Short Fiction, Vsevolod Garshin [howl and other poems .txt] 📗

Today Evsei Evsevich spoke to me:

“You will listen to me, Ivan Ivanovich⁠—what I, an old man, am going to say to you. You, my dear boy, have begun to behave stupidly. Take care that it does not reach the ears of the Chief!”

He went on talking for a long time (trying to speak of the very essence of the matter by roundabout means) about the service, the respect due to rank, of our Chief, about myself, and finally began to talk about my misfortune. We were sitting in a traktir,3 where Nadejda Nicolaievna and her friends often came.

Evsei Evsevich had long ago noticed, and had long ago drawn from me a number of details. I could not hold my stupid tongue, and let it all out, and even almost cried.

Evsei Evsevich got angry.

“Bah! you old woman, you tenderhearted old woman! A young man, a good official, you have started all this nonsense for such rubbish! Have done with her! What have you to do with her? It would be all right if she were a respectable, decent girl; but for, if I may say so⁠ ⁠…”

Evsei Evsevich even spat.

After this incident he often returned to the subject (Evsei Evsevich was sincerely grieved about and for me), but he no longer stormed at me, because he saw that it annoyed me. At the same time, he could not contain himself for long, and although he would try at first to talk in a roundabout way on the subject, eventually he would come to the one conclusion that it was necessary to have done with it, etc.

And I, strictly speaking, agree with what he says every day to me. How many times have I also thought that it was necessary to have done with it. Yes, how many times! And how many times after such thoughts have I gone out of the house, and my feet have borne me to that street.⁠ ⁠… And here she comes, berouged, with pencilled eyebrows, in a velvet shuba, and a dainty sealskin cap, straight towards me, and I cross to the other side, so that she shall not notice that I am following her. She goes up to the corner, then turns back, impudently, brazenly looking at the passersby, and sometimes talking with them. I follow behind her from the other side of the street, trying not to lose sight of her, and hopelessly I gaze at her little figure until some⁠ ⁠… blackguard goes up to her and speaks. She answers him, turns round, and goes with him⁠ ⁠… and I after them. If the road were strewn with sharp nails it could not be more painful for me. I go along hearing nothing, seeing nothing, except two figures.⁠ ⁠…

I do not look where I am going, and go along with my eyes starting out of my head, bumping against passersby, and meeting in return with reproofs, abuse, and pushes. Once I knocked a child over.⁠ ⁠…

They turn to the right, then to the left, they go through the little door into the yard. She first, then he. Almost always out of some strange politeness he gives her the way. Then I follow. Opposite her two windows, so familiar to me, there stands a shed with a hayloft. There is a small flight of iron steps leading up to the hayloft, ending with a small landing devoid of any railing. I sit down on this landing and gaze at the lowered white blinds.⁠ ⁠…

Today I was at my awful post, although there was a sharp frost. I became thoroughly benumbed. My feet lost all feeling, but still I stood there. Steam rose from my face, my moustaches and beard became frozen, my feet began to freeze. People kept passing through the courtyard, but did not notice me, and, talking loudly, used to pass by me. From the street came sounds of drunken singing (it was a gay street), interchange of abuse, the noise of the scrapers on the pavement as the dvorniks cleared it of snow. All these sounds rang in my ears, but I paid no attention to them or to the frost, which was biting my face and my benumbed legs. All this, the sounds, my feet, and the frost, seemed to be all far, far away from me. My legs were aching violently, but something inside me was aching even more violently. I have not the courage to go to her. Does she know that there is a man who would consider it happiness to sit with her in a room, and only look into her eyes, not even touching her hands? That there is a man who would hurl himself into the fire if it would help her to get out of the hell in which she lives, if she wanted to get out of it? But she does not wish.⁠ ⁠… And I, up to now, do not know why she does not wish. I cannot believe that she is spoilt to the very marrow of her bones. I cannot believe this because I know it is not so, because I know her, because I love her, love her.

A waiter went up to Ivan Ivanovich, who had placed his elbows on the table, and with his face buried in his arms, was shuddering from time to time, and touched him on the shoulder.

“Mr. Nikitin. You mustn’t sit like this.⁠ ⁠… In front of everyone.⁠ ⁠… The proprietor will make a fuss. Mr. Nikitin! Please get up. You must not act like this here.”

Ivan Ivanovich raised his head and looked at the waiter. He was not the least drunk, and the waiter understood this as soon as he saw his mournful face.

“It is nothing, Simon⁠—nothing. Give me a bottle of vodka.”

“What will you order with it?”

“What? A wineglass.