Yama by Aleksandr Kuprin (best ereader for pdf TXT) 📕

“No. I won’t eat,” answered Jennka hoarsely, “and I won’t detain you for long⁠ ⁠… a few minutes. I have to talk things over, have some advice⁠—but I haven’t anybody.”

“Very well⁠ ⁠… Let’s go then! In whatever way I can, I’m always at your service, in everything. I love you very much, Jennka!”

She looked at him sadly and gratefully.

“I know this, Serge Ivanovich; that’s why I’ve come.”

“You need money, perhaps? Just say so. I haven’t got much with me, myself; but the gang will trust me with an advance.”

“No, thanks⁠ ⁠… it isn’t that at all. I’ll tell everything at once, there, where we’re going now.”

In the dim, low-ceiled little inn, the customary haunt of petty thieves, who transacted their business and divvied up there, and where trade became brisk only in the evening, and went on until very far into the night, Platonov took up a little half-dark cubby hole.

“Give me boiled meat, cucumbers, a large glass of vodka, and bread,” he ordered the waiter.

The waiter⁠—a young fellow with a dirty face, pugnosed; as dirty and greasy in all his person as though he had just been pulled out of a cesspool⁠—wiped his lips and asked hoarsely:

“How many kopecks’ bread?”

“As much as it comes to.”

Then he started laughing:

“Bring as much as possible⁠—we’ll reckon it up later⁠ ⁠… and some bread cider!”

“Well, Jennie, say what your trouble is⁠ ⁠… I can already see by your face that there’s trouble, or something distasteful in general⁠ ⁠… Go ahead and tell it!”

Jennka for a long time plucked her handkerchief and looked at the tips of her slippers, as though, gathering her strength. Timorousness had taken possession of her⁠—the necessary and important words would not come into her mind, for anything. Platonov came to her aid:

“Don’t be embarrassed, my dear Jennie, tell all there is! For you know that I’m like one of the family, and will never give you away. And perhaps I may really give you some worthwhile advice. Well, dive off with a splash into the water⁠—begin!”

“That’s just it, I don’t know how to begin,” said Jennka irresolutely. “Here’s what, Sergei Ivanovich, I’m a sick woman⁠ ⁠… Understand?⁠—sick in a bad way⁠ ⁠… With the most nasty disease⁠ ⁠… Do you know which?”

“Go on!” said Platonov, nodding his head.

“And I’ve been that way for a long time⁠ ⁠… more than a month⁠ ⁠… a month and a half, maybe⁠ ⁠… Yes, more than a month, because I found out about this on the Trinity⁠ ⁠…”

Platonov quickly rubbed his forehead with his hand.

“Wait a while, I’ve recalled it⁠ ⁠… This was that day I was there together with the students⁠ ⁠… isn’t that so?”

“That’s right, Sergei Ivanovich, that’s so⁠ ⁠…”

“Ah, Jennka,” said Platonov reproachfully and with regret. “For do you know, that after this two of the students got sick⁠ ⁠… Wasn’t it from you?”

Jennka wrathfully and disdainfully flashed her eyes.

“Perhaps even from me⁠ ⁠… How should I know? There were a lot of them⁠ ⁠… I remember there was this one, now, who was even trying to pick a fight with you all the time⁠ ⁠… A tall sort of fellow, fair-haired, in pince-nez⁠ ⁠…”

“Yes, yes⁠ ⁠… That’s Sobashnikov. They passed the news to me⁠ ⁠… That’s he⁠ ⁠… that one was nothing⁠—a little coxcomb! But then the other⁠—him I’m sorry for. Although I’ve known him long, somehow I never made the right inquiries about his name⁠ ⁠… I only remember that he comes from some city or other⁠—Poliyansk⁠ ⁠… Zvenigorodsk⁠ ⁠… His comrades called him Ramses⁠ ⁠… When the physicians⁠—he turned to several physicians⁠—when they told him irrevocably that he had the lues, he went home and shot himself⁠ ⁠… And in the note that he wrote there were amazing things, something like this: ‘I supposed all the meaning of life to be in the triumph of mind, beauty and good; with this disease I am not a man, but junk, rottenness, carrion; a candidate for a progressive paralytic. My human dignity cannot reconcile itself to this. But guilty in all that has happened, and therefore in my death as well, am I alone; for that I, obeying a momentary bestial inclination, took a woman without love, for money. For that reason have I earned the punishment which I myself lay upon me⁠ ⁠…’ ”

“I am sorry for him⁠ ⁠…” added Platonov quietly.

Jennka dilated her nostrils.

“But I, now, not the very least bit.”

“That’s wrong⁠ ⁠… You go away now, young fellow. When I’ll need you I’ll call out,” said Platonov to the serving-man “Absolutely wrong, Jennechka! This was an unusually big and forceful man. Such come only one to the hundreds of thousands. I don’t respect suicides. Most frequent of all, these are little boys, who shoot and hang themselves over trifles, like a child that has not been given a piece of candy, and butts its head against a wall to spite those around it. But before his death I reverently and with sorrow bow my head. He was a wise, generous, kindly man, attentive to all; and, as you see, too strict to himself.”

“But to me this is absolutely all one,” obstinately contradicted Jennka, “wise or foolish, honest or dishonest, old or young⁠—I have come to hate them all. Because⁠—look upon me⁠—what am I? Some sort of universal spittoon, cesspool, privy. Think of it, Platonov; why, thousands, thousands of people have taken me, clutched me; grunted, snorted over me; and all those who were, and all those who might yet have been on my bed⁠—oh, how I hate them all! If I only could, I would sentence them to torture by fire and iron!⁠ ⁠… I would order⁠ ⁠…”

“You are malicious and proud, Jennie,” said Platonov quietly.

“I was neither malicious nor proud⁠ ⁠… It’s only now. I wasn’t ten yet when my own mother sold me; and since that time I’ve been travelling from hand to hand⁠ ⁠… If only someone had seen a human being in me! No!⁠ ⁠… I am vermin, refuse, worse than a beggar, worse than a thief, worse than a murderer!⁠ ⁠… Even a hangman⁠ ⁠… we have even such coming to the establishment⁠—and even he would have treated me loftily, with loathing: