Notes From Underground Read online

headlong downstairs. "This is very different from the Pope's leaving Rome

  and going to Brazil, very different from the ball on Lake Como!"

  "You are a scoundrel," a thought flashed through my mind, "if you

  laugh at this now."

  "No matter!" I cried, answering myself. "Now everything is lost!"

  There was no trace to be seen of them, but that made no difference--I

  knew where they had gone.

  At the steps was standing a solitary night sledge-driver in a rough

  peasant coat, powdered over with the still falling, wet, and as it were

  warm, snow. It was hot and steamy. The little shaggy piebald horse was

  also covered with snow and coughing, I remember that very well. I made

  a rush for the roughly made sledge; but as soon as I raised my foot to get

  into it, the recollection of how Simonov had just given me six roubles

  seemed to double me up and I tumbled into the sledge like a sack.

  "No, I must do a great deal to make up for all that," I cried. "But I will

  make up for it or perish on the spot this very night. Start!"

  We set off. There was a perfect whirl in my head.

  "They won't go down on their knees to beg for my friendship. That is a

  mirage, cheap mirage, revolting, romantic and fantastical--that's another

  ball on Lake Como. And so I am bound to slap Zverkov's face! It is

  my duty to. And so it is settled; I am flying to give him a slap in the face.

  Hurry up!"

  The driver tugged at the reins.

  "As soon as I go in I'll give it him. Ought I before giving him the slap

  to say a few words by way of preface? No. I'll simply go in and give it him.

  They will all be sitting in the drawing-room, and he with Olympia on the

  sofa. That damned Olympia! She laughed at my looks on one occasion

  and refused me. I'll pull Olympia's hair, pull Zverkov's ears! No, better

  one ear, and pull him by it round the room. Maybe they will all begin

  beating me and will kick me out. That's most likely, indeed. No matter!

  Anyway, I shall first slap him; the initiative will be mine; and by the laws

  of honour that is everything: he will be branded and cannot wipe off the

  slap by any blows, by nothing but a duel. He will be forced to fight. And

  let them beat me now. Let them, the ungrateful wretches! Trudolyubov

  will beat me hardest, he is so strong; Ferfitchkin will be sure to catch hold

  sideways and tug at my hair. But no matter, no matter! That's what I am

  going for. The blockheads will be forced at last to see the tragedy of it all!

  When they drag me to the door I shall call out to them that in reality they

  are not worth my little finger. Get on, driver, get on!" I cried to the driver.

  He started and flicked his whip, I shouted so savagely.

  "We shall fight at daybreak, that's a settled thing. I've done with the

  office. Ferfitchkin made a joke about it just now. But where can I get

  pistols? Nonsense! I'll get my salary in advance and buy them. And

  powder, and bullets? That's the second's business. And how can it all be

  done by daybreak? and where am I to get a second? I have no friends.

  Nonsense!" I cried, lashing myself up more and more. "It's of no consequence!

  The first person I meet in the street is bound to be my second, just

  as he would be bound to pull a drowning man out of water. The most

  eccentric things may happen. Even if I were to ask the director himself to

  be my second tomorrow, he would be bound to consent, if only from a

  feeling of chivalry, and to keep the secret! Anton Antonitch ...."

  The fact is, that at that very minute the disgusting absurdity of my plan

  and the other side of the question was clearer and more vivid to my

  imagination than it could be to anyone on earth. But ....

  "Get on, driver, get on, you rascal, get on!"

  "Ugh, sir!" said the son of toil.

  Cold shivers suddenly ran down me. Wouldn't it be better ... to go

  straight home? My God, my God! Why did I invite myself to this dinner

  yesterday? But no, it's impossible. And my walking up and down for three

  hours from the table to the stove? No, they, they and no one else must

  pay for my walking up and down! They must wipe out this dishonour!

  Drive on!

