The guests were gone. We two remained alone, sat facing each other, and silently lit our pipes. Silvio was preoccupied; there was no trace left of his convulsive gaiety. A grim pallor, flashing eyes, and the thick smoke coming from his mouth gave him the look of a real devil. Several minutes passed, and Silvio broke the silence.
“You and I may never see each other again,” he said to me. “Before we part, I would like to have a talk with you. You might have noticed that I have little respect for other people’s opinion of me; but I like you, and I feel it would be painful for me to leave an unjust impression in your mind.”
He paused and began to refill his burnt-out pipe; I was silent and lowered my eyes.
“You found it strange,” he went on, “that I did not demand satisfaction from that drunken madcap R––. You’ll agree that, having the right to choose weapons, his life was in my hands, and mine was almost safe. I could ascribe my restraint to magnanimity alone, but I don’t want to lie. If I could have punished R–– without any risk to my life, I would not have forgiven him for anything.”
I looked at Silvio in amazement. This confession totally disconcerted me. Silvio went on.
“Precisely so: I have no right to risk my life. Six years ago I was slapped in the face, and my enemy is still alive.”
My curiosity was greatly aroused.
“You didn’t fight with him?” I asked. “Circumstances must have separated you?”
“I did fight with him,” Silvio replied, “and here is a souvenir of our duel.”
Silvio stood up and took from a box a red cap with a gold tassel and galloon (what the French call a bonnet de police). He put it on. There was a bullet hole about two inches above the brow.
“You know,” Silvio went on, “that I served in the * * * hussar regiment. My character is familiar to you: I am accustomed to taking first place, but in my youth it was my passion. In our time rowdiness was in fashion: I was the foremost rowdy in the army. We boasted of our drunkenness: I outdrank the famous Burtsov, whose praises were sung by Denis Davydov.3 Duels went on constantly in our regiment: I was in all of them, either as a second or as a participant. My comrades adored me, and the regimental commanders, who were constantly being replaced, looked upon me as a necessary evil.
“I was quietly (or not so quietly) enjoying my reputation, when a young man from a rich and noble family joined our regiment (I don’t want to say his name). Never in all my born days had I met a more fortunate and brilliant fellow! Picture to yourself youth, intelligence, good looks, the wildest gaiety, the most carefree courage, a big name, money that he didn’t bother to count and that never came to an end, and imagine the effect he was bound to make among us. My primacy was shaken. Enticed by my reputation, he began to seek my friendship; but I received him coldly, and he drew away from me without any regret. I came to hate him. His successes in the regiment and in the society of women drove me to utter despair. I began to seek a quarrel with him. To my epigrams he responded with epigrams which always seemed to me more unexpected and witty than mine, and which were certainly more amusing: he joked, while I was malicious. Once, finally, at a Polish landowner’s ball, seeing him the object of attention of all the ladies, and especially of the hostess, with whom I had a liaison, I spoke some crude banality into his ear. He flared up and slapped me. We rushed for our swords; the ladies all swooned; we were dragged apart, and that same night we went out to fight a duel.
“It was at dawn. I stood at the appointed place with my three seconds. With indescribable impatience, I awaited my opponent. The spring sun rose, and its heat could already be felt. I saw him in the distance. He was coming on foot, his jacket hung on his sword, accompanied by one second. We went to meet him. He approached, holding his cap, which was full of cherries. The seconds measured out twelve paces for us. I was supposed to shoot first: but my spiteful agitation was so strong that I could not count on the steadiness of my hand, and, to give myself time to cool off, I offered him the first shot. My opponent did not accept. We decided to draw lots: the first number went to him, the eternal favorite of fortune. He aimed and shot a hole in my cap. It was my turn. His life was finally in my hands; I looked at him greedily, trying to catch at least a trace of uneasiness. He stood facing my pistol, picking ripe cherries from his cap and spitting out the stones, which landed at my feet. His indifference infuriated me. What’s the use of taking his life, I thought, if he doesn’t value it at all? A malicious thought flashed through my mind. I lowered the pistol.
“ ‘It seems your mind is not on death now,’ I said. ‘You’re having breakfast. I wouldn’t want to hinder you.’
“ ‘You’re not hindering me in the least,’ he retorted. ‘Feel free to shoot. But, anyhow, suit yourself. Your shot remains yours; I’m always ready to be at your service.’
“I turned to my seconds, announced that I had no intention of shooting right then, and with that the duel ended.
“I retired from the army and withdrew to this little town. Since then not a single day has gone by that I have not thought of revenge. Now my hour has come…”
Silvio took from his pocket the letter he had received in the morning and gave it to me to read. Someone (apparently his agent) wrote from Moscow that a certain person would soon be entering into lawful matrimony with a young and beautiful girl.
“You can guess who that certain person is,” said Silvio. “I am going to Moscow. We shall see whether he accepts death before his wedding with the same indifference as when he awaited it over the cherries!”
With those words, Silvio stood up, flung his cap on the floor, and started pacing the room like a tiger in its cage. I listened to him without moving: strange, contradictory feelings stirred in me.
A servant came in and announced that the horses were ready. Silvio gripped my hand firmly; we kissed. He got into the cart, where two trunks lay, one with pistols, the other with his belongings. We said good-bye once more, and the horses galloped off.
II
Several years went by, and domestic circumstances forced me to settle in a poor little village of the N–– district. Busy with my estate, I never stopped secretly sighing for my former noisy and carefree life. Hardest of all was accustoming myself to spending the autumn and winter evenings in complete solitude. I still managed to drag out the time till dinner, talking with the village headman, riding around the farm works, or visiting the new installations; but as soon as it began to get dark, I simply did not know what to do with myself. The small number of books I found in the bottoms of cupboards and in the storeroom I already knew by heart. The housekeeper Kirilovna had told me all the tales she was able to recall; the village women’s songs wearied me. I took to unsweetened liqueurs, but they gave me a headache; and, I confess, I was afraid of turning into a drunkard from grief, that is, a most grievous drunkard, of which I saw many examples in our district. I had no near neighbors except for two or three grievous ones, whose conversation consisted mostly of hiccups and sighs. Solitude was more tolerable.
Three miles away from me there was a rich estate that belonged to Countess B––; but no one lived there except the steward, and the countess had visited her estate only once, in the first year of her marriage, and had stayed no more than a month. However, in the second spring of my reclusion, a rumor went around that the countess and her husband were coming to her estate for the summer. In fact, they arrived at the beginning of June.