1
The catastrophe with Liza and the death of Marya Timofeevna made an overwhelming impression on Shatov. I mentioned earlier that I’d met him that morning in passing; he seemed not to be in his right mind. He told me, incidentally, that the previous evening around nine o’clock (that is, three hours before the fire), he’d been to see Marya Timofeevna. The next morning he went to have a look at the bodies, but, as far as I know, made no official statement anywhere that morning. Meanwhile, towards the end of that day, a veritable storm had arisen in his mind and… it seems I can now state with certainty, there came a moment just around twilight when he was ready to get up, go out, and—tell everything. Exactly what this everything was:—he himself didn’t quite know. Of course he would have achieved nothing except to give himself away. He had no evidence whatever that could expose the crime that had just been committed; he himself had mere vague conjectures about it to go on, only enough to convince himself alone with absolute certainty. But he was prepared to ruin himself if he could but ‘crush the scoundrels’—in his own words. Peter Stepanovich had fairly correctly divined this impulse in him and knew he was taking a big risk in putting off the execution of his terrible new plan until the next day. On his side, as usual, he showed great self-confidence and contempt for all these ‘insignificant little creatures’, Shatov in particular. For some time he’d despised Shatov for his ‘snivelling idiocy’, as he himself had expressed it during his time abroad; he confidently hoped to be able to deal with such a simple creature, namely by not letting him out of his sight the whole of that day, and intercepting him at the first sign of danger. But what saved the ‘scoundrels’ for a little while longer was an entirely unexpected circumstance, something not one of them had foreseen…
p. 637↵At about eight o’clock in the evening (precisely when the members of the group were gathering at Erkel’s awaiting Peter Stepanovich, indignant and agitated), Shatov was lying stretched out on his bed in the darkness without a candle, suffering from a headache and a slight chill. He was tormented by uncertainty; he was angry; he kept trying to make up his mind, but was unable to do so; cursing himself, he felt that nothing would come of it. Gradually he slipped into a light sleep and had something like a nightmare; he dreamt he was tied to his bed with ropes, totally bound and unable to move, and all the while he heard someone pounding at the fence, at the gate, at his door, at Kirillov’s door, so furiously that the whole house was shaking. Some distant, familiar voice that tormented him was calling to him plaintively. He suddenly came to and sat up in bed. To his astonishment the pounding at the gate continued, although not nearly as loudly as it had seemed in his dream; still it was repeated and persistent, and the strange, ‘tormenting’ voice, yet not at all plaintive, on the contrary, impatient and irritable, was heard down at the gate alternating with someone else’s voice, more restrained and ordinary. He jumped up, opened the window, and stuck out his head.
‘Who’s there?’ he asked, literally petrified with fear.
‘If that’s Shatov,’ came the curt, firm reply from below, ‘be so good as to tell me directly and honestly whether you’ll agree to let me in or not?’
So it was true; he had recognized the voice!
‘Marie!… Is that you?’
‘Yes, it’s me, Marya Shatova. I assure you I can’t keep the driver here a moment longer.’
‘At once… I’ll get a candle…’ Shatov cried weakly. Then he rushed to find matches. As usual in such cases, the matches were nowhere to be found. He dropped the candlestick and the candle on the floor, and as soon as he heard the impatient voice calling from below once more, gave it all up and rushed down the steep staircase as fast as he could to open the gate.
‘Do me a favour, hold my bag while I settle with this blockhead,’ was the greeting he received from Mrs Marya p. 638↵Shatova. She thrust into his hands a rather flimsy cheap canvas bag made in Dresden and studded with brass nails. She pounced angrily on the driver:
‘I can assure you, you’re asking too much. If you spent an extra hour dragging me around through muddy streets, it’s your own fault because you didn’t know where the stupid street was or how to get to this idiotic house. Be so kind as to take your thirty kopecks and understand that you won’t get anything more.’
‘Come on, lady, you kept telling me Voznesenskaya Street, but this is Bogoyavlenskaya*: Voznesenskaya is a long way from here. You’ve just got my gelding in a sweat.’
‘Voznesenskaya, Bogoyavlenskaya—you ought to know these stupid street names better than me since you live here. Besides, you’re being unfair: the first thing I said was Filippov’s house, and you told me you knew where it was. In any case you can take me to court tomorrow if you like; as for now, I beg you to leave me in peace.’
‘Here’s another five kopecks!’ said Shatov, impetuously taking a five-kopeck piece from his pocket and handing it to the driver.
‘I must ask you not to do that!’ Madame Shatova cried, flaring up, but the driver had urged his gelding on and Shatov, taking Marya by the hand, led her in through the gate.
‘Hurry, Marie, quickly… that doesn’t matter—you’re soaking wet! Here, this way—what a pity there’s no light—the stairs are steep. Hold tight. Well, here’s my little room. Excuse me, I have no light… One minute!’
He picked up the candlestick, but it was still a while before any matches could be found. Madame Shatova stood waiting in silence in the middle of the room and didn’t move.
‘Thank God, at last!’ he cried gleefully, lighting up the room. Marya Shatova quickly surveyed the place.
‘I heard you were living in squalor, but I didn’t think it would be like this,’ she said in disgust and moved towards the bed.
‘Oh, I’m so tired!’ she said, sitting on the hard bed with an exhausted air. ‘Please put down the bag and sit down on p. 639↵that chair. Oh well, do as you like, but you’re getting in the way. I’ve come to stay with you for a while, until I find work, because I know nothing about things here and don’t have any money. But if I’m in your way, please tell me at once, as you must do if you’re an honest man. I could sell something tomorrow and stay in a hotel. You could take me there yourself… Oh, I’m so very tired!’
Shatov trembled all over.
‘There’s no need, Marie, no need for a hotel! What hotel? Why? Why?’
He clasped his hands, imploring her.
‘Well, if we can do without a hotel, I still have to explain the situation. You remember, Shatova, we lived together as a married couple in Geneva for a little over two weeks; it’s been three years since we parted, without any particular quarrel though. Don’t think I’ve come back to resume anything from our stupid past. I’ve come back to find work, and if I’ve returned to this town, it’s only because it’s all the same to me. I haven’t come to apologize for anything; please don’t get any stupid ideas about that.’
‘Oh, Marie! That’s not necessary, not at all!’ Shatov muttered vaguely.
‘Well, if that’s so, if you’re so civilized that you understand the situation, let me add that if I’ve turned to you now and come straight to your place, it’s partly because I’ve always considered you to be no villain, and perhaps much better than the others… those scoundrels!’
Her eyes Hashed. She must have endured a great deal from those ‘scoundrels’.
‘I do assure you I wasn’t laughing at you just now when I said you were kind. I was speaking plainly, without eloquence, which I can’t bear. But this is all nonsense. I’ve always hoped you would have enough intelligence not to annoy me… Enough, I’m tired!’
