Short Fiction, Anton Chekhov [websites to read books for free .TXT] 📗

them almost for nothing.⁠ ⁠… He said: ‘take them, take them.⁠ ⁠…’ I must introduce you to the prince sometime. A man of culture! He’s forever writing, writing.⁠ ⁠… And do you know what their names are? One is Fanny, the other Isabella.⁠ ⁠… There’s Europe, ha-ha-ha!⁠ ⁠… The west! Goodbye!”

Ivan Petrovitch left Liza and Groholsky in peace, and devoted himself to his ladies. All day long sound of talk, laughter, and the clatter of crockery came from his villa.⁠ ⁠… The lights were not put out till far into the night.⁠ ⁠… Groholsky was in bliss.⁠ ⁠… At last, after a prolonged interval of agony, he felt happy and at peace again. Ivan Petrovitch with his two ladies had no such happiness as he had with one. But alas, destiny has no heart. She plays with the Groholskys, the Lizas, the Ivans, and the Mishutkas as with pawns.⁠ ⁠… Groholsky lost his peace again.⁠ ⁠…

One morning, about ten days afterwards, on waking up late, he went out on to the verandah and saw a spectacle which shocked him, revolted him, and moved him to intense indignation. Under the verandah of the villa opposite stood the French women, and between them Liza. She was talking and looking askance at her own villa as though to see whether that tyrant, that despot were awake (so Groholsky interpreted those looks). Ivan Petrovitch standing on the verandah with his sleeves tucked up, lifted Isabella into the air, then Fanny, and then Liza. When he was lifting Liza it seemed to Groholsky that he pressed her to himself.⁠ ⁠… Liza too flung one leg over the parapet.⁠ ⁠… Oh these women! All sphinxes, every one of them!

When Liza returned home from her husband’s villa and went into the bedroom on tiptoe, as though nothing had happened, Groholsky, pale, with hectic flushes on his cheeks, was lying in the attitude of a man at his last gasp and moaning.

On seeing Liza, he sprang out of bed, and began pacing about the bedroom.

“So that’s what you are like, is it?” he shrieked in a high tenor. “So that’s it! Very much obliged to you! It’s revolting, madam! Immoral, in fact! Let me tell you that!”

Liza turned pale, and of course burst into tears. When women feel that they are in the right, they scold and shed tears; when they are conscious of being in fault, they shed tears only.

“On a level with those depraved creatures! It’s⁠ ⁠… it’s⁠ ⁠… it’s⁠ ⁠… lower than any impropriety! Why, do you know what they are? They are kept women! Cocottes! And you a respectable woman go rushing off where they are⁠ ⁠… And he⁠ ⁠… He! What does he want? What more does he want of me? I don’t understand it! I have given him half of my property⁠—I have given him more! You know it yourself! I have given him what I have not myself.⁠ ⁠… I have given him almost all.⁠ ⁠… And he! I’ve put up with your calling him Vanya, though he has no right whatever to such intimacy. I have put up with your walks, kisses after dinner.⁠ ⁠… I have put up with everything, but this I will not put up with.⁠ ⁠… Either he or I! Let him go away, or I go away! I’m not equal to living like this any longer, no! You can see that for yourself!⁠ ⁠… Either he or I.⁠ ⁠… Enough! The cup is brimming over.⁠ ⁠… I have suffered a great deal as it is.⁠ ⁠… I am going to talk to him at once⁠—this minute! What is he, after all? What has he to be proud of? No, indeed.⁠ ⁠… He has no reason to think so much of himself.⁠ ⁠…”

Groholsky said a great many more valiant and stinging things, but did not “go at once”; he felt timid and abashed.⁠ ⁠… He went to Ivan Petrovitch three days later.

When he went into his apartment, he gaped with astonishment. He was amazed at the wealth and luxury with which Bugrov had surrounded himself. Velvet hangings, fearfully expensive chairs.⁠ ⁠… One was positively ashamed to step on the carpet. Groholsky had seen many rich men in his day, but he had never seen such frenzied luxury.⁠ ⁠… And the higgledy-piggledy muddle he saw when, with an inexplicable tremor, he walked into the drawing room⁠—plates with bits of bread on them were lying about on the grand piano, a glass was standing on a chair, under the table there was a basket with a filthy rag in it.⁠ ⁠… Nut shells were strewn about in the windows. Bugrov himself was not quite in his usual trim when Groholsky walked in.⁠ ⁠… With a red face and uncombed locks he was pacing about the room in deshabille, talking to himself, apparently much agitated. Mishutka was sitting on the sofa there in the drawing room, and was making the air vibrate with a piercing scream.

“It’s awful, Grigory Vassilyevitch!” Bugrov began on seeing Groholsky, “such disorder⁠ ⁠… such disorder⁠ ⁠… Please sit down. You must excuse my being in the costume of Adam and Eve.⁠ ⁠… It’s of no consequence.⁠ ⁠… Horrible disorderliness! I don’t understand how people can exist here, I don’t understand it! The servants won’t do what they are told, the climate is horrible, everything is expensive.⁠ ⁠… Stop your noise,” Bugrov shouted, suddenly coming to a halt before Mishutka; “stop it, I tell you! Little beast, won’t you stop it?”

And Bugrov pulled Mishutka’s ear.

“That’s revolting, Ivan Petrovitch,” said Groholsky in a tearful voice. “How can you treat a tiny child like that? You really are⁠ ⁠…”

“Let him stop yelling then.⁠ ⁠… Be quiet⁠—I’ll whip you!”

“Don’t cry, Misha darling.⁠ ⁠… Papa won’t touch you again. Don’t beat him, Ivan Petrovitch; why, he is hardly more than a baby.⁠ ⁠… There, there.⁠ ⁠… Would you like a little horse? I’ll send you a little horse.⁠ ⁠… You really are hardhearted.⁠ ⁠…”

Groholsky paused, and then asked:

“And how are your ladies getting on, Ivan Petrovitch?”

“Not at all. I’ve turned them out without ceremony. I might have gone on keeping them, but it’s awkward.⁠ ⁠… The boy will grow up.⁠ ⁠… A father’s example.⁠ ⁠… If I were alone, then it would be a different thing.⁠ ⁠… Besides,