Short Fiction, Vladimir Korolenko [finding audrey TXT] 📗

news and gossip. On wakening early in the morning I used greatly to enjoy listening to these simple-minded conversations. Titus had a delightfully naive way of putting himself on Markelych’s level, giving him in return original suggestions, sometimes even improvised lectures on scientific subjects. It happened occasionally that I could not help laughter at them, whereupon Titus, bashful yet good-natured, would laugh too, and Markelych growl indignantly.

“I don’t know what there is to laugh at; Titus Ivanich is a bit cleverer than most people, and he always crosses himself when he goes up for examination, and there you are giggling at nothing. If you ask some folks what they are laughing at they don’t know themselves⁠—ugh!⁠ ⁠…”

And the old man would angrily pick up the clothes he was going to brush and leave the room, shuffling along with his old slippers, the thick hems of his trousers dragging on the floor.

That morning there had evidently been another conference, and this put me into rather a nonsensical humor, all the more so as Titus looked very dismal. I could not see his face, only his long, lanky body showing white in the darkness. He put on his boots, sighed, and stood still a moment then after another deep sigh he lighted a cigarette. As he puffed at it intermittently the little gleam in the dark room seemed to express confusion and agitation.

“Markelych seems to have brought bad news this morning, Titus Ivanich,” said I, in joke.

“Ah, you heard?”

“No I didn’t; but I hear now. You are sighing as if it were examination morning.”

The only notice Titus took of my joke was to puff still more furiously at his cigarette, making the mouthpiece squeak again. Presently he took it from his lips and said bluntly⁠—

“Last night someone threw himself under the train.”

Even this ill-omened news failed to put me in a less frivolous mood.

“My dear old Titushka,” I remarked in a tone of ironical sympathy, “somebody dies in this world every day. You and I too, alas! will some day succumb to the universal law. All men, all people⁠—”

“It is very near,” Titus answered gloomily.

“Then the whole point lies in the melancholy event occurring not far from Titus Ivanich. If it had been a hundred versts off⁠—”

“He did it himself,” interrupted Titus, still more gloomily.

“Well, what of that? In that case it was a voluntary action.”

I, too, lighted a cigarette, and puffing smoke into the darkness began persecuting Titus with rationalistic questions.

“Now, just think, Titushka, is it not much more melancholy when a man dies who wishes to live? If one feels one’s-self useless, superfluous. The ancients had a tradition about Hyperboreans; when their old people had thoroughly enjoyed life they used to walk into the water and die. To speak plainly, they drowned themselves. It was very sensible of them. When I grow old and begin to feel that I am useless, that I am, as one may say, taking more from life than I can give, I⁠—”

“You are talking nonsense,” interrupted Titus angrily.

I burst out laughing. Titus, who worked very hard for his living, was exceedingly careful of his health, and for some time past had been afraid of death. I rejoiced in the consciousness that my nerves were strong and that my “way of thinking” placed me above foolish and superstitious terrors. I had slept well and felt fresh: I wanted to do something out of the common as an outlet for my superfluous energy.

“Titushka,” said I, throwing away the end of my cigarette, “do you know what?”

“What now?”

“Let us go there and see!”

Titus struck a match, and lighting the candle, eyed me askance. His face wore a scowling and sleepy expression, and he regarded me rather sternly, as he might have done a naughty child. Titus had rather a domineering way at times, after the fashion of Markelych. This time he said very gravely,

“You’re a clever fellow, Gavrik, and also a terrible fool.”

I laughed again, and being by this time half dressed, began to wash, enjoying the fresh feeling of the cold water. Titus looked at me interrogatively.

“You are not really going?” he asked when I had finished.

“Of course I’m going: and I hope you will go with me.”

“Not for the world!”

“You are silly, Titushka.”

He shrugged his shoulders. I knew that gesture, it meant that Titus was not going to argue, seeing beforehand that it would be useless, but that his decision remained unshaken.

I dressed and went out.

XIV

As I left the house and went into the cold air an invigorating sense of freshness came over me. The sun was not yet risen. It was that indefinite interval between night and dawn when light mingles with darkness and sleep with awakening, and I felt that I was not quite awake; the vague floating images of sleep still kept passing through my mind, and everything around looked somehow different⁠—new and strange.

The sky was entirely covered with clouds, the Academy windows looked blindly out on to the square, and the bluish reflections of dawn were beginning to play on their convex panes. Lights were burning in the basement with a reddish, greasy look, like the light of the street lamps just before they are extinguished. By the church stood a policeman in his sheepskin coat and huge goloshes, yawning and waiting for the relief-guard. A slumbering sledge driver passed; he had probably taken some students home after a frolic, and was now fast asleep on his seat while his horse trotted slowly along the familiar road. A dog ran out from somewhere, crossed the square as if looking for something, and then went towards Vyselki, meditatively hanging his head and curling his tail between his legs. The dog, at any rate, had begun the day, though as yet did not seem quite decided as to his plans.

I, too, was in a meditative and indefinite mood. The chilly air penetrating my coat, reminded me of my warm bed I had just left. Having sat up late with Titus the