‘And how do you like her papa?’ laughed the Count.
‘He’s insane… should be in a lunatic asylum, not managing forests. You wouldn’t be far wrong if you went and hung the sign “Lunatic Asylum” on the gates to your estate. It’s sheer Bedlam here! This forester, Owlet, that card-mad Franz, that old man in love, an overexcited girl, a drunken Count – what more do you want?’
‘And I pay that forester wages! How can he work if he’s insane?’
‘It’s obvious that Urbenin’s keeping him on solely because of the daughter. Urbenin says that Nikolay Yefimych goes off his rocker every summer. But that’s not so… that forester’s constantly off his rocker, not only during the summer. Fortunately your Pyotr Yegorych rarely lies and he’d soon give himself away if he did.’
‘Last year Urbenin wrote to inform me that our old forester Akhmetyev was going to Mount Athos21 to become a monk and he recommended the “experienced, honest and worthy Skvortsov”. Of course, I agreed, as I invariably do. After all, letters aren’t faces: they don’t show it if they lie!’
The carriage drove into the courtyard and stopped at the main entrance. We climbed out. By now it had stopped raining. Giving off flashes of lightning and angrily rumbling, a storm cloud was racing towards the north-east, revealing an ever-increasing expanse of starry blue sky. It seemed as if some heavily armed power, having wrought wholesale devastation and exacted terrible tribute, was now rushing on to new conquests. Small clouds that had been left behind hurried after it in hot pursuit, as if afraid they would not catch up with it. Peace was being restored to Nature.
And this peace was apparent in the calm aromatic air, filled with languor and nightingale melodies, in the silence of the sleeping garden, in the caressing light of the rising moon. The lake awoke after its daytime slumbers and made itself audible to man with its gentle murmur.
At such times it is pleasant to drive through open country in a comfortable carriage, or to row on a lake. But we went into the house: there a different kind of poetry was awaiting us.
V
The man who, under the influence of mental pain or plagued with unbearable suffering, puts a bullet in his brains is called a suicide. But for those who give full rein to their pathetic, spiritually debasing passions during the sacred days of their youth there is no name in the language of man. Bullets are followed by the peace of the grave, ruined youth is followed by years of grief and agonizing memories. Anyone who has profaned his youth will understand my present state of mind. I’m not old yet, I’m not grey, but I’m no longer alive. Psychiatrists tell of a soldier who, wounded at Waterloo, went mad, subsequently assuring everyone (and he believed it himself) that he had been killed at Waterloo and that the person they now took to be him was merely his ghost, an echo of the past. And now I’m experiencing something similar to that half-death.
‘I’m very glad you didn’t have anything to eat at the forester’s and haven’t spoilt your appetite,’ the Count told me as we entered the house. ‘We’re going to have an excellent supper, just like old times. You can serve us now,’ he told Ilya, who was helping him off with his jacket and putting on his dressing-robe.
Off we went to the dining-room. Here, on a side-table, life was already ‘bubbling away’. Bottles of every colour and conceivable size stood in rows, as they do on the shelves of theatre bars, reflecting the light from the lamps and awaiting our attention. Salted, marinaded meats, all kinds of savouries stood on another table, together with a carafe of vodka and another of English bitters.22 Close to the wine bottles were two dishes: one with sucking-pig, the other with cold sturgeon.
‘Well, gentlemen,’ began the Count, filling three glasses and shuddering as if he felt cold. ‘Good health! Take your glass, Kaetan Kazimirovich!’
I emptied mine, but the Pole shook his head negatively. He drew the sturgeon closer to him, sniffed it and started eating.
Here I must crave the reader’s forgiveness, for now I have to describe something which is not in the least ‘poetic’.
‘Well now, you’ve had your first,’ said the Count, refilling the glasses. ‘Be bold, my dear Lecoq!’
I took my glass, glanced at it and put it down. ‘To hell with it, it’s ages since I last had a drink,’ I said. ‘Why not remember the good old days?’ And without further hesitation I filled five glasses and, one after the other, poured their contents down my throat. That was the only way I knew how to drink. Little schoolboys learn from big ones how to smoke cigarettes. The Count looked at me as he poured himself five glasses, arched his body, wrinkled his face, shook his head and tossed them all back. My own five glasses struck him as an act of bravado, but I didn’t drink at all to flaunt my talent for drinking: far from it. I craved intoxication, pure and utter intoxication such as I had not known for a very long time, living as I did in a tiny little village. After drinking my fill I sat at the table and started on the sucking-pig.
Intoxication was not long in coming. Soon I felt a slight dizziness. Then I experienced a pleasant, cool sensation in my chest – this was the start of a blissful, expansive state. Suddenly, without any particularly noticeable transition, I became extremely merry. My feelings of boredom and emptiness gave way to a sensation of perfect joy and euphoria. I started smiling. Suddenly I yearned for conversation, laughter, people. As I chewed the sucking-pig I began to experience life in all its plenitude, almost complete contentment with life, almost perfect happiness.
‘Why aren’t you drinking?’ I asked the Pole.
‘He doesn’t drink,’ said the Count. ‘Don’t try and force him.’
‘All the same, you must at least drink something!’ I exclaimed. The Pole popped a large slice of sturgeon into his mouth and shook his head dismissively. His silence only egged me on.
‘Listen, Kaetan… what’s your second name?… why do you never say a word?’ I asked. ‘So far I haven’t had the pleasure of hearing your voice.’
His eyebrows rose like a swallow in flight and he looked at me.
‘Do you vish me to speak?’ he asked with a strong Polish accent.
‘I vish very much.’
‘And vy is zat?’
‘Vy indeed! On board ship, during dinner, strangers and people who’ve never met manage to get into conversation. But we, who have known each other for several hours now, simply gape at one another – and so far we haven’t spoken a single word to each other. It’s unheard of!’
The Pole said nothing.
‘But vy are you so silent?’ I asked after a brief interval. ‘Give me some sort of reply.’
‘I don’t vish to reply. I can detect laughter in your voice and I don’t like being ridiculed.’
‘But he’s not laughing at you at all!’ the Count said in alarm. ‘Where did you get that idea from, Kaetan? He’s just being friendly.’
‘Counts and princes have never taken zat tone with me!’ Kaetan said, frowning. ‘I don’t like zat tone.’
‘So, you won’t honour us with a little conversation?’ I persisted, polishing off another glass and laughing.
‘Do you know my real reason for coming back here?’ interrupted the Count, wishing to change the subject. ‘Haven’t I told you yet? In St Petersburg I went to see a doctor friend who’s always treated me, complaining about not feeling well. He listened, tapped, poked me all over and asked: “You’re not a coward, are you?” Well, although I’m no coward, I went white and replied that I wasn’t.’
‘Cut it short, old man, you’re boring me!’
‘He diagnosed that I would die very soon if I didn’t leave St Petersburg and go abroad. My whole liver was diseased from chronic drinking. So I decided to come here. Yes, it would have been stupid to have stayed on there. This estate is magnificent, so rich… the climate alone is priceless! Here one can at least get on with some work! Hard work is the best, the most effective medicine. Isn’t that so, Kaetan? I’ll do a spot of farming and give up drink. The doctor forbade me a single glass… not even one glass!’