Childhood, Boyhood, Youth (Penguin ed.)

by Leo Tolstoy

  ‘Listen, gentlemen, after dinner we’ll have to take Diplomat in hand,’ Dubkov said. ‘Why don’t we go to Auntie’s and deal with him there?’

  ‘You know Nekhlyudov won’t go,’ Volodya said.

  ‘What a milksop you are, what an intolerable milksop!’ Dubkov said to Dmitry. ‘Come along with us and you’ll see what a fine lady Auntie is.’

  ‘Not only won’t I go, but I won’t let him go, either,’ Dmitry replied, turning red.

  ‘Who? Diplomat? But you want to go, don’t you, Diplomat? Why, he was radiant at the mere mention of Auntie.’

  ‘It’s not that I won’t let him,’ Dmitry went on, getting up from his place and starting to walk around the room without looking at me, ‘but that I don’t advise him to go and wish that he wouldn’t. He’s no longer a child, and if he wants to, then he can go by himself without the two of you. And you really ought to be ashamed of yourself, Dubkov. Whenever you’re up to no good, you want others to do the same.’

  ‘But what’s so terrible about my inviting all of you to Auntie’s for a cup of tea?’ Dubkov asked, winking at Volodya. ‘Well, if going with us is so unpleasant, then let Volodya and me go by ourselves. You’ll go, won’t you, Volodya?’

  ‘Uh-huh!’ Volodya confirmed. ‘We’ll stop by there, and then go back to my place for more piquet.’

  ‘So, do you want to go with them or not?’ Dmitry asked, coming over to me.

  ‘No,’ I answered, sliding over on the sofa so he could sit down beside me, which he did. ‘I just don’t want to, and if you don’t advise it, then I certainly won’t.’ ‘No,’ I added after a pause, ‘it wasn’t true when I said that I didn’t want to go with them, but I’m happy not to.’

  ‘Which is excellent,’ Dmitry said. ‘Live your own way, and don’t dance to anyone else’s tune – that’s the best way.’

  Not only did that little spat not spoil our fun, it even increased it. Dmitry suddenly recovered the mild mood I liked so much. The feeling that he had done something good had that effect on him, as I later noticed more than once. He was pleased with himself for defending me. He became exceptionally merry, ordered another bottle of champagne (which was against his rule), invited a strange gentleman into our room for a drink, sang Gaudeamus igitur,36 asking everyone to join in, and suggested driving out to Sokolniki,37 at which point Dubkov objected that that would be just too sentimental.

  ‘Let’s have a good time today,’ Dmitry said with a smile. ‘In honour of his matriculation, I’ll get drunk for the first time, and so be it.’ That merriment sat rather strangely on Dmitry. He was like a family tutor or kind father who’s pleased with his children and has relaxed and wants to entertain them, yet at the same time show that it’s possible to have fun honourably and decently. Even so, that unexpected merriment infected me and apparently the others, too, and all the more since each of us had by then drunk close to half a bottle of champagne.

  In that pleasant mood I went out to the main room to light a cigarette Dubkov had given me.

  When I got up from my seat, I noticed that I was a little dizzy and that my arms and legs moved naturally only when I concentrated on them. Otherwise, my legs would wander sideways and my arms would produce gesticulations of some kind. I focused all my attention on those appendages, ordering my arms to lift themselves up and button my frock coat and smooth my hair (during which they tossed my elbows terrifically high) and my legs to walk through the door, which they did, although they put my feet down either too hard or not hard enough, especially the left one, which kept getting up on tiptoe. A voice called out, ‘Where are you going? They’ll bring a candle.’ I surmised that it belonged to Volodya and took pleasure in having done so, but only gave him a little smile in reply and continued on my way.

  SIXTEEN

  A Quarrel

  Sitting and eating something at a small table in the main room was a short, stocky civilian gentleman with a red moustache. Sitting next to him was a tall brunet without a moustache. They were speaking French. Their glances gave me pause, but I decided, even so, to light my cigarette off the candle standing in front of them. With my face to the side to avoid their gaze, I went over to the table and started to light the cigarette. After it was lit, I couldn’t help myself and looked at the gentleman who was dining. His grey eyes were staring at me with a hostile expression. I was about to turn away when his red moustache moved and he said in French, ‘I don’t care for smoking, sir, while I’m dining.’

  I mumbled something unintelligible.

  ‘That’s right, sir, I don’t care for it,’ the gentleman with the moustache continued in a severe tone, after a quick glance at the gentleman without a moustache, as if inviting him to admire the working over he was about to give me. ‘And I also don’t care, sir, for people who are so impolite as to come over and smoke under your nose – I don’t care for them, either.’ I realized at once that the gentleman was giving me a good scold, even though it had seemed to me from the start that I was very much in the wrong in regard to him.

  ‘I didn’t think that it would bother you,’ I said.

  ‘And you didn’t think that you were a boor, either, but I did!’ the gentleman yelled.

  ‘What right have you to yell?’ I said, sensing that I was being insulted and getting angry myself.