  And what if they give me into custody? They won't dare! They'll be

  afraid of the scandal. And what if Zverkov is so contemptuous that he

  refuses to fight a duel? He is sure to; but in that case I'll show them ... I

  will turn up at the posting station when he's setting off tomorrow, I'll

  catch him by the leg, I'll pull off his coat when he gets into the carriage.

  I'll get my teeth into his hand, I'll bite him. "See what lengths you can

  drive a desperate man to!" He may hit me on the head and they may

  belabour me from behind. I will shout to the assembled multitude:

  "Look at this young puppy who is driving off to captivate the Circassian

  girls after letting me spit in his face!"

  Of course, after that everything will be over! The office will have

  vanished off the face of the earth. I shall be arrested, I shall be tried, I

  shall be dismissed from the service, thrown in prison, sent to Siberia.

  Never mind! In fifteen years when they let me out of prison I will trudge

  off to him, a beggar, in rags. I shall find him in some provincial town. He

  will be married and happy. He will have a grown-up daughter .... I shall

  say to him: "Look, monster, at my hollow cheeks and my rags! I've lost

  everything--my career, my happiness, art, science, THE WOMAN I LOVED,

  and all through you. Here are pistols. I have come to discharge my pistol

  and ... and I ... forgive you. Then I shall fire into the air and he will

  hear nothing more of me ...."

  I was actually on the point of tears, though I knew perfectly well at that

  moment that all this was out of Pushkin's SILVIO and Lermontov's MASQUERADE.

  And all at once I felt horribly ashamed, so ashamed that I

  stopped the horse, got out of the sledge, and stood still in the snow in the

  middle of the street. The driver gazed at me, sighing and astonished.

  What was I to do? I could not go on there--it was evidently stupid,

  and I could not leave things as they were, because that would seem as

  though ... Heavens, how could I leave things! And after such insults!

  "No!" I cried, throwing myself into the sledge again. "It is ordained! It is

  fate! Drive on, drive on!"

  And in my impatience I punched the sledge-driver on the back of the neck.

  "What are you up to? What are you hitting me for?" the peasant

  shouted, but he whipped up his nag so that it began kicking.

  The wet snow was falling in big flakes; I unbuttoned myself, regardless

  of it. I forgot everything else, for I had finally decided on the slap, and

  felt with horror that it was going to happen NOW, AT ONCE, and that NO FORCE

  COULD STOP IT. The deserted street lamps gleamed sullenly in the snowy

  darkness like torches at a funeral. The snow drifted under my great-coat,

  under my coat, under my cravat, and melted there. I did not wrap myself

  up--all was lost, anyway.

  At last we arrived. I jumped out, almost unconscious, ran up the steps

  and began knocking and kicking at
the door. I felt fearfully weak,

  particularly in my legs and knees. The door was opened quickly as

  though they knew I was coming. As a fact, Simonov had warned them

  that perhaps another gentleman would arrive, and this was a place in

  which one had to give notice and to observe certain precautions. It was

  one of those "millinery establishments" which were abolished by the

  police a good time ago. By day it really was a shop; but at night, if one had

  an introduction, one might visit it for other purposes.

  I walked rapidly through the dark shop into the familiar drawing-

  room, where there was only one candle burning, and stood still in

  amazement: there was no one there. "Where are they?" I asked somebody.

  But by now, of course, they had separated. Before me was standing a

  person with a stupid smile, the "madam" herself, who had seen me

  before. A minute later a door opened and another person came in.

  Taking no notice of anything I strode about the room, and, I believe, I

  talked to myself. I felt as though I had been saved from death and was

  conscious of this, joyfully, all over: I should have given that slap, I should

  certainly, certainly have given it! But now they were not here and ...

  everything had vanished and changed! I looked round. I could not realise

  my condition yet. I looked mechanically at the girl who had come in: and

  had a glimpse of a fresh, young, rather pale face, with straight, dark

  eyebrows, and with grave, as it were wondering, eyes that attracted me at

  once; I should have hated her if she had been smiling. I began looking at

  her more intently and, as it were, with effort. I had not fully collected my

  thoughts. There was something simple and good-natured in her face, but

  something strangely grave. I am sure that this stood in her way here, and

  no one of those fools had noticed her. She could not, however, have been

  called a beauty, though she was tall, strong-looking, and well built. She

  was very simply dressed. Something loathsome stirred within me. I went

  straight up to her.

