Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

  The arrival of a footman in gorgeous livery who mentioned the name of Prince X. as his master, who had sent on purpose to fetch Yefimov, a poor musician — all this instantly made a great impression on my mother. I have mentioned already when describing her character that the poor woman still loved my father. And now in spite of eight years of perpetual misery and suffering her heart was still unchanged, she still could love him! God knows, perhaps at this moment she imagined a complete change in his fortunes. Even the faintest shadow of hope had an influence on her. How can one tell, perhaps she, too, was a little infected by her crazy husband’s unshakable self-confidence. And indeed it would have been impossible that his self-confidence should not have had some influence on a weak woman, and on Prince X.’s attention she might instantly build a thousand plans for him. In an instant she was ready to turn to him again; she was ready to forgive him for all her life, even to overlook his last crime, the sacrifice of her only child, and in a rush of renewed enthusiasm, in a rush of new hope, to reduce that crime to an ordinary act, an act of cowardice to which he had been driven by poverty, his degraded life, and his desperate position. Everything with her was impulsive, and in an instant she had forgiveness and boundless compassion for her ruined husband.

  My father began bustling about; he, too, was impressed by this attention from Prince X. and B. He turned straight away to mother, whispered something to her, and she went out of the room. She came back two minutes later, having changed the money, and father immediately gave a silver rouble to the messenger, who went away with a polite bow. Meanwhile mother, after going out for a minute, brought an iron, got out her husband’s best shirt-front and began ironing it. She herself tied round his neck a white cambric cravat which had been preserved from time immemorial in his wardrobe, together with his black — by now very shabby — dress-coat which had been made for him when he was in the orchestra of a theatre. When his toilet was complete, father took his hat, but as he was going out asked for a glass of water; he was pale, and sat down on a chair for a minute, feeling faint. I had recovered sufficiently to hand him the water; perhaps the feeling of hostility had stolen back again into mother’s heart and cooled her first enthusiasm.

  Father went away; we were left alone. I crouched in the corner, and for a long time watched my mother in silence. I had never before seen her in such excitement; her lips were quivering, her pale cheeks suddenly glowed, and from time to time she trembled all over. At last her misery began to find an outlet in complaining, in stifled sobs and lamentation.

  “It is all my fault, my fault, wretched mother that I am!” she said, talking to herself. “What will become of her? What will become of her when I die?” she went on, standing still in the middle of the room, as though thunderstruck by the very thought. “Nyetochka! my child! My poor little child! Unhappy child!” she said, taking me by the hand and embracing me convulsively. “How will you be left after I am dead, when even now I can’t educate you, look after you and watch over you as I ought? Ah, you don’t understand me! Do you understand? Will you remember what I have just said to you, Nyetochka? Will you remember it in the future?”

  “I will, mother, I will,” I said, clasping my hands and beseeching her.

  She held me tight in a long embrace, as though trembling at the very thought of parting from me. My heart was bursting.

  “Mammy! Mammy!” I said, sobbing. “Why is it... Why is it you don’t love Daddy?” and my sobs prevented my finishing.

  A groan broke from her bosom. Then in a new rush of terrible misery she began walking up and down the room.

  “My poor, poor child! And I did not notice how she was growing up; she knows, she knows all about it! My God! What an impression, what an example!” And again she wrung her hands in despair.

  Then she came up to me and with frenzied love kissed me, kissed my hands, bathed them with tears, sought my forgiveness.... I have never seen such suffering.... At last she seemed exhausted, and fell into apathy. So passed a whole hour. Then she got up, weary and exhausted, and told me to go bed. I went off into my corner, wrapped myself up in the quilt, but could not get to sleep. I was worried about her and I was worried about father. I awaited his return with impatience. I was possessed by a kind of terror at the thought of him. Half an hour later mother took a candle and came up to me to see whether I was asleep. To soothe her I shut my eyes tight and pretended to be asleep. After looking at me she went very quietly to the cupboard, opened it, and poured herself out a glass of wine. She drank it and went to sleep, leaving a candle alight on the table and the door unlocked, as she always did when father might come in late.

