Текст книги "Notes from Underground"

Автор книги: Fyodor Dostoevsky

Соавторы: Fyodor Dostoevsky
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Once, passing at night by some wretched little tavern, I saw through the lighted window some gentlemen fighting with their cues around the billiard table and one of them being chucked out the window. At another time I would have been filled with loathing; but one of those moments suddenly came over me, and I envied this chucked-out gentleman, envied him so much that I even went into the tavern, into the billiard room: "Perhaps I, too, will have a fight," I thought, "and get chucked out the window myself."

I was not drunk, but what do you want of me – anguish can eat a man into such hysterics! But it came to nothing. I proved incapable even of jumping out the window and left without having had any fight.

From the very first I was brought up short there by a certain officer.

I was standing beside the billiard table, blocking the way unwittingly, and he wanted to pass; he took me by the shoulders and silently – with no warning or explanation – moved me from where I stood to another place, and then passed by as if without noticing. I could even have forgiven a beating, but I simply could not forgive his moving me and in the end just not noticing me.

Devil knows what I'd have given then for a real, more regular quarrel, more decent, more, so to speak, literary! I had been treated like a fly. This officer was a good six feet tall; and I am a short and skinny man. The quarrel, however, was up to me: all I had to do was protest a bit and, of course, I'd be chucked out the window. But I changed my mind and preferred… to efface myself spitefully.

I left the tavern confused and agitated, went straight home, and the next day continued my little debauch still more timidly, downtroddenly, and sadly than before, as if with a tear in my eye – yet I did continue it. Do not think, however, that I turned coward before the officer out of cowardice: in my soul I have never been a coward, though I constantly turned coward in reality, but – don't laugh too quickly, there's an explanation for that; rest assured, I have an explanation for everything.

Oh, if this officer had been one of those who would agree to fight a duel! But no, he was precisely one of those gentlemen (alas, long since vanished) who preferred to set about it with billiard cues, or, like Lieutenant Pirogov in Gogol 5 – by means of the authorities. But they would not fight a duel, and in any case would regard a duel with our sort, the pencil-pushers, as indecent – and they generally regarded dueling as something inconceivable, freethinking, French, while giving ample offense themselves, especially in cases of six-foot-tallness.