  I chanced to look into the glass. My harassed face struck me as

  revolting in the extreme, pale, angry, abject, with dishevelled hair. "No

  matter, I am glad of it," I thought; "I am glad that I shall seem repulsive

  to her; I like that."

  VI

  ... Somewhere behind a screen a clock began wheezing, as though

  oppressed by something, as though someone were strangling it. After an

  unnaturally prolonged wheezing there followed a shrill, nasty, and as it

  were unexpectedly rapid, chime--as though someone were suddenly

  jumping forward. It struck two. I woke up, though I had indeed not been

  asleep but lying half-conscious.

  It was almost completely dark in the narrow, cramped, low-pitched

  room, cumbered up with an enormous wardrobe and piles of cardboard

  boxes and all sorts of frippery and litter. The candle end that had been

  burning on the table was going out and gave a faint flicker from time to

  time. In a few minutes there would be complete darkness.

  I was not long in coming to myself; everything came back to my mind

  at once, without an effort, as though it had been in ambush to pounce

  upon me again. And, indeed, even while I was unconscious a point

  seemed continually to remain in my memory unforgotten, and round it

  my dreams moved drearily. But strange to say, everything that had

  happened to me in that day seemed to me now, on waking, to be in the

  far, far away past, as though I had long, long ago lived all that down.

  My head was full of fumes. Something seemed to be hovering over

  me, rousing me, exciting me, and making me restless. Misery and spite

  seemed surging up in me again and seeking an outlet. Suddenly I saw

  beside me two wide open eyes scrutinising me curiously and persistently.

  The look in those eyes was coldly detached, sullen, as it were utterly

  remote; it weighed upon me.

  A grim idea came into my brain and passed all over my body, as a

  horrible sensation, such as one feels when one goes into a damp and

  mouldy cellar. There was something unnatural in those two eyes,

  beginning to look at me only now. I recalled, too, that during those two

  hours I had not said a single word to this creature, and had, in fact,

  considered it utterly superfluous; in fact, the silence had for some reason

  gratified me. Now I suddenly realised vividly the hideous idea--

  revolting as a spider--of vice, which, without love, grossly and shamelessly

  begins with that in which true love finds its consummation. For a long time

  we gazed at each other like that, but she did not drop her eyes before mine

  and her expression did not change, so that at last I felt uncomfortable.

  "What is your name?" I asked abruptly, to put an end to it.

  "Liza," she answered almost in a whisper, but somehow far from

  graciously, and she turned her eyes away.

  I was silent.

  "What weather! The snow ... it's disgusting!" I said, almost to myself,

  putting my arm under my head despondently, and gazing at the ceiling.

  She made no answer. This was horrible.

  "Have you always lived in Petersburg?" I asked a minute later, almost

  angrily, turning my head slightly towards her.

  "No."

  "Where do you come from?"

  "From Riga," she answered reluctantly.

  "Are you a German?"

  "No, Russian."

  "Have you been here long?"

  "Where?"

  "In this house?"

  "A fortnight."

  She spoke more and more jerkily. The candle went out; I could no

  longer distinguish her face.

  "Have you a father and mother?"

  "Yes ... no ... I have."

  "Where are they?"

  "There ... in Riga."

  "What are they?"

  "Oh, nothing."

  "Nothing? Why, what class are they?"

  "Tradespeople."

  "Have you always lived with them?"

  "Yes."

  "How old are you?"

  "Twenty."

  "Why did you leave them?"

  "Oh, for no reason."

  That answer meant "Let me alone; I feel sick, sad."

  We were silent.

