The Eternal Husband and Other Stories

“Well, you know, Your Excellency, considering there’s a new order here.”

“What sort of new order?”

“But we’ve died, so to speak, Your Excellency.”

“Ah, yes! Well, there’s still order…”

Well, thank you very much! Some comfort, really! If it’s come to that here, what can we expect on the upper floor? But, anyhow, what antics! I went on listening, however, though with boundless indignation.

“No, I could live a little! No… you know, I… could live a little!” suddenly came someone’s new voice, from somewhere in between the general and the irritable lady.

“Listen, Your Excellency, our man’s at it again. For three days he’s silent as can be, then suddenly: ‘I could live a little, no, I could live a little!’ And with, you know, such appetite, hee, hee!”

“And such light-mindedness.”

“It’s getting to him, Your Excellency, and, you know, he falls asleep, he’s fast asleep already, he’s been here since April, and suddenly: ‘I could live a little!’ ”

“A bit boring, though,” His Excellency observed.

“A bit boring, Your Excellency, maybe we’ll tease Avdotya Ignatievna again, hee, hee?”

“Ah, no, I beg you, spare me that. I can’t stand that insolent loudmouth.”

“And I, on the other hand, can stand neither of you,” the loudmouth squeamishly retorted. “You’re both utterly boring and cannot talk about anything ideal. And as for you, Your Excellency—you needn’t swagger so—I know a little story of how a lackey swept you from under some marital bed one morning with a broom.”

“Nasty woman!” the general growled through his teeth.

“Avdotya Ignatievna, dearie,” the shopkeeper suddenly cried out again, “my dear lady, meaning no harm, tell me what it is, am I visiting the torments,⁸ or is something else happening?…”

“Ah, he’s at it again, I just knew it, because I get this smell from him, this smell, it’s from him tossing around there.”

“I don’t toss around, dearie, and there’s no special smell from me, because I preserved myself in the wholeness of my body, and it’s you, dear lady, who’s a bit gone off—because the smell really is unbearable, even considering the place. I don’t say anything only out of politeness.”

“Ah, nasty offender! Such a stink coming from him, and he shifts it onto me.”

“Oh, woe, woe, woe! If only the fortieth day⁹ would come sooner: to hear the tearful voices above me, the wailing of my spouse and the quiet weeping of my children!…”

“Well, look what he’s weeping about: they’ll stuff their faces with kutya¹⁰ and leave. Ah, if only someone would wake up!”

“Avdotya Ignatievna,” the fawning official spoke. “Wait a bit, the new ones will speak.”

“And are any of them young?”

“There are young ones, Avdotya Ignatievna. Adolescents, even.”

“Ah, that would be most welcome!”

“And what, they haven’t started yet?” His Excellency inquired.

“Even the ones from two days ago haven’t come to yet, Your Excellency, you know yourself they’re sometimes silent for a whole week. It’s a good thing so many suddenly got brought all at once yesterday, and the day before, and today. Otherwise, for a hundred feet around, they’re all from last year.”

“Yes, interesting.”

“Look, Your Excellency, today they buried the actual privy councillor Tarasevich, I could tell from the voices. His nephew is an acquaintance of mine, he was lowering the coffin just now.”

“Hm, is he here somewhere?”

“About five steps away from you, Your Excellency, to the left. Almost at your feet, sir… You ought to get acquainted, Your Excellency.”

“Hm, no… I can’t be the first.”

“But he’ll start it himself, Your Excellency. He’ll even be flattered, leave it to me, Your Excellency, and I…”

“Ah, ah… ah, what’s happened to me?” someone’s frightened, new little voice suddenly groaned.

“A new one, Your Excellency, a new one, thank God, and so soon! Other times they’re silent for a whole week.”

“Ah, I think it’s a young man!” squealed Avdotya Ignatievna.

“I… I… from complications, and so suddenly!” the young man prattled again. “Just the day before, Schulz says to me: you have complications, he says, and in the morning all at once I up and died. Ah! Ah!”

“Well, no help for it, young man,” the general observed benignly, obviously glad of the newcomer, “you must take comfort! Welcome to our, so to speak, valley of Jehoshaphat.¹¹ We’re kindly folk, you’ll come to know and appreciate us. Major General Vassily Vassiliev Pervoedov, at your service.”

“Ah, no! No, no, not to me! I went to Schulz; I had complications, you know, it got my chest first and I coughed, and then I caught cold: chest and grippe… and then suddenly, quite unexpectedly… above all, quite unexpectedly.”

“You say it was the chest first,” the official softly intervened, as if wishing to encourage the newcomer.