I turned coward not from cowardice, but from the most boundless vanity. I was afraid, not of six-foot-tallness, nor of being badly beaten and chucked out the window; I really would have had physical courage enough; what I lacked was sufficient moral courage. I was afraid that none of those present – from the insolent marker to the last putrid and blackhead-covered clerk with a collar of lard who was hanging about there -would understand, and that they would all deride me if I started protesting and talking to them in literary language. Because among us to this day it is impossible to speak of a point of honor – that is, not honor, but a point of honor (point d'honneur) – otherwise than in literary language. In ordinary language there is no mention of a "point of honor." I was quite sure (what a sense of reality, despite all romanticism!) that they would all simply burst with laughter, and the officer would beat me, not simply, that is, inoffensively, but would certainly start kicking me with his knee, driving me in this manner around the billiard table, and only then perhaps have mercy and chuck me out the window. Of course, for me this measly story could not end there. Later I often met this officer in the street and made good note of him. Only I don't know whether he recognized me. Probably not; I conclude that from certain signs. I, however, I – looked at him with spite and hatred, and so it continued… for several years, sirs! My spite even kept strengthening and burgeoning with the years. First I quietly began finding things out about this officer. This was not easy for me, because I had no acquaintances. But once someone called him by his surname in the street while I was following him at a distance, as if tied to him, and so I learned his surname. Another time I trailed him all the way home, and for ten kopecks found out from the caretaker where he lived, on what floor, alone or with someone, and so on – in short, everything that can be learned from a caretaker. Then one morning, though I had never literaturized, it suddenly came into my head to describe this officer in the manner of an espose, as a caricature, in a story. It was a delight to me to write this story. I esposed him, even slandered him a bit; at first I distorted his surname in a way that made it immediately recognizable, but then, on riper reflection, I changed it and sent the story to Fatherland Notes. But there were no esposes yet, and my story wasn't published. 6 I found this quite vexing. There were times when I was simply choking with spite. In the end I decided to challenge my adversary to a duel. I composed a beautiful, attractive letter to him, entreating him to apologize to me; and hinted quite strongly at a duel in case of refusal. The letter was composed in such a way that if the officer had even the slightest notion of "the beautiful and lofty," he could not fail to come running to me, to throw himself on my neck and offer me his friendship. And that would be so nice! What a life we would have, what a life! He would protect me with his dignity; I would ennoble him with my development and, well… ideas, and there could be so much of this or that! Imagine, by then it was already two years since he had offended me, and my challenge was a most outrageous anachronism, in spite of all the cleverness of my letter in explaining away and concealing the anachronism. But, thank God (to this day I thank the Almighty with tears), I did not send my letter. I go cold all over when I recall what might have happened if I had sent it. And suddenly… suddenly I got my revenge in the simplest, the most brilliant way! The brightest idea suddenly dawned on me. Sometimes on holidays I would go to Nevsky Prospect between three and four, and stroll along the sunny side. That is, I by no means went strolling there, but experienced countless torments, humiliations, and risings of bile; that must have been just what I needed. I darted like an eel among the passers-by, in a most uncomely fashion, ceaselessly giving way now to generals, now to cavalry officers and hussars, now to ladies; in those moments I felt convulsive pains in my heart and a hotness in my spine at the mere thought of the measliness of my attire and the measliness and triteness of my darting little figure. This was a torment of torments, a ceaseless, unbearable humiliation from the thought, which would turn into a ceaseless and immediate sensation, of my being a fly before that whole world, a foul, obscene fly – more intelligent, more developed, more noble than everyone else – that went without saying – but a fly, ceaselessly giving way to everyone, humiliated by everyone, insulted by everyone. Why I gathered this torment onto myself, why I went to Nevsky – I don't know, I was simply drawn there at every opportunity.

