Short Fiction, Fyodor Sologub [most popular novels of all time .txt] 📗

of not appearing “a blockhead” the next day seemed to him both silly and unnecessary. The thought perturbed him. He began to yawn from tedium and from sadness, and to dangle his feet impatiently; he simply could not sit still.

But he knew too well that the lessons must be learnt, that this was very important, that his future depended upon it; and so he went on conscientiously with the tedious business.

Volodya made a blot on the copybook, and he put his pen aside. He looked at the blot, and decided that it could be erased with a penknife. He was glad of the distraction.

Not finding the penknife on the table he put his hand into his pocket and rummaged there. Among all such rubbish as is to be found in a boy’s pocket he felt his penknife and pulled it out, together with some sort of leaflet.

He did not see at first what the paper was he held in his hands, but on looking at it he suddenly remembered that this was the little book with the shadows, and quite as suddenly he grew cheerful and animated.

And there it was⁠—that same little leaflet which he had forgotten when he began his lessons.

He jumped briskly off his chair, moved the lamp nearer the wall, looked cautiously at the closed door⁠—as though afraid of someone entering⁠—and, turning the leaflet to the familiar page, began to study the first drawing with great intentness, and to arrange his fingers according to directions. The first shadow came out as a confused shape, not at all what it should have been. Volodya moved the lamp, now here, now there; he bent and he stretched his fingers; and he was at last rewarded by seeing a woman’s head with a three-cornered hat.

Volodya grew cheerful. He inclined his hand somewhat and moved his fingers very slightly⁠—the head bowed, smiled, and grimaced amusingly.

Volodya proceeded with the second figure, then with the others. All were hard at the beginning, but he managed them somehow in the end.

He spent a half-hour in this occupation, and forgot all about his lessons, the school, and the whole world.

Suddenly he heard familiar footsteps behind the door. Volodya flushed; he stuffed the leaflet into his pocket and quickly moved the lamp to its place, almost overturning it; then he sat down and bent over his copybook. His mother entered.

“Let’s go and have tea, Volodenka,” she said to him.

Volodya pretended that he was looking at the blot and that he was about to open his penknife. His mother gently put her hands on his head. Volodya threw the knife aside and pressed his flushing face against his mother. Evidently she noticed nothing, and this made Volodya glad. Still, he felt ashamed, as though he had actually been caught at some stupid prank.

III

The samovar stood upon the round table in the dining-room and quietly hummed its garrulous song. The hanging-lamp diffused its light upon the white tablecloth and upon the dark walls, filling the room with dream and mystery.

Volodya’s mother seemed wistful as she leant her handsome, pale face forward over the table. Volodya was leaning on his arm, and was stirring the small spoon in his glass. It was good to watch the tea’s sweet eddies and to see the little bubbles rise to the surface. The little silver spoon quietly tinkled.

The boiling water, sputtering, ran from the tap into his mother’s cup.

A light shadow was cast by the little spoon upon the saucer and the tablecloth, and it lost itself in the glass of tea. Volodya watched it intently: the shadows thrown by the tiny little eddies and bubbles recalled something to him⁠—precisely what, Volodya could not say. He held up and he turned the little spoon, and he ran his fingers over it⁠—but nothing came of it.

“All the same,” he stubbornly insisted to himself, “it’s not with fingers alone that shadows can be made. They are possible with anything. But the thing is to adjust oneself to one’s material.”

And Volodya began to examine the shadows of the samovar, of the chairs, of his mother’s head, as well as the shadows cast on the table by the dishes; and he tried to catch a resemblance in all these shadows to something. His mother was speaking⁠—Volodya was not listening properly.

“How is Lesha Sitnikov getting on at school?” asked his mother.

Volodya was studying then the shadow of the milk-jug. He gave a start, and answered hastily: “It’s a tomcat.”

“Volodya, you must be asleep,” said his astonished mother. “What tomcat?”

Volodya grew red.

“I don’t know what’s got into my head,” he said. “I’m sorry, mother, I wasn’t listening.”

IV

The next evening, before tea, Volodya again thought of his shadows, and gave himself up to them. One shadow insisted on turning out badly, no matter how hard he stretched and bent his fingers.

Volodya was so absorbed in this that he did not hear his mother coming. At the creaking of the door he quickly put the leaflet into his pocket and turned away, confused, from the wall. But his mother was already looking at his hands, and a tremor of fear lit up her eyes.

“What are you doing, Volodya? What have you hidden?”

“Nothing, really,” muttered Volodya, flushing and changing colour rapidly.

It flashed upon her that Volodya wished to smoke, and that he had hidden a cigarette.

“Volodya, show me at once what you are hiding,” she said in a frightened voice.

“Really, mamma.⁠ ⁠…”

She caught Volodya by the elbow.

“Must I feel in your pocket myself?”

Volodya grew even redder, and pulled the little book out of his pocket.

“Here it is,” he said, giving it to his mother.

“Well, what is it?”

“Well, here,” he explained, “on this side are the drawings, and here, as you see, are the shadows. I was trying to throw them on the wall, and I haven’t succeeded very well.”

“What is there to hide here!” said his mother, becoming more tranquil. “Now show me what they look like.”

Volodya, taken aback, began obediently to show his