Collected Shorter Fiction, Volume 1

by Leo Tolstoy

  While Nikita was making up a bed we rose, and again, in the dark, began walking up and down the battery. Guskov must really have had a very weak head, for after only two cups of vodka and two glasses of wine he was unsteady on his feet. When we had walked away from the candle I noticed that he put the ten-ruble note, which he had held in his hand all through the foregoing conversation, back into his pocket, trying not to let me see it. He continued to say that he felt he might yet rise if he had a man like myself to take an interest in him.

  We were about to enter the tent to go to bed when suddenly a cannon-ball whistled over us and struck into the ground not far off. It was very strange: the quiet, sleeping camp, our conversation – and suddenly the enemy’s ball flying, God knows whence, right in among our tents: so strange that it was some time before I could realize what had happened. But one of our soldiers, Andreev, who was pacing up and down the battery on guard, came towards me.

  ‘He’s sneaked within range. There’s the place he fired from,’ remarked he.

  ‘The Captain must be roused,’ said I, and glanced at Guskov.

  He had crouched nearly to the earth and stammered, trying to say something, ‘This … this … is unple … this is … most … absurd.’ He said no more, and I did not see how and where he suddenly vanished.

  In the Captain’s tent a candle was lit and we heard him coughing, as he always did on waking; but he soon appeared, demanding the linstock to light his little pipe with.

  ‘What’s the matter, old man?’ said he, smiling. ‘It seems I am to have no sleep to-night; first you come with your “fellow from the ranks”, and now it’s Shamyl. What are we going to do? Shall we reply or not? Nothing was mentioned about it in the orders?’

  ‘Nothing at all. There he is again,’ said I; ‘and this time with two guns.’

  And, in fact, before us, a little to the right, two fires were seen in the darkness like a pair of eyes, and then a ball flew past, as well as an empty shell, probably one of our own returned to us – which gave a loud and shrill whistle. The soldiers crept out of the neighbouring tents and could be heard clearing their throats, stretching themselves, and talking.

  ‘Hear him a-whistling through the fuse-hole just like a nightingale!’ remarked an artilleryman.

  ‘Call Nikita!’ said the Captain, with his usual kindly banter. ‘Nikita, don’t go hiding yourself; come and listen to the mountain nightingales.’

  ‘Why not, y’r honour?’ said Nikita, as he came up and stood by the Captain. ‘I have seen them nightingales and am not afraid of ’em; but there’s that guest who was here a moment ago drinking your wine, he cut his sticks soon enough when he heard ’em; went past our tent like a ball, doubled up like some animal.’

  ‘Well, someone must ride over to the Chief of Artillery,’ said the Captain to me in a grave and authoritative tone, ‘to ask whether we are to reply to the shots or not. We can’t hit anything, but we can shoot for all that. Be so good as to go and ask. Order a horse to be saddled, you’ll get there quicker; take my Polkan, if you like.’

  Five minutes later the horse was brought, and I started to find the Chief of Artillery.

  ‘Mind, the watchword is pole,’ whispered the careful Captain, ‘or you won’t be allowed to pass the cordon.’

  It was barely half a mile to where the Chief of Artillery was stationed. The whole way lay among tents. As soon as I had left the light of our own camp-fires behind, it was so dark that I could not even see my horse’s ears – only the camp-fires, which seemed now very near, now very far away, flickered before my eyes. Having given the horse the rein and let him take his own course for a little, I began to distinguish the white four-cornered tents, and then the black ruts of the road. Half an hour later, after having asked my way some three or four times, twice stumbled over tent-pegs and been sworn at each time from within the tent, and after having been twice stopped by sentries, I reached the Chief of Artillery at last.

  While on my way I heard two more shots fired at our camp, but they did not reach the place where the staff was stationed. The Chief of Artillery ordered not to fire, especially now that the enemy had ceased firing; so I returned, leading my horse and making my way on foot among the infantry tents. More than once, while passing a soldier’s tent in which I saw a light, I slackened my pace to listen to a tale told by some wag, or to a book read out by some ‘literate’ person, to whom a whole company listened, tightly packed inside and crowding outside the tent and now and then interrupting the reader with their remarks, or I caught merely some scrap of conversation about an expedition, about home, or about the officers.