She gave him a long, weary, harassed look. Shatov stood in front of her, about five paces away, on the other side of the room, listening to her timidly, but with a sense of renewal, with unwonted radiance in his expression. This strong, rough man, whose exterior was so prickly, had p. 640↵suddenly softened completely and was now radiant. Something extraordinary and completely unexpected stirred in his soul. Three years of separation, three years of broken marriage had driven nothing whatever from his heart. Perhaps he’d dreamt about her every day for the last three years, about this dear creature who’d once told him ‘I love you.’ Knowing Shatov, I can say for certain that he never even allowed himself to dream of the possibility that one day a woman would say ‘I love you’ to him. He was chaste and incredibly bashful; he considered himself a terrible monster; he hated his own face and character; he compared himself to a freak that could be carted around and exhibited at fairs. As a result he valued honesty above all else, and was fanatically devoted to his own convictions; he was gloomy, proud, easily angered and taciturn. Yet here was this unique being who’d loved him for two weeks (he always believed that, always!)—a being he’d always considered immeasurably higher than himself, in spite of a quite clear-eyed understanding of all her mistakes; a being he could forgive everything, absolutely everything (there could be no question about that whatsoever; in fact, even the opposite was true; as it turned out, he considered he had wronged her); and now, all of a sudden, this woman, this Marya Shatova was back in his house, once again standing before him… it was almost inconceivable! He was so overcome, there was so much that was terrible in this event, and at the same time so much happiness that he couldn’t, perhaps didn’t even want to, perhaps was afraid to understand it all. It was a dream. But when she looked at him with her tormented eyes, he suddenly realized this dear being was suffering and perhaps had been wronged. His heart froze. He looked at her features with anguish: the first bloom of youth had long since disappeared from the exhausted face. True, she was still attractive—in his eyes just as beautiful as ever. (In fact, she was about twenty-five years old, quite strongly built, above average height (she was taller than Shatov), with a full head of dark brown hair, a pale oval face and large dark eyes that glittered now with a feverish brilliance.) But the earlier light-hearted, innocent, good-natured energy that he p. 641↵had known so well had been replaced by sullen irritability, disenchantment, almost cynicism to which she herself had not grown accustomed and which she actually resented. But the main thing was, she was ill, that he saw clearly. In spite of his fear of her, he went up to her abruptly and took hold of both her hands.
‘Marie… you know… you may be very tired, for God’s sake, don’t be angry… Would you like some tea, for example? It might make you feel better, don’t you think? If you’d only agree!…’
‘What’s to agree with? Of course I agree! What a baby you are. Give me some tea, if you can. It’s so cramped in here! And very cold!’
‘Oh, I’ll get some logs, logs… I have some logs!’ said Shatov, pacing around the room. ‘Logs… that is, but… I’ll get the tea first,’ he said, waving his arm in desperate determination and grabbing his cap.
‘Where are you going? Don’t you have any tea here?’
‘I will, I will, I will, soon I’ll have everything here… I…’. He seized a revolver from the shelf.
‘I’ll sell this revolver at once… or I’ll pawn it…’
‘That’s stupid and will take too long! Here, take some of my money if you don’t have any. There’s eighty kopecks, I think. That’s all. This place is like a madhouse.’
‘No, no, I don’t need your money. I’ll be right back, in a minute, I can manage without the revolver…’
He went straight to see Kirillov. This was probably about two hours before Peter Stepanovich and Liputin paid him the visit. Although Shatov and Kirillov lived in the same, yard, they scarcely saw each other. When they met they never greeted or spoke to each other: they’d ‘lain’ side by side in America for too long.
‘Kirillov, you always have tea. Do you have any now and a samovar?’
Kirillov was pacing around the room (as was his custom, from one corner to another, all night long). He suddenly stopped and stared intently at this man who’d come rushing in, though without any particular surprise.
‘Yes, I have tea, I have sugar, and I have a samovar. But p. 642↵you don’t need a samovar since the tea is still hot. Sit down and have some.’
‘Kirillov, in America we lay side by side… My wife has come back to me… I… Give me some tea… I need a samovar.’
‘If your wife’s come back, you need a samovar. But take it later. I have two of them. For now take the teapot from the table. It’s hot, very hot. Take everything, take the sugar; everything. Bread… Lots of bread, take it all. There’s some veal. I’ve a rouble in money.’
‘Give it to me, friend. I’ll give you it back tomorrow! Oh, Kirillov!’
‘Is it the same wife who was in Switzerland? That’s good. And the fact you came running in here is also good.’
‘Kirillov!’ cried Shatova, putting the teapot under his arm, taking the sugar and bread in both hands. ‘Kirillov! If… if only you’d renounce your terrible fantasies and stop your atheistic ravings… oh, what a fine person you’d be, Kirillov!’
‘Clearly you love your wife even after Switzerland. That’s good—if even after Switzerland. When you need more tea, come back. Any time of night, I never sleep. I’ll have a samovar. Take the rouble, there. Go back to your wife; I’ll stay here and think about you and your wife.’
Marya Shatova was obviously satisfied with the speed of it and sipped the tea almost greedily; but there was no need to go back for the samovar. She drank only half a cup and ate only a tiny piece of bread. She refused the veal irritably and with disgust.
‘You’re ill, Marie, this all shows you’re not well…’ Shatov observed timidly, waiting on her timidly.
‘Of course, I’m not well; please sit down. Where did you get the tea since you had none?’
Shatov told her briefly about Kirillov. She’d heard something about him.
‘I know he’s insane; that’s enough, thanks. Aren’t there enough idiots? So you were in America? I heard, you wrote.’
‘Yes, I… I wrote to Paris.’
‘Enough, and please talk about something else. Are you a Slavophile* by conviction?’
p. 643↵‘I… it’s not that I… I became a Slavophile because it was impossible to be a Russian,’ he said with a wry smile and with the effort of a man who’s made an inappropriate and ill-timed witticism.
‘You’re not a Russian?’
‘No, I’m not.’
‘Well, that’s stupid. Sit down, I beg you, once and for all. Why are you wandering around? You think I’m delirious? Perhaps I will be. You said only two of you live in this house?’
‘Two… downstairs…’
‘And both so clever. Downstairs? You said downstairs?’
‘No, nothing.’
‘How do you mean, nothing? I want to know.’
‘I was only going to say that now there are only two of us living in this house, but the Lebyadkins also used to live downstairs before…’
‘That’s who was murdered last night?’ she shot back suddenly. ‘I’ve heard. I’d just arrived when I heard. You had a fire?’
‘Yes, Marie, yes, and perhaps I’m doing a despicable thing this minute by forgiving those scoundrels…’ he said, standing up suddenly, pacing around the room and waving his arms almost in a frenzy.
But Marie didn’t quite understand him. She was listening absent-mindedly; she asked questions, but didn’t listen to his replies.
‘Nice goings-on around here. Oh, it’s so disgusting! They’re all scoundrels! Sit down, I beg you, once and for all. Oh, how you irritate me!’ she said, dropping her head on the pillow in exhaustion.
‘Marie, I won’t… Maybe you should have a bit of a lie down, Marie?’
She didn’t answer and closed her eyes in exhaustion. Her pale face resembled a corpse. She fell asleep almost immediately. Shatov looked around, put out the candle, once again glanced uneasily at her face, clasped his hands tight in front of him, left the room on tiptoe and went out into the passage. At the top of the stairs he pressed his face into p. 644↵the corner and stood there for about ten minutes, in silence, without moving. He would have stood there longer, but suddenly from below he heard quiet, cautious footsteps. Someone was coming up the stairs. Shatov remembered he’d forgotten to lock the gate.
‘Who’s there?’ he asked in a whisper.
The unknown visitor kept climbing the stairs without hurrying or replying. When he got to the top he stopped; it was impossible to get a good look at him in the darkness. Suddenly he asked cautiously:
‘Ivan Shatov?’
Shatov identified himself but then quickly held out his hand to stop him; but the stranger took Shatov’s hand—Shatov recoiled as if he’d touched a horrible reptile.
‘Stay here,’ he whispered quickly. ‘Don’t go in. I can’t receive you now. My wife has come back to me. I’ll bring a candle.’
