Sanine by Mikhail Artsybashev (ebook pdf reader for pc .TXT) 📕

his cheerful countenance. Then all at once, they remembered that not one of them had asked about Soloveitchik.

“Where did he hang himself? Do you know?”

“In the shed next to the dog’s kennel. He let the dog loose, and then hanged himself.”

Sina and Yourii simultaneously seemed to hear a shrill voice exclaim:

“Lie down, Sultan!”

“Yes, and he left a note behind,” continued Riasantzeff, unable to conceal the merry twinkle in his eyes. “I made a copy of it. In a way, it’s really a human document.” Taking out his pocketbook he read as follows:

“Why should I live, since I do not know how I ought to live? Men such as I cannot make their fellow-creatures happy.”

He stopped suddenly, as if somewhat embarrassed. Dead silence ensued. A sad spirit seemed to pass noiselessly through the room. Tears rose to Sina’s eyes, and Lialia’s face grew red with emotion. Yourii smiled mournfully as he turned towards the window.

“That’s all,” said Riasantzeff meditatively.

“What more would you have?” asked Sina with quivering lips.

Ivanoff rose and reached across for the matches that were on the table.

“It’s nothing more than tomfoolery,” he muttered.

“For shame!” was Sina’s indignant protest.

Yourii glanced in disgust at Ivanoff’s long, smooth hair and turned away.

“To take the case of Soloveitchik,” resumed Riasantzeff, and again his eyes twinkled. “I always thought him a nincompoop⁠—a silly Jew boy. And now, see what he has shown himself to be! There is no love more sublime than the love which bids one sacrifice one’s life for humanity.”

“But he didn’t sacrifice his life for humanity,” replied Ivanoff, as he looked askance at Riasantzeff’s portly face and figure, and observed how tightly his waistcoat fitted him.

“Yes, but it’s the same thing, for if⁠ ⁠…”

“It’s not the same thing at all,” was Ivanoff’s stubborn retort, and his eyes flashed angrily. “It’s the act of an idiot, that’s what it is!”

His strange hatred of Soloveitchik made a most unpleasant impression upon the others.

Sina Karsavina, as she got up to go, whispered to Yourii, “I am going. He is simply detestable.”

Yourii nodded. “Utterly brutal,” he murmured.

Immediately after Sina’s departure, Lialia and Riasantzeff went out. Ivanoff sat pensively smoking his cigarette for a while, as he stared sulkily at a corner of the room. Then he also departed.

In the street as he walked along, swinging his arms in the usual way, he thought to himself, in his wrath:

“These fools imagine that I am not capable of understanding what they understand! I like that! I know exactly what they think and feel, better than they do themselves. I also know that there is no love more sublime than the love which bids a man lay down his life for others. But for a man to go and hang himself simply because he is of no good to anybody⁠—that’s absolute nonsense!”

XXXIV

When to the sound of martial music Sarudine’s remains were borne to the churchyard, Yourii from his window watched the sad, imposing procession. He saw the horses draped in black, and the deceased officer’s cap that lay on the coffin-lid. There were flowers in profusion, and many female mourners. Yourii was deeply grieved at the sight.

That evening he walked for a long while with Sina Karsavina; yet her beautiful eyes and gentle caressing manner did not enable him to shake off his depression.

“How awful it is to think,” he said, his eyes fixed on the ground, “to think that Sarudine no longer exists. A handsome, merry, careless young officer like that! One would have thought that he would live forever, and that the horrible things of life, such as pain and doubt and suffering, were unknown to him, would never touch him. Yet one fine day this very man is swept away like dust, after passing through a terrible ordeal known to none but himself. Now he’s gone, and will never, never return. All that’s left of him is the cap on the coffin-lid.”

Yourii was silent, and he still gazed at the ground. Swaying slightly as she walked beside him, Sina listened attentively, while with her pretty, dimpled hands she kept twisting the lace of her parasol. She was not thinking about Sarudine. It was a keen pleasure for her to be near Yourii, yet unconsciously she shared his melancholy mood, and her face assumed a mournful expression. “Yes! wasn’t it sad? That music, too!”

“I don’t blame Sanine,” said Yourii with emphasis.

“He could not have acted otherwise. The horrible part of it all is that the paths of these two men crossed, so that one or the other was obliged to give way. It is also horrible that the victor does not realize that his triumph is an appalling one. He calmly sweeps a man off the face of the earth, and yet is in the right.”

“Yes, he’s in the right, and⁠—” exclaimed Sina, who had not heard all that Yourii had said. Her bosom heaved with excitement.

“But I call it horrible!” cried Yourii, hastily interrupting her, as he glanced at her shapely form and eager face.

“Why is it so?” asked Sina in a timid voice. She blushed suddenly, and her eyes lost their brightness.

“Anyone else would have felt remorse, or have suffered some kind of spiritual anguish,” said Yourii. “But he showed not the slightest sign of it. ‘I’m very sorry,’ says he, ‘but it’s not my fault.’ Fault, indeed! As if the question were one of fault or of blame!”

“Then of what is it?” asked Sina. Her voice faltered, and she looked downwards, fearing to offend her companion.

“That I don’t know; but a man has no right to behave like a brute,” was the indignant rejoinder.

For some time they walked along without speaking. Sina was grieved at what seemed their momentary estrangement, at this breaking of their spiritual bond which to her was so sweet, while Yourii felt that he had not expressed himself clearly, and this wounded his self-respect.

Soon afterwards they parted, she being sad and somewhat hurt. Yourii noticed her dejection, and was morbidly pleased thereat,