I am joined to my love
By an invincible force.
God have mercy,
On her, on me!
On her, on me!
On her, on me!
The singing stopped. It was a cloying, affected tenor voice. Suddenly, another voice, a woman’s, spoke caressingly and somewhat timidly, but also with much affectation.
‘Why haven’t you been to see us all this time, Pavel Fyodorovich, why do you neglect us?’
‘Nothing of the kind,’ replied the man’s voice firmly and with dignity, but politely. Clearly, the man was the dominant person, and the woman was playing up to him. ‘Surely that’s Smerdyakov,’ thought Alyosha, ‘it sounds like his voice, and I suppose the woman’s the daughter of the house, the one who’s just arrived from Moscow, wears a dress with a train, and goes to Marfa Ignatyevna for soup…’
‘I adore poetry when it all fits nicely together,’ continued the woman’s voice. ‘Why don’t you go on?’
The man began singing again:
Provided my dear one’s well—
What’s one Tsar’s crown to me?
Lord have mercy,
On her, on me!
On her, on me!
On her, on me!
‘Last time it sounded even better,’ remarked the woman’s voice. ‘In the bit about the crown you sang: “if my little darling’s well”. That sounded more tender, you probably forgot today.’
‘Poetry’s rubbish,’ cut in Smerdyakov.
‘Oh no, I really love the poetry bits.’
‘When it comes to poetry, it’s a lot of rubbish. Just think about it: who in the world speaks in rhyme? And if we all began to speak in rhyme, even if it was by order of the authorities, would we really say anything much? Poetry’s irrelevant, Marya Kondratyevna.’
‘How do you come to be so intelligent? Where does it all come from?’ The woman’s voice sounded more and more caressing.
‘You don’t know the half of it; given the chance I’d have shown you a thing or two, but it wasn’t to be, right from the day I was born. I’d have shot dead with a pistol in a duel any man who called me a scoundrel because I was Smerdyashchaya’s bastard; I used to get taunted about that even in Moscow, where they knew all about it thanks to Grigory Vasilyevich. Grigory Vasilyevich reproaches me that I resent having being born: “You”, he says, “tore her guts out.”* That’s all very well, but I’d rather they’d killed me in my mother’s womb and not let me come into the world at all. They used to say in the market—and even your mother, crude that she is, couldn’t resist telling me—that she went around with filthy, matted hair and that she was scarcely two arshins and a bit. Why “a bit”, why not say “just over”, like everyone else does? Deep down, all this folksy talk is nothing but peasant sentimentality. I ask you, is a Russian peasant worthy of holding a candle to an educated person? Being the yokel that he is, he’s not fit for anything. Ever since I was little, whenever I heard that “a bit”, it used to drive me up the wall. I hate the whole of Russia, Marya Kondratyevna.’
‘If you were an army cadet or a dashing young hussar, you wouldn’t talk like that, you’d seize your sabre and defend all of Russia.’
‘Not only would I not want to be a dashing hussar, Marya Kondratyevna, but on the contrary I’d gladly do away with all soldiers.’
‘And when the enemy came, who’d defend us?’
‘There’d be absolutely no need. In 1812 Russia was invaded by Emperor Napoleon 1, the father* of the present one, and it would have been an excellent thing if we’d have been conquered by the French; an intelligent nation would have overpowered a thoroughly stupid one and annexed it. Everything would have been different.’
‘As though, where they come from, they were any better than our own lot! There are some of our young blades I wouldn’t swap for three young Englishmen,’ said Marya Kondratyevna tenderly, no doubt accompanying these words with a most languid gaze.
‘Each to his own, in a manner of speaking.’
‘You yourself are just like a foreigner to us, a most distinguished foreigner, I don’t mind telling you.’
‘If you want to know, when it comes to depravity there’s nothing to choose between them and us. They’re all blackguards, but there they walk about in patent leather boots while our scoundrels go around like stinking beggars and don’t see anything wrong in it. The Russian people need thrashing, as Fyodor Pavlovich quite rightly said yesterday, even if he is mad, and all his offspring to boot.’
‘You said yourself, you respect Ivan Fyodorovich.’
