That evening she looked so lovely that, drunk as I was, I forgot everything in the world and firmly embraced her. She vowed that she had never loved anyone but me – and that was true: she did love me. And at the height of her vows she suddenly took it into her head to utter the hateful phrase: “I’m so unhappy! If I hadn’t married Urbenin I could marry the Count right now!” For me this phrase was like a bucket of cold water. All that had been seething within me suddenly erupted. Seized by a feeling of revulsion and despair, I grasped that small, loathsome creature by the shoulder and threw her to the ground as if she were a ball. My anger had reached boiling point. Well, I finished her… I just went and finished her… Now you’ll understand what happened with Kuzma.’
I glanced at Kamyshev. On his face I could detect neither remorse nor regret. ‘I just went and finished her’ was said as nonchalantly as ‘I just smoked a cigarette’. And I in turn was gripped by a feeling of anger and revulsion. I turned away.
‘And is this Urbenin doing hard labour in Siberia now?’ I quickly asked.
‘Well, they say he died on the way, but it hasn’t been confirmed yet. What of it?’
‘I’ll tell you what. An innocent man has suffered and all you can say is “What of it?????’
‘But what should I do? Go and confess?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Well, let’s suppose so! I’m not averse to taking Urbenin’s place, but I won’t give in without a struggle. Let them come and take me if they want, but I shan’t go and give myself up. Why didn’t they take me when I was in their hands? I howled so loudly at Olga’s funeral, I became so hysterical that even a blind man must have spotted the truth… It’s not my fault that they’re so stupid.’
‘I find you perfectly loathsome,’ I said.
‘That’s only natural… I’m loathsome to myself.’
Silence followed. I opened the cash ledger and mechanically started totting up some figures. Kamyshev reached for his hat.
‘I see you find it stuffy in here with me,’ he said. ‘By the way, would you care to see Count Karneyev? He’s outside sitting in the cab.’
I went to the window and looked out. With his back towards us there he sat, a small, hunched figure in a shabby hat and faded collar. It was hard to recognize him as one of the leading characters in the drama!
‘I’ve heard that Urbenin’s son is living here in Moscow, in Andreyev’s Chambers,’ Kamyshev said. ‘I want to arrange for the Count to receive a little “offering” from him… Let at least one of them be punished! However, I must bid you adieu!’
Kamyshev nodded and hurried out of the room. I sat at the table and gave myself up to bitter thoughts.
I felt suffocated.
Notes
1. Spencer: Herbert Spencer (1820–1903), English sociologist and biologist. In his Education: Intellectual, Moral, Physical (1861), he championed the many-sided development of man, giving special emphasis to physical education. Chekhov mentions him often and in a letter to Aleksandr Chekhov (17/18 April 1883) praises the chapter dealing with moral education.
2. ‘sweet sounds’ in words: Periphrasis of last words of Pushkin’s famous Poet and the Crowd (1829):
We are born for inspiration
For sweet sounds and prayers.
3. Gaboriau: Emile Gaboriau (1832–73), originator of crime novel (roman policier) in France, whose detective Monsieur Lecoq was a forerunner of Sherlock Holmes. His thrillers – they first appeared as feuilletons – include Monsieur Lecoq (1869): extremely popular in Russia, it appeared in Russian translation in the year of its publication. His other main detective novels are L’Affaire Lerouge (1865–6); Le Crime d’Orcival (1867); and Le Dossier no. 113 (1867). The young Maxim Gorky was acquainted with the French writer, whom he avidly read – along with others such as Dumas père (My Apprenticeship, Harmondsworth, 1974).
4. Shklyarevsky: A. A. Shklyarevsky (1837–83), Russian author of detective novels and known as the ‘Russian Gaboriau’. His main novels are: Tales of an Investigating Magistrate (1872) and The Unsolved Crime (1878). For details of the current vogue for detective novels see A Note on the Text, p. xx.
5. sui generis: Unique.
6. Lecoq: See note 3.
7. The Count of Monte Christo: By Alexandre Dumas (Dumas père, 1802–70), highly popular novel (1844–5) of betrayal and vengeance. In a letter of 28 May 1892, to Suvorin, Chekhov writes: ‘What shall I do with Monte Christo? I’ve abridged it until it resembles someone suffering from typhus. The first part – until the Count becomes rich – is very interesting and well written, but the second (with few exceptions) is unbearable, since Monte-Christo performs and speaks inflated nonsense. But on the whole the novel is quite effective.’ In 1892 Suvorin intended publishing an abridged version of the novel, on which Chekhov worked May/June that year.
8. Auguste Comte: French mathematician and philosopher (1798–1857), founder of Positivism. His Cours de philosophie positive (1830–42) expounds a religion of humanity.
9. you: Actually the familiar form in Russian = ‘thou’.
10. Riga balsam: A kind of brandy, usually black, distilled with herbs.
11. Eynem’s: famous Moscow shop selling biscuits and preserves.
12. Leporello: Faithful servant and confidant of Don Juan, hero of Pushkin’s Stone Guest (1830).
13. stukolka: A popular card game of the time.
