The Man Who Was Afraid [108]
going somewhere along a straight road. There Sophya Pavlovna Medinskaya is standing, her hands hanging impotently, just as she stood in her drawing-room when he saw her last. Her eyes were large, but some great fright gleams in them. Sasha, too, is here. Indifferent, paying no attention to the jostling, she is stoutly going straight into the very dregs of life, singing her songs at the top of her voice, her dark eyes fixed in the distance before her. Foma hears tumult, howls, laughter, drunken shouts, irritable disputes about copecks--songs and sobs hover over this enormous restless heap of living human bodies crowded into a pit. They jump, fall, crawl, crush one another, leap on one another's shoulders, grope everywhere like blind people, stumbling everywhere over others like themselves, struggle, and, falling, disappear from sight. Money rustles, soaring like bats over the heads of the people, and the people greedily stretch out their hands toward it, the gold and silver jingles, bottles rattle, corks pop, someone sobs, and a melancholy female voice sings:
"And so let us live while we can, And then--e'en grass may cease to grow!"
This wild picture fastened itself firmly in Foma's mind, and growing clearer, larger and more vivid with each time it arose before him, rousing in his breast something chaotic, one great indefinite feeling into which fell, like streams into a river, fear and revolt and compassion and wrath and many another thing. All this boiled up within his breast into strained desire, which was thrusting it asunder into a desire whose power was choking him, and his eyes were filled with tears; he longed to shout, to howl like a beast, to frighten all the people, to check their senseless bustle, to pour into the tumult and vanity of their life something new, his own-- to tell them certain loud firm words, to guide them all into one direction, and not one against another. He desired to seize them by their heads, to tear them apart one from another, to thrash some, to fondle others, to reproach them all, to illumine them with a certain fire.
There was nothing in him, neither the necessary words, nor the fire; all he had was the longing which was clear to him, but impossible of fulfillment. He pictured himself above life outside of the deep valley, wherein people were bustling about; he saw himself standing firmly on his feet and--speechless. He might have cried to the people:
"See how you live! Aren't you ashamed?"
And he might have abused them. But if they were to ask on hearing his voice:
"And how ought we to live?"
It was perfectly clear to him that after such a question he would have to fly down head foremost from the heights there, beneath the feet of the throng, upon the millstone. And laughter would accompany him to his destruction.
Sometimes he was delirious under the pressure of this nightmare. Certain meaningless and unconnected words burst from his lips; he even perspired from this painful struggle within him. At times it occurred to him that he was going mad from intoxication, and that that was the reason why this terrible and gloomy picture was forcing itself into his mind. With a great effort of will he brushed aside these pictures and excitements; but as soon as he was alone and not very drunk, he was again seized by his delirium and again grew faint under its weight. And his thirst for freedom was growing more and more intense, torturing him by its force. But tear himself away from the shackles of his wealth he could not. Mayakin, who had Foma's full power of attorney to manage his affairs, acted now in such a way that Foma was bound to feel almost every day the burden of the obligations which rested upon him. People were constantly applying to him for payments, proposing to him terms for the transportation of freight. His employees overwhelmed him in person and by letter with trifles with which he had never before concerned himself, as they used to settle these trifles at their own risk. They looked for him and found him in the taverns, questioned him as to what and how
"And so let us live while we can, And then--e'en grass may cease to grow!"
This wild picture fastened itself firmly in Foma's mind, and growing clearer, larger and more vivid with each time it arose before him, rousing in his breast something chaotic, one great indefinite feeling into which fell, like streams into a river, fear and revolt and compassion and wrath and many another thing. All this boiled up within his breast into strained desire, which was thrusting it asunder into a desire whose power was choking him, and his eyes were filled with tears; he longed to shout, to howl like a beast, to frighten all the people, to check their senseless bustle, to pour into the tumult and vanity of their life something new, his own-- to tell them certain loud firm words, to guide them all into one direction, and not one against another. He desired to seize them by their heads, to tear them apart one from another, to thrash some, to fondle others, to reproach them all, to illumine them with a certain fire.
There was nothing in him, neither the necessary words, nor the fire; all he had was the longing which was clear to him, but impossible of fulfillment. He pictured himself above life outside of the deep valley, wherein people were bustling about; he saw himself standing firmly on his feet and--speechless. He might have cried to the people:
"See how you live! Aren't you ashamed?"
And he might have abused them. But if they were to ask on hearing his voice:
"And how ought we to live?"
It was perfectly clear to him that after such a question he would have to fly down head foremost from the heights there, beneath the feet of the throng, upon the millstone. And laughter would accompany him to his destruction.
Sometimes he was delirious under the pressure of this nightmare. Certain meaningless and unconnected words burst from his lips; he even perspired from this painful struggle within him. At times it occurred to him that he was going mad from intoxication, and that that was the reason why this terrible and gloomy picture was forcing itself into his mind. With a great effort of will he brushed aside these pictures and excitements; but as soon as he was alone and not very drunk, he was again seized by his delirium and again grew faint under its weight. And his thirst for freedom was growing more and more intense, torturing him by its force. But tear himself away from the shackles of his wealth he could not. Mayakin, who had Foma's full power of attorney to manage his affairs, acted now in such a way that Foma was bound to feel almost every day the burden of the obligations which rested upon him. People were constantly applying to him for payments, proposing to him terms for the transportation of freight. His employees overwhelmed him in person and by letter with trifles with which he had never before concerned himself, as they used to settle these trifles at their own risk. They looked for him and found him in the taverns, questioned him as to what and how