintance with Kartinkin
consisted in. Did they meet often?”
“Consisted in? . . . He invited me for the lodgers; it was not an
acquaintance at all,” answered Maslova, anxiously moving her eyes from
the president to the public prosecutor and back to the president.
“I should like to know why Kartinkin invited only Maslova, and none
of the other girls, for the lodgers?” said the public prosecutor, with
half-closed eyes and a cunning, Mephistophelian smile.
“I don’t know. How should I know?” said Maslova, casting a frightened
look round, and fixing her eyes for a moment on Nekhludoff. “He asked
whom he liked.”
“Is it possible that she has recognised me?” thought Nekhludoff, and the
blood rushed to his face. But Maslova turned away without distinguishing
him from the others, and again fixed her eyes anxiously on the public
prosecutor.
“So the prisoner denies having had any intimate relations with
Kartinkin? Very well, I have no more questions to ask.”
And the public prosecutor took his elbow off the desk, and began writing
something. He was not really noting anything down, but only going over
the letters of his notes with a pen, having seen the procureur and
leading advocates, after putting a clever question, make a note, with
which, later on, to annihilate their adversaries.
The president did not continue at once, because he was consulting the
member with the spectacles, whether he was agreed that the questions
(which had all been prepared be forehand and written out) should be put.
“Well! What happened next?” he then went on.
“I came home,” looking a little more boldly only at the president, “and
went to bed. Hardly had I fallen asleep when one of our girls, Bertha,
woke me. ‘Go, your merchant has come again!’ He”--she again uttered the
word _he_ with evident horror--“he kept treating our girls, and then
wanted to send for more wine, but his money was all gone, and he sent me
to his lodgings and told me where the money was, and how much to take.
So I went.”
The president was whispering to the member on his left, but, in order to
appear as if he had heard, he repeated her last words.
“So you went. Well, what next?”
“I went, and did all he told me; went into his room. I did not go alone,
but called Simeon Kartinkin and her,” she said, pointing to Botchkova.
“That’s a lie; I never went in,” Botchkova began, but was stopped.
“In their presence I took out four notes,” continued Maslova, frowning,
without looking at Botchkova.
“Yes, but did the prisoner notice,” again asked the prosecutor, “how
much money there was when she was getting out the 40 roubles?”
Maslova shuddered when the prosecutor addressed her; she did not know
why it was, but she felt that he wished her evil.
“I did not count it, but only saw some 100-rouble notes.”
“Ah! The prisoner saw 100-rouble notes. That’s all?”
“Well, so you brought back the money,” continued the president, looking
at the clock.
“I did.”
“Well, and then?”
“Then he took me back with him,” said Maslova.
“Well, and how did you give him the powder? In his drink?”
“How did I give it? I put them in and gave it him.”
“Why did you give it him?”
She did not answer, but sighed deeply and heavily.
“He would not let me go,” she said, after a moment’s silence, “and I was
quite tired out, and so I went out into the passage and said to Simeon,
‘If he would only let me go, I am so tired.’ And he said, ‘We are also
sick of him; we were thinking of giving him a sleeping draught; he will
fall asleep, and then you can go.’ So I said all right. I thought they
were harmless, and he gave me the packet. I went in. He was lying behind
the partition, and at once called for brandy. I took a bottle of ‘fine
champagne’ from the table, poured out two glasses, one for him and one
for myself, and put the powders into his glass, and gave it him. Had I
known how could I have given them to him?”
“Well, and how did the ring come into your possession?” asked the
president. “When did he give it you?”
“That was when we came back to his lodgings. I wanted to go away, and he
gave me a knock on the head and broke my comb. I got angry and said I’d
go away, and he took the ring off his finger and gave it to me so that I
should not go,” she said.
Then the public prosecutor again slightly raised himself, and, putting
on an air of simplicity, asked permission to put a few more questions,
and, having received it, bending his head over his embroidered collar,
he said: “I should like to know how long the prisoner remained in the
merchant Smelkoff’s room.”
Maslova again seemed frightened, and she again looked anxiously from the
public prosecutor to the president, and said hurriedly:
“I do not remember how long.”
“Yes, but does the prisoner remember if she went anywhere else in the
lodging-house after she left Smelkoff?”
Maslova considered for a moment. “Yes, I did go into an empty room next
to his.”
“Yes, and why did you go in?” asked the public prosecutor, forgetting
himself, and addressing her directly.
“I went in to rest a bit, and to wait for an isvostchik.”
“And was Kartinkin in the room with the prisoner, or not?”
“He came in.”
“Why did he come in?”
“There was some of the merchant’s brandy left, and we finished it
together.”
“Oh, finished it together. Very well! And did the prisoner talk to
Kartinkin, and, if so, what about?”
Maslova suddenly frowned, blushed very red, and said, hurriedly, “What
about? I did not talk about anything, and that’s all I know. Do what you
like with me; I am not guilty, and that’s all.”
“I have nothing more to ask,” said the prosecutor, and, drawing up his
shoulders in an unnatural manner, began writing down, as the prisoner’s
own evidence, in the notes for his speech, that she had been in the
empty room with Kartinkin.
There was a short silence.
“You have nothing more to say?”
“I have told everything,” she said, with a sigh, and sat down.
Then the president noted something down, and, having listened to
something that the member on his left whispered to him, he announced
a ten-minutes’ interval, rose hurriedly, and left the court. The
communication he had received from the tall, bearded member with
the kindly eyes was that the member, having felt a slight stomach
derangement, wished to do a little massage and to take some drops. And
this was why an interval was made.
When the judges had risen, the advocates, the jury, and the witnesses
also rose, with the pleasant feeling that part of the business was
finished, and began moving in different directions.
Nekhludoff went into the jury’s room, and sat down by the window.
CHAPTER XII.
TWELVE YEARS BEFORE.
“Yes, this was Katusha.”
The relations between Nekhludoff and Katusha had been the following:
Nekhludoff first saw Katusha when he was a student in his third year
at the University, and was preparing an essay on land tenure during
the summer vacation, which he passed with his aunts. Until then he had
always lived, in summer, with his mother and sister on his mother’s
large estate near Moscow. But that year his sister had married, and his
mother had gone abroad to a watering-place, and he, having his essay to
write, resolved to spend the summer with his aunts. It was very quiet
in their secluded estate and there was nothing to distract his mind; his
aunts loved their nephew and heir very tenderly, and he, too, was fond
of them and of their simple, old-fashioned life.
During that summer on his aunts’ estate, Nekhludoff passed through that
blissful state of existence when a young man for the first time, without
guidance from any one outside, realises all the beauty and significance
of life, and the importance of the task allotted in it to man; when he
grasps the possibility of unlimited advance towards perfection for one’s
self and for all the world, and gives himself to this task, not only
hopefully, but with full conviction of attaining to the perfection
he imagines. In that year, while still at the University, he had read
Spencer’s Social Statics, and Spencer’s views on landholding especially
impressed him, as he himself was heir to large estates. His father had
not been rich, but his mother had received 10,000 acres of land for her
dowry. At that time he fully realised all the cruelty and injustice of
private property in land, and being one of those to whom a sacrifice
to the demands of conscience gives the highest spiritual enjoyment, he
decided not to retain property rights, but to give up to the peasant
labourers the land he had inherited from his father. It was on this land
question he wrote his essay.
He arranged his life on his aunts’ estate in the following manner. He
got up very early, sometimes at three o’clock, and before sunrise went
through the morning mists to bathe in the river, under the hill.
He returned while the dew still lay on the grass and the flowers.
Sometimes, having finished his coffee, he sat down with his books of
reference and his papers to write his essay, but very often, instead of
reading or writing, he left home again, and wandered through the fields
and the woods. Before dinner he lay down and slept somewhere in the
garden. At dinner he amused and entertained his aunts with his bright
spirits, then he rode on horseback or went for a row on the river, and
in the evening he again worked at his essay, or sat reading or playing
patience with his aunts.
His joy in life was so great that it agitated him, and kept him awake
many a night, especially when it was moonlight, so that instead of
sleeping he wandered about in the garden till dawn, alone with his
dreams and fancies.
And so, peacefully and happily, he lived through the first month of his
stay with his aunts, taking no particular notice of their half-ward,
half-servant, the black-eyed, quick-footed Katusha. Then, at the age
of nineteen, Nekhludoff, brought up under his mother’s wing, was still
quite pure. If a woman figured in his dreams at all it was only as a
wife. All the other women, who, according to his ideas he could not
marry, were not women for him, but human beings.
But on Ascension Day that summer, a neighbour of his aunts’, and her
family, consisting of two young daughters, a schoolboy, and a young
artist of peasant origin who was staying with them, came to spend the
day. After tea they all went to play in the meadow in front of the
house, where the grass had already been mown. They played at the game
of gorelki, and Katusha joined them. Running about and changing partners
several times, Nekhludoff caught Katusha, and she became his partner.
Up to this time he had liked Katusha’s looks, but the possibility of any
nearer relations with her had never entered his mind.
“Impossible to catch those two,” said the merry young artist, whose turn
it was to catch, and who could run very fast with his short, muscular
legs.
“You! And not catch us?” said Katusha.
“One, two, three,” and the artist clapped his hands. Katusha, hardly
restraining her laughter, changed places with Nekhludoff, behind the
artist’s back, and pressing his large hand with her little rough one,
and rustling with her starched petticoat, ran to the left. Nekhludoff
ran fast to the right, trying to escape from the artist, but when he
looked round he saw the artist running after Katusha, who kept well
ahead, her firm young legs moving rapidly. There was a lilac bush in
front of them, and Katusha made a sign with her head to Nekhludoff to
join her behind it, for if they once clasped hands again they were safe
from their pursuer, that being a rule of the game. He understood the
sign, and ran behind the bush, but he did not know that there was a
small ditch overgrown with nettles there. He stumbled and fell into the
nettles, already wet with dew, stinging his bands, but rose immediately,
laughing at his mishap.
Katusha, with her eyes black as sloes, her face radiant with joy, was
flying towards him, and they caught hold of each other’s hands.
“Got stung, I daresay?” she said, arranging her hair with her free hand,
breathing fast and looking straight up at him with a glad, pleasant
smile.
“I did not know there was a ditch here,” he answered, smiling also, and
keeping her hand in his. She drew nearer to him, and he himself, not
knowing how it happened, stooped towards her. She did not move away, and
he pressed her hand tight and kissed her on the lips.
“There! You’ve done it!” she said; and, freeing her hand with a swift
movement, ran away from him. Then, breaking two branches of white lilac
from which the blossoms were already falling, she began fanning her hot
face with them; then, with her head turned back to him, she walked away,
swaying her arms briskly in front of her, and joined the other players.
After this there grew up between Nekhludoff and Katusha those peculiar
relations which often exist between a pure young man and girl who are
attracted to each other.
When Katusha came into the room, or even when he saw her white apron
from afar, everything brightened up in Nekhludoff’s eyes, as when the
sun appears everything becomes more interesting, more joyful, more
important. The whole of life seemed full of gladness. And she felt the
same. But it was not only Katusha’s presence that had this effect on
Nekhludoff. The mere thought that Katusha existed (and for her that
Nekhludoff existed) had this effect.
When he received an unpleasant letter from his mother, or could not get
on with his essay, or felt the unreasoning sadness that young people are
often subject to, he had only to remember Katusha and that he should see
her, and it all vanished. Katusha had much work to do in the house, but
she managed to get a little leisure for reading, and Nekhludoff gave her
Dostoievsky and Tourgeneff (whom he had just read himself) to read. She
liked Tourgeneff’s Lull best. They had talks at moments snatched when
meeting in the passage, on the veranda, or the yard, and sometimes
in the room of his aunts’ old servant, Matrona Pavlovna, with whom he
sometimes used to drink tea, and where Katusha used to work.
These talks in Matrona Pavlovna’s presence were the pleasantest. When
they were alone it was worse. Their eyes at once began to say something
very different and far more important than what their mouths uttered.
Their lips puckered, and they felt a kind of dread of something that
made them part quickly. These relations continued between Nekhludoff
and Katusha during the whole time of his first visit to his aunts’.
They noticed it, and became frightened, and even wrote to Princess
Elena Ivanovna, Nekhludoff’s mother. His aunt, Mary Ivanovna, was
afraid Dmitri would form an intimacy with Katusha; but her fears were
groundless, for Nekhludoff, himself hardly conscious of it, loved
Katusha, loved her as the pure love, and therein lay his safety--his and
hers. He not only did not feel any desire to possess her, but the very
thought of it filled him with horror. The fears of the more poetical
Sophia Ivanovna, that Dmitri, with his thoroughgoing, resolute
character, having fallen in love with a girl, might make up his mind to
marry her, without considering either her birth or her station, had more
ground.