When he returned with a candle, he saw it was a young officer; he didn’t remember his name, but he’d seen him somewhere before.
‘Erkel,’ the man introduced himself. ‘You saw me at Virginsky’s.’
‘I remember; you sat there and kept writing. Listen,’ Shatov cried suddenly, going up to him frantically, but still speaking in a whisper, ‘You gave me a signal just now when you took my hand. I don’t give a damn about all these signals! I don’t acknowledge them… I don’t want to… I can throw you downstairs right now, do you know that?’
‘No, I don’t know that and have no idea why you’re so angry,’ the guest replied without malice, almost good-naturedly. ‘I’ve merely come to give you a message and have no desire to waste any time. You have a printing press that doesn’t belong to you and you’re responsible for, as you yourself know. I’ve been ordered to ask you to hand it over to Liputin at seven o’clock tomorrow evening. Furthermore, I’ve been instructed to tell you that nothing more will be required of you.’
‘Nothing?’
‘Absolutely nothing. Your request is being granted; you’re p. 645↵being released. I’ve been told to relay that message to you definitely.’
‘Who ordered you to tell me?’
‘Those who gave me the signal.’
‘Have you come from abroad?’
‘That… I think, should make no difference to you.’
‘Oh, damn you! Why didn’t you come earlier if you were ordered to?’
‘I was following instructions and wasn’t alone.’
‘I understand, I understand you weren’t alone. Oh… hell! Why didn’t Liputin come himself?’
‘So, I’ll call for you at six o’clock tomorrow evening and we’ll proceed on foot. Besides the three of us, no one else will be there.’
‘Will Verkhovensky be there?’
‘No, he won’t. Verkhovensky is leaving town tomorrow morning at eleven o’clock.’
‘Just as I thought,’ Shatov whispered furiously and struck his fist against his hip. ‘He’s running away, the scoundrel.’
He sank into agitated reflection. Erkel stared at him intently, remaining silent, waiting.
‘How will you take possession of it? You can’t just pick it up and carry it away.’
‘That won’t be necessary. You’ll simply show us where it is and we’ll make sure it’s really buried there. We know only approximately where it is; we don’t know exactly. Have you ever shown anyone the place?’
Shatov looked at him.
‘You, you, you’re such a little boy—such a silly little boy—you’re up to your ears in it too, like a stupid sheep. Oh, that’s just what they need—young blood like yours! Well, go on! Ugh! That scoundrel has deceived all of you and now he’s run off.’
Erkel gave him a clear, calm look, but seemed not to understand.
‘Verkhovensky’s run off, Verkhovensky!’ Shatov cried furiously, grinding his teeth.
‘But he’s still here, he hasn’t left yet. He’s going tomorrow,’ Erkel replied softly and persuasively. ‘I invited him p. 646↵to be present as a witness; all my instructions made reference to him.’ He confided everything like an inexperienced young boy. ‘Unfortunately, he couldn’t agree because of his impending departure; he’s really in something of a hurry.’
Shatov once again glanced pityingly at the young simpleton, but suddenly made a gesture of dismissal as if thinking: ‘It’s not even worth pitying them.’
‘Fine, I’ll come,’ he said abruptly all of a sudden. ‘As for now, go away, off with you!’
‘I’ll call for you at six o’clock Sharp,’ Erkel said, bowing politely and descending the stairs without hurrying.
‘You little fool!’ Shatov cried after him from the top of the stairs, unable to restrain to himself.
‘What’s that?’ Erkel called up from below.
‘Nothing, keep going.’
‘I thought you said something.’
2
Erkel was the sort of ‘little fool’ who lacks only the higher form of reason that controls man’s head; but he had plenty of inferior, subordinate reasoning powers, even to the point of cunning. Fanatically, childishly devoted to ‘the cause’, but in fact devoted to Peter Verkhovensky, he acted on the instructions given him during the meeting of the group of five at Virginsky’s when roles were being decided and distributed. Peter Stepanovich, when assigning him the role of messenger, managed to take him aside and talk with him for about ten minutes. Carrying out orders was a necessity for this shallow, unthinking creature, who always yearned to submit to someone else’s will—oh, not, of course, for any reason other than the good of the ‘common’ or ‘noble’ cause. But even that didn’t make any difference, since little fanatics such as Erkel can never conceive of serving an idea other than by identifying it with the person who according to their conception expresses the idea. The sensitive, affectionate, and kind-hearted Erkel was perhaps the most callous of the murderers planning to kill Shatov; he would be present at the execution without blinking an eye, without feeling the least bit of personal guilt. For example, he’d been ordered p. 647↵to get a good look at Shatov’s surroundings while carrying out his orders; when Shatov met him at the top of the stairs and blurted out (probably without thinking) that his wife had come back to him, Erkel had enough instinctive cunning to evince not the least bit of curiosity, in spite of the fact that it immediately occurred to him that the return of Shatov’s wife could have a significant impact on the success of their undertaking…
And so it did: that fact alone saved the ‘scoundrels’ from Shatov’s carrying out his intention and, at the same time, helped them ‘get rid of him…’. In the first place, it rattled Shatov, threw him off track, deprived him of his usual perspicacity and caution. Any idea of his personal safety was the last thing that could have struck him when he was so preoccupied with something else. On the contrary, he was eager to believe that Peter Verkhovensky really would run away tomorrow: that coincided with all his suspicions! Returning to his room, he sat down in the corner again, rested his elbows on his knees and covered his face with his hands. He was tormented by bitter thoughts…
Then he’d lift his head again and tiptoe in to have a look at her. ‘Good Lord! She’ll have a fever by tomorrow morning; she may even have one now! Of course she’s caught a cold. She’s not used to this awful climate; then that railway carriage, third class, snowstorm, rain, and all she was wearing was that thin cloak, no other clothes… How could anyone leave her like that, abandon her without help? And that bag of hers, it’s so tiny, light, crumpled—weighing only about ten pounds! The poor thing, she’s worn out! She’s been through so much! She’s proud, that’s why she doesn’t complain. But how irritable, how very irritable she is! That’s her illness: even an angel becomes irritable when ill. What a dry forehead, feverish no doubt; her skin is so dark around the eyes… and yet, how beautiful the oval shape of her face is, and her rich hair, how…’
He quickly averted his eyes, walked away in haste, as if afraid of seeing something in her other than an unhappy, exhausted creature in need of help—’how could he even think about hopes? Oh, how base man is, how vile a beast!’ p. 648↵And he went back to his corner, sat down, covered his face with his hands, and once more started dreaming, reminiscing… Once more he was haunted by those hopes.
‘Oh, I’m so tired, so very tired’; he recalled her exclamations, her weak, broken voice. ‘Lord! Abandon her now, when all she has is eighty kopecks; she’d even held out her purse, that tiny old thing! She’s come back to find a position—well, what does she know about positions? What do they know about Russia? Why, they’re just like capricious children; it’s their own fantasies they’ve created themselves. And she’s angry, poor thing, because Russia isn’t anything like their foreign fantasies! Oh, you unfortunate creatures, you innocent babes!… But it really is quite cold in here.’
He remembered her complaint and his promise to light the stove. ‘I have some logs; I could bring them in, but I don’t want to wake her. Still, I could. And what about the veal? She might want something to eat when she wakes up… Well, later; Kirillov doesn’t sleep all night. I should cover her; she’s sound asleep, but she’s probably very, very cold!’
