by Maxim Gorky
Foma spoke, interrupting his speech with loud, malevolent laughter, and saw that his words were producing an impression on these people. Before, when he had spoken to all of them they turned away from him, stepping aside, forming groups, and looking at their accuser from afar with anger and contempt. He saw smiles on their faces, he felt in their every movement something scornful, and understood that while his words angered them they did not sting as deep as he wished them to. All this had chilled his wrath, and within him there was already arising the bitter consciousness of the failure of his attack on them. But as soon as he began to speak of each one separately, there was a swift and striking change in the relation of his hearers toward him.
When Kononov sank heavily in the chair, as though he were unable to withstand the weight of Foma’s harsh words, Foma noticed that bitter and malicious smiles crossed the faces of some of the merchants. He heard some one’s whisper of astonishment and approval:
“That’s well aimed!”
This whisper gave strength to Foma, and he confidently and passionately began to hurl reproaches, jeers and abuses at those who met his eyes. He growled joyously, seeing that his words were taking effect. He was listened to silently, attentively; several men moved closer toward him.
Exclamations of protest were heard, but these were brief, not loud, and each time Foma shouted some one’s name, all became silent, listening, casting furtive, malicious glances in the direction of their accused comrade.
Bobrov laughed perplexedly, but his small eyes bored into Foma as gimlets. And Lup Reznikov, waving his hands, hopped about awkwardly and, short of breath, said:
“Be my witnesses. What’s this! No-o! I will not forgive this! I’ll go to court. What’s that?” and suddenly he screamed in a shrill voice, out-stretching his hand toward Foma:
“Bind him!”
Foma was laughing.
“You cannot bind the truth, you can’t do it! Even bound, truth will not grow dumb!”
“Go-o-od!” drawled out Kononov in a dull, broken voice.
“See here, gentlemen of the merchant class!” rang out Mayakin’s voice. “I ask! you to admire him, that’s the kind of a fellow he is!”
One after another the merchants moved toward Foma, and on their faces he saw wrath, curiosity, a malicious feeling of satisfaction, fear. Some one of those modest people among whom Foma was sitting, whispered to him:
“Give it to them. God bless you. Go ahead! That will be to your credit.”
“Robustov!” cried Foma. “What are you laughing at? What makes you glad? You will also go to the galleys.”
“Put him ashore!” suddenly roared Robustov, springing to his feet.
And Kononov shouted to the captain:
“Back! To the town! To the Governor.”
And someone insinuatingly, in a voice trembling with feeling:
“That’s a collusive agreement. That was done on purpose. He was instigated, and made drunk to give him courage.”
“No, it’s a revolt!”
“Bind him! Just bind him!”
Foma grasped a champagne bottle and swung it in the air.
“Come on now! No, it seems that you will have to listen to me.”
With renewed fury, frantic with joy at seeing these people shrinking and quailing under the blows of his words, Foma again started to shout names and vulgar oaths, and the exasperated tumult was hushed once more. The men, whom Foma did not know, gazed at him with eager curiosity, with approval, while some looked at him even with joyous surprise. One of them, a gray-haired little old man with rosy cheeks and small mouse eyes, suddenly turned toward the merchants, who had been abused by Foma, and said in a sweet voice:
“These are words from the conscience! That’s nothing! You must endure it. That’s a prophetic accusation. We are sinful. To tell the truth we are very—”
He was hissed, and Zubov even jostled him on the shoulder. He made a low bow and disappeared in the crowd.
“Zubov!” cried Foma. “How many people have you fleeced and turned to beggars? Do you ever dream of Ivan Petrov Myakinnikov, who strangled himself because of you? Is it true that you steal at every mass ten roubles out of the church box?”
Zubov had not expected the attack, and he remained as petrified, with his hand uplifted. But he immediately began to scream in a shrill voice, as he jumped up quickly:
“Ah! You turn against me also? Against me, too?”
And suddenly he puffed up his cheeks and furiously began to shake his fist at Foma, as he screamed in a shrill voice:
“The fool says in his heart there is no God! I’ll go to the bishop! Infidel! You’ll get the galleys!”
The tumult on the steamer grew, and at the sight of these enraged, perplexed and insulted people, Foma felt himself a fairy-tale giant, slaying monsters. They bustled about, waving their arms, talking to one another—some red with anger, others pale, yet all equally powerless to check the flow of his jeers at them.
“Send the sailors over here!” cried Reznikov, tugging Kononov by the shoulder. “What’s the matter with you, Ilya? Ah? Have you invited us to be ridiculed?”
“Against one puppy,” screamed Zubov.
A crowd had gathered around Yakov Tarasovitch Mayakin, and listened to his quiet speech with anger, and nodded their heads affirmatively.
“Act, Yakov!” said Robustov, loudly. “We are all witnesses. Go ahead!”
And above the general tumult of voices rang out Foma’s loud, accusing voice:
“It was not life that you have built—you have made a cesspool! You have bred filth and putrefaction by your deeds! Have you a conscience? Do you remember God? Money—that’s your God! And your conscience you have driven away. Whither have you driven it away? Blood-suckers! You live on the strength of others. You work with other people’s hands! You shall pay for all this! When you perish, you will be called to account for everything! For everything, even to a teardrop. How many people have wept blood at those great deeds of yours? And according to your deserts, even hell is too good a place for you, rascals. Not in fire, but in boiling mud you shall be scorched. Your sufferings shall last for centuries. The devils will hurl you into a boiler and will pour into it—ha, ha, ha! they’ll pour into it—ha, ha, ha! Honourable merchant class! Builders of Life. Oh, you devils!”
Foma burst into ringing laughter, and, holding his sides, staggered, tossing his head up high.
At that moment several men quickly exchanged glances, simultaneously rushed on Foma and downed him with their weight. A racket ensued.
“Now you’re caught!” ejaculated some one in a suffocating voice.
“Ah! Is that the way you’re doing it?” cried Foma, hoarsely.
For about a half a minute a whole heap of black bodies bustled about on one spot, heavily stamping their feet, and dull exclamations were heard:
“Throw him to the ground!”
“Hold his hand, his hand! Oh!”
“By the beard?”
“Get napkins, bind him with napkins.”
“You’ll bite, will you?”
“So! Well, how’s it? Aha!”
“Don’t strike! Don’t dare to strike.”
“Ready!”
“How strong he is!”
“Let’s carry him over there toward the side.”
“Out in the fresh air, ha, ha!”
They dragged Foma away to one side, and having placed him against the wall of the captain’s cabin, walked away from him, adjusting their costumes, and mopping their sweat-covered brows. Fatigued by the struggle, and exhausted by the disgrace of his defeat, Foma lay there in silence, tattered, soiled with something, firmly bound, hand and foot, with napkins and towels. With round, blood-shot eyes he gazed at the sky; they were dull and lustreless, as those of an idiot, and his chest heaved unevenly and with difficulty.
Now cam
e their turn to mock him. Zubov began. He walked up to him, kicked him in the side and asked in a soft voice, all trembling with the pleasure of revenge:
“Well, thunder-like prophet, how is it? Now you can taste the sweetness of Babylonian captivity, he, he, he!”
“Wait,” said Foma, hoarsely, without looking at him. “Wait until I’m rested. You have not tied up my tongue.”
But saying this, Foma understood that he could no longer do anything, nor say anything. And that not because they had bound him, but because something had burned out within him, and his soul had become dark and empty.
Zubov was soon joined by Reznikov. Then one after another the others began to draw near. Bobrov, Kononov and several others preceded by Yakov Mayakin went to the cabin, anxiously discussing something in low tones.
The steamer was sailing toward the town at full speed. The bottles on the tables trembled and rattled from the vibration of the steamer, and Foma heard this jarring, plaintive sound above everything else. Near him stood a throng of people, saying malicious, offensive things.
But Foma saw them as though through a fog, and their words did not touch him to the quick. A vast, bitter feeling was now springing up within him, from the depth of his soul; he followed its growth and though he did not yet understand it, he already experienced something melancholy and degrading.
“Just think, you charlatan! What have you done to yourself?” said Reznikov. “What sort of a life is now possible to you? Do you know that now no one of us would care even as much as to spit on you?”
“What have I done?” Foma tried to understand. The merchants stood around him in a dense, dark mass.
“Well,” said Yashchurov, “now, Fomka, your work is done.”
“Wait, we’ll see,” bellowed Zubov in a low voice.
“Let me free!” said Foma.
“Well, no! we thank you humbly!”
“Untie me.”
“It’s all right! You can lie that way as well.”
“Call up my godfather.”
But Yakov Tarasovich came up at this moment. He came up, stopped near Foma, sternly surveyed with his eyes the outstretched figure of his godson, and heaved a deep sigh.
“Well, Foma,” he began.
“Order them to unbind me,” entreated Foma, softly, in a mournful voice.
“So you can be turbulent again? No, no, you’d better lie this way,” his godfather replied.
“I won’t say another word. I swear it by God! Unbind me. I am ashamed! For Christ’s sake. You see I am not drunk. Well, you needn’t untie my hands.”
“You swear that you’ll not be troublesome?” asked Mayakin.
“Oh Lord! I will not, I will not,” moaned Foma.
They untied his feet, but left his hands bound. When he rose, he looked at them all, and said softly with a pitiful smile:
“You won.”
“We always shall!” replied his godfather, smiling sternly.
Foma bent, with his hands tied behind his back, advanced toward the table silently, without lifting his eyes to anyone. He seemed shorter in stature and thinner. His dishevelled hair fell on his forehead and temples; the torn and crumpled bosom of his shirt protruding from under his vest, and the collar covered his lips. He turned his head to push the collar down under his chin, and was unable to do it. Then the gray-headed little old man walked up to him, adjusted what was necessary, looked into his eyes with a smile and said:
“You must endure it.”
Now, in Mayakin’s presence, those who had mocked Foma were silent, looking at the old man questioningly, with curiosity and expectancy. He was calm but his eyes gleamed in a way not at all becoming to the occasion, contentedly and brightly.
“Give me some vodka,” begged Foma, seating himself at the table, and leaning his chest against its edge. His bent figure look piteous and helpless. Around they were talking in whispers, passing this way and that cautiously. And everyone looked now at him, now at Mayakin, who had seated himself opposite him. The old man did not give Foma the vodka at once. First he surveyed him fixedly, then he slowly poured out a wine glassful, and finally, without saying a word, raised it to Foma’s lips. Foma drank the vodka, and asked:
“Some more!”
“That’s enough!” replied Mayakin.
And immediately after this there fell a minute of perfect, painful silence. People were coming up to the table noiselessly, on tiptoe, and when they were near they stretched their necks to see Foma.
“Well, Fomka, do you understand now what you have done?” asked Mayakin. He spoke softly, but all heard his question.
Foma nodded his head and maintained silence.
“There’s no forgiveness for you!” Mayakin went on firmly, and raising his voice. “Though we are all Christians, yet you will receive no forgiveness at our hands. Just know this.”
Foma lifted his head and said pensively:
“I have quite forgotten about you, godfather. You have not heard anything from me.”
“There you have it!” exclaimed Mayakin, bitterly, pointing at his godson. “You see?”
A dull grumble of protest burst forth.
“Well, it’s all the same!” resumed Foma with a sigh. “It’s all the same! Nothing—no good came out of it anyway.”
And again he bent over the table.
“What did you want?” asked Mayakin, sternly.
“What I wanted?” Foma raised his head, looked at the merchants and smiled. “I wanted—”
“Drunkard! Nasty scamp!”
“I am not drunk!” retorted Foma, morosely. “I have drank only two glasses. I was perfectly sober.”
“Consequently,” said Bobrov, “you are right, Yakov Tarasovich, he is insane.”