Had Nekhludoff at that time been conscious of his love for Katusha, and
especially if he had been told that he could on no account join his life
with that of a girl in her position, it might have easily happened
that, with his usual straight-forwardness, he would have come to the
conclusion that there could be no possible reason for him not to marry
any girl whatever, as long as he loved her. But his aunts did not
mention their fears to him; and, when he left, he was still unconscious
of his love for Katusha. He was sure that what he felt for Katusha was
only one of the manifestations of the joy of life that filled his whole
being, and that this sweet, merry little girl shared this joy with him.
Yet, when he was going away, and Katusha stood with his aunts in the
porch, and looked after him, her dark, slightly-squinting eyes filled
with tears, he felt, after all, that he was leaving something beautiful,
precious, something which would never reoccur. And he grew very sad.
“Good-bye, Katusha,” he said, looking across Sophia Ivanovna’s cap as he
was getting into the trap. “Thank you for everything.”
“Good-bye, Dmitri Ivanovitch,” she said, with her pleasant, tender
voice, keeping back the tears that filled her eyes--and ran away into
the hall, where she could cry in peace.
CHAPTER XIII.
LIFE IN THE ARMY.
After that Nekhludoff did not see Katusha for more than three years.
When he saw her again he had just been promoted to the rank of officer
and was going to join his regiment. On the way he came to spend a few
days with his aunts, being now a very different young man from the one
who had spent the summer with them three years before. He then had been
an honest, unselfish lad, ready to sacrifice himself for any good cause;
now he was depraved and selfish, and thought only of his own enjoyment.
Then God’s world seemed a mystery which he tried enthusiastically and
joyfully to solve; now everything in life seemed clear and simple,
defined by the conditions of the life he was leading. Then he had felt
the importance of, and had need of intercourse with, nature, and with
those who had lived and thought and felt before him--philosophers
and poets. What he now considered necessary and important were human
institutions and intercourse with his comrades. Then women seemed
mysterious and charming--charming by the very mystery that enveloped
them; now the purpose of women, all women except those of his own family
and the wives of his friends, was a very definite one: women were the
best means towards an already experienced enjoyment. Then money was not
needed, and he did not require even one-third of what his mother allowed
him; but now this allowance of 1,500 roubles a month did not suffice,
and he had already had some unpleasant talks about it with his mother.
Then he had looked on his spirit as the I; now it was his healthy strong
animal I that he looked upon as himself.
And all this terrible change had come about because he had ceased to
believe himself and had taken to believing others. This he had done
because it was too difficult to live believing one’s self; believing
one’s self, one had to decide every question not in favour of one’s own
animal life, which is always seeking for easy gratifications, but almost
in every case against it. Believing others there was nothing to decide;
everything had been decided already, and decided always in favour of the
animal I and against the spiritual. Nor was this all. Believing in his
own self he was always exposing himself to the censure of those around
him; believing others he had their approval. So, when Nekhludoff had
talked of the serious matters of life, of God, truth, riches, and
poverty, all round him thought it out of place and even rather funny,
and his mother and aunts called him, with kindly irony, notre cher
philosophe. But when he read novels, told improper anecdotes, went
to see funny vaudevilles in the French theatre and gaily repeated the
jokes, everybody admired and encouraged him. When he considered it
right to limit his needs, wore an old overcoat, took no wine, everybody
thought it strange and looked upon it as a kind of showing off; but
when he spent large sums on hunting, or on furnishing a peculiar and
luxurious study for himself, everybody admired his taste and gave him
expensive presents to encourage his hobby. While he kept pure and meant
to remain so till he married his friends prayed for his health, and even
his mother was not grieved but rather pleased when she found out that
he had become a real man and had gained over some French woman from his
friend. (As to the episode with Katusha, the princess could not without
horror think that he might possibly have married her.) In the same way,
when Nekhludoff came of age, and gave the small estate he had inherited
from his father to the peasants because he considered the holding
of private property in land wrong, this step filled his mother and
relations with dismay and served as an excuse for making fun of him to
all his relatives. He was continually told that these peasants, after
they had received the land, got no richer, but, on the contrary, poorer,
having opened three public-houses and left off doing any work. But when
Nekhludoff entered the Guards and spent and gambled away so much with
his aristocratic companions that Elena Ivanovna, his mother, had to draw
on her capital, she was hardly pained, considering it quite natural
and even good that wild oats should be sown at an early age and in good
company, as her son was doing. At first Nekhludoff struggled, but all
that he had considered good while he had faith in himself was considered
bad by others, and what he had considered evil was looked upon as good
by those among whom he lived, and the struggle grew too hard. And at
last Nekhludoff gave in, i.e., left off believing himself and began
believing others. At first this giving up of faith in himself was
unpleasant, but it did not long continue to be so. At that time he
acquired the habit of smoking, and drinking wine, and soon got over this
unpleasant feeling and even felt great relief.
Nekhludoff, with his passionate nature, gave himself thoroughly to the
new way of life so approved of by all those around, and he entirely
stifled the inner voice which demanded something different. This began
after he moved to St. Petersburg, and reached its highest point when he
entered the army.
Military life in general depraves men. It places them in conditions of
complete idleness, i.e., absence of all useful work; frees them of their
common human duties, which it replaces by merely conventional ones to
the honour of the regiment, the uniform, the flag; and, while giving
them on the one hand absolute power over other men, also puts them into
conditions of servile obedience to those of higher rank than themselves.
But when, to the usual depraving influence of military service with its
honours, uniforms, flags, its permitted violence and murder, there is
added the depraving influence of riches and nearness to and intercourse
with members of the Imperial family, as is the case in the chosen
regiment of the Guards in which all the officers are rich and of good
family, then this depraving influence creates in the men who succumb
to it a perfect mania of selfishness. And this mania of selfishness
attacked Nekhludoff from the moment he entered the army and began living
in the way his companions lived. He had no occupation whatever except
to dress in a uniform, splendidly made and well brushed by other people,
and, with arms also made and cleaned and handed to him by others, ride
to reviews on a fine horse which had been bred, broken in and fed by
others. There, with other men like himself, he had to wave a sword,
shoot off guns, and teach others to do the same. He had no other work,
and the highly-placed persons, young and old, the Tsar and those near
him, not only sanctioned his occupation but praised and thanked him for
it.
After this was done, it was thought important to eat, and particularly
to drink, in officers’ clubs or the salons of the best restaurants,
squandering large sums of money, which came from some invisible source;
then theatres, ballets, women, then again riding on horseback, waving
of swords and shooting, and again the squandering of money, the wine,
cards, and women. This kind of life acts on military men even more
depravingly than on others, because if any other than a military man
lead such a life he cannot help being ashamed of it in the depth of his
heart. A military man is, on the contrary, proud of a life of this kind
especially at war time, and Nekhludoff had entered the army just after
war with the Turks had been declared. “We are prepared to sacrifice
our lives at the wars, and therefore a gay, reckless life is not only
pardonable, but absolutely necessary for us, and so we lead it.”
Such were Nekhludoff’s confused thoughts at this period of his
existence, and he felt all the time the delight of being free of the
moral barriers he had formerly set himself. And the state he lived in
was that of a chronic mania of selfishness. He was in this state when,
after three years’ absence, he came again to visit his aunts.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE SECOND MEETING WITH MASLOVA.
Nekhludoff went to visit his aunts because their estate lay near the
road he had to travel in order to join his regiment, which had gone
forward, because they had very warmly asked him to come, and especially
because he wanted to see Katusha. Perhaps in his heart he had already
formed those evil designs against Katusha which his now uncontrolled
animal self suggested to him, but he did not acknowledge this as his
intention, but only wished to go back to the spot where he had been so
happy, to see his rather funny, but dear, kind-hearted old aunts, who
always, without his noticing it, surrounded him with an atmosphere of
love and admiration, and to see sweet Katusha, of whom he had retained
so pleasant a memory.
He arrived at the end of March, on Good Friday, after the thaw had set
in. It was pouring with rain so that he had not a dry thread on him and
was feeling very cold, but yet vigorous and full of spirits, as always
at that time. “Is she still with them?” he thought, as he drove into the
familiar, old-fashioned courtyard, surrounded by a low brick wall, and
now filled with snow off the roofs.
He expected she would come out when she heard the sledge bells but she
did not. Two bare-footed women with pails and tucked-up skirts, who had
evidently been scrubbing the floors, came out of the side door. She was
not at the front door either, and only Tikhon, the man-servant, with his
apron on, evidently also busy cleaning, came out into the front porch.
His aunt Sophia Ivanovna alone met him in the ante-room; she had a silk
dress on and a cap on her head. Both aunts had been to church and had
received communion.
“Well, this is nice of you to come,” said Sophia Ivanovna, kissing him.
“Mary is not well, got tired in church; we have been to communion.”
“I congratulate you, Aunt Sophia,” [it is usual in Russia to
congratulate those who have received communion] said Nekhludoff, kissing
Sophia Ivanovna’s hand. “Oh, I beg your pardon, I have made you wet.”
“Go to your room--why you are soaking wet. Dear me, you have got
moustaches! . . . Katusha! Katusha! Get him some coffee; be quick.”
“Directly,” came the sound of a well-known, pleasant voice from the
passage, and Nekhludoff’s heart cried out “She’s here!” and it was as if
the sun had come out from behind the clouds.
Nekhludoff, followed by Tikhon, went gaily to his old room to change his
things. He felt inclined to ask Tikhon about Katusha; how she was,
what she was doing, was she not going to be married? But Tikhon was so
respectful and at the same time so severe, insisted so firmly on pouring
the water out of the jug for him, that Nekhludoff could not make up
his mind to ask him about Katusha, but only inquired about Tikhon’s
grandsons, about the old so-called “brother’s” horse, and about the
dog Polkan. All were alive except Polkan, who had gone mad the summer
before.
When he had taken off all his wet things and just begun to dress again,
Nekhludoff heard quick, familiar footsteps and a knock at the door.
Nekhludoff knew the steps and also the knock. No one but she walked and
knocked like that.
Having thrown his wet greatcoat over his shoulders, he opened the door.
“Come in.” It was she, Katusha, the same, only sweeter than before. The
slightly squinting naive black eyes looked up in the same old way. Now
as then, she had on a white apron. She brought him from his aunts
a piece of scented soap, with the wrapper just taken off, and two
towels--one a long Russian embroidered one, the other a bath towel. The
unused soap with the stamped inscription, the towels, and her own self,
all were equally clean, fresh, undefiled and pleasant. The irrepressible
smile of joy at the sight of him made the sweet, firm lips pucker up as
of old.
“How do you do, Dmitri Ivanovitch?” she uttered with difficulty, her
face suffused with a rosy blush.
“Good-morning! How do you do?” he said, also blushing. “Alive and well?”
“Yes, the Lord be thanked. And here is your favorite pink soap and
towels from your aunts,” she said, putting the soap on the table and
hanging the towels over the back of a chair.
“There is everything here,” said Tikhon, defending the visitor’s
independence, and pointing to Nekhludoff’s open dressing case filled
with brushes, perfume, fixatoire, a great many bottles with silver lids
and all sorts of toilet appliances.
“Thank my aunts, please. Oh, how glad I am to be here,” said Nekhludoff,
his heart filling with light and tenderness as of old.
She only smiled in answer to these words, and went out. The aunts, who
had always loved Nekhludoff, welcomed him this time more warmly than
ever. Dmitri was going to the war, where he might be wounded or killed,
and this touched the old aunts. Nekhludoff had arranged to stay only a
day and night with his aunts, but when he had seen Katusha he agreed to
stay over Easter with them and telegraphed to his friend Schonbock, whom
he was to have joined in Odessa, that he should come and meet him at his
aunts’ instead.
As soon as he had seen Katusha Nekhludoff’s old feelings toward her
awoke again. Now, just as then, he could not see her white apron without
getting excited; he could not listen to her steps, her voice, her laugh,
without a feeling of joy; he could not look at her eyes, black as sloes,
without a feeling of tenderness, especially when she smiled; and, above
all, he could not notice without agitation how she blushed when they
met. He felt he was in love, but not as before, when this love was a
kind of mystery to him and he would not own, even to himself, that he
loved, and when he was persuaded that one could love only once; now he
knew he was in love and was glad of it, and knew dimly what this love
consisted of and what it might lead to, though he sought to conceal
it even from himself. In Nekhludoff, as in every man, there were two
beings: one the spiritual, seeking only that kind of happiness for him
self which should tend towards the happiness of all; the other, the
animal man, seeking only his own happiness, and ready to sacrifice to it
the happiness of the rest of the world. At this period of his mania of
self-love brought on by life in Petersburg and in the army, this animal
man ruled supreme and completely crushed the spiritual man in him.
But when he saw Katusha and experienced the same feelings as he had had
three years before, the spiritual man in him raised its head once more
and began to assert its rights. And up to Easter, during two whole days,
an unconscious, ceaseless inner struggle went on in him.
