publication as a book was to come afterwards.) Despite its understated quality, it earned Chekhov esteem: he was now a conscience for the nation, like Tolstoy.
The desire to revisit Petersburg receded - Anton was not to go there for nearly two years. Suvorin was abroad, talking to novelists lie published in Russia: Zola and Daudet. Aleksandr, after being so outspoken, was ignored. After Potapenko, Anton was seeking new confidants and setting aside old friends. He was apparently unmoved when the poet Pleshcheev died of a stroke in Paris. Some of the women who loved Anton recognized a change, and stood back: in autumn 1893 Olga Kundasova wrote: (2 5 September) I don't think it's bad for you to be in solitude. (17 November) I want, and I don't want, to visit you. One lives mostly on illusions and feels even worse when they scatter. Devoted to you with all my soul, Kund. Both Olga Kundasova and Suvorin recognized that they had in common not only a love for Anton, but symptoms of mental illness, manic depression. Kundasova sought treatment, while Suvorin sought distraction. Despite their diametrically opposed political views, Kundasova and Suvorin had respect, even affection, for each other and, for the next decade, gave each other support. Suvorin's support was
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monetary, which Olga ne;irly choked on. 'Don't think that I am charmed by the prospects of free provision at others' expense.'™
Another woman also withdrew from Anton on 16 October 1893: 'I feel I shall write a lot of various stupid things today, so - farewell! With far more than respect, Aleksandra Pokhlebina.'
Once autumn came, Lika visited less often. A more varied social life, as well as teaching in the Rzhevskaia School, kept her in Moscow. Acolytes also retreated. Bilibin, Shcheglov and Gruzinsky all felt neglected. Ezhov was becoming demented: 'Critics have started leaping from behind gates, biting my trousers… I've become a complete swine and write to you like a drunken peasant.'35 All editors slammed their doors in Ezhov's face after he offered Amusement a sketch called 'The Sad Boy'. Two women ask a street urchin where he lives: ' 'In a cunt,' replied the rude boy and went his way.'
Grim news came from Petersburg. On 25 October Tchaikovsky died, apparently of cholera. Suvorin, who recorded every scrap of gossip, had noted Tchaikovsky living as man and 'wife' with the poet Apukhtin, but heard not a whisper about suicide or homosexual scandal. All Russia felt bereaved and blamed, if anyone, Dr Bertenson who failed to save the composer. Anton took Tchaikovsky's death as calmly as Pleshcheev's. On the same day he heard from Aleksandr of his own demise: You, my friend, are dangerously ill witfr consumption and will soon die. Rest in peace! Today Leikin came to our office with tbis sad newsith tbi? he shed bitter tears while he spoke, claiming that you had confided to him alone in the world the tale of your so early extinction from an incurable ailment. Aleksandr warned Anton that if he didn't die soon, he would be accused of publicity-seeking.
Anton leapt into action as if to scotch the rumours and to live to the full. On 27 October 1893 he broke free to Moscow and stayed until 7 November. On 25 November he was back in Moscow for four weeks, ostensibly to read the proofs of Sakhalin. In Moscow Anton had a new nickname, 'Happy Avelan'. In France the Russian Admiral Avelan was received with Bacchic hospitality, to celebrate the new Franco-Russian alliance. Anton, like Admiral Avelan, began to relish wine, acclaim and beautiful women. Lika's happiness was soon underOCTOBER-DECEMBER 1893 mined by the knowledge that she was now one of several women in Anton's life.
Anton-Avelan's 'squadron' included Potapenko, Sergeenko, the Miperman-reporter Uncle Giliai (Giliarovsky) and the wheezing editor of The Performing Artist, Kumanin (whose life the squadron's expeditions shortened). They haunted the Loskutnaia, Louvre and Madrid hotels. They were entertained by Lika and her friend, the budding opera singer, Varia Eberle. Two women from Kiev also joined them.
()ne was Tania Shchepkina-Kupernik. Nineteen years old, less than live foot tall, the daughter of a rake, the lawyer Kupernik, she had the blood of Russia's great actor Shchepkin in her veins. She was.ilready famed as a verse translator from French and English: she singled out plays with a strong female role - Sappho, The Taming of the Shrew, The Distant Princess. She was a Sapphic love poet. Misha (ihekhov already knew her; now she moved into Anton's life. Tania charmed men, too, and Anton would value her above any other woman writer. She was called 'topsy-turvy' (kuvyrkom sounded like Kupernik) for her impetuosity.
