II.
Hippolyte had now been five days at the Ptitsins’. His flitting from the
prince’s to these new quarters had been brought about quite naturally and
without many words. He did not quarrel with the prince—in fact, they
seemed to part as friends. Gania, who had been hostile enough on that
eventful evening, had himself come to see him a couple of days later,
probably in obedience to some sudden impulse. For some reason or other,
Rogojin too had begun to visit the sick boy. The prince thought it might be
better for him to move away from his (the prince’s) house. Hippolyte
informed him, as he took his leave, that Ptitsin “had been kind enough to
offer him a corner,” and did not say a word about Gania, though Gania had
procured his invitation, and himself came to fetch him away. Gania noticed
this at the time, and put it to Hippolyte’s debit on account.
Gania was right when he told his sister that Hippolyte was getting better;
that he was better was clear at the first glance. He entered the room now last
of all, deliberately, and with a disagreeable smile on his lips.
Nina Alexandrovna came in, looking frightened. She had changed much
since we last saw her, half a year ago, and had grown thin and pale. Colia
looked worried and perplexed. He could not understand the vagaries of the
general, and knew nothing of the last achievement of that worthy, which
had caused so much commotion in the house. But he could see that his
father had of late changed very much, and that he had begun to behave in so
extraordinary a fashion both at home and abroad that he was not like the
same man. What perplexed and disturbed him as much as anything was that
his father had entirely given up drinking during the last few days. Colia
knew that he had quarrelled with both Lebedeff and the prince, and had just
bought a small bottle of vodka and brought it home for his father.
“Really, mother,” he had assured Nina Alexandrovna upstairs, “really you
had better let him drink. He has not had a drop for three days; he must be
suffering agonies—” The general now entered the room, threw the door
wide open, and stood on the threshold trembling with indignation.
“Look here, my dear sir,” he began, addressing Ptitsin in a very loud tone
of voice; “if you have really made up your mind to sacrifice an old man—
your father too or at all events father of your wife—an old man who has
served his emperor—to a wretched little atheist like this, all I can say is, sir,
my foot shall cease to tread your floors. Make your choice, sir; make your
choice quickly, if you please! Me or this—screw! Yes, screw, sir; I said it
accidentally, but let the word stand—this screw, for he screws and drills
himself into my soul—”
“Hadn’t you better say corkscrew?” said Hippolyte.
“No, sir, not corkscrew. I am a general, not a bottle, sir. Make your
choice, sir—me or him.”
Here Colia handed him a chair, and he subsided into it, breathless with
rage.
“Hadn’t you better—better—take a nap?” murmured the stupefied
Ptitsin.
“A nap?” shrieked the general. “I am not drunk, sir; you insult me! I see,”
he continued, rising, “I see that all are against me here. Enough—I go; but
know, sirs—know that—”
He was not allowed to finish his sentence. Somebody pushed him back
into his chair, and begged him to be calm. Nina Alexandrovna trembled, and
cried quietly. Gania retired to the window in disgust.
“But what have I done? What is his grievance?” asked Hippolyte,
grinning.
“What have you done, indeed?” put in Nina Alexandrovna. “You ought to
be ashamed of yourself, teasing an old man like that—and in your position,
too.”
“And pray what is my position, madame? I have the greatest respect for
you, personally; but—”
“He’s a little screw,” cried the general; “he drills holes in my heart and
soul. He wishes me to be a pervert to atheism. Know, you young greenhorn,
that I was covered with honours before ever you were born; and you are
nothing better than a wretched little worm, torn in two with coughing, and
dying slowly of your own malice and unbelief. What did Gavrila bring you
over here for? They’re all against me, even to my own son—all against
me.”
“Oh, come—nonsense!” cried Gania; “if you did not go shaming us all
over the town, things might be better for all parties.”
“What—shame you? I?—what do you mean, you young calf? I shame
you? I can only do you honour, sir; I cannot shame you.”
He jumped up from his chair in a fit of uncontrollable rage. Gania was
very angry too.
“Honour, indeed!” said the latter, with contempt.
“What do you say, sir?” growled the general, taking a step towards him.
“I say that I have but to open my mouth, and you—”
Gania began, but did not finish. The two—father and son—stood before
one another, both unspeakably agitated, especially Gania.
“Gania, Gania, reflect!” cried his mother, hurriedly.
“It’s all nonsense on both sides,” snapped out Varia. “Let them alone,
mother.”
“It’s only for mother’s sake that I spare him,” said Gania, tragically.
“Speak!” said the general, beside himself with rage and excitement;
“speak—under the penalty of a father’s curse!”
“Oh, father’s curse be hanged—you don’t frighten me that way!” said
Gania. “Whose fault is it that you have been as mad as a March hare all this
week? It is just a week—you see, I count the days. Take care now; don’t
provoke me too much, or I’ll tell all. Why did you go to the Epanchins’
yesterday—tell me that? And you call yourself an old man, too, with grey
hair, and father of a family! H’m—nice sort of a father.”
“Be quiet, Gania,” cried Colia. “Shut up, you fool!”