  Passing one of the tents of the 3rd Battalion, I heard Guskov’s loud voice speaking very merrily and confidently. He was answered by young voices, not of privates but of gentlemen, as merry as his own. This was evidently a cadet’s or sergeant-major’s tent. I stopped.

  ‘I have long known him,’ Guskov was saying. ‘When I was in Petersburg he often came to see me and I visited him. He belonged to very good society.’

  ‘Whom are you talking about?’ asked a tipsy voice.

  ‘About the prince,’ answered Guskov. ‘We are related, you know; more than that, we are old friends. You know, gentlemen, it is a good thing to have such an acquaintance. He is awfully rich, you see. A hundred rubles is nothing to him; so I’ve taken a little off him till my sister sends me some.’

  ‘Well, then send …’

  ‘All right! … Savelich, old boy!’ came Guskov’s voice from the tent as he drew near to the entrance; ‘here are ten rubles, go to the canteen and get two bottles of Kahetinsky.… What else, gentlemen? Speak up!’ and Guskov, bare-headed and with hair dishevelled, reeled out of the tent. Throwing open his sheepskin and thrusting his hands into the pockets of his greyish trousers, he stopped at the entrance. Though he was in the light and I in the dark, I trembled with fear lest he should see me, and moved on, trying not to make a noise.

  ‘Who’s there?’ shouted Guskov at me in a perfectly tipsy voice. The cold air evidently had an effect on him. ‘What devil is prowling about there with a horse?’

  I did not reply, and silently found my way out on to the road.

  1 Gorodki is a game in which short, thick sticks are arranged in certain figures within squares. Each side has its own square, and each player in turn throws a stick to try to clear out the enemy’s square. The side wins which first accomplishes this with the six figures in which the sticks are successively arranged.

  2 Run of ill luck.

  3 ‘The luck has turned.’

  4 ‘Yes, my dear fellow, the days follow, but do not resemble one another.’

  5 Kabardá is a district in the Térek Territory of the Caucasus, and Kabardá horses are famous for their powers of endurance.

  6 A position in the world.

  7 ‘My father allowed me 10,000 rubles a year.’

  8 ‘I was received in the best society of Petersburg; I could aspire …’

  9 ‘But in particular I spoke the society jargon.’

  10 ‘Was that liaison with Mme D—.’

  11 ‘My father; you will have heard him spoken of.’

  12 ‘He disinherited me.’

  13 ‘He has been consistent.’

  14 Camp life.

  15 ‘I should be seen under fire.’

  16 ‘You know, with the prestige that misfortune gives.’

  17 ‘(But) what a disenchantment!’

  18 ‘I hope that is saying a good deal.’

  19 ‘You can have no idea of what I had to suffer.’

  20 ‘With the small means I had, I lacked everything.’

  21 ‘With my pride, I wrote to my father.’

  22 ‘Have you a cigarette?’

  23 ‘Who is the son of my father’s steward.’

  24 ‘I have been seen under fire.’

  25 War, camp-life.

  26 ‘It is dreadful, it is killing.’

  27 ‘Quite frankly.’

  28 ‘You are above that
[i.e. above despising me for my misfortunes], my dear fellow, I have not a halfpenny.’

  29 ‘Can you lend me ten rubles?’

  30 ‘Do not trouble yourself.’

  31 Reversing.

  32 From light-heartedness.

  33 Women of good breeding.

  34 ‘And I have not a strong head.’

  35 Morskaya – one of the best streets in Petersburg.

  36 On the ground floor.

  37 ‘In the morning I went out.’

  38 ‘It must be admitted that she was a ravishing woman.’

  39 ‘Always gay, always loving.’

  40 ‘And I have much to reproach myself with.’

  41 ‘I made her suffer, often.’

  42 ‘I am broken.’

  43 Dignity in misfortune.

  44 ‘Has stained me.’