14. The Cornfield (Niva): A popular illustrated family magazine published in St Petersburg (1870–1918).
15. ‘I lo-ove the storms of early Ma-ay’: The first line of the poem Spring Storm (1829) by Fyodor Tyutchev (1803–73). It was set to music by many composers.
16. one of Born’s books: Pseudonym of Georg Fülleborn (1837–1902), highly prolific German novelist, author of cheap ‘boulevard’ novels. His Eugene, or Secrets of the French Court was published in Russian translation in 1882.
17. Yevtushevsky’s Mathematics Problem Book: A collection of arithmetical problems by A. A. Yevtushevsky (1836–88).
18. The Task: Literary-political journal, published in St Petersburg (1866–88).
19. Miscellany: A literary miscellany published in St Petersburg in 1874 for the benefit of famine sufferers in Samara district. It comprised minor works by Turgenev, Dostoyevsky, Ostrovsky, Goncharov and others.
20. ‘pitcher-snouts’: Reference to Gogol’s clerk Ivan Antonovich in Dead Souls (1848), whose face appeared to have turned into one enormous nose: ‘…the whole of the middle of his face stuck out and looked like a nose – briefly, it was the kind of face commonly called pitcher-snout’ (chap. 7).
21. Mount Athos: Athos – a Greek peninsula in Chalcidice (Macedonia), with numerous monasteries and churches, the object of pilgrimages since the eleventh century.
22. English bitters: Liquor with bitter flavour used for mixing with cocktails.
23. Depré’s: Well-known wine shop in Moscow.
24. ‘Ah, Moscow, Moscow… stone walls’: From the well-known folk song.
25. ‘Down Mo-other Volga… Vo-olga’: Famous folk song.
26. ‘Oh burn, oh speak… speak!’: Refrain from folk dance song, ‘See the young dandy strutting down the street.’
27. ‘Nights of madness, nights of gladness’: Inaccurate quotation from the poem Nights of madness, sleepless nights (1886) by A. N. Apukhtin (1841–93). It was set to music by Tchaikovsky and others. In the 1880s it became a very popular gipsy romance, with various musical settings. The second line runs: ‘Wild words, tired glances…’
28. Shandor candle: A heavy candlestick.
29. ad patres: (Lat.) to his forefathers – i.e. he died.
30. terra incognita: (Lat.) unknown territory. Latin and French tags occur frequently in Chekhov’s earlier stories.
31. Themis: Greek goddess of justice and law.
32. casus belli: (Lat.) an act or situation provoking war.
33. beau monde: Fashionable society.
34. sinister old crones: Words spoken by Chatsk
y, hero of A. S. Griboyedov’s comedy Woe from Wit (1822–4).
35. A kind of Onegin: Reference to the disenchanted hero of Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin (1831). One of the first exemplars of the Superfluous Man in Russian literature, disillusioned and at odds with society.
36. Homo sum: (Lat.) possible reference to the Roman playwright Terence: Homo sum; humani nil a me alienum puto (I am a man, I count nothing human indifferent to me).
37. Pukirev’s picture: The painting referred to is Misalliance (1862), by V. V. Pukirev (1832–90), a savage denunciation of women’s lack of rights and of the treatment of marriage as a commercial transaction. The painting had far-reaching social repercussions.
38. bon vivant: Person indulging in good living.
39. He was as impressive as forty thousand best men put together: A humorous periphrasis of Hamlet’s words after Ophelia’s death:
I lov’d Ophelia. Forty thousand brothers
Could not with all their quantity of love
Make up my sum.
Hamlet, Act V, Scene I
In his early stories Chekhov liked to refer to this ‘forty thousand’ in a humorous context, for example in ‘Night in a Cemetery’ (1886) where he writes: ‘… I got as drunk as forty thousand brothers.’
40. Like Risler Senior in Alphonse Daudet’s novel: The novel is Fromont jeune et Risler Aîné (1874), which tells of a senile, wealthy proprietor of a Paris wallpaper factory marrying a young girl.
41. Krylov’s fable: Reference to Hermit and Bear (1804) by I. A. Krylov (1769–1844). In this fable a bear befriends a hermit, who when sleeping is pestered by a fly. When all other efforts to drive it away have failed, the despairing bear hurls a rock at it, thus smashing his friend’s skull. Chekhov frequently refers to Krylov’s fables.
42. infusoria: A class of Protozoa, so called because they are found in infusions of decaying animal or vegetable matter.
43. jeune premier: Leading man/character.
44. like Pushkin’s Tatyana: The heroine of Eugene Onegin who thrusts her love upon the uninterested, blasé hero.
45. ‘your hand in mine’: Line from aria in Act 4 of Borodin’s opera, Prince Igor.
46. nolens volens: (Lat.) willy-nilly, perforce.
47. barely time to wear out her wedding shoes: Periphrasis of words spoken by Hamlet, in A. Kroneberg’s Russian translation. The actual lines are:
… or ere those shoes were old
With which she follow’d my poor father’s body
Like Niobe, all tears.