He went in to have another look at her; her dress had got rucked up a little and half her right leg was exposed to the knee. He turned away suddenly, almost in alarm, took off his own warm coat and, left in his old threadbare jacket, covered her up, trying not to look at her bare leg.
Lighting the logs, walking around on tiptoe, inspecting the sleeping woman, dreaming in the corner, another inspection—all this took a great deal of time. Two or three hours passed. It was during this time that Verkhovensky and Liputin paid their visit to Kirillov. At long last Shatov dozed in the corner. Then he heard her groan; she awoke and called to him; he jumped up like a criminal.
‘Marie! I must have dozed… Oh, what a scoundrel I am, Marie!’
She sat up, looked around with wonder as if not recognizing where she was, and suddenly jumped up in indignation and fury:
‘I’ve taken your bed; I was dead tired and fell asleep. Why didn’t you wake me? How dare you think I came to be a burden to you?’
p. 649↵‘How could I wake you, Marie?’
‘You could have. You should have! There’s no bed for you here, since I took yours. You shouldn’t have put me in such an awkward position. Do you think I’ve come to take advantage of your generosity? You must take your own bed right now and I’ll lie down on some chairs in the corner…’
‘Marie, I don’t have enough chairs and there’s nothing to make a bed.’
‘Well, then, I’ll simply lie down on the floor. Otherwise you’ll have to sleep there. I want to lie on the floor, right now, right now!’
She stood up, went to take a step, but suddenly a violent spasm of pain took away all her strength and resolution; she fell back on the bed with a loud groan. Shatov ran over to her but, hiding her face in the pillow, Marie seized his hand and squeezed it with all her might. This lasted about a minute.
‘Marie, my dear, if necessary, there’s a Doctor Frenzel who lives nearby; he’s a friend of mine, a close friend… I could fetch him.’
‘Nonsense!’
‘Why nonsense? Tell me, Marie, what’s hurting? We could try some compresses… on your stomach, for instance… I could do that even without a doctor… Or mustard plasters.’
‘What’s this?’ she asked strangely, lifting her head and looking at him in fear.
‘What’s what, Marie?’ Shatov asked, not understanding her. ‘What are you talking about? Oh God, I’m completely lost, Marie. Forgive me, I don’t understand a thing.’
‘Oh, leave me alone. It’s not for you to understand. It would even be ridiculous…’ she said, smiling bitterly. ‘Talk to me about something. Walk around the room and talk to me. Don’t just stand there next to me and don’t look at me: I ask you for the five-hundredth time!’
Shatov began to walk around the room, looking at the floor, trying with all his might not to look at her.
‘There’s—don’t be angry, Marie, I beg you—there’s some veal, just right here, and some tea… You ate so little before…’
p. 650↵She waved him away angrily and in disgust. Shatov bit his tongue in desperation.
‘Listen, I plan to open a bookbinding shop* here, organized on rational principles. Since you live here, what do you think: will it succeed or not?’
‘Oh, Marie, books aren’t read much here, and there simply aren’t any around. Do they really need them bound?’
‘Who’s “they”?’
‘Local readers and inhabitants in general, Marie.’
‘Well, speak more clearly. He says “they”, and who does he mean by “they”? You don’t know any grammar.’
‘It’s in the spirit of the language, Marie,’ Shatov muttered.
‘Oh, get away with your spirit, I’m sick of it. Why won’t the local inhabitants or readers need their books bound?’
‘Because reading books and having them bound represent two enormously different stages of development. First, people gradually get used to reading, over centuries naturally, but they don’t take care of their books and toss them around. Having books bound signifies respect for the book; it indicates that people not only love to read, but they view it as an important occupation. Nowhere in Russia has that stage been reached. Europe has been binding its books for some time.’
‘Even though pedantically put, that’s at least not stupid and reminds me of three years ago; you were sometimes rather clever three years ago.’
She said this with the same disgust as she had all her previous capricious utterances.
‘Marie, Marie,’ Shatov said, turning to her with deep emotion. ‘Oh, Marie! If you only knew how much has happened during these last three years! I heard later that you despised me for changing my convictions. But who was it I deserted? Enemies of real life; antiquated little liberals afraid of their own independence; lackeys of thought, enemies of personality and freedom, decrepit preachers of death and decay! What do they have? Old age, the golden mean, base philistine mediocrity, envious equality, equality with no sense of dignity, equality as understood by lackeys p. 651↵or Frenchmen in 1793… But the main thing is, they’re all scoundrels, scoundrels, and more scoundrels.’
‘Yes, there are a lot of scoundrels,’ she replied abruptly and as if in pain. She lay there stretched out, not moving, as if afraid to stir, her head thrown back on the pillow, resting on her side, directing her exhausted but proud gaze at the ceiling. Her face was pale, her lips dry and parched.
‘You understand, Marie, you understand!’ Shatov cried. She tried to shake her head in disagreement, but suddenly another spasm of pain overcame her. Once again she hid her face in the pillow and with all her might gripped Shatov’s hand until it hurt. He’d rushed over to her and was beside himself with fear.
‘Marie, Marie! This may be very serious, Marie!’
‘Be quiet… I won’t have it, I won’t,’ she cried, almost in frenzy, turning her face upwards again. ‘Don’t you dare look at me with that compassion of yours! Walk around the room, say something, talk…’
Shatov, like one distraught, began muttering something.
‘What kind of work do you do here?’ she asked, interrupting him with contemptuous impatience.
‘I work in the office of a local merchant. If I really wanted to, Marie, I could earn good money here.’
‘So much the better for you…’
‘Oh, don’t misunderstand me, Marie. I merely said it as…’
‘What else do you do? What are you preaching? You have to be preaching something; that’s your nature!’
‘I’m preaching God, Marie.’
‘But you don’t believe in Him. I never could understand that idea.’
‘Let’s leave that until later, Marie.’
‘What sort of person was Marya Timofeevna?’
‘Let’s leave that until later, too.’
‘Don’t you dare say things like that to me! Is it true her death was caused by the wickedness of… those people?’
‘Absolutely,’ Shatov said, grinding his teeth.
Marie suddenly raised her head and cried out in pain:
‘Don’t you ever talk about that again, never again, never!’
She fell back on the bed in a spasm of the same terrible p. 652↵pain; this was the third time, but now her groans were louder and had become screams.
‘Oh, you intolerable man! You unbearable man!’ she cried, tossing about, no longer sparing herself and shoving Shatov away as he stood over her.
‘Marie, I’ll do whatever you want… I’ll walk around and talk to you…’
‘Can’t you see it’s begun?’
‘What’s begun, Marie?’
‘How do I know? How do I know anything about it?… Oh, damn it! Damn it all from the very beginning!’
‘Marie, if you’d tell what’s begun… or else I… how can I understand?’
‘Oh, you abstract, useless windbag. Damn everything on earth!’
‘Marie! Marie!’
He seriously thought she was going insane.
‘Can’t you see I’m in labour?’ She sat up and looked at him with terrible, acute malice distorting her whole face. ‘Curse this child, even before it’s born!’
‘Marie,’ Shatov cried, finally realizing what it was all about. ‘Marie… Why didn’t you tell me before?’ he cried, pulling himself together suddenly and grabbing his cap with energetic decisiveness.
‘How could I know when I came in here? Would I really have come to you? They told me it would be another ten days! Where are you going? Where? Don’t you dare!’
‘To fetch a midwife! I’ll sell my revolver; first thing we need now is money!’
