Short Fiction, Leonid Andreyev [good e books to read .TXT] 📗

with their hands, but on their heads. And a great crowd of policemen walked behind. But none of your friends were there; and none of the people in the city. And all the doors and windows were barred when you were carried by⁠—as they are at night!

“I was so frightened that I waked up, and began to think about it⁠—and that is what I am going to write you about.⁠ ⁠… I thought maybe there is no one at all who will cry for you when you are dead. The people in your house are all hard and selfish, and only care about themselves; and perhaps when you die they’ll be glad, because they think then they can be Governor! I do not know your wife, but I don’t believe there can be very many gentle and kind ladies in those circles of pleasure and pride.

“No respectable people would ever go to your funeral, of course, for they are all angry at the way you treated the workmen⁠ ⁠… and one man even said they wanted to put you out of the club, but they were afraid of the Government!⁠ ⁠… Masses won’t do any good, because you know yourself our Bishop would just as soon say a Mass for a dead dog if he got money enough for it.⁠ ⁠… And when I think that you probably know all this without my telling you, then I feel very sorry for you⁠—as if you were really a friend of mine. I’ve only seen you twice: once on Moscowa Street⁠—but that was long ago⁠—and the second time at our school exhibition, when you drove up with the Bishop⁠ ⁠… but, of course, you wouldn’t remember me then⁠ ⁠… and I promise you faithfully that I’ll pray for you, and that I’ll cry over you as though I really had been your daughter, because I am very, very sorry for you.

“P.S.⁠—Please burn this letter! But I am so awfully sorry for you.”

He loved that little schoolgirl.

Late that night, just before going to bed, he stepped out on to the balcony⁠—that same balcony from which he had given the signal with his white handkerchief!⁠ ⁠… The cold fall rains had already set in, and the night was black and dismal. In this heavy autumnal darkness one felt how far away the sun was, how long it had been gone, and how late the dawn would be. Far to the left in the driveway burned two bright lanterns with reflectors, and their white light penetrated the darkness, yet did not banish it.⁠ ⁠… There it still lay⁠—quiet, close, ponderous.

The city doubtless slept already, for not a lighted window was to be seen, and no wheels sounded in the dim-lit streets. Under one of the lanterns something gleams vaguely⁠—probably a puddle.⁠ ⁠…

School had closed for the day, and she no doubt has long since done her lessons, and now sleeps quietly somewhere in this black, silent space⁠—from whence they send their letters with their threats⁠—from whence his death is about to come.⁠ ⁠… But there, too, lives this little child, who sleeps just now, but who will weep for him when his time comes.

How quiet it is, how dark⁠—how silent.

VIII

Two weeks before the Governor’s death, a linen-covered package was handed in to the Government House⁠—its value declared at three roubles. It proved to be an infernal machine⁠—a bomb intended to explode on being opened. But it was badly made by the unskilled hands of one who had only read of such things⁠—so it missed fire. Yet in the very homemade simplicity of the outfit there was something sinister and terrifying, as if blind Death had stretched forth his hand and was fumbling clumsily about in the dark.

The police sounded the alarm, and Maria Petrovna insisted upon her husband’s wiring to St. Petersburg that very day, to ask for sick leave. She herself drove first to the tailor’s, and then wrote her son a long letter full of horrors⁠—all in French.⁠ ⁠…

A strange and radical change had come over the Governor. In place of the man they used to know appeared an entirely new figure. No one knew precisely when the change came about, and in the main he seemed the same; but upon his face had dawned such an expression of righteousness it seemed a new countenance. He smiled where formerly he would have been grave, and frowned where he had been wont to smile; he was bored and indifferent where he used to be attentive and animated. He was horribly candid in the expression of his feelings. When he chose, he was silent; left the room when he felt inclined, and turned his back when people bored him.

Those who had counted for years on his liking and friendship, who knew all his thoughts and moods, felt themselves suddenly neglected⁠—quite shoved aside⁠—and could no longer understand his feelings and fancies. All the bows and smiles and cordial greetings had suddenly disappeared⁠—the little ceremonious form of politeness: “If you will be so good, my dear fellow!”⁠—“I am vastly obliged to you, my dear sir!”⁠—which had seemed like second nature to him, he dropped completely; and people were taken aback at the remarkable, even alarming originality of his new manner. So animals, accustomed to looking on a man’s apparel as the person himself, might be taken aback at the sight of a naked figure.

He had simply ceased to be polite⁠—and directly the bond was broken which had held him throughout many years to his wife, his children, his associates⁠—as though it had only been made of smiles and compliments, and had vanished together with the ceremonious kissing of the hand. He did not judge them, he did not hate them; found nothing new or repulsive in them⁠—they simply fell out of his soul; as decayed teeth crumble in the mouth⁠ ⁠… as the hair falls out⁠ ⁠… as a dead skin is sloughed off⁠—painlessly, quietly, without an effort. When the veil of custom and politeness fell from him, he stood there forsaken and aloof; yet