Stories (32 page)

And he gladly stroked her hair and shoulders, pressed her hands and wiped her tears … Finally she stopped crying. She went on for a long time complaining about her father and her difficult, unbearable life in this house, imploring Kovrin to put himself in her place; then she gradually began to smile and sigh about God having given her such a bad character, in the end burst into loud laughter, called herself a fool, and ran out of the room.

When Kovrin went out to the garden a little later, Yegor Semyonych and Tanya were strolling side by side along the walk, as if nothing had happened, and they were both eating black bread and salt, because they were both hungry.

Pleased that he had succeeded so well in the role of peacemaker, Kovrin went into the park. As he sat on a bench and reflected, he heard the rattle of carriages and women’s laughter—that was guests arriving. When the evening shadows began to lengthen in the garden, he vaguely heard the sounds of a violin an
d voices singing, and that reminded him of the black monk. Where, in what country or on what planet, was that optical incongruity racing about now?

No sooner had he remembered the legend and pictured in his imagination the dark phantom he had seen in the rye field, than there stepped from behind a pine tree just opposite him, inaudibly, without the slightest rustle, a man of average height, with a bare, gray head, all in dark clothes and barefoot, looking like a beggar, and his black eyebrows stood out sharply on his pale, deathly face. Nodding his head affably, this beggar or wanderer noiselessly approached
the bench and sat down, and Kovrin recognized him as the black monk. For a moment the two looked at each other—Kovrin wi
th amazement, and the monk tenderly and, as before, a little slyly, with the expression of one who keeps his own counsel.

“But you are a mirage,” said Kovrin. “Why are you here and sitting in one place? It doesn’t agree with the legend.”

“That makes no difference,” the monk answered after a moment, in a low voice, turning his face to him. “The legend, the mirage, and I—it is all a product of your excited imagination. I am a phantom.”

“So you don’t exist?” asked Kovrin.

“Think as you like,” said the monk, and he smiled faintly. “I exist in your imagination, and your imagination is part of nature, which means that I, too, exist in nature.”

“You have a very old, intelligent, and highly expressive face, as if you really have lived more than a thousand years,” said Kovrin. “I didn’t know that my imagination was capable of creating such phenomena. But why are you looking at me with such rapture? Do you like me?”

“Yes. You are one of the few who are justly called the chosen of God. You serve the eternal truth. Your thoughts and intentions, your astonishing science and your whole life bear a divine, heavenly imprint, because they are devoted to the reasonable and the beautiful—that is, to what is eternal.”

“You said: the eternal truth … But can people attain to eternal truth and do they need it, if there is no eternal life?”

“There is eternal life,” said the monk.

“You believe in people’s immortality?”

“Yes, of course. A great, magnificent future awaits you people. And the more like you there are on earth, the sooner that future will be realized. Without you servants of the higher principle, who live consciously and freely, mankind would be insignificant; developing in natural order, it would wait a long time for the end of its earthly history. But you will lead it into the kingdom of eternal truth several thousand years earlier—and in that lies your high worth. You incarnate in yourselves the blessing of God that rests upon people.”

“And what is the goal of eternal life?” asked Kovrin.

“The same as of any life—enjoyment. True enjoyment is in
knowledge, and eternal life will provide countless and inexhaustible sources for knowledge, and in that sense it is said: ‘In my Father’s house are many mansions.’”
⁵

“If you only knew how nice it is to listen to you!” said Kovrin, rubbing his hands with pleasure.

“I’m very glad.”

“But I know: when you leave, I’ll be troubled by the question of your essence. You’re a phantom, a hallucination. Meaning that I’m mentally ill, abnormal?”

“Suppose you are. What is so troubling? You’re ill because you worked beyond your strength and got tired, and that means you sacrificed your health to an idea, and the time is near when you will also give your life to it. What could be better? That is generally what all noble natures, endowed from on high, strive for.”

“If I know that I am mentally ill, then can I believe myself?”

“And how do you know that people of genius, whom the whole world believes, did not also see phantoms? Learned men now say that genius is akin to madness. My friend, only the ordinary herd people are healthy and normal. Reflections on this nervous age, fatigue, degeneracy, and so on, can seriously worry only those who see the goal of life in the present, that is, herd people.”