He knew in the depths of his soul that he ought to go away, that there
was no real reason for staying on with his aunts, knew that no good
could come of it; and yet it was so pleasant, so delightful, that he did
not honestly acknowledge the facts to himself and stayed on. On Easter
eve, the priest and the deacon who came to the house to say mass had had
(so they said) the greatest difficulty in getting over the three miles
that lay between the church and the old ladies’ house, coming across the
puddles and the bare earth in a sledge.
Nekhludoff attended the mass with his aunts and the servants, and kept
looking at Katusha, who was near the door and brought in the censers
for the priests. Then having given the priests and his aunts the Easter
kiss, though it was not midnight and therefore not Easter yet, he was
already going to bed when he heard the old servant Matrona Pavlovna
preparing to go to the church to get the koulitch and paski [Easter
cakes] blest after the midnight service. “I shall go too,” he thought.
The road to the church was impassable either in a sledge or on wheels,
so Nekhludoff, who behaved in his aunts’ house just as he did at home,
ordered the old horse, “the brother’s horse,” to be saddled, and instead
of going to bed he put on his gay uniform, a pair of tight-fitting
riding breeches and his overcoat, and got on the old over-fed and heavy
horse, which neighed continually all the way as he rode in the dark
through the puddles and snow to the church.
CHAPTER XV.
THE EARLY MASS.
For Nekhludoff this early mass remained for ever after one of the
brightest and most vivid memories of his life. When he rode out of the
darkness, broken only here and there by patches of white snow, into the
churchyard illuminated by a row of lamps around the church, the service
had already begun.
The peasants, recognising Mary Ivanovna’s nephew, led his horse, which
was pricking up its ears at the sight of the lights, to a dry place
where he could get off, put it up for him, and showed him into the
church, which was full of people. On the right stood the peasants; the
old men in home-spun coats, and clean white linen bands [long strips of
linen are worn by the peasants instead of stockings] wrapped round their
legs, the young men in new cloth coats, bright-coloured belts round
their waists, and top-boots.
On the left stood the women, with red silk kerchiefs on their
heads, black velveteen sleeveless jackets, bright red shirt-sleeves,
gay-coloured green, blue, and red skirts, and thick leather boots.
The old women, dressed more quietly, stood behind them, with white
kerchiefs, homespun coats, old-fashioned skirts of dark home-spun
material, and shoes on their feet. Gaily-dressed children, their hair
well oiled, went in and out among them.
The men, making the sign of the cross, bowed down and raised their heads
again, shaking back their hair.
The women, especially the old ones, fixed their eyes on an icon
surrounded with candies and made the sign of the cross, firmly pressing
their folded fingers to the kerchief on their foreheads, to their
shoulders, and their stomachs, and, whispering something, stooped
or knelt down. The children, imitating the grown-up people, prayed
earnestly when they knew that they were being observed. The gilt case
containing the icon glittered, illuminated on all sides by tall candles
ornamented with golden spirals. The candelabra was filled with tapers,
and from the choir sounded most merry tunes sung by amateur choristers,
with bellowing bass and shrill boys’ voices among them.
Nekhludoff passed up to the front. In the middle of the church stood
the aristocracy of the place: a landed proprietor, with his wife and
son (the latter dressed in a sailor’s suit), the police officer, the
telegraph clerk, a tradesman in top-boots, and the village elder, with
a medal on his breast; and to the right of the ambo, just behind the
landed proprietor’s wife, stood Matrona Pavlovna in a lilac dress and
fringed shawl and Katusha in a white dress with a tucked bodice, blue
sash, and red bow in her black hair.
Everything seemed festive, solemn, bright, and beautiful: the priest in
his silver cloth vestments with gold crosses; the deacon, the clerk and
chanter in their silver and gold surplices; the amateur choristers in
their best clothes, with their well-oiled hair; the merry tunes of the
holiday hymns that sounded like dance music; and the continual blessing
of the people by the priests, who held candles decorated with flowers,
and repeated the cry of “Christ is risen!” “Christ is risen!” All was
beautiful; but, above all, Katusha, in her white dress, blue sash, and
the red bow on her black head, her eyes beaming with rapture.
Nekhludoff knew that she felt his presence without looking at him. He
noticed this as he passed her, walking up to the altar. He had nothing
to tell her, but he invented something to say and whispered as he passed
her: “Aunt told me that she would break her fast after the late mass.”
The young blood rushed up to Katusha’s sweet face, as it always did
when she looked at him. The black eyes, laughing and full of joy, gazed
naively up and remained fixed on Nekhludoff.
“I know,” she said, with a smile.
At this moment the clerk was going out with a copper coffee-pot
[coffee-pots are often used for holding holy water in Russia] of holy
water in his hand, and, not noticing Katusha, brushed her with his
surplice. Evidently he brushed against Katusha through wishing to pass
Nekhludoff at a respectful distance, and Nekhludoff was surprised that
he, the clerk, did not understand that everything here, yes, and in
all the world, only existed for Katusha, and that everything else might
remain unheeded, only not she, because she was the centre of all. For
her the gold glittered round the icons; for her all these candles in
candelabra and candlesticks were alight; for her were sung these
joyful hymns, “Behold the Passover of the Lord” “Rejoice, O ye people!”
All--all that was good in the world was for her. And it seemed to him
that Katusha was aware that it was all for her when he looked at her
well-shaped figure, the tucked white dress, the wrapt, joyous expression
of her face, by which he knew that just exactly the same that was
singing in his own soul was also singing in hers.
In the interval between the early and the late mass Nekhludoff left the
church. The people stood aside to let him pass, and bowed. Some knew
him; others asked who he was.
He stopped on the steps. The beggars standing there came clamouring
round him, and he gave them all the change he had in his purse and went
down. It was dawning, but the sun had not yet risen. The people grouped
round the graves in the churchyard. Katusha had remained inside.
Nekhludoff stood waiting for her.
The people continued coming out, clattering with their nailed boots on
the stone steps and dispersing over the churchyard. A very old man with
shaking head, his aunts’ cook, stopped Nekhludoff in order to give
him the Easter kiss, his old wife took an egg, dyed yellow, out of her
handkerchief and gave it to Nekhludoff, and a smiling young peasant in a
new coat and green belt also came up.
“Christ is risen,” he said, with laughing eyes, and coming close to
Nekhludoff he enveloped him in his peculiar but pleasant peasant smell,
and, tickling him with his curly beard, kissed him three times straight
on the mouth with his firm, fresh lips.
While the peasant was kissing Nekhludoff and giving him a dark brown
egg, the lilac dress of Matrona Pavlovna and the dear black head with
the red bow appeared.
Katusha caught sight of him over the heads of those in front of her, and
he saw how her face brightened up.
She had come out with Matrona Pavlovna on to the porch, and stopped
there distributing alms to the beggars. A beggar with a red scab in
place of a nose came up to Katusha. She gave him something, drew nearer
him, and, evincing no sign of disgust, but her eyes still shining with
joy, kissed him three times. And while she was doing this her eyes met
Nekhludoff’s with a look as if she were asking, “Is this that I am doing
right?” “Yes, dear, yes, it is right; everything is right, everything is
beautiful. I love!”
They came down the steps of the porch, and he came up to them.
He did not mean to give them the Easter kiss, but only to be nearer to
her. Matrona Pavlovna bowed her head, and said with a smile, “Christ is
risen!” and her tone implied, “To-day we are all equal.” She wiped her
mouth with her handkerchief rolled into a ball and stretched her lips
towards him.
“He is, indeed,” answered Nekhludoff, kissing her. Then he looked
at Katusha; she blushed, and drew nearer. “Christ is risen, Dmitri
Ivanovitch.”
“He is risen, indeed,” answered Nekhludoff, and they kissed twice, then
paused as if considering whether a third kiss were necessary, and,
having decided that it was, kissed a third time and smiled.
“You are going to the priests?” asked Nekhludoff.
“No, we shall sit out here a bit, Dmitri Ivanovitch,” said Katusha with
effort, as if she had accomplished some joyous task, and, her whole
chest heaving with a deep sigh, she looked straight in his face with
a look of devotion, virgin purity, and love, in her very slightly
squinting eyes.
In the love between a man and a woman there always comes a moment when
this love has reached its zenith--a moment when it is unconscious,
unreasoning, and with nothing sensual about it. Such a moment had come
for Nekhludoff on that Easter eve. When he brought Katusha back to his
mind, now, this moment veiled all else; the smooth glossy black head,
the white tucked dress closely fitting her graceful maidenly form, her,
as yet, un-developed bosom, the blushing cheeks, the tender shining
black eyes with their slight squint heightened by the sleepless night,
and her whole being stamped with those two marked features, purity and
chaste love, love not only for him (he knew that), but for everybody and
everything, not for the good alone, but for all that is in the world,
even for that beggar whom she had kissed.
He knew she had that love in her because on that night and morning
he was conscious of it in himself, and conscious that in this love he
became one with her. Ah! if it had all stopped there, at the point it
had reached that night. “Yes, all that horrible business had not yet
happened on that Easter eve!” he thought, as he sat by the window of the
jurymen’s room.
CHAPTER XVI.
THE FIRST STEP.
When he returned from church Nekhludoff broke the fast with his aunts
and took a glass of spirits and some wine, having got into that habit
while with his regiment, and when he reached his room fell asleep at
once, dressed as he was. He was awakened by a knock at the door. He knew
it was her knock, and got up, rubbing his eyes and stretching himself.
“Katusha, is it you? Come in,” said he.
She opened the door.
“Dinner is ready,” she said. She still had on the same white dress, but
not the bow in her hair. She looked at him with a smile, as if she had
communicated some very good news to him.
“I am coming,” he answered, as he rose, taking his comb to arrange his
hair.
She stood still for a minute, and he, noticing it, threw down his comb
and made a step towards her, but at that very moment she turned suddenly
and went with quick light steps along the strip of carpet in the middle
of the passage.
“Dear me, what a fool I am,” thought Nekhludoff. “Why did I not stop
her?” What he wanted her for he did not know himself, but he felt that
when she came into his room something should have been done, something
that is generally done on such occasions, and that he had left it
undone.
“Katusha, wait,” he said.
“What do you want?” she said, stopping.
“Nothing, only--” and, with an effort, remembering how men in his
position generally behave, he put his arm round her waist.
She stood still and looked into his eyes.
“Don’t, Dmitri Ivanovitch, you must not,” she said, blushing to tears
and pushing away his arm with her strong hard hand. Nekhludoff let her
go, and for a moment he felt not only confused and ashamed but disgusted
with himself. He should now have believed himself, and then he would
have known that this confusion and shame were caused by the best
feelings of his soul demanding to be set free; but he thought it was
only his stupidity and that he ought to behave as every one else did. He
caught her up and kissed her on the neck.
This kiss was very different from that first thoughtless kiss behind
the lilac bush, and very different to the kiss this morning in the
churchyard. This was a dreadful kiss, and she felt it.
“Oh, what are you doing?” she cried, in a tone as if he had irreparably
broken something of priceless value, and ran quickly away.
He came into the dining-room. His aunts, elegantly dressed, their family
doctor, and a neighbour were already there. Everything seemed so very
ordinary, but in Nekhludoff a storm was raging. He understood nothing
of what was being said and gave wrong answers, thinking only of Katusha.
The sound of her steps in the passage brought back the thrill of that
last kiss and he could think of nothing else. When she came into the
room he, without looking round, felt her presence with his whole being
and had to force himself not to look at her.
After dinner he at once went into his bedroom and for a long time walked
up and down in great excitement, listening to every sound in the house
and expecting to hear her steps. The animal man inside him had now not
only lifted its head, but had succeeded in trampling under foot the
spiritual man of the days of his first visit, and even of that every
morning. That dreadful animal man alone now ruled over him.
Though he was watching for her all day he could not manage to meet her
alone. She was probably trying to evade him. In the evening, however,
she was obliged to go into the room next to his. The doctor had been
asked to stay the night, and she had to make his bed. When he heard her
go in Nekhludoff followed her, treading softly and holding his breath as
if he were going to commit a crime.
She was putting a clean pillow-case on the pillow, holding it by two of
its corners with her arms inside the pillow-case. She turned round
and smiled, not a happy, joyful smile as before, but in a frightened,
piteous way. The smile seemed to tell him that what he was doing was
wrong. He stopped for a moment. There was still the possibility of a
struggle. The voice of his real love for her, though feebly, was still
speaking of her, her feelings, her life. Another voice was saying,
“Take care I don’t let the opportunity for your own happiness, your own
enjoyment, slip by!” And this second voice completely stifled the first.
He went up to her with determination and a terrible, ungovernable animal
passion took possession of him.
With his arm round he made her sit down on the bed; and feeling that
there was something more to be done he sat down beside her.
“Dmitri Ivanovitch, dear! please let me go,” she said, with a piteous
voice. “Matrona Pavlovna is coming,” she cried, tearing herself away.
Some one was really coming to the door.
“Well, then, I’ll come to you in the night,” he whispered. “You’ll be
alone?”
“What are you thinking of? On no account. No, no!” she said, but only
with her lips; the tremulous confusion of her whole being said something
very different.
