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

marker trembled and suddenly twitched his reddened ears, as a hare does, and whispered:

“They were stolen.”

Peredonov exclaimed in a frightened voice:

“Good Lord! Who stole them?”

“It’s not known,” said the marker; “no one seemed to have been here, and then when I went to look for the balls they weren’t there.”

Routilov sniggered and exclaimed:

“What a funny thing!”

Volodin assumed an injured look and scolded the marker:

“If you allow the billiard balls to be stolen when you are somewhere else and the billiard balls disappear, then you ought to have provided others for us to have something to play with. We come here and want to play, and if there are no billiard balls, how can we play?”

“Don’t whine, Pavloushka,” said Peredonov, “it’s bad enough without you. Now, marker, you go and look for those balls, we must play⁠—but meanwhile bring us a couple of beers.”

They began to drink the beer. But it was tedious. The billiard balls could not be found. They wrangled with one another and they cursed the marker. The latter felt guilty and said nothing.

Peredonov detected in this theft a new intrigue, hostile to himself.

“Why?” he thought dejectedly, and could not understand.

He went into the garden, sat down on a bench near the pond⁠—he had never sat there before⁠—and fixed his eyes dully on the weed-clogged water.

Volodin sat down beside him and shared his grief, looking also at the pond with his sheepish eyes.

“Why is there such a dirty mirror here, Pavloushka,” said Peredonov, pointing at the pond with his stick.

Volodin smiled and replied:

“It’s not a mirror, Ardasha, it’s a pond. And as there’s no breeze just now the trees are reflected in it as if in a mirror.”

Peredonov looked up; a fence on the other side of the pond separated the garden from the street. Peredonov asked:

“Why is the cat on that fence?”

Volodin looked in the same direction and said with a snigger:

“It was there, but it’s gone.”

There really had been no cat⁠—it was an illusion of Peredonov’s⁠—a cat with wide green eyes, his cunning, tireless enemy.

Peredonov began to think about the billiard balls:

“Who needed them? Has the nedotikomka devoured them? Perhaps that’s why I haven’t seen it today,” thought Peredonov. “It must have gorged itself and be asleep somewhere now.”

Peredonov went home dejectedly.

The sunset was fading. A small cloud was wandering across the sky. She moved stealthily on her soft shoes, and peeped out at him. On her dark edges a reflection smiled enigmatically.

Above the stream, which flowed between the garden and the town, the shadows of the houses and the bushes wavered, whispered to each other, and seemed to be searching for someone.

And on the earth, in this dark and eternally hostile town, all the people he met were evil and malicious. Everything became mingled in a general ill-will towards Peredonov, the dogs laughed at him and the people barked at him.

The ladies of the town began to visit Varvara. Some of them with an eager curiosity had managed to pay a visit on the second or third day, to see how Varvara looked at home. Others delayed a week or more. And still others did not come at all⁠—as, for instance, Vershina.

The Peredonovs awaited return visits every day with anxious impatience; they counted up those who had not yet come. They awaited the Headmaster and his wife with special impatience. They waited and were immensely agitated for fear that the Khripatches should suddenly arrive.

A week had passed. The Khripatches had not yet come. Varvara had got into a temper and began to pour out abuse. This waiting plunged Peredonov into a deeply depressed state of mind. Peredonov’s eyes became entirely vacant. It was as if they were becoming extinguished, and sometimes they seemed like the eyes of a dead man. Absurd fears tormented him. Without any visible cause he began to be afraid of one or another object. An idea somehow came into his head⁠—and tormented him for several days⁠—that they would cut his throat; he was afraid of everything sharp and hid the knives and the forks.

“Perhaps,” he thought, “they’ve been bewitched by whispered spells. It might happen that I might cut myself with them.”

“Why are there knives?” he asked Varvara. “Chinamen eat with chopsticks.”

For a whole week after this they did not cook any meat, but lived on cabbage-soup and gruel.

Varvara, to get even with Peredonov for the troubles he had caused her before their wedding, sometimes agreed with him and encouraged him to think that his fancies and superstitions had a basis in reality. She told him that he had many enemies and that they had every reason to envy him. More than once she told Peredonov tauntingly that he had been informed against and slandered to the authorities and the Princess. And she rejoiced at his visible fear.

It seemed clear to Peredonov that the Princess was dissatisfied with him. Why couldn’t she have sent him for his wedding an icon or cake. He thought: Oughtn’t he to earn her favour? But how? By falsehood? Should he slander someone, calumniate someone, inform against someone? He knew that all women love tittle-tattle⁠—and so couldn’t he invent something, something pleasant and risqué about Varvara and write it to the Princess? She would laugh and give him the place.

But Peredonov was not able to write the letter, and felt apprehensive about writing to a Princess. And later he forgot all about this scheme.

Peredonov gave ordinary visitors vodka and the cheapest port-wine. But he bought a three-rouble bottle of Madeira for the Headmaster. He considered this wine extremely expensive, kept it in his bedroom and showed it to his visitors, saying:

“It’s for the Headmaster!”

Routilov and Volodin were once sitting at Peredonov’s. Peredonov showed them the Madeira.

“What’s the good of looking at the outside, it doesn’t taste well,” said Routilov with a snigger, “you might treat us to some of your expensive Madeira.”

“What an idea!” exclaimed Peredonov angrily. “What should I give the Headmaster?”

“The Headmaster could drink a glass of vodka,” said Routilov.

“Headmasters don’t drink vodka, they