‘Don’t you dare, don’t you dare go for a midwife. Fetch any old woman, an old peasant woman; I have eighty kopecks in my bag… Peasant women give birth without midwives… And if I croak, so much the better…’
‘You’ll have a midwife and an old peasant woman. But how can I leave you alone, Marie?’
Realizing it was better to leave her alone now without help, rather than later, in spite of her frantic state, he paid no attention to her moans and angry exclamations, and rushed downstairs as fast as he possibly could.
p. 6533
First he went to see Kirillov. It was already almost one o’clock in the morning. Kirillov was standing in the middle of his room.
‘Kirillov, my wife’s having a baby!’
‘What do you mean?’
‘A baby, she’s having a baby!’
‘You’re… not mistaken?’
‘Oh, no, no, she’s having contractions!… We need a woman, some old woman, right away… Can we get one now? You used to have so many old women around…’
‘I’m sorry I don’t know how to give birth to babies,’ Kirillov replied thoughtfully. ‘I mean, not that I don’t know how to give birth, I don’t know what to do to give birth to them… or… No, I don’t know how to say it.’
‘You mean you don’t know how to help someone in labour; but that’s not what I’m asking. I’m asking for a woman, an old woman, a peasant woman, a nurse, a servant!’
‘You’ll get an old woman, but perhaps not right away. If you like, I could come instead..’.’
‘Oh, that’s impossible; I’ll go to Mrs Virginskaya, the midwife.’
‘She’s horrible!’
‘Oh, yes, Kirillov, yes, but she’s the best of the lot! Oh, no, there won’t be reverence, or joy, only disdain, abuse, blasphemy—and in the presence of so great a mystery, the arrival of a new being!… Oh, she’s cursing it already!…’
‘If you like, I’ll…’
‘No, no, but while I’m running to fetch her (I’ll drag Mrs Virginskaya there), you can go to the bottom of our staircase and stand there quietly listening, but don’t dare go in, you’ll frighten her; don’t go in under any circumstances; just listen… in case of any emergency. And only if there’s an emergency, then go in.’
‘I understand. I have another rouble. Here. I was going to buy a chicken tomorrow, but I’m not going to now. Hurry up, go as fast as you can. There’ll be a samovar here all night.’
p. 654↵Kirillov knew nothing about the plans for Shatov, nor was he aware of the danger the man was in. He knew only that he had some old score to settle with ‘those people’. Even though he himself was partly implicated in the affair as a result of instructions from abroad (which, by the way, were very vague, since he wasn’t too closely involved with them), lately he’d given it all up, all instructions; he’d distanced himself from everything, from the ‘common cause’ in particular, and had been devoting himself to a life of contemplation. Although at the meeting Peter Verkhovensky had invited Liputin to go with him to Kirillov’s house to make sure the latter would, at the right moment, take the ‘Shatov affair’ upon himself, still during the interview with Kirillov he said not one word about Shatov, he didn’t even hint at it. He probably thought it impolitic and considered Kirillov unreliable, and so decided to leave it until the next day when it would all be over and really wouldn’t make any difference to Kirillov. At least that’s what Peter Stepanovich thought about Kirillov. Liputin also noted there’d been no mention whatever of Shatov, in spite of Verkhovensky’s promise; but Liputin was too agitated to protest about that.
Shatov ran like a whirlwind to Muravirtaya Street, cursing the distance and seeing no end to it.
He had to knock for some time at Virginsky’s house: everyone had gone to sleep a while ago. But that didn’t keep Shatov from pounding at the shutters with all his might. The dog chained in the yard rushed around barking at him ferociously. All the dogs in the street followed suit; a canine bedlam ensued.
‘Why are you knocking and what do you want?’ asked Virginsky at the window at long last, but in a gentle tone, quite different from what one would expect in response to such an ‘outrage’. The shutters were thrown back and the little ventilation pane opened.
‘Who’s there? What scoundrel?’ a woman’s voice shrieked with all the anger one would have expected in the circumstances. It was Virginsky’s relative, the old maid.
‘It’s me, Shatov. My wife’s come back to me and now she’s giving birth…’
p. 655↵‘Well, let her give birth. Go away!’
‘I’ve come for Arina Prokhorovna and won’t leave without her!’
‘She can’t take care of everyone. Night deliveries is a special practice… Go to Maksheeva’s and stop making so much noise!’ the angry female voice rattled on. Shatov heard Virginsky try to stop her, but the old maid pushed him aside and wouldn’t give way.
‘I won’t leave!’ Shatov shouted again.
‘Wait a bit, just wait a bit!’ Virginsky cried at last, having dealt with the old woman. ‘I beg you, wait five minutes, Shatov. I’ll wake Arina Prokhorovna. Please don’t knock and don’t shout… Oh, how terrible this all is!’
After five interminable minutes Arina Prokhorovna appeared.
‘So your wife has come back to you?’ her voice asked from the window. To Shatov’s surprise she didn’t sound angry at all, just peremptory as usual; but that was the only way Arina Prokhorovna knew how to speak.
‘Yes, my wife, and she’s in labour.’
‘Marya Ignatievna?’
‘Yes, Marya Ignatievna. Of course, Marya Ignatievna!’
There was a moment’s silence. Shatov waited. He heard whispering inside the house.
‘Has she been back long?’ Madame Virginskaya enquired again.
‘She arrived at eight o’clock this evening. Hurry, please.’
Again he heard whispering, as if they were conferring.
‘Listen, you’re not making a mistake, are you? Did she send you to me?’
‘No, she didn’t send me to you. She wanted an old woman, any old woman, so as not to burden me with the expense. But don’t worry, I’ll pay you.’
‘Fine, I’ll come whether you pay or not. I’ve always valued Marya Ignatievna’s independent attitude, even though she may not remember me. Do you have the most essential things?’
‘I don’t have anything, but I’ll get it, I’ll get it…’
‘There’s generosity even in these people!’ Shatov thought p. 656↵as he headed for Lyamshin’s. ‘Convictions and human feeling—it seems they’re two very different things. Perhaps I’ve been unfair to blame them!… We’re all to blame, all of us… if only everyone could be convinced of that!…’
He didn’t have to knock very long at Lyamshin’s; to his surprise, Lyamshin opened the window at once, having jumped out of bed in his night-shirt and bare feet, running the risk of catching a cold. He was very cautious and always worried about his health. But there was a special reason for his alertness and haste: Lyamshin had been trembling all evening and was unable to fall asleep as a result of his agitation after the meeting of the group; he was haunted by fear of a visit from uninvited and entirely unwanted guests. Most of all he was tormented by news of Shatov’s denunciation… And now, all of a sudden, as if on purpose, someone was pounding at his window incredibly loudly!…
He was so terrified when he saw Shatov that he immediately slammed the window shut and jumped back into bed. Shatov began pounding ferociously and shouting.
‘How dare you knock like that so late at night?’ Lyamshin shouted menacingly, though quaking with fear, at least two minutes later when he decided to open the window again and make sure Shatov had come alone.
‘Here’s your revolver back. Take it and give me fifteen roubles for it.’
‘What’s going on? Are you drunk? This is highway robbery; I’m going to catch cold. Wait a minute, I’ll get a blanket on.’
‘Give me fifteen roubles right now. If you don’t, I’ll knock and shout until dawn; I’ll break your window-frame.’
‘And I’ll get the police and have you locked up.’
‘Think I’m dumb, do you? Think I won’t get the police? Who has more to fear from them, you or me?’
‘How can you harbour such contemptible beliefs?… I know what you’re hinting at… Stop it, stop it, for heaven’s sake, stop knocking! Who on earth can get hold of any money at night? What do you need the money for if you’re not drunk?’
‘My wife has come back to me. I’m letting you have this p. 657↵revolver for ten roubles less than I paid for it and I’ve never even fired it; take the revolver, take it immediately.’
Lyamshin stuck his hand out mechanically through the open window and took the revolver; he waited and suddenly, thrusting his head rapidly out of the window, muttered, as if beside himself, with a chill running up and down his spine:
‘You’re lying, your wife hasn’t come back to you at all. You… you just want to run away.’
‘You idiot, where can I run to? Let your Peter Verkhovensky run away, not me. I was just at the midwife Virginskaya’s house and she’s agreed to come. Ask her. My wife is suffering. I need money; give it to me!’
An elaborate firework display of ideas exploded in Lyamshin’s devious mind. Suddenly everything appeared in a different light, but fear still prevented him from thinking clearly.
‘But how can that be… you’re not even living with your wife?’
‘I’ll smash your skull for asking questions like that.’
‘Oh, my God, forgive me, I understand, I was simply so surprised… I understand, I understand. But… but—will Arina Prokhorovna really come? Did you just say she’d gone? You know that’s not true. You see, you see, you see, you’re lying to me at every stage.’
‘She’s probably with my wife right now; don’t delay me. It’s not my fault you’re so stupid.’
‘That’s not true, I’m not stupid. Excuse me, I can’t possibly…’
And now, absolutely distraught, he began to close the window for the third time, but Shatov let out such a yell that he stuck his head back out at once.
‘But this is absolutely personal assault! What on earth do you want from me? What? Tell me! Formulate it! And think, just think, it’s the middle of the night!’
‘I want fifteen roubles, you blockhead!’
‘But I might not want my revolver back at all. You have no right. You bought it from me—now it’s over and done with; you have no right. There’s no way I can come up p. 658↵with that kind of money in the middle of the night. Where can I get that sum?’
‘You always have money. I’ve taken ten roubles off the price already, but you’re well-known as a moneygrubbing little Yid.’
‘Come back the day after tomorrow—listen, in the morning the day after tomorrow, precisely at twelve o’clock, and I’ll let you have it all, all of it, you hear?’
Shatov pounded ferociously on the window-frame for the third time:
‘Give me ten roubles, and tomorrow, as soon as it’s light, another five.’
‘No, another five the day after tomorrow; tomorrow, I swear, I won’t have it. Don’t even think of coming.’
‘Give me ten roubles; oh, you scoundrel!’
‘What are you insulting me for? Wait a moment, I have to get some light; you’ve broken the window here… Imagine going round swearing at people in the middle of the night. Here!’ he said and thrust a banknote out through the window.
Shatov grabbed it—it was a five-rouble note.
‘I swear to you, I can’t do any more, you can slit my throat but I can’t. I can give you the rest the day after tomorrow, but I can’t give you any more now.’
‘I won’t leave,’ Shatov bellowed.
‘Well, here, take this, here, this as well, see, but I won’t give you any more. Even if you yell your head off, I won’t give you any more, no matter what, I won’t, I won’t, I won’t!’
He was in a frenzy, in despair, in a cold sweat. The two bills he’d just handed over were one-rouble notes. Shatov now had a total of seven roubles.
‘Well, damn you; I’ll come back tomorrow. I’ll beat the hell out of you, Lyamshin, if you don’t have the other eight roubles.’
‘You won’t find me at home, you fool!’ flashed through Lyamshin’s mind.
‘Wait a minute, wait!’ he shouted frantically to Shatov who was already running away. ‘Wait a minute, come back. p. 659↵Tell me, please, were you telling me the truth? Has your wife really come back to you?’
‘Idiot!’ Shatov cried, spat in disgust, and ran home as fast as his legs could carry him.
4
I must mention that Arina Prokhorovna knew nothing about the resolutions adopted at yesterday’s meeting. When Virginsky had returned home feeling weak and stunned, he didn’t dare tell her about the decision that had been taken; but he was unable to restrain himself completely and told her half of it—that is, Verkhovensky’s announcement of Shatov’s intention to inform on them; but even then he said he didn’t really believe it. Arina Prokhorovna was terribly frightened. That explains why, when Shatov came running to fetch her, even though she was exhausted from having spent the previous night attending another labour, she decided to go with him at once. She’d always been sure that ‘a piece of trash like Shatov was capable of committing any sort of despicable political act’; but the arrival of Marya Ignatievna put things in an entirely different light. Shatov’s fear, the desperate tone of his request, and his entreaties for help all signified a change in the traitor’s feelings: a man who had decided to betray himself merely in order to destroy others would have had a very different look and tone. In a word, Arina Prokhorovna decided to see for herself, with her own eyes. Virginsky was very pleased with her decision—it was as if a large weight had been lifted from him! He even began to feel somewhat hopeful: Shatov’s ‘ appearance seemed utterly incompatible with Verkhovensky’s conclusion…
Shatov was not mistaken; upon his return he found Arina Prokhorovna already with Marie. She’d just arrived and had contemptuously dismissed Kirillov, who was hanging around at the foot of the staircase. She quickly introduced herself to Marie who failed to recognize her as a previous acquaintance. She found her in a ‘very bad way’, that is, spiteful, distraught, in a state of ‘the most cowardly despair’; within five minutes she managed to overcome all resistance.
p. 660↵‘Why do you insist you don’t want an expensive midwife?’ she was asking just as Shatov came in. ‘That’s pure nonsense, spurious notions resulting from your present abnormal condition. With the help of just any old woman, a peasant woman, there’s a fifty-fifty chance something would go wrong; then the trouble and cost would be even greater than with an expensive midwife. How do you know I’m an expensive midwife? You’ll pay me later; I won’t charge more than necessary, and I guarantee success. You won’t die with me; I’ve seen worse cases. If you like, I can send the child off tomorrow to an orphanage, then to be brought up in the country, and that will be that. You’ll recuperate, take up some reasonable work, and in a very short time you’ll pay Shatov back for the room and board, which won’t be that much anyway…’
‘It’s not that… I have no right to burden…’
‘Those are very rational and civic feelings, but believe me, Shatov will hardly spend anything if he’s willing to transform himself from a creature of fantasies into a man with even a drop of common sense. He merely has to refrain from doing anything stupid, beating a drum, running around with his tongue wagging. If we don’t take him firmly in hand by morning he’ll have roused all the doctors in town; he woke all the dogs on my street. You don’t need a doctor, I’ve already told you I can answer for everything. You could still hire an old woman as a servant, that won’t cost much. But he might prove useful too himself, instead of just doing stupid things. He has two hands and two legs; he could run to the chemist’s without offending your feelings by his charity. To hell with his charity! Wasn’t it he who brought you to this position? Wasn’t it he who caused all the trouble in that family where you were a governess when he came up with the selfish idea of marrying you? We heard all about it… Though just now he came running to fetch me like a madman, shouting up and down the whole street. I won’t force myself on anyone; I’ve come for your sake alone, on principle, because we should stick together. I told him that evert before I left the house. If you think I’m not needed here, I’ll say goodbye; I only hope there won’t be any trouble which could easily be avoided.’
p. 661↵She even rose from the chair.
Marie was so helpless, in such suffering and, truth be told, so afraid of what lay ahead of her, that she dared not let her go. But this woman suddenly became hateful to her: she was talking at complete cross-purposes, that wasn’t what Marie had in mind! But the prediction about death in the hands of an incompetent midwife overcame her aversion. On the other hand, from then on she became more demanding of Shatov, even merciless. It finally reached the point where she forbade him not only to look at her, but even to stand near her. Her suffering increased. Her curses, even her abuse, became more ferocious.
