That summer of 1875 Aleksandr had matriculated with a silver medal. Despite their poverty, the family decided to send both Aleksandr and Kolia to Moscow, Aleksandr to study mathematics and science in Moscow University, and Kolia to enrol at the Moscow College of Art and Architecture, which willingly accepted students, even if they had only completed half their secondary education, on a portfolio of work. As Tsar Alexander II and his ministers planned more wars, military conscription (for six years) was in 1874 extended: not just the peasantry, but also sons of any class who failed to secure exemption, were liable. If they enrolled in university, the spectre of military service receded; if they graduated it melted away for ever. On 7 August 1875, their luggage packed by uncle Mitrofan, Pavel's two eldest sons took the train to Moscow. They were not friendless there. They would soon be joined by a fellow student from Taganrog, Gauzenbaum; the wealthy Ivan Loboda, a frequent traveller, would check up on them. Apart from fellow students from Taganrog they would find in Moscow their twenty-four-year old cousin from Kaluga, Mikhail [Misha] Chekhov (or Chokhov as many pronounced his surname). Misha was a clerk in Gavrilov's wholesale haberdashery firm of Gavrilov, agent for Coats Paisley's threads. Gavrilov supplied many Taganrog merchants, notably the Lobodas, and had even dealt with Pavel Chekhov. Mikhail, however different in his shop boy's background from his educated provincial cousins, was a sharp 'likely lad' who could find them cheap lodgings.
1874-6
The shock of the big city was considerable, particularly for Kolia who was less resourceful and who had to prove himself to the College of Art. Aleksandr, however, wrote a blase letter on his twentieth birthday:27 We arrived safely. We met Misha. When we talk to him we use the polite Vy just like papa and uncle. I think we are going to get on with him… The hotel is real rubbish. The table somehow dances and limps on one leg. The samovar is like a drunk… My respects to his Excellence Anton as the oldest child in the house… If Vania knew how plump the women are in Moscow. But don't tell him or he'll be seduced… Kolia is spitting in all the corners and under the table. He kept crossing himself on die journey. We are quarrelling over mat… Misha is very kind. We haven't found a flat yet. When someone is coming to Moscow, send the violin, a balaclava, my galoshes and my pen… That same day Kolia explained why he spat and crossed himself against the evil eye:
… the rail journey was shaky to Kursk and at one place our train nearly crashed into a goods train, if it hadn't been for a circle blocking the track. All the passengers were very scared… after tea we went in search of cousin Misha. We asked for him [at the warehouse] and he appeared. A real dandy, quite unrecognizable from his photograph… we answer, 'don't you recognize us?' 'Yes, judging by what Ivan Loboda tells me, if I'm not mistaken.' 'We're your cousins', says Aleksandr.28 Two days later, the brothers were installed in the first of many lodgings, 'Furnished Rooms over the Smyrna Dining Rooms', two minutes from the Art College and twenty from the university. Moscow landladies disliked students, but the brothers' charm worked. Their land-lady told them, said Kolia: 'No rows: play, sing, dance, the only thing that frightens me is rows. Of course you're young men and I have no right to forbid you anything.'
Aleksandr was enrolled, but Kolia was embroiled in misunderstandings that sapped his will power. On 13 August Aleksandr (who had his father's obsession with accounts) broached the subject of money: Enrolling in the University cost me 1 rouble. If [Kolia] passes his examination he won't be able to pay the whole fee: he has to pay
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30 silver roubles by 10 August… The flat costs us [each] per month 5.33, board 6.50, bread and tea 1.50, laundry 1, lighting 1.50, total 15 roubles. We can't live on less… Kolia doesn't know about this letter. He has gone completely dozy, just crosses himself all the time and touches the icon with his forehead. Four days later Aleksandr was still complaining: 'Damn Kolia's pomade. He's been carefully greasing his hair and combing it in with both combs, so that I have got my hair terribly greasy.' Pavel was not interested in his sons' hair. He planned to get Aleksandr to buy goods wholesale on credit and send them to Taganrog. Aleksandr was set against this and, using cousin Misha as a commercial authority, told his father why: Firstly, when Loboda finds out, he'll undercut you in Taganrog… secondly, you can only buy for cash in Moscow…, thirdly, buying on credit costs three times more…, fourthly, Moscow will ask Loboda what sort of person you are, and Loboda will naturally say as suits him: fifthly, Loboda is an expert… sixthly, Loboda is in place and has customers; seventhly, Loboda will squash us with his prices; eighthly, you will inevitably quarrel with him. And now consider Misha's position… he will lose his reputation and his boss will look askance… Keep struggling with the grocery. For the first time, the tables had turned. Pavel had lost his authority and his sons were finding independence. Aleksandr could as a silver medallist always find private pupils in Moscow. Acrimony between him and his father poisoned their relations, though Aleksandr sympathized with Pavel as Taganrog's merchants squeezed him: 'because of some bastard who is only concerned about his ugly mug you and I have to suffer, the thought makes me spit blood.'
Kolia was paralysed by the financial obstacles: he wanted to move on to Petersburg, where entry to art college was free, but had no money for the fare. Pavel, after repeated pleas, petitioned Liubov Alferaki, the wife of Taganrog's richest merchant, asking her to pay for Kolia's transfer to the Petersburg Academy of the Arts: Give him an education in the arts, which bounty you have bestowed on many… for twelve years my son and I have read and sung in the Palace church when you pronounced your prayers to the Almighty God with great ardour.
1874-6
The Alferakis did not help. Kolia felt abandoned, and sank in despair at the prospect of joining Misha Chokhov in Gavrilov's warehouse. Aleksandr was hurt by his parents' apathy. They offered reproaches, not support. Evgenia suspected him of hating his brother; Pavel ordered him to church. Aleksandr begged them: 'And for God's sake I ask you to write more warmly to us, from the heart: daddy, you just give lectures which we have learnt by heart since we were children
Evgenia was distressed by Aleksandr's closing remark: 'I've been to the catholic church. Wonderful music' 'Aleksandr, pray properly, you've no business going round catholic churches,' she replied. She sent Aleksandr two roubles and a torrent of complaints for his name day, and begged Aleksandr to apply to the railway millionaire Poliakov for a free ticket, so that she could come and settle Kolia in. She was desperate enough finding money and space in Taganrog, and persuading the two gimnazia to keep Maria, Anton and Vania on, when the fees could not be paid. As soon as her two eldest sons had left, she took on Selivanov's niece Sasha as a paying guest. Anton w;is in the country, too ill to write. Evgenia poured her heart out to Aleksandr: Kolia must be ill, my heart can sense it. We've let the annexe to tenants and we are living like sardines in a can, I'm worn out with running from living room to kitchen and I expect the people in the rooms are finding it very tight… The younger brothers in Taganrog were still full of the joys of their summer holidays: on 16 August 1875 Vania wrote to Aleksandr and Kolia: It was good, I rode a horse yesterday was Mama's birthday and I spent the whole day in the shop and the day before was a dinner at uncle Mitrofan's where our cousins had dinner and there were a lot of priests… I had the first letter from you and took it especially it interested the Kamburovs when I read out that Kolia was crossing himself at every step. I'm well Anton is not very well… By September 1875 the two brothers were living in conditions that Aleksandr recalled as 'a cloaca with fish floating up from beneath the floorboards'. Aleksandr wanted to send Kolia home for Christmas alone. 'I've no reason to go to Taganrog, I find it repulsive now.' Evgenia's sons had done what she had asked them not to: they had
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1E I 111 l-C Ml Mil MAN asked a Jew for help. Kolia described his visit to Rubinstein, a member of the distinguished composer's family, well known for philanthropy to provincial students: 'I already know half Moscow. I've been to see Rubinstein. He is a tiny little yid, about the height of our Misha, he received us rather coolly, he hardly speaks any Russian and so I talked through a Jewish interpreter…' Kolia wanted private pupils. Rubinstein promised to help. Kolia explained to his mother, at great length, that as a stranger in Moscow he had only expenses and no prospects of earnings. Anton still had Kolia's paints in Taganrog. 'I sit alone at home, I'm fed up with sloping around Moscow.' Finally on 4 September he passed a mathematics exam, was enrolled at the Art College and began to draw. Even though he could now only afford half a roll for breakfast and his shoes let in the rain, Kolia's mood swung violently from depression to euphoria. Ivan Loboda brought him a violin from ' I aganrog. Kolia reassured his mother in a tone that must have aroused Anton's envy: a life outside the parental home, independent! And in an independent life you have to keep your ears sharp and your eyes open, because you're dealing not with boys but with mature people… Today I had for dinner: borshch and fried eggs, yesterday I had borshch and chops… Kolia's