  God knows why I did not go away. I felt myself more and more sick and

  dreary. The images of the previous day began of themselves, apart from

  my will, flitting through my memory in confusion. I suddenly recalled

  something I had seen that morning when, full of anxious thoughts, I was

  hurrying to the office.

  "I saw them carrying a coffin out yesterday and they nearly dropped

  it," I suddenly said aloud, not that I desired to open the conversation, but

  as it were by accident.

  "A coffin?"

  "Yes, in the Haymarket; they were bringing it up out of a cellar."

  "From a cellar?"

  "Not from a cellar, but a basement. Oh, you know ... down below ... from

  a house of ill-fame. It was filthy all round ... Egg-shells, litter ...

  a stench. It was loathsome."

  Silence.

  "A nasty day to be buried," I began, simply to avoid being silent.

  "Nasty, in what way?"

  "The snow, the wet." (I yawned.)
<
br />   "It makes no difference," she said suddenly, after a brief silence.

  "No, it's horrid." (I yawned again). "The gravediggers must have sworn

  at getting drenched by the snow. And there must have been water in the grave."

  "Why water in the grave?" she asked, with a sort of curiosity, but

  speaking even more harshly and abruptly than before.

  I suddenly began to feel provoked.

  "Why, there must have been water at the bottom a foot deep. You can't

  dig a dry grave in Volkovo Cemetery."

  "Why?"

  "Why? Why, the place is waterlogged. It's a regular marsh. So they

  bury them in water. I've seen it myself ... many times."

  (I had never seen it once, indeed I had never been in Volkovo, and had

  only heard stories of it.)

  "Do you mean to say, you don't mind how you die?"

  "But why should I die?" she answered, as though defending herself.

  "Why, some day you will die, and you will die just the same as that

  dead woman. She was ... a girl like you. She died of consumption."

  "A wench would have died in hospital ..." (She knows all about it

  already: she said "wench," not "girl.")

  "She was in debt to her madam," I retorted, more and more provoked

  by the discussion; "and went on earning money for her up to the end,

  though she was in consumption. Some sledge-drivers standing by were

  talking about her to some soldiers and telling them so. No doubt they

  knew her. They were laughing. They were going to meet in a pot-house

  to drink to her memory."

  A great deal of this was my invention. Silence followed, profound

  silence. She did not stir.

  "And is it better to die in a hospital?"

  "Isn't it just the same? Besides, why should I die?" she added irritably.

  "If not now, a little later."

  "Why a little later?"

  "Why, indeed? Now you are young, pretty, fresh, you fetch a high

  price. But after another year of this life you will be very different--you

  will go off."

  "In a year?"

  "Anyway, in a year you will be worth less," I continued malignantly.

  "You will go from here to something lower, another house; a year later--

  to a third, lower and lower, and in seven years you will come to a

  basement in the Haymarket. That will be if you were lucky. But it would

  be much worse if you got some disease, consumption, say ... and caught

  a chill, or something or other. It's not easy to get over an illness in your

  way of life. If you catch anything you may not get rid of it. And so you

  would die."

  "Oh, well, then I shall die," she answered, quite vindictively, and she

  made a quick movement.

  "But one is sorry."

  "Sorry for whom?"

  "Sorry for life."

  Silence.

  "Have you been engaged to be married? Eh?"

  "What's that to you?"

  "Oh, I am not cross-examining you. It's nothing to me. Why are you

  so cross? Of course you may have had your own troubles. What is it to

  me? It's simply that I felt sorry."

  "Sorry for whom?"

  "Sorry for you."

  "No need," she whispered hardly audibly, and again made a faint movement.

  That incensed me at once. What! I was so gentle with her, and she ....

  "Why, do you think that you are on the right path?"

  "I don't think anything."

  "That's what's wrong, that you don't think. Realise it while there is still

  time. There still is time. You are still young, good-looking; you might

  love, be married, be happy ...."

  "Not all married women are happy," she snapped out in the rude

  abrupt tone she had used at first.