Forty Stories - Anton Chekhov [111]
But there was a note of weakness and good nature in his voice, and no one was afraid of him. After dinner it was his habit to wear his best clothes. Pale, with cuts on his chin from shaving, he would stand in front of the mirror for half an hour, combing his hair, twisting his black mustache, and sprinkling himself with perfume. Finally he would tie his cravat in a bow, slip on his gloves, put on his top hat, and go off to give private lessons. If it was a holiday, he remained at home and painted or played the harmonium, which hissed and growled; he would try to wrestle melodic and harmonious sounds from it, and he would sing to the music, or else he would roar at the boys: “Vile creatures! Good-for-nothings! They have ruined the instrument!”
In the evening Anna’s husband played cards with his colleagues who lived under the same roof at the government-owned house. While they were playing cards, the wives of the officials would come in—ugly, tastelessly dressed, coarse as cooks—and the gossip that circulated through the apartment was as ugly and tasteless as the women themselves. Sometimes it happened that Modest Alexeich took Anna to the theater. During the entr’acte he would not let her move an inch from his side, but walked with her on his arm in the foyer and in the corridors. Whenever he bowed to anyone he would immediately whisper to Anna: “He’s a State Councilor … attends the receptions of His Excellency,” or “Very well-to-do … has a house of his own.” Passing the buffet, Anna was overwhelmed with a desire for sweets; she loved chocolate and apple tarts, but she had no money and did not like to ask her husband. He would take up a pear, pinch it with his fingers, and ask uncertainly: “How much?”
“Twenty-five kopecks.”
“Good heavens!” he would say, replacing the pear, but as it was awkward to leave the buffet without buying anything he would order a bottle of seltzer water and drink it all himself, while tears would come to his eyes. At such times Anna loathed him. Or else, suddenly blushing scarlet, he would say quickly: “Bow to that old lady!”
“But I’ve never been introduced to her.”
“It doesn’t matter. She’s the wife of the director of the local treasury. Yes, I’m talking to you—bow to her!” he would grumble insistently. “Your head won’t fall off!”
Anna bowed, and her head did not fall off, but it was sheer torture. She did everything her husband wanted her to do, and was furious with herself for letting him deceive her like the silliest little fool. She had only married him for his money, and yet she had less money now than before her marriage. Formerly her father would sometimes give her a twenty-kopeck piece, but now she did not have a kopeck to her name. She could not bring herself to steal money or ask for it: she was afraid of her husband and trembled before him. She felt as though she had been afraid of him for many years. In her childhood the most imposing and terrifying person had been the principal of her high school, a man who swept down on her like a thundercloud or a steam engine about to crush her. Another great power, often discussed by her family and inordinately feared, was His Excellency. Among the dozen less formidable powers were her high-school teachers, stern and implacable, with their shaved upper lips. But now she feared Modest Alexeich most of all, that man of principle, whose face even resembled the face of her high-school principal. In Anna’s imagination all these powers merged into one single power which took the form of a huge and terrifying white bear which attacked the guilty and those who were weak like her father. The thought of contradicting her husband terrified her, and so she smiled her strained smile and pretended to be pleased when he caressed her in a coarse way or defiled her with his embraces, which filled her with horror.
Only once did Pyotr Leontyich make bold to ask him for a loan of fifty rubles to pay off a most unpleasant debt, but what agony it was!
“Very well, I shall