The Man Who Was Afraid

But he still tried to persuade her not to forsake him, and, finally – which was to be expected – announced his desire to marry her.

“So, so!” and she began to laugh. “Shall I marry you while my husband is still alive? My darling, my queer fellow! You have a desire to marry, eh? But do they marry such women as I am? You will have many, many mistresses. Marry then, when you have overflowed, when you have had your fill of all sweets and feel like having rye bread. Then you may marry! I have noticed that a healthy man, for his own peace, must not marry early. One woman will not be enough to satisfy him, and he’ll go to other women. And for your own happiness, you should take a wife only when you know that she alone will suffice for you.”

But the more she spoke, the more persistent Foma became in his desire not to part with her.

“Just listen to what I’ll tell you,” said the woman, calmly. “A splinter of wood is burning in your hand, and you can see well even without its light – you had better dip it into water, so that there will be no smell of smoke and your hand will not be burned.”

“I do not understand your words.”

“Do understand. You have done me no wrong, and I do not wish to do you any. And, therefore, I am going away.”

It is hard to say what might have been the result of this dispute if an accident had not interfered with it. In Kazan Foma received a telegram from Mayakin, who wrote to his godson briefly: “Come immediately on the passenger steamer.” Foma’s heart contracted nervously, and a few hours later, gloomy and pale, his teeth set together, he stood on the deck of the steamer, which was leaving the harbour, and clinging to the rail with his hands, he stared motionlessly into the face of his love, who was floating far away from him together with the harbour and the shore. Pelageya waved her handkerchief and smiled, but he knew that she was crying, shedding many painful tears. From her tears the entire front of Foma’s shirt was wet, and from her tears, his heart, full of gloomy alarm, was sad and cold. The figure of the woman was growing smaller and smaller, as though melting away, and Foma, without lifting his eyes, stared at her and felt that aside from fear for his father and sorrow for the woman, some new, powerful and caustic sensation was awakening in his soul. He could not name it, but it seemed to him as something like a grudge against someone.

The crowd in the harbour blended into a close, dark and dead spot, faceless, formless, motionless. Foma went away from the rail and began to pace the deck gloomily.

The passengers, conversing aloud, seated themselves to drink tea; the porters bustled about on the gallery, setting the tables; somewhere below, on the stern, in the third class, a child was crying, a harmonica was wailing, the cook was chopping something with knives, the dishes were jarring – producing a rather harsh noise. Cutting the waves and making foam, shuddering under the strain and sighing heavily, the enormous steamer moved rapidly against the current. Foma looked at the wide strip of broken, struggling, and enraged waves at the stern of the steamer, and began to feel a wild desire to break or tear something; also to go, breast foremost, against the current and to mass its pressure against himself, against his breast and his shoulders.

“Fate!” said someone beside him in a hoarse and weary voice.

This word was familiar to him: his Aunt Anfisa had often used it as an answer to his questions, and he had invested in this brief word a conception of a power, similar to the power of God. He glanced at the speakers: one of them was a gray little old man, with a kind face; the other was younger, with big, weary eyes and with a little black wedge-shaped beard. His big gristly nose and his yellow, sunken cheeks reminded Foma of his godfather.

“Fate!” The old man repeated the exclamation of his interlocutor with confidence, and began to smile. “Fate in life is like a fisherman on the river: it throws a baited hook toward us into the tumult of our life and we dart at it with greedy mouths. Then fate pulls up the rod – and the man is struggling, flopping on the ground, and then you see his heart is broken. That’s how it is, my dear man.”

Foma closed his eyes, as if a ray of the sun had fallen full on them, and shaking his head, he said aloud:

“True! That is true!”

The companions looked at him fixedly: the old man, with a fine, wise smile; the large-eyed man, unfriendly, askance. This confused Foma; he blushed and walked away, thinking of Fate and wondering why it had first treated him kindly by giving him a woman, and then took back the gift from him, so simply and abusively? And he now understood that the vague, caustic feeling which he carried within him was a grudge against Fate for thus sporting with him. He had been too much spoiled by life, to regard more plainly the first drop of poison from the cup which was just started, and he passed all the time of the journey without sleep, pondering over the old man’s words and fondling his grudge. This grudge, however, did not awaken in him despondency and sorrow, but rather a feeling of anger and revenge.

