The Collected Novellas & Short Stories of Anton Chekhov (200+ Titles in Multiple Translations). Anton Chekhov
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thrice cleared his throat, and pulled his cloak nervously around him. When he had heard about epizooty my uncle looked earnestly at Pobiedimsky, and emitted a queer sound through his nose.
“I swear to God! . . .” he stammered, looking at us as if we were manikins. “This is indeed the real life. . . . This is what life should really be. And you, why are you so silent, Pelageya Ivanovna?” he said, turning to Tatiana Ivanovna, who reddened and coughed.
“Talk, ladies and gentlemen; sing . . . play! Lose no time! Time, the rascal, is flying . . . he won't wait. I swear to God — before you've had time to turn your head, old age is on you. . . . It's too late then to live! Isn't that so, Pelageya Ivanovna? On no account sit still and keep silence. . . .”
Supper was brought in from the kitchen. Uncle followed us into the wing, and, for company's sake, ate five curd-fritters and a duck's wing. As he ate he looked at us. We seemed to inspire nothing but rapture and emotion. The worst nonsense of my tutor, every act of Tatiana Ivanovna, he found charming and entrancing. When after supper Tatiana Ivanovna sat quietly in a corner and knitted away, he kept his eyes on her fingers and chattered without cease.
“You, my friends, hurry up; make haste to live! God forbid that you should sacrifice to-day for to-morrow! The present is yours; it brings youth, health, ardour — the future is a mirage, smoke! As soon as you reach the age of twenty you must begin to live!”
Tatiana Ivanovna dropped a knitting-needle. My uncle hopped from his seat, recovered and restored it, with a bow which told me for the first time that there were men in the world more gallant than Pobiedimsky.
“Yes,” continued my uncle. “Love, mairy ! . . . Play the fool ! Follies are much more vital and sane than labours such as mine, saner far than our efforts to lead a rational life. . . .”
My uncle spoke much, in fact at such length that we soon grew tired, and I sat aside on a box, listened, and dreamed. I was ofiended because he never once turned his attention on me. He stayed in the wing until two in the morning, when I, no longer able to resist my drowsiness, slept soundly.
From that day on, my uncle came to the wing every night. He sang with us, supped with us, and stayed till two in the morning, chattering incessantly of one and the same subject. His night work was forgotten, and at the end of June, by which time he had learnt to eat my mother's turkeys and compotes, his daily occupation was also neglected. He tore himself from his desk, and rushed, so to speak, into “life,” By day he marched about the garden, whistled, and hindered the workmen, forcing them to tell him stories. When Tatiana Ivanovna came within sight, he ran up to her, and if she carried a load, offered to help her, causing her endless confusion.
The longer summer lasted the more frivolous, lively, and abstracted grew my uncle. Pobiedimsky was quickly disillusioned.
“As a man — one-sided,” was his verdict. “No one would believe that he stands on the high steps of the official hierarchy. He doesn't even speak well. After every word he adds ‘I swear to God!’ No, I don't like him.”
From the night of my uncle's first visit to the wing, Feodor and my tutor changed noticeably. Feodor gave up shooting, returned early from his work, and his taciturnity increased; and, when my uncle was present, looked still more viciously at his wife, Pobiedimsky ceased to speak about epizootic diseases, frowned, and sometimes smiled ironically.
“Here comes our mouse-foal!” he growled once, as uncle approached the wing.
Searching for an explanation, I concluded that both had taken offence. My uncle confused their names, and to the day of his departure had not learnt which was my tutor and which Tatiana Ivanovna's husband. As for Tatiana Ivanovna, he called her indiscriminately “Nastasya,” “Pelageya,” and “Yevdokia.” In his emotion and delight he treated all four of us as young children. All of which, of course, might easily be taken as offensive by young people. But the cause of the change of manner lay not in this, but, as I soon understood, in subtler shades of feeling.
I remember one evening I sat on a box and fought my desire to sleep. My eyelids drooped, my body, fatigued with a day's hard exercise, fell on one side. It was nearly midnight. Tatiana Ivanovna, rosy and meek, as always, sat at a little table and mended her husband's underclothes. From one corner glared Teodor, grim and morose ; in another sat Pobiedimsky, hidden behind his high collar, and angrily snoring. My uncle, lost in thought, walked from corner to corner. No one spoke, the only sound was the rustling of the cloth in Tatiana's hands. My uncle suddenly stopped in front of Tatiana Ivanovna, and said —
“There you are; all so young, so good, living so restfiilly in this refuge that I envy you! I have got so used to this life that my heart sinks when I think I must leave you. . . . Believe in me; I am sincere.”
Slumber closed my eyes, and I lost consciousness. I was awakened by a noise, and saw that my uncle still stood before Tatiana Ivanovna, and looked at her with rapture. His cheeks burned.
“My life is past,” he said. “I have never lived. Your young face reminds me of my vanished youth. I should rejoice to sit here and look at you till the day of my death! With what joy could I take you back with me to St. Petersburg!”
“What is the meaning of this?” asked Feodor hoarsely.
“I should set you down on my desk under a glass case, and admire you, and show you to my friends. Pelageya Ivanovna, such as you we have none! We have wealth, distinction, sometimes beauty! But never this living sincerity . . . this healthy restfulness.”
My uncle sat down before Tatiana Ivanovna and took her by the hand.
“So you don't want to come to St. Petersburg,” he continued caressingly. “In that case give me here your little handy! Adorable little handy! You won't give it? Well, miser, at least let me give it a kiss ! . . .”
A chair moved noisily. Feodor leaped up, and with measured, heavy footsteps, went up to his wife. His face was pale grey, and trembled. With his whole force he banged his fist on the table, and said in a hoarse voice —
“I will not tolerate this!”
And at the same moment Pobiedimsky jumped from his chair. As pale as Feodor and looking equally vicious, he strode up to Tatiana Ivanovna, and banged his iist on the table.
“I will not . . . tolerate this!” he exclaimed.
“I don't understand. What is the matter?” asked my uncle.
“I will not tolerate this!” repeated Feodor. And again he banged his fist noisily on the table.
My uncle rose from his seat and blinked timidly. He tried to say something, but astonishment and fright prevented him uttering a word; and, leaving his hat behind, he tottered with old-man's steps out of the wing. When a little later my terrified mother ran into the wing, Feodor and Pobiedimsky, like a pair of blacksmiths, were banging their fists on the table and roaring, “I will not tolerate this!”
“What on earth has happened?” asked my mother. “Why have you insulted my brother? What is the matter?”
But seeing Tatiana Ivanovna's pale, frightened face and the glare of her raging husband, my mother quickly guessed what was the matter. She sighed and shook her head.
“Don't bang the table again! Feodor, stop! And why are you banging the table, Yegor Alexeievitch? What has this to do with you?”
Pobiedimsky staggered back in confusion. Feodor gave him a piercing glance, then looked at his wife, and walked up the room. But the moment my mother left I witnessed what at first I thought must be a dream. I saw Feodor seizing my tutor, lifting him high in the air, and flinging him violently against the door.
When I awoke next morning my tutor's bed was empty. My nurse whispered that he had been taken to hospital that morning and that his arm was broken. Saddened by this news, and with my mind full of the scandal of the night before, I went into the yard. The weather was dull. ITie sky was veiled with clouds, and a strong wind blew, carrying before it dust, papers, and feathers. I foresaw rain. The faces of men and animals expressed tedium. When I returned to the house I was