It was Matrona Pavlovna who had come to the door. She came in with a
blanket over her arm, looked reproachfully at Nekhludoff, and began
scolding Katusha for having taken the wrong blanket.
Nekhludoff went out in silence, but he did not even feel ashamed. He
could see by Matrona Pavlovna’s face that she was blaming him, he knew
that she was blaming him with reason and felt that he was doing wrong,
but this novel, low animal excitement, having freed itself of all the
old feelings of real love for Katusha, ruled supreme, leaving room for
nothing else. He went about as if demented all the evening, now into his
aunts’, then back into his own room, then out into the porch, thinking
all the time how he could meet her alone; but she avoided him, and
Matrona Pavlovna watched her closely.
CHAPTER XVII.
NEKHLUDOFF AND KATUSHA.
And so the evening passed and night came. The doctor went to bed.
Nekhludoff’s aunts had also retired, and he knew that Matrona Pavlovna
was now with them in their bedroom so that Katusha was sure to be alone
in the maids’ sitting-room. He again went out into the porch. It was
dark, damp and warm out of doors, and that white spring mist which
drives away the last snow, or is diffused by the thawing of the last
snow, filled the air. From the river under the hill, about a hundred
steps from the front door, came a strange sound. It was the ice
breaking. Nekhludoff came down the steps and went up to the window of
the maids’ room, stepping over the puddles on the bits of glazed snow.
His heart was beating so fiercely in his breast that he seemed to hear
it, his laboured breath came and went in a burst of long-drawn sighs. In
the maids’ room a small lamp was burning, and Katusha sat alone by the
table, looking thoughtfully in front of her. Nekhludoff stood a long
time without moving and waited to see what she, not knowing that she
was observed, would do. For a minute or two she did not move; then she
lifted her eyes, smiled and shook her head as if chiding herself, then
changed her pose and dropped both her arms on the table and again began
gazing down in front of her. He stood and looked at her, involuntarily
listening to the beating of his own heart and the strange sounds from
the river. There on the river, beneath the white mist, the unceasing
labour went on, and sounds as of something sobbing, cracking, dropping,
being shattered to pieces mixed with the tinkling of the thin bits of
ice as they broke against each other like glass.
There he stood, looking at Katusha’s serious, suffering face, which
betrayed the inner struggle of her soul, and he felt pity for her; but,
strange though it may seem, this pity only confirmed him in his evil
intention.
He knocked at the window. She started as if she had received an electric
shock, her whole body trembled, and a look of horror came into her face.
Then she jumped up, approached the window and brought her face up to the
pane. The look of terror did not leave her face even when, holding her
hands up to her eyes like blinkers and peering through the glass, she
recognised him. Her face was unusually grave; he had never seen it so
before. She returned his smile, but only in submission to him; there was
no smile in her soul, only fear. He beckoned her with his hand to come
out into the yard to him. But she shook her head and remained by the
window. He brought his face close to the pane and was going to call out
to her, but at that moment she turned to the door; evidently some one
inside had called her. Nekhludoff moved away from the window. The fog
was so dense that five steps from the house the windows could not be
seen, but the light from the lamp shone red and huge out of a shapeless
black mass. And on the river the same strange sounds went on, sobbing
and rustling and cracking and tinkling. Somewhere in the fog, not
far off, a cock crowed; another answered, and then others, far in the
village took up the cry till the sound of the crowing blended into one,
while all around was silent excepting the river. It was the second time
the cocks crowed that night.
Nekhludoff walked up and down behind the corner of the house, and once
or twice got into a puddle. Then again came up to the window. The lamp
was still burning, and she was again sitting alone by the table as
if uncertain what to do. He had hardly approached the window when she
looked up. He knocked. Without looking who it was she at once ran out of
the room, and he heard the outside door open with a snap. He waited
for her near the side porch and put his arms round her without saying a
word. She clung to him, put up her face, and met his kiss with her lips.
Then the door again gave the same sort of snap and opened, and the voice
of Matrona Pavlovna called out angrily, “Katusha!”
She tore herself away from him and returned into the maids’ room. He
heard the latch click, and then all was quiet. The red light disappeared
and only the mist remained, and the bustle on the river went on.
Nekhludoff went up to the window, nobody was to be seen; he knocked, but
got no answer. He went back into the house by the front door, but could
not sleep. He got up and went with bare feet along the passage to her
door, next to Matrona Pavlovna’s room. He heard Matrona Pavlovna snoring
quietly, and was about to go on when she coughed and turned on her
creaking bed, and his heart fell, and he stood immovable for about five
minutes. When all was quiet and she began to snore peacefully again, he
went on, trying to step on the boards that did not creak, and came to
Katusha’s door. There was no sound to be heard. She was probably
awake, or else he would have heard her breathing. But as soon as he
had whispered “Katusha” she jumped up and began to persuade him, as if
angrily, to go away.
“Open! Let me in just for a moment! I implore you!” He hardly knew what
he was saying.
* * * * * * *
When she left him, trembling and silent, giving no answer to his words,
he again went out into the porch and stood trying to understand the
meaning of what had happened.
It was getting lighter. From the river below the creaking and tinkling
and sobbing of the breaking ice came still louder and a gurgling sound
could now also be heard. The mist had begun to sink, and from above it
the waning moon dimly lighted up something black and weird.
“What was the meaning of it all? Was it a great joy or a great
misfortune that had befallen him?” he asked himself.
CHAPTER XVIII.
AFTERWARDS.
The next day the gay, handsome, and brilliant Schonbock joined
Nekhludoff at his aunts’ house, and quite won their hearts by his
refined and amiable manner, his high spirits, his generosity, and his
affection for Dmitri.
But though the old ladies admired his generosity it rather perplexed
them, for it seemed exaggerated. He gave a rouble to some blind beggars
who came to the gate, gave 15 roubles in tips to the servants, and
when Sophia Ivanovna’s pet dog hurt his paw and it bled, he tore his
hemstitched cambric handkerchief into strips (Sophia Ivanovna knew that
such handkerchiefs cost at least 15 roubles a dozen) and bandaged the
dog’s foot. The old ladies had never met people of this kind, and did
not know that Schonbock owed 200,000 roubles which he was never going to
pay, and that therefore 25 roubles more or less did not matter a bit to
him. Schonbock stayed only one day, and he and Nekhludoff both, left
at night. They could not stay away from their regiment any longer, for
their leave was fully up.
At the stage which Nekhludoff’s selfish mania had now reached he could
think of nothing but himself. He was wondering whether his conduct, if
found out, would be blamed much or at all, but he did not consider what
Katusha was now going through, and what was going to happen to her.
He saw that Schonbock guessed his relations to her and this flattered
his vanity.
“Ah, I see how it is you have taken such a sudden fancy to your aunts
that you have been living nearly a week with them,” Schonbock remarked
when he had seen Katusha. “Well, I don’t wonder--should have done the
same. She’s charming.” Nekhludoff was also thinking that though it was
a pity to go away before having fully gratified the cravings of his
love for her, yet the absolute necessity of parting had its advantages
because it put a sudden stop to relations it would have been very
difficult for him to continue. Then he thought that he ought to give her
some money, not for her, not because she might need it, but because it
was the thing to do.
So he gave her what seemed to him a liberal amount, considering his and
her station. On the day of his departure, after dinner, he went out and
waited for her at the side entrance. She flushed up when she saw him
and wished to pass by, directing his attention to the open door of the
maids’ room by a look, but he stopped her.
“I have come to say good-bye,” he said, crumbling in his hand an
envelope with a 100-rouble note inside. “There, I . . . ”
She guessed what he meant, knit her brows, and shaking her head pushed
his hand away.
“Take it; oh, you must!” he stammered, and thrust the envelope into the
bib of her apron and ran back to his room, groaning and frowning as if
he had hurt himself. And for a long time he went up and down writhing as
in pain, and even stamping and groaning aloud as he thought of this last
scene. “But what else could I have done? Is it not what happens to every
one? And if every one does the same . . . well I suppose it can’t be
helped.” In this way he tried to get peace of mind, but in vain. The
recollection of what had passed burned his conscience. In his soul--in
the very depths of his soul--he knew that he had acted in a base, cruel,
cowardly manner, and that the knowledge of this act of his must prevent
him, not only from finding fault with any one else, but even from
looking straight into other people’s eyes; not to mention the
impossibility of considering himself a splendid, noble, high-minded
fellow, as he did and had to do to go on living his life boldly and
merrily. There was only one solution of the problem--i.e., not to think
about it. He succeeded in doing so. The life he was now entering upon,
the new surroundings, new friends, the war, all helped him to forget.
And the longer he lived, the less he thought about it, until at last he
forgot it completely.
Once only, when, after the war, he went to see his aunts in hopes of
meeting Katusha, and heard that soon after his last visit she had left,
and that his aunts had heard she had been confined somewhere or other
and had gone quite to the bad, his heart ached. According to the time of
her confinement, the child might or might not have been his. His aunts
said she had gone wrong, that she had inherited her mother’s depraved
nature, and he was pleased to hear this opinion of his aunts’. It seemed
to acquit him. At first he thought of trying to find her and her child,
but then, just because in the depths of his soul he felt so ashamed and
pained when thinking about her, he did not make the necessary effort to
find her, but tried to forget his sin again and ceased to think about
it. And now this strange coincidence brought it all back to his memory,
and demanded from him the acknowledgment of the heartless, cruel
cowardice which had made it possible for him to live these nine years
with such a sin on his conscience. But he was still far from such an
acknowledgment, and his only fear was that everything might now be found
out, and that she or her advocate might recount it all and put him to
shame before every one present.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE TRIAL--RESUMPTION.
In this state of mind Nekhludoff left the Court and went into the
jurymen’s room. He sat by the window smoking all the while, and hearing
what was being said around him.
The merry merchant seemed with all his heart to sympathise with
Smelkoff’s way of spending his time. “There, old fellow, that was
something like! Real Siberian fashion! He knew what he was about, no
fear! That’s the sort of wench for me.”
The foreman was stating his conviction, that in some way or other the
expert’s conclusions were the important thing. Peter Gerasimovitch
was joking about something with the Jewish clerk, and they burst out
laughing. Nekhludoff answered all the questions addressed to him in
monosyllables and longed only to be left in peace.
When the usher, with his sideways gait, called the jury back to the
Court, Nekhludoff was seized with fear, as if he were not going to
judge, but to be judged. In the depth of his soul he felt that he was a
scoundrel, who ought to be ashamed to look people in the face, yet,
by sheer force of habit, he stepped on to the platform in his usual
self-possessed manner, and sat down, crossing his legs and playing with
his pince-nez.
The prisoners had also been led out, and were now brought in again.
There were some new faces in the Court witnesses, and Nekhludoff noticed
that Maslova could not take her eyes off a very fat woman who sat in the
row in front of the grating, very showily dressed in silk and velvet, a
high hat with a large bow on her head, and an elegant little reticule on
her arm, which was bare to the elbow. This was, as he subsequently found
out, one of the witnesses, the mistress of the establishment to which
Maslova had belonged.
The examination of the witnesses commenced: they were asked their names,
religion, etc. Then, after some consultation as to whether the witnesses
were to be sworn in or not, the old priest came in again, dragging
his legs with difficulty, and, again arranging the golden cross on his
breast, swore the witnesses and the expert in the same quiet manner,
and with the same assurance that he was doing something useful and
important.
The witnesses having been sworn, all but Kitaeva, the keeper of the
house, were led out again. She was asked what she knew about this
affair. Kitaeva nodded her head and the big hat at every sentence
and smiled affectedly. She gave a very full and intelligent account,
speaking with a strong German accent. First of all, the hotel servant
Simeon, whom she knew, came to her establishment on behalf of a rich
Siberian merchant, and she sent Lubov back with him. After a time
Lubov returned with the merchant. The merchant was already somewhat
intoxicated--she smiled as she said this--and went on drinking and
treating the girls. He was short of money. He sent this same Lubov to
his lodgings. He had taken a “predilection” to her. She looked at the
prisoner as she said this.
Nekhludoff thought he saw Maslova smile here, and this seemed disgusting
to him. A strange, indefinite feeling of loathing, mingled with
suffering, arose in him.
“And what was your opinion of Maslova?” asked the blushing and confused
applicant for a judicial post, appointed to act as Maslova’s advocate.
“Zee ferry pesht,” answered Kitaeva. “Zee yoong voman is etucated and
elecant. She was prought up in a coot family and can reat French. She
tid have a trop too moch sometimes, put nefer forcot herself. A ferry
coot girl.”
Katusha looked at the woman, then suddenly turned her eyes on the jury
and fixed them on Nekhludoff, and her face grew serious and even severe.
One of her serious eyes squinted, and those two strange eyes for some
time gazed at Nekhludoff, who, in spite of the terrors that seized him,
could not take his look off these squinting eyes, with their bright,
clear whites.
