The Duel. Александр Куприн
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the writing-table.
Romashov smiled with a martyr’s air of resignation. Suddenly he replied, in a melancholy and quavering voice —
“You are very beautiful.”
Shurochka looked at him roguishly from her half-closed eyes, and a turbulent curl got loose and fell over her forehead.
“Romochka, how funny you are!” she twittered in a rather thin, girlish voice. The sub-lieutenant blushed and thought according to his wont —
“And his heart was cruelly lacerated.”
Nobody said a word. Shurochka went on diligently crocheting. Vladimir Yefimovich, who was bravely struggling with a German translation, now and then mumbled out some German words. One heard the flame softly sputtering and fizzing in the lamp, which displayed a great yellow silk shade in the form of a tent. Romochka had again managed to possess himself of the crochet-cotton, which, almost without thinking about it, he softly and caressingly drew through the young woman’s fingers, and it afforded him a delightful pleasure to feel how Shurochka unconsciously resisted his mischievous little pulls. It seemed to him as if mysterious, magnetic currents, now and again, rushed backwards and forwards through the delicate white threads.
Whilst he was steadily gazing at her bent head, he whispered to himself, without moving his lips, as if he were carrying on a tender and impassioned conversation —
“How boldly you said to me, ‘Am I pretty?’ Ah, you are most beautiful! Here I sit looking at you. What happiness! Now listen. I am going to tell you how you look – how lovely you are. But listen carefully. Thy face is as dark as the night, yet pale. It is a face full of passion. Thy lips are red and warm and good to kiss, and thine eyes surrounded by a light yellowish shadow. When thy glance is directed straight before thee, the white of thine eyes acquires a bluish shade, and amidst it all there beams on me a great dark blue mysteriously gleaming pupil. A brunette thou art not; but thou recallest something of the gipsy. But thy hair is silky and soft, and braided at the back in a knot so neat and simple that one finds a difficulty in refraining from stroking it. You little ethereal creature, I could lift you like a little child in my arms; but you are supple and strong, your bosom is as firm as a young girl’s, and in all thy being there is something quick, passionate, compelling. A good way down on your left ear sits a charming little birthmark that is like the hardly distinguishable scar after a ring has been removed. What charm – ”
“Have you read in the newspapers about the duel between two officers?” asked Shurochka suddenly.
Romashov started as he awoke from his dreams, but he found it hard to remove his gaze from her.
“No, I’ve not read about it, but I have heard talk of it. What about it?”
“As usual, of course, you read nothing. Truly, Yuri Alexeitch, you are deteriorating. In my opinion the proceedings were ridiculous. I quite understand that duels between officers are as necessary as they are proper.”
Shurochka pressed her crochet to her bosom with a gesture of conviction.
“But why all this unnecessary and stupid cruelty? Just listen. A lieutenant had insulted another officer. The insult was gross, and the Court of Honour considered a duel necessary. Now, there would have been nothing to say about it, unless the conditions themselves of the duel had been so fixed that the latter resembled an ordinary execution: fifteen paces distance, and the fight to last till one of the duellists was hors de combat. This is only on a par with ordinary slaughter, is it not? But hear what followed. On the duelling-ground stood all the officers of the regiment, many of them with ladies; nay, they had even put a photographer behind the bushes! How disgusting! The unfortunate sub-lieutenant or ensign – as Volodya usually says – a man of your youthful age, moreover the party insulted, and not the one who offered the insult – received, after the third shot, a fearful wound in the stomach, and died some hours afterwards in great torture. By his deathbed stood his aged mother and sister, who kept house for him. Now tell me why a duel should be turned into such a disgusting spectacle. Of course the immediate consequence” (Shurochka almost shrieked these words) “was that all those sentimental opponents of duelling – eugh, how I despise these ‘liberal’ weaklings and poltroons! – at once began making a noise and fuss about ‘barbarism,’ ‘fratricide,’ how ‘duels are a disgrace to our times,’ and more nonsense of that sort.”
“Good God! I could never believe that you were so bloodthirsty, Alexandra Petrovna,” exclaimed Romashov, interrupting her.
“I am by no means bloodthirsty,” replied Shurochka, sharply. “On the contrary, I am very tender-hearted. If a beetle crawls on to my neck I remove it with the greatest caution so as not to inflict any hurt on it – but try and understand me, Romashov. This is my simple process of reasoning: ‘Why have we officers?’ Answer: ‘For the sake of war.’ ‘What are the most necessary qualities of an officer in time of war?’ Answer: ‘Courage and a contempt of death.’ ‘How are these qualities best acquired in time of peace?’ Answer: ‘By means of duels.’ How can that be proved? Duels are not required to be obligatory in the French Army, for a sense of honour is innate in the French officer; he knows what respect is due to himself and to others. Neither is duelling obligatory in the German Army, with its highly developed and inflexible discipline. But with us – us, as long as among our officers are to be found notorious card-sharpers such as, for instance, Artschakovski; or hopeless sots, as our own Nasanski, when, in the officers’ mess or on duty, violent scenes are of almost daily occurrence – then, such being the case, duels are both necessary and salutary. An officer must be a pattern of correctness; he is bound to weigh every word he utters. And, moreover, this delicate squeamishness, the fear of a shot! Your vocation is to risk your life – which is precisely the point.”
All at once she brought her long speech to a close, and with redoubled energy resumed her work.
“Shurochka, what is ‘rival’ in German?” asked Nikoläiev, lifting his head from the book.
“Rival?” Shurochka stuck her crochet-needle in her soft locks. “Read out the whole sentence.”
“It runs – wait – directly – directly – ah! it runs: ‘Our rival abroad.’”
“Unser ausländischer Nebenbuhler” translated Shurochka straight off.
“Unser,” repeated Romashov in a whisper as he gazed dreamily at the flame of the lamp. “When she is moved,” thought he, “her words come like a torrent of hail falling on a silver tray. Unser– what a funny word! Unser – unser – unser.”
“What are you mumbling to yourself about, Romashov?” asked Alexandra Petrovna severely. “Don’t dare to sit and build castles in the air whilst I am present.”
He smiled at her with a somewhat embarrassed air.
“I was not building castles in the air, but repeating to myself ‘Unser – unser.’ Isn’t it a funny word?”
“What rubbish you are talking! Unser. Why is it funny?”
“You see” (he made a slight pause as if he really intended to think about what he meant to say), “if one repeats the same word for long, and at the same time concentrates on it all his faculty of thought, the word itself suddenly loses all its meaning and becomes – how can I put it?”
“I know, I know!” she interrupted delightedly. “But it is not easy to do it now. When I was a child, now – how we used to love doing it!”
“Yes – yes – it belongs to childhood – yes.”
“How well I remember it! I remember the word ‘perhaps’ particularly struck me. I could sit for a long time with eyes shut, rocking my body to and fro, whilst I was repeatedly saying over and over again, ‘Perhaps, perhaps.’ And suddenly I quite forgot what the word itself meant. I tried to remember, but it was no use. I saw only a little round, reddish blotch with two tiny tails. Are you attending?” Romashov looked tenderly at her.
“How wonderful that we should think the same thoughts!” he exclaimed in a dreamy tone. “But let us return to our unser. Does not