They are like children, thought Maria. They go from one extreme to another.
The house lights were extinguished. A flurry in the curtains culminated in the appearance of Apollon Mikhailovich. He was not a tall man, a little under average height in fact, but on that tiny stage he attained the stature of a giant. His eyes twinkled with a benign but compelling light. Maria began to relax, sensing the confidence and control in his presence.
His bass voice boomed out, filling the auditorium effortlessly: ‘My friends — and I hope I will not be accused of presumption in addressing you all thus — ’ he cast a sly, mischievous glance up towards the imperial box. ‘But by your presence here tonight, you all — each and every one of you — declare yourselves friends of education. And may I say that any friend of education is a friend of mine!’ The quip was well judged. It found favour with the democratically-inclined members of the audience, without causing offence to the conservatives. Even the Tsarevich, known to be the most unthinking of reactionaries, could not fail to be disarmed by the crinkles of good humour in Apollon Mikhailovich’s face.
Now that face became suffused with feeling. ‘My name is Apollon Mikhailovich Perkhotin. I stand before you as a humble teacher. No — more than that — as a humbled teacher. And what I have been humbled by is nothing other than …’ He broke off, with a natural storyteller’s sense of the dramatic. His glittering eyes cast their gaze this way and that over the audience, drinking in their expectation. ‘ … my pupils. Yes, that’s right — children! For what could be more humbling than a child … who, of his own volition, without enforcement or encouragement, overcomes every obstacle, risks even punishment and abuse, to come before a teacher and demand, “Teach me!” What could be more inspiring?’
The audience responded to the rhetorical question with murmurs of approval.
‘I am proud and honoured to stand before you now as the teacher of such children. My friends, now it is your turn to be proud, your turn to be honoured. Yes! Be proud!’ His eyes widened as he encouraged them to open themselves up to that emotion. ‘Be honoured!’ he insisted. There was some embarrassed laughter now. Apollon Mikhailovich smiled and nodded, acknowledging it. Then the smile snapped from his face. A sudden intensity burned in his eyes. ‘By your presence here tonight …’ The words came in a forceful staccato. He stabbed the air on each syllable with two fingers of his right hand. He had transformed himself into a demagogue, holding the pause beyond the dramatic, stretching it into a breathtaking chasm. ‘ … You have shown yourselves to be the friend of these children. And I know you are not the men and women to turn your back on your friends. You are, after all — we all are — Russians!’
The diverse political strands of the audience were united by this appeal to nationalism. They roared their enthusiasm and stamped their feet in approval. Apollon Mikhailovich bowed humbly, then turned to push his way through the barrier of velvet.
The stage was clear for the first of the literary gentlemen.
This was Karmazinov, an established and once celebrated author who had fallen out of favour with the younger generation for his negative portrayal of a ‘new man’. Tall and broad-shouldered, he cut an impressive figure, physically at least. The whiteness of his hair and beard glowed, giving him a distinguished if prematurely-aged appearance. But there was a diffidence to his expression, a timidity even, that diminished him. Blinking in the limelight, he was barely able to look directly at the audience, preferring either to stare loftily over their heads, or to keep his gaze fixed on the sheets of manuscript in his hands. His voice was soft, and failed to carry even in that auditorium. It was not long before cries of ‘Speak up!’ were replaced by others even less encouraging.
Maria could bear it no longer. She sprang to her feet and turned on the audience. ‘Quiet! Show some respect!’ The shock of her intervention, and her undoubted school mistress’ manner, had the desired effect. She turned to Karmazinov, who looked as dumbfounded as the chastised audience members. ‘You sir, continue — but speak up, I beg you.’
He did as he was directed — indeed, what else could he do?
It was now possible at least to understand what he was reading, and perhaps it would have been better if his voice had remained inaudible. For the poems he had chosen were altogether too romantic, too painfully sensitive, for the modern taste. Suddenly people remembered why no one read Karmazinov any longer. It was not that the poems were badly done — Karmazinov had always been acknowledged to be a fine writer — it was just that they seemed superfluous. He was felt to be a man who had had his day and now they were impatient for him to clear the stage.
Strangely, Karmazinov seemed to share this sentiment, and was as relieved as anyone when he came to the end of his reading.
The applause, apart from Maria’s strenuous clapping, was perfunctory and brief. Karmazinov fought his way through the complicated drapes, which conspired to prolong his humiliation.
And so the evening progressed. The musical interludes were on the whole more enthusiastically received than the readings. One young writer bucked the trend, winning favour by reading a series of crude lampoons of well-known literary figures including, in an outrageous exhibition of bad form, Karmazinov. However, the audience still appeared cowed by Maria’s earlier rebuke. Occasional warning glances from her were enough to keep a lid on any further unpleasantness. There was no doubt, though, that the prevailing mood of impatience only increased as the entertainments wore on.
At last the curtains parted on a scene from Prince Bykov’s play, and the audience readied itself for the imminent reappearance of Yelena Filippovna. Indeed there was some disappointment that she wasn’t present from the outset.
The narrow stage appeared crowded by the disposition of props and actors upon it. A young man in a Bukhara dressing gown lay sprawled across a chaise longue. Another young man, more formally dressed, was seated at a writing desk, pen in hand. A third man, evidently a servant of some kind, stood to one side. In a gesture of great irony, this part was taken by the epicene Prince Bykov himself. A more unlikely manservant it was impossible to imagine. He performed his part with relish, even though all he had to do was take a letter from the young man at the desk and quit the stage.
The two actors left on stage delivered their stagnant lines without conviction. It took some time to understand that they were discussing the disappearance of a young lady with whom the young man on the chaise longue was in love. The audience became more enlivened and engaged at this, sensing that this would be the part taken by Yelena Filippovna. But still the interminable exchange of platitudes ground on.
Then suddenly the dramatic genius of Prince Bykov seemed to show itself at last. A piercing off-stage scream cut short the stodgy dialogue. The actors’ performances were transformed. They became, in a word, authentic. The two men were hanging on what would happen next as much as any member of the audience. And when Aglaia Filippovna burst out from the wings, one arm extended back as she pointed at an unseen something, they gave the most truthful portrayals of shock ever seen on a St Petersburg stage.
The coup de theatre came when Aglaia cried out: ‘She’s dead. My sister’s dead. He’s killed her!’ Her eyes spun upwards, filling with white. A kind of wave went through her as she fell. Her arms and head rose, as if resisting. But the ultramarine dress that had sat so uneasily on her pulled her down, as though it were made from some impossibly heavy material.