At the time I did not realize that, I only suspected it, but it was already more than a suspicion. It lay somewhere between a suspicion and a certainty. We walked on. “Now we will go and eat,” said Lakatos, “and then you will come with me to my hotel. It’s nicer, when one is in a strange town, to know that someone is with one, someone near, a good friend, a younger brother.”
Well, we went and ate. We turned into the Tchornaya — and do you know where we went, my friends?
Here Golubchik paused. He looked at our host. The latter stared back at the narrator with his bright prominent eyes. At the word “Tchornaya” it seemed as though a light had been lit in his eyes, a quite extraordinary light. Yes, the “Tchornaya,” he repeated. As I said — the “Tchornaya,” began Golubchik again. At that time there was a restaurant there which bore exactly the same name as this one here, in which we are now sitting. It was called the “Tari-Bari”—and the owner was the same.
Our host, who was sitting opposite the speaker, now stood up, went around the table, spread out his arms, and embraced Golubchik. They drank eternal friendship; and all of us, too, his listeners, lifted our glasses and emptied them.
Well, that was where we went, began Golubchik again. Our host here, my friends, inaugurated, so to speak, my misfortune in his restaurant. For there were gypsies there, in the old “Tari-Bari” in Odessa, women who were marvelous violin and tambourine players. And what wines! And Herr Lakatos paid for everything. And I was in such a place for the first time in my life. “Drink up, drink up!” said Herr Lakatos. And I drank.
“Drink!” he repeated. And I drank again.
After a time, it must have been late in the evening, perhaps long after midnight — but in my memory it seems to me as though that whole night was one long midnight — Lakatos asked me: “What are you actually doing here in Odessa?”
“I have come,” I said (though I probably mumbled it at the time), “to visit my real father. He has been expecting me for several weeks.”
“And who is your father?” asked Lakatos.
“Prince Krapotkin.”
At this Lakatos banged his fork on his glass and ordered another bottle of champagne. I saw how he rubbed his hands under the table, and how above, across the table, across the white tablecloth, his narrow face lit up, suddenly reddened and grew fuller, as though he had puffed out his cheeks.
“I know him — His Highness, I mean,” began Lakatos. “Now I understand what it’s all about. He’s a sly old fox, your papa! Of course, you are his illegitimate son! God help you. if you make even the smallest mistake! You must look as though you are strong and dangerous. He is as sly as a fox and as cowardly as a jackal! Yes, my son, you are not the first, nor are you the only one. There are probably hundreds of his illegitimate sons wandering about Russia. I know him. I’ve done business with him. Hops! I should have told you, I am a hop merchant. Well, go to his house tomorrow and announce yourself as Golubchik — see? And if they ask you what you’ve got to say to the Prince, simply tell them: Private business. And when you are standing inside, in front of his great black desk that looks like a coffin, and he asks you: ‘What do you want?’ you must say: ‘I am your son, Prince!’—‘Prince,’ you must say. Not: ‘Your Highness.’ And then you will see what happens. You must rely on your own wit after that. I will take you there. And I shall wait for you outside. And if he is at all unfriendly to you, just tell him that we have ways and means. And that you have a powerful friend! Understand?”
I understood all this very well, it ran like honey into my head, and I pressed Herr Lakatos’s hand under the table, firmly and gratefully. He beckoned one of the gypsy women, then a second, and a third. Perhaps there were even more. For one of them at any rate, the one who came and sat beside me, I fell completely. My hand was caught in her lap like a fly in a net. Everything was hot, confused, senseless, and yet I felt exultantly happy.
I can still remember the gray, leaden morning, something soft and warm in a strange bed, in a strange room, shrill bells in the corridor outside, and most of all can I remember the shaming, shameless misery of a new day.
When I awoke, the sun was already high in the sky. As I went down the steps, someone said to me that the room had been paid for. From Lakatos I found only a note: “Good luck!” it said — and: “I have had to leave suddenly. Go by yourself. My best wishes are with you!”
So I went alone to the Prince’s house.
The house of my father, Prince Krapotkin, stood solitary, proud and white on the outskirts of the city. Although a broad, yellow, well-kept road separated it from the shore, it seemed to me that day as though the house lay on the very edge of the sea. So blue and omnipotent was the sea on that morning when I approached the Prince’s house that it looked as though its gentle waves were lapping continually over the stone steps of the house, only to withdraw at intervals to leave the road free. In addition to this, a board stood at the side of the road, long before one reached the house, which announced that vehicles were forbidden to proceed farther. It was obvious that the Prince did not wish his serene summer quiet to be disturbed. Two policemen were standing near the board, and they watched me while I stared at them as coolly and haughtily as if I myself had ordered their presence. If they had asked me what I was doing there, I would have answered that I was the young Prince Krapotkin. Actually, I was waiting for this question. But they let me pass, only following me a while with their glances; I could feel their eyes on the back of my neck. The nearer I approached Krapotkin’s house, the more uneasy I became. Lakatos had promised to accompany me so far. Now I had only his note in my pocket. Loudly and vividly his words echoed in my head: “Don’t call him Your Highness — say, Prince! He is as sly as a fox and as cowardly as a jackal!” Ever slower and more dragging grew my steps, and all at once I noticed the fearful heat of the day, which was approaching its zenith. The sky was blue, the sea on my right was motionless, and the sun beat down mercilessly upon my back. There was certainly thunder in the air, only it was not yet noticeable. I sat down for a little while at the side of the road. But when I stood up again I was even wearier than before. Very slowly, with a parching throat, I dragged my burning feet towards the white steps of the house. Blinding white they were, as white as milk and snow, and although they drank in the heat of the sun with every pore, they gave out a beneficent coolness. In front of the brown double-door stood an enormous doorkeeper, wearing a long sand-colored overcoat, a great black bearskin cap (in spite of the heat), and holding in one hand a large scepter on the end of which glittered a sort of golden apple. Slowly I climbed the flat stone steps. The doorkeeper did not seem to notice me until I stood immediately in front of him, small, perspiring, and very miserable. Even then, he did not move. Only his round blue eyes rested on me as on a worm, a snail, a nothing, as though I were not even human, like he, a being on two legs. Thus he stared at me for a while in silence. It was as though he did not ask my business simply because he knew already that such a miserable creature as I was quite incapable of human speech. Through my cap, through my skull, the sun burned fiercely, destroying the last few coherent thoughts that still buzzed in my head. Up till then I had really felt no fear or hesitation. But I simply had not reckoned with a doorkeeper, still less with one who never opened his mouth to ask me my business. So I still stood there, small and pitiful, in front of the yellow colossus and his menacing scepter. His eyes, which were as round as the ball on the end of his scepter, still rested on my despicable figure. I could think of no suitable question, my tongue lay dry, swollen, and cumbersome in my mouth. Then it suddenly occurred to me that he really ought to salute me or even take off his heavy cap; and rage boiled up in my breast at the thought of such impertinence from a lackey — a lackey in the service of my own father. I must order him — I thought rapidly — to take off his cap. But instead of giving this order, I took off my own cap to him and stood there, still more pitiful, bareheaded like a beggar. As though he had been waiting for just that, he now inquired, in an astonishingly thin, almost feminine voice, what my business was. “I wish to see the Prince,” I said, very timorously and quite faintly. “Have you an appointment?” “The Prince is expecting me.” “If you please,” he said, somewhat louder and this time in a manly voice.