He thought of that dreadful night, with its mist, the ice breaking on
the river below, and when the waning moon, with horns turned upwards,
that had risen towards morning, lit up something black and weird. These
two black eyes now looking at him reminded him of this weird, black
something. “She has recognised me,” he thought, and Nekhludoff shrank as
if expecting a blow. But she had not recognised him. She sighed quietly
and again looked at the president. Nekhludoff also sighed. “Oh, if it
would only get on quicker,” he thought.
He now felt the same loathing and pity and vexation as when, out
shooting, he was obliged to kill a wounded bird. The wounded bird
struggles in the game bag. One is disgusted and yet feels pity, and one
is in a hurry to kill the bird and forget it.
Such mixed feelings filled Nekhludoff’s breast as he sat listening to
the examination of the witnesses.
CHAPTER XX.
THE TRIAL--THE MEDICAL REPORT.
But, as if to spite him, the case dragged out to a great length. After
each witness had been examined separately and the expert last of all,
and a great number of useless questions had been put, with the usual
air of importance, by the public prosecutor and by both advocates, the
president invited the jury to examine the objects offered as material
evidence. They consisted of an enormous diamond ring, which had
evidently been worn on the first finger, and a test tube in which the
poison had been analysed. These things had seals and labels attached to
them.
Just as the witnesses were about to look at these things, the public
prosecutor rose and demanded that before they did this the results of
the doctor’s examination of the body should be read. The president, who
was hurrying the business through as fast as he could in order to visit
his Swiss friend, though he knew that the reading of this paper could
have no other effect than that of producing weariness and putting off
the dinner hour, and that the public prosecutor wanted it read simply
because he knew he had a right to demand it, had no option but to
express his consent.
The secretary got out the doctor’s report and again began to read in his
weary lisping voice, making no distinction between the “r’s” and “l’s.”
The external examination proved that:
“1. Theropont Smelkoff’s height was six feet five inches.
“Not so bad, that. A very good size,” whispered the merchant, with
interest, into Nekhludoff’s ear.
“2. He looked about 40 years of age.
“3. The body was of a swollen appearance.
“4. The flesh was of a greenish colour, with dark spots in several
places.
“5. The skin was raised in blisters of different sizes and in places had
come off in large pieces.
“6. The hair was chestnut; it was thick, and separated easily from the
skin when touched.
“7. The eye-balls protruded from their sockets and the cornea had grown
dim.
“8. Out of the nostrils, both ears, and the mouth oozed serous liquid;
the mouth was half open.
“9. The neck had almost disappeared, owing to the swelling of the face
and chest.”
And so on and so on.
Four pages were covered with the 27 paragraphs describing all the
details of the external examination of the enormous, fat, swollen, and
decomposing body of the merchant who had been making merry in the
town. The indefinite loathing that Nekhludoff felt was increased by the
description of the corpse. Katusha’s life, and the scrum oozing from
the nostrils of the corpse, and the eyes that protruded out of their
sockets, and his own treatment of her--all seemed to belong to the same
order of things, and he felt surrounded and wholly absorbed by things of
the same nature.
When the reading of the report of the external examination was ended,
the president heaved a sigh and raised his hand, hoping it was finished;
but the secretary at once went on to the description of the internal
examination. The president’s head again dropped into his hand and he
shut his eyes. The merchant next to Nekhludoff could hardly keep awake,
and now and then his body swayed to and fro. The prisoners and the
gendarmes sat perfectly quiet.
The internal examination showed that:
“1. The skin was easily detachable from the bones of the skull, and
there was no coagulated blood.
“2. The bones of the skull were of average thickness and in sound
condition.
“3. On the membrane of the brain there were two discoloured spots about
four inches long, the membrane itself being of a dull white.” And so on
for 13 paragraphs more. Then followed the names and signatures of
the assistants, and the doctor’s conclusion showing that the changes
observed in the stomach, and to a lesser degree in the bowels and
kidneys, at the postmortem examination, and described in the official
report, gave great probability to the conclusion that Smelkoff’s death
was caused by poison which had entered his stomach mixed with alcohol.
To decide from the state of the stomach what poison had been introduced
was difficult; but it was necessary to suppose that the poison entered
the stomach mixed with alcohol, since a great quantity of the latter was
found in Smelkoff’s stomach.
“He could drink, and no mistake,” again whispered the merchant, who had
just waked up.
The reading of this report had taken a full hour, but it had not
satisfied the public prosecutor, for, when it had been read through and
the president turned to him, saying, “I suppose it is superfluous to
read the report of the examination of the internal organs?” he answered
in a severe tone, without looking at the president, “I shall ask to have
it read.”
He raised himself a little, and showed by his manner that he had a right
to have this report read, and would claim this right, and that if that
were not granted it would serve as a cause of appeal.
The member of the Court with the big beard, who suffered from catarrh of
the stomach, feeling quite done up, turned to the president:
“What is the use of reading all this? It is only dragging it out. These
new brooms do not sweep clean; they only take a long while doing it.”
The member with the gold spectacles said nothing, but only looked
gloomily in front of him, expecting nothing good, either from his wife
or life in general. The reading of the report commenced.
“In the year 188-, on February 15th, I, the undersigned, commissioned
by the medical department, made an examination, No. 638,” the secretary
began again with firmness and raising the pitch of his voice as if to
dispel the sleepiness that had overtaken all present, “in the presence
of the assistant medical inspector, of the internal organs:
“1. The right lung and the heart (contained in a 6-lb. glass jar).
“2. The contents of the stomach (in a 6-lb. glass jar).
“3. The stomach itself (in a 6-lb. glass jar).
“4. The liver, the spleen and the kidneys (in a 9-lb. glass jar).
“5. The intestines (in a 9-lb. earthenware jar).”
The president here whispered to one of the members, then stooped to the
other, and having received their consent, he said: “The Court considers
the reading of this report superfluous.” The secretary stopped reading
and folded the paper, and the public prosecutor angrily began to write
down something. “The gentlemen of the jury may now examine the articles
of material evidence,” said the president. The foreman and several of
the others rose and went to the table, not quite knowing what to do with
their hands. They looked in turn at the glass, the test tube, and the
ring. The merchant even tried on the ring.
“Ah! that was a finger,” he said, returning to his place; “like a
cucumber,” he added. Evidently the image he had formed in his mind of
the gigantic merchant amused him.
CHAPTER XXI.
THE TRIAL--THE PROSECUTOR AND THE ADVOCATES.
When the examination of the articles of material evidence was finished,
the president announced that the investigation was now concluded and
immediately called on the prosecutor to proceed, hoping that as the
latter was also a man, he, too, might feel inclined to smoke or dine,
and show some mercy on the rest. But the public prosecutor showed mercy
neither to himself nor to any one else. He was very stupid by nature,
but, besides this, he had had the misfortune of finishing school with a
gold medal and of receiving a reward for his essay on “Servitude” when
studying Roman Law at the University, and was therefore self-confident
and self-satisfied in the highest degree (his success with the ladies
also conducing to this) and his stupidity had become extraordinary.
When the word was given to him, he got up slowly, showing the whole of
his graceful figure in his embroidered uniform. Putting his hand on the
desk he looked round the room, slightly bowing his head, and, avoiding
the eyes of the prisoners, began to read the speech he had prepared
while the reports were being read.
“Gentlemen of the jury! The business that now lies before you is, if I
may so express myself, very characteristic.”
The speech of a public prosecutor, according to his views, should always
have a social importance, like the celebrated speeches made by the
advocates who have become distinguished. True, the audience consisted of
three women--a semptress, a cook, and Simeon’s sister--and a coachman;
but this did not matter. The celebrities had begun in the same way. To
be always at the height of his position, i.e., to penetrate into the
depths of the psychological significance of crime and to discover the
wounds of society, was one of the prosecutor’s principles.
“You see before you, gentlemen of the jury, a crime characteristic, if
I may so express myself, of the end of our century; bearing, so to say,
the specific features of that very painful phenomenon, the corruption to
which those elements of our present-day society, which are, so to say,
particularly exposed to the burning rays of this process, are subject.”
The public prosecutor spoke at great length, trying not to forget any of
the notions he had formed in his mind, and, on the other hand, never to
hesitate, and let his speech flow on for an hour and a quarter without a
break.
Only once he stopped and for some time stood swallowing his saliva, but
he soon mastered himself and made up for the interruption by heightened
eloquence. He spoke, now with a tender, insinuating accent, stepping
from foot to foot and looking at the jury, now in quiet, business-like
tones, glancing into his notebook, then with a loud, accusing voice,
looking from the audience to the advocates. But he avoided looking at
the prisoners, who were all three fixedly gazing at him. Every new craze
then in vogue among his set was alluded to in his speech; everything
that then was, and some things that still are, considered to be the last
words of scientific wisdom: the laws of heredity and inborn criminality,
evolution and the struggle for existence, hypnotism and hypnotic
influence.
According to his definition, the merchant Smelkoff was of the genuine
Russian type, and had perished in consequence of his generous, trusting
nature, having fallen into the hands of deeply degraded individuals.
Simeon Kartinkin was the atavistic production of serfdom, a stupefied,
ignorant, unprincipled man, who had not even any religion. Euphemia was
his mistress, and a victim of heredity; all the signs of degeneration
were noticeable in her. The chief wire-puller in this affair was
Maslova, presenting the phenomenon of decadence in its lowest form.
“This woman,” he said, looking at her, “has, as we have to-day heard
from her mistress in this court, received an education; she cannot only
read and write, but she knows French; she is illegitimate, and probably
carries in her the germs of criminality. She was educated in an
enlightened, noble family and might have lived by honest work, but she
deserts her benefactress, gives herself up to a life of shame in which
she is distinguished from her companions by her education, and chiefly,
gentlemen of the jury, as you have heard from her mistress, by her power
of acting on the visitors by means of that mysterious capacity lately
investigated by science, especially by the school of Charcot, known by
the name of hypnotic influence. By these means she gets hold of this
Russian, this kind-hearted Sadko, [Sadko, the hero of a legend] the rich
guest, and uses his trust in order first to rob and then pitilessly to
murder him.”
“Well, he is piling it on now, isn’t he?” said the president with a
smile, bending towards the serious member.
“A fearful blockhead!” said the serious member.
Meanwhile the public prosecutor went on with his speech. “Gentlemen of
the jury,” gracefully swaying his body, “the fate of society is to a
certain extent in your power. Your verdict will influence it. Grasp the
full meaning of this crime, the danger that awaits society from those
whom I may perhaps be permitted to call pathological individuals, such
as Maslova. Guard it from infection; guard the innocent and strong
elements of society from contagion or even destruction.”
And as if himself overcome by the significance of the expected verdict,
the public prosecutor sank into his chair, highly delighted with his
speech.
The sense of the speech, when divested of all its flowers of rhetoric,
was that Maslova, having gained the merchant’s confidence, hypnotised
him and went to his lodgings with his key meaning to take all the money
herself, but having been caught in the act by Simeon and Euphemia had to
share it with them. Then, in order to hide the traces of the crime, she
had returned to the lodgings with the merchant and there poisoned him.
After the prosecutor had spoken, a middle-aged man in swallow-tail coat
and low-cut waistcoat showing a large half-circle of starched white
shirt, rose from the advocates’ bench and made a speech in defence of
Kartinkin and Botchkova; this was an advocate engaged by them for 300
roubles. He acquitted them both and put all the blame on Maslova. He
denied the truth of Maslova’s statements that Botchkova and Kartinkin
were with her when she took the money, laying great stress on the
point that her evidence could not be accepted, she being charged with
poisoning. “The 2,500 roubles,” the advocate said, “could have been
easily earned by two honest people getting from three to five roubles
per day in tips from the lodgers. The merchant’s money was stolen by
Maslova and given away, or even lost, as she was not in a normal state.”
The poisoning was committed by Maslova alone; therefore he begged the
jury to acquit Kartinkin and Botchkova of stealing the money; or if they
could not acquit them of the theft, at least to admit that it was done
without any participation in the poisoning.
In conclusion the advocate remarked, with a thrust at the public
prosecutor, that “the brilliant observations of that gentleman on
heredity, while explaining scientific facts concerning heredity, were
inapplicable in this case, as Botchkova was of unknown parentage.” The
public prosecutor put something down on paper with an angry look, and
shrugged his shoulders in contemptuous surprise.
Then Maslova’s advocate rose, and timidly and hesitatingly began his
speech in her defence.