  I lay in a sort of stupor, but sleep would not come to me.

  As soon as I had closed my eyes, I woke up again trembling at some horrible vision. My misery grew more acute every minute. I wanted to cry out, but the scream died away in my breast. At last, late in the night, I heard our door open. I don’t remember how long it was afterwards, but when I opened my eyes I saw father. It seemed to me that he was fearfully pale. He was sitting in a chair close to the door, and seemed to be lost in thought. There was a deathly stillness in the room. The guttering candle shed a mournful light over our abode.

  I watched him a long time, but still father did not move from his seat; he was sitting motionless, still in the same position, with his head bowed, and his hands pressed rigidly against his knees. Several times I attempted to call to him, but could not. My state of numb stupor persisted. At last he suddenly came to himself, raised his head and got up from his chair. He stood for some minutes in the middle of the room as though he were making some decision; then suddenly went up to my mother’s bed, listened, and assuring himself that she was asleep, went to the chest where he kept his violin.

  He unlocked the chest, brought out the black violin case and put it on the table; then looked about him again. His eyes had a lustreless and wandering look, such as I had never seen in them before.

  He was about to take up the violin, but at once leaving it went back and shut the door; then noticing the open cupboard, went stealthily to it, saw the glass and the wine, poured some out and drank it. Then for the third time he took up the violin, but for the third time put it down and went up to mother’s bed. Rigid with terror, I watched to see what would happen.

  He listened for a very long time, then put the quilt over her face and began feeling her with his hand. I started. He bent down once more and almost put his head to her, but when he got up the last time there seemed a gleam of a smile on his fearfully white face. He quietly and carefully covered the sleeping figure with the quilt, covered her head, her feet and I began trembling with a terror I did not understand; I felt frightened for mother, I felt terrified by her deep sleep, and I looked with uneasiness at the immovable angular fine of her limbs under the quilt.... Like lightning the fearful thought flashed through me!

  When he had finished all these preliminaries he went back to the cupboard again and drank off the rest of the wine. He was trembling all over as he went to the table. His face was unrecognisable, it was so white. Then he took up the violin again. I saw the violin and knew what it was, but now I expected something awful, terrible, monstrous.... I shuddered at the first note. Father began playing, but the notes came, as it were, jerkily, he kept stopping as though he were recalling something; at last with a harassed agonised face put down his bow and looked strangely at the bed. Something there still troubled him. He went up to the bed again.... I did not miss a single movement he made, and almost swooning with a feeling of horror, watched him.

  All at once he began hurriedly groping for something, and again the same fearful thought flashed through me like lightning. I wondered why mother slept so soundly. How was it she did not wake when he touched her face with his hand? At last I saw him getting together all the clothes he could. He took mother’s pelisse, his old frock-coat, his dressing-gown, even the clothes that I had thrown off when I went to bed, so that he covered mother completely and hid her under the pile thr
own on her. She still lay motionless, not stirring a limb.

  She was sleeping soundly.

  He seemed to breathe more freely when he had finished his task. This time nothing hindered him, but yet he was still uneasy. He moved the candle and stood with his face towards the door, so as not even to look towards the bed. At last he took the violin, and with a despairing gesture drew his bow across it.... The music began.

  But it was not music.... I remember everything distinctly; to the last moment I remembered everything that caught my attention at the time. No, this was not music such as I have heard since. They were not the notes of the violin, but some terrible voice seemed to be resounding for the first time in our room. Either my impressions were abnormal and due to delirium, or my senses had been so affected by all I had witnessed and were prepared for terrible and agonising impressions — but I am firmly convinced that I heard groans, the cry of a human voice, weeping. Utter despair flowed forth in these sounds; and at the end, when there resounded the last awful chord which seemed to combine all the horror of lamentation, the very essence of torment, of hopeless despair, I could not bear it — I began trembling, tears spurted from my eyes, and rushing at father with a fearful, despairing shriek, I clutched at his hands. He uttered a cry and dropped the violin.

  He stood for a minute as though bewildered. At last his eyes began darting and straying from side to side, he seemed to be looking for something; suddenly he snatched up the violin, brandished it above me, and... another minute and he would perhaps have killed me on the spot.

  “Daddy!” I shouted at him; “Daddy!”

  He trembled like a leaf when he heard my voice, and stepped back a couple of paces.

  “Oh, so you are still left! So it’s not all over yet! So you are still left with me!” he shouted, lifting me in the air above his shoulders.

  “Daddy!” I cried again. “For God’s sake don’t terrify me! I am frightened! Oh!’’

  My wail impressed him; he put me down on the ground gently, and for a minute looked at me without speaking, as though recognising and remembering something. At last, as though at some sudden revulsion, as though at some awful thought, tears gushed from his lustreless eyes; he bent down and began looking intently in my face.

  “Daddy,” I said to him, racked by terror, “don’t look like that! Let us go away from here! Let us make haste and go away! Let us go, let us run away!”

  “Yes, we’ll run away, we’ll run away. It’s high time. Come along, Nyetochka. Make haste, make haste!” And he rushed about as though he had only now grasped what he must do. He looked hurriedly around, and seeing mother’s handkerchief on the ground, picked it up and put it in his pocket. Then he saw her cap, and picked that up too and put it in his pocket, as though preparing for a long journey and putting together everything he would want.

  I got my clothes on in an instant, and in haste I too began snatching up everything which I fancied necessary for the journey.

  “Is everything ready, everything?” asked my father. “Is everything ready? Make haste! make haste!”

  I hurriedly tied up my bundle, threw a kerchief on my head, and we were about to set off when the idea occurred to me that I must take the picture which was hanging on the wall. Father instantly agreed to this. Now he was quiet, spoke in a whisper, and only urged me to make haste and start. The picture hung very high up. Together we brought a chair, put a stool on it, and clambering on it, after prolonged efforts, took it down. Then everything was ready for our journey. He took me by the hand, and we had almost started when father suddenly stopped me. He rubbed his forehead for some minutes as though trying to remember something which had not been done. At last he seemed to find what he wanted; he felt for the key which lay under mother’s pillow and began hurriedly looking for something in the chest of drawers. At last he came back to me and brought me some money he had found in the box.

  “Here, take this, take care of it,” he whispered to me. Don’t lose it, remember, remember!”

  At first he put the money in my hand, then took it back and thrust it in the bosom of my dress. I remembered that I shuddered when that silver touched my body, and it seemed that only then I understood what money meant. Now we were ready again, but all at once he stopped me again.

  “Nyetochka!” he said to me, as though reflecting with an effort, “my child, I have forgotten.... What is it?... I can’t remember.... Yes, yes, I have found it, I remember!... Come here, Nyetochka!”

  He led me to the corner where the holy image stood, and told me to kneel down.

  “Pray, my child, pray! You will feel better!... Yes, really it will be better,” he whispered, pointing to the ikon, and looking at me strangely. “Say your prayers,” he said in an imploring voice.

  I dropped on my knees, and clasping my hands, full of horror and despair which by now had gained complete possession of me, I sank on the floor and lay there for some moments without breathing. I strained every thought, every feeling to pray, but tears overwhelmed me. I got up exhausted with misery. I no longer wanted to go with him, I was frightened of him. At last what harassed and tortured me burst out.

  “Daddy,” I said, melting into tears, “and Mammy?... What’s the matter with Mammy? Where is she? Where’s my Mammy?”

  I could not go on, I wept bitterly.

  He shed tears too, as he looked at me. At last he took me by the hand, led me up to the bed, swept away the pile of clothes and turned down the quilt. My God! she lay dead, already cold and blue. Almost senseless, I flung myself on her and threw my arms round her dead body. My father made me kneel down.

  “Bow down to her, child!” he said. “Say good-bye to her....”

  I bowed down. My father bowed down beside me. He was fearfully pale. His lips were trembling and whispering something.

  “It wasn’t I, Nyetochka, it wasn’t I,” he said, pointing at the dead body with a trembling finger. “Do you hear? It was not I, it was not my doing. Remember, Nyetochka!”

  “Daddy, let us go,” I whispered in terror, “it’s time!”

  “Yes, it is time now, we ought to have gone long ago!” he said, gripping me tightly by the hand, in haste to get out of the room. “Now let us set off. Thank God, thank God, now it is all over!”

  We went down the stairs; the drowsy porter unlocked the gate for us, looking at us suspiciously; and father, as though afraid he would question him, ran out of the gate first, so that I had difficulty in overtaking him. We went down our street and came out on the bank of the canal. Snow had fallen on the pavement overnight, and was coming down in tiny flakes now. It was cold, I was chilled to the bone, and ran along with father clutching convulsively at the skirts of his coat. His violin was under his arm, and he was continually stopping to prevent its slipping.

  We walked for a quarter of an hour; at last he turned along the sloping pavement down to the edge of the canal and sat down on the farthest part. There was a hole cut in the ice two paces from us. There was not a sound around. Oh, God! How I remember to this day the terrible feeling that overpowered me! At last everything of which I had been dreaming for a whole year had come to pass. We had left our poor home. But was this what I was expecting, was it of this I was dreaming, was this the creation of my childish imagination, when I looked into the future for the happiness of him whom I loved with a passion so unlike a child’s? Above all, the thought of mother tortured me at that moment. Why had we left her alone, I wondered. We had abandoned her body like some useless thing. I remember that that harassed and tortured me more than anything.

  “Daddy,” I began, unable to endure my agonising thoughts, “Daddy!”

  “What is it?” he said sullenly.

  “Why have we left Mammy there, Daddy? Why have we deserted her?” I asked, beginning to cry. “Daddy, let us go home again. Let us fetch someone to her.”

  “Yes, yes,” he said, starting and getting up from the post as though some new idea had come into his mind, which settled all his doubts. “Yes, Nyetochka, it
won’t do; we must go to Mother, she is cold there. You go to her, Nyetochka. It isn’t dark, there’s a candle there, don’t be frightened. Fetch someone to her and then come back to me; you go alone and I will wait for you here.... I won’t go away...”

  I went at once, but I had scarcely reached the pavement when something seemed to stab me to the heart.... I turned round, and saw that he was already running in the opposite direction and was running away from me, leaving me alone, abandoning me at such a moment. I screamed as loud as I could and panic-stricken flew to overtake him. I gasped for breath; he ran faster and faster.... I lost sight of him. On the way I came upon his hat which he had lost in his flight. I picked it up and fell to running again. My breath failed me and my legs gave way under me. I felt as though something hideous were happening to me. It kept seeming to me that it was a dream, and at times I had the sensation I had had in dreams that I was running away from someone, but that my legs were giving way under me, that I was being overtaken and was falling senseless. An agonising sensation was rending my heart; I was sorry for him, my heart ached when I realised that he was running without an overcoat, without a hat away from me, away from his beloved child.... I wanted to overtake him simply to kiss him warmly once more, to tell him not to be afraid of me, to soothe him, to assure him that I would not run after him if he did not wish it, but would go back alone to mother. I made out at last that he had turned down a street. Running to it and turning down it I could still discern him before me. Then my strength failed me; I began crying and screaming. I remember that as I ran I knocked up against two passers-by, who stopped in the middle of the pavement and looked after us in amazement.

  “Daddy, Daddy!” I cried for the last time, but I slipped on the pavement and fell at the gateway of a house. I felt my whole face bathed in blood. A moment later I lost consciousness.

  I came to myself in a soft warm bed, and saw beside me kind welcoming faces which greeted my recovery with delight.