"I go left, you go right; the bridge is ended. Listen, Fyodor, I like my words to be understood once and for alclass="underline" I won't give you a kopeck, don't meet me on the bridge or anywhere else from now on, I don't and won't have any need of you, and if you refuse to obey—I'll tie you up and hand you over to the police. March!"
"Ah, well, at least throw me something for my company, it was more fun walking, sir."
"Off with you!"
"And do you know your way around here, sir? There'll be such back alleys ... I could lead you, because this town here is like the devil took and shook it from a sack."
"Hey, I'll tie you up!" Nikolai Vsevolodovich turned around threateningly.
"You might consider, sir; it's easy enough to wrong an orphan."
"Well, you certainly are sure of yourself!"
"I'm sure of you, sir, not so much of myself."
"I don't need you at all, I told you!"
"But I need you, sir, that's what. All right, then, I'll wait till you come back."
"On my word of honor, if I meet you I'll tie you up."
"And I'll prepare the belt, sir. Have a good journey, sir, anyway you warmed an orphan under your umbrella, for that alone I'll thank you till my dying day."
He dropped behind. Nikolai Vsevolodovich was preoccupied as he came to the place. This man who had fallen from the sky was fully convinced that he was necessary to him, and hastened to declare it all too insolently. Generally, he was being treated unceremoniously. But it could also be that the tramp was not altogether lying, and was offering to be of service just on his own and precisely in secret from Pyotr Stepanovich; now that was the most curious thing of all.
II
The house that Nikolai Vsevolodovich came to stood in a deserted nook between fences, beyond which stretched kitchen gardens, literally on the very edge of town. It was quite a solitary little wooden house, built only recently and not yet clapboarded. The shutters of one of the windows were purposely not closed, and a candle stood on the windowsill—evidently meant to serve as a beacon for a late visitor who was expected that night. From thirty paces away Nikolai Vsevolodovich could make out the figure of a tall man standing on the porch, probably the master of the house, who had come out impatiently to look down the road. His voice could also be heard, impatient and as if timid:
"Is it you, sir? Is it?"
"It's me," Nikolai Vsevolodovich replied, but not before he had actually come to the porch, folding his umbrella.
"At last, sir!" Captain Lebyadkin—for it was he—fussed and fidgeted. "Your umbrella, please; it's very wet, sir; I'll open it here on the floor in the corner—welcome, welcome."
The door from the entryway to a room lighted by two candles stood wide open.
"If it hadn't been for your word that you'd certainly come, I'd have stopped believing it."
"A quarter to one," Nikolai Vsevolodovich looked at his watch as he went into the room.
"And in this rain, and such an interesting distance ... I don't have a watch, and there are just kitchen gardens out the window, so... one lags behind events... but, as a matter of fact, not to murmur, for I wouldn't dare, I wouldn't dare, but solely from impatience consumed all week, in order to finally ... be released."
"How's that?"
"To hear my fate, Nikolai Vsevolodovich. Welcome."
He bent forward, indicating a place by the little table in front of the sofa.
Nikolai Vsevolodovich looked around; the room was tiny, low; the furniture was the most necessary, wooden chairs and a sofa, also of quite new manufacture, without upholstery or pillows, two limewood tables, one by the sofa and the other in the corner, covered with a tablecloth, all cluttered with things, over which a very clean napkin had been spread. The whole room was also obviously kept extremely clean. Captain Lebyadkin had not been drunk for some eight days; his face had become somehow bloated and yellow; his look was restless, curious, and obviously bewildered; it was all too noticeable that he himself did not yet know in what tone he should begin to speak or it would be most profitable for him to strike straight off.
"Here, sir," he pointed around him, "I live like Zossima. [98]Sobriety, solitude, and poverty—the vow of the knights of old."
"You think the knights of old used to make such vows?" "Maybe I've got it muddled. Alas, no development for me! I've ruined everything! Believe me, Nikolai Vsevolodovich, here for the first time I've recovered from my shameful predilections—not a glass, not a drop! I have a corner to live in, and for six days I've been feeling a well-being of conscience. Even the walls smell of resin, reminding one of nature. And what was I, who was I?
I blow about by night unhoused, By day with my tongue hanging out, in the poet's ingenious expression! [99]But... how wet you are... Wouldn't you like some tea?"
"Don't bother."
"The samovar was boiling since before eight, but... went out... like everything in this world. And the sun, they say, will go out in its turn... Still, if you want, I can come up with it. Agafya's not asleep."
"Tell me, Marya Timofeevna is..."
"Here, here," Lebyadkin at once picked up, in a whisper. "Would you like to have a look?" he pointed towards the closed door to the other room.
"Not asleep?"
"Oh, no, no, how could she be? On the contrary, she's been waiting since evening, and as soon as she learned of it today, she immediately saw to her toilette," he twisted his mouth for a moment into a playful little smile, but instantly checked himself.
"How is she, generally?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich asked, frowning.
"Generally? That, sir, you know yourself" (he shrugged regretfully), "and now... now she sits reading the cards..."
"Very well, later; first we must finish with you."
Nikolai Vsevolodovich sat down on a chair.
The captain did not dare to sit on the sofa, but at once pulled another chair over for himself and bent forward to listen in trembling expectation.
"And what is it you've got there in the corner under the cloth?" Nikolai Vsevolodovich suddenly paid attention.
"That, sir?" Lebyadkin also turned around. "That is from your own generosities, by way of housewarming, so to speak, also taking into account the further way and natural fatigue," he tittered sweetly, then rose from his seat and, tiptoeing over, reverently and carefully took the cloth from the table in the corner. Under it a light supper turned out to have been prepared: ham, veal, sardines, cheese, a small greenish carafe, and a tall bottle of Bordeaux; everything had been laid out neatly, expertly, and almost elegantly.
"Was it you who saw to that?"
"Me, sir. Since yesterday, and whatever I could do to honor ... And Marya Timofeevna, you know yourself, is indifferent in this respect. And, above all, it's from your generosity, it's yours, since you are the master here, not me, and I'm only by way of being your steward, so to speak, for all the same, all the same, Nikolai Vsevolodovich, all the same I am independent in spirit! You won't take away this last possession of mine, will you?" he ended sweetly.
"Hm! ... why don't you sit back down."
"With gra-a-atitude, gratitude and independence!" (He sat down.) "Ah, Nikolai Vsevolodovich, so much has been stewing in this heart that I couldn't wait for you to come! So you will now decide my fate, and... that unfortunate woman's, and then... then, as I used to, in the old days, I'll pour everything out to you, as four years ago! You did deign to listen to me then, you read my stanzas... And though you used to call me your Falstaff from Shakespeare, you meant so much in my fate! ... I have great fears now, and wait for counsel and light from you alone. Pyotr Stepanovich acts terribly with me!"
Nikolai Vsevolodovich listened with curiosity, studying him closely. It was obvious that Captain Lebyadkin, though he had stopped drinking, was still far from being in a harmonious state. Something incoherent, dazed, something damaged and crazy, as it were, finally settles for good into such long-term drunkards, though, by the way, they can cheat, dodge, and sham almost no worse than anyone else if need be.