Without denying that she had taken part in the stealing of the money,
he insisted on the fact that she had no intention of poisoning Smelkoff,
but had given him the powder only to make him fall asleep. He tried to
go in for a little eloquence in giving a description of how Maslova was
led into a life of debauchery by a man who had remained unpunished while
she had to bear all the weight of her fall; but this excursion into the
domain of psychology was so unsuccessful that it made everybody feel
uncomfortable. When he muttered something about men’s cruelty and
women’s helplessness, the president tried to help him by asking him to
keep closer to the facts of the case. When he had finished the public
prosecutor got up to reply. He defended his position against the first
advocate, saying that even if Botchkova was of unknown parentage the
truth of the doctrine of heredity was thereby in no way invalidated,
since the laws of heredity were so far proved by science that we can not
only deduce the crime from heredity, but heredity from the crime. As to
the statement made in defence of Maslova, that she was the victim of an
imaginary (he laid a particularly venomous stress on the word imaginary)
betrayer, he could only say that from the evidence before them it was
much more likely that she had played the part of temptress to many and
many a victim who had fallen into her hands. Having said this he sat
down in triumph. Then the prisoners were offered permission to speak in
their own defence.
Euphemia Botchkova repeated once more that she knew nothing about it and
had taken part in nothing, and firmly laid the whole blame on Maslova.
Simeon Kartinkin only repeated several times: “It is your business, but
I am innocent; it’s unjust.” Maslova said nothing in her defence. Told
she might do so by the president, she only lifted her eyes to him, cast
a look round the room like a hunted animal, and, dropping her head,
began to cry, sobbing aloud.
“What is the matter?” the merchant asked Nekhludoff, hearing him utter
a strange sound. This was the sound of weeping fiercely kept back.
Nekhludoff had not yet understood the significance of his present
position, and attributed the sobs he could hardly keep back and the
tears that filled his eyes to the weakness of his nerves. He put on his
pince-nez in order to hide the tears, then got out his handkerchief and
began blowing his nose.
Fear of the disgrace that would befall him if every one in the court
knew of his conduct stifled the inner working of his soul. This fear
was, during this first period, stronger than all else.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE TRIAL--THE SUMMING UP.
After the last words of the prisoners had been heard, the form in which
the questions were to be put to the jury was settled, which also took
some time. At last the questions were formulated, and the president
began the summing up.
Before putting the case to the jury, he spoke to them for some time in a
pleasant, homely manner, explaining that burglary was burglary and theft
was theft, and that stealing from a place which was under lock and key
was stealing from a place under lock and key. While he was explaining
this, he looked several times at Nekhludoff as if wishing to impress
upon him these important facts, in hopes that, having understood it,
Nekhludoff would make his fellow-jurymen also understand it. When he
considered that the jury were sufficiently imbued with these facts, he
proceeded to enunciate another truth--namely, that a murder is an
action which has the death of a human being as its consequence, and that
poisoning could therefore also be termed murder. When, according to his
opinion, this truth had also been received by the jury, he went on to
explain that if theft and murder had been committed at the same time,
the combination of the crimes was theft with murder.
Although he was himself anxious to finish as soon as possible, although
he knew that his Swiss friend would be waiting for him, he had grown so
used to his occupation that, having begun to speak, he could not stop
himself, and therefore he went on to impress on the jury with much
detail that if they found the prisoners guilty, they would have the
right to give a verdict of guilty; and if they found them not guilty,
to give a verdict of not guilty; and if they found them guilty of one of
the crimes and not of the other, they might give a verdict of guilty
on the one count and of not guilty on the other. Then he explained that
though this right was given them they should use it with reason.
He was going to add that if they gave an affirmative answer to any
question that was put to them they would thereby affirm everything
included in the question, so that if they did not wish to affirm the
whole of the question they should mention the part of the question they
wished to be excepted. But, glancing at the clock, and seeing it was
already five minutes to three, he resolved to trust to their being
intelligent enough to understand this without further comment.
“The facts of this case are the following,” began the president, and
repeated all that had already been said several times by the advocates,
the public prosecutor and the witnesses.
The president spoke, and the members on each side of him listened with
deeply-attentive expressions, but looked from time to time at the clock,
for they considered the speech too long though very good--i.e., such
as it ought to be. The public prosecutor, the lawyers, and, in fact,
everyone in the court, shared the same impression. The president
finished the summing up. Then he found it necessary to tell the jury
what they all knew, or might have found out by reading it up--i.e., how
they were to consider the case, count the votes, in case of a tie to
acquit the prisoners, and so on.
Everything seemed to have been told; but no, the president could not
forego his right of speaking as yet. It was so pleasant to hear the
impressive tones of his own voice, and therefore he found it necessary
to say a few words more about the importance of the rights given to the
jury, how carefully they should use the rights and how they ought not
to abuse them, about their being on their oath, that they were the
conscience of society, that the secrecy of the debating-room should be
considered sacred, etc.
From the time the president commenced his speech, Maslova watched him
without moving her eyes as if afraid of losing a single word; so that
Nekhludoff was not afraid of meeting her eyes and kept looking at her
all the time. And his mind passed through those phases in which a face
which we have not seen for many years first strikes us with the outward
changes brought about during the time of separation, and then gradually
becomes more and more like its old self, when the changes made by
time seem to disappear, and before our spiritual eyes rises only the
principal expression of one exceptional, unique individuality. Yes,
though dressed in a prison cloak, and in spite of the developed figure,
the fulness of the bosom and lower part of the face, in spite of a few
wrinkles on the forehead and temples and the swollen eyes, this was
certainly the same Katusha who, on that Easter eve, had so innocently
looked up to him whom she loved, with her fond, laughing eyes full of
joy and life.
“What a strange coincidence that after ten years, during which I never
saw her, this case should have come up today when I am on the jury, and
that it is in the prisoners’ dock that I see her again! And how will it
end? Oh, dear, if they would only get on quicker.”
Still he would not give in to the feelings of repentance which began to
arise within him. He tried to consider it all as a coincidence, which
would pass without infringing his manner of life. He felt himself in
the position of a puppy, when its master, taking it by the scruff of
its neck, rubs its nose in the mess it has made. The puppy whines, draws
back and wants to get away as far as possible from the effects of its
misdeed, but the pitiless master does not let go.
And so, Nekhludoff, feeling all the repulsiveness of what he had done,
felt also the powerful hand of the Master, but he did not feel the whole
significance of his action yet and would not recognise the Master’s
hand. He did not wish to believe that it was the effect of his deed that
lay before him, but the pitiless hand of the Master held him and he felt
he could not get away. He was still keeping up his courage and sat on
his chair in the first row in his usual self-possessed pose, one leg
carelessly thrown over the other, and playing with his pince-nez. Yet
all the while, in the depths of his soul, he felt the cruelty, cowardice
and baseness, not only of this particular action of his but of his whole
self-willed, depraved, cruel, idle life; and that dreadful veil which
had in some unaccountable manner hidden from him this sin of his and
the whole of his subsequent life was beginning to shake, and he caught
glimpses of what was covered by that veil.
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE TRIAL--THE VERDICT.
At last the president finished his speech, and lifting the list of
questions with a graceful movement of his arm he handed it to the
foreman, who came up to take it. The jury, glad to be able to get
into the debating-court, got up one after the other and left the room,
looking as if a bit ashamed of themselves and again not knowing what
to do with their hands. As soon as the door was closed behind them
a gendarme came up to it, pulled his sword out of the scabbard, and,
holding it up against his shoulder, stood at the door. The judges got up
and went away. The prisoners were also led out. When the jury came
into the debating-room the first thing they did was to take out their
cigarettes, as before, and begin smoking. The sense of the unnaturalness
and falseness of their position, which all of them had experienced
while sitting in their places in the court, passed when they entered the
debating-room and started smoking, and they settled down with a feeling
of relief and at once began an animated conversation.
“‘Tisn’t the girl’s fault. She’s got mixed up in it,” said the kindly
merchant. “We must recommend her to mercy.”
“That’s just what we are going to consider,” said the foreman. “We must
not give way to our personal impressions.”
“The president’s summing up was good,” remarked the colonel.
“Good? Why, it nearly sent me to sleep!”
“The chief point is that the servants could have known nothing about the
money if Maslova had not been in accord with them,” said the clerk of
Jewish extraction.
“Well, do you think that it was she who stole the money?” asked one of
the jury.
“I will never believe it,” cried the kindly merchant; “it was all that
red-eyed hag’s doing.”
“They are a nice lot, all of them,” said the colonel.
“But she says she never went into the room.”
“Oh, believe her by all means.”
“I should not believe that jade, not for the world.”
“Whether you believe her or not does not settle the question,” said the
clerk.
“The girl had the key,” said the colonel.
“What if she had?” retorted the merchant.
“And the ring?”
“But didn’t she say all about it?” again cried the merchant. “The fellow
had a temper of his own, and had had a drop too much besides, and gave
the girl a licking; what could be simpler? Well, then he’s sorry--quite
naturally. ‘There, never mind,’ says he; ‘take this.’ Why, I heard them
say he was six foot five high; I should think he must have weighed about
20 stones.”
“That’s not the point,” said Peter Gerasimovitch. “The question is,
whether she was the instigator and inciter in this affair, or the
servants?”
“It was not possible for the servants to do it alone; she had the key.”
This kind of random talk went on for a considerable time. At last the
foreman said: “I beg your pardon, gentlemen, but had we not better take
our places at the table and discuss the matter? Come, please.” And he
took the chair.
The questions were expressed in the following manner.
1. Is the peasant of the village Borki, Krapivinskia district, Simeon
Petrov Kartinkin, 33 years of age, guilty of having, in agreement with
other persons, given the merchant Smelkoff, on the 17th January, 188-,
in the town of N-----, with intent to deprive him of life, for the
purpose of robbing him, poisoned brandy, which caused Smelkoff’s death,
and of having stolen from him about 2,500 roubles in money and a diamond
ring?
2. Is the meschanka Euphemia Ivanovna Botchkova, 43 years of age, guilty
of the crimes described above?
3. Is the meschanka Katerina Michaelovna Maslova, 27 years of age,
guilty of the crimes described in the first question?
4. If the prisoner Euphemia Botchkova is not guilty according to the
first question, is she not guilty of having, on the 17th January, in the
town of N----, while in service at the hotel Mauritania, stolen from a
locked portmanteau, belonging to the merchant Smelkoff, a lodger in that
hotel, and which was in the room occupied by him, 2,500 roubles, for
which object she unlocked the portmanteau with a key she brought and
fitted to the lock?
The foreman read the first question.
“Well, gentlemen, what do you think?” This question was quickly
answered. All agreed to say “Guilty,” as if convinced that Kartinkin
had taken part both in the poisoning and the robbery. An old artelshik,
[member of an artel, an association of workmen, in which the members
share profits and liabilities] whose answers were all in favour of
acquittal, was the only exception.
The foreman thought he did not understand, and began to point out to him
that everything tended to prove Kartinkin’s guilt. The old man answered
that he did understand, but still thought it better to have pity on him.
“We are not saints ourselves,” and he kept to his opinion.
The answer to the second question concerning Botchkova was, after much
dispute and many exclamations, answered by the words, “Not guilty,”
there being no clear proofs of her having taken part in the poisoning--a
fact her advocate had strongly insisted on. The merchant, anxious to
acquit Maslova, insisted that Botchkova was the chief instigator of it
all. Many of the jury shared this view, but the foreman, wishing to be
in strict accord with the law, declared they had no grounds to consider
her as an accomplice in the poisoning. After much disputing the
foreman’s opinion triumphed.
To the fourth question concerning Botchkova the answer was “Guilty.” But
on the artelshik’s insistence she was recommended to mercy.
The third question, concerning Maslova, raised a fierce dispute. The
foreman maintained she was guilty both of the poisoning and the theft,
to which the merchant would not agree. The colonel, the clerk and the
old artelshik sided with the merchant, the rest seemed shaky, and the
opinion of the foreman began to gain ground, chiefly because all the
jurymen were getting tired, and preferred to take up the view that would
bring them sooner to a decision and thus liberate them.
From all that had passed, and from his former knowledge of Maslova,
Nekhludoff was certain that she was innocent of both the theft and the
poisoning. And he felt sure that all the others would come to the same
conclusion. When he saw that the merchant’s awkward defence (evidently
based on his physical admiration for her, which he did not even try
to hide) and the foreman’s insistence, and especially everybody’s
weariness, were all tending to her condemnation, he longed to state his
objections, yet dared not, lest his relations with Maslova should be
discovered. He felt he could not allow things to go on without stating
his objection; and, blushing and growing pale again, was about to speak
when Peter Gerasimovitch, irritated by the authoritative manner of
the foreman, began to raise his objections and said the very things
Nekhludoff was about to say.
“Allow me one moment,” he said. “You seem to think that her having the
key proves she is guilty of the theft; but what could be easier than
for the servants to open the portmanteau with a false key after she was
gone?”
“Of course, of course,” said the merchant.
“She could not have taken the money, because in her position she would
hardly know what to do with it.”
“That’s just what I say,” remarked the merchant.
“But it is very likely that her coming put the idea into the servants’
heads and that they grasped the opportunity and shoved all the blame
on her.” Peter Gerasimovitch spoke so irritably that the foreman became
irritated too, and went on obstinately defending the opposite views; but
Peter Gerasimovitch spoke so convincingly that the majority agreed with
him, and decided that Maslova was not guilty of stealing the money and
that the ring was given her.
