Текст книги "Demons"
Автор книги: Федор Достоевский
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For Sofya Matveevna there followed two of the most frightful days of her life; even now she shudders to recall them. Stepan Trofimovich became so seriously ill that he could not go on the steamer, which this time came on schedule at two o'clock in the afternoon; to leave him alone was more than she could do, so she did not go to Spasov either. By her account, he was even very glad when the steamer left.
"Well, that's fine, that's wonderful," he muttered from the bed, "and I kept being afraid we would have to go. It's so nice here, it's better than anywhere... You won't leave me? Oh, you haven't left me!"
"Here," however, was not so nice at all. He did not want to know anything about her difficulties; his head was filled with nothing but fantasies. His illness he considered a fleeting thing, a trifle, and he gave no thought to it, but thought only of how they would go and sell "these books." He asked her to read him the Gospel.
"It's a long time since I've read it ... in the original. Otherwise someone may ask and I'll make a mistake; one must also be prepared, after all."
She sat down beside him and opened the book.
"You read beautifully," he interrupted her at the very first line. "I see, I see, I was not mistaken!" he added obscurely but rapturously. And generally he was in a constant state of rapture. She read the Sermon on the Mount. [204]
"Assez, assez, mon enfant, [ccv] enough... You can't think that thatis not enough!"
And he closed his eyes strengthlessly. He was very weak, but did not yet lose consciousness. Sofya Matveevna moved to get up, thinking he wanted to sleep. But he stopped her:
"My friend, I've been lying all my life. Even when I was telling the truth. I never spoke for the truth, but only for myself, I knew that before, but only now do I see... Oh, where are those friends whom I have insulted with my friendship all my life? And everyone, everyone! Savez-vous, [ccvi] perhaps I'm lying now; certainly I'm also lying now. The worst of it is that I believe myself when I lie. The most difficult thing in life is to live and not lie... and ... and not believe one's own lie, yes, yes, that's precisely it! But wait, that's all for later... You and I together, together!" he added with enthusiasm.
"Stepan Trofimovich," Sofya Matveevna asked timidly, "shouldn't we send to the 'big town' for a doctor?"
He was terribly struck.
"What for? Est-ce que je suis si malade? Mais rien de sérieux. [ccvii] And what do we need strangers for? People will find out and—what will happen then? No, no, no strangers, you and I together, together!"
"You know," he said after a silence, "read me something more, just so, don't choose, something, wherever your eye falls."
Sofya Matveevna opened and started to read.
"Wherever it opens, wherever it happens to open," he repeated.
“‘And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write...’” [205]
"What? What is that? From where?"
"It's from the Apocalypse."
" O, je m'en souviens, oui, l'Apocalypse. Lisez, lisez, [ccviii] I want to divine our future by the book, I want to know what comes out; read from the angel, from the angel..."
“‘And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write: The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God's creation. I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot! Would that you were cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew you out of my mouth. For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing; not knowing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.’”
"That. . . and that is in your book!" he exclaimed, flashing his eyes and raising himself from his pillow. "I never knew that great place! Do you hear: sooner cold, sooner cold than lukewarm, than onlylukewarm. Oh, I'll prove to them. Only don't leave me, don't leave me alone! We'll prove to them, we'll prove to them!"
"No, I won't leave you, Stepan Trofimovich, I'll never leave you, sir!" she seized his hands and pressed them in hers, bringing them to her heart, looking at him with tears in her eyes. ("I pitied him so very much at that moment," she recounted later.) His lips quivered as if convulsively.
"However, Stepan Trofimovich, what are we going to do, sir?
Shouldn't we let some one of your acquaintances know, or maybe your relations?"
