The Little Demon, Fyodor Sologub [reading the story of the TXT] 📗

post?” asked Avinovitsky angrily as he admitted Peredonov into the drawing-room. “Or have you been the victim of a crime yourself, which is more possible in our town. Ours is a filthy town and its police is even worse. I’m astonished that you don’t find dead bodies every morning lying about the place. Well, sit down. What is your business? Are you the criminal or the victim?”

“No,” said Peredonov, “I haven’t done anything of the kind. Now there’s the Headmaster who’d undoubtedly like to settle my hash for me, but I haven’t any such thing in mind.”

“So you haven’t come with a confession?” asked Avinovitsky.

“No, I can’t say that I have,” mumbled Peredonov timidly.

“Well, if that’s the case,” said the District Attorney with savage emphasis, “then let me offer you something.”

He picked up a small handbell from the table and rang it. No one came. Avinovitsky took the handbell in both hands, raised a furious racket, then threw the bell on the floor, stamped his feet and shouted in a savage voice:

“Malanya! Malanya! Devils! Beasts! Demons!”

Unhurried footsteps were heard and a schoolboy came in, Avinovitsky’s son, a stubby, black-haired boy of about thirteen years of age with an air of confidence and self-assurance. He greeted Peredonov, picked up the bell, put in on the table and said quietly:

“Malanya is in the vegetable garden.”

Avinovitsky recovered his calm for a moment, and looking at his son with a tenderness that did not altogether become his overgrown and angry face, he said:

“Now run along, sonny, and tell her to bring us something to drink and some zakouska.”

The boy leisurely walked out of the room. His father looked after him with a pleased and proud smile. But while the boy was still on the threshold Avinovitsky suddenly frowned savagely and shouted in his terrible voice which made Peredonov tremble:

“Look alive!”

The schoolboy began to run and they could hear how impetuously he slammed the doors. Avinovitsky, smiling with his heavy red lips, again renewed his angry-sounding conversation:

“My heir⁠—not bad, eh? What’s he going to turn out like? What do you say? He may become a fool, but a knave, a coward or a rag⁠—never!”

“Well⁠—a⁠—” mumbled Peredonov.

“People are trivial nowadays⁠—they’re a parody of the human race!” roared Avinovitsky. “They consider health a trifle. Some German invented under-waistcoats. Now I would have sent that German to hard labour. Imagine my Vladimir suddenly in an under-waistcoat! Why all summer he walked about in the village without once putting his boots on, and then think of him in an under-waistcoat! Why, he even gets out of his bath and runs naked in a frost and rolls in the snow⁠—think of him in an under-waistcoat. A hundred lashes for the accursed German!”

Avinovitsky passed from the German who invented under-waistcoats to other criminals.

“Capital punishment, my dear sir, is not barbarism!” he shouted. “Science admits that there are born criminals. There’s nothing to be said for them, my friend. They ought to be destroyed and not supported by the State. A man’s a scoundrel⁠—and they give him a warm corner in a convict prison. He’s a murderer, an incendiary, a seducer, but the taxpayer must support him out of his pocket. No-o! It’s much juster and cheaper to hang them.”

The round table in the dining-room was covered with a white tablecloth with a red border, and upon it were distributed plates with fat sausages and other salted, smoked, and pickled eatables, and decanters and bottles of various sizes and forms, containing all sorts of vodkas, brandies and liqueurs. Everything was to Peredonov’s taste, and even the slight carelessness of their arrangement pleased him.

The host continued to shout. Apropos of the food, he began to abuse the shopkeepers, and then for some reason began to talk about ancestry.

“Ancestry is a big thing,” he shouted savagely, “for the muzhiks to enter the aristocracy is stupid, absurd, impractical and immoral. The soil is getting poorer and the cities are filled with unemployed. Then there are bad harvests, idleness and suicides⁠—how does that please you? You may teach the muzhik as much as you like but don’t give him any rank⁠—it makes a peasantry lose its best members and it always remains rabble and cattle. And the gentry also suffer detriment from the influx of uncultured elements. In his own village he was better than others, but when he gets into a higher rank he brings into it something coarse, unknightly and plebeian. In the first case the most important things are gain and his stomach. No-o, my dear fellow, the castes were a wise institution.”

“Here, for instance, our Headmaster lets all sorts of riffraff into the school,” said Peredonov angrily. “There are even peasant children there and many commoners’ children.”

“Fine doings, I must say!” shouted the host.

“There’s a circular saying that we shouldn’t admit all kinds of riffraff, but he does as he likes,” complained Peredonov. “He refuses hardly anyone. Life is rather poorish in our town, he says, and there are too few pupils as it is. What does he mean by few? It would be better if there were less. It’s all we can do to correct the exercise-books alone. There’s no time to read the schoolbooks. They purposely write dubious words in their compositions⁠—you have to look in Grote to see how they’re spelled.”

“Have some brandy,” suggested Avinovitsky. “Well, what is your business with me?”

“I have enemies,” growled Peredonov, as he looked dejectedly into his glass of yellow vodka before drinking it.

“There was once a pig who lived without enemies,” said Avinovitsky, “and he also was slaughtered. Have a bit⁠—it was a very good pig.”

Peredonov took a slice of ham and said: “They’re spreading all sorts of scandal about me.”

“Well, as for gossip I can assure you that no town is worse,” shouted the host. “What a town! No matter what you do, all the pigs begin to grunt at you at once.”

“Princess Volchanskaya has promised to get me an inspector’s job, and suddenly they all begin to gossip. This