‘And he treats me like a stinking lackey. He thinks I may rebel, but he’s wrong. If I had money in my pocket, I’d have upped and left long ago. Dmitry Fyodorovich is worse than any lackey in his behaviour, his way of thinking, and his poverty; he’s a good-for-nothing—but that doesn’t stop him being respected by everyone. As for me, you could say I’m no more than a soupstirrer, and yet given half a chance I could open a restaurant in Moscow on Petrovka,* because I can do haute cuisine, which none of them in Moscow can do, except foreigners. Dmitry Fyodorovich is a guttersnipe, yet he could challenge the noblest count’s son and he would agree to fight a duel with him, but how is he any better than me? He’s far stupider than me. Look how much money he’s squandered without having anything to show for it.’
‘I think a duel must be ever so exciting,’ remarked Marya Kondratyevna suddenly.
‘What do you mean exactly?’
‘It’s so frightening and so brave of them, especially when young officers with drawn pistols fire at each other over a girl. You can just picture it. If only they’d let girls watch; I’d just love to watch.’
‘It’s fine if you’re the one who’s pointing the pistol, but if someone else is aiming at you smack between the eyes, you feel pretty stupid. You’d run a mile, Maria Kondratyevna.’
‘Surely you wouldn’t run away?’
Smerdyakov did not deign to reply. After a moment’s silence another chord sounded and the falsetto voice began the last verse:
No matter what you do,
Off I shall go,
And enjo-oy life so.
In the capital I shall live!
I shall not grieve,
Not at all shall I grieve,
Not the least bit shall I grieve.
All of a sudden there was an unexpected interruption; Alyosha suddenly sneezed. The two people on the bench fell silent. Alyosha stood up and walked over to them. It was indeed Smerdyakov, all dressed up, wearing patent leather boots and with his hair pomaded and looking almost as if it had been curled. His guitar lay on the bench. The woman was indeed Marya Kondratyevna, the daughter of the owner of the house; she was wearing a pale-blue dress with a two-arshin train; she was still quite a young girl, and would have been not bad-looking had it not been for her very round face and unsightly freckles.
‘Will my brother Dmitry be back soon?’ asked Alyosha as calmly as he could.
Smerdyakov got up slowly from the bench; Marya Kondratyevna also stood up.
‘Why should I know anything about Dmitry Fyodorovich? It would be a different matter if I’d been meant to keep guard over him,’ replied Smerdyakov softly, distinctly, and with disdain.
‘I merely asked if you knew,’ explained Alyosha.
‘I know nothing of his whereabouts and, what’s more, I don’t wish to know.’
‘But my brother specifically told me that it was you who kept him informed about everything that went on in the house, and that you’d promised to let him know when Agrafena Aleksan-drovna came.’
Slowly and imperturbably Smerdyakov raised his eyes and looked at Alyosha.
‘And how did you manage to get in this time, seeing that the gate here has already been locked for an hour?’ he asked, gazing fixedly at Alyosha.
‘I went along the alley, climbed over the fence, and went straight into the summer-house. I hope you will forgive me for this,’ he addressed Marya Kondratyevna. ‘I had to catch my brothe
r as soon as possible.’
‘Oh, how can we be offended by you?’ drawled Marya Kondratyevna, flattered by Alyosha’s apology. ‘After all, Dmitry Fyodorovich gets into the summer-house the same way; sometimes we don’t even realize that he’s already there, sitting in the summer-house.’
‘It’s very urgent that I find him. I really need to see him or to find out from you where he is now. Believe me, it’s about something of the utmost importance to him.’
‘He doesn’t keep us in the picture,’ prattled Marya Kondratyevna.
‘I’ve been coming here purely on social visits,’ Smerdyakov continued, ‘but even here he keeps on pestering me with endless questions about the master; how things are there, who’s coming and going, and can’t I tell him this or that. Twice he’s threatened to kill me.’
‘What do you mean, kill you?’ cried Alyosha, astonished.
‘He wouldn’t think twice about it, what with his character, which you had the pleasure of observing for yourself yesterday. “If”, he says to me, “you let Agrafena Aleksandrovna slip past and she spends the night here, you’re as good as dead.” I’m scared to death of him, and by rights I should have gone to the local authorities to warn them about him, only that scares me even more. God knows what he might do.’