But at this he became so frightened that she regretted mentioning it. He implored her, trembling and shaking, not to send for anyone, not to do anything; he made her promise, he insisted: "No one, no one! We alone, only alone, nous partirons ensemble." [ccix]
Another very bad thing was that the proprietors also began to worry, grumbling and pestering Sofya Matveevna. She paid them and made sure they saw she had money; this softened them for a time; but the proprietor demanded Stepan Trofimovich's "identity." With a haughty smile the sick man pointed to his little bag; in it Sofya Matveevna found the certificate of his resignation or something of the sort, with which he had lived all his life. The proprietor would not leave off and said that "he ought to be put someplace or other, because we're not a hospital, and if he dies there might be consequences; we'd all be in for it." Sofya Matveevna tried to speak with him about a doctor, but it turned out that sending to the "big town" would be so expensive that any thought of a doctor had, of course, to be abandoned. In anguish she went back to her patient. Stepan Trofimovich was growing weaker and weaker.
"Now read me one more passage... about the swine," he said suddenly.
"What, sir?" Sofya Matveevna was terribly frightened.
"About the swine... it's there... ces cochons [ccx] ... I remember, demons entered into the swine and they all drowned. You must read it to me; I'll tell you why afterwards. I want to recall it literally. I need it literally."
Sofya Matveevna knew the Gospel well and immediately found in Luke the same passage I have placed as an epigraph to my chronicle. I quote it here again:
"Now a large herd of swine was feeding there on the hillside; and they begged him to let them enter these. So he gave them leave. Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned. When the herdsmen saw what had happened, they fled, and told it in the city and in the country. Then people went out to see what had happened, and they came to Jesus, and found the man from whom the demons had gone, sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. And those who had seen it told them how he who had been possessed with demons was healed."
"My friend," Stepan Trofimovich said in great excitement, "savez-vous,this wonderful and... extraordinary passage has been a stumbling block for me all my life... dans ce livre... so that I have remembered this passage ever since childhood. And now a thought has occurred to me; une comparaison.Terribly many thoughts occur to me now: you see, it's exactly like our Russia. These demons who come out of a sick man and enter into swine—it's all the sores, all the miasmas, all the uncleanness, all the big and little demons accumulated in our great and dear sick man, in our Russia, for centuries, for centuries! Oui, cette Russie que j'aimais toujours. [ccxi] But a great will and a great thought will descend to her from on high, as upon that insane demoniac, and out will come all these demons, all the uncleanness, all the abomination that is festering on the surface... and they will beg of themselves to enter into swine. And perhaps they already have! It is us, us and them, and Petrusha. . . et les autres avec lui, [ccxii] and I, perhaps, first, at the head, and we will rush, insane and raging, from the cliff down into the sea, and all be drowned, and good riddance to us, because that's the most we're fit for. But the sick man will be healed and 'sit at the feet of Jesus'... and everyone will look in amazement... Dear, vous comprendrez après,but it excites me very much now... Vous comprendrez après... Nous comprendrons ensemble, " [ccxiii]
He became delirious and finally lost consciousness. It continued thus all the next day. Sofya Matveevna sat beside him and wept, this being the third night she went almost without sleep, and avoided being seen by the proprietors, who, as she sensed, were already up to something. Deliverance followed only on the third day. That morning Stepan Trofimovich came to, recognized her, and gave her his hand. She crossed herself in hope. He wished to look out the window: "Tiens, un lac," [ccxiv]he said, "ah, my God, I haven't even seen it yet..." At that moment someone's carriage clattered at the front door and a great hubbub arose in the house.
III
It was Varvara Petrovna herself, arriving in a four-place coach-and-four, with two footmen and Darya Pavlovna. The miracle had come about simply: Anisim, dying of curiosity, on his arrival in town, did after all go the next day to Varvara Petrovna's house, and blabbed to the servants that he had met Stepan Trofimovich alone in a village, that peasants had seen him on the high road, alone, on foot, and that he had set out for Spasov, by way of Ustyevo, together with Sofya Matveevna. Since Varvara Petrovna, for her part, was already terribly worried, and was searching as well as she could for her runaway friend, she was informed at once about Anisim. Having listened to him and, chiefly, to the details of the departure for Ustyevo together with some Sofya Matveevna in the same britzka, she instantly got ready and, following the still warm tracks, came rolling into Ustyevo herself. She knew nothing as yet of his illness.