Hamlet, Act I, Scene 2
48. She’s in a hurry to live!: Possibly a reference to First Snow (1819), by Pushkin’s close friend Prince P. A. Vyazemsky (1792–1878). The epigraph to Chapter 1 of Eugene Onegin runs: ‘He hurries to live and hastens to feel.’
49. tussore: A strong, coarse silk made in India.
50. Nevsky Prospekt: Famous thoroughfare in St Petersburg, running for about two and a half miles from the Admiralty to the Aleksandr Nevsky Monastery.
51. ‘As Hamlet… the sin of suicide’: The actual lines are:
Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d
His canon ’gainst self-slaughter!
Hamlet, Act I, Scene 2
Chekhov often quotes from Hamlet in his stories.
52. Hofman drops: In a letter of 20 June 1891 to Lidiya Mizinova (who was not well) Chekhov writes (after giving dietary advice): ‘Take something bitter before food: Hofman’s elixir (Elixir vis-ceralis Hofmani) or tincture of quinine.’ And in a letter to his sister Masha of 23/24 July 1897 he writes: ‘Tell Mother if she has dizzy spells to take 15 Hofman drops at a time.’
53. à la Le Coq: See note 3.
54. of Gaboriau and our own Shklyarevsky: See notes 3 and 4.
55. three leaves: Like stukolka (see note 13), a popular card game.
56. Sapienti sat: (Lat.) enough for a wise man.
57. habitus: (Lat.) general aspect.
58. humanum est errare: (Lat.) to err is human.
* I apologize to the reader for using such expressions. The unfortunate Kamyshev’s story abounds with them, and if I haven’t deleted them it’s only because I considered it necessary, in the interests of providing the reader with a complete portrait of the author, to print his story in toto (without omissions). A. C.
* Here 140 lines of Kamyshev’s manuscript are crossed through. A. C.
† At this point in the manuscript there’s a pen and ink drawing of a pretty girl’s head, her face distorted in horror. All that is written underneath has been meticulously blotted out. The upper half of the following page is also blotted out and through the dense ink blots only one word – ‘temple’ – is decipherable. A. C.
* This has also been blotted out. A. C.
* Here almost a whole page has been carefully crossed out. Only a few words that provide no clue to deciphering what’s been crossed out have been spared. A.C.
† Unfortunately everything is crossed out here. It is clear that Kamyshev did not cross any words out at the time of writing, but afterwards. I shall pay special attention to these crossings-out towards the end of this story. A. C.
* This last phrase is written over a crossed-out line, in which one can make out: ‘I would have torn his head from his shoulders and broken all the windows.’ A.C.
* There follows a strikingly pretentious interpretation of the author’s emotional resilience. The sight of human misery, blood, autopsies apparently left him completely unmoved. The whole of this passage is tinged with boastful naïveté, insincerity. It is startlingly crude and I have deleted it. As far as characterization of Kamyshev is concerned, it’s of no importance. A. C.
* Here two lines are crossed out. A. C.
* I draw the reader’s attention to one circumstance. Although Kamyshev is so fond of holding forth to all and sundry about the state of his soul, even when he’s describing his clashes with Polikarp, he says nothing about the impression the dying Olga made on him. I think that this omission is deliberate. A. C.
* I must direct the reader’s attention to yet another very important circumstance. For two or three hours all Mr Kamyshev does is pass from room to room, becomes exasperated (together with the doctors) at the servants, and liberally bestows clouts on the ear, etc. Would you recognize this person as an investigating magistrate? Evidently he’s in no hurry and is only trying to kill time somehow. Obviously he knew who the murderer was. What’s more, that needless search of Owlet’s room, the questioning of the gipsies (described a little further on) – more like mockery than cross-examination – could only have been carried out as a delaying tactic. A. C.
* This evasion of a question of the first importance could have had only one objective: to drag the time out and await loss of consciousness, when Olga would no longer be able to name the murderer. A trick that’s quite in character and it’s amazing that the doctors didn’t see through it. A. C.
† All this seems naïve only at first glance. Evidently, Kamyshev had to make Olga aware of the serious consequences any declaration on her part would have for the murderer. If the murderer was dear to her, ergo, she had to keep quiet. A.C.
* If Mr Kamyshev found all this necessary, wouldn’t it have been easier to question the coachmen who had driven the gipsies? A. C.
† Why? Assuming all this was done by the investigating magistrate when he was drunk or half-asleep then why write about it? Wouldn’t it have been better to conceal these gross errors from the reader? A. C.
* Kamyshev had no reason to abuse the deputy prosecutor. All the prosecutor was guilty of was the fact that Mr Kamyshev didn’t like his face. It would have been more honest to admit either to inexperience or deliberate mistakes. A. C.
* A fine investigating magistrate! Instead of continuing his questioning and extracting useful evidence, he lost his temper – behaviour that forms no part of a civil servant’s duties! Moreover, I place little trust in all of this… If Mr Kamyshev couldn’t give a damn about his duties, then plain human
curiosity should have compelled him to continue with the questioning. A. C.
* A role certainly more suited to Kamyshev than that of investigator: he could not have been an investigating magistrate in the Urbenin case. A. C.
Anton Chekhov, The Shooting Party
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