“I?” exclaimed Foma.
But they paid no attention to him. Reznikov, Zubov and Bobrov leaned over to Mayakin and began to talk in low tones.
“Guardianship!” Foma’s ears caught this one word. “I am in my right mind!” he said, leaning back in his chair and staring at the merchants with troubled eyes. “I understand what I wanted. I wanted to speak the truth. I wanted to accuse you.”
He was again seized with emotion, and he suddenly jerked his hands in an effort to free them.
“Eh! Hold on!” exclaimed Bobrov, seizing him by the shoulders. “Hold him.”
“Well, hold me!” said Foma with sadness and bitterness. “Hold me—what do you need me for?”
“Sit still!” cried his godfather, sternly.
Foma became silent. He now understood that what he had done was of no avail, that his words had not staggered the merchants. Here they stood, surrounding him in a dense throng, and he could not see anything for them. They were calm, firm, treating him as a drunkard and a turbulent fellow, and were plotting something against him. He felt himself pitiful, insignificant, crushed by that dark mass of strong-souled, clever and sedate people. It seemed to him that a long time had passed since he had abused them, so long a time that he himself seemed as a stranger, incapable of comprehending what he had done to these people, and why he had done it. He even experienced in himself a certain feeling of offence, which resembled shame at himself in his own eyes. There was a tickling sensation in his throat, and he felt there was something foreign in his breast, as though some dust or ashes were strewn upon his heart, and it throbbed unevenly and with difficulty. Wishing to explain to himself his act, he said slowly and thoughtfully, without looking at anyone:
“I wanted to speak the truth. Is this life?”
“Fool!” said Mayakin, contemptuously. “What truth can you speak? What do you understand?”
“My heart is wounded, that I understand! What justification have you all in the eyes of God? To what purpose do you live? Yes, I feel—I felt the truth!”
“He is repenting!” said Reznikov, with a sarcastic
smile.
“Let him!” replied Bobrov, with contempt.
Some one added:
“It is evident, from his words, that he is out of his wits.”
“To speak the truth, that’s not given to everyone!” said Yakov Tarasovich, sternly and instructively, lifting his hand upward. “It is not the heart that grasps truth; it is the mind; do you understand that? And as to your feeling, that’s nonsense! A cow also feels when they twist her tail. But you must understand, understand everything! Understand also your enemy. Guess what he thinks even in his dreams, and then go ahead!”
According to his wont, Mayakin was carried away by the exposition of his practical philosophy, but he realised in time that a conquered man is not to be taught how to fight, and he stopped short. Foma cast at him a dull glance, and shook his head strangely.
“Lamb!” said Mayakin.
“Leave me alone!” entreated Foma, plaintively. “It’s all yours! Well, what else do you want? Well, you crushed me, bruised me, that serves me right! Who am I? O Lord!”
All listened attentively to his words, and in that attention there was something prejudiced, something malicious.
“I have lived,” said Foma in a heavy voice. “I have observed. I have thought; my heart has become wounded with thoughts! And here—the abscess burst. Now I am utterly powerless! As though all my blood had gushed out. I have lived until this day, and still thought that now I will speak the truth. Well, I have spoken it.”
He talked monotonously, colourlessly, and his speech resembled that of one in delirium.
“I have spoken it, and I have only emptied myself, that’s all. Not a trace have my words left behind them. Everything is uninjured. And within me something blazed up; it has burned out, and there’s nothing more there. What have I to hope for now? And everything remains as it was.”
Yakov Tarasovich burst into bitter laughter.
“What then, did you think to lick away a mountain with your tongue? You armed yourself with malice enough to fight a bedbug, and you started out after a bear, is that it? Madman! If your father were to see you now. Eh!”
“And yet,” said Foma, suddenly, loudly, with assurance, and his eyes again flared up, “and yet it is all your fault! You have spoiled life! You have made everything narrow. We are suffocating because of you! And though my truth against you is weak, it is truth, nevertheless! You are godless wretches! May you all be cursed!”