But when the question of her having taken part in the poisoning was
raised, her zealous defender, the merchant, declared that she must
be acquitted, because she could have no reason for the poisoning. The
foreman, however, said that it was impossible to acquit her, because she
herself had pleaded guilty to having given the powder.
“Yes, but thinking it was opium,” said the merchant.
“Opium can also deprive one of life,” said the colonel, who was fond
of wandering from the subject, and he began telling how his
brother-in-law’s wife would have died of an overdose of opium if there
had not been a doctor near at hand to take the necessary measures. The
colonel told his story so impressively, with such self-possession and
dignity, that no one had the courage to interrupt him. Only the clerk,
infected by his example, decided to break in with a story of his own:
“There are some who get so used to it that they can take 40 drops. I
have a relative--,” but the colonel would not stand the interruption,
and went on to relate what effects the opium had on his brother-in-law’s
wife.
“But, gentlemen, do you know it is getting on towards five o’clock?”
said one of the jury.
“Well, gentlemen, what are we to say, then?” inquired the foreman.
“Shall we say she is guilty, but without intent to rob? And without
stealing any property? Will that do?” Peter Gerasimovitch, pleased with
his victory, agreed.
“But she must be recommended to mercy,” said the merchant.
All agreed; only the old artelshik insisted that they should say “Not
guilty.”
“It comes to the same thing,” explained the foreman; “without intent to
rob, and without stealing any property. Therefore, ‘Not guilty,’ that’s
evident.”
“All right; that’ll do. And we recommend her to mercy,” said the
merchant, gaily.
They were all so tired, so confused by the discussions, that nobody
thought of saying that she was guilty of giving the powder but without
the intent of taking life. Nekhludoff was so excited that he did not
notice this omission, and so the answers were written down in the form
agreed upon and taken to the court.
Rabelais says that a lawyer who was trying a case quoted all sorts of
laws, read 20 pages of judicial senseless Latin, and then proposed to
the judges to throw dice, and if the numbers proved odd the defendant
would be right, if not, the plaintiff.
It was much the same in this case. The resolution was taken, not because
everybody agreed upon it, but because the president, who had been
summing up at such length, omitted to say what he always said on such
occasions, that the answer might be, “Yes, guilty, but without the
intent of taking life;” because the colonel had related the story of his
brother-in-law’s wife at such great length; because Nekhludoff was too
excited to notice that the proviso “without intent to take life” had
been omitted, and thought that the words “without intent” nullified the
conviction; because Peter Gerasimovitch had retired from the room while
the questions and answers were being read, and chiefly because, being
tired, and wishing to get away as soon as possible, all were ready to
agree with the decision which would bring matters to an end soonest.
The jurymen rang the bell. The gendarme who had stood outside the door
with his sword drawn put the sword back into the scabbard and stepped
aside. The judges took their seats and the jury came out one by one.
The foreman brought in the paper with an air of solemnity and handed
it to the president, who looked at it, and, spreading out his hands
in astonishment, turned to consult his companions. The president was
surprised that the jury, having put in a proviso--without intent to
rob--did not put in a second proviso--without intent to take life. From
the decision of the jury it followed that Maslova had not stolen, nor
robbed, and yet poisoned a man without any apparent reason.
“Just see what an absurd decision they have come to,” he whispered to
the member on his left. “This means penal servitude in Siberia, and she
is innocent.”
“Surely you do not mean to say she is innocent?” answered the serious
member.
“Yes, she is positively innocent. I think this is a case for putting
Article 817 into practice (Article 817 states that if the Court
considers the decision of the jury unjust it may set it aside).”
“What do you think?” said the president, turning to the other member.
The kindly member did not answer at once. He looked at the number on a
paper before him and added up the figures; the sum would not divide
by three. He had settled in his mind that if it did divide by three he
would agree to the president’s proposal, but though the sum would not so
divide his kindness made him agree all the same.
“I, too, think it should be done,” he said.
“And you?” asked the president, turning to the serious member.
“On no account,” he answered, firmly. “As it is, the papers accuse the
jury of acquitting prisoners. What will they say if the Court does it?
I, shall not agree to that on any account.”
The president looked at his watch. “It is a pity, but what’s to be
done?” and handed the questions to the foreman to read out. All got
up, and the foreman, stepping from foot to foot, coughed, and read the
questions and the answers. All the Court, secretary, advocates, and even
the public prosecutor, expressed surprise. The prisoners sat impassive,
evidently not understanding the meaning of the answers. Everybody sat
down again, and the president asked the prosecutor what punishments the
prisoners were to be subjected to.
The prosecutor, glad of his unexpected success in getting Maslova
convicted, and attributing the success entirely to his own eloquence,
looked up the necessary information, rose and said: “With Simeon
Kartinkin I should deal according to Statute 1,452 paragraph 93.
Euphemia Botchkova according to Statute . . ., etc. Katerina Maslova
according to Statute . . ., etc.”
All three punishments were the heaviest that could be inflicted.
“The Court will adjourn to consider the sentence,” said the president,
rising. Everybody rose after him, and with the pleasant feeling of a
task well done began to leave the room or move about in it.
“D’you know, sirs, we have made a shameful hash of it?” said Peter
Gerasimovitch, approaching Nekhludoff, to whom the foreman was relating
something. “Why, we’ve got her to Siberia.”
“What are you saying?” exclaimed Nekhludoff. This time he did not notice
the teacher’s familiarity.
“Why, we did not put in our answer ‘Guilty, but without intent of
causing death.’ The secretary just told me the public prosecutor is for
condemning her to 15 years’ penal servitude.”
“Well, but it was decided so,” said the foreman.
Peter Gerasimovitch began to dispute this, saying that since she did
not take the money it followed naturally that she could not have had any
intention of committing murder.
“But I read the answer before going out,” said the foreman, defending
himself, “and nobody objected.”
“I had just then gone out of the room,” said Peter Gerasimovitch,
turning to Nekhludoff, “and your thoughts must have been wool-gathering
to let the thing pass.”
“I never imagined this,” Nekhludoff replied.
“Oh, you didn’t?”
“Oh, well, we can get it put right,” said Nekhludoff.
“Oh, dear no; it’s finished.”
Nekhludoff looked at the prisoners. They whose fate was being decided
still sat motionless behind the grating in front of the soldiers.
Maslova was smiling. Another feeling stirred in Nekhludoff’s soul. Up to
now, expecting her acquittal and thinking she would remain in the town,
he was uncertain how to act towards her. Any kind of relations with her
would be so very difficult. But Siberia and penal servitude at once cut
off every possibility of any kind of relations with her. The wounded
bird would stop struggling in the game-bag, and no longer remind him of
its existence.
CHAPTER XXIV.
THE TRIAL--THE SENTENCE.
Peter Gerasimovitch’s assumption was correct. The president came back
from the debating room with a paper, and read as follows:--“April 28th,
188-. By His Imperial Majesty’s ukase No. ----- The Criminal Court, on
the strength of the decision of the jury, in accordance with Section
3 of Statute 771, Section 3 of Statutes 770 and 777, decrees that the
peasant, Simeon Kartinkin, 33 years of age, and the meschanka Katerina
Maslova, 27 years of age, are to be deprived of all property rights and
to be sent to penal servitude in Siberia, Kartinkin for eight, Maslova
for four years, with the consequences stated in Statute 25 of the code.
The meschanka Botchkova, 43 years of age, to be deprived of all special
personal and acquired rights, and to be imprisoned for three years with
consequences in accord with Statute 48 of the code. The costs of the
case to be borne equally by the prisoners; and, in the case of their
being without sufficient property, the costs to be transferred to the
Treasury. Articles of material evidence to be sold, the ring to be
returned, the phials destroyed.” Botchkova was condemned to prison,
Simeon Kartinken and Katerina Maslova to the loss of all special rights
and privileges and to penal servitude in Siberia, he for eight and she
for four years.
Kartinkin stood holding his arms close to his sides and moving his lips.
Botchkova seemed perfectly calm. Maslova, when she heard the sentence,
blushed scarlet. “I’m not guilty, not guilty!” she suddenly cried, so
that it resounded through the room. “It is a sin! I am not guilty! I
never wished--I never thought! It is the truth I am saying--the truth!”
and sinking on the bench she burst into tears and sobbed aloud. When
Kartinkin and Botchkova went out she still sat crying, so that a
gendarme had to touch the sleeve of her cloak.
“No; it is impossible to leave it as it is,” said Nekhludoff to himself,
utterly forgetting his bad thoughts. He did not know why he wished to
look at her once more, but hurried out into the corridor. There was
quite a crowd at the door. The advocates and jury were going out,
pleased to have finished the business, and he was obliged to wait a few
seconds, and when he at last got out into the corridor she was far
in front. He hurried along the corridor after her, regardless of the
attention he was arousing, caught her up, passed her, and stopped. She
had ceased crying and only sobbed, wiping her red, discoloured face with
the end of the kerchief on her head. She passed without noticing him.
Then he hurried back to see the president. The latter had already left
the court, and Nekhludoff followed him into the lobby and went up to
him just as he had put on his light grey overcoat and was taking the
silver-mounted walking-stick which an attendant was handing him.
“Sir, may I have a few words with you concerning some business I have
just decided upon?” said Nekhludoff. “I am one of the jury.”
“Oh, certainly, Prince Nekhludoff. I shall be delighted. I think we
have met before,” said the president, pressing Nekhludoff’s hand and
recalling with pleasure the evening when he first met Nekhludoff, and
when he had danced so gaily, better than all the young people. “What can
I do for you?”
“There is a mistake in the answer concerning Maslova. She is not guilty
of the poisoning and yet she is condemned to penal servitude,” said
Nekhludoff, with a preoccupied and gloomy air.
“The Court passed the sentence in accordance with the answers you
yourselves gave,” said the president, moving towards the front door;
“though they did not seem to be quite in accord.” And he remembered
that he had been going to explain to the jury that a verdict of “guilty”
meant guilty of intentional murder unless the words “without intent to
take life” were added, but had, in his hurry to get the business over,
omitted to do so.
“Yes, but could not the mistake be rectified?”
“A reason for an appeal can always be found. You will have to speak to
an advocate,” said the president, putting on his hat a little to one
side and continuing to move towards the door.
“But this is terrible.”
“Well, you see, there were two possibilities before Maslova,” said the
president, evidently wishing to be as polite and pleasant to Nekhludoff
as he could. Then, having arranged his whiskers over his coat collar, he
put his hand lightly under Nekhludoff’s elbow, and, still directing his
steps towards the front door, he said, “You are going, too?”
“Yes,” said Nekhludoff, quickly getting his coat, and following him.
They went out into the bright, merry sunlight, and had to raise their
voices because of the rattling of the wheels on the pavement.
“The situation is a curious one, you see,” said the president; “what lay
before this Maslova was one of two things: either to be almost acquitted
and only imprisoned for a short time, or, taking the preliminary
confinement into consideration, perhaps not at all--or Siberia. There is
nothing between. Had you but added the words, ‘without intent to cause
death,’ she would have been acquitted.”
“Yes, it was inexcusable of me to omit that,” said Nekhludoff.
“That’s where the whole matter lies,” said the president, with a smile,
and looked at his watch. He had only three-quarters of an hour left
before the time appointed by his Clara would elapse.
“Now, if you like to speak to the advocates you’ll have to find a reason
for an appeal; that can be easily done.” Then, turning to an isvostchik,
he called out, “To the Dvoryanskaya 30 copecks; I never give more.”
“All right, your honour; here you are.”
“Good-afternoon. If I can be of any use, my address is House Dvornikoff,
on the Dvoryanskaya; it’s easy to remember.” And he bowed in a friendly
manner as he got into the trap and drove off.
CHAPTER XXV.
NEKHLUDOFF CONSULTS AN ADVOCATE.
His conversation with the president and the fresh air quieted Nekhludoff
a little. He now thought that the feelings experienced by him had been
exaggerated by the unusual surroundings in which he had spent the whole
of the morning, and by that wonderful and startling coincidence. Still,
it was absolutely necessary to take some steps to lighten Maslova’s
fate, and to take them quickly. “Yes, at once! It will be best to find
out here in the court where the advocate Fanarin or Mikishin lives.”
These were two well-known advocates whom Nekhludoff called to mind. He
returned to the court, took off his overcoat, and went upstairs. In the
first corridor he met Fanarin himself. He stopped him, and told him that
he was just going to look him up on a matter of business.
Fanarin knew Nekhludoff by sight and name, and said he would be very
glad to be of service to him.
“Though I am rather tired, still, if your business will not take very
long, perhaps you might tell me what it is now. Will you step in here?”
And he led Nekhludoff into a room, probably some judge’s cabinet. They
sat down by the table.
“Well, and what is your business?”
“First of all, I must ask you to keep the business private. I do not
want it known that I take an interest in the affair.”
“Oh, that of course. Well?”
