Petersburg (Penguin Classics)

by Andrei Bely

  The sound of that voice?

  It is as indistinct as the call of the cranes above the city; the cranes flying high up there – in the city’s rumble the city-dwellers cannot hear them; but they fly, fly past above the city – the cranes! … Somewhere, on Nevsky Prospect, let us suppose, in the quiver of the flying carriages and the uproar of the newspaper-sellers, where above it all perhaps only the throat of the motor car rises – among those metal throats, at a pre-vesperal, vernal hour, on the paving the dweller of the woodless plains, who has landed in the city by chance, will arise as though rooted to the spot; he will stop – lean his shaggy, bearded head to one side, and stop you.

  ‘Shhh! …’

  ‘What is it?’

  And he, the dweller of the woodless plains, who has landed in the city by chance, will to your amazement shake his head and smile a cunning, cunning smile:

  ‘Can’t you hear them?’

  ‘? …’

  ‘Listen …’

  ‘What? What is it?’

  And he will sigh:

  ‘There … the cranes … are calling.’

  You also listen.

  At first you will hear nothing; and then, from somewhere up above, in the spaces you will hear: a familiar, forgotten sound – a strange sound …

  There the cranes are calling.

  You both raise your heads. A third, a fifth, a tenth person raises his head.

  At first the universal spaces dazzle you all; nothing, apart from air … And yet – no: there is something apart from air …, because amidst all that blue there clearly emerges – something that is none the less familiar: northwards … fly … the cranes!

  Around you there is an entire ring of inquisitive people; they all have their heads raised, and the pavement is blocked; a policeman makes his way through; and yet – no: he cannot restrain his curiosity; has stopped, thrown back his head; he is looking.

  And a murmur:

  ‘The cranes! …’

  ‘They’re coming back again …’

  ‘Dear creatures …’

  Above the accursed Petersburg roofs, above the boarded roadway, above the crowd – that pre-vernal image, that familiar voice!

  So also – the voice of childhood!

  It is not audible; yet it – exists; from time to time the calling of the cranes above the Petersburg roofs – will be heard! Thus the voice of childhood.

  It was something of this kind that Nikolai Apollonovich heard now.

  As though someone sad, whom Nikolai Apollonovich had never seen before, had outlined around his soul a solid, penetrating circle and had entered his soul; the bright light of his eyes began to transpierce his soul. Nikolai Apollonovich gave a start; something rang out, that had been compressed within his soul; now it receded lightly into immensity; yes, here was immensity, saying dauntlessly:

  ‘You all persecute me! …’

  ‘What? What? What?’ Nikolai Apollonovich said, trying to make out that voice; and the immensity said dauntlessly:

  ‘I look after you all …’

  Thus did it speak.

  Nikolai Apollonovich cast his eyes over space in astonishment, as though he expected to see before him the owner of the singing voice; but what he saw was something else; namely: he saw a dense, floating mass – of bowler hats, moustaches, chins; walked further – simply the misty prospect; and in it floated his gaze, as everything floated now.

  The misty prospect seemed familiar and kindly; ai-ai-ai – how sad the misty prospect seemed; and the flood of bowler hats with its faces? All these faces that were passing here – passed reflective, unutterably sad.

  But the voice’s owner was not there.

  Only who was that there? There, on that side? Outside that colossus of a house, over there? And – under a pile of balconies?

  Yes, someone was standing there.

  Just like him, Nikolai Apollonovich; and standing, like him, outside a shop window – under an open umbrella … And not conspicuous: he might possibly be looking at something … so it might seem; impossible to make out his face. And what was so special about him? On this side stood Nikolai Apollonovich, not particularly remarkable, for his own satisfaction … Well, and the other man, too, was not conspicuous: like Nikolai Apollonovich, like all the other people who were passing – just a casual passer-by; and he too was sad and kindly (as everyone was kindly now); looked about him with an independent air: as if to say, so what, there’s nothing special about me: I’ve got a few whiskers on my face, too! … No – he was clean-shaven … The outline of his little overcoat recalled, but … what? Was he nodding? …

  Simply wearing some sort of little peaked cap.

  And where had it happened before?

  Should he approach him, the kindly owner of the peaked cap? After all, it was a public prospect; well, truly! There was room for everyone on this public prospect … Simply, in an unconspicuous manner – approach: look at the objects that were there … behind glass on the other side of the shop window. For everyone had a right …

  Stand independently there beside him, and when an opportunity arose cast a fleeting glance, a glance that was dissembling – apparently absent-minded, but in fact attentive, –

  – at him!

  Make sure: as if to say: what is this?

  No, no, no! … Touch the doubtless ossifying fingers, and weep with stupid happiness! …

  Fall down prostrate on the paving!

  ‘I am sick, deaf, heavy laden … Give me rest, Master, give me shelter …’

  And hear in reply:

  ‘Arise …

  ‘Go …

  ‘Sin no more …’

  No, of course there would be no reply.

  But of course – the sad figure would not reply, because there could be no replies for the present; the reply would come later – in an hour, in one year, or five, or perhaps even more – in a hundred, in a thousand years; but a reply there would be! But now the sad, tall figure, never seen in dreams, but absolutely no more than a stranger, but a stranger with a hidden purpose, and, so to speak, a mysterious stranger – the sad, tall figure would simply look at him and put a finger to his lips. Without looking, without stopping, he would walk there through the slush …

  And in the slush disappear …

  But a day would come.

  All this would alter in the twinkling of an eye. And all the passing strangers – those who had passed before one another (in a backstreet somewhere) at a moment of mortal danger, those who spoke of that inexpressible moment with an inexpressible look and then withdrew into immensity – they would all, all meet!

  No one would take the joy of that meeting away from them.

  I’m Going My Own Way … I’m Not Getting in Anyone’s Way …

  ‘What am I doing,’ thought Nikolai Apollonovich. ‘This is no time to be day-dreaming …’

  There was no time to be lost now … Time was passing, and the sardine tin was ticking away; he must go straight to the desk; carefully wrap the whole thing up in paper, put it in his pocket, and into the Neva with it …

  And now he moved his eyes away from that colossus of a house where the stranger was standing under a pile of brick balconies with an open umbrella, because again the ill-famed mass of torsos had begun to flow on its many legs – the mass of human bodies that had been rushing here for springs, summers, winters: of ceaseless bodies.

  And lost his resolve, looked again.

  The stranger was still there; he was evidently waiting, as Nikolai Apollonovich had been waiting, for the rain to stop; suddenly he moved off, suddenly fell into the human current – into those couples and those foursomes; his three-cornered hat, gleaming with lustre, covered him; his umbrella stuck up helplessly.

  ‘I ought to turn away, and go my own way! And so, really, ought he, the stranger!’

  But no sooner had he thought this than (he noticed) from beneath his gleaming three-cornered hat and out of the shoulders of the people who were rushing past, the small pea
ked cap again began to show itself; risking ending up under a cab, he ran across the roadway; he was absurdly stretching forth the umbrella, which was being torn away by the wind.

  Well, how was he to turn away now? How could he go his own way?

  ‘What’s he up to?’ thought Nikolai Apollonovich, and was, unexpectedly to himself, astonished:

  ‘Oh, so that’s what he looks like, is it?’

  The stranger had undoubtedly lost by being close to; being in the distance was more advantageous; he appeared more mysterious; more melancholy; his movements were more sluggish.

  ‘Heh! … But for pity’s sake: he looks like an idiot, doesn’t he? Ai, that little peaked cap! Do you see that cap? He keeps running on those crane’s legs; his little coat is fluttering, his umbrella is torn; and one of his galoshes doesn’t fit …’

  ‘Phoo!’ a self-respecting citizen would have expressed himself inarticulately at this point and kept on walking, his lips pressed shut offendedly, with an independent air: a self-respecting citizen would have certainly felt something – something of the following kind:

  ‘Oh, let him be! … I’m going my own way … I’m not getting in anyone’s way … I can give way when the occasion arises. But do you think I’m going to …? No, no, no: I have my own way to go …’

  Nikolai Apollonovich, it must be admitted, did not feel himself to be a self-respecting citizen in any way (after all, what kind of respect could there be now?); but the stranger probably did, in spite of his little coat, his wretched little umbrella and the galosh that was falling off his foot.

  As though he were saying:

  ‘Well, see here: I am just a chance passer-by, but a passer-by who respects himself … And I won’t let anyone get in my way … I won’t give way to anyone …’

  Now Nikolai Apollonovich felt hostility; and, having already prepared himself to step aside, changed his tactics: did not step aside; thus they nearly collided, nose to nose; Nikolai Apollonovich – astounded; the stranger – without any astonishment; it was remarkable: a large, numb hand (with goose-pimples) was raised to the cap; while a hoarse and wooden tattoo decisively rapped out:

  ‘Ni-ko-lai A-pol-lo-no-vich!! …’

  Only now did Nikolai Apollonovich begin to notice that the individual who had so swiftly flown up (he was an artisan, perhaps) had bandaged up his throat; he probably had a boil on his throat (as is well known, a boil, impeding one’s freedom of movement, may appear in a most inconvenient fashion on one’s Adam’s apple, on one’s backbone (between the shoulder-blades) – may appear … in an indescribable place! …)

  But a more detailed reflection on the properties of insidious boils was broken off:

  ‘You don’t seem to recognize me?’

  (Ai, ai, ai!) …

  ‘With whom do I have the honour,’ Nikolai Apollonovich began, pressing his lips together offendedly, but, on taking a closer look at the stranger, suddenly staggered back, threw off his hat and exclaimed with a wholly contorted mouth:

  ‘No … is it you? … But what put you here? …’

  He had probably intended to exclaim: ‘What brought you here …’

  Of course: it was hard to perceive that the chance passer-by, who looked like a beggar, was Sergei Sergeich, because, for one thing, Likhutin was dressed in civilian clothes, and they sat on him like a saddle on a cow; and, for another: Sergei Sergeich Likhutin was – ai, ai, ai! – clean-shaven: that was what it was! Instead of a small, twining blond beard, what protruded was a kind of pimply, awkward void; and – where had his little moustache gone? This place that was free of hair (between his lips and his nose) had turned a familiar physiognomy into an unfamiliar physiognomy – quite simply, into a sort of unpleasant void.

  The absence of the customary Likhutin beard and the customary Likhutin moustache gave the second lieutenant the shocking appearance of an idiot:

  ‘No … Or perhaps my eyes deceive me, but … it seems to me, Sergei Sergeyevich, that … you …’

  ‘Quite correct: I am in civvies …’

  ‘No, it’s not that, Sergei Sergeich … not that … That is not what astounds me … No, what astounds me is …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You have somehow been entirely transformed, Sergei Sergeich … You must please excuse me …’

  ‘That is a trivial matter, sir …’

  ‘Oh, of course, of course … I didn’t mean anything by it … I just meant that you’ve shaved …’

  ‘Hey, what is this?’ Likhutin said, taking offence now. ‘What is this about “you’ve shaved”? Why shouldn’t I? Yes, I’ve shaved … I couldn’t sleep last night … Why shouldn’t I have shaved? …’

  In the second lieutenant’s voice Nikolai Apollonovich was struck by what was quite simply a kind of fury, some kind of overpowering fraughtness that was quite out of keeping with being shaved.

  ‘Yes, I’ve shaved …’

  ‘Of course, of course …’

  ‘Well, what of it?’ said Likhutin, refusing to calm down. ‘I’m leaving the service …’

  ‘You’re leaving it? … Why? …’

  ‘For private reasons, which concern me personally … Those trivial details do not concern you, Nikolai Apollonovich … Our private matters do not concern you.’

  Now second lieutenant Likhutin began to draw closer.

  ‘As a matter of fact, there are matters which …’

  Nikolai Apollonovich, pushing into passers-by with his back, began plainly to retreat:

  ‘There are matters, Sergei Sergeich? …’

  ‘Matters which, sir …’

  Nikolai Apollonovich caught the plainly ominous note in the second lieutenant’s hoarse voice; and it seemed to him that the latter was for some reason distinctly preparing to seize his arms.

  ‘Have you got a cold?’ he said, abruptly changing the subject, and jumped down off the pavement; in explanation of his comment he touched his own neck, alluding to the bandage round Likhutin’s neck, to some sort of cold in the throat – some quinsy or – influenza.

  But Sergei Sergeyevich turned red, and swiftly jumped down off the pavement, continuing his advance in order to … to … Several passers-by stopped and looked:

  ‘Ni-ko-lai Apollonovich! …’

  ‘?’

  ‘I really haven’t come running after you in order to talk to you about your neck, the devil take it …’

  A third, a fifth, a tenth person stopped, doubtless supposing that some pilferer had been caught.

  ‘It has nothing to do with the matter …’

  Ableukhov’s attention grew acute; to himself he whispered:

  ‘Eh? … What has nothing to do with what matter?’ And, evading Likhutin, he again found himself on the damp pavement.

  ‘What is the matter, then? …’

  Where was his memory?

  The matter he had to discuss with the second lieutenant was no joke. Yes – the domino! The devil take it, the domino! Nikolai Apollonovich had completely forgotten about the domino; now he merely remembered:

  ‘There is a matter, there is …’

  Sofya Petrovna Likhutina had without doubt gone and talked to everyone about the incident in the unlit entrance porch; she had also talked about the incident beside the Winter Canal.

  It was to this matter that Likhutin was proceeding now.

  ‘This is all I needed … Oh, the devil take it: how inconvenient it is! … How very inconvenient! …’

  And suddenly everything was overcast.

  The swarms of bowler hats grew dark; vengefully the top hats began to gleam; from all sides the nose of the ordinary man in the street began once more to hop: noses flowed by in great numbers: aquiline, cockerel-like, hen-like, greenish, grey; and – a nose with a wart on it: absurd, hurried, enormous.

  Nikolai Apollonovich, avoiding Likhutin’s gaze, surveyed all this and fixed his eyes on the shop window.

  Meanwhile Sergei Sergeich Likhutin, seizing Ableukhov’s arm and, now pressing it, now quit
e simply squeezing it, gathering around him a crowd of inquisitive gawpers – implacably, indefatigably snapped out in a wooden falsetto: – why, here was the beating of drumsticks! –

  ‘I … I … I … have the honour to inform you that since this morning I … I … I …’

  ‘?’

  ‘I have been on your trail … And I have been, have been everywhere – to your lodgings, incidentally … I was let into your room … I sat there … Left a note …’

  ‘Oh, what a pit …’

  ‘None the less,’ the second lieutenant interrupted (why, here was the beating of drumsticks), ‘having a matter to settle with you: an urgent discussion of business …’

  ‘Now it’s beginning,’ dashed through Ableukhov’s brain, and he saw his reflection in the large shop window amidst gloves, umbrellas and similar articles.

  Meanwhile a cold, whistling pandemonium had broken out along the Nevsky, swooping, rattling and whispering with small, staccato, steady drops against the umbrellas, the sternly bent backs, drenching the hair, drenching the frozen, stringy hands of artisans, students, and workers; meanwhile a cold, whistling pandemonium had broken out along the Nevsky, pouring a poisonous, mocking, metallic highlight on to the street signs, twisting billions of wet grains of dust into funnels, forming tornadoes, driving and driving them through the streets, shattering them against stones; and further, driving the bat’s wing of the clouds out of Petersburg through the vacant lots; and already a cold, whistling pandemonium had broken out above the vacant lots; with a mettlesome, buccaneer whistling it caroused through the expanses – of Samara, Tambov, Saratov – in gullies, sands, thistles, wormwood, tearing the straw from the roofs, tearing down the high-topped haystacks and spreading its sticky rot across the threshing-floors; a heavy, granular sheaf is born from it; the native, spring-water well is blocked up by it; woodlice will appear; and through a series of wet villages typhus goes raging.