‘The other day he said to him, “I’ll grind you in a mortar”,’ added Marya Kondratyevna.
‘Well, if he said that, perhaps it’s just talk…’, remarked Alyosha. ‘If I could only see him for a second I could tackle him about it…’
‘There’s only one thing I can tell you,’ said Smerdyakov, as if he had suddenly come to a decision. ‘I come here out of normal neighbourly friendliness; after all, why shouldn’t I? On the other hand, Ivan Fyodorovich sent me before daybreak today to Dmitry Fyodorovich at his rooms in Ozernaya Street, no letter or anything, to tell him myself to be sure to come to this inn on the square to have lunch with him. I went, but I didn’t find Dmitry Fyodorovich at home, and it was only eight o’clock. “He was here,” they said, “but he’s gone out”—those were the exact words the landlord and his wife used. It looks as if there’s some sort of plot between your two brothers. Perhaps right now, at this very minute, he’s sitting in that inn with Ivan Fyodorovich, since Ivan Fyodorovich hasn’t been home for lunch, and Fyodor Pavlovich lunched alone an hour ago and is now taking a nap. But I beg you, don’t say anything to him about me or about what I’ve told you; don’t say anything, otherwise he’s sure to kill me.’
‘Ivan invited Dmitry to come to the inn?’ Alyosha queried quickly.
‘Exactly.’
‘To The Stolichny Gorod, the inn on the square?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘That’s quite possible,’ exclaimed Alyosha in great excitement. ‘Thank you, Smerdyakov, you’ve been very helpful. I’ll go there straight away.’
‘Don’t let on I told you,’ Smerdyakov called after him.
‘Oh no, I’ll turn up at the inn as if by chance, don’t worry.’
‘Where are you going? I’ll open the gate for you,’ cried Marya Kondratyevna.
‘No, it’s quicker this way; I’ll go over the fence again.’
The news had really shaken Alyosha. He hurried to the inn. It would be unseemly for him to enter the inn in his cassock, but he could enquire at the entrance and get someone to fetch them. However, no sooner had he reached the inn than a window opened and Ivan himself called down to him.
‘Alyosha, can you come up or not? I’d be really grateful.’
‘Of course I can, but what about my cassock?’
‘I’m in a private room, go round to the front and I’ll come down and meet you…’
A minute later, Alyosha was sitting with his brother. Ivan was alone, eating his lunch.
3
THE BROTHERS GET TO KNOW EACH OTHER
IVAN was not in a private room, however. It was merely an alcove by the window, partitioned off by a screen, but all the same anyone sitting behind the screen could not be seen from the room. This was the first room one encountered on entering the inn, and it had a dresser against the side wall. Waiters dashed through it every minute or so. As for the customers, there was only one old man, a retired soldier, drinking tea in a corner. But in the other rooms there was all the normal bustle of an inn; one could hear orders being shouted, beer bottles being opened, the click of billiard balls, and the droning of a harmonium. Alyosha knew that Ivan hardly ever came to this inn and that he did not normally frequent inns. Therefore he was here, it seemed to him, for a prearranged meeting with Dmitry. Only Dmitry was not there.
‘Shall I order you some fish soup or something? You can’t live by tea alone,’ said Ivan, evidently extremely pleased to have enticed Alyosha to enter the inn. He himself had already finished his lunch and was drinking tea.
‘I’ll have some fish soup and then some tea; I’m starving,’ said Alyosha cheerfully.
‘And some cherry preserve? It’s on the menu here. Do you remember how you used to love cherry preserve at Polyonov’s when you were little?’
‘Fancy you remembering that! Yes, let’s have some preserve, I’m still partial to it.’
Ivan rang for the waiter and ordered fish soup, tea, and preserve.
‘I remember everything, Alyosha, I remember you up to the age of eleven, I was nearly fifteen then. Fifteen and eleven, that’s such a big difference that brothers are never friends at that age. I don’t even know if I liked you. When I went away to Moscow I didn’t even think about you for the first few years. Then when you came to Moscow we met only once, I think, somewhere. And now I’ve been living here for over three months and we haven’t exchanged a word. I’m leaving tomorrow and I was just thinking, sitting here, “When can I see him to say goodbye?” and just at that moment you happened to turn up.’