  45 ‘I cannot.’

  46 ‘I have shown it.’

  LUCERNE

  FROM PRINCE NEKHLYÚDOV’S MEMOIRS

  LUCERNE

  8th July, 1857.

  LAST night I arrived at Lucerne, and put up at the Schweizerhof, the best hotel.

  Lucerne, an ancient town and the capital of the canton, situated on the shore of the Lake of Lucerne, says Murray, is one of the most romantic places in Switzerland: here three important high roads meet, and it is only one hour by steamboat to Mount Rigi, from which one of the most magnificent views in the world can be seen.

  Whether this be right or not, other guide-books say the same, and so tourists of all nationalities, especially the English, flock there.

  The magnificent five-storeyed Schweizerhof Hotel has been recently erected on the quay, close to the lake at the very place where of old there was a roofed and crooked bridge1 with chapels at its corners and carvings on its beams. Now, thanks to the enormous influx of English people, their needs, their tastes, and their money, the old bridge has been torn down and a granite quay, as straight as a stick, erected, on which straight, rectangular, five-storeyed houses have been built, in front of which two rows of little lindens with stakes to them have been planted, between which the usual small green benches have been placed. This is a promenade, and here Englishwomen wearing Swiss straw hats, and Englishmen in stout and comfortable clothes, walk about enjoying the work they have inspired. Perhaps such quays and houses and lime trees and Englishmen are all very well in some places, but not here amid this strangely majestic and yet inexpressibly genial and harmonious Nature.

  When I went up to my room and opened the window facing the lake I was at first literally blinded and shaken by the beauty of that water, those mountains, and the sky. I felt an inward restlessness and a need to find expression for the emotion that filled my soul to overflowing. At that moment I felt a wish to embrace someone, to hug him closely, to tickle and pinch him – in a word to do something extraordinary to myself and to him.

  It was past six and had rained all day, but was now beginning to clear up. The lake, light-blue like burning sulphur, and dotted with little boats which left vanishing tracks behind them, spread out before my windows motionless, smooth, and apparently convex between its variegated green shores, then passed into the distance where it narrowed between two enormous promontories, and, darkening, leaned against and disappeared among the pile of mountains, clouds, and glaciers, that towered one above the other. In the foreground were the moist, fresh-green, far-stretching shores with their reeds, meadows, gardens, and chalets; further off were dark-green wooded promontories crowned by ruined castles; in the background was the rugged, purple-white distance with its fantastic, rocky, dull-white, snow-covered mountain crests, the whole bathed in the delicate, transparent azure of the air and lit up by warm sunset rays that pierced the torn clouds. Neither on the lake nor on the mountains, nor in the sky, was there a single precise line, or one precise colour, or one unchanging moment: everywhere was motion, irregularity, fantastic shapes, an endless intermingling and variety of shades and lines, and over it all lay tranquillity, softness, unity, and inevitable beauty. And here, before my very window, amid this undefined, confused, unfettered beauty, the straight white line of the quay stretched stupidly and artificially, with its lime trees, their supports, and the green benches – miserable, vulgar human productions which did not blend with the general harmony and beauty as did the distant chalets and ruins, but on the contrary clashed coarsely with it. My eyes continually encountered that dreadfully straight quay, and I felt a desire to push it away or demolish it, as one would wipe off a black smudge that disfigured the nose just under one’s eye. But the embankment with the English people walking about on it remained where it was, and I instinctively tried to find a point of view from which it would not be visible. I found a way to do this, and sat till dinner-time all alone, enjoying the incomplete, but all the more tormentingly sweet feeling one experiences when one gazes in solitude on the beauty of Nature.

