Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian | Page 7

at the gates, scraping the ground
with a spade. . . . From behind every corner, from behind every
window-blind, the others were watching him. . . . The trick succeeded
beyond all expectations. On seeing Tatiana, at first, he nodded as usual,
making caressing, inarticulate sounds; then he looked carefully at her,
dropped his spade, jumped up, went up to her, brought his face close to
her face. . . . In her fright she staggered more than ever, and shut her
eyes. . . . He took her by the arm, whirled her right across the yard, and
going into the room where the council had been sitting, pushed her
straight at Kapiton. Tatiana fairly swooned away. . . . Gerasim stood,
looked at her, waved his hand, laughed, and went off, stepping heavily,
to his garret. . . . For the next twenty-four hours he did not come out of
it. The postilion Antipka said afterwards that he saw Gerasim through a
crack in the wall, sitting on his bedstead, his face in his hand. From
time to time he uttered soft regular sounds; he was wailing a dirge, that
is, swaying backwards and forwards with his eyes shut, and shaking his
head as drivers or bargemen do when they chant their melancholy
songs. Antipka could not bear it, and he came away from the crack.
When Gerasim came out of the garret next day, no particular change
could be observed in him. He only seemed, as it were, more morose,
and took not the slightest notice of Tatiana or Kapiton. The same
evening, they both had to appear before their mistress with geese under
their arms, and in a week's time they were married. Even on the day of
the wedding Gerasim showed no change of any sort in his behavior.
Only, he came back from the river without water, he had somehow
broken the barrel on the road; and at night, in the stable, he washed and

rubbed down his horse so vigorously, it swayed like a blade of grass in
the wind, and staggered from one leg to the other under his fists of iron.
All this had taken place in the spring. Another year passed by, during
which Kapiton became a hopeless drunkard, and as being absolutely of
no use for anything, was sent away with the store wagons to a distant
village with his wife. On the day of his departure, he put a very good
face on it at first, and declared that he would always be at home, send
him where they would, even to the other end of the world; but later on
he lost heart, began grumbling that he was being taken to uneducated
people, and collapsed so completely at last that he could not even put
his own hat on. Some charitable soul stuck it on his forehead, set the
peak straight in front, and thrust it on with a slap from above. When
everything was quite ready, and the peasants already held the reins in
their hands, and were only waiting for the words "With God's
blessing!" to start, Gerasim came out of his garret, went up to Tatiana,
and gave her as a parting present a red cotton handkerchief he had
bought for her a year ago. Tatiana, who had up to that instant borne all
the revolting details of her life with great indifference, could not
control herself upon that; she burst into tears, and as she took her seat
in the cart, she kissed Gerasim three times like a good Christian. He
meant to accompany her as far as the town-barrier, and did walk beside
her cart for a while, but he stopped suddenly at the Crimean ford,
waved his hand, and walked away along the riverside.
It was getting towards evening. He walked slowly, watching the water.
All of a sudden he fancied something was floundering in the mud close
to the bank. He stooped over, and saw a little white-and-black puppy,
who, in spite of all its efforts, could not get out of the water; it was
struggling, slipping back, and trembling all over its thin wet little body.
Gerasim looked at the unlucky little dog, picked it up with one hand,
put it into the bosom of his coat, and hurried with long steps
homewards. He went into his garret, put the rescued puppy on his bed,
covered it with his thick overcoat, ran first to the stable for straw, and
then to the kitchen for a cup of milk. Carefully folding back the
overcoat, and spreading out the straw, he set the milk on the bedstead.
The poor little puppy was not more than three weeks old, its eyes were
just open--one eye still seemed rather larger than the other;