Her stern and commanding voice rang out; even the proprietors quailed. She had stopped just to make inquiries and find things out, being certain that Stepan Trofimovich had long been in Spasov; learning that he was there and ill, she worriedly entered the cottage.
"Well, where is he? Ah, it's you!" she cried, seeing Sofya Matveevna, who just at that moment appeared in the doorway of the second room. "I could tell by your shameless face that it was you. Out, vile creature! Don't let a trace of her remain in the house! Drive her out, or else, my girl, I'll tuck you away in jail for good. Guard her meanwhile in another house. She already once spent time in jail in our town, and she can spend some more. And I ask you, landlord, not to dare let anyone in while I'm here. I am General Stavrogin's widow and I am taking the whole house. And you, my dearest, will account to me for everything."
The familiar sounds shocked Stepan Trofimovich. He trembled. But she had already come behind the partition. Flashing her eyes, she drew up a chair with her foot and, sitting back in it, shouted to Dasha:
"Go out for a while, stay with the proprietors. What is this curiosity? And do close the door tightly behind you."
For some time she peered silently and with a sort of predatory look into his frightened face.
"Well, how are you doing, Stepan Trofimovich? Had a nice little spree?" suddenly burst from her with furious irony.
''Chère," Stepan Trofimovich babbled, hardly aware of himself, "I've come to know Russian real life ... Et je prêcherai l'Évangile ..." [ccxv]
"Oh, shameless, ignoble man!" she suddenly cried out, clasping her hands. "It wasn't enough for you to disgrace me, you had to get mixed up with... Oh, you old, shameless profligate!"
"Chère..."
His voice broke off, and he was unable to utter a sound, but only stared, his eyes popping with terror.
"What is she?"
"C'est un ange... C'était plus qu'un ange pour moi, [ccxvi] all night she... Oh, don't shout, don't frighten her, chère, chère..."
Varvara Petrovna suddenly jumped up from her chair with a clatter; her frightened cry rang out: "Water, water!" Though he came to, she was still trembling from fear and, pale, was looking at his distorted face: only here for the first time did she get some idea of the extent of his illness.
"Darya," she suddenly started whispering to Darya Pavlovna, "send immediately for the doctor, for Salzfisch; let Yegorych go at once; let him hire horses here, and take another coach from town. They must be here by nighttime."
Dasha rushed to carry out the order. Stepan Trofimovich went on staring with the same popping, frightened eyes; his white lips were trembling.
"Wait, Stepan Trofimovich, wait, my dearest," she was coaxing him like a child, "just wait, wait, Darya will come back and... Ah, my God, mistress, mistress, you come at least, my dear!"
In her impatience she ran to the mistress herself.
"Right now, this minute, that womanmust come back. Bring her back, bring her back!"
Fortunately, Sofya Matveevna had not yet had time to get far from the house and was just going out the gate with her bag and bundle. They brought her back. She was so frightened that her legs and hands even shook. Varvara Petrovna seized her by the hand, like a hawk seizing a chicken, and dragged her impetuously to Stepan Trofimovich.
"Well, here she is for you. I didn't eat her. You must have thought I'd simply eaten her."
Stepan Trofimovich seized Varvara Petrovna by the hand, brought it to his eyes, and dissolved in tears, sobbing morbidly, fitfully.
"Well, calm yourself, calm yourself, my dear, my dearest. Ah, my God, but do ca-a-alm yourself!" she cried furiously. "Oh, tormentor, tormentor, my eternal tormentor!"
"Dear," Stepan Trofimovich finally murmured, addressing Sofya Matveevna, "stay out there, dear, I want to say something here..."
Sofya Matveevna hastened out at once.
"Chérie, chérie..." he was suffocating.
"Wait before you talk, Stepan Trofimovich, wait a little and rest meanwhile. Here's water. Wa-a-ait, I said!"
She sat down on the chair again. Stepan Trofimovich held her firmly by the hand. For a long time she would not let him talk. He brought her hand to his lips and began to kiss it. She clenched her teeth, looking off into a corner.
"Je vous aimais!" [ccxvii] escaped him finally. She had never heard such a word from him, spoken in such a way.
"Hm," she grunted in reply.
