'I know Shchedrin isn't on your syllabus, but that's beside the point. Just you explain what makes Pushkin a psychologist.'
'Biit it's plain as a pikcstaff Very well, then, I'll give exmnples.'
He recited some passages of Eugene Oncgi« and then of Boris Goduuot>.
'I see no psychology thcre,' sighed Vary;i. 'A psychologist ddvcs into the crannies of the human soul. Those arc fine vcrses, nothing more.'
Nikitin was offended. 'I know your sort of psychology. You want somebody to saw my finger with a blunt saw while I yell my head ofi", that's your idea of psychology.'
'Fceble! And you still haven't proved that Piishkin's a psychologist.'
When Nikitin found himself arguing against views which he thought hackneyed, conventional and the like, he usually jumpcd out of his seat, clutched his head in both hands and ran up and down thc room groaning—which is what he did now. He jumped up, he clutched his head, he walked round the table groaning, and then sat away from it.
The officers took his part. Captain Polyansky .assured V;irya that Pushkin really was a psychologist, citing two lines of Lermontov to prove it, and Lieutenant Gernct said that Pushkin wouldn't have had a statue erected to him in Moscow had he not been a psychologist.
'It's the act of a bounder,' was heard from.thc other end of the table. 'I said as much to the Governor. "It's the act of a bounder, sir", I told him.'
'I shan't argue any more!' shouted Nikitin. 'This could go on till doomsday, I've had enough. Oh, clear off, you bloody dog!' he shouted at Fishface who had put his head and paw on his lap.
A guttural snarl came from under his chair.
'Admit you're in the wrong!' Varya shouted. 'Own up!'
But some young ladies came in, and the dispute died a natural death. They all went into the drawing-room, where Varya sat at the grand piano and played dances. They danced a waltz, a polka and a quadrille with a grand chain led through the whole house by Captain Polyansky, after which they waltzed again.
Watching the yoWigsters in the drawing-room, the older folk sat out the dances and smoked, among them the municipal bank manager Shebaldin, reno-wned for his love oflitcrature and dramatic art. He had founded the local music and drama group, taking part in performances himself, but for some reason only playing comic footmen or intoning Alexis Tolstoy's poem 'The Sinful Woman'. He had been nicknamed 'the Mummy' in to^n because he was tall, emaciated and sinewy with a fixed, solemn expression and dull, glazed eyes. So sincere was his love of the theatre that he cven shaved his moustache and beard, which made him look still more like a mummy.
After the grand chain he shuffled up sideways to Nikitin.
'I had the pleasure of being present at the argument during tca,' he remarked, coughing. 'And I fully share your opinion. We're fellow- spirits, you and I, and I'd much welcome a chat. Now, have you read Lessing's Hamburgische Dramaturgie ?'
'No.'
Shebaldin lookcd horrified, waved his hands as if he had b^nt his fi.ngers, and backed away from Nikitin without a word. The man's ftgure, his question, his surprise—all seemed absurd to Nikitin, who yet wondered whether it wasn't 'really rather embarrassing. Here I am teaching literature, and I still haven't read Lessing. I shall have to.'
Before supper everyone, young and old, sat do^ to play forfeits. They took two packs of cards. One was dealt round, the other laid on the table face downwards.
'Whoever holds this card,' said old Shelestov solemnly, lifting the top card of the second pack, 'his forfeit is to go straight to the nursery and kiss Nanny.'
The good fortune ofkissing Nanny devolved upon Shebaldin. They all flocked rotmd him, they took him to the nursery and they made him kiss the nanny in an uproar of laughing, clapping and shouting.
'Less passion, I insist!' shouted Shclestov, tears rolling down his cheeks.
Nikitin's forfeit was to take confession. He sat on a chair in the middle of the drawing-room, a shawl was brought and put over his head. Varya came to confess first.
'I know your sins, madam.' Nikitin gazed at her stcm profile in thc gloom. 'How, pray, do you account for going out with Polyansky every day? Oho, there's more to this than meets the eye!'
'Feeblc,' said Varya. And went.
Then Nikitin saw big, lustrous, unwavering eyes tmder his shawl, a lovely profile emerged from the gloom, and he caught a familiar, precious fragrance redolent of.Masha's room.
'Marie Godefroi, what are your sins?' he said, and did not know his own voice—so tender, so soft was it.
Masha screwed up her eyes, put out the tip of her tongue, laughed and went away. A minute later she was standing in the middle of the room clapping her hands.
'Supper, supper, supper,' she shouted, and all trooped into the dining-room.
At supper Varya had another argument, with her father this time. Polyansky stolidly ate his food, drank his claret, and told Nikitin about a winter's night which he had once spent knee-deep in a bog when on active service. The enemy had been so near that they were forbidden to speak or smoke, it had been cold and dark, there had been a piercing wind. Nikitin listened, watching Masha out of the corner of his eye while she gazed at him without wavering or blinking, as if deep in thought and oblivious ofher surroundings. This pleased and tormented him.
'Why docs shc look at me like that?' he agonizingly wondercd. 'It's embarrassing, someone may notice. Oh, how young, how innoccnt she is.'
The party broke up at midnight. When Nikitin had gone through the gate a first-floor window banged open, Masha showed herself, and called his name.
'What is it?'
'It's just that—.' Masha was obviously wondering what to say. 'Er, Polyansky's promised to bring his camera in a day or two and photo- graph us all. We must have a get-together.'
'Fine.'
Masha disappearcd, the window slammed, and someone in the house at once started playing the piano.
'Oh, what a house,' thought Nikitin, crossing the street. 'A house where the only moaning comes from the Egyptian pigeons, and that simply because they have no other way to express their joy.'
Fun was not confined to the Shelestovs', though, for Nikitin had not taken two hundrcd steps before piano music was heard from another house. He w.alked on a bit and saw a peasant playing a balalaika near a gate. The band in the park struck up a pot-pourri of Russian folk- songs.
Nikitin lived a quarter of a mile from the Shclcstovs in an eight- roomed flat, rented at three hundred roubles a year, which he shared with his colleague Hippolytus, the geography and history master. This Hippolytus—a snub-nosed, reddish-bearded, middlc-aged man with a rather coarse but good-natured cxpression more like a workman's than an intcllectual's—was sitting at his desk correcting pupils' maps when Nikitin returncd. According to Hippolytus, drawing your maps was the most crucial and essential aspect of geography, while with history it was knowing your dates—he would sit up night after night with his blue pencil correcting the maps of boys and girls he taught, or compiling lists of dates.
'Wonderful weather today,' said Nikitin, going into Hippolytus's room. 'I don't know how you can stay indoors.'
No great talker, Hippolytus would either say nothing at all or utter the merest platitudes. He now vouchsafed the following reply.
'It is indeed excellent weather. It is May now, and it will soon be full su^mer. Summer differs from winter. Stoves must be lit in winter, whercas in summer you can keep warm without them. Open your windows on a summer night and you'll still be warm, whereas in winter you are cold even with the double frames.'
After sitting near the desk for less than a minute, Nikitin felt bored and stood up, yawning.
'Good night,' he said. 'I wanted to tell you something romantic affecting myself, but you have geography on the brain. One talks to you of love, and you ask for the date of the Battle of Kalka. To hell with your battles and your Siberian capes.'