after the regiment, there was much disgrace and degradation in my life, but not moral degradation, because I was the first to hate my actions even then. It was only the degradation of my will and mind, and was caused only by the desperateness of my situation. But that has passed…”
“Oh, now you’re somebody—a financier!”
That is, a hint at the pawnshop. But I had already managed to control myself. I saw that she desired explanations humiliating to me and—I didn’t give them. A client opportunely rang the bell, and I went out to him in the big room. Afterward, an hour later, when she suddenly got dressed to go out, she stopped in front of me and said:
“You told me nothing about it before the wedding, however.”
I did not reply, and she left.
And so, the next day I stood in that room behind the door and listened to how my fate was being decided, and in my pocket there was a revolver. She was dressed up and sitting at the table, and Yefimovich was clowning in front of her. And what then: the outcome was (I say it to my credit), the outcome was just exactly what I anticipated and expected—though without being aware that I was anticipating and expecting it. I don’t know whether I’ve expressed myself clearly.
The outcome was this. I listened for a whole hour, and for a whole hour I was witness to a combat between a most noble and lofty woman and a depraved, dull-witted society creature with a reptilian soul. And where, I thought, amazed, where did she, this naive, this meek, this taciturn woman, get to know all that? The wittiest author of high-society comedies would have been unable to create this scene of mockery, the most naive laughter, and the holy disdain of virtue for vice. And so much brilliance in her words and little phrases; such sharpness in her quick responses, such truth in her condemnation! And at the same time so much of an almost girlish simple- heartedness. She laughed in his face at his declarations of love, at his gestures, at his offers. Having come with crude assault in mind and anticipating no resistance, he suddenly wilted. At first I might have thought it was simply her coquetry here—“the coquetry of a depraved but witty being, to put on a more costly show.” But no, the truth shone like the sun, and it was impossible to doubt it. Only out of hatred toward me, affected and impulsive, could she, so inexperienced, have ventured upon this meeting, but as soon as it came to business—her eyes were opened at once. Here was simply a creature thrashing about, so as to insult me in any way possible, but, having decided upon such filth, she could not bear the disorder. And how could she, so pure and sinless, she, with her ideal, be tempted by Yefimovich or anyone else you like among these high-society creatures? On the contrary, he could only make her laugh. The whole truth rose from her soul, and indignation called up sarcasm from her heart. I repeat, toward the end this buffoon was quite withered and sat scowling and barely responding, so that I began to be afraid he might risk insulting her out of base vengeance. And I repeat again: to my credit, I heard the scene out almost without astonishment. As if I had encountered only what I knew. As if I had gone so as to encounter it. I had gone believing nothing, no accusation, though I did put a revolver in my pocket—that is the truth! And how could I have imagined her different? Why, then, did I love her, why did I esteem her, why had I married her? Oh, of course, I satisfied myself only too well as to how much she hated me then, but I also satisfied myself as to how chaste she was. I stopped the scene suddenly by opening the door. Yefimovich jumped up, I took her by the hand and invited her to leave with me. Yefimovich quickly recovered and suddenly burst into a ringing and rolling guffaw.
“Oh, I won’t oppose the sacred rights of matrimony, take her, take her! And you know,” he shouted after me, “though it’s not possible for a decent man to fight a duel with you, still, out of respect for your lady, I’m at your service… If you’ll risk it, that is…”
“Do you hear!” I stopped her on the threshold for a moment.
After that not a word all the way home. I led her by the hand, and she didn’t resist. On the contrary, she was terribly struck, but only till home. Having come home, she sat down on a chair and fixed her eyes on me. She was extremely pale; though mockery formed on her lips at once, her look was solemnly and severely challenging, and it seemed she was seriously convinced in the first moments that I was going to kill her with the revolver. But I silently took the revolver out of my pocket and put it on the table. She looked at me and at the revolver. (Note this: the revolver was familiar to her. I had had it and kept it loaded ever since I opened the pawnshop. On opening the pawnshop, I had decided not to keep any huge dogs, or a muscular lackey, as Moser, for instance, does. My clients are let in by the cook. But it’s impossible for someone occupied with this trade to go without self-protection, just in case, and so I kept a loaded revolver. In the first days after she entered my house, she got very interested in this revolver, asked questions, and I even explained the mechanism and system to her, and besides that, persuaded her once to shoot at a target. Note all that.) Paying no attention to her frightened look, I lay down half undressed on the bed. I was completely worn out; it was already nearly eleven o’clock. She went on sitting in the same place, without stirring, for about an hour longer, then put out the candle and lay down, also dressed, by the wall, on the sofa. The first time she didn’t lie down with me—note that as well…
VI
A TERRIBLE MEMORY
Now, this terrible memory …
I woke up in the morning, between seven and eight, I think, and it was already almost completely light in the room. I woke up all at once with full consciousness and suddenly opened my eyes. She was standing by the table holding the revolver in her hand. She didn’t see that I was awake and watching. And suddenly I see her start moving toward me with the revolver in her hand. I quickly closed my eyes and pretended to be fast asleep.
She came to the bed and stood over me. I heard everything; and though a dead silence fell, I heard that silence. Here a convulsive movement occurred—and suddenly, irresistibly, against my will, I opened my eyes. She was looking at me, right into my eyes, and the revolver was already at my temple. Our eyes met. But we looked at each other for no more than a moment. I forcibly closed my eyes again, and at the same moment decided with all my strength of soul that I would not stir or open my eyes again, no matter what lay ahead of me.
In fact, it does happen that a deeply sleeping man suddenly opens his eyes, even raises his head for a second and looks around the room, and then, after a moment, unconsciously lays his head back on the pillow and falls asleep, remembering nothing.
When I, having met her gaze and felt the revolver at my temple, suddenly closed my eyes again and did not stir, like a man fast asleep—she decidedly could have supposed that I was in fact sleeping and had seen nothing, the more so as it was quite incredible for someone, after seeing what I had seen, to close his eyes again at
Yes, incredible. But even so she might have guessed the truth—it was this that suddenly flashed through my mind, still in that same moment. Oh, what a whirlwind of thoughts and feelings swept through my mind in less than a moment, and long live the electricity of human thought! In that case (so I felt), if she had guessed the truth and knew I was not asleep, then I had already crushed her by my readiness to accept death, and her hand might now falter. The former resolution might be dashed against the new extraordinary impression. They say that people standing on a high place are as if drawn down of themselves into the abyss. I think many suicides and murders have been committed only because the revolver has already been taken in hand. Here, too, is an abyss; here, too, is a forty-five-degree slope, down which you cannot help sliding, and something invincibly challenges you to pull the trigger. But the awareness that I had seen everything, knew everything, and was silently awaiting death from her —might keep her from the slope.
