The Man Who Was Afraid

“Thank God! You must be quite tired now?”

Cold wind blew in Foma’s face. A contented, boastful bustle was in the air about him; swearing at one another in a friendly way, merry, with smiles on their perspiring brows, the peasants approached him and surrounded him closely. He smiled in embarrassment: the excitement within him had not yet calmed down and this hindered him from understanding what had happened and why all those who surrounded him were so merry and contented.

“We’ve raised a hundred and seventy thousand puds as if we plucked a radish from a garden-bed!” said some one.

“We ought to get a vedro of whisky from our master.”

Foma, standing on a heap of cable, looked over the heads of the workers and saw; between the barges, side by side with them, stood a third barge, black, slippery, damaged, wrapped in chains. It was warped all over, it seemed as though it swelled from some terrible disease and, impotent, clumsy, it was suspended between its companions, leaning against them. Its broken mast stood out mournfully in the centre; reddish streams of water, like blood, were running across the deck, which was covered with stains of rust. Everywhere on the deck lay heaps of iron, of black, wet stumps of wood, and of ropes.

“Raised?” asked Foma, not knowing what to say at the sight of this ugly, heavy mass, and again feeling offended at the thought that merely for the sake of raising this dirty, bruised monster from the water, his soul had foamed up with such joy.

“How’s the barge?” asked Foma, indefinitely, addressing the contractor.

“It’s pretty good! We must unload right away, and put a company of about twenty carpenters to work on it – they’ll bring it quickly into shape,” said the contractor in a consoling tone.

And the light-haired fellow, gaily and broadly smiling into Foma’s face, asked:

“Are we going to have any vodka?”

“Can’t you wait? You have time!” said the contractor, sternly. “Don’t you see – the man is tired.”

Then the peasants began to speak:

“Of course, he is tired!

“That wasn’t easy work!”

“Of course, one gets tired if he isn’t used to work.”

“It is even hard to eat gruel if you are not used to it.”

“I am not tired,” said Foma, gloomily, and again were heard the respectful exclamations of the peasants, as they surrounded him more closely.

“Work, if one likes it, is a pleasant thing.”

“It’s just like play.”

“It’s like playing with a woman.”

But the light-haired fellow persisted in his request:

“Your Honour! You ought to treat us to a vedro of vodka, eh?” he said, smiling and sighing.

Foma looked at the bearded faces before him and felt like saying something offensive to them. But somehow everything became confused in his brain, he found no thoughts in it and, finally, without giving himself an account of his words, said angrily:

“All you want is to drink all the time! It makes no difference to you what you do! You should have thought – why? to what purpose? Eh, you!”

There was an expression of perplexity on the faces of those that surrounded him, blue and red, bearded figures began to sigh, scratch themselves, shift themselves from one foot to another. Others cast a hopeless glance at Foma and turned away.

“Yes, yes!” said the contractor, with a sigh. “That wouldn’t harm! That is – to think – why and how. These are words of wisdom.”

The light-haired fellow had a different opinion on the matter; smiling kind-heartedly, he waved his hand and said:

“We don’t have to think over our work! If we have it – we do it! Our business is simple! When a rouble is earned – thank God! we can do everything.”

“And do you know what’s necessary to do?” questioned Foma, irritated by the contradiction.

“Everything is necessary – this and that.”

“But where’s the sense?”

“There’s but one and the same sense in everything for our class – when you have earned for bread and taxes – live! And when there’s something to drink, into the bargain.”

“Eh, you!” exclaimed Foma, with contempt. “You’re also talking! What do you understand?”

“Is it our business to understand?” said the light-haired fellow, with a nod of the head. It now bored him to speak to Foma. He suspected that he was unwilling to treat them to vodka and he was somewhat angry.

“That’s it!” said Foma, instructively, pleased that the fellow yielded to him, and not noticing the cross, sarcastic glances. “And he who understands feels that it is necessary to do everlasting work!”

“That is, for God!” explained the contractor, eyeing the peasants, and added, with a devout sigh:

“That’s true. Oh, how true that is!”

And Foma was inspired with the desire to say something correct and important, after which these people might regard him in a different light, for he was displeased with the fact that all, save the light-haired fellow, kept silent and looked at him askance, surlily, with such weary, gloomy eyes.

“It is necessary to do such work,” he said, moving his eyebrows. “Such work that people may say a thousand years hence: ‘This was done by the peasants of Bogorodsk – yes!’”

The light-haired fellow glanced at Foma with astonishment and asked:

“Are we, perhaps, to drink the Volga dry?” Then he sniffed and, nodding his head, announced: “We can’t do that – we should all burst.”

Foma became confused at his words and looked about him; the peasants were smiling morosely, disdainfully, sarcastically. And these smiles stung him like needles. A serious-looking peasant, with a big gray beard, who had not yet opened his mouth up to that time, suddenly opened it now, came closer to Foma and said slowly:

“And even if we were to drink the Volga dry, and eat up that mountain, into the bargain – that too would be forgotten, your Honour. Everything will be forgotten. Life is long. It is not for us to do such deeds as would stand out above everything else. But we can put up scaffoldings – that we can!”

He spoke and sceptically spitting at his feet, indifferently walked off from Foma, and slipped into the crowd, as a wedge into a tree. His words crushed Foma completely; he felt, that the peasants considered him stupid and ridiculous. And in order to save his importance as master in their eyes, to attract again the now exhausted attention of the peasants to himself, he bristled up, comically puffed up his cheeks and blurted out in an impressive voice:

“I make you a present of three buckets of vodka.”

Brief speeches have always the most meaning and are always apt to produce a strong impression. The peasants respectfully made way for Foma, making low bows to him, and, smiling merrily and gratefully, thanked him for his generosity in a unanimous roar of approval.

“Take me over to the shore,” said Foma, feeling that the excitement that had just been aroused in him would not last long. A worm was gnawing his heart, and he was weary.

“I feel disgusted!” he said, entering the hut where Sasha, in a smart, pink gown, was bustling about the table, arranging wines and refreshments. “I feel disgusted, Aleksandra! If you could only do something with me, eh?”

She looked at him attentively and, seating herself on the bench, shoulder to shoulder with him, said:

“Since you feel disgusted – it means that you want something. What is it you want?”