  ‘This right: that I’ll never allow anyone to be disrespectful to me and will always teach brave fellows like you a lesson. What’s your name, sir, and where do you live?’

  I was so enraged that my lips trembled and my breath came in starts. But I still felt myself in the wrong, probably for having drunk so much champagne, and said nothing rude to the gentleman at all, but on the contrary told him my last name and our address in the most submissive way.

  ‘My name is Kolpikov, sir, and be more courteous in the future. You’ll hear from me – vous aurez de mes nouvelles,’ he concluded, since the whole conversation had been in French.

  Trying to make my voice as firm as possible, I merely said, ‘I’m very glad,’ and then turned around and went back to our room with the cigarette, which had managed to go out.

  I said nothing about what had happened to me either to my brother or to our friends, all the more since they were engaged in some heated dispute of their own, but instead sat down in a corner by myself and reflected on the strange episode. The words ‘you, sir, are a boor’ (un mal élevé, monsieur) rang in my ears and made me more and more indignant. My intoxication had completely passed. As I meditated on how I had acted in the affair, the terrible thought suddenly came to me that I had acted like a coward. ‘What right did he have to attack me? Why didn’t he just say that I was disturbing him? Doesn’t that mean he was in the wrong? When he called me a boor, why didn’t I just say to him, “A boor, sir, is someone who permits himself such rudeness”? Or why didn’t I just shout at him, “Silence!” That would have been excellent! Why didn’t I challenge him to a duel? No, I didn’t do any of that, but swallowed the insult like a miserable little coward.’ ‘You, sir, are a boor’ rang unceasingly and gallingly in my ears. ‘No, I can’t leave it there,’ I thought and got up with the firm intention of going back to the gentleman and saying some terrible thing to him, and perhaps even bashing him in the head with the candlestick, if it came to that. I imagined the last idea with the greatest of pleasure, but it wasn’t without a strong sense of fear that I entered the main room again. Fortunately, Mr Kolpikov had already left and the only person there was a serving boy clearing the table. I was about to tell him what had happened and explain that I hadn’t been in the wrong in any way, but for some reason I changed my mind and went back to our room in the gloomiest of moods.

  ‘What’s happened to our Diplomat?’ Dubkov said. ‘He’s probably deciding the fate of Europe.’

  ‘Oh, leave me alone,’ I said in a sulky voice, turning away. Immediately after that, as I was walking about the room, I for some reason started to reflect that Dubkov wasn’t
a good person at all. ‘What about the endless joking and the name “Diplomat”? There’s nothing kind about that. All he wants is to win money off Volodya and visit some “Auntie” or other … There’s nothing pleasant about him. Everything he says is either a lie or some vulgarity, and he’s always making fun of people. I think he’s just stupid, and a bad person, too.’ I spent five minutes or so brooding like that, and for some reason feeling more and more hostile towards Dubkov. He paid no attention to me, however, which made me even more furious. I was even angry with Volodya and Dmitry for talking to him.

  ‘You know what, gentlemen? The Diplomat needs a good dousing,’ Dubkov said with a smile that struck me as mocking and even treacherous. ‘He’s in a bad way. He truly is.’

  ‘And you, sir, could use a good dousing, too, since you’re in a bad way yourself,’ I retorted with a spiteful grin, forgetting that he and I were now on familiar terms.

  The retort probably surprised Dubkov, but he indifferently turned away and continued his conversation with Volodya and Dmitry.

  I was going to try to join in, but I sensed that I absolutely would not be able to pretend and went off to my corner again, remaining there until it was time to leave.

  After we had settled up and were putting on our overcoats, Dubkov said to Dmitry, ‘Well, then, where are Orestes and Pylades38 off to? Probably home to talk about “love”. How much better than your sour friendship for us to call on a nice auntie.’

  ‘How dare you talk like that and laugh at us?’ I immediately replied, going up very close to him and waving my arms. ‘How dare you laugh at feelings you don’t understand! I won’t allow it! Silence!’ I shouted, and then fell silent, breathing hard from agitation and not knowing what else to say. Dubkov was at first astonished, and then tried to smile and treat it as a joke, but in the end it frightened him and he looked away, to my great surprise.

  ‘I’m not laughing at you and your feelings at all. It’s just the way I talk,’ he meekly replied.

  ‘That’s just it!’ I yelled, but at the same time I felt ashamed of myself and sorry for Dubkov, whose flushed, embarrassed face expressed genuine distress.

  ‘What’s the matter with you?’ Volodya and Dmitry started asking together. ‘No one meant to offend you.’

  ‘No, he was trying to insult me.’

  ‘What a desperate gentleman your brother is,’ Dubkov said as he was already on his way out of the door and wouldn’t be able to hear my reply.

  I might perhaps have run after him to abuse him with more rude remarks, but at that moment the serving boy who had been present during the affair with Kolpikov offered me my overcoat and I immediately calmed down, although I simulated enough residual anger to Dmitry for the instant calming not to seem odd. Dubkov and I ran into each other the next day in Volodya’s room and didn’t mention the episode, although we remained on formal terms and found it even harder to look each other in the eye than before.

