Forty Stories - Anton Chekhov [62]
When he returned from high school, Pyotr Demyanich went to a local store and bought a mousetrap for fifteen kopecks. After dinner he hung a small morsel of cutlet on the hook and set the trap under the divan, where there was a litter of old exercise books which Praskovya would sometimes use for her own domestic purposes. Exactly at six o’clock that evening, when our worthy Latinist was sitting at table and correcting his students’ exercises, he heard a sudden clop! coming from under the divan—the sound was so loud that my uncle jumped up in the air and dropped his pen. Without any hesitation he marched over to the divan and drew out the mousetrap. In it he found a sleek and tiny mouse, about the size of a thimble, sniffing at the wire cage and shivering with fear.
“Aha!” muttered Pyotr Demyanich, and he gazed at the mouse with the expression of a man about to give it a bad mark. “I’ve caught you now, you little devil! Just you wait! I’ll teach you to eat my grammar book!”
For a while Pyotr Demyanich continued to feast his eyes on the spectacle of his little victim, then he put the mousetrap on the floor and shouted: “Praskovya, the mouse hasn’t got away! Bring the kitten in here!”
“Coming at once!” Praskovya answered, and a few moments later she walked in, carrying in her arms the descendant of tigers.
“Very good,” Pyotr Demyanich murmured, rubbing his hands together. “Now we’ll teach him a lesson. Put him down facing the mousetrap.… That’s right. Let him sniff at it, and have a good look. That’s right.”
The kitten looked wonderingly at my uncle and then at the armchair, and then he sniffed the mousetrap with a look of complete bewilderment. Perhaps it was because he was frightened by the glare of the lamp and the attention he was receiving: suddenly he was off to the door, scampering away in fear and trembling.
“Stop!” shouted my uncle, seizing him by the tail. “Stop, you little idiot! Fool, he’s afraid of the mouse! Look at the mouse! Look hard! I told you to look, didn’t I?”
Pyotr Demyanich lifted the kitten by the scruff of the neck and pushed his nose against the mousetrap.
“Vile, stupid creature!… Praskovya, take him and hold him. Hold him opposite the door of the trap! When I let the mouse out, let the kitten go after him at once. Are you listening? Let him go at once!”
My uncle assumed a mysterious expression and lifted the door. The mouse emerged, uncertain and frightened; it sniffed the air, and then flew quick as an arrow under the divan. When the kitten was let go, he lifted his tail and ran under the table.
“He’s got away! He’s got away!” Pyotr Demyanich shouted, assuming a ferocious expression. “Where is the kitten, the little horror? Under the table, eh? Just you wait!”
My uncle dragged the kitten from under the table and gave him a good shaking.
“What a rascal you are, eh?” he muttered, smacking the kitten across the ear. “Take that! Take that! Will you just stand there gawking the next time? You r-r-r-rascal, you!”
The following day Praskovya heard him shouting for the second time: “Praskovya, we’ve caught a mouse! Bring the kitten here!”
After the abuse he had received the previous day the kitten had taken to hiding under the stove, where he remained throughout the night. When Praskovya pulled him out and carried him by the scruff of the neck to the study, he was trembling all over and mewing pathetically. He was put in front of the mousetrap.
“You see, he has to feel at home,” Pyotr Demyanich said. “Let him look and sniff a bit. Look and learn!” And when he saw the kitten backing away from the trap, he shouted: “Stop, dammit! I’ll tear you to pieces! Hold him by the ear!… That’s right, and now set him down opposite the door.”
My uncle slowly lifted the door. The mouse dived under the kitten’s nose, threw itself against Praskovya’s hand, and then dived under a cupboard, while the kitten, feeling relieved, decided upon a sudden desperate leap in the air and scuttled under the divan.
“That’s the second mouse he has let go!” Pyotr Demyanich roared