“I was on the jury to-day, and we have condemned a woman to Siberia,
an innocent woman. This bothers me very much.” Nekhludoff, to his own
surprise, blushed and became confused. Fanarin glanced at him rapidly,
and looked down again, listening.
“Well?”
“We have condemned a woman, and I should like to appeal to a higher
court.”
“To the Senate, you mean,” said Fanarin, correcting him.
“Yes, and I should like to ask you to take the case in hand.” Nekhludoff
wanted to get the most difficult part over, and added, “I shall take the
costs of the case on myself, whatever they may be.”
“Oh, we shall settle all that,” said the advocate, smiling with
condescension at Nekhludoff’s inexperience in these matters. “What is
the case?”
Nekhludoff stated what had happened.
“All right. I shall look the case through to-morrow or the day
after--no--better on Thursday. If you will come to me at six o’clock I
will give you an answer. Well, and now let us go; I have to make a few
inquiries here.”
Nekhludoff took leave of him and went out. This talk with the advocate,
and the fact that he had taken measures for Maslova’s defence, quieted
him still further. He went out into the street. The weather was
beautiful, and he joyfully drew in a long breath of spring air. He was
at once surrounded by isvostchiks offering their services, but he went
on foot. A whole swarm of pictures and memories of Katusha and his
conduct to her began whirling in his brain, and he felt depressed and
everything appeared gloomy. “No, I shall consider all this later on; I
must now get rid of all these disagreeable impressions,” he thought to
himself.
He remembered the Korchagin’s dinner and looked at his watch. It was
not yet too late to get there in time. He heard the ring of a passing
tramcar, ran to catch it, and jumped on. He jumped off again when they
got to the market-place, took a good isvostchik, and ten minutes later
was at the entrance of the Korchagins’ big house.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE HOUSE OF KORCHAGIN.
“Please to walk in, your excellency,” said the friendly, fat doorkeeper
of the Korchagins’ big house, opening the door, which moved noiselessly
on its patent English hinges; “you are expected. They are at dinner.
My orders were to admit only you.” The doorkeeper went as far as the
staircase and rang.
“Are there any strangers?” asked Nekhludoff, taking off his overcoat.
“Mr. Kolosoff and Michael Sergeivitch only, besides the family.”
A very handsome footman with whiskers, in a swallow-tail coat and white
gloves, looked down from the landing.
“Please to walk up, your excellency,” he said. “You are expected.”
Nekhludoff went up and passed through the splendid large dancing-room,
which he knew so well, into the dining-room. There the whole Korchagin
family--except the mother, Sophia Vasilievna, who never left her
cabinet--were sitting round the table. At the head of the table sat old
Korchagin; on his left the doctor, and on his right, a visitor, Ivan
Ivanovitch Kolosoff, a former Marechal de Noblesse, now a bank director,
Korchagin’s friend and a Liberal. Next on the left side sat Miss Rayner,
the governess of Missy’s little sister, and the four-year-old girl
herself. Opposite them, Missy’s brother, Petia, the only son of the
Korchagins, a public-school boy of the Sixth Class. It was because of
his examinations that the whole family were still in town. Next to
him sat a University student who was coaching him, and Missy’s cousin,
Michael Sergeivitch Telegin, generally called Misha; opposite him,
Katerina Alexeevna, a 40-year-old maiden lady, a Slavophil; and at the
foot of the table sat Missy herself, with an empty place by her side.
“Ah! that’s right! Sit down. We are still at the fish,” said old
Korchagin with difficulty, chewing carefully with his false teeth,
and lifting his bloodshot eyes (which had no visible lids to them) to
Nekhludoff.
“Stephen!” he said, with his mouth full, addressing the stout, dignified
butler, and pointing with his eyes to the empty place. Though Nekhludoff
knew Korchagin very well, and had often seen him at dinner, to-day this
red face with the sensual smacking lips, the fat neck above the napkin
stuck into his waistcoat, and the whole over-fed military figure, struck
him very disagreeably. Then Nekhludoff remembered, without wishing to,
what he knew of the cruelty of this man, who, when in command, used
to have men flogged, and even hanged, without rhyme or reason, simply
because he was rich and had no need to curry favour.
“Immediately, your excellency,” said Stephen, getting a large soup ladle
out of the sideboard, which was decorated with a number of silver vases.
He made a sign with his head to the handsome footman, who began at once
to arrange the untouched knives and forks and the napkin, elaborately
folded with the embroidered family crest uppermost, in front of the
empty place next to Missy. Nekhludoff went round shaking hands with
every one, and all, except old Korchagin and the ladies, rose when he
approached. And this walk round the table, this shaking the hands of
people, with many of whom he never talked, seemed unpleasant and odd. He
excused himself for being late, and was about to sit down between Missy
and Katerina Alexeevna, but old Korchagin insisted that if he would not
take a glass of vodka he should at least take a bit of something to whet
his appetite, at the side table, on which stood small dishes of lobster,
caviare, cheese, and salt herrings. Nekhludoff did not know how hungry
he was until he began to eat, and then, having taken some bread and
cheese, he went on eating eagerly.
“Well, have you succeeded in undermining the basis of society?”
asked Kolosoff, ironically quoting an expression used by a retrograde
newspaper in attacking trial by jury. “Acquitted the culprits and
condemned the innocent, have you?”
“Undermining the basis--undermining the basis,” repeated Prince
Korchagin, laughing. He had a firm faith in the wisdom and learning of
his chosen friend and companion.
At the risk of seeming rude, Nekhludoff left Kolosoff’s question
unanswered, and sitting down to his steaming soup, went on eating.
“Do let him eat,” said Missy, with a smile. The pronoun him she used as
a reminder of her intimacy with Nekhludoff. Kolosoff went on in a loud
voice and lively manner to give the contents of the article against
trial by jury which had aroused his indignation. Missy’s cousin, Michael
Sergeivitch, endorsed all his statements, and related the contents of
another article in the same paper. Missy was, as usual, very distinguee,
and well, unobtrusively well, dressed.
“You must be terribly tired,” she said, after waiting until Nekhludoff
had swallowed what was in his mouth.
“Not particularly. And you? Have you been to look at the pictures?” he
asked.
“No, we put that off. We have been playing tennis at the Salamatoffs’.
It is quite true, Mr. Crooks plays remarkably well.”
Nekhludoff had come here in order to distract his thoughts, for he
used to like being in this house, both because its refined luxury had a
pleasant effect on him and because of the atmosphere of tender flattery
that unobtrusively surrounded him. But to-day everything in the house
was repulsive to him--everything: beginning with the doorkeeper, the
broad staircase, the flowers, the footman, the table decorations, up to
Missy herself, who to-day seemed unattractive and affected. Kolosoff’s
self-assured, trivial tone of liberalism was unpleasant, as was also the
sensual, self-satisfied, bull-like appearance of old Korchagin, and the
French phrases of Katerina Alexeevna, the Slavophil. The constrained
looks of the governess and the student were unpleasant, too, but most
unpleasant of all was the pronoun _him_ that Missy had used. Nekhludoff
had long been wavering between two ways of regarding Missy; sometimes he
looked at her as if by moonlight, and could see in her nothing but what
was beautiful, fresh, pretty, clever and natural; then suddenly, as
if the bright sun shone on her, he saw her defects and could not help
seeing them. This was such a day for him. To-day he saw all the wrinkles
of her face, knew which of her teeth were false, saw the way her hair
was crimped, the sharpness of her elbows, and, above all, how large her
thumb-nail was and how like her father’s.
“Tennis is a dull game,” said Kolosoff; “we used to play lapta when we
were children. That was much more amusing.”
“Oh, no, you never tried it; it’s awfully interesting,” said Missy,
laying, it seemed to Nekhludoff, a very affected stress on the word
“awfully.” Then a dispute arose in which Michael Sergeivitch, Katerina
Alexeevna and all the others took part, except the governess, the
student and the children, who sat silent and wearied.
“Oh, these everlasting disputes!” said old Korchagin, laughing, and he
pulled the napkin out of his waistcoat, noisily pushed back his chair,
which the footman instantly caught hold of, and left the table.
Everybody rose after him, and went up to another table on which stood
glasses of scented water. They rinsed their mouths, then resumed the
conversation, interesting to no one.
“Don’t you think so?” said Missy to Nekhludoff, calling for a
confirmation of the statement that nothing shows up a man’s character
like a game. She noticed that preoccupied and, as it seemed to her,
dissatisfied look which she feared, and she wanted to find out what had
caused it.
“Really, I can’t tell; I have never thought about it,” Nekhludoff
answered.
“Will you come to mamma?” asked Missy.
“Yes, yes,” he said, in a tone which plainly proved that he did not want
to go, and took out a cigarette.
She looked at him in silence, with a questioning look, and he felt
ashamed. “To come into a house and give the people the dumps,” he
thought about himself; then, trying to be amiable, said that he would go
with pleasure if the princess would admit him.
“Oh, yes! Mamma will be pleased. You may smoke there; and Ivan
Ivanovitch is also there.”
The mistress of the house, Princess Sophia Vasilievna, was a recumbent
lady. It was the eighth year that, when visitors were present, she lay
in lace and ribbons, surrounded with velvet, gilding, ivory, bronze,
lacquer and flowers, never going out, and only, as she put it, receiving
intimate friends, i.e., those who according to her idea stood out from
the common herd.
Nekhludoff was admitted into the number of these friends because he was
considered clever, because his mother had been an intimate friend of the
family, and because it was desirable that Missy should marry him.
Sophia Vasilievna’s room lay beyond the large and the small
drawing-rooms. In the large drawing-room, Missy, who was in front of
Nekhludoff, stopped resolutely, and taking hold of the back of a small
green chair, faced him.
Missy was very anxious to get married, and as he was a suitable match
and she also liked him, she had accustomed herself to the thought that
he should be hers (not she his). To lose him would be very mortifying.
She now began talking to him in order to get him to explain his
intentions.
“I see something has happened,” she said. “Tell me, what is the matter
with you?”
He remembered the meeting in the law court, and frowned and blushed.
“Yes, something has happened,” he said, wishing to be truthful; “a very
unusual and serious event.”
“What is it, then? Can you not tell me what it is?” She was pursuing her
aim with that unconscious yet obstinate cunning often observable in the
mentally diseased.
“Not now. Please do not ask me to tell you. I have not yet had time
fully to consider it,” and he blushed still more.
“And so you will not tell me?” A muscle twitched in her face and she
pushed back the chair she was holding. “Well then, come!” She shook her
head as if to expel useless thoughts, and, faster than usual, went on in
front of him.
He fancied that her mouth was unnaturally compressed in order to keep
back the tears. He was ashamed of having hurt her, and yet he knew that
the least weakness on his part would mean disaster, i.e., would bind
him to her. And to-day he feared this more than anything, and silently
followed her to the princess’s cabinet.
CHAPTER XXVII.
MISSY’S MOTHER.
Princess Sophia Vasilievna, Missy’s mother, had finished her very
elaborate and nourishing dinner. (She had it always alone, that no one
should see her performing this unpoetical function.) By her couch stood
a small table with her coffee, and she was smoking a pachitos. Princess
Sophia Vasilievna was a long, thin woman, with dark hair, large black
eyes and long teeth, and still pretended to be young.
Her intimacy with the doctor was being talked about. Nekhludoff had
known that for some time; but when he saw the doctor sitting by her
couch, his oily, glistening beard parted in the middle, he not only
remembered the rumours about them, but felt greatly disgusted. By
the table, on a low, soft, easy chair, next to Sophia Vasilievna, sat
Kolosoff, stirring his coffee. A glass of liqueur stood on the table.
Missy came in with Nekhludoff, but did not remain in the room.
“When mamma gets tired of you and drives you away, then come to me,”
she said, turning to Kolosoff and Nekhludoff, speaking as if nothing had
occurred; then she went away, smiling merrily and stepping noiselessly
on the thick carpet.
“How do you do, dear friend? Sit down and talk,” said Princess Sophia
Vasilievna, with her affected but very naturally-acted smile, showing
her fine, long teeth--a splendid imitation of what her own had
once been. “I hear that you have come from the Law Courts very much
depressed. I think it must be very trying to a person with a heart,” she
added in French.
“Yes, that is so,” said Nekhludoff. “One often feels one’s own de--one
feels one has no right to judge.”
“Comme, c’est vrai,” she cried, as if struck by the truth of this
remark. She was in the habit of artfully flattering all those with whom
she conversed. “Well, and what of your picture? It does interest me so.
If I were not such a sad invalid I should have been to see it long ago,”
she said.
“I have quite given it up,” Nekhludoff replied drily. The falseness of
her flattery seemed as evident to him to-day as her age, which she was
trying to conceal, and he could not put himself into the right state to
behave politely.
“Oh, that _is_ a pity! Why, he has a real talent for art; I have it from
Repin’s own lips,” she added, turning to Kolosoff.
“Why is it she is not ashamed of lying so?” Nekhludoff thought, and
frowned.
Whe
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