  The memory of the quarrel with Kolpikov, who failed to give me de ses nouvelles either the next day or any day after that, was for many years a terribly vivid and painful one. For five years or so I would writhe and audibly moan every time I recalled the unavenged offence, comforting myself, however, with satisfaction at what a brave fellow I had shown myself to be in the business with Dubkov. It was only much later that I began to regard that business altogether differently and to remember the quarrel with Kolpikov for the pleasure of its comedy, and to regret the undeserved insult I had inflicted on the ‘decent fellow’ Dubkov.

  When I told Dmitry the same evening about the adventure with Kolpikov, whose appearance I described in detail, he was quite amazed.

  ‘Why it’s the same fellow!’ he said. ‘Can you imagine? This Kolpikov is a famous rascal and cheat, but mainly a coward who was forced out of his regiment by his comrades for refusing to fight after being slapped. Where did he find the pluck?’ he added, looking at me with a kindly smile. ‘Did he really only call you a “boor”?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s bad, but still no disaster!’ Dmitry consoled me.

  It was only later when I was able to reflect calmly about the situation that I reached the fairly plausible conclusion that Kolpikov, sensing that he could attack me with impunity, had in the presence of the brunet without a moustache avenged the slap he had received years before, just as I had in my turn immediately avenged his ‘boor’ on the innocent Dubkov.

  SEVENTEEN

  I Get Ready to Make Some Calls

  My first thought on waking the next morning was the adventure with Kolpikov, and I moaned again and ran around the room, but there was nothing to be done about it, and anyway it was my last day in Moscow and on Papa’s orders I had to make the calls he had written down on a piece of paper for me. His worry for us was not so much our morality and education as our social connections. In his rapid scrawl he had written: ‘1) Prince Ivan Ivanovich without fail, 2) the Ivins without fail, 3) Prince Mikhailo, 4) and Princess Nekhlyudova and Mme Valakhina, if you have time. And, obviously, the university warden, rector and professors.’

  Dmitry talked me out of the university calls, saying that they were not only unnecessary but even inappropriate; the rest, however, all had to be made that day. Of those, I was especially daunted by the first two with the words ‘without fail’ written next to them. Prince Ivan Ivanovich was a general-in-chief, an old man and a rich one, and lived by himself. That meant that I, a sixteen-year-old student, would inevitably have direct dealings with him that could not – I had a premonition – be flattering to me. The Ivins were rich people, too, and their father was an important civilian general39 who had come to see us only once in Grandmother’s time. After she died, however, I noticed that the youngest Ivin was avoiding us and apparently giving himself airs. The oldest, I knew from hearsay, had already finished the law course and was working in Petersburg; the middle one, Sergey, whom I had idolized, was also in Petersburg, where he was a big, fat cadet in the Corps of Pages.40

  Not only didn’t I care in my youth for relations with people who considered themselves above me, but those relations were even an unbearable agony for me, thanks to my constant fear of being insulted, and the exertion of all my mental powers to show my independence. I did, however, have to make up for ignoring Papa’s last order by obeying his first ones. I was walking around my room looking over my clothes, sword and hat laid out on the chairs and getting ready to go, when old man Grap came in to congratulate me, bringing Ilenka with him. Grap the father was a Russianized German, an intolerable hypocrite and flatterer, and often intoxicated. Most of the time he came only to ask for something, and Papa would sometimes sit him down in the study but never invite him to dine with us. His abasement and begging were so blended with a certain external good will and ease in our home that everyone attached great merit to his apparent devotion to us, but I just didn’t like him and always felt ashamed for him whenever he spoke.

  I was quite unhappy about the arrival of those guests and made no attempt to hide it. I had got so used to looking down on Ilenka, and he had got so used to giving us the right to do so, that it was a little unpleasant for me that he was as much a student as I was. It seemed to me that he was slightly embarrassed about that equality, too. I greeted them coldly, without asking them to sit down, since I felt awkward about it, thinking that they could certainly sit without an invitation from me, and ordered the droshky harnessed. Ilenka was a kind, very honest and by no means stupid young man, but he was also what is known as a bit touched. He was constantly subject without any apparent reason to one extreme mood or another, whether tearfulness, hilarity or sensitivity about every little thing, and he now seemed to be in the last mood. He said nothing, looked venomously at me and his father, and when addressed merely smiled the stiff little smile behind which he was used to hiding all his feelings, but especially the feeling of shame for his father that he couldn’t help experiencing around us.

  �
�So, then, Nikolay Petrovich, sir,’ the old man said, while following me around the room as I got dressed, and twirling in his stubby fingers with deferential slowness a silver snuffbox given to him by my grandmother. ‘As soon as I heard from my son that you, sir, had passed your examinations so brilliantly – your intellect is known to everyone – I at once ran over to congratulate you, dear fellow. After all, I once carried you on my shoulder, and, as God is my witness, I love you all as if you were my own, and my Ilenka kept asking to come and see you. He’s got quite used to you, too.’