Tania lived in the Hotel Madrid, which was linked to the Hotel Louvre through corridors (known as the 'catacombs' or 'Pyrenees'). In the Hotel Louvre lived the love of Tania's life, also from Kiev, the twenty-three-year- old actress Lidia lavorskaia. Their love affair began as loudly as it ended: Tania had come to deny that she had slandered I ?Ia in Kiev. For 1893 anc^ J^94» Lidia's heart was Tania's, although she devoted the rest of her person to her manager, Korsh (of the Korsh theatre), to a lover in the Customs Department, to Anton Chekhov and, perhaps, to Ignati Potapenko. Like Tania, lavorskaia was a vivacious polyglot. Her background was darker. Her father, I lubbenett, of Huguenot origin, was Chief of Police in Kiev and, like her, promiscuous, self-important, vindictive, yet generous. Hubbenett helped lavorskaia literally to force herself on stage. Sensuality made up for shallowness. In Moscow she hypnotized Korsh into hiring her as La Dame aux camelias. Lidia lavorskaia stormed through Anton's life: she aroused both lust and disgust in him. The 'sirens of the Louvre', however, romped with Isaak Levitan, who called them his 'little girls', and Anton found this off-putting. Avelan's expeditions to theatres, restaurants and long sessions in
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hotel rooms were fuelled by the passion between Tania and Lidia Iavorskaia. Iavorskaia destroyed Tania's letters; Tania kept everything. Bits of paper and card, in Russian and French, in prose and verse, show Lidia responding to the poetess's affection: let's go… I await you. I kiss you as strongly as I love you. Lidia… Cette nuit d'Athenes etait belle. Le beau est inoubliable. Cher poete, si vous saviez quel mal de tete… J'attends le vice supreme et je vous envoie votre dot. Ma petite Sappho. Venez immediatement, urgent..? Anton saw Lidia act Napoleon's mistress Katrina Hubsche in Sar-dou's Madame Sans-Gine. He raved to Suvorin on n November 1893: I spent two weeks in intoxication. Beca use my life in Moscow has been nothing but feasts and new friendships, they call me Avelan to tease me. Never before have I felt so free. Firsdy, I have no flat -I can live where I want, secondly, I still haven't got my passport and… girls, girls, girls… Recently frivolity has taken me over and I feel drawn to people as never before, and literature has become my Abishag [King David's comforter] In the same letter Anton asserted that all thinkers are impotent by forty: sexual potency, he implied, was for savages, even though he hoped, in Apuleius' phrase, to go on 'drawing his bow'.
Both Tania and Lidia did their best. After he left on 7 November Tania sent him a poem (drafted on the back of one of Lidia's love-letters to her): All, all our dreams see Avelan All that we see recalls this man, Through the rosy mist he looms And quietly sails into our rooms.37 Tania wrote her Avelan notes on Lidia's behalf as her own. One sent to room No. 54 at the end of November runs: 'Perhaps you will honour with your presence the modest room No. 8. And I shan't say how happy the hostess will be. Tatiana K.' Iavorskaia set her sights on Anton and frightened Lika. Lika enjoyed the party, and even added her phrases to joint messages to Anton, but, embarrassed, humiliated, even shocked, she now wanted out. Anton had that summer claimed
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he was too old to be a lover; now she saw him in thrall to the 'sirens of the Louvre'. On 2 November she fired across his bows: I also know your attitude - either condescending pity or complete neglect… don't invite me to your place - don't meet me! - that's not so important for you, but it may help me to forget you. I cannot leave earlier than December or January - otherwise I would go now… Two days later, when Anton was back in Melikhovo, Lika wrote: I got to bed at 8 a.m. Mme Iavorskaia was wim us, she said that Chekhov is a charmer and that she definitely intended to marry him, she asked me to help and I promised to do everytbing for your mutual happiness. You are so nice and accessible that I thought I wouldn't find it hard. I ddia met Anton at Masha's empty flat (Masha was in Melikhovo). In spring 1894 she recalled the talk they had one November night: I was fleeing a man who was harassing me and I tlirew myself on your hospitality… You kept asking me 'what was I after?' When revulsion and pity for die man battled inside me, you, an artist, as a psychologist, as a human being, told me about a person's right to dispose of their affections, to love or not to love, freely submitting to inner feeling.'8 Lidia Iavorskaia extracted a promise of a play for her, to be called Daydreams.
The sirens had made Anton forget Suvorin. He wrote on 28 November: 'For mysterious reasons I shall not stay with you but in the Hotel Russia on the Moika.' Suvorin was badly upset. A draft of his reply runs: 30 November
