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

Varvara uttered curses, spat at the boys, and showed them the Koukish. The guests and the bride’s-men roared with laughter.

At last they reached home. The entire company tumbled into Peredonov’s house with a shout, a hubbub and whistling. They drank champagne, then took to vodka and began to play cards. They kept on drinking all night. Varvara got tipsy, danced, and was happy; Peredonov was also happy⁠—Volodin had not yet been substituted for him. As always, the visitors conducted themselves disrespectfully and indecently towards Varvara; this seemed to her to be in the order of things.

After the wedding the Peredonovs’ existence changed very little. Only Varvara’s attitude towards her husband became more assured and independent. She ran about less for her husband⁠—but, through deep-rooted habit, she was still a little afraid of him. Peredonov, also from habit, shouted at her as he used to do and sometimes even beat her. But he too scented the assurance she had acquired with her new position. And this depressed him. It seemed to him that if she was not so afraid of him as she had been, it was because she had strengthened her criminal idea to leave him and get Volodin into his place.

“I must be on my guard,” he thought.

Varvara triumphed. She, together with her husband, paid visits to the town ladies, even to those with whom she was little acquainted. At these visits she showed a ridiculous pride and awkwardness. She was received everywhere though in many houses with astonishment. Varvara had ordered in good time for these visits a hat from the best local modiste. The large vivid flowers set abundantly on the hat delighted her.

The Peredonovs began their visits with the Headmaster’s wife. Then they went to the wife of the Marshal of the Nobility.

On the day that the Peredonovs had prepared to make the visits⁠—of which, of course, the Routilovs knew beforehand⁠—the sisters went to Varvara Nikolayevna Khripatch, to see out of curiosity how Varvara Peredonov would conduct herself. The Peredonovs soon arrived. Varvara made a curtsy to the Headmaster’s wife, and in a more than usually jarring voice said:

“Well, we’ve come to see you. Please love us and be kind to us.”

“I’m very glad,” replied the Headmaster’s wife constrainedly. And she seated Varvara on the sofa.

Varvara sat down with obvious pleasure in the place indicated, spread out her rustling green dress, and said, trying to appear at ease:

“I’ve been a Mam’zell until now, but now I’ve become a Madam. We’re namesakes⁠—I’m Varvara and you’re Varvara⁠—and we’ve not been to each other’s houses. While I was a Mam’zell, I sat at home most of the time. What’s the good of sitting by one’s stove all the time! Now Ardalyon Borisitch and I will live more socially. Grant me a favour⁠—we will come to you and you will come to us, Mossure to Mossure and Madame to Madame.”

“But I hear that you’re not going to stay here long,” said the Headmaster’s wife. “I’m told that you and your husband are going to be transferred.”

“Yes, the paper will come soon and then we shall leave here,” replied Varvara. “But as the paper has not yet come, we must stay here a little longer and show ourselves.”

Varvara had hopes of the inspector’s position. After the wedding she wrote a letter to the Princess. She had not yet received an answer. She decided to write again at the New Year.

Liudmilla said:

“But we thought, Ardalyon Borisitch, that you were going to marry the young lady, Pilnikov?”

“What’s the good of me marrying anyone else?” said Peredonov. “I need patronage.”

“But how did your affair with Mademoiselle Pilnikov get broken off,” Liudmilla teased him. “Didn’t you pay her attentions? Did she refuse you?”

“I’ll show her up yet,” growled Peredonov morosely.

“That’s an idée fixe of Ardalyon Borisitch,” said the Headmaster’s wife with a dry laugh.

XXIV

The Peredonov’s cat acted wildly, snarled and refused to come when called⁠—it had become quite incorrigible. The animal alarmed Peredonov. He sometimes pronounced exorcisms over it.

“I wonder whether it will help,” he thought. “There’s strong electricity in a cat’s fur. That’s where the trouble is.”

Once the idea came into his mind to have the cat shorn. No sooner thought of than done. Varvara was not at home. She had gone to Grushina’s, after having put a bottle of cherry brandy into her pocket. There was no one to hinder her. Peredonov tied the cat on a cord⁠—he had made a collar out of a pocket handkerchief⁠—and led the animal to the hairdresser. The cat mewed wildly, and struggled. Sometimes it threw itself in desperation at Peredonov⁠—but Peredonov kept it at a distance with his stick. A crowd of small boys ran behind him, hooting and laughing. Passersby paused to look. People looked out of their windows to see what the noise was about. Peredonov morosely dragged the cat along on the cord without the least embarrassment.

He succeeded in getting the cat to the hairdresser and said:

“Shave the cat, barber, the closer the better.”

The small boys crowded at the shop door, roaring with laughter and making faces. The hairdresser felt offended and grew red. He said in a slightly trembling voice:

“I beg your pardon, sir, we don’t undertake such jobs. And who ever heard of a shaved cat? It must be the very latest fashion which hasn’t reached us yet.”

Peredonov listened to him with stupefied disappointment. He shouted:

“You’d better admit that you can’t do it, incompetent!”

And he walked away, dragging after him the cat, which mewed continuously. On the way he thought dejectedly that everywhere and always everyone laughed at him and no one wanted to help him. His sadness oppressed his heart.

Peredonov went with Volodin and Routilov to the Summer-garden to play billiards. The marker said to them with embarrassment:

“I’m sorry, gentlemen, you can’t play today.”

“Why not?” asked Peredonov irritatedly.

“Well, I’m sorry to say there are no billiard balls,” replied the marker.

“Someone pinched them when he wasn’t looking,” said the bartender sternly, leaning across the counter.

The