‘Ach, we’d better send him away,’ snapped Arina Prokhorovna. ‘He looks terrible, he’s only scaring you; he’s as a pale as a corpse! Tell me, please, you odd creature, what’s up with you? What a performance!’
Shatov made no reply; he decided not to answer.
‘I’ve seen stupid fathers in such cases who go off their heads too. But at least they…’
‘Stop it, or leave me here to die! Don’t say another word, not another word! I won’t have it, I won’t!’ Marie screamed.
‘No question of not saying another word, unless you’ve lost your reason; that’s what I think has happened with you in your condition. We must at least talk about the business in hand: tell me, has anything been prepared? You tell me, Shatov, since she can’t.’
‘Tell me what you need.’
‘So nothing’s been prepared.’
She listed everything she needed; to be fair to her, she limited herself only to what was absolutely essential, the bare necessities. Shatov managed to find some of them. Marie took out a key and offered it to him so he could look inside her travelling bag. Since his hands were trembling it took him longer than necessary to open the unfamiliar lock. Marie was beside herself, but when Arina Prokhorovna jumped up to grab the key away from him, Marie wouldn’t permit her to look inside the bag on any account and insisted, screaming and shrieking wilfully, that only Shatov was allowed to open it.
p. 662↵It was necessary to run to Kirillov to fetch some other things. As soon as Shatov turned to go, Marie began to call him back frantically and calmed down only when Shatov came rushing back from the stairs to assure her he’d only be gone a minute or so to fetch the necessary items and he’d be right back.
‘Well, my lady, it’s certainly hard to please you,’ Arina Prokhorovna said with a chuckle. ‘First you tell him to stand there facing the wall and not dare look at you, then you tell him he can’t leave you, even for a minute, or else you’ll start crying. Why, he might begin to imagine all sorts of things. Come, come, don’t be silly, don’t fuss, I was only teasing.’
‘He won’t dare imagine anything.’
‘My, my, my, if he didn’t love you like a sheep he wouldn’t be running all over town with his tongue hanging out and wouldn’t be waking up all the dogs. He even broke my window-frame.’
5
Shatov found Kirillov still pacing up and down in his room, so preoccupied that he’d quite forgotten about the arrival of Shatov’s wife; he listened, but didn’t understand.
‘Oh, yes,’ he remembered suddenly, as if tearing himself away from some absorbing idea with great effort and only for a moment. ‘Yes… an old woman..,. Your wife or an old woman? Wait a minute: both your wife and an old woman, right? I remember. I did go; the old woman will come, but not right away. Take a pillow. Anything else? Yes… Wait a minute. Shatov, do you ever experience moments of eternal harmony?’
‘You know, Kirillov, you really shouldn’t stay up every night.’
Kirillov came to his senses and—strange to say—began speaking much more coherently than usual; it was obvious he’d formulated these thoughts some time ago, perhaps even jotted them down:
‘There are seconds, usually no more than five or six at a time, when you suddenly feel the presence of eternal harmony, completely attained. It’s not an earthly feeling; I’m p. 663↵not saying it’s heavenly, but in his earthly form man is unable to endure it. He must be physically transformed or else die. This feeling is clear and unmistakable. It’s as if you suddenly sensed the whole of nature and said: Yes, it’s true. When He created the world, God said at the end of every day of creation: “Yes, it is true, it is good.” It’s… it’s not a flood of tender emotion, it’s simply a sense of happiness. You don’t have to forgive; anything because there’s no longer anything to forgive. It’s not that you feel love, oh—it’s much higher than that! What’s most terrifying is that it’s so awfully clear and there’s such a feeling of happiness. If it were to last for more than five seconds—the soul couldn’t endure it and would have to disappear. In these five seconds I live a lifetime and I’d give my whole life for them because it’d be worth it. To withstand ten seconds one must be transformed physically. I think that man must stop having children. Why have children? What’s the use of development if the goal’s already been achieved? In the Gospel it says that at the Resurrection people will no longer bear children, but will he like angels of God.* That’s a hint. Is your wife giving birth?’
‘Kirillov, does this occur often?’
‘Once every three days, once a week.’
‘Do you have epilepsy?’
‘No.’
‘Well, you will. Watch out, Kirillov, I’ve heard that’s just the way epilepsy begins. An epileptic once described in detail his sensation before a seizure just the way you did; he said it lasted five seconds and he couldn’t endure any more. Remember Mohammed’s pitcher* from which not one drop of water spilled while he circled paradise on his steed? The pitcher—that’s your five seconds; it’s too much like your eternal harmony, and Mohammed was an epileptic. Watch out, Kirillov, it’s epilepsy!’
‘It won’t have time,’ Kirillov said, laughing softly.
6
The night was passing. Shatov was summoned, abused, and sent on errands. Marie reached an extreme stage of fear for p. 664↵her life. She screamed that she wanted to live ‘absolutely, absolutely!’ and was afraid to die. ‘I don’t want to, I don’t want to!’ she kept repeating. If Arina Prokhorovna hadn’t been there, things would have gone very badly. She gradually gained complete control of her patient. Marie began to obey her every word and order, like a little child. Arina Prokhorovna ruled by sternness, not kindness, but it worked brilliantly. It began to grow light. Suddenly Arina Prokhorovna got the idea that Shatov had just run out on to the stairs to pray to God, and she began laughing. Marie also began laughing maliciously, sarcastically, as if she experienced some relief from that laughter. They finally chased Shatov away altogether. The morning was cold and damp. Shatov stood in the corner pressing his face against the wall, just as he had the evening before when Erkel arrived. He trembled like a leaf, afraid to think, but his mind clung to every image as it emerged, just as it does in our dreams. He was preoccupied with fantasies which continually broke apart, like rotten threads. At last the moans coming from the room were replaced by horrible animal cries, unbearable, impossible. He wanted to cover his ears, but couldn’t; he fell to his knees, repeating unconsciously, ‘Marie, Marie!’ At last a cry was heard, a new cry that made Shatov shudder and jump up from his knees; it was a baby’s cry, weak and discordant. He made the sign of the cross and went rushing into the room. In her arms Arina Prokhorovna held a small, pink, wrinkled creature that was crying and moving its tiny arms and legs; it was terrifyingly helpless and, like a speck of dust, at the mercy of the first breath of wind. But it was crying and proclaiming that it too had every right to exist… Marie lay there almost unconscious, but in a minute she opened her eyes and looked at Shatov in a very, very strange way: it was an entirely new look. He wasn’t yet able to understand it, but he’d never seen it before or remembered anything like it.
‘Is it a boy? A boy?’ she asked Arina Prokhorovna in a feeble voice.
‘A little boy!’ she shouted in reply, swaddling the infant.
For a moment, after swaddling him and before laying him across the bed between two pillows, she gave him to Shatov p. 665↵to hold. Marie, as if afraid of Arina Prokhorovna, quietly signalled to him. He understood at once and lifted the baby up to show her.
‘How… pretty…’ she whispered weakly with a smile.
‘My word, look at him staring!’ the triumphant Arina Prokhorovna replied, laughing cheerfully, looking right into Shatov’s face. ‘What a face he’s making!’
‘Rejoice, Arina Prokhorovna… It’s a great joy…’ muttered Shatov with an expression of idiotic bliss, radiant after Marie’s two words about the child.
