'Very well then. But I still don't know if the matter's within my jurisdiction, old man. After all, your relations with your asistant are, in a manner of speaking, official. Besides, you dotted him one when he was on official duty. I don't know for certain, actually, but now we can ask the Chairman.'
Hasty steps and heavy breathing were heard, and Leo Trofimovich, the Chairman, appeared in the doorway—a balding, white-haired old man with a long beard and red eyelids. 'Good day to you,' he panted. 'Phew, I say! Tell them to bring me some kvau, judge. This'll be the death of me.'
He sank into an armchair, but immediately sprang up, trotted over to the doctor, and glared at him furiously. 'Many, thanks to
you, Doctor.' He spoke in a shrill, high-pitched voice. 'You've done me no end of a good turn. Most grateful to you, I'm sure. I shan't forget you in a month of SWldays. But is this the way for friends to behave? Say what you like, but you haven't been all that considerate, have you? Why didn't you let me know? Do you take me for your enemy? For a stranger? Your enemy, am I? Did I ever refuse you any- thing, eh?'
Glaring and twiddling his fingers, the Chairman drank his kvass, quickly wiped his lips and continued.
'Thank you so very, very much! But why didn't you let me know? If you'd had any feelings for me at all you'd have driven over and spoken to me as a friend. "My dear Leo Trofimovich, the facts are this that and the other. What's happened is that et cetera et cetera." I'd have settled it all in two ticks, and there would have been no need for scandal. That imbecile seems to have gone clean off his rocker. He's touring the county muck-raking and gossiping with village women while you, shameful to relate, have stirred up one hell of a witch's brew, if you'll pardon my saying so, and have got this jackass to sue you. You should be do^right ashamed of yourself. Everyone's asking me the rights and wrongs of it, and I—the Chairman!—don't know what you're up to. You have no use for me. Many, many thanks to you, Doctor.'
The Chairman bowed so low that he even turned purple. Then he went up to the window. 'Zhigalov, send Smimovsky here,' he shouted. 'I want him this instant!' Then he came away from the window. 'It's a bad business, sir. Even my wife was upset, and you know how much she's on your side. You're all too clever by half, gentlemen. You're keen on logic, principles and such flapdoodle, but where does it get you? Youjust confuse the issue.'
'Wdl, you're keen on being illogical, and where does that get you?' the doctor asked.
'All right, I'll tell you. Where it gets me is this, that ifl hadn't come here now you'd have disgraced both yoursdf and us. It's lucky for you I did come.'
The orderly entered and stood near the door. The Chairman stood sideways on to him, thrust his hands in his pockets and cleared his throat.
'Apologize to the doctor at once,' he said.
The doctor blushed and ran into another room.
'There, you see, the doctor do^'t want to accept your apology,' went on the Chairman. 'He wants you to show you're sorry in deeds, not words. Will you promise to do what he says and lead a sober life from this day onwards?'
'I will,' the orderly brought out in a deep, grim voice.
'Then watch your step, or heaven hdp you—you'll get the order of the boot double quick! If anything goes wrong you can expect no mercy. All right—off home with you.'
For the orderly, who had already accepted his misfortune, this of events was a delightful surprise. He even went pale with joy. He wanted to say something and put out his hand, but remained silent, smiled foolishly and went out.
'That's that,' said the Chairman. 'No need for a trial either.' He sighed with relief, surveyed the samovar and glasses with the air of one who has just brought off an extremely difficult and important coup, and wiped his hands.
'Blessed are the peacemakers,' said he. 'Pour me another glass, Alexander. Oh yes, and tell them to bring me a bite to eat first. And, well, some vodka '
'I say, this just won't do!' Still flushed, the doctor came into the dining-room, wringing his hands. 'This, er—it's a farce, it's revolting. I can't stand it. Better have twenty trials than settle things in this cock- eyed fashion. I can't stand it, I tell you!'
'What do you want then?' the Chairman snapped back. 'To get rid of him? Very well, I'll fire him.'
'No don't do that. I don't know what I do want, but this attitude to life, gentlemen- God, this is sheer agony!'
The doctor started bustling nervously, looked for his hat, could not find it, and sank exhausted in an armchair. 'Disgusting,' he repeated.
'My dear fellow,' whispered the judge. 'To some extent I fail to understand you, in a manner of speaking. The incident was your fault, after all. Socking folks in the jaw at the end of the nineteenth century! Say what you like, but, in a manner of speaking, it er, quite the thing. The man's a blackguard, but you must admit you acted in- cautiously yourself..'
'Of course,' the Chairman agreed.
Vodka and hors-d'a:uvre were served. On his way out the doctor mechanically drank a glass of vodka and ate a radish. As he drove back to hospital his thoughts were veiled in mist like gras on autu^ mornings.
How could it be, he wondered, that after all tie anguish, all the hean-searching, all the talk of the past week, everything had fizzled out in a finale so banal? How utterly stupid!
He was ashamed of involving strangers in his personal problem, ashamed of what he had said to these people, ashamed of the vodka that he had drunk from the habit of idle drinking and icle living, ashamed of his insensitive, shallow mind.
On returning to hospital, he at once started on his ward rounds. The orderly accompanied him, treading softly as a cat, answering questions gently. The orderly, the Mermaid, the nurses-—all pretended that nothing had happened, that all was as it should be. The doctor too made every effort to appear unaffected. He gave orders, he fumed, he joked with the patients, while one idea kept stirring in his brain.
'The sheer, the crass stupidity ofit all.'
THE BEAUTIES
I
I remember driving with my grandfather from the village of Bolshaya Krepkaya, in the Don Region, to Rostov-on-Don when I was a high-school boy in the fifth or sixth form. It was a sultry August day, exhausting and depretting. Our eyes were practically gu^rned up, and our mouths were parched from the heat and the hot, dry wind that drove clouds of dust towards us. We did not feel like looking, speaking or ^^&ng. When our dozing driver, a Ukrainian called ^upo, caught me on the cap with his whip while lashing at his horse, I neither protested nor uttered a sound, but just opened my eyes, half asleep as I was, and looked dispiritedly and mildly into the distance to see if a village ^^ visible through the dust.
We stopped to feed the horse in the large ^menian settlement of Bakhchi-Salakh, at the house of a rich Armenian whom my grand- father knew. Never in my life have I seen anything more grotesque. Imagine a small, cropped head with thick, beetling eyebrows, a beaked nose, long white whiskers, and a wide mouth with a long cherry- wood chibouk sticking out of it. The smaJl head has been cl^mily tacked to a gaunt, hunched carcase arayed in bizare garb—a short red jacket and gaudy, sky-blue, baggy trousers. The creature walks about splaying its legs, shuffling its slippers, speaking with its pipe in its mouth, yet comporting itself with the dignity of your true Arme- nian—unsmiling, goggle-eyed, and trying to take as little notice of his visitors as po^ible.
The Armenian's dwelling was wind-free and dust-free inside, but it was just as disagreeable, stuffy and depressing as the prairie and the road. I remember sitting on a green chest in a corner, dusty and exhausted by the heat. The unpainted wooden walls, the f^mture and the ochre-stained floorboards reeked of dry sun-baked wood. Wherever I looked there were flies, flies, flies. In low voices Grand- father and the Armenian discussed sheep, pasturage and grazing problems. I knew they would be a good hour getting the samovar going, and that Grandfather would spend at least another hour over his tea, after which he would sleep for two or three hours more. A quarter of my day would be spent waiting, and then there would be