'One is to take it, in other words, that a grcat man likc byevsky is great even in his fall. His dissipation, his lack of cducation, his dirty habits are an evolutionary phcnomenon hallowed by inevitability and based on prcmisses so earth-shaking and elemental that we should all bow down and worship the man as a doomed victim of an era, of trends, of heredity and all that stuff. The local officials and thcir ladiej; all drooled and slobbered over him when he spoke, and I couldn't tcll for ages whether I was dcaling with a cynic or a wily crook. Types like that, resembling intellectuals with their smattering of education, and always going on about how noble they are—they can pass themselves off as cxtremely complex natures.'
'Shut up!' blazed Samoylenko. 'No one shall run down such a thoroughly dccent chap in my presence.'
'You keep out of this, Alexander,' Von Koren said coldly. Tll bc through in a moment. Laycvsky's a fairly simplc organism. His moral framework is as follows. Early morning: slippers, bathing, coffee. Till lunch-time: slippcrs, strolling, convcrsation. Two o'clock: slippers, lunch, liquor. Five o'clock: bathing, tea, liquor—then bridge and bare- faced lying. Ten o'clock: slippers, liquor. After midnight: bed and la femme. His existencc is encased in this narrow timetablc, like an egg in its shell. Whcthcr hc walks, sits, loses his temper, writes or enjoys himself-it all boils down to wine, cards, slippers, woman. Woman plays a fatal and overwhelming part in his life. He was alrcady in love at the age of thirteen, as he'll tell you himself. As a first-year student he lived with a lady who influenced him for the good and gave him his musical education. In his sccoiid year at univcrsity he bought a prosti- tute from a brothel and raised her to his own level—made hcr his mis- tress in othcr words. Shc lived with him for six months and then ran back to her madame, an escape which causcd him no little spiritual anguish. So much did he suffcr, alas, that hc had to leave the university and spend two years at home in idleness. But it all worked out for the best. At home he took up with a widow who advised him to drop law and read an arts subject, so he did. On complcting his studies, he fell passionately in love with this marricd woman, whatever she's called, and had to rush off here with her to the Caucasus—out of idealism, we're told.
'He'll lose interest in her any day now and trot back to St. Peters- burg—and that, too, will be idealism.'
'How can you tell?' grumbled Samoylenko, glaring at thc zoologist. 'Better eat your lunch.'
They served boiled grey mullet a la polouaise, and Samoylenko gave both his guests a whole fish, pouring the sauce himself. Some two minutes passcd in silence.
'Woman plays a crucial p.Trt in every man's life,' said.the deacon. 'You can't get away from that.'
'Yes, but it's a matter of degree. To each of us woman is our mother, sister, wife or friend. But to Laycvsky she's the whole of existence, yet no more than his mistress. She—cohabitarion \vith her, rather—is his bliss, his goal in life. If he's gay, sad, bored, disillusioned, that's woman's doing. If he's tired of life, it's a woman's fault. The dav.:n ofa new life glows, ideals have appeared on the scene—and once again there must be a woman somewherc about.
'Only those writings or pictures satisfy him which feature a woman. Ours is a bad period in his view—worse than the forties and the sixties —just because we don't know hov.r to abandon ourselves utterly to love's ecstasy and passion. These voluptuaries must have some special growth in their heads, a tumour which has crushed the brain and con- trols the whole nervous system. Try watching Layevsky when he's in ĉompany. Sec what happens if you raise some general topic in his presence—cells or instincts, say. He sits on one side, he says nothing, he doesn't hear. He looks limp and blase. Nothing intcrests him, it's all stale and trivial. But you start talking about male and female—about the female spider's habit of eating the male after mating, say—and his eyes light up with curiosity, his face brightens. The fellow comes to life, in short. All his ideas, be they never so cxalted, lofty or dis- interested, have this onc focal point. You might walk down the street with him and meet a donkey, say.
"'Do tell me," says he. "What would happen if you crossed a donkey with a camel?"
'And his dreams! Has he told you about those? They're priceless! First he dreams he's being married to the moon, then he's summoned to a police station and ordered to cohabit with a guitar '
The deacon gave a ringing chortle. Samoylenko's brow clouded and he frowned angrily to stop himself laughing, but he could not keep it up and burst out laughing all the same.
'What rubbish,' he said, wiping away his tears. 'God, what rubbish!'
IV
The deacon was easily amused. Any trifle made him laugh till he had a stitch in his side aJ?.d nearly fell over. He only seemed to enjoy company because people had their funny side and he could give them absurd nicknames. He called Samoylenko 'the Tarantub', his orderly was 'Drake', and he was tickled pink when Von Koren once referred to Layevsky and Nadczhda as a couple of baboons. He stared eagerly into people's faces, listened without blinking, and one could see his eyes fill with laughter and his face grow tense as he waited till he could let himself go and roar with laughter.
'He's a corrupt, perverted individual,' went on the zoologist, while the deacon gaped at him, anticipating some amusing remark. 'You don't often meet such a nonentity. Physically he's flabby, feeble and senile. Intellectually he's the exact equal of a fat woman—a shopkeeper's wife who does nothing but guzzle food and drink, sleeps on a feather bed, and takes her coachman as a lover.'
The deacon again burst out laughing.
'Don't laugh, Deacon, that's just silly,' said Von Koren. 'I'd over- look the man's insignificance,' he went on, after waiting for the deacon to stop. 'I'd ignore him were he less pernicious and dangerous. His most noxious feature is his success with women, which means that he threatens to have descendants, thus presenting the world with a dozen Layevskys as puny and perverted as himself. Secondly, he's highly contagious—I'vc already mentioned the bridge and beer business. In a couple of years he'll conquer the whole Caucasian coast- line. You know how the masses, especially their middle strata, believe in intellectualism, university education, good manners and speaking correctly. Whatever filthy trick he plays, everyone thinks it's perfectly right and proper because he's an intellectual, a liberal, a university man. He's also a failure, a Superfluous Man, a neurotic, a victim of the age— which means he can do as he pleases. Hc's a nice chap, a good sort, and so genuinely tolerant of human weakncss. He's accommodating, easy- going, adaptable and free from pride. You can share a drink with him, swap the occasional dirty story or bit of scandal.
'The masses always tend towards anthropomorphism in religion and morals, and they prefcr their idols to share their own \vcaknesses. So you can sec how wide a ficld he h:^s to blight. Besides, he's a fair actor, a smart operator—oh yes, he has things prettv \vcil sized up. You take his twists and turns—his attitude to civilization, say. He never so much as caught a whiff of civilization, but you listen to him! "Oh, how civilization has crippled us!" "Oh, how I envy savages—children of nature untouched by civilization!" We're to take it that he was once heart and soul for civilization in the old days, see? He served it, he knew it inside out, but it wearied him—disillusioned and cheated him. He's a Faust, get it ? A second Tolstoy.
'As for Schopenhauer and Spencer, they're just schoolboys to him. He patronizes them, claps them on the shoulder. "How is everything, Spencer, old bean ?" He's never read Spencer, ofcourse, but how charm- ing he is when he says with that casual air, that nonchalant irony, that his- lady friend "has read her Spencer"! And people listen to him. And no one will see that this charlatan has no right to kiss the sole of Spencer's foot, let alone speak about him in that tone. The subversion of civilization, authority and other people's idols, the mud-slinging, the jocular wink designed solely to justify and conceal your own spinelessness and moral bankruptcy—only an animal, a selfish, base, foul animal, could do such things.'