Tales of Chekhov 11- The Schoolmaster and other stories

I took all the tricks, playing no trumps. . . . Yes, indeed. . . .

Olga Andreyevna was so exasperated that her false tooth fell out

of her mouth.'

But at last the 'Eternal Memory' is sung. Gelikonsky respectfully takes away the candles, and the memorial service is over. Thereupon there follows a momentary commotion; there is a changing of vestments and a thanksgiving service. After the thanksgiving, while Father Yevmeny is disrobing, the visitors rub their hands and cough, while their hostess tells some anecdote of the good-heartedness of the deceased Trifon Lvovitch.

'Pray come to lunch, friends,' she says, concluding her story with a sigh.

The visitors, trying not to push or tread on each other's feet, hasten into the dining-room. . . . There the luncheon is awaiting them. The repast is so magnificent that the deacon Konkordiev thinks it his duty every year to fling up his hands as he looks at it and, shaking his head in amazement, say:

'Supernatural! It's not so much like human fare, Father Yevmeny, as offerings to the gods.'

The lunch is certainly exceptional. Everything that the flora and fauna of the country can furnish is on the table, but the only thing supernatural about it, perhaps, is that on the table there is everything except . . . alcoholic beverages. Lyubov Petrovna has taken a vow never to have in her house cards or spirituous liquors —the two sources of her husband's ruin. And the only bottles contain oil and vinegar, as though in mockery and chastisement of the guests who are to a man desperately fond of the bottle, and given to tippling.

'Please help yourselves, gentlemen!' the marshal's widow presses them. 'Only you must excuse me, I have no vodka. . . . I have none in the house.'

The guests approach the table and hesitatingly attack the pie. But the progress with eating is slow. In the plying of forks, in the cutting up and munching, there is a certain sloth and apathy. . . . Evidently something is wanting.

'I feel as though I had lost something,' one of the justices of the peace whispers to the other. 'I feel as I did when my wife ran away with the engineer. . . . I can't eat.'

Marfutkin, before beginning to eat, fumbles for a long time in his pocket and looks for his handkerchief.

'Oh, my handkerchief must be in my greatcoat,' he recalls in a loud voice, 'and here I am looking for it,' and he goes into the vestibule where the fur coats are hanging up.

He returns from the vestibule with glistening eyes, and at once attacks the pie with relish.

'I say, it's horrid munching away with a dry mouth, isn't it?' he whispers to Father Yevmeny. 'Go into the vestibule, Father. There's a bottle there in my fur coat. . . . Only mind you are careful; don't make a clatter with the bottle.'

Father Yevmeny recollects that he has some direction to give to

Luka, and trips off to the vestibule.

'Father, a couple of words in confidence,' says Dvornyagin, overtaking him.

'You should see the fur coat I've bought myself, gentlemen,' Hrumov boasts. 'It's worth a thousand, and I gave . . . you won't believe it . . . two hundred and fifty! Not a farthing more.'

At any other time the guests would have greeted this information with indifference, but now they display surprise and incredulity. In the end they all troop out into the vestibule to look at the fur coat, and go on looking at it till the doctor's man Mikeshka carries five empty bottles out on the sly. When the steamed sturgeon is served, Marfutkin remembers that he has left his cigar case in his sledge and goes to the stable. That he may not be lonely on this expedition, he takes with him the deacon, who appropriately feels it necessary to have a look at his horse. . . .

On the evening of the same day, Lyubov Petrovna is sitting in her study, writing a letter to an old friend in Petersburg:

'To-day, as in past years,' she writes among other things, 'I had a memorial service for my dear husband. All my neighbours came to the service. They are a simple, rough set, but what hearts! I gave them a splendid lunch, but of course, as in previous years, without a drop of alcoholic liquor. Ever since he died from excessive drinking I have vowed to establish temperance in this district and thereby to expiate his sins. I have begun the campaign for temperance at my own house. Father Yevmeny is delighted with my efforts, and helps me both in word and deed. Oh, ma chere, if you knew how fond my bears are of me! The president of the Zemstvo, Marfutkin, kissed my hand after lunch, held it a long while to his lips, and, wagging his head in an absurd way, burst into tears: so much feeling but no words! Father Yevmeny, that delightful little old man, sat down by me, and looking tearfully at me kept babbling something like a child. I did not understand what he said, but I know how to understand true feeling. The police captain, the handsome man of whom I wrote to you, went down on his knees to me, tried to read me some verses of his own composition (he is a poet), but . . . his feelings were too much for him, he lurched and fell over . . . that huge giant went into hysterics, you can imagine my delight! The day did not pass without a hitch, however. Poor Alalykin, the president of the judges' assembly, a stout and apoplectic man, was overcome by illness and lay on the sofa in a state of unconsciousness for two hours. We had to pour water on him. . . . I am thankful to Doctor Dvornyagin: he had brought a bottle of brandy from his dispensary and he moistened the patient's temples, which quickly revived him, and he was able to be moved. . . .'

A BAD BUSINESS

'WHO goes there?'

No answer. The watchman sees nothing, but through the roar of the wind and the trees distinctly hears someone walking along the avenue ahead of him. A March night, cloudy and foggy, envelopes the earth, and it seems to the watchman that the earth, the sky, and he himself with his thoughts are all merged together into something vast and impenetrably black. He can only grope his way.

'Who goes there?' the watchman repeats, and he begins to fancy that he hears whispering and smothered laughter. 'Who's there?'

'It's I, friend . . .' answers an old man's voice.

'But who are you?'

'I . . . a traveller.'

'What sort of traveller?' the watchman cries angrily, trying to disguise his terror by shouting. 'What the devil do you want here? You go prowling about the graveyard at night, you ruffian!'

'You don't say it's a graveyard here?'

'Why, what else? Of course it's the graveyard! Don't you see it is?'

'O-o-oh . . . Queen of Heaven!' there is a sound of an old man sighing. 'I see nothing, my good soul, nothing. Oh the darkness, the darkness! You can't see your hand before your face, it is dark, friend. O-o-oh. . .'

'But who are you?'

'I am a pilgrim, friend, a wandering man.'

'The devils, the nightbirds. . . . Nice sort of pilgrims! They are drunkards . . .' mutters the watchman, reassured by the tone and sighs of the stranger. 'One's tempted to sin by you. They drink the day away and prowl about at night. But I fancy I heard you were not alone; it sounded like two or three of you.'

'I am alone, friend, alone. Quite alone. O-o-oh our sins. . . .'

The watchman stumbles up against the man and stops.

'How did you get here?' he asks.

'I have lost my way, good man. I was walking to the Mitrievsky Mill and I lost my way.'

'Whew! Is this the road to Mitrievsky Mill? You sheepshead! For the Mitrievsky Mill you must keep much more to the left, straight out of the town along the high road. You have been drinking and have gone a couple of miles out of your way. You must have had a drop in the town.'

'I did, friend . . . Truly I did; I won't hide my sins. But how am

I to go now?'