Short Fiction

right to judge others like that! We must each remember our own faults. Peasant Yes, that’s right enough. Long pause. The Peasant shakes his head, and smiles. What it comes to is this: that if we all were to tackle it at once, the land would be ours at one go, and there would be no more taxes. Traveller No, friend, that’s not what I mean. I don’t mean that if we live according to God’s will, the land will be ours, and there will be no more taxes. I mean that our life is evil, only because we ourselves do evil. If one lived according to God’s will, life would not be evil. What our life would be like if we lived according to God’s will, God alone knows; but certainly life would not be evil. We drink, scold, fight, go to law, envy, and hate men; we do not accept God’s Law; we judge others; call one fat-paunched and another long-maned; but if anyone offers us money, we are ready to do anything for it: go as watchmen, policemen, or soldiers, to help ruin others, and to kill our own brothers. We ourselves live like devils, and yet we complain of others! Peasant That’s so! But it is hard, oh, how hard! Sometimes it’s more than one can bear. Traveller But, for our souls’ sakes, we must bear it. Peasant That’s quite right.⁠ ⁠… We live badly, because we forget God. Traveller Yes, that’s it! That’s why life is evil. Take the Revolutionaries; they say: “Let’s kill this or that squire, or these fat-paunched rich folk (it’s all because of them); and then our life will be happy.” So they kill, and go on killing, and it profits them nothing. It’s the same with the authorities: “Give us time!” they say, “and we’ll hang, and do to death in the prisons, a thousand or a couple of thousand people, and then life will become good.⁠ ⁠…” But it only gets worse and worse! Peasant Yes, that’s just it! How can judging and punishing do any good? It must be done according to God’s Law. Traveller Yes, that is just it. You must serve either God or the devil. If it’s to be the devil, go and drink, scold, fight, hate, covet, don’t obey God’s Law, but man’s laws, and life will be evil. If it is God, obey Him alone. Don’t rob or kill, and don’t even condemn, and do not hate anyone. Do not plunge into evil actions, and then there will be no evil life. Peasant Sighs. You speak well, daddy, very well⁠—only we are taught so little! Oh, if we were taught more like that, things would be quite different! But people come from the town, and chatter about their way of bettering things: they chatter fine, but there’s nothing in it.⁠ ⁠… Thank you, daddy, your words are good!⁠ ⁠… Well, where will you sleep? On the oven, yes?⁠ ⁠… The missis will make up a bed for you.

A Talk with a Wayfarer

I have come out early. My soul feels light and joyful. It is a wonderful morning. The sun is only just appearing from behind the trees. The dew glitters on them and on the grass. Everything is lovely; everyone is lovable. It is so beautiful that, as the saying has it, “One does not want to die.” And, really, I do not want to die. I would willingly live a little longer in this world with such beauty around me and such joy in my heart. That, however, is not my affair, but the Master’s.⁠ ⁠…

I approach the village. Before the first house I see a man standing, motionless, sideways to me. He is evidently waiting for somebody or something, and waiting as only working people know how to wait, without impatience or vexation. I draw nearer: he is a bearded, strong, healthy peasant, with shaggy, slightly grey hair, and a simple, worker’s face. He is smoking not a “cigar” twisted out of paper, but a short pipe. We greet one another.

“Where does old Alexéy live?” I ask.

“I don’t know, friend; we are strangers here.”

Not “I am a stranger,” but “we are strangers.” A Russian is hardly ever alone. If he is doing something wrong, he may perhaps say “I”; otherwise it is always “we” the family, “we” the artél, “we” the Commune.

“Strangers? Where do you come from?”

“We are from Kaloúga.”

I point to his pipe. “And how much do you spend a year on smoking? Three or more roubles, I daresay!”

“Three? That would hardly be enough.”

“Why not give it up?”

“How can one give it up when one’s accustomed to it?”

“I also used to smoke, but have given it up⁠ ⁠… and I feel so well⁠—so free!”

“Well of course⁠ ⁠… but it’s dull without it.”

“Give it up, and the dullness will go! Smoking is no good, you know!”

“No good at all.”

“If it’s no good, you should not do it. Seeing you smoke, others will do the same⁠ ⁠… especially the young folk. They’ll say, ‘If the old folk smoke, God himself bids us do it!’ ”

“That’s true enough.”

“And your son, seeing you smoke, will do it too.”

“Of course, my son too.⁠ ⁠…”

“Well then, give it up!”

“I would, only it’s so dull without it.⁠ ⁠… It’s chiefly from dullness. When one feels dull, one has a smoke. That’s where the mischief lies.⁠ ⁠… It’s dull! At times it’s so dull⁠ ⁠… so dull⁠ ⁠… so dull!” drawled he.

“The best remedy for that is to think of one’s soul.”

He threw a glance at me, and at once the expression of his face quite changed: instead of his former kindly, humorous, lively and talkative expression, he became attentive and serious.

“ ‘Think of the soul⁠ ⁠… of the soul,’ you say?” he asked, gazing questioningly into my eyes.

“Yes! When you think of the soul, you give up all foolish things.”

His face lit up affectionately.

“You are right, daddy! You say truly. To think of the soul is the great thing. The soul’s the chief thing.⁠ ⁠…” He paused. “Thank you, daddy, it is quite true”;