"je vous aimais toute ma vie... vingt ans!" [ccxviii]
She remained silent—two minutes, three. "And sprayed yourself with perfume, getting ready for Dasha..." she suddenly said in a terrible whisper. Stepan Trofimovich simply froze.
"Put on a new tie..." Again about two minutes of silence.
"Remember the little cigar?"
"My friend," he began mumbling in terror.
"The little cigar, in the evening, by the window ... in the moonlight... after the gazebo ... in Skvoreshniki? Do you remember? Do you remember?" she jumped up from her place, seizing his pillow by two corners and shaking his head together with it. "Do you remember, you empty, empty, inglorious, fainthearted, eternally, eternally empty man!" she spat out in her furious whisper, keeping herself from shouting. Finally she dropped him and fell onto the chair, covering her face with her hands. "Enough!" she snapped, straightening up. "Twenty years are gone, there's no bringing them back; I'm a fool, too."
"Je vous aimais," he again clasped his hands.
"Why keep at me with your aimais, aimais!Enough!" she jumped up again. "And if you don't go to sleep right now, I'll... You need rest; go to sleep, go to sleep right now, close your eyes. Ah, my God, maybe he wants to have lunch! What do you eat? What does he eat? Ah, my God, where's that woman? Where is she?"
A hubbub began. But Stepan Trofimovich murmured in a weak voice that he would indeed like to sleep for une heure,and then– un bouillon, un thé... enfin, il est si heureux. [ccxix] He lay back and indeed seemed to fall asleep (he was probably pretending). Varvara Petrovna waited a little and then tiptoed out from behind the partition.
She sat down in the proprietors' room, chased the proprietors out, and ordered Dasha to bring her that woman.A serious interrogation began.
"Now, my girl, tell me all the details; sit beside me, so. Well?"
"I met Stepan Trofimovich..."
"Wait, stop. I warn you that if you lie or hold anything back, I'll dig you up out of the ground. Well?"
"Stepan Trofimovich and I ... as soon as I came to Khatovo, ma'am..." Sofya Matveevna was almost suffocating...
"Wait, stop, be quiet; what's all this stammering? First of all, what sort of bird are you?"
The woman told her haphazardly, though in the briefest terms, about herself, beginning with Sebastopol. Varvara Petrovna listened silently, sitting straight-backed on her chair, looking sternly and steadily straight into the narrator's eyes.
"Why are you so cowed? Why do you look at the ground? I like people who look straight and argue with me. Go on."
She finished telling about their meeting, about the books, about how Stepan Trofimovich treated the peasant woman to vodka...
"Right, right, don't leave out the smallest detail," Varvara Petrovna encouraged her. Finally, she told of how they had set off and how Stepan Trofimovich had kept talking, "already completely sick, ma'am," and even spent several hours here telling her his whole life from the very first beginning.
"Tell me about the life."
Sofya Matveevna suddenly faltered and was completely nonplussed.
"I couldn't say anything about that, ma'am," she spoke all but in tears, "and, besides, I hardly understood anything."
"Lies—it's impossible that you understood nothing at all."
"He was telling for a long time about some black-haired noble lady, ma'am," Sofya Matveevna blushed terribly, incidentally noticing Varvara Petrovna's fair hair and her total lack of resemblance to the "brunette."
"Black-haired? What, precisely? Speak!"
"How this noble lady was very much in love with him, ma'am, all her life, a whole twenty years; but she didn't dare open her heart and was ashamed before him, because she was very portly, ma'am..."
"Fool!" Varvara Petrovna snapped out, pensively but resolutely.
Sofya Matveevna was now completely in tears.
"I can't tell anything right about it, because I myself was in great fear for him and couldn't understand him, since he's such an intelligent man..."
"It's not for a crow like you to judge his intelligence. Did he offer you his hand?"
The narrator trembled.
"Did he fall in love with you? Speak! He offered you his hand?" Varvara Petrovna yelled.
"That's nearly how it was, ma'am," she sobbed. "Only I took it all for nothing, on account of his illness," she added firmly, raising her eyes.
"What is your name, name and patronymic?"
"Sofya Matveevna, ma'am."
"Let it be known to you, then, Sofya Matveevna, that he is the paltriest, the emptiest little man... Lord, Lord! Do you take me for some vile creature?"
The woman goggled her eyes.
"A vile creature, a tyrant? Who ruined his life?"
"How could that be, ma'am, seeing you yourself are weeping?"
Varvara Petrovna did indeed have tears in her eyes.
"Well, sit down, sit down, don't be frightened. Look me in the eyes again, straight; why are you blushing? Dasha, come here, look at her: what do you think, is her heart pure?..."
And to Sofya Matveevna's surprise, and perhaps still greater fright, she suddenly patted her on the cheek.
"Only it's a pity you're a fool. Too great a fool for your years. Very well, my dear, I shall concern myself with you. I see that this is all nonsense. Stay nearby for the time being, lodgings will be rented, and I'll provide board and everything... till I ask for you."
The frightened Sofya Matveevna tried to peep that she must hurry.
"You don't have to hurry anywhere. I'm buying all your books, and you can stay here. Quiet, no excuses. After all, if I hadn't come, you wouldn't have left him, would you?"
"I wouldn't have left him for anything, ma'am," Sofya Matveevna said softly and firmly, wiping her eyes.
It was late at night when Dr. Salzfisch was brought. He was a rather venerable old man, and quite an experienced practitioner, who had recently lost his official position in our town as the result of some ambitious quarrel with his superiors. Varvara Petrovna had instantly begun "patronizing" him with all her might. He examined the patient attentively, asked questions, and cautiously announced to Varvara Petrovna that the "sufferer's" condition was quite doubtful, owing to the occurrence of a complication in the illness, and that one must expect "even all the worst." Varvara Petrovna, who in twenty years had grown unaccustomed even to thinking that anything serious and decisive could proceed from Stepan Trofimovich personally, was deeply shaken, and even turned pale:
"Is there really no hope?"
"How could it be that there is by no means not any hope at all, but..."
She did not go to bed that night and could barely wait until morning. As soon as the sick man opened his eyes and regained consciousness (he had been conscious all the while, though he was growing weaker by the hour), she accosted him with the most resolute air:
"Stepan Trofimovich, one must foresee everything. I have sent for a priest. You have to fulfill your duty..."
Knowing his convictions, she greatly feared a refusal. He looked at her in surprise.
"Nonsense, nonsense!" she cried out, thinking he was already refusing. "This is no time for mischief. Enough foolery."
"But... am I really so ill?"
He pensively agreed. And, generally, I was greatly surprised to learn afterwards from Varvara Petrovna that he was not in the least afraid of death. Perhaps he simply did not believe it and continued to regard his illness as a trifle.
He confessed and took communion quite willingly. Everyone, including Sofya Matveevna, and even the servants, came to congratulate him on receiving the Holy Sacrament. Everyone to a man wept restrainedly, looking at his pinched and worn-out face and his pale, quivering lips.
"Oui, mes amis,and I am only surprised that you are... fussing so. Tomorrow I'll probably get up and we'll ... set off ... Toute cette cérémonie [ccxx] ...which, to be sure, I give all its due... has been..."
"I beg you, father, to be sure to stay with the sick man," Varvara Petrovna quickly stopped the priest, who was already taking off his vestments. "As soon as tea has been served, I beg you to start talking immediately about things divine, to bolster his faith."
The priest started to speak; everyone was sitting or standing near the sick man's bed.
"In our sinful times," the priest began smoothly, a cup of tea in his hands, "faith in the Most High is the only refuge for mankind in all the trials and tribulations of life, as well as in the hope of eternal bliss promised to the righteous..."
Stepan Trofimovich grew all animated, as it were; a subtle smile flitted across his lips.
"Mon pire, je vous remercie, et vous êtes bien bon, mais ..." [ccxxi]
"No, no, no mais,no maisat all!" Varvara Petrovna exclaimed, leaping from her chair. "Father," she turned to the priest, "this, this is the sort of man, the sort of man ... he'll have to be reconfessed again in an hour. That's the sort of man he is!"