‘What kind of great joy is it?’ Arina Prokhorovna asked good-naturedly, bustling about, cleaning up, and working as hard as a convict.
‘The mystery of the appearance of a new being; it’s a great and inexplicable mystery, Arina Prokhorovna. What a pity you don’t understand!’
Shatov mumbled incoherently, stupefied and enraptured. It was as if something was reeling around inside his head and, of itself, beyond his control, was flowing from his soul.
‘There were two people, and all of a sudden there’s a third being, a new spirit, whole and complete, such that no human hands could ever create; new thought and new love; it’s frightening, actually… There’s nothing greater on earth!’
‘Ach, what nonsense! It’s simply a new stage of organic development and nothing more, no mystery at all,’ Arina Prokhorovna replied, laughing sincerely and cheerfully. ‘Your way, every fly is a mystery. But here’s what: unnecessary people should never be born. First remake the world so they won’t be unnecessary, then give birth to them. As it is, we’ll have to take him off to the orphanage the day after tomorrow… But, that’s how it should be.’
‘I’ll never let him go to any orphanage!’ Shatov announced resolutely, staring at the floor.
‘Adopting him as your son are you?’
‘He is my son.’
‘Of course, he’s a Shatov, legally he’s a Shatov, but there’s no reason for you to pose as some great benefactor of all humanity. He can’t ever manage without grand phrases. Well, well, all right, but listen here, good people,’ she said, p. 666↵finally finishing her cleaning up, ‘it’s time for me to go. I’ll come again in the morning and in the evening if I need to, but now, since everything’s turned out so well, I have to attend to some others who’ve been waiting for me for quite a while. Shatov, I hear you’ve got an old woman somewhere; well, an old woman’s all well and good, but you, her husband, shouldn’t leave her; sit by her, in case you’re needed. Marya Ignatievna won’t chase you away… Now, now, I’m only teasing…’
Shatov accompanied her to the gate and she added to him alone:
‘You’ve given me something to laugh at for the rest of my life. I won’t take any money from you; I’ll be laughing even in my sleep. I’ve never seen anything funnier than you last night.’
She left entirely satisfied. From Shatov’s appearance and his utterances it was as clear as day that this man ‘was intending to become a father and was an absolute ninny’. She ran home on purpose to tell Virginsky all about it, even though it was more direct and closer for her to drop in on her next patient.
‘Marie, she told you to wait a bit before you go to sleep, though I can see it’s terribly difficult…’ Shatov began timidly. ‘I’ll sit here by the window and watch over you, all right?’
He sat down near the window behind the sofa so she couldn’t possibly see him. But even before a minute had gone by she called him over and asked him irritably to adjust the pillow for her. He started to do so. She looked at the wall in anger.
‘Not like that, oh, not like that… How clumsy you are!’
Shatov adjusted the pillow again.
‘Bend down to me,’ she suddenly said wildly, trying as hard as she could not to look at him.
He shuddered, but bent down.
‘More… not like that… closer,’ and suddenly her left arm went rapidly round his neck and he felt a firm, moist kiss on his forehead.
‘Marie!’
p. 667↵Her lips trembled; she tried to regain control of herself, but suddenly lifted herself up and, with eyes flashing, pronounced:
‘Nikolai Stavrogin is a scoundrel!’
And she fell back on the bed helplessly, like a blade of grass mown down, her face buried in the pillow, sobbing hysterically, clasping Shatov’s hand tightly in her own.
From that moment on she wouldn’t let him leave her side; she demanded he sit near the bed. She couldn’t say much, but kept looking at him, smiling blissfully. It was as if she’d become a silly little girl. Everything seemed to have been reborn. First Shatov cried like a little boy, then he talked about God knows what, in a wild, stupefied, inspired way; he kissed her hands; she listened to him in ecstasy, perhaps not even understanding, but affectionately touching his hair with her feeble hand, stroking it, admiring it. He told her about Kirillov, how they’d begin to live now, ‘anew and for ever’, the existence of God, how good everyone was… In rapture they lifted up the child to have another look at him.
‘Marie,’ he cried, holding the child in his arms. ‘The old delirium, disgrace, and death are over! Let’s work and begin a new life—all three of us. Yes, yes!… Oh, yes: what shall we name him, Marie?’
‘Him? What shall we name him?’ she repeated in surprise. Suddenly her face expressed terrible grief.
She clasped her hands, looked at Shatov with reproach, and buried her face in the pillow.
‘Marie, what’s the matter?’ he cried in grief-stricken alarm.
‘How could you, how could you…? Oh, you ingrate!’
‘Marie, forgive me, Marie… I merely asked what we’d name him. I don’t know…’
‘Ivan, Ivan,’ she said, lifting her flushed, tearstained face. ‘Did you really suppose we could call him any other horrible name?’
‘Marie, calm down, you’re so distraught!’
‘There you go again; you think it’s because I’m so distraught? I bet if I’d said we should call him… that horrible name, you’d have agreed at once, and wouldn’t even have p. 668↵noticed! Oh, you’re ungrateful, mean creatures, all of you!’
A minute later they made it up, of course. Shatov persuaded her to get some rest. She fell asleep, but didn’t let go of his hand; she woke frequently, looked at him as if she was afraid he might leave, then went back to sleep again.
Kirillov sent an old woman over to ‘congratulate them’, in addition, he sent some hot tea, a fresh cutlet, some bouillon, and some white bread for ‘Marya Ignatievna’. The patient sipped the bouillon eagerly, the old woman changed the baby’s nappy, and Marie forced Shatov to eat the cutlet.
Time passed. Shatov fell asleep in exhaustion on the chair, his head resting on Marie’s pillow. That’s how they were found by Arina Prokhorovna, who kept her promise; she cheerfully woke them, spoke to Marie about important’ matters, examined the child, and once again ordered Shatov to stay there. Then, after making fun of the ‘happy couple’ with a shade of contempt and scorn, she went away, as satisfied as she’d been before.
It was already quite dark when Shatov woke up. He lit a candle quickly and went to fetch the old woman; but he’d scarcely started downstairs when he was met by the sound of someone’s soft, unhurried footsteps coming up towards him. It was Erkel.
‘Don’t go in!’ whispered Shatov. Seizing him impetuously by the arm, he pulled him back toward the gate. ‘Wait here, I’ll be right out, I forgot about you, forgot all about you! Oh, you’ve certainly reminded me, though!’
He was in such a hurry that he didn’t even stop to see Kirillov, and merely called the old woman. Marie was in despair and indignation that ‘he could even think of leaving her alone.’
‘But,’ he cried ecstatically, ‘it’s the very last step! Then we’ll embark on a new path, and never, never again will we have to recall the old horrors!’
Somehow or other he convinced her and promised to return precisely at nine o’clock; he kissed her firmly, kissed the baby, and quickly went out to meet Erkel.
Both set off to the Stavrogin park at Skvoreshniki where a year and a half ago, in a deserted place at the edge of the p. 669↵park where the pine forest begins, he had buried the printing press entrusted to him. It was a wild and deserted place some distance from the Skvoreshniki mansion and not visible from it. It was a walk of three or even four miles from Filippov’s house.
‘Are we going on foot? Let’s take a cab.’
‘No cab, please,’ objected Erkel. ‘They insisted on that. A cab driver would be a witness.’
‘Oh… hell! Never mind, only I want to get it over and done with!’
They walked very quickly.
‘Erkel, you’re still such a young boy!’ cried Shatov. ‘Have you ever been happy?’
‘You seem to be very happy just now,’ Erkel observed with curiosity.