“The Romans said:
mens sana in corpore sano.”
⁶

“Not everything that the Romans or Greeks said was true. An exalted state, excitement, ecstasy—all that distinguishes the prophets, the poets, the martyrs for an idea, from ordinary people—runs counter to the animal side of man, that is, to his physical health. I repeat: if you want to be healthy and normal, join the herd.”

“Strange, you’re repeating what often goes through my own head,” said Kovrin. “It’s as if you had spied and eavesdropped on my innermost thoughts. But let’s not talk about me. What do you mean by eternal truth?”

The monk did not reply. Kovrin looked at him and could not make out his face: his features were dim and blurred. Then the monk’s head and hands began to disappear; his body mingled with the bench and the evening twilight, and he vanished completely.

“The hallucination is over!” said Kovrin, and he laughed. “Too bad.”

He went back to the house cheerful and happy. The little that the black monk had said to him had flattered not his vanity but his whole soul, his whole being. To be a chosen one, to serve the
eternal truth, to stand in the ranks of those who will make mankind worthy of the Kingdom of God several thousand years earlier, that is, deliver people from several thousand extra years of struggle, sin, and suffering, to give everything to that idea—youth, strength, health, to be ready to die for the common good—what a lofty, what a happy fate! His past, pure, chaste, filled with toil, ra
ced through his memory, he remembered all that he had studied and what he taught others, and he decided that there was no exaggeration in the monk’s words.

Tanya came walking towards him through the park. She was wearing a different dress.

“You’re here?” she said. “And we’ve been looking and looking for you … But what’s the matter?” she said in surprise, seeing his rapturous, radiant face and his eyes brimming with tears. “You’re so strange, Andryusha.”

“I’m contented, Tanya,” said Kovrin, placing his hands on her shoulders. “I’m more than contented, I’m happy! Tanya, dear Tanya, you’re an extremely sympathetic being. Dear Tanya, I’m so glad, so glad!”

He warmly kissed both her hands and went on:

“I’ve just lived through some bright, wondrous, unearthly moments. But I can’t tell you everything, because you’ll call me mad or you won’t believe me. Let’s talk about you. Dear, nice Tanya! I love you and I’m used to loving you. To have you near, to meet you a dozen times a day, has become a necessity for my soul. I don’t know how I’ll do without you when I go back home.”

“Well!” Tanya laughed. “You’ll forget us in two days. We’re little people, and you’re a great man.”

“No, let’s talk seriously!” he said. “I’ll take you with me, Tanya. Yes? Will you go with me? Do you want to be mine?”

“Well!” said Tanya, and again she wanted to laugh, but the laughter did not come out, and red spots appeared on her face.

She started breathing fast, and quickly went, not towards the house, but further into the park.

“I wasn’t thinking of that … I wasn’t!” she said, clasping her hands as if in despair.

And Kovrin followed her, saying with the same radiant, rapturous face:

“I want a love that will capture the whole of me, and only you, Tanya, can give me that love. I’m happy! Happy!”

She was stunned, she bent, shrank, and seemed to grow ten years older, but he found her lovely and expressed his rapture aloud: “How beautiful she is!”

On learning from Kovrin not only that the romance was under way, but that there was even to be a wedding, Yegor Semyonych paced up and down for a long time, trying to conceal his agitation. His hands began to tremble, his neck swelled and turned purple, he ordered his racing droshky harnessed and drove off somewhere. Tanya, seeing how he whipped up the horse and how far down, almost to the ears, he had pulled his cap, understood his mood, locked herself in her room, and cried all day.

The peaches and plums were already ripe in the conservatory; the packing and sending of these delicate and capricious goods to Moscow called for much attention, work, and trouble. The summer being very hot and dry, it was necessary to water every tree,
which took a lot of time and labor, and besides that multitudes of caterpillars appeared, which the workers, and even Yegor Semyonych and Tanya, squashed in their fingers, to Kovrin’s great disgust. With all that it was necessary to receive the fall orders for fruit and trees and carry on a vast correspondence. And at the busiest time, when nobody seemed to have a single free moment, the time came for work in the fields, which took half the workers from the gardens; Yegor Semyonych, deeply tanned, worn out, angry, galloped off now to the gardens, now to the fields, and shouted that he was being
torn to pieces and that he was going to put a bullet through his head.