I was then already beginning to experience the influxes of those pleasures of which I have already spoken in the first chapter. And after the story with the officer, I began to be drawn there even more strongly: it was on Nevsky that I met him most often, it was there that I admired him. He, too, used mostly to go there on holidays. And he, too, swerved out of the way before generals and persons of dignity, and he, too, slipped among them like an eel, but those of our sort, or even better than our sort, he simply crushed; he went straight at them as if there were an empty space before him, and on no occasion gave way to them. I reveled in my spite as I watched him, and… each time spitefully swerved out of his way. It tormented me that even in the street I simply could not be on an equal footing with him. "Why is it invariably you who swerve first?" I kept nagging at myself, in furious hysterics, sometimes waking up, say, between two and three in the morning. "Why precisely you and not him? There's no law that says so, it's not written anywhere? Well, then let it be equal, as is usual when men of delicacy meet: he can yield by half, and you by half, and so you will pass mutually respecting each other." But it was never so, and I still kept swerving, and he did not even notice that I was giving way to him. And then a most astonishing thought suddenly dawned on me. "What," I fancied, "what if I meet him and… do not step aside? Deliberately do not step aside, even if I have to shove him – eh? how will that be?" This bold thought gradually took such possession of me that it left me no peace. I dreamed of it ceaselessly, terribly, and deliberately went more often to Nevsky, to picture more clearly how I was going to do it when I did it. I was in ecstasy. The intention seemed more and more probable and possible to me. "Not really to shove him, of course," I thought, growing kinder in advance from joy, "but just so, simply not to give way, to bump into him, not so very painfully, but so, shoulder against shoulder, only as much as decency warrants, so that exactly as much as he bumps me, I will also bump him." I was, finally, completely decided on it. But the preparations took a very long time. First of all, at the time of the performance one had to look as decent as possible and see to one's attire. "Just in case, supposing, for example, that a public incident should get started (and the public there is superflu: 7 a countess goes, Prince D. goes, the whole of literature goes), one must be well dressed; this makes an impression, and in some sense will put us straightaway on an equal footing in the eyes of high society." To that end I asked for an advance on my salary and bought black gloves and a respectable hat at Churkin's. Black gloves, it seemed to me, were both more imposing and more in bon ton than the lemon-colored ones I had first presumed upon. "The color is too striking, it's too much as if a man wants to make a show of himself," and I did not buy the lemon ones. I had long since prepared a good shirt with white bone cufflinks; but I was very much detained by the overcoat. My overcoat was not bad at all in itself, it kept me warm; but it had a quilted cotton lining, and the collar was of raccoon, which constituted the height of lackeydom. It was necessary to change the collar at any cost and to acquire a beaver, something like what officers wore. For that I began walking about the Gostiny Arcade 8 and, after several attempts, set my sights on a cheap German beaver. Though these German beavers wear out very quickly and acquire a most measly look, at first, when new, they even seem quite decent; and I needed it for only one time. I asked the price: it was expensive even so. After some solid reflection I decided to sell my raccoon collar. And the remaining and for me quite considerable sum I decided to try and borrow from Anton Antonych Setochkin, my department chief, a humble but serious and positive man, who never loaned money to anyone, but to whom I had once, on entering my post, been especially recommended by the important personage who had placed me in the civil service. I was terribly tormented. To ask money of Anton Antonych seemed to me monstrous and shameful. I even could not sleep for two or three nights, but then I generally slept little at that time, I was in a fever; my heart was somehow vaguely sinking, or else it would suddenly start to go thump, thump, thump!… Anton Antonych was surprised at first, then he frowned, then he considered, and after all he gave me the loan, having me sign an authorization for him to take the loaned money from my salary two weeks later. Thus everything was finally ready; a handsome beaver came to reign in place of the squalid raccoon, and I gradually began to get down to business. I really couldn't just decide it straight off, slapdash; the thing had to be handled deftly, precisely gradually. But I confess that after many attempts I even began to despair: we simply couldn't bump into each other – and that was that! After all my preparations, after all my premeditations – it would look as if we were just about to bump into each other, and then – again I'd give way, and he would pass by without noticing me. I even recited prayers while approaching him, asking God to inspire me with decisiveness. One time I was already quite decided, but it just ended with me getting under his feet, because in the very last moment, at some two inches away, I lost courage. He quite calmly walked over me, and I bounced aside like a ball. That night I was sick again, feverish and delirious. And suddenly everything ended in the best possible way. The night before, I resolved finally not to carry out my pernicious intention and to let it all go for naught, and with that purpose in mind I went to Nevsky for the last time, just to see how I was going to let it all go for naught. Suddenly, within three steps of my enemy, I unexpectedly decided, closed my eyes, and – we bumped solidly shoulder against shoulder! I did not yield an inch and passed by on a perfectly equal footing! He did not even look back and pretended not to notice: but he only pretended, I'm sure of that. To this day I'm sure of it! Of course, I got the worst of if, he was stronger, but that was not the point. The point was that I had achieved my purpose, preserved my dignity, yielded not a step, and placed myself publicly on an equal social footing with him. I returned home perfectly avenged for everything. I was in ecstasy. I exulted and sang Italian arias. Of course, I shall not describe for you what happened to me three days later; if you've read my first chapter, "Underground," you can guess for yourself. The officer was later transferred somewhere. I haven't seen him for about fourteen years. What's the sweet fellow doing these days? Whom does he crush now?

II

Then the spell of my little debauch would end, and I'd feel terribly nauseated. Repentance would come; I'd drive it away – it was too nauseating. Little by little, however, I'd get used to that as well. I could get used to anything – that is, not really get used, but somehow voluntarily consent to endure it. But I had a way out that reconciled everything, which was – to escape into "everything beautiful and lofty," in dreams, of course. I dreamed terribly, I would dream for three months at a time, shrinking into my corner, and, believe me, in those moments I bore no resemblance to that gentleman who, in the panic of his chicken heart, sat sewing a German beaver to the collar of his overcoat. I'd suddenly become a hero. And then I wouldn't even have let the six-foot lieutenant into the house. I couldn't even imagine him then. What these dreams of mine were, and how I could have been satisfied with them – is difficult to say now, but I was satisfied with them then. However, I'm somewhat satisfied with them even now. Dreams came to me with a particular sweetness and intensity after a little debauch, they came with repentance and tears, with curses and raptures. There were moments of such positive ecstasy, such happiness, that not even the slightest mockery could be felt in me, by God. There was faith, hope, love. This was the point, that I blindly believed then that through some miracle, some external circumstance, all this would suddenly extend, expand; suddenly a horizon of appropriate activity would present itself, beneficent, beautiful, and, above all, quite ready-made (precisely what, I never knew, but above all – quite ready-made), and thus I would suddenly step forth under God's heaven all but on a white horse and wreathed in laurels. A secondary role was incomprehensible to me, and that was precisely why, in reality, I so calmly filled the last. Either hero or mud, there was no in between. And that is what ruined me, because in the mud I comforted myself with being a hero at other times, and the hero covered up the mud: for an ordinary man, say, it's shameful to be muddied, but a hero is too lofty to be completely muddied, consequently one can get muddied. Remarkably, these influxes of "everything beautiful and lofty" used also to come to me during my little debauches; precisely when I was already at the very bottom, they would come just so, in isolated little flashes, as if reminding me of themselves, and yet they did not annihilate the little debauch with their appearance; on the contrary, it was as if they enlivened it by contrast and came in exactly the proportion required for a good sauce. The sauce here consisted of contradiction and suffering, of tormenting inner analysis, and all these torments and tormenticules lent my little debauch a certain piquancy, even meaning – in short, they fully fulfilled the function of a good sauce. All this was even not without some profundity. For how could I consent to a simple, direct, trite little scrivener's debauch, and to bearing all this mud on myself! What was there in it that could seduce me and lure me into the streets at night? No, sir, I had a noble loophole for everything…

But how much love, Lord, how much love I used to experience in those dreams of mine, in those "escapes into everything beautiful and lofty": though it was a fantastical love, though it was never in reality applied to anything human, there was so much of it, this love, that afterwards, in reality, I never even felt any need to apply it; that would have been an unnecessary luxury. Everything, however, would always end most happily with a lazy and rapturous transition to art – that is, to beautiful forms of being, quite ready-made, highly stolen from poets and novelists, and adapted to every possible service or demand. For example, I triumph over everyone; everyone, of course, is lying in the dust and is forced to voluntarily acknowledge all my perfections, and I forgive them all. I fall in love, being a famous poet and court chamberlain; I receive countless millions and donate them immediately to mankind, and then and there confess before all the world my disgraces, which, of course, are not mere disgraces, but contain an exceeding amount of "the beautiful and lofty," of something manfredian. 9 Everyone weeps and kisses me (what blockheads they'd be otherwise), and I go barefoot and hungry to preach new ideas and crush the retrograde under Austerlitz. 10 Then a march is struck up, an amnesty is granted, the Pope agrees to quit Rome for Brazil; then a ball is given for the whole of Italy at the Villa Borghese, now on the shores of Lake Como, since Lake Como has been transferred to Rome especially for the occasion; 11 then comes a scene in the bushes, etc., etc. – you know what I mean! You will say that it's vulgar and vile to bring all this out into the marketplace now, after so many raptures and tears, to which I myself have confessed. But why is it vile, sirs? Can you really think I'm ashamed of it all, or that it's all any stupider than whatever there may have been, gentlemen, in your own lives? And besides, believe me, some of it was by no means badly composed… And not all of it took place on Lake Como. However, you're right, it is indeed both vulgar and vile. And what's vilest is that I've now started justifying myself before you. And viler still is that I'm now making this remark. Enough, however; otherwise there will be no end to it: things will go on getting viler and viler… I was simply incapable of dreaming for longer than three months at a time, and would begin to feel an irresistible need to rush into society. To rush into society in my case meant to go and visit my department chief, Anton Antonych Setochkin. He was the only permanent acquaintance I've had in my whole life, and I'm even surprised now at this circumstance. But even to him I used to go only when such a spell came, and my dreams had reached such happiness that I needed, instantly and infallibly, to embrace people and the whole of mankind – for which I had to have available at least one really existing person. Anton Antonych, however, could be visited only on Tuesdays (his day), and consequently my need to embrace the whole of mankind always had to be adusted to a Tuesday. This Anton Antonych was located near the Five Corners, 12 on the fourth floor and in four little rooms, low-ceilinged, each one smaller than the last, of a most economical and yellow appearance. There were two daughters and their aunt, who poured tea. The daughters, one thirteen and the other fourteen, were both pug-nosed, and I was terribly abashed before them, because they constantly whispered together and giggled. The host usually sat in the study, on a leather sofa in front of the desk, along with some gray-haired guest, an official from our own or even some other department. I never saw more than two or three guests there, always the same ones. They talked about excise, negotiations in the Senate, salaries, promotions, His Excellency, ways of making oneself liked, and so on and so forth. I had patience enough to sit it out by these people like a fool for four hours on end, listening to them, myself not daring or knowing how to begin talking with them about anything. My mind would grow dull, I'd break into a sweat several times, paralysis hovered over me; but this was good and beneficial. On returning home, I'd put off for a while my desire to embrace the whole of mankind.

I had, however, another acquaintance as it were – Simonov, a former schoolfellow. No doubt there were many of my schoolfellows in Petersburg, but I did not associate with them, and had even stopped nodding to them in the street. I perhaps got myself transferred to another department so as not to be together with them and to cut off all at once the whole of that hateful childhood of mine. Curses on that school, on those terrible years of penal servitude! In short, I parted ways with my fellows as soon as I was set free. There were two or three people left whom I still greeted when we met. Among them was Simonov, who had not been distinguished for anything in our school, was quiet and equable, but in whom I distinguished a certain independence of character and even honesty. I do not even think he was so very narrow-minded. I had once had some rather bright moments with him, but they did not last long and somehow suddenly clouded over. These recollections were apparently burdensome for him, and it seemed he kept being afraid I would lapse into the former tone. I suspected that he found me quite disgusting, but I kept going to him all the same, having no sure assurance of it.

And so once, on a Thursday, unable to endure my solitude, and knowing that on Thursdays Anton Antonych's door was closed, I remembered about Simonov. On the way up to his fourth-floor apartment, I was precisely thinking that I was a burden to this gentleman and that I shouldn't be going to him. But since in the end such considerations, as if by design, always egged me on further into some ambiguous situation, I did go in. It was almost a year since I had last seen Simonov.

III

I found two more of my schoolfellows with him. They were apparently discussing an important matter. None of them paid more than the slightest attention to my coming, which was even strange, because I hadn't seen them for years. Obviously they regarded me as something like a quite ordinary fly. I had not been treated that way even at school, though everyone there hated me. Of course, I understood that they must scorn me now for the unsuccess of my career in the service and for my having gone too much to seed, walking around badly dressed, and so on – which in their eyes constituted a signboard of my incapacity and slight significance. But all the same I did not expect such a degree of scorn. Simonov was even surprised at my coming. Before, too, he had always seemed surprised at my coming. All this took me aback; I sat down in some anguish and began to listen to what they were talking about.

The conversation, a serious and even heated one, was about a farewell dinner which these gentlemen wanted to organize jointly on the very next day for their schoolfellow Zverkov, an officer in the army, who was leaving for a province far away. M'sieur Zverkov had also been my schoolfellow all the while. I had begun especially to hate him starting in the higher grades. In the lower grades he had been just a pretty, frisky boy whom everybody liked. I, however, had hated him in the lower grades as well, precisely for being a pretty and frisky boy. He was always a bad student, and got worse as he went on. Nevertheless, he graduated successfully, because he had his protectors. In his last year at school he received an inheritance, two hundred souls, 13 and since we were almost all of us poor, he even began to swagger before us. He was a vulgarian in the highest degree, but a nice fellow nonetheless, even while swaggering. And despite the external, fantastic, and highfalutin forms of honor and glory in our school, everyone, apart from a very few, minced around Zverkov, the more so the more he swaggered. They minced not for the sake of some sort of profit, but just so, because he was a man favored with the gifts of nature. Besides, it was somehow an accepted thing among us to regard Zverkov as an expert in the line of adroitness and good manners. This last particularly infuriated me. I hated the sharp, un-self-doubting tone of his voice, his admiration of his own witticisms, which came out terribly stupid, though he did have a bold tongue; I hated his handsome but silly face (for which, by the way, I'd gladly have traded my intelligent one) and his free and easy officer-of-the-forties airs. I hated the things he used to say about his future successes with women (he hadn't ventured to start up with women, not having his officer's epaulettes yet, and was looking forward to them impatiently) and about how he'd be fighting duels all the time. I remember myself, always taciturn, suddenly lighting into Zverkov when he was talking with some friends about his future gallantries once during a recess, got quite playful in the end, like a puppy in the sun, and suddenly declared that he wouldn't leave a single village maiden on his estate without his attentions, that this was his droit de seigneur, 14 and if the peasants dared to protest, he'd give them all a whipping and heap a double quitrent on the bearded canaille. Our oafs applauded, but I lit into him, and not at all out of pity for maidens or their fathers, but simply because such a little snot was being so applauded. I got the best of him that time, but Zverkov, though stupid, was gay and impudent, and therefore laughed it off, and even in such a way that, in truth, I did not quite get the best of him: the laughter remained on his side. Later he got the best of me several more times, though not with spite, but just somehow jokingly, in passing, with a laugh. I spitefully and contemptuously refused to reply. Upon graduation he tried to make a step towards me, I did not resist too much, because it flattered me, but we quickly and naturally parted ways. Later I heard about his barracksy lieutenanty successes, about his carousing. Later other rumors went around – that he was succeeding in the service. Now he no longer greeted me in the street, and I suspected he was afraid of compromising himself by greeting a person as insignificant as I was. I also saw him in the theater once, in the third circle, now wearing aiguillettes. He was mincing and twining around the daughters of some ancient general. In three short years he had gone very much to seed, though he was still quite handsome and adroit; he had become somehow puffy and was beginning to grow fat; one could see that by the age of thirty he would be completely flabby. It was for this finally departing Zverkov that our fellows wanted to give a dinner. They had constantly associated with him all those three years, though inwardly they did not consider themselves on an equal footing with him, I'm sure of that.

Of Simonov's two guests, one was Ferfichkin, from Russian-German stock – short, monkey-faced, a fool who comically mimicked everyone, my bitterest enemy even in the lower grades – a mean, impudent little fanfaron who played at being most ticklishly ambitious, though of course he was a coward at heart. He was one of those admirers of Zverkov who flirted with him for his own ends, and often borrowed money from him. Simonov's other guest, Trudolyubov, was an unremarkable person, a military type, tall, with a cold physiognomy, honest enough, but worshiping any success, and capable only of discussing promotions. He was some sort of distant relation of Zverkov's, and that, silly though it was, endowed him with a certain significance among us. He had always regarded me as nothing, but treated me, if not quite politely, at least passably.

"Well, so, if it's seven roubles each," Trudolyubov said, "that makes twenty-one for the three of us – we can have a nice dinner. Zverkov doesn't pay, of course."

"Naturally not, since we're inviting him," Simonov decided.

"Do you really think," Ferfichkin broke in presumptuously and fervently, like an impudent lackey boasting of his master's, the general's, decorations, "do you really think Zverkov will let us pay for it all? He'll accept out of delicacy, but he'll stand us to a half-dozen himself."

"And what are the four of us going to do with a half-dozen," Trudolyubov remarked, having paid attention only to the half-dozen.

"So, it's the three of us, four with Zverkov, twenty-one roubles, the Hotel de Paris, tomorrow at five o'clock," Simonov, who had been elected manager, finally concluded.