Foma was met by his godfather, and to his hasty and agitated question, Mayakin, his greenish little eyes flashing excitedly, said when he seated himself in the carriage beside his godson:

“Your father has grown childish.”

“Drinking?”

“Worse – he has lost his mind completely.”

“Really? Oh Lord! Tell me.”

“Don’t you understand? A certain lady is always around him.”

“What about her?” exclaimed Foma, recalling his Pelageya, and for some reason or other his heart was filled with joy.

“She sticks to him and – bleeds him.”

“Is she a quiet one?”

“She? Quiet as a fire. Seventy-five thousand roubles she blew out of his pocket like a feather!”

“Oh! Who is she?”

“Sonka Medinskaya, the architect’s wife.”

“Great God! Is it possible that she – Did my father – Is it possible that he took her as his sweetheart?” asked Foma, with astonishment, in a low voice.

His godfather drew back from him, and comically opening his eyes wide, said convincedly:

“You are out of your mind, too! By God, you’re out of your mind! Come to your senses! A sweetheart at the age of sixty-three! And at such a price as this. What are you talking about? Well, I’ll tell this to Ignat.”

And Mayakin filled the air with a jarring, hasty laughter, at which his goat-like beard began to tremble in an uncomely manner. It took Foma a long time to obtain a categorical answer; the old man, contrary to his habit, was restless and irritated; his speech, usually fluent, was now interrupted; he was swearing and expectorating as he spoke, and it was with difficulty that Foma learned what the matter was. Sophya Pavlovna Medinskaya, the wealthy architect’s wife, who was well known in the city for her tireless efforts in the line of arranging various charitable projects, persuaded Ignat to endow seventy-five thousand roubles for the erection of a lodging-house in the city and of a public library with a reading-room. Ignat had given the money, and already the newspapers lauded him for his generosity. Foma had seen the woman more than once on the streets; she was short; he knew that she was considered as one of the most beautiful women in the city, and that bad rumours were afoot as to her behaviour.

“Is that all?” exclaimed Foma, when his godfather concluded the story. “And I thought God knows what!”

“You? You thought?” cried Mayakin, suddenly grown angry. “You thought nothing, you beardless youngster!”

“Why do you abuse me?” Foma said.

“Tell me, in your opinion, is seventy-five thousand roubles a big sum or not?”

“Yes, a big sum,” said Foma, after a moment’s thought.

“Ah, ha!”

“But my father has much money. Why do you make such a fuss about it?”

Yakov Tarasovich was taken aback. He looked into the youth’s face with contempt and asked him in a faint voice:

“And you speak like this?”

“I? Who then?”

“You lie! It is your young foolishness that speaks. Yes! And my old foolishness – brought to test a million times by life – says that you are a young dog as yet, and it is too early for you to bark in a basso.”

Foma hearing this, had often been quite provoked by his godfather’s too picturesque language.

Mayakin always spoke to him more roughly than his father, but now the youth felt very much offended by the old man and said to him reservedly, but firmly:

“You had better not abuse me without reflection, for I am no longer a small child.”

“Come, come!” exclaimed Mayakin, mockingly lifting his eyebrows and squinting.

This roused Foma’s indignation. He looked full into the old man’s eyes and articulated with emphasis:

“And I am telling you that I don’t want to hear any more of that undeserved abuse of yours. Enough!”

“Mm! So-o! Pardon me.”

Yakov Tarasovich closed his eyes, chewed a little with his lips, and, turning aside from his godson, kept silent for awhile. The carriage turned into a narrow street, and, noticing from afar the roof of his house, Foma involuntarily moved forward. At the same time Mayakin asked him with a roguish and gentle smile: