True, an intangible bond between brother and sister had been severed. Despite Chekhov's firm determination that nothing would change in their relations, the change had already begun, and both Masha and Olga were fully aware of it. Though they tried to avoid the inevitable offenses when the hostess of a household is displaced by another, the offenses multiplied whenever they and Chekhov occupied the same house together. This may have been in the back of Chekhov's mind in his odd assertion that he would continue to live apart from Olga as much as he did before their marriage. But Masha was wrong. In gaining a wife Chekhov had not lost a beloved sister. Never for a moment did their years together fail to invoke a warm glow of remembered associations or allow him to forget the gratitude that he owed Masha.
chapter xxiv
"A Wife Who, Like the Moon, Will Not Appear in My Sky Every Day"
The kumiss treatment added weight to Chekhov's thin body but boredom to his soul. How he loathed this business of doctoring himself! Though the sanatorium was situated in a lovely oak forest, its accommodations were primitive in the extreme. He liked the wild flowers in the steppes and the sound of snorting from the large droves of horses, but the Bashkirs and local inhabitants in general were inexpressibly dull and he thirsted for books and newspapers — the only newspapers he could find were a year old. He went fishing with Olga, who chattered and laughed merrily on her honeymoon. But nothing compensated for the lack of gay, sophisticated friends who now had become a necessity when he was unable to work. The quips in letters from Aksenovo are the humor of discontent: "Well, sir, I suddenly up and got married," he wrote to Sobolevsky. "I've already grown accustomed, or almost so, to my new state, that is, to the deprivation of certain rights and privileges, and I feel fine. My wife is a very decent person, not at all stupid, and a good soul." (June 9, 1901.) After informing Koni that Dr. Shchurovsky had discovered a definite worsening in his condition, Chekhov continued: "This disturbed me a bit and I hastened to get married and go off for a kumiss cure. Now I'm fine, have added eight pounds, only I don't know from what — the kumiss or marriage." (June 12, 1901.) However, he did know that he had had enough of the cure — after one month, instead of the two that had been prescribed, and he and Olga set off for Yalta.
For the first time Olga took her place in the Chekhov household as his wife. A stream of Yalta friends called to greet the newly married couple and Bunin came from Odessa to see them. Though Olga tried to avoid interfering in the household chain of command, she naturally insisted upon assuming the sole care of her husband. With some reason, she believed that he had been spoiled by doting females who catered to his fixed bachelor habits, and, with the efficiency and practicality of her German background, she tried to introduce order into his daily existence. He must change his tie frequently, have his clothes and shoes brushed regularly, wash his head and have his hair cut and his beard trimmed more often.
Olga was particularly concerned about his health. Shortly after his return from the kumiss treatment, Chekhov began to feel unwell again and to cough up blood. One of the factors contributing to his steady decline, as Dr. Altschuler recognized, was Chekhov's insistence on travel and his refusal to subject himself to a strict regimen of continued and quiet living at Yalta. When the doctor had explained the seriousness of his condition to Masha, she had expressed her willingness to give up teaching at Moscow, live permanently at Yalta, and nurse her brother. Even if he had been willing to accept this sacrifice, which might well have prolonged his life, his marriage and the fact that his wife spent most of her year in Moscow made it impossible. Olga concentrated on his frequent complaints of stomach trouble and ordered a changed diet and prescribed purgatives. She could not know that the tubercular bacilli had already invaded his intestines, a fact, which, if guessed by Chekhov, he failed to reveal even to his doctors. Olga surrounded him with carc that summer, urged him to go on with his writing, and was very helpful, as he told Gorky, in assisting him in the endless job of proofreading.
Though Olga tried to be considerate to Chekhov's mother, and had quickly re-established her old friendship with Masha, her efforts to "dress him up" and to order spccial dishes for him, as well as her prescribing of medical nostrums, caused friction in the household. Masha and her mother, who had devotedly looked out for his every want for years, resented her interference. Exasperated, Olga confided to Chekhov that she would like to carry him off and keep him all for herself. Patiently he explained to her that his mother and the old servant Marfusha were anxious to do all they could, but that one was seventy and the other eighty and they could not be expected to understand about newfangled diets. When Olga wrote him of her jealousy of his mother and sister, shortly after she left for Moscow, he kindly assured her that her jealousy was not without grounds but it did not suit her character. Then he added: "You write that Masha will never get used to you, and so forth and so forth. Wbat nonsense this all is! You exaggerate it all, think of silly things, and I'm afraid that before we know it you will be quarreling with Masha. Let me say this: Have patience and keep silent for only one year, then everything will become clear to you. No matter what they say to you, whatever you imagine, remain silent. For all newly married wives and husbands, all the pleasant things of life depend upon this nonresistance in the early days. Do as I say, darling, be a clever girl!" (September 3, 1901.)
Certainly Chekhov left Olga under no illusions about the permanence of his affection for Masha and the extent of his gratitude to her. For that summer he gave his wife a letter addressed to Masha, to be turned over to her at the time of his death. It was his will. "Dear Masha," he wrote, "I bequeath to you my Yalta house for possession during your lifetime, and the money and income from my dramatic productions; and to my wife Olga Leonardovna my dacha at Gurzuf and five thousand roubles. If you wish, you may sell the real estate. Give brother Alexander three thousand and Ivan five thousand, and Mikhail three thousand. To Alexei Dolzhenko1 one thousand, and one thousand roubles to Elena Chekhova (Lyolya)2 upon her marriage. After your death and the death of Mother, all that remains, except for the income from the plays, is to go to the Taganrog city administration for public education, and the income from the plays to brother Ivan; but after his, Ivan's death, to the Taganrog city administration for public education. I promised the peasants of Melikhovo village one hundred roubles to pay for the highway; I also promised Gavrila Alexeevich Kharchenko3 (his home is in Kharkov, Moskalevka Street) to pay for his older daughter's school education if she is not released from tuition payments. Help the poor. Take care of Mother. Live peacefully." (August 3, 1901.)