‘And did you really want to see me?’
‘Very much. I want to get to know you at last, and you to get to know me. And then, adieu. In my opinion the best time to get to know someone is before a farewell. I’ve seen how you looked at me these last three months; there was a kind of perpetual anticipation in your eyes, and that’s what I couldn’t bear; that’s why I avoided you. But in the end I learned to respect you; “The boy’s got guts,” I said to myself. Mind you, I may laugh at it now, but I’m talking seriously. Well, you have got guts, haven’t you? I like people who stand by their beliefs, whatever they are, even if they’re little scallywags like you. In the end your expectant gaze no longer irritated me; on the contrary, in the end I even got to like your expectant gaze… I think for some reason you’re fond of me, Alyosha, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, I am, Ivan. Dmitry says about you, “Ivan is the soul of discretion.” I always say, “Ivan’s an enigma.” You’re still an enigma to me, but there’s one thing about you that I’ve worked out, but only since this morning!’
‘What’s that?’ laughed Ivan.
‘You won’t be angry?’ Alyosha laughed too.
‘No, go on.’
‘That you’re just the same as any other young man of twenty-three, just as young and impressionable, just as wholesome and splendid, just a fledgling! Well, have I offended you very much?’
‘On the contrary, I’m struck by the coincidence,’ exclaimed Ivan warmly and cheerfully. ‘Would you believe it, ever since we saw Katerina Ivanovna this morning, I haven’t stopped thinking about it, about the way I behaved just like a na…ve twenty-three-year-old, and suddenly, as if you’d guessed it, you came straight out with it. I was just sitting here, and you know what I was thinking to myself? “Take away my belief in life, my trust in a good woman, destroy my faith in the order of things, convince me that, on the contrary, everything is just chaos, disordered, damned, and perhaps diabolical, drive me to despair at the thought of losing all earthly hope—I shall still want to go on living; having put this goblet to my lips, I shall not tear them away until I have drained it! Or rather, when I’m getting on for thirty, I shall probably throw the gobl
et away even if I haven’t emptied it, and leave for good… I don’t know where. But until I’m thirty, of one thing I’m sure, my youth will triumph over everything—all disillusion, all revulsion against life, everything. I’ve asked myself many times whether there’s a despair on earth that’s powerful enough to extinguish this frenzied, perhaps even indecent, thirst for life in me, and I decided that apparently there was not, at least not before the age of thirty, and then I’ll no longer want it, or so it seems to me. Some feeble, snivelling moralists, especially poets, condemn this thirst for life as vile. This trait, this thirst for life, is in one sense, it’s true, a typical Karamazov trait—in spite of everything you have it too—but why should it be vile? A very strong centripetal force exists on our planet, Alyosha. I want to live, and I do live, although it’s against all logic. I may not believe in an ordered world, but the tiny, sticky leaf-buds of spring are dear to me, the blue sky is dear to me, one or two people are dear to me—though for the life of me I sometimes really wonder why—and so is the occasional human achievement, which perhaps I long ago ceased to believe in, but nevertheless still can’t help respecting from sheer nostalgia. Here’s your soup, tuck in. The fish soup’s excellent, the food’s good here. I want to take a trip to Europe, Alyosha, and I shall leave straight from here. I know I shall be going to a graveyard, but to the dearest, most beloved graveyard! The beloved departed lie there, each gravestone testifying to such splendid past lives, to such passionate, fervent belief in their achievements, in their truth, in their struggles and in their learning, that I know already that I shall fall to my knees and kiss those stones and weep over them—and all the time knowing in my heart that it has long been a graveyard and nothing more. And I shall weep, not from despair, but simply out of happiness that I’m shedding tears. I shall be intoxicated by my own emotions. I love the tiny, sticky spring leaves, the blue sky, so there it is! There’s no sense in it, no logic, it’s instinct, it’s a gut feeling; one loves one’s first youthful impulses… Do you understand anything of my nonsense, Alyosha, or not?’ Ivan laughed suddenly.
The Karamazov Brothers Page 36