  At half-past seven I was called to dinner. In the large, splendidly decorated room on the ground floor two tables were laid for at least a hundred persons. For about three minutes the silent movement of assembling visitors continued – the rustle of women’s dresses, light footsteps, whispered discussions with the very polite and elegant waiters – but at last all the seats were occupied by men and women very well and even richly and generally most immaculately dressed. As usual in Switzerland the majority of the visitors were English, and therefore the chief characteristic of the common table was the strict decorum they regard as an obligation – a reserve not based on pride, but on the absence of any necessity for social intercourse, and on content with the comfortable and agreeable satisfaction of their requirements. On all sides gleamed the whitest of laces, the whitest of collars, the whitest of teeth – natural or artificial – and the whitest of complexions and hands. But the faces, many of them very handsome, expressed only a consciousness of their own well-being and a complete lack of interest in all that surrounded them unless it directly concerned themselves; and the whitest of hands in rings and mittens moved only to adjust a collar, to cut up beef, or to lift a wine glass: no mental emotion was reflected in their movements. Occasionally families would exchange a few words among themselves in subdued voices about the pleasant flavour of this or that dish or wine, or the lovely view from Mount Rigi. Individual tourists, men and women, sat beside one another not even exchanging a look. If occasionally some two among these hundred people spoke to one another it was sure to be about the weather and the ascent of Mount Rigi. Knives and forks moved on the plates with scarcely any sound, food was taken a little at a time, peas and other vegetables were invariably eaten with a fork. The waiters, involuntarily subdued by the general silence, asked in a whisper what wine you would take. At such dinners I always feel depressed, uncomfortable, and at last melancholy. I always feel as if I were guilty of something and am being punished, as I used to be when, as a child, I was put in a chair when I had been naughty, and ironically told: ‘Rest yourself, my dear!’ while my youthful blood surged in my veins and I heard the merry shouts of my brothers in the next room. Formerly I tried to rebel against the feeling of oppression I experienced during such dinners, but in vain: all those inanimate countenances have an insuperable effect on me and I become similarly inanimate myself. I wish nothing, think nothing, and cease even to observe what is going on. At first I used to try to talk to my neighbours; but except for phrases apparently repeated a hundred thousand times in the same place and by the same people I got no response. And yet not all these frozen people are stupid and unfeeling, on the contrary many of them, no doubt, have an inner life just such as my own, and in many of them it may be much more complex and interesting. Then why do they deprive themselves of one of life’s greatest pleasures – the enjoyment that comes from the intercourse of man with man?

  How different it was in our Paris pension, where some twenty of us, of various nationalities, professions, and dispositions, under the influence of French sociability used to meet at the common table as at a game! There, from one e
nd of the table to the other, conversation, interspersed with jests and puns, even if in broken language, at once became general. There everyone, not troubling how it would sound, said anything that came into his head. There we had our philosopher, our debater, our bel esprit, and our butt, all in common. There immediately after dinner we pushed away the table and, in time and out, danced the polka on the dusty carpet till late in the evening. There, even if we were inclined to flirt and were not very clever or respectable, we were human beings. The Spanish countess with her romantic adventures, the Italian abbé who declaimed the Divine Comedy after dinner, the American doctor who had the entrée to the Tuileries, the young playwright with long hair, and the pianist who, according to her account, had composed the best polka in the world, the unhappy widow who was a beauty and had three rings on every finger – we all treated one another like human beings, in a friendly if superficial manner, and carried away, some of us light, and others sincere and cordial, memories. But of these English at the table d’hôte, I often think as I look at all these silk dresses, laces, ribbons, rings, and pommaded locks, how many live women would be happy and make others happy with these adornments. It is strange to think how many potential friends and lovers – very happy friends and lovers – may be sitting there side by side without knowing it, and, God knows why, will never know it and never give one another the happiness they desire so much and which they might so easily give.

  I began to feel depressed, as always after such a dinner, and without finishing my dessert went in very low spirits to stroll about the town. The narrow, dirty, unlighted streets, the shops closing, the encounters I had with tipsy workmen and with women going bareheaded to fetch water, or others wearing hats who flitted along the walls of the side-streets and continually glanced round, not only did not dispel my ill-humour but even increased it. It had already grown quite dark in the streets when, without looking around me and without any thought in my head, I turned back to the hotel hoping by sleep to rid myself of my dismal frame of mind. I was feeling terribly chilled at heart, lonely and depressed, as sometimes happens without cause to those who have just arrived at a new place.