Stepan Trofimovich smiled restrainedly.
"My friends," he said, "God is necessary for me if only because he is the one being who can be loved eternally..."
Either he had really come to believe, or the majestic ceremony of the performed sacrament had shaken him and aroused the artistic receptivity of his nature, but he uttered firmly and, they say, with great feeling, a few words which went directly against many of his former convictions.
"My immortality is necessary if only because God will not want to do an injustice and utterly extinguish the fire of love for him once kindled in my heart. And what is more precious than love? Love is higher than being, love is the crown of being, and is it possible for being not to bow before it? If I have come to love him and rejoice in my love—is it possible that he should extinguish both me and my joy and turn us to naught? If there is God, then I am immortal! Voilà ma profession de foi.” [ccxxii]
"There is God, Stepan Trofimovich, I assure you there is," Varvara Petrovna implored, "give up, drop all your silliness at least once in your life!" (It seems she had not quite understood his profession de foi. )
"My friend," he was growing more and more animated, though his voice broke frequently, "my friend, when I understood ... that turned cheek, I... right then I also understood something else... J'ai menti toute ma vie, [ccxxiii] all, all my life! and I'd like... tomorrow, though... Tomorrow we shall all set off."
Varvara Petrovna began to weep. He was searching for someone with his eyes.
"She's here, here she is!" she seized Sofya Matveevna by the hand and brought her to him. He smiled tenderly.
"Oh, I wish so much to live again!" he exclaimed, with an extraordinary rush of energy. "Each minute, each instant of life should be blessedness for man... they should, surely they should! It is man's own duty to arrange it so; it is his law—a hidden but a surely existing one ... Oh, I wish to see Petrusha ... and all of them ... and Shatov!"
I will note that neither Darya Pavlovna, nor Varvara Petrovna, nor even Salzfisch, the latest to come from town, knew anything yet about Shatov.
Stepan Trofimovich was growing more and more excited, morbidly so, beyond his strength.
"The one constant thought that there exists something immeasurably more just and happy than I, fills the whole of me with immeasurable tenderness and—glory—oh, whoever I am, whatever I do! Far more than his own happiness, it is necessary for a man to know and believe every moment that there is somewhere a perfect and peaceful happiness, for everyone and for everything... The whole law of human existence consists in nothing other than a man's always being able to bow before the immeasurably great. If people are deprived of the immeasurably great, they will not live and will die in despair. The immeasurable and infinite is as necessary for man as the small planet he inhabits ... My friends, all, all of you: long live the Great Thought! The eternal, immeasurable Thought! For every man, whoever he is, it is necessary to bow before that which is the Great Thought. Even the stupidest man needs at least something great. Petrusha... Oh, how I want to see them all again! They don't know, they don't know that they, too, have in them the same eternal Great Thought!"
Dr. Salzfisch had not been present at the ceremony. Coming in suddenly, he was horrified and dispersed the gathering, insisting that the sick man should not be disturbed.
Stepan Trofimovich died three days later, by then completely unconscious. He somehow quietly went out, like a burnt-down candle. Varvara Petrovna, after having the funeral service performed there, transferred the body of her poor friend to Skvoreshniki. His grave is within the churchyard and is already covered with a marble slab. The inscription and railing have been left till spring.
In all, Varvara Petrovna's absence from town had lasted some eight days. Along with her, sitting beside her in the carriage, there also arrived Sofya Matveevna, who seemed to have settled with her for good. I will note that as soon as Stepan Trofimovich lost consciousness (that same morning), Varvara Petrovna immediately had Sofya Matveevna removed again, out of the cottage entirely, and tended the sick man herself, alone to the end; but the moment he gave up the ghost, she immediately summoned her. She refused to listen to any objections, terribly frightened though the woman was by her offer (her order, rather) to settle in Skvoreshniki for good.
"That's all nonsense! I myself will go around selling Gospels with you. I have no one in the world now!"
"You do have a son, however," Salzfisch attempted to observe. "I have no son!" Varvara Petrovna snapped out—as if prophetically.
