Short Fiction, Ivan Bunin [reading women .TXT] 📗

was curling the flimsiest wisp of a cloud.⁠ ⁠… Then the captain called out from the roundhouse: “Here, Chang! Come on and have coffee!” and Chang immediately jumped up, circled the roundhouse, and deftly dashed over its brass threshold. And beyond the threshold it proved to be even better than on the bridge: there was a broad leather divan, fixed to the wall; over it hung certain things like wall-clocks, their glass and hands glistening; and on the floor was a slop-bowl with a mixture of sweet milk and bread. Chang began lapping it greedily, while the captain busied himself with his work. Upon the counter, placed under the window opposite the divan, he unrolled a large maritime chart, and, placing a ruler over it, firmly drew a long line upon it with scarlet ink. Chang, having finished his lapping, with milk on his muzzle, jumped up on the counter and sat down near the very window, out of which he could see the blue turned-over collar of a sailor in a roomy blouse, who, with his back to the window, was standing at the many-horned wheel. And at this point the captain, who, as it turned out afterward, was very fond of having a chat when he was all alone with Chang, said to him:

“You see, brother, this is the Red Sea itself. You and I have to pass through it as cleverly as we can⁠—just see how gaily coloured it is! I have to land you in Odessa in good order, because they already know there of your existence. I have already blabbed about you to a most capricious little girl; I have bragged to her about your lordship, over a sort of long cable, d’you understand, that has been laid down by clever people over the bottom of all the seas and oceans.⁠ ⁠… For after all, Chang, I am an awfully lucky fellow, so lucky that you can’t even imagine it, and for that reason I am terribly averse to getting stuck on one of these reefs, to have no end of disgrace on my first distant cruise.⁠ ⁠…”

And, saying this, the captain suddenly gave Chang a stern look and slapped his muzzle:

“Paws off!” he cried commandingly. “Don’t you dare climb on government property!”

And Chang, with a toss of his head, growled and puckered up his face. This was the first slap he had ever received, and he was offended; it again seemed to him that to be living in this world and to be sailing the seas was an atrocious thing. He turned away, his translucently yellow eyes dimming and contracting, and with a low growl he bared his wolfish fangs. But the captain did not consider Chang’s offended feelings of any importance. He lit a cigarette and returned to the divan; having taken a gold watch out of a side pocket of his piqué jacket, he pried back its lids with a strong nail, and looking upon a glistening, unusually animated, bustling something which ran and resoundingly whispered within the watch, again began speaking in a comradely tone. He again told Chang that he was bringing him to Odessa, to Elissavetinskaya Street; that in Elissavetinskaya Street he, the captain, had apartments, first of all; secondly, a wife who was a beauty; and, thirdly, a wonderful little daughter; and that he, the captain, was a very lucky fellow after all.

“A lucky fellow, after all, Chang!” said the captain, and then added:

“This daughter of mine, Chang, is a lively little girl, full of curiosity and persistence⁠—it is going to be bad for you at times, especially for your tail! But if you only knew, Chang, what a beautiful creature she is! I love her so much, brother, that at times I am even afraid of my love: she is all the world to me⁠—well, almost all, let us say; but is that as it should be? And, in general, should anyone be loved so greatly?” he asked. “For, were all these Buddhas of yours more foolish than you and I? And yet, just you listen to what they say about this love of the universe and all things corporeal, beginning with sunlight, with a wave, with the air, and winding up with woman, with an infant, with the scent of white acacia! Or else⁠—do you know what sort of a thing this Tao is, that has been thought up by nobody else but you Chinamen? I know it but poorly myself, brother, but then, everybody knows it poorly; but, as far as it is possible to understand it, just what is it, after all? The Abyss, our First Mother; She gives birth to all things that exist in this universe, and She devours them as well, and, devouring them, gives birth to them anew; or, to put it in other words, It is the Path of all that exists, which nothing that exists may resist. But we resist It every minute; every minute we want to turn to our desire not only the soul of a beloved woman, let us say, but even the entire universe as well! It is an eerie thing to be living in this world, Chang,” said the captain; “it’s a most pleasant thing, but still an eerie one, and especially for such as I! For I am too avid of happiness, and all too often do I lose the way: dark and evil is this Path⁠—or is it entirely, entirely otherwise?”

And, after a silence, he added further:

“For after all, what is the main thing? When you love somebody, there is no power on earth that can make you believe that the one you love can possibly not love you. And that is just where the devil comes in, Chang. But how magnificent life is; my God, how magnificent!”

Made red hot by the now high risen sun, and quivering slightly as it ran, the steamer was tirelessly cleaving the Red Sea, now stilled in the abyss of the sultry empyrean spaciousness. The radiant void of