And on top of that there was the bustling over the trousseau, something to which the Pesotskys attached great importance; the snick of scissors, the rattle of sewing machines, the burning smell of irons, the fussiness of the dressmaker, a nervous, easily offended lady, made everyone in the house dizzy. And, as if by design, guests came every day, who had to be entertained, fed, and even put up overnight. But all this hard labor passed unobserved, as in a fog. Tanya felt as if love and happiness had caught her unawares, though for some reason she had been certain since the age of fo
urteen that Kovrin would marry precisely her. She was amazed, perplexed,
did not believe herself… Sometimes she would be flooded with such joy that she wanted to fly up to the clouds and there pray to God, but then she would suddenly remember that in August she had to part with her own nest and leave her father, or else the thought would come, God knows from where, that she was insignificant, small, and unworthy of such a great man as Kovrin— and she would go to her room, lock herself in, and weep bitterly for several hours. When guests came, she would suddenly think that Kovrin was remarkably handso
me and that all the women were in love with him and envied her, and her soul would be filled with rapture and pride, as if she had conquered the whole world, but he had only to smile affably to some young lady, and she would tremble with jealousy, go to her room, and—tears again. These new feelings took complete possession of her
, she helped her father mechanically, and did not notice the peaches, or the caterpillars, or the workers, or how quickly the time raced by.

Almost the same thing happened with Yegor Semyonych. He worked from morning till night, was always hurrying somewhere, lost patience, became irritated, but all as if in some magical half dream. It was now as if two persons were sitting in him: one was the real Yegor Semyonych, who, listening to the gardener, Ivan Karlych, reporting some disorders to him, became indignant and clutched his head in despair, and the other not the real one, as if half drunk, who would suddenly break off the business conversation in mid-sentence, touch the gardener’s shoulder, and begin to murmur:

“Whatever you say, blood means a lot. His mother was a most amazing, noble, intelligent woman. It was a pleasure to look at her face, as kind, bright, and pure as an angel’s. She made wonderful drawings, wrote verses, spoke five foreign languages, sang … The poor thing died of consumption, may she rest in peace.”

The unreal Yegor Semyonych sighed and, after a pause, went on:

“When he was a little boy and growing up in my house, he had the same angelic face, bright and good. His eyes, his movements, and his conversation were gentle and graceful, like his mother’s. And his intelligence? He always amazed us with his intelligence. Let me tell you, he’s not a master of arts for nothing. Not for nothing. Wait and see, Ivan Karlych, what becomes of him in ten years. He’ll be unapproachable!”

But here the real Yegor Semyonych would recollect himself, make a terrible face, clutch his head, and shout:

“Devils! Besmutted, bemangled, begrimed! The orchard’s lost! The orchard’s ruined!”

And Kovrin worked with his former zeal and did not notice the turmoil. Love only added fuel to the fire. After each meeting with Tanya, he went to his room, happy, rapturous, and with the same passion with which he had just kissed Tanya and declared his love to her, got down to his book or manuscript. What the black monk had said about the chosen of God, the eternal truth, the magnificent future of mankind, and so on, endowed his work with a special, extraordinary importance and filled his soul with pride, with an awareness of his own loftiness. He met the black monk once or twice
a week, in the park or in the house, and had long talks with him, but that did not alarm him; on the contrary, it delighted him, because he was now firmly convinced that such visions came only to chosen, outstanding people who devoted themselves to the service of the idea.

Once the monk came during dinner and sat by the window in the dining room. Kovrin was glad and very adroitly started a conversation with Yegor Semyonych and Tanya about something that would interest the monk; the black visitor listened and nodded affably, and Yegor Semyonych and Tanya also listened and smiled cheerfully, not suspecting that Kovrin was not talking to them but to his hallucination.