“Yes, but how have I offended him?” repeated Hippolyte, still in the
same jeering voice. “Why does he call me a screw? You all heard it. He
came to me himself and began telling me about some Captain Eropegoff. I
don’t wish for your company, general. I always avoided you—you know
that. What have I to do with Captain Eropegoff? All I did was to express my
opinion that probably Captain Eropegoff never existed at all!”
“Of course he never existed!” Gania interrupted.
But the general only stood stupefied and gazed around in a dazed way.
Gania’s speech had impressed him, with its terrible candour. For the first
moment or two he could find no words to answer him, and it was only when
Hippolyte burst out laughing, and said:
“There, you see! Even your own son supports my statement that there
never was such a person as Captain Eropegoff!” that the old fellow
muttered confusedly:
“Kapiton Eropegoff—not Captain Eropegoff!—Kapiton—major retired
—Eropegoff—Kapiton.”
“Kapiton didn’t exist either!” persisted Gania, maliciously.
“What? Didn’t exist?” cried the poor general, and a deep blush suffused
his face.
“That’ll do, Gania!” cried Varia and Ptitsin.
“Shut up, Gania!” said Colia.
But this intercession seemed to rekindle the general.
“What did you mean, sir, that he didn’t exist? Explain yourself,” he
repeated, angrily.
“Because he didn’t exist—never could and never did—there! You’d
better drop the subject, I warn you!”
“And this is my son—my own son—whom I—oh, gracious Heaven!
Eropegoff—Eroshka Eropegoff didn’t exist!”
“Ha, ha! it’s Eroshka now,” laughed Hippolyte.
“No, sir, Kapitoshka—not Eroshka. I mean, Kapiton Alexeyevitch—
retired major—married Maria Petrovna Lu—Lu—he was my friend and
companion—Lutugoff—from our earliest beginnings. I closed his eyes for
him—he was killed. Kapiton Eropegoff never existed! tfu!”
The general shouted in his fury; but it was to be concluded that his wrath
was not kindled by the expressed doubt as to Kapiton’s existence. This was
his scapegoat; but his excitement was caused by something quite different.
As a rule he would have merely shouted down the doubt as to Kapiton, told
a long yarn about his friend, and eventually retired upstairs to his room. But
today, in the strange uncertainty of human nature, it seemed to require but
so small an offence as this to make his cup to overflow. The old man grew
purple in the face, he raised his hands. “Enough of this!” he yelled. “My
curse—away, out of the house I go! Colia, bring my bag away!” He left the
room hastily and in a paroxysm of rage.
His wife, Colia, and Ptitsin ran out after him.
“What have you done now?” said Varia to Gania. “He’ll probably be
making off there again! What a disgrace it all is!”
“Well, he shouldn’t steal,” cried Gania, panting with fury. And just at this
moment his eye met Hippolyte’s.
“As for you, sir,” he cried, “you should at least remember that you are in
a strange house and—receiving hospitality; you should not take the
opportunity of tormenting an old man, sir, who is too evidently out of his
mind.”
Hippolyte looked furious, but he restrained himself.
“I don’t quite agree with you that your father is out of his mind,” he
observed, quietly. “On the contrary, I cannot help thinking he has been less
demented of late. Don’t you think so? He has grown so cunning and careful,
and weighs his words so deliberately; he spoke to me about that Kapiton
fellow with an object, you know! Just fancy—he wanted me to—”
“Oh, devil take what he wanted you to do! Don’t try to be too cunning
with me, young man!” shouted Gania. “If you are aware of the real reason
for my father’s present condition (and you have kept such an excellent
spying watch during these last few days that you are sure to be aware of it)
—you had no right whatever to torment the—unfortunate man, and to
worry my mother by your exaggerations of the affair; because the whole
business is nonsense—simply a drunken freak, and nothing more, quite
unproved by any evidence, and I don’t believe that much of it!” (he snapped
his fingers). “But you must needs spy and watch over us all, because you
are a—a—”
“Screw!” laughed Hippolyte.
“Because you are a humbug, sir; and thought fit to worry people for half
an hour, and tried to frighten them into believing that you would shoot
yourself with your little empty pistol, pirouetting about and playing at
suicide! I gave you hospitality, you have fattened on it, your cough has left
you, and you repay all this—”
“Excuse me—two words! I am Varvara Ardalionovna’s guest, not yours;
you have extended no hospitality to me. On the contrary, if I am not
mistaken, I believe you are yourself indebted to Mr. Ptitsin’s hospitality.
Four days ago I begged my mother to come down here and find lodgings,
because I certainly do feel better here, though I am not fat, nor have I
ceased to cough. I am today informed that my room is ready for me;
therefore, having thanked your sister and mother for their kindness to me, I
intend to leave the house this evening. I beg your pardon—I interrupted you
—I think you were about to add something?”
“Oh—if that is the state of affairs—” began Gania.
“Excuse me—I will take a seat,” interrupted Hippolyte once more, sitting
down deliberately; “for I am not strong yet. Now then, I am ready to hear
you. Especially as this is the last chance we shall have of a talk, and very
likely the last meeting we shall ever have at all.”
Gania felt a little guilty.
“I assure you I did not mean to reckon up debits and credits,” he began,
“and if you—”
“I don’t understand your condescension,” said Hippolyte. “As for me, I
promised myself, on the first day of my arrival in this house, that I would
have the satisfaction of settling accounts with you in a very thorough
manner before I said good-bye to you. I intend to perform this operation
now, if you like; after you, though, of course.”
“May I ask you to be so good as to leave this room?”
“You’d better speak out. You’ll be sorry afterwards if you don’t.”
“Hippolyte, stop, please! It’s so dreadfully undignified,” said Varia.
“Well, only for the sake of a lady,” said Hippolyte, laughing. “I am ready
to put off the reckoning, but only put it off, Varvara Ardalionovna, because
an explanation between your brother and myself has become an absolute
necessity, and I could not think of leaving the house without clearing up all
misunderstandings first.”
“In a word, you are a wretched little scandal-monger,” cried Gania, “and
you cannot go away without a scandal!”
“You see,” said Hippolyte, coolly, “you can’t restrain yourself. You’ll be
dreadfully sorry afterwards if you don’t speak out now. Come, you shall
have the first say. I’ll wait.”
Gania was silent and merely looked contemptuously at him.
“You won’t? Very well. I shall be as short as possible, for my part. Two
or three times to-day I have had the word ‘hospitality’ pushed down my
throat; this is not fair. In inviting me here you yourself entrapped me for
your own use; you thought I wished to revenge myself upon the prince. You
heard that Aglaya Ivanovna had been kind to me and read my confession.
Making sure that I should give myself up to your interests, you hoped that
you might get some assistance out of me. I will not go into details. I don’t
ask either admission or confirmation of this from yourself; I am quite
content to leave you to your conscience, and to feel that we understand one
another capitally.”
“What a history you are weaving out of the most ordinary
circumstances!” cried Varia.
“I told you the fellow was nothing but a scandal-monger,” said Gania.
“Excuse me, Varia Ardalionovna, I will proceed. I can, of course, neither
love nor respect the prince, though he is a good-hearted fellow, if a little
queer. But there is no need whatever for me to hate him. I quite understood
your brother when he first offered me aid against the prince, though I did
not show it; I knew well that your brother was making a ridiculous mistake
in me. I am ready to spare him, however, even now; but solely out of
respect for yourself, Varvara Ardalionovna.
“Having now shown you that I am not quite such a fool as I look, and
that I have to be fished for with a rod and line for a good long while before
I am caught, I will proceed to explain why I specially wished to make your
brother look a fool. That my motive power is hate, I do not attempt to
conceal. I have felt that before dying (and I am dying, however much fatter
I may appear to you), I must absolutely make a fool of, at least, one of that
class of men which has dogged me all my life, which I hate so cordially,
and which is so prominently represented by your much esteemed brother. I
should not enjoy paradise nearly so much without having done this first. I
hate you, Gavrila Ardalionovitch, solely (this may seem curious to you, but
I repeat)—solely because you are the type, and incarnation, and head, and
crown of the most impudent, the most self-satisfied, the most vulgar and
detestable form of commonplaceness. You are ordinary of the ordinary; you
have no chance of ever fathering the pettiest idea of your own. And yet you
are as jealous and conceited as you can possibly be; you consider yourself a
great genius; of this you are persuaded, although there are dark moments of
doubt and rage, when even this fact seems uncertain. There are spots of
darkness on your horizon, though they will disappear when you become
completely stupid. But a long and chequered path lies before you, and of
this I am glad. In the first place you will never gain a certain person.”
“Come, come! This is intolerable! You had better stop, you little
mischief-making wretch!” cried Varia. Gania had grown very pale; he
trembled, but said nothing.
Hippolyte paused, and looked at him intently and with great gratification.
He then turned his gaze upon Varia, bowed, and went out, without adding
another word.
Gania might justly complain of the hardness with which fate treated him.
Varia dared not speak to him for a long while, as he strode past her,
backwards and forwards. At last he went and stood at the window, looking
out, with his back turned towards her. There was a fearful row going on
upstairs again.
“Are you off?” said Gania, suddenly, remarking that she had risen and
was about to leave the room. “Wait a moment—look at this.”
He approached the table and laid a small sheet of paper before her. It
looked like a little note.
“Good heavens!” cried Varia, raising her hands.
This was the note:
“GAVRILA ARDOLIONOVITCH,—persuaded of your kindness of
heart, I have determined to ask your advice on a matter of
great importance to myself. I should like to meet you
tomorrow morning at seven o’clock by the green bench in
the park. It is not far from our house. Varvara Ardalionovna,
who must accompany you, knows the place well.
“A. E.”
“What on earth is one to make of a girl like that?” said Varia.
Gania, little as he felt inclined for swagger at this moment, could not
avoid showing his triumph, especially just after such humiliating remarks as
those of Hippolyte. A smile of self-satisfaction beamed on his face, and
Varia too was brimming over with delight.
“And this is the very